bookshelves of doom

"There's plenty of evidence that the best children's books contain all the grammar young readers need."

From the Guardian:

Children's writers relish using language well; of course they do, that is an essential tool of their work. Spelling, punctuation, regular and irregular verbs and everything else about grammar underpin all that they do. (It is odd that anyone thinks it doesn't.)

None of my elementary schooling involved diagramming sentences or anything of the like. That I remember, anyway. I do remember, though, very clearly, that in second grade, our classroom teacher made little grammar books* for each of us, and every time we did something NEW and DIFFERENT (and CORRECT) in an assignment, she would chronicle it in that book. (She was VERY LIBERAL with the foil stars, bless her.)

I also very clearly remember her astonishment when I used a serial comma without any sort of prompting—she asked me how I knew to use it, and all I could tell her was that "it looked right". But now, of course, I assume it must have come from reading.

_____________________________

*The covers were made from wallpaper samples. 

Snowday links.

Just a few, as Josh and I spent a chunk of the afternoon watching Moonrise Kingdom for the first time. The lightning strike made me concerned that the whole adventure was in his head, a la Brazil. Because of the threat of electroshock, I mean. But probably I'm being crazy. Anyway. Links!

• The rights to John Rocco's Blackout (<--it's a picture book) have been sold.
• Storify: Is it chick lit?
• On Charlotte Lucas's choice: "It’s certainly true that she isn’t young, pretty, or rich, and that those facts set the stage for her marriage. But it’s also true that Charlotte marries Collins because she is sensible and intelligent. It’s actually her sensibleness that gives her no choice but to do it. What really compels her to marry him is her thoughtfulness."
• New blog in my feed reader: Grumm's Fairy Tales.
• Harrods had some fabulously ridiculous books in its 'gender-neutral' toy department.
• From the flu to a best-selling trilogy.
• At Stacked: Doing disservice to introversion. Don't miss the comments section.
• THE MOST AMAZING SNOWDAY FOOD EVER.
• At BookRiot: Environmentally-Friendly Libraries.
• Laura Lam's Pantomime at Scalzi's The Big Idea: "I started with Micah Grey as a 27-year-old, and I have about 80,000 words of a manuscript with a more mature, world-weary person that I will re-visit one day."

Afternoon links.

So many open that my COMPUTER IS SMOKING:

• There's an excerpt from Karen Healey's When We Wake up at Tor. SO EXCITED to read it, as I've loved her other books, ESPECIALLY The Shattering. (via FW)
• At Stacked: "Best of" 2012 Lists Revisited: How Do YALSA's "Best of" Lists Compare?
• Erik P. Kraft rates a certain hotel in California.
• Beth Revis on what makes a good teen novel: "Your story cannot be so vague that just anyone could narrate it – your narrator must be the one person who can tell the story in this way."
• Willems Shakespeare.
• Bookshelvers Anonymous on Paper Lantern Lit: "I must admit, when I first read the article, my response was not positive. It felt squicky (an icky thing that makes you squirm). To me, if felt like a cold, calculating idea factory, rather than the organic, love-based process that writing a book should be." It's basically a packaging company like Alloy, no? Or the Stratemeyer Syndicate? Also, PLL did Venom? I... couldn't even finish it, and that's a rarity for me.
• Timewaster: The Random Conspiracy Generator.
• Timewaster the second: Jack Donaghy Insult Generator.
• What Claudia Wore argues that BSC fashions are alive and well.
• Lauren DeStefano has a new upcoming series: USA Today says it will be "...utopian, not dystopian. The series, called (perhaps ironically) The Internment Chronicles, kicks off on Feb. 11, 2014, with Perfect Ruin."
• Redditors argue about whether or not this graph depicting the length of fantasy books means anything.
• My hair is probably going to be completely white before I'm forty. So this was an especially interesting piece for me. (via Sharyn November'sFB)
• New to my feedreader: Corsets, Cutlasses, & Candlesticks.

Evening links.

Reorganizing my feed reader = more links:

• At BookRiot: a review of Bookish.
• At SLJ: a compilation of 2012's best adult books for teen readers lists.
• At Smart Pop Books: Sharper Than a Seraph Blade, by Diana Peterfreund. (It's an essay from Shadowhunters and Downworlders.)
• More on that shushing business. (I really don't understand why this has to be an either/or argument.)
• Infographic: Libraries are Forever: E-Books & Print Books Can Coexist.
• Bonus Infographic: The Very, Very Many Varieties of Beer.
• There is Atlas Shrugged jewelry. Beyond this, I mean.
• I can't even handle how happy these pictures make me.
• Due to interest from @SarahRettger and @chasingray, I hereby declare that here at Bookshelves of Doom, the first week of March (3-9), will be PETERSWEEK, in which I celebrate my love for Elizabeth Peters/Barbara Michaels. Anyone and everyone is welcome to join in. (Ideas, suggestions, etc., are also welcome, obvs.)

Morning links.

• At Buzzfeed: 13 Teen Death Novels From The '90s That Actually Exist. In going through boxes of mass market paperbacks (yes, many of our books are packed away by size, why do you ask?) I discovered that I have a LOT of Lurlene McDaniel books. I have no idea why. Or where they came from. 
• At #Giffy Reviews: Breaking Dawn.
• At the Guardian: Chick lit 'harms body image', study finds. I live for that Elizabeth Peters book (or was she writing as Barbara Michaels?) where the heroine describes herself as being a bit overweight, but then she loses a bunch of weight over the course of the book as she runs around investigating whatever she's investigating (and, yes, gets the guy and all that jazz), BUT THEN, in the epilogue, it's months later and she's gained all of the weight back AND THEY'RE STILL DELIRIOUSLY IN LOVE AND INSANELY HAPPY, AND, LIKE, EATING BRIE AND BUTTER OR SOMETHING. Love that.
• The Cryptofloricon. (via boingboing)
• ZOMG, MY BRAIN JUST EXPLODED: SETH COHEN IS DATING BLAIR WALDORF.
• Those bastards at Hasbro have retired Monopoly's iron. At least it wasn't my beloved thimble, I guess. *grumble* (The new token will be the cat. But, as far as I'm concerned, it doesn't exist. Just like blue M&Ms. Man, I am so bad at dealing with change.)

Afternoon links.

• Free excerpts from the first two new Doctor Who books: the first by Eoin Colfer, the second by Michael Scott. 
• At the WP: "A proposal by the Prince George’s County Board of Education to copyright work created by staff and students for school could mean that a picture drawn by a first-grader, a lesson plan developed by a teacher or an app created by a teen would belong to the school system, not the individual." Errrr...
• At BookRiot: Should eBooks be pay-as-you-go?
• Weekend at Richard III's.
• 10 Great YA Novels with Strong Female Characters.
• Cats in the Alley.
• The Idea Channel: Can D&D make you a confident & successful person?

Morning links.

• At the NYT: It may not have been scarlet fever that blinded Mary Ingalls.
• Introducing: Bookish.
• Scalzi is donating money to various charities every time A Certain Troll posts about him, and others have pledged to match him. Follow-up here.
• Agatha Christie was investigated by MI-5 during WWII: "Christie happened to be a close friend of Dilly Knox, one of the leading codebreakers at Bletchley Park. MI5 was concerned that the major's inside knowledge of the progress of the war was based on what the codebreakers knew about Hitler's plans. Had Christie mischievously named the character Bletchley because Knox told her what was going on there?"
• Via Biblio File, I got my first look at the cover of Golden Girl, the sequel to Dust Girl.
• At NPR: On Sendak's last book.

I... could have gone my whole life without knowing that This Is A Thing.

But, you know, since I had to suffer, I figured I'd share.

From BookRiot:

Goodreads is the largest bookish social network, with over 13 million users- and apparently some of those users have been using the site for something other than book reviewing: sexual roleplay. On Goodreads. Sexual roleplay…on Goodreads.

Afternoon links.

• YALSA’s 2013 Hub Reading Challenge Begins! (I am terrible at ever finishing challenges, but I'm tempted by this one.)
• J.L. Bell on Wodehouse v. Milne.
• At Scalzi's Whatever: John Hornor Jacobs. Based on the awesomeness of this column, I'm going to read The Twelve-Fingered Boy ASAP.
• Interested in serving on a YALSA committee? This is the perfect time to let that be known.
• Here's the schedule for the Sydney Taylor Book Award Blog Tour.
• Amelia Bedelia has a new look.
• At Word for Teens: On the cover redesign of The Immortal Rules.
• The Vampire Academy movie is a go.
• In case you haven't heard, Beyonce has hired a personal librarian.
• American Icons: The Outsiders.
• At NPR: How To Save A Public Library: Make It A Seed Bank.

The 2012 American Indian Youth Literature Awards...

...have been announced, and the YA winner is Pipestone: My Life in an Indian Boarding School, by Adam Fortunate Eagle.

Click on through for the other winners & honorees.

(via Waking Brain Cells)

[ETA: Errrr... these were actually announced LAST YEAR. Sorry about that. Ah, well, nothing wrong with highlighting 'em again, right?]

Yet another tumblr to follow:

#giffy reviews.

P.G. Wodehouse vs. A.A. Milne.

At the Paris Review:

The two men were initially friends: exactly the same age, and both comic writers, they moved in the same circles in 1920s London, playing on the same cricket team and contributing to many of the same publications. In 1928, they even collaborated on the adaptation of Wodehouse’s A Damsel in Distress. By the 1930s, their friendship had cooled somewhat—Wodehouse defenders cite jealousy—but it wasn’t until World War II that things became actively hostile.

The Scholastic Kids & Family Reading Report.

From the highlights:

Kids say that ebooks are better than print books when they do not want their friends to know what they are reading, and when they are out and about/traveling; print is better for sharing with friends and reading at bedtime.

The whole report is downloadable, though I'm going to save that for tomorrow: tonight is all about Kevin Bacon and The Following.

Lunchtime links.

• At Flavorwire: The Best Fictional Libraries in Pop Culture. (via an email from Adam, subject line: "Now this better make the teeny bopper blog.")
• I compiled the links to my posts about Alex Award winners on a Pinterest board. Same goes for the Printz award. (I'm a bit horrified about how FEW of those titles I've written about. Eeek.)
• After reading this interview with Katherine Applegate, I'm even more positive that there's NO WAY I can read this year's Newbery winner, The One and Only Ivan. I'm pretty sure that I would drown in an ocean of my own tears. Either that or get so dehydrated (from the crying) that I would dry up and blow away. OR LOOK LIKE THE DESICCATED CHIPMUNK THAT JOSH FOUND IN OUR BEDROOM YESTERDAY. Ahem.
• MOAR PLAGIARISM. (via Cuddlebuggery, Chronicler of ALL THINGS SCANDALOUS.)
• Reader’s Advisory Challenge for 2013. (via Liz B)
• Colleen on Midwinter. Still so very much wish I could have been there.
• Peter Brown on his Caldecott Honor. (via the comments of Betsy's post on the 2013 awards)
• At BookRiot: Perfume inspired by dead writers.

Kindle Daily Deal: 2013 Alex Winner & Dorothy Sayers!

Julianna Baggott's Pure and Dorothy Sayers' Gaudy Night are both $1.99 today.

COINCIDENTALLY, THEY ARE BOTH ALSO AWESOME.