Book News Round-Up

Welcome to the first book news round-up of September. It's not really any different from any other round-up, except for the fact that it's now September. Enjoy it just the same!

• September means back to school and back to teachers assigning books that might get a few parents riled up. The ALA and Google teamed up to document the challenges to certain books across the country. The interactive Google Map shows where books are banned and which books are put on the chopping block. The project is a collaboration of the National Coalition Against Censorship and the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression.
• Alas, the deliciously ironic television show Reading Rainbow is no more. After 26 years and more than two dozen Emmy Awards, the third-longest running show on PBS is ending its reign. Hosted by LeVar Burton (best known to most people as Geordi La Forge from Star Trek: The Next Generation), the show lacked the necessary funds to renew its broadcast rights. The show debuted in 1983 and was instrumental in showing children why reading was so important.
  
• Now I just feel old. And unaccomplished. While most teenagers are preoccupied with high school, fellow classmates and typical teenage angst, Cayla Kulver was busy creating an entirely new world. After filled hundreds of notebooks with family trees, maps and histories, Kulver published her first novel, Legacy, at the age of 14. Rave reviews and book awards followed, causing Kulver to catch the eye of Amazon Encore, a program that brings independent authors to a much wider audience. Amazon is now republishing Legacy and Kulver, now 16, is already working on a sequel.
• Just call Stephenie Meyer the ultimate hand up. A new edition of Charlotte Bronte's Wuthering Heights was recently released with cover art that mimicked Meyer's popular Twilight series and on the cover, it's marketed as "Bella and Edward's favorite book." Some people will do whatever it takes to sell a thoroughly depressing love story, I guess.
• Thanks to Kurt Vonnegut, we now know why real life is so much more boring than fiction. Awhile back, Vonnegut explain fiction vs. reality in terms of a grid/line graph, with a range of possible emotions from ecstasy to misery, over the passage of time. It probably doesn't make sense when I try to write it out, so just check out his graphs and you'll get it.
• Resource of the week: 100 useful Twitter feeds for book lovers. You're welcome.
  
• It's official - I'm beyond jealous of Neil Gaiman's personal library. It's pretty much my idea of heaven on earth and what I would want for my own library. And, to add a cherry on top, Gaiman said in an interview that his entire collection is, in fact, organized alphabetically by author. *sigh* *swoon*
  
• Boston area author readings: Children’s author Margaret Peterson Haddix will be at the Wellesley Free Library on Tuesday Sept. 8th; Anita Diamant will be at Newtonville Books on Thursday the 10th; and on Saturday September 12th, Tomie dePaola will sign copies of his latest Strega Nona book at the Andover Bookstore.