Review: Notorious R.B.G.

Recap: Ruth Bader Ginsburg is only the second woman to ever rule on the U.S. Supreme Court, and she made it to the top with good reason. As a hardworking Jewish girl from New York, she grew up in a time when women weren’t expected to have careers, but she decided she wanted more out of life than a husband.

Notorious R.B.G. started as a Tumblr page  whose creators then turned it into a book. The near coffee table-sized book details RBG’s rise to the Supreme Court — including her years in college and law school — as well as the feminist qualities that allowed her to build a career and a family simultaneously when women didn’t typically do that. The book includes photos, doodles and annotated Supreme Court decisions, more or less mixing biography with history book. It’s an interesting read for anyone who may want to learn more about law, the Supreme Court or just feminist badassery. For all those reasons, Notorious RBG totally worked for me.

Analysis: Okay, so maybe this book was given to me as a gift with me not having very much care for the Notorious RBG. And maybe this book was given to me even though I was clueless about the fact that Ruth Bader Ginsberg had famously became an internet sensation several years ago. But I was still intrigued, if for no other reason than RBG and I share two letters in our monogram (I was LBG before I got married) and she was a small, Jewish woman — like me. So I read it and was naively astounded to learn how truly prolific this feminist woman is. What she has done for our country’s judicial system, people fighting for their rights and women around the country and world is incredible. She is a true force to be reckoned with.

The writing style itself was nothing special. Some of the sections — though cleverly sectioned and titled based on Notorious B.I.G. lyrics — skipped around with the timeline of her life, and at points I found that confusing. A more linear timeline may have worked a bit better. Some of the explanations of the court cases also could have been simplified — though to be fair, details of court cases sometimes make my head spin, so maybe that’s just a personal issue? But mostly, it was funny, inspiring, easy to follow and transforming.

As women, we could all use someone like RBG to look up to. Now with my understanding and knowledge of her life and work, I can’t wait to read and follow the rest of her court decisions, dissents, and career.

Amazon Offering One-Hour Delivery in Manhattan

Amazon started out as a web site from which you could order things — primarily books. Then it became a brick-and-mortar store. Now it’s a brick-and-mortar store from which you can order things and get them (in New York City) in less than an hour.

According to Entertainment Weekly, Amazon has opened a location on 34th Street in Manhattan. Using a new service called Prime Now, people who live in Manhattan can order from the site and have the items delivered to them from the 34th Street location in an hour or less for $7.99, or in two hours or less for free.

Prime Now is a mobile app from which orders can be made everyday between 6 a.m. and 12 a.m. Amazon’s SVP of worldwide operations Dave Clark said this is good alternative for many people:

“There are times when you can’t make it to the store and other times when you simply don’t want to go.”

Now you can get what you want without leaving your home…in less than an hour.

For now the service is only available in New York City, but there are plans for it to spread to other cities in the future. My guess? LA would be next.

New Web Site for Books At Least a Year Old

If you’re anything like me, it take you a while to get around to reading the books you’ve added to your “To Read” list. Usually I’m a few years behind on the big bestsellers. It’s not that I don’t want to read them; it’s just that I’m backed up with reading other things, and before I know it, I’m reading books two years after they made the bestseller list.

Well if you’re like me, there’s a new web site that’s perfect for us! According to The New York Times, publisher Simon & Schuster has created a web site called offtheshelf.com. Those who run the site review book that are at least a year old — books that you may not have gotten around to reading, books that you may have simply overlooked, or classics that you read years ago and forgot about. This is the explanation on from the web site:

Off the Shelf is a site and newsletter created by passionate editors, authors, and others inside the book business to help you discover—or rediscover—great books. Whether they’re bestsellers you never got a chance to read or classics you remember falling for when you first read them, the books we write about have made an indelible impression on us as readers and have become friends we revisit often. We hope that shining a new light on these wonderful books will help you discover a passion for them too. 

Sounds awesome! What do you guys think? Stupid or brilliant?

Great Web Sites for Bookworms

If you’re a bookworm like me — and you probably are, since you’re reading my blog — there are a few fantastic web sites to help you keep track of what books you’re reading, see what people think of them, share books, and know when books are being adapted into feature films. So here you go…take a look at some of the awesome web sites that will enhance your nerdiness and give you a new way to connect with other readers.

Goodreads.com:  Goodreads is one of the more well-known book sites. More and more, I’m finding that people are already familiar with Goodreads, which acts as a social networking site for readers. Once you make a Goodreads profile — for free — you can become friends with other Goodreads users, and search books that you’ve read or are interested in. You can then separate those books into lists: Read, Currently Reading, and To-Read. The lists help you keep track of what you’ve read. Once you finish reading a book, you can also rate it on a scale of 5 stars, as well as add your own review.  This allows your friends to look at what you’ve read, see how much you liked a particular book, and decide whether or not they want to read it. And vice versa. You’re able to view all the books your friends are reading, have read, or want to read, and then decide if you’re interested, based on how they rate it. The web site also offers book recommendations catered to you, based on what you’ve already read.

Bookcrossing.com: Bookcrossing is another social networking site, but it works in a very different way from Goodreads. Bookcrossing acts as an online library, where you can share and trade books with other readers. Instead of letting your old books collect dust on your bookshelf, you can register it on the site, label it, and send it to someone who’d like to read it. Not only can you share books, but you can then track them. Only 29% of the site’s users are from the United States, which means your book could travel anywhere in the world, and you’ll always know where it is. How amazing is it to be able to send your book to someone in Finland, Germany, or even just Wisconsin and follow your book on its journey around the world? Bookcrossing also allows you to borrow books from people around the world, which means you can probably get a hold of books you never thought you’d have access to. Bookcrossing is also free to join.

Readit1st.com: When I know a book is being adapted into a movie, I vow to read the book first, then see the movie. I feel like I owe it to the book, as the original, to read that first. And I don’t think I’m the only one who feels this way. That’s what Readit1st is for; you can sign up for the site and receive newsletters about when the newest book-movie adaptation is coming to the big screen. On the site’s homepage, you can either pledge to read the book first or sign up, saying you’ll read the book whenever you want. But either way, you can get the newsletters. After all, according to the site, 50% of the highest grossing movies of 2010 were based on books. Readit1st is also free to sign up.

Encyclopaedia Britannicas Selling Fast

In its final days, the Encyclopaedia Britannica is seeing a resurgence. The oldest continuously published encyclopedia in the English language has been flying off the shelves since the company announced last month it would discontinue its print editions.

According to this article by The New York Times, sales of the Encyclopaedia Britannica — a 32-volume set that weighs 129 pounds — had greatly decreased in recent years. Thanks to the Internet and sites like Wikipedia, the need for print editions of encyclopedias has become scarce. Before the March 13th announcement, only 60 sets — at a cost of $1,395 — were sold per week.

Since then, the 4,000 copies stored in the Britannica warehouse have gone so quickly, there are now only a few hundred left. On average, 1,050 are now being sold per week. They’re all expected to be sold by the end of April.

According to Jorge Cauz, president of Encyclopaedia Britannica, “When they thought it would be around forever, there was no rush to buy one,” Mr. Cauz said in an e-mail. “But now, suddenly, it’s a scarce item.”

It’s not surprising that the company would opt to discontinue publishing the print editions. After all, print encyclopedias are a dying breed. Nonetheless, it’s still sad to see the end of an era. Just another item that has become irrelevant in our society — like the Walkman and answering machine.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Tiny Book

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is mostly an actor, really an Internet enthusiast, but also kind of an author. Confused yet? Well the Hollywood actor — best known for his work in 500 Days of Summer and Inception — has recently released a book, based on a collection of short stories developed on his web site.

Gordon-Levitt started the online production company hitRECord within the last few years. The company is collection of people’s thoughts and personal works of art meshed together. It’s made up of a movies, stories, art, and music. And now Gordon-Levitt has combined the works of his production company into one tiny book, The Tiny Book of Tiny Stories: Volume 1.

Entertainment Weekly recently sat down with Gordon-Levitt to talk about the new book. From the conversation, one can tell Gordon-Levitt is a dreamer, who both loves all forms of art and has a special appreciation for physical books. Go ahead and read the entire interview. I don’t know about you, but it certainly makes me want to grab a copy of this clever, little book.

Get The Tiny Book of Tiny Stories in hardcover for only $9.

Amazon’s Book Monopoly Is Growing

Amazon already sells books. It may soon start a Netflix-like rental service. And now it’s entering another field in the book industry: publishing.

According to this article by The New York Times, Amazon will publish 122 books and e-books this fall. This is good news for authors and the book industry in general. Now authors who may have had a difficult time getting published will have a fresh set of eyes to look at their material, which could result in a second chance at publishing. And in terms of the book industry, that means more books will be physically and digitally available to people all over the world.

But it’s bad news for the intermediate players in the game: the publishers and agents, as David Streitfeld explains in his article.

“Everyone’s afraid of Amazon,” said Richard Curtis, a longtime agent who is also an e-book publisher. “If you’re a bookstore, Amazon has been in competition with you for some time. If you’re a publisher, one day you wake up and Amazon is competing with you too. And if you’re an agent, Amazon may be stealing your lunch because it is offering authors the opportunity to publish directly and cut you out.

Either way, Amazon is creating a book industry monopoly. It may be cruel, but it’s also smart. And as one of Amazon’s top executives, Russell Grandinetti,  says in the article, “The only really necessary people in the publishing process now are the writer and reader. Everyone who stands between those two has both risk and opportunity.”

 

Amazon May Get Netflix-like Service for Books

Kindle e-books might now be available at libraries across the country, but the changes don’t stop there. A report by the Wall Street Journal says Amazon might be working on a new Netflix-like service for books.

The service would be part of the Amazon Prime package — a special program that gives members free two-day shipping and reduced price one-day shipping on all Amazon orders for a year, for a $79 annual fee.

The additional book service would allow Prime customers to read a limited number of books for free every month from a library of “older titles.”

According to this article by PC World, it seems Amazon hopes the service — which is still in its early stages — will help gain Prime members.

Perhaps spurred by the reaction to its Prime Instant unlimited video streaming, Amazon hopes to convince more people to join Prime with enticing add-ons. The company’s Prime library might also tie-in to the retailer’s strategy for its highly rumored, Android-based tablet to compete with the iPad.

Similar to Apple, Amazon’s slate could offer an integrated shopping experience with one-click access to online movie and TV viewing, e-book sales, MP3s, and apps. But Amazon would also want to encourage people to use their Amazon tablets to shop for physical items such as TVs, consoles and games, physical books, DVDs, computers, and toys.

Many of the details of this project are still unknown, however. For instance, how old are these “older titles”? And how many books will be available on a monthly basis? Not to mention, is this service even worth it now that libraries are offering Kindle e-books anyway? It sounds good on paper, but the kinks definitely still need to be ironed out. What do you guys think?

Harry Potter E-Books Delayed

There’s been so much attention on J.K. Rowling’s Pottermore web site that we’ve almost forgotten what its true purpose is: selling e-book versions of the Harry Potter series. That’s because the books still aren’t available yet.

And now the Associated Press is reporting they won’t be until 2012. The e-books have been delayed.

The AP says the e-books were supposed to be available come October, but it’s taking management longer than they had anticipated to perfect it.

In a blog posting on the site, “Pottermore” management said registration would be open to everyone from the end of October, and the online store would open in “the first half of 2012.”

The posting said use of the site so far had been “phenomenal,” and the delay would “allow us to focus on our first priority: opening ‘Pottermore’ to as many people as possible and making the experience as good as it can be.”

I’m sure with the issues they’ve had so far on the site, they thought it was simply in their best interest to take their time with the new addition. What do you guys think?

Perez Hilton To Publish Children’s Book

Born This Way. Firework. It Gets Better. These uplifting themes that have become pop culture references in their own right are exactly what’s going into Perez Hilton’s new children’s book.

Called The Boy With Pink Hair, the book follows the story of a young boy with pink hair who gets bullied, makes a friend, and overcomes the hate. According to this Entertainment Weekly article, the book is creative and tells an inspiring story. As Stephen Lee explains, there’s no reason for parents who might not like Perez Hilton to worry.

No, the “Boy with Pink Hair” isn’t a euphemism for “Boy with Homosexual Tendencies,” as some may fear; the book will appeal to creative kids who may have been picked on for their offbeat interests…Devoid of Hilton’s signature snark and celebrity obsession, The Boy with Pink Hair is a harmless, fun read for kids.

It sounds to me like this children’s book is a keeper. And we all know what that means…the famed celebrity blogger’s new title may very well be bestseller.