Category: Today In Books

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Magination Press.

First Look At She-Ra Reboot

Nimona creator Noelle Stevenson is working on a She-Ra reboot for Netflix, and she gave us a first look today! It looks pretty epic. Expect to see DreamWorks’ She-Ra and the Princesses of Power on Netflix November 16. This child of the ’80s is pretty stoked. Also, congrats to Stevenson and The Witch Boy creator Molly Knox Ostertag!

Andy Weir’s Artemis Will Be Adapted

Geneva Robertson-Dworet (Captain Marvel) is adapting Andy Weir’s Artemis for film. The sci-fi crime caper follows smuggler Jasmine Bashara, who finds herself in the middle of a major conspiracy. Phil Lord and Chris Miller will direct.

Literary Tourism–Portugal

Trying to decide on your next travel destination? Check out this literary themed hotel in Portugal. It comes with its own library and a gin bar featuring a cocktail list inspired by literary icons and their works. They even have reading nooks in the dining room!

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Click here to enter.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Amazon Publishing.

How About A Book With That Meal?

My answer is a big fat, “Yes!” In 1970 the restaurant owner of Traveler found themselves in the pickle of having a house full of books–I don’t see the pickle part, but I digress–and decided the solution was to gift a book to each customer. The Connecticut restaurant may have changed owners in the ’90s, but the tradition of book giving didn’t. Now customers each get three books to take home after their meal. Feed the belly and feed the mind.

Delhi-Based Initiative Brings Literature To The Streets

Freelance illustrator and writer Nidhin Kundathil and Manoj Pandey started StickLit, an initiative that prints literary quotes on A4-size posters and pastes them in public spaces around Delhi. Their hope is to “Remove the elitism associated with reading.” So far, posters with quotes from George Orwell, Shashi Tharoor, and Salman Rushdie have gone up.

Let’s Round Up Some Adaptation News From The Week

Looks like Megan Abbot has finished the script for the Dare Me adaptation, and used a coming soon tag! Chloë Grace Moretz revealed the poster for The Miseducation of Cameron Post. Author of Big Little Lies, Liane Moriarty, has sold the rights to another novel for a TV series: Three Wishes. And Karin Slaughter’s upcoming crime novel Pieces of Her has also sold the rights for a TV series with Charlotte Stoudt writing the adaptation and Lesli Linka Glatter directing. Directors Ridley Scott and Asif Kapadia are adapting Yuval Noah Harari’s bestseller Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind.

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Pet a Luckdragon and enter here!

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Beacon Press.

Obama’s Summer Reading List Of Books From African Authors

In honor of an upcoming trip to Africa, Barack Obama shared a list of books by African authors for summer reading. The list includes Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, A Grain of Wheat by Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela, and a short summary for each of the six works. Obama will be in South Africa for the Obama Foundation, which will convene 200 young leaders from across the continent, and to deliver a speech to mark the 100th anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s birth. He’ll also pay a visit to Kenya, the Obama ancestral home.

An Alternative To The Nobel Prize In Literature

A New Academy has risen from the rubble of the Swedish Academy sexual assault allegations that initially canceled the 2018 Nobel prize in literature. A group of the country’s cultural figures came together and asked Swedish librarians to nominate an author from anywhere in the world. The result is a very interesting longlist. Also, shortlist voting is open worldwide, and the New Academy is enforcing a gender quota on this stage–the shortlist will comprise two men and two women.

Black Girls Read Visits The Library Of Congress

This is just nice. Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden welcomed “Black Girls Read” and their families from Louisville, Mississippi to the Library of Congress. She met the young women at the Mississippi Book Festival last summer. Check out her tweet and pic here!

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Click here to enter.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Libby, the one-tap reading app from OverDrive.

New Obama White House Book Throws Shade

Pete Souza, the former Chief Official White House Photographer for Barack Obama, well known for his Instagram images and commentary on the state of the country and the presidency, will release a new book entitled, Shade: A Tale of Two Presidents. “Some call this ‘throwing shade.’ Souza calls it telling the truth,” the book’s publisher, Little Brown, wrote in its announcement post.

Weetzie Bat On The Big Screen

Anya Taylor-Joy (The Witch) has been cast in the film adaptation of Francesca Lia Block’s Weetzie Bat. The 1989 YA novel follows Weetzie, of Shangri-L.A., who discovers a magic lamp that grants her three wishes. The adaptation will be written by Lock herself.

Pepe The Frog Creator Wins Suit Against Neo-Nazi Site

Matt Furie, the creator of Pepe the Frog, won a copyright action against neo-Nazi website the Daily Stormer for using his comic character on their site. The character was appropriated as a hate symbol by white supremacists. Recently, Furie also had to take legal action against a self-published author who used the character in a children’s book that espoused “racist, Islamophobic and hate-filled themes.”

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Click here to enter.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by BookishFirst. Read excerpts, share your thoughts, earn points, and win FREE books. Get 500 points just for joining! Sign up at BookishFirst.com.

Gee, Wonder Woman and G. Willow Wilson

This fall, DC’s Wonder Woman ongoing series gets a new creative team in writer G. Willow Wilson and artist Cary Nord. We know and love Wilson forever for creating teen superhero Ms. Marvel, and we’re looking forward to seeing what she does with Diana.

Oldest Odyssey Excerpt Discovered

This one’s for the archaeology, classics, and history nerds out there: researchers have found a clay tablet from the third century A.D. containing thirteen verses from Homer’s Odyssey. The epic oral poem is way older than that, but this is now the oldest known written form of it.

The Handmaid’s Tale Wine Comes and Goes

We got all worked up over this really, really, really, REALLY bad marketing tie-in that compared the women of Gilead to wines available for purchase (Ofglen’s Cabernet Sauvignon had a “warm, spicy finish”). And less than twenty-four hours later, the collection has been cancelled. If only our outcries over more egregious offenses were addressed as quickly and satisfactorily.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Flatiron Books and If You See Me Don’t Say Hi by Neel Patel.

PBS Masterpiece To Adapt Jane Austen’s Sandition

Austen’s unfinished novel about a sleepy fishing village turned fashionable seaside resort and a young, unconventional heroine is getting a television adaptation. PBS Masterpiece and British broadcaster ITV have teamed up to produce the eight-part adaptation of Sandition, with War and Peace and Mr. Selfridge writer Andrew Davies on the team.

Winnie-the-Pooh Map Sets Record At Auction

The original map of Winnie-the-Pooh’s Hundred Acre Wood by the artist EH Shepard just set a world record for a book illustration sold at auction. The map, which was privately owned and unseen for nearly 50 years, is selling at London auction house Sotheby’s for £430,000. Captioned “Drawn by Me and Mr Shepard helpd,” (“Me” being Christopher Robin) the map is littered with spelling errors like “nice for picnicks” and “100 aker wood.”

Inside The Largest Chained Library

BBC took us inside an ancient library. The library at Hereford Cathedral in the UK is the largest surviving chained library in the world–chained as in all the books are locked in by chains. The library was rebuilt exactly as it had been from 1611 to 1841. Take a peek!

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Click here to enter.

We are giving away a stack of 11 of our favorite Beach Reads for Summer 2018! Go here to enter for a chance to win, or just click on the image below. Good luck!

Watch The Trailer For OITNB Season 6

Netflix dropped the trailer for the sixth season of Orange is the New Black, the series adapted from Piper Kerman’s memoir, Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison. I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone who hasn’t binge watched the previous seasons, but if you want a play-by-play of the trailer with a little look back at season five, you can check out this BuzzFeed announcement.

The English Patient Wins Best Of Man Booker

Michael Ondaatje’s wartime love story The English Patient won the Golden Man Booker Prize. This “best of” Booker Prize commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Man Booker. The public voted to choose the winner from a shortlist of five previous Man Booker winners selected by a panel of judges.

Stolen Yeats Letters Identified

A researcher discovered a collection of unpublished, stolen letters written by W.B. Yeats. The letters, burgled in the 1970s, had only recently been returned to Princeton University, delivered anonymously. In the recovered collection, the Irish poet corresponded with his publisher and publishing assistant. “I am desperately hard up and owe about £20,” Yeats wrote in a letter. That writer’s life.

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Click here to enter.

We’re giving away $500 of the year’s best YA! Click here, or on the image below to enter:

A Young, Sexy Crime-Fighting Sigmund Freud

So that’s a thing that is coming to Netflix. The psychoanalyst, and prolific writer, will be searching for a serial killer in an upcoming drama that will obviously be fictional history. Freud is currently casting and will start filming in the fall. I’m sure there will be plenty of Oedipus jokes to come.

Jahkara Smith Cast In AMC’s Upcoming NOS4A2 Adaptation

YouTube star Jahkara Smith, who uses makeup tutorials for hilarious and scathing social commentary, has landed a recurring role in the adaptation of Joe Hill’s awesome NOS4A2. Smith working on an adaptation on a super imaginative horror novel seems perfect and I can’t wait. Is it 2019 yet?!

Rapper Stormzy Announces Publishing Imprint

English rapper Stormzy, in partnership with Penguin Random House, has a new publishing imprint called #Merky Books. With plans to publish two to three books a year, it will also offer writing competitions and paid internships beginning in 2019. “I know too many talented writers that don’t always have an outlet or a means to get their work seen and hopefully #Merky Books can now be a reference point for them to say “I can be an author.”

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by K.J. Howe’s The Freedom Broker.

Arsenic And Old Books

So, it turns out that three rare books from the 16th and 17th centuries contain large concentrations of arsenic on their covers. The poisonous books hail from the University of Southern Denmark’s library collection. Researchers were trying to read recycled Latin texts used to make the books’ covers when a lab came back with the results that the green pigment layer obscuring the texts was arsenic. (Note to self: never lick fingers after touching books again.)

ALA Approves Graphic Novel Roundtable

The American Library Association’s governing council approved a Graphic Novel Roundtable. This means we may get awards, events, guests and more from the ALA around graphic novels. The decision was announced at the ALA annual conference.

Philip Pullman Argues Against Emphasis On Exams

Philip Pullman, author of His Dark Materials, spoke against the emphasis on exam results in education and reading. “The function of a book or a poem or a story is to delight, to enchant, to beguile,” said Pullman. The author was one of dozens of children’s writers to sign a letter calling for Sats (curriculum assessments carried out in primary schools in England) to be scrapped.

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Click here to enter.

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Diode Editions.

Banksy Offers To Support Bristol Libraries

Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees announced that graffiti star Banksy has volunteered to help keep Bristol’s 27 libraries open. Sweeping cuts would have closed 17 of the 27 libraries. The Banksy news arrived with the announcements that there would be a reprieve on the cuts and that all of Bristol’s libraries would remain open.

Barnes & Noble Fires CEO

The struggling company fired CEO Demos Parneros for violating company policies, though B&N didn’t specify which policies Parneros violated. They did say his termination “is not due to any disagreement with the Company regarding its financial reporting, policies or practices or any potential fraud relating thereto.”

Goodreads Readers Choose Today’s Great American Novelist

Goodreads posted the results of a Facebook and Twitter survey asking readers to choose who they think is the greatest living American novelist. The top picks included Toni Morrison, Stephen King, Donna Tartt, and Jesmyn Ward. Click here to see the full list.

And don’t forget–we’re giving away $500 of this year’s best YA books (so far)! Click here to enter.