Links: not dormant, just distracted

• Sara Zarr takes on L'Engle's Austin family
• The ABFFE Silent Auction has an online presence this year (all credit to the fab Kristen Gilligan Vlahos!)
• Buildings made from trees -- as in trees, not lumber
• Typography for Lawyers
• Analyzing the narrative features of breaking news
• For everyone who liked my "how to flirt with your bookseller" post -- Edwardian flirting!
• (Some) actual numbers on independent bookstores and e-books
• Trying to make academics write better
• Book snobbery smackdowns
• How privilege might apply to reading romance
• The historical fiction fan's tour of London

Links

• On being an introvert: Kelly, Liz, Charlotte
• On discoverability: Guy, Laura, Brett
• Leila is hosting Petersweek
• James Fallows on the latest State of the Union speech
• Worst neologism of the week: "boutique revivalism"
• An appreciation of the Post Office's social impact
• On writing for readers in an academic context
• From the perspective of an African-American WWI YMCA canteen worker
• Journalism skills for novelists

The link harvest is good this week

• Medieval Judeo-Persian manuscripts have been discovered
• Elizabeth Wein on what makes a novel YA
• The story of Robert Smalls
• Wharton takes on Barnes & Noble
• Justine Larbalestier on genre-bashing
• Reading a book at the right age (to which I say "yes and no")
• On digital fact-checking (and the importance of links)
• Brett Sandusky says many smart things
• On the idea of selling out (or not)

(Post pic: just because.)

Links (short version)

• Self-defense for women in 1942
• For those of us doing revisions, even of the non-NaNo variety
• Lee Child on writing suspense
• File under things I don't know enough about: the War of 1812

Reading break links

I'm halfway through Paul Shackel's Memory in Black and White, so I've put down the notebook for a few minutes so I can post some links instead:

• An excellent use of Photoshop
• Mr. Rogers in infographic form (side note: if your Facebook friends weren't among those reposting the picture of Mr. Rogers with Koko the gorilla, you don't have enough sentimental nerds in your life)
• Created land is poorly drained? Who would have thought?
• What Turing's Cathedral leaves out
• Digital humanities in action: making ancient documents legible
• Alexander McCall Smith on early female detectives
• Someday I'm going to write about why James Fallows is a brilliant writer, but for now just read for yourself
• I was totally hooked by Henry Wiencek's book teaser in Smithsonian, so the reviews (especially from my historian-hero Annette Gordon-Reed) are fascinating
• The reading skills journalists need
• An in-depth look at the first show I ever got hooked on

Need a writing prompt?

This guy works with robots, and he thinks that "at some point, we have to get over" emergency shutoff buttons.
Speaking of which: robot bees.
"I can tell you, it's strange to write a research proposal and have half your bibliography be science fiction."
Forget parrots, this beluga is trying to speak human.
A transcript of the Bretton Woods conference was just rediscovered.

This week's links

• A book on women in early Hollywood? Yes, please.
• More problems with cities below sea level: when saltwater enters the aquifers.
• How-to-manage-women manuals that are really more about dealing with all employees.
• Was the Gloucester sea serpent just a whale in a fishing net?
• I don't completely agree with David's anti-sticker-book rant, but I do admire his passion.

Meet Stompy (and other links)

• Apparently Boston's getting a new robotic neighbor
• Mars exploration family portrait
• "Would you ever ask a man that question?"
• Elephants communicate with infrasounds
• Rosalind Franklin's sister has written a book
• The Times presents backyard animals
• Go check out the beginning of the lovely Gwenda's new book!
  

Links for the week

A new take on the long-tail aspect of bookselling
There are mini Mini Coopers running around the Olympic fields
A multi-source "buy this book" widget
Coverage of the recent Keplers2020 event: from Ron Charles (1, 2, 3) and Peter Turner (1, 2)
It's Kidlitcon time again
Excuses, valid and otherwise, to watch animal cams
Background on the Olympics-related use of animated GIFs

Links again

Bookselling definitions in search of words -- brilliant.
Just because everyone else has already linked to the six-year-old judging books by their covers doesn't mean I'm going to skip it.
A case before the Supreme Court that hinges on the interpretation of the First Sale Doctrine.
New covers for Octavia E. Butler.
An elaborate and informative Amazon infographic.
Advice for beginning journalists.
Comments. Lots and lots of comments. On the DOJ antitrust settlement.

Quick links

• Smart stuff from Kristin Cashore (also this, though if you want to set me up with someone, I wouldn't turn you down)
• Boston, mark your calendars for September 30 at the BPL
• Josh offers some food for thought on the nature of reading
• How do I procrastinate during revisions? By drawing First Draft Island

And more links!

For research purposes: Georgian cookery (via Two Nerdy History Girls)
To be read whenever you need to be reminded that yeah, you are slacking off
More on the wonders of the typewriter shop
Why "good metadata" means something different for everyone involved

Oh, look. Links!

Colleen shares another of her fab publisher round-ups.
A reason to visit Amherst this month: Dickinson-poem-decorated sheds.
It's been a while since I've listened to dial-up.
APOD rocks, as always. (And is the source of the post pic.)
NPR kicks off its summer YA series with a point-counterpoint on Gone With the Wind. (For reference.)
Gail reminds me that I still need to read True Grit. (I have seen the more recent movie version, though!)
David takes on the too-long book.
Unpacking the assumptions behind a Library of Congress classification. (via Debbie Reese)

Haven't done a link roundup in a while...

Stuff that is not necessarily new, but intriguing. (To me, at least.)

• Melodies from isotopes
• The Ultimate Story Checklist
• Watch this video
• Polarized light as a proto-compass?
• We can always use a reminder of how awesome Mr. Rogers was
• 19th-century female math nerd FTW
• Wrenching NPR story on Native children in foster care
• UK journalism history (as relates to the hacking scandal)
• The phrase "Iron Age road" will usually get me to click
• I grew up on Ms. Magazine
• Experiments from the NYT
• Report cards from the 1920s
• Why the battle between Hamilton and Jefferson still hasn't gone away
• A key moment in the collapse of the USSR

Stuff I mostly haven't read yet

... but am sharing anyway. Partly so I can clear out my bookmarks, and partly because a quick skim makes me reasonably confident that there's something to worth reading in all of these.

• Jo Walton on "reading protocols." An older piece that Josh Christie turned up a couple weeks ago. Thought-provoking, but I still haven't formed an articulate response to it.
• "When Jill Abramson Was the Only Grownup..." This one I have read. And now I want to be a reporter again.
• Andrew Karre on the end goal of contemporary YA romance. Much more interesting than my description makes it sound. Go read it.
• Post-Artifact Books and Publishing. Haven't read this one, but Craig Mod's previous stuff has been worth it.
• A look at changes in book publishing over the last couple decades. See above, then substitute Peter Osnos for Craig Mod.
• Junot Díaz on disasters. Because it's Junot Díaz.
• Some day I plan to blog about the sheer awesomeness of Annette Gordon-Reed. For now, this.

Tab-closing

As some of these are tabs I haven't had open for months, I suppose "bookmark-deleting" would be a more accurate title. However: links, not necessarily new, that are worth following:

• The Horn Book on Augusta Baker
• Discovery of a smugglers' tunnel in Hastings
• Monkey See on cultural omnivores
• Isaac Asimov is awesome (and, apparently, lived not far from here!)
• Caleb Crain on That Photo
• Kevin Kelly has some thoughts on books
• Jane Eyre thoughts from Laura Miller
• Jane Eyre thoughts from What's Old Is New
• Why Robert Darnton was one of the historians I actually enjoyed last semester
• HNN on park ranger hats
• Awaiting: Beekeeping for Beginners (and The Pirate King)
• An old headline, but still infuriating
• This might actually make Foursquare useful
• Because I totally need to spend more time with digital history
• Speaking of which: "affective history"
• New tagline: "granola is not nongrapefruit"

Good stuff from other blogs

Cool idea from Laurel:

"For any group of (at least) THREE kids (or grownups, I guess) who wants to get together and read THREE books from the list below (that they have not read before) I will offer a FREE SKYPE VISIT to chat with the group about the books they’ve read. I’ll also happily chat about other things, but at the heart of the conversation should be the books on this list."

Read it for the categories:

"Related to this is the explosion of commentary in 2009 around the publishing industry’s future. Pundits bloviated over ebooks in post after post without definition or focus."

If Cheryl hadn't posted this, I probably would not have found a connection between Taylor Swift and my historical WIP:

"The thing that so impresses me about this line is that it implies four layers of relationship in those ten words"

Fascinating ideas, fabulous graf-level linking:

"Here’s a little idea for creating innovation in news coverage: the 100 percent solution. It works like this: First, you set a goal to cover 100 percent of… well, of something. In trying to reach the goal you immediately run into problems. To solve those problems you often have to improvise or innovate. And that’s the payoff, even if you don’t meet your goal."

Katherine takes on picture books:

"Yes, I think price is a factor. No matter how many times these books are going to be read, people see an $18 + price tag on a 32 page book and they balk."

Awesome:

"The maps use typography as the sole visual clue."

In which J.L. Bell makes me reconsider a minor character in said WIP:

"It’s always a printer’s apprentice."

Food for thought:

"Publishers are in the business of linking content to markets, but we’re hamstrung at search because we’ve made context the last thing we think about."

Loads of advice from Deborah Heiligman:

"Transcribe your notes soon after taking them. Write so you can read your handwriting. Make a note of the source if it's not from your head."

In which I attempt to get through some of the stuff I've starred in my reader over the past month

With all due credit to Deanna Raybourn for the style of the post title. (Go read Silent on the Moor. It's excellent.)

Naturally, I haven't read any of these stories yet, but I will.

I'd be all over this if it were more geographically desirable.

Shannon Hale on the difference between confusion and mystery. (For the record: my protagonist? Rather confused at the moment. Working on that.)

A fake cell phone designed to market Nova Scotia - sweet.

Amy or Jo? How about Jo with a touch of Meg's practicality?

I don't need any more blogs in my reader. I don't. But I looked at Carlie's list anyway.

Want.

Speaking of things that let me procrastinate research: Victorian London online! (See also: Jane Austen's World)

I don't think I'm supposed to appreciate CJR's Mad Libs this much. But I do.

Much overdue, but I'm amazed at all the work that went into the KidLitosphere Central.

Vikings and world-building.

Two things I never expected to see adjacent to each other: "Lois Lowry" and "OMG."

What everyone else is up to

Upcoming: A post on They Also Ran, part of Colleen's month of politics. For now, a collection of links, both kidlit and non.

The ever-fab Elizabeth Peters answers all sorts of questions for Powell's. (via bookshelves of doom) (Naturally, the month I don't read the Powell's newsletter all the way through...)

Kirsten Miller adds to her list of underground cities. (Before climbing down, take a look at the experts.)

Feministing asks why we don't have more Gwen Ifills - they ask the question in the context of presidential debate moderators, but as she's one of the journalists I admire, it's a question that should get more attention.

Errol Morris discusses how easy it is to change our perception of an image by altering the caption - from Hurricane Katrina victims to alleged WMDs. (via both Boing Boing and Gwenda Bond)

Kelly pointed me to some LOLs that don't involve any cats. Instead, they involve a certain world leader and major sporting event.

A post for everyone who's read The Green Glass Sea (even those of us who still haven't gotten an ARC of White Sands, Red Menace...)

It's no secret that I really like Boston. Maud just adds to it.

Also Boston-related - I want time to sit and read through Boston 1775. J.L. Bell has written some fascinating stuff lately, but all I've been able to do is skim. (And thank Ann Rinaldi for stoking my interest in the Jefferson/Hemings relationship.)

The great thing about being a reporter is getting to say things like this: "Quoting [Steve Jobs] calling me a 'slime bucket' is not even remotely problematic. He didn't go off the record for another 10 minutes."

MotherReader tried out the fish pedicure - I think it actually looks pretty cool. (Says the girl who's never had a normal pedicure.)

Another Very Cool Thing, courtesy of Sara Lewis Holmes - NASA offers a workshop for writers that includes some observing time. Ah, the days of flats and darks and RGBSun...

Joseph Bruchac makes an appearance at Cynsations.

New additions to the TBR list:
High Dive by Tamar Stein
Don't Talk to Me About the War by David A. Adler

Procrastinating

I told myself I was going to write tonight. And I'm going to get to it, just as soon as I do a crossword and link to all sorts of wonderful things I haven't had a chance to read this month.

Jezebel remembers Tasha Tudor.

I was vaguely aware of Instructables, but it took Ananka's Diary to really put it on my radar.

The Onion on the hazards of CEO Barbie (via Feministing)

Cynthia Leitich Smith and Dana Reinhardt

Utterly disgusted. Not much else to say about this one.

Look for Whip Cracking Wednesdays at BookMoot this summer.

Everyone's been having fun with Wordle, but I learned about it first on Justine's blog.

Two pieces of history from Boing Boing.

The other Sarah (yeah, like there are only two of us!) sold me on this one.

Jen Robinson gets credit for this one.

A new toy, thanks to Linda Urban.

Libba's Bad Day.

I've kind of had enough of t-shirts at the moment, but I might just have to get myself some Gallagher Gear.

I have a coworker who started his career at Bennett Cerf's Random House - like I needed a reason to read an oral history.

Speaking of oral histories, how is it that I'm only now adding this collection of Freedom Rider reminiscences to my reader? (via Bookslut)
Now that I've read Climbing the Stairs, I'm almost tempted to take Padma Ventrakaman up on her bindi offer. (Or I could just go visit my neighbor who shares all sorts of pretty things she brings back from Mumbai because she has two sons, who are not nearly as fun to dress up as I am.)

Peter Parley did some of his writing and teaching here in Ridgefield, so I'm going to have to follow up on J.L.'s post. (If you're in the area next Saturday, Ridgefield's 300th anniversary celebration continues with a parade and events throughout the day. And if you make it to the parade, see if you can guess which float has been taking up half my garage for the past two weeks.)

Updates from some of the journalists currently reporting from Iraq. (via FishBowlNY)

Okay. Writing. That's the real goal for tonight.