Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).
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I hope everyone had a safe and happy holiday, however you chose to celebrate! And now it’s time to hold on to your butts, because this newsletter is PACKED.
Libraries & Librarians
- Last newsletter, I reported that the Museum & Library Services Act was stalled in the House. The day after I posted the newsletter, the act was passed by an overwhelming majority!
- Meet Skye Patrick, Library Journal’s Librarian of the Year.
- Chicago Public Librarians are bringing storytime to the laundromats.
- A profile of Albie Johnson, state librarian of Massachusetts.
- A Sacramento Public Library patron arrested for allegedly stealing over SIX THOUSAND items from the Fair Oaks library branch. SIX. THOUSAND. ITEMS.
- A St. Louis librarian is set to appear on Jeopardy in January!
- Check out this historic Brazilian library that feels like it was pulled right out of Harry Potter.
Book Adaptations in the News
- Bird Box had the most first week views of any Netflix film…over 45 million accounts tuned in! If your patrons aren’t already asking for the book, prepare for an onslaught of requests!
- A Blade So Black by LL McKinney is coming to TV.
- First look at Zachary Quinto as Charlie Manx in NOS4A2 and all I have to say is YEESH. Merry Christmas indeed.
- MGM partners with Reese Witherspoon for the adaptation of Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine.
- Here’s the first trailer for Where’d You Go, Bernadette?
Books in the News
- NASA scientist Katherine Johnson, who just recently celebrated her 100th (!!!) birthday, is releasing an autobiography for young next year.
- Coloring Without Borders is a bilingual coloring book that encourages kids to use their imagination to finish the artwork, plus proceeds go to help families separated at the US/Mexico border.
- Diana Gabaldon announces that the 9th Outlander title will be released in 2019, and there is a 10th book in the pipeline as well.
- Chelsea Clinton is publishing a children’s book about endangered animals in April 2019.
- Zadie Smith is publishing her first short story collection in the fall.
By the Numbers
- Books have had a great year…so great, in fact, that some publishers were unprepared for the holiday book-buying rush.
Pop Cultured
- The trailer for Men in Black: International just dropped.
- A look at the Downton Abbey movie.
- Jordan Peele gave us a gift in the form of the official trailer for his next horror movie, Us, which he released Christmas morning. It’s CREEPY.
All Things Comics
- Entertainment Weekly and Wired give us their picks for the best graphic novels of 2018.
- Autostraddle: Best LGBTQ Graphic Novels of 2018.
Audiophilia
Best Books of 2018
- Elle
- Atlantic
- New Yorker: More Books We Loved
- All the books mentioned in the #libfaves18 conversation on Twitter.
- NYT: Books That Didn’t Make Our Best-Of Lists, But Deserve Attention Anyway.
- Buzzfeed: Queer YA Books We Loved in 2018.
- Huffington Post: Best Children’s Books of 2018, as nominated by librarians.
- Seattle Times: Best Mysteries & Thrillers.
- New York Times give us creative categories for best crime fiction of 2018.
- Crime Reads: Best International Crime Fiction.
- The Verge: Best SFF.
- Paste: Best Fantasy.
- Becky Spratford at RA For All lists her picks for top 2018 horror titles.
- Book Riot: Best Poetry.
- AllAfrica: Africa’s Best Books of 2018.
Coming Up in 2019
- Tor gives us two lists of their most anticipated SFF novels.
- More SFF picks from The Verge.
- The most anticipated LGBTQ+ reads of 2019.
- Bustle: 29 Nonfiction Books for 2019 to put on your radar.
- Vanity Fair gives us their top 2019 book picks, & the winter’s best nonfiction reads.
- The 10 most anticipated 2019 releases, according to independent bookstores.
- More 2019 book lists from Entertainment Weekly, Shondaland, Vogue, and the Huffington Post.
- Electric Lit: 48 books by women & nonbinary authors of color to read in 2019.
- Anticipated January reads from Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, and LitHub.
Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists
- Tor.com has a wide-ranging list of 100 SF/F books you should consider reading in 2019.
- Overdrive lists its most popular eBooks & eAudiobooks for 2018.
- 20 dark fantasy YA novels.
- 15 sophomore novels being published in 2019.
- 15 books you should read if you loved Wonder.
- 50 favorite historical fiction novels, as picked by Book Riot readers.
- 20 healthy eating books to inspire your resolutions.
- Obama’s favorite books, movies, and songs from the year..take a guess as to his favorite book of the year!
Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous
- 7 year old Nicholas Buamah’s vocabulary-building book has been accepted into the Library of Congress!
- Here’s a list of the books, films, and works of art entering the public domain in 2019.
- Unnecessary life skills we learned from reading.
- Why did Quirrell’s turban smell like garlic, and other unsolved Harry Potter mysteries.
- Which forgettable Harry Potter side character are you? (Surprise…I’m Madame Pince, the cranky librarian.)
- A plea to American publishers to stop “translating” British and Australian books into American English.
- How paperback redesigns give publishers a second chance at winning readers.
Level Up (Library Reads)
Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? We’ve made it easy for you to find eligible diverse titles to nominate. Kelly Jensen created a database of upcoming diverse books that anyone can edit, and Nora Rawlins of Early Word is doing the same, as well as including information about series, vendors, and publisher buzz.
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Thanks for hanging out and I’ll see you again next week!
–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter. Currently reading Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant.