“Mixer publishing, with guest editor Paul Tremblay (author of Swallowing A Donkey’s Eye), is offering a $1,200 honorarium for the best speculative/sci-fi story, graphic narrative (comic), or poem.” The contest deadline is June 30th.
Mixer Publishing Contest
Kristof on the Value of Teachers
At the New York Times, Nicholas Kristof highlights a study finding that a classroom of students of a strong fourth-grade teacher will collectively earn $700,000 more over their lifetimes than those taught by a weak teacher.
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Monday Linkday
My mom pointed out this article in the Washington Post about a bookstore in Baltimore that primarily gives away books rather than selling them. It's called the Book Thing:"That's the whole thing with the Book Thing," Wattenberg says. "All I am is a middleman. The people have books.... They give them to me, they're happy to have a place to see them go somewhere, and the people that get the books are happy to get the books."Also, file under conspicuous consumption: Anyone looking for an extravagant gift for the film buff in their life should look no further.Spotted on the el: The Travels of Marco Polo... sure the red line doesn't go all the way to China, but we can dream.
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Weather Advisory
“These are not stories about the weather, these are stories about life and death.” Over at Ploughshares, E.V. De Cleyre considers the weather in contemporary literature.
Goodreads Recommendations
Goodreads has unveiled its new book recommendation feature. Unlike Amazon's feature, Goodreads' will draw data from every book you've read and logged, not just those you've purchased online.
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Tuesday New Release Day
Andrew O'Hagan, whose books have gotten some Booker Prize notice over the years, has a new one out (it's been out in the UK for a while now) called The Life and Opinions of Maf the Dog, and of His Friend Marilyn Monroe, which, as the title perhaps suggests, is told in the voice of Monroe's Scottish maltese poodle called Maf. Also out this week is Tom Clancy's first new "Jack Ryan" thriller in quite some time, Dead or Alive.
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Featuring Jimmy Carter
Kickstarters for creative projects run the gamut from endeavors like Star Citizen to requests for food or rent money to let a writer finish a novel. In between those extremes is this, a charmingly eccentric children's book titled Pete Peanut and the Trouble with Birthdays, which needs help covering the costs of its ambitious design. You can also buy tailor-made birthday invitations or the title character's own furniture.
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