Category: Today In Books

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi.

Is this children’s book too hard or is Steinbeck too easy?

Mr. Greedy by Roger Hargreaves has been found to be almost as complex as Of Mice and Men when analyzed “for sentence length, average word length and word difficulty level.” Adjust your high school English syllabi accordingly.

The Selectors of the NYPL

Go behind the scenes of the New York Public Library to learn how a title makes it to their shelves.

Apiary at the Library

Tens of thousands of bees live atop the Redwood City Public Library, producing honey sold at the library’s store. Click on over to see the slideshow of these bookish bees.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by HQN Books.

Leave The Kiddos At Home

If you’re in New England and want a Peter Pan night of never growing up, your wish is about to come true. Saturday, June 22nd Story Land will hold a 21 and older only night from 6-9 p.m. and tickets will go on presale from March 15th-17th.

The Villains Are Coming

Serena Valentino’s Disney Villain book series will be adapted for the upcoming Disney streaming platform. Info on Book of Enchantment is still pretty scarce but Michael Seitzman is reported to be the showrunner “currently hiring writers, with a writers room slated to open in April.”

The Misty Copeland Biopic Gets A Director

Based on Misty Copeland’s memoir Life in Motion: An Unlikely Ballerina, the biopic will be directed by Nzingha Stewart. Stewart, who has directed episodes of Pretty Little Liars, Grey’s Anatomy, and How to Get Away with Murder,  said “As an African American woman, I know firsthand that when Misty Copeland leaps, we all soar. As a filmmaker, I am thrilled to bring this hopeful, triumphant, and cinematic story to the big screen.” So ready the popcorn and the tissues.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Amazon Publishing and The Fever King by Victoria Lee.

Do Your Homework And Eat Your Veggies

Ann M. Martin’s The Baby-Sitters Club will once again be adapted! This time we’re getting a ten-episode series on Netflix. “’The themes of The Baby-Sitters Club still resonate 30 years after the original book series was released and there has never been a more opportune time to tell an aspirational story about empowering young female entrepreneurs,’ said Melissa Cobb, vice president of Kids & Family at Netflix.”

Serial Box + Marvel

Serial Box, a publisher that serializes stories that read like a television series broken down into episodes but, all together, make up a season, has partnered with Marvel. So we’re going to get new original stories, not based on films or comics, for Black Panther, Black Widow, Jessica Jones, and Thor in the Serials form. Cool!

New Play Adaptation!

Erika L. Sánchez’s I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter will be a play at Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago in 2020. Isaac Gomez will write the adaptation and Sandra Marquez will direct. So exciting!

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Devil’s Daughter by Lisa Kleypas.

Publisher Ready For Mueller Report 

In anticipation of the possibility of Mueller’s Report being made public, Skyhorse Press is prepared to have it published in book form. How ready? It already has a cover and an attorney commissioned to write the introduction. Guess they got the early bird memo.

The Night Circus Adaptation Gets A Director

Erin Morgenstern’s amazing The Night Circus is being adapted to film by Lionsgate and we now know the director: Geremy Jasper. The adaptation has been in the works since 2011 and has had three writers on the script–Annie Baker, Moira Buffini, Patrick Ness–so here’s hoping that this director news means we’re going to get the film sooner than later.

The Booker Prize Has New Financial Supporter

Man Booker International Prize lost its financial sponsor and thus is going to be known as the The Booker Prize and The International Booker Prize (literature in translation prize). Its new financial support–for the next five years–is “Crankstart, the charitable foundation of Sir Michael Moritz KBE and his wife, Harriet Heyman.” All’s well that ends well.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Beautiful Bad, a gripping psychological thriller by Annie Ward.

The Future Is In Good Hands

Jonah Larson has landed a book deal after an article about his crocheting went viral. The 11-year-old’s book–Hello, Crochet Friends! Making Art, Being Mindful, Giving Back: Do What Makes You Happy–will publish in July. So this article is totally worth clicking to see his you-should-be-a-star photo and to get to know him. Also, of course this amazing child has a “GoFundMe campaign to raise money for Roots Ethiopia, a nonprofit organization that partners with Ethiopian communities to improve education and support entrepreneurship.”

10,000 Public Domain Books Digitized By The Arabic Collections Online

The Arabic Collections Online hit a big milestone recently having digitized more than 10,000 public domain volumes making them available for free across the globe. You can read more about this awesome project, and their goal to digitize 23,000 books, here.

Free Online Resources For Teachers And Students

Anyone really can benefit from Masterpiece on PBS’s online Masterpiece Collection which, according to PBS, is “a treasure trove of videos from MASTERPIECE films, supported by essays and teaching tips, this collection offers innovative ways to access, understand, and analyze classic literature adapted for the screen.” Learn more about getting your literary classics learning on here.

You could win a six-month subscription to an amazing Romance box! Go here to enter for a chance to win, or just click the image below:

Someone Film These Missing Scenes, Please!

At the Women in Film Oscar Party screenwriter Adele Lim explained her first screenplay adaptation of Crazy Rich Asians had “all these hot, steamy, getting-it-on scenes.” She was obviously reigned in and we got a rom-com for all but I’d like to petition for some bonus scenes to be filmed for a special DVD release. And if Hollywood truly just hates making money then, um, sell that first script.

Shexy Voice Runs In The Family

Okay, I promise last shexy related news item–I didn’t choose this theme it apparently chose me! James Earl Jones’ son, Flynn, is a romance audiobook narrator and everything about this just feels so right.

I Had No Idea It Was An Adaptation

The creator and author of the show The Love Boat, which was adapted from her nonfiction book Love Boats, Jeraldine Saunders has died at 96. “Jeraldine was an active woman who never lost her interest in dancing, younger men, and the written word.”

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Flatiron Books.

Charles Dickens’ Wife’s Unseen Letters Reveal A Lot

That Charles Dickens’ was a dickens to his wife was already known–the dude separated from her when he started having an affair with an eighteen-year-old. But now, thanks to ninety-eight previously unseen letters written by Edward Dutton Cook– Dickens neighbor and friend–to a fellow journalist revealing what Catherine had shared with him before she died, we know he was even worse. You can read about Dickens gaslighting and trying to have Catherine locked away in an asylum here.

His Dark Materials Teaser

Watch the thirty second teaser for the upcoming adaptation of Philip Pullman’s trilogy. The BBC has yet to release an official premiere date for the series–which stars Dafne Keen, Ruth Wilson, James McAvoy, Clarke Peters, and Lin-Manuel Miranda–but it’s expected sometime this year.

You Can Now Peruse 800 Medieval Manuscripts Online

800 manuscripts, dated between 700 and 1200, from the collections of the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France are now available online thanks to a two year project which digitized and organized the manuscripts by themes, authors, places and centuries. *Shines history nerd badge and dives in. *

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by our giveaway of $100 to Amazon in support of Swords and Spaceships, our sci-fi/fantasy newsletter!

From FRESH PRINCE OF BEL-AIR To Princess

Will Smith has a three-book children’s deal with HarperCollins Children’s Books. The books will be reminiscent to his role on the The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, except starring a young girl named Destiny. Denene Millner will write and Gladys Jose will illustrate. This sounds super fun.

Publishing Insight Thanks To The Bookseller’s Survey

A survey taken by 1,167 people in the publishing industry has revealed some interesting things including that 78% who identified as working class believe that their background has had negative effects on their career. Read all about the survey and findings here.

Potter Heads Getting A New Ride

Universal Orlando’s Wizarding World of Harry Potter is getting a new ride: Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure. Not many details out yet, but based on the announcement it looks like Thunder Mountain with Hagrid’s motorbike as the cars. (I know TM is Disney.)

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by James Patterson’s latest thriller, The Chef.

Michelle Obama’s Letter To Readers

You may have heard by now that Michelle Obama wrote a memoir, Becoming, that sold A LOT. She’s now written a letter, posted on Goodreads that members can read, where she discusses a bit about how she came to tell her story and invites readers to connect with her: “I hope you’ll ask me a question or share some of your insights with me here on Goodreads or on social media using #IAmBecoming.” *Raises hand * Where do I sign up to be friends with Michelle Obama?

The Haunting Of Hill House News

The Netflix show, adapted from Shirley Jackson’s novel The Haunting of Hill House, is getting the anthology treatment and will have a second season. What the anthology treatment basically means is the first season made them enough money that they want to continue, even though they used up all of the original source material (the novel), so now they’ll continue without it. And we stay tuned for more news and frights.

Ancient Manuscript Decoded?

Scholars always have ancient manuscripts with languages they have been unable to decipher, including the Voynich Manuscript which appears to have been created around 1420 by a “hermitic community that seems to have left no other trace behind.” But now, thanks to Father Ahmet Ardiç, there is a new theory: the script is like an Old Turkic, “written in a ‘poetic’ style.” Feed your nerd heart with all the info here.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by HMH Teen.

Obama Presidential Library Lawsuit To Move Forward

Protect Our Parks filed a lawsuit to stop former President Barack Obama’s presidential library complex from being built on the South Side of Chicago and U.S. District Judge John Robert Blakey just ruled that the suit can move forward. The activists want to protect more than 20 acres of historic Jackson Park while “the city of Chicago wants to ‘lease’ 20 acres of the 500 acre park to the Obama library.”

Poet Arrested For Poem Critical Of Government

Abdirahman Abees, a British citizen, was arrested on January 12th after reciting poems in Hargeisa, Somaliland describing the human rights abuses he’d witnessed. “Mr Abees’ lawyer told the BBC that the poem called on the Somaliland government to reform its prisons and criminal justice systems and was not defamatory.” Amnesty International is demanding his immediate release.

Amy Poehler Keeps Being Awesome

Jennifer Mathieu’s novel Moxie is not only getting adapted by Amy Poehler’s production company, Paper Kite, but Poehler will also be directing the adaptation scripted by Tamara Chestna. Bring on the Riot Grrrl punk movement and feminist revolution!