Reading Spaces

more reference resource controversies

In another New York Times article the controversies surrounding information in the Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World. Climate scientists contest claims about the speed at which Greenland's glaciers are melting, including mapping of ice-free parts of the coastline. Underlines the challenge of producing "neutral" information sources. Worth a read.

Felicity Barringer. "Scientists Want Publisher to Refreeze Greenland." NYTimes 24 September 2011, online at: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/25/science/earth/25atlas.html

Nunberg on Webster's 3rd New International Dictionary

Geoffrey Nunberg's essay in the NYT Sunday Book Review, "When a Dictionary Could Outrage" published online September 23, features the controversy that followed upon the 1961 publication of Webter's 3rd New International Dictionary. Nunberg tells us that the outrage went beyond the culture pages and was referred to in Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe stories and in a New Yorker cartoon by Alan Dunn:

 

What many of us have been saying at least since the NEA 2004 report: Young People Are Reading More Than You by Hannah Withers and Lauren Ross, in McSweeney's

http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/young-people-are-reading-more-than-you

Patrick Ness wins Carnegie Medal for Monsters of Men

The Chaos Walking series by expat American YA author, Patrick Ness, is among my favourites. I don't have time right now to give all the reasons why I highly recommend it, and I'm still mulling over the conclusion, but I'm happy to see the books receive this kind of recognition. The writing is at times, truly, breath-taking. He can certainly turn a very nice phrase. The Carnegie medal is awarded by a committee of librarians, and Ness gives a quote-worthy defense of libraries in his acceptance speech. To read more about the Carnegie, library cuts and Patrick Ness see this article in the Bookseller, this BBC article, or this Guardian article.

Half Brother by Kenneth Oppel wins CLA Children's and YA Book Awards

The author reports on his double award on his blog. Half Brother is an excellent book -- challenging, interesting, timely, beautifully written and suitable for all ages. I loved it. But, I can't decide how I feel about the same title being granted both awards. The cons for me: 1) it makes it seem as though the field of production is so small, that we need to double up awards, 2) it takes away the uniqueness of the young adult field if books that are suitable for all ages can be nominated and win the YA award. For what it's worth, Half Brother for me, is solidly in the YA camp, but that wouldn't stop me from recommending it to strong younger readers. The pros: 1) really good books float to the top, regardless of age category, 2) the resistance of age categories suggests the kind of wiliness that is such a big part of reading -- you just can't pin readers down.

ReachOut Reads

I just read about Reach Out Reads over at Boing Boing where Cory Doctorow tells readers that it is a YALSA endorsed project that recommends YA fiction to help young adults who are experiencing "hard personal problems and mental health issues". May is Mental Health Month (Mental Health Week in Canada is 1-7 May 2011) and many public libraries make displays to support it -- this is in another way to do that without the hard work of selecting suitable books yourself. Also, Reach Out Reads supports live chats with a number of authors over the course of the month.

A cafe for booklovers and design geeks

A new cafe on the Lower East Side, designed by Anurag Nema (nemaworkshop).

 

"Anonymity in a World of Digital Books"

A new article by Elizabeth Jones and Joe Janes, in the latest issue of Policy & Internet:

Anonymity in a World of Digital Books: Google Books, Privacy, and the Freedom to Read

New article on book trailers: ALAN Revew

ALAN Review Fall 2010: feature article on booktrailers: from the ALAN blog:

"The first featured article “Not so innocent: Book trailers as promotional texts and anticipatory stories”, written by Denise Davila, was published in the Fall 2010 issue of The ALAN Review.  In her article, Davila proposes that book trailers, produced as part of the official promotion of a published YA book, “can be viewed as a texts and cultural artifacts” in and of themselves.  Her article also includes the findings of three different research studies in which college undergraduates respond to promotional book trailers."

 

From School Matters blog, a note from Stephen Krashen on the most recent Kaiser study findings:

"The Kaiser study described in the Post article reported that 15-18 year olds averaged 21 minutes a day of book reading. Back in 1946, Link and Hopf, in their book People and Books, reported that those ages 15 to 19 averaged 22 minutes a day of book"