Author: Katie McLain

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

“Check Your Shelf” is sponsored by Witness: Lessons from Elie Wiesel’s Classroom by Ariel Burger.

The world remembers Elie Wiesel—Nobel laureate, activist, and author of more than forty books—as a great humanist. He passed away in July of 2016. Now, in Witness: Lessons from Elie Wiesel’s Classroom, we see him as never before—not only as an extraordinary human being, but as a master teacher. Written by Wiesel’s devoted protégé and friend, Ariel Burger, Witness takes us inside the classroom, where listening and storytelling keep memory alive. Witness provides a front row seat to these lessons in compassion, teaching us that listening to a witness, makes us all witnesses. In this book, Wiesel’s legacy lives on.

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Libraries & Librarians

• The Boston Public Library is now lending out WiFi hotspots.
• The La Quinta branch of the Riverside County (CA) Library System is under investigation for allegations of cultural censorship. Students invited from a local elementary school were allegedly asked to remove references to Mexican culture from a presentation about Mexican Independence Day.
• Indy Pride, Inc. and the Indianapolis Public Library are partnering to create a permanent exhibit of LGBTQ+ related research, books, and history – one of the largest such collections in a US public library.
• And if you need an idea for next year’s Staff Day…

Book Adaptations in the News

• The trailer for Dumplin’ is here!
• Also, here’s the extended trailer for The Mortal Engines.
• The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter by Theodora Goss will be adapted as a CW series.
• Armie Hammer and Lily James will be starring in the Netflix adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca.
• Jack Reacher is becoming a TV series, and Tom Cruise will no longer play the title character. It sounds like they’re looking for someone taller.
• Netflix picks up the rights to The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, directed by (and starring!) Chiwetel Ejiofor.
• AMC has optioned Annalee Newitz’s pharmaceutical piracy novel Autonomous as a TV series!
• April 2019 will mark the beginning of the last season of Game of Thrones. (This would be a good time to start planning GoT displays, lists, and possibly a small program or two.)
• NBC has a TV series adaptation of The Bone Collector by Jeffrey Deaver in the works.
• Mira Grant’s mermaid thriller, Rolling in the Deep, is being adapted for the screen by Mary Lambert, who directed Pet Sematary. I give this news all of the heart-eye emojis.

Books in the News

• Sarah Dessen has a new book coming out! Keep an eye out for The Rest of the Story, out June 4, 2019.
• Brandy Colbert has a debut middle grade novel slated for 2020.
• Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark is coming back with a brand new collection of stories, written by some seriously awesome authors! (Tananarive Due?! Josh Malerman?! RL Stine?!)

By the Numbers

• Barnes & Noble reports that Becoming by Michelle Obama racked up more presales than any other adult title since Go Set a Watchman in 2015.
• Publishers’ Weekly released the Publishing Industry Salary Survey, which highlights numbers in regards to salary, workforce diversification, and sexual harassment issues.

Award News

• The National Book Awards have been announced! 
• Junot Diaz will resume his Pulitzer Board duties after being cleared of sexual misconduct. Reactions have been mixed.

Pop Cultured

• William Goldman, award-winning screenwriter and author of The Princess Bride, has passed away.

All Things Comics

• Here’s a list of comics featuring characters outside the gender binary.
• The best of Stan Lee’s Marvel comic books.
• 17 comics about depression that’ll make you feel seen.

Audiophilia

• 6 fiction audiobooks narrated by the author.

Best Books of 2018

• Time: Best Fiction
• NYT: Notable Books of 2018
• New York Public Library: Best Books for Adults
• Kirkus: Best Picture Books

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• 5 sci-fi/fantasy novels pulled from forgotten histories.
• Barnes & Noble lists their 50 greatest sci-fi/fantasy debuts.
• And let’s round out these SFF lists with some transgender sci-fi/fantasy novels.
• 50 unreliable narrators.
• 7 titles to get you started with romantic suspense. 
• WWMRR? (What would Mr. Rogers read?)
• Best cookbooks of 2018.
• The Mary Sue lists the best queer books published this fall.

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• One mom and her two children are working to send diverse children’s books to all 50 states. This is such a cool project!
• Strategies for protecting your books from damage.
• Bookish ornaments under $20.
• Harry Potter stocking stuffers! *Grabby hands*

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!).

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! I hope everyone had a peaceful and fulfilling Thanksgiving, however you chose to spend it.

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter.

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

“Check Your Shelf” is sponsored by Laurie Halse Anderson’s SHOUT.

Bestselling author Laurie Halse Anderson is known for the unflinching way she writes about, and advocates for, survivors of sexual assault. Now, inspired by her fans and enraged by how little in our culture has changed since her groundbreaking novel Speak was first published twenty years ago, she has written a poetry memoir that is as vulnerable as it is rallying, as timely as it is timeless. In free verse, Anderson shares reflections, rants, and calls to action woven between deeply personal stories from her life that she’s never written about before. Searing and soul-searching, this important memoir is a denouncement of our society’s failures and a love letter to all the people with the courage to say #MeToo and #TimesUp, whether aloud, online, or only in their own hearts. SHOUT speaks truth to power in a loud, clear voice—and once you hear it, it is impossible to ignore.

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I am very excited to announce that I (Katie) will be taking over Check Your Shelf on a weekly basis! Thank you to everyone who has subscribed so far – I look forward to filling your inboxes every week!

Libraries & Librarians

• How academic libraries respond to university budget cuts.
• “Our values can’t exist in a vacuum—they must work for librarians in the real world.”
• A perspective on the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre and the resulting silence from librarians. (TW: hate crimes, anti-Semitism)
• A round up of library referenda and November election results.
• Constructive confrontation and saying “No” to patrons who accost library employees for dates or personal information. My colleague and I have given multiple presentations on addressing sexual harassment in the public library and dealing with patron incidents like this, so I was VERY happy to read this article.
• UK government’s response to library advocates has been “hugely disappointing.”
• Related: If books can cure loneliness, why are we closing libraries?
• Inside the Bodeleian Library’s collection of explicit and “immoral” books.
• Buzzfeed’s list of 17 Things Librarians Want You To Know.

Book Adaptations in the News

• A round-up of mixed reviews for Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.
• Lifetime is adapting a contemporary version of Pride and Prejudice set in Atlanta.
• John Boyega & Letitia Wright are set to star in the adaptation of Hold Back the Stars by Katie Khan.
• HBO is adapting The Plot Against America by Philip Roth.
• All of the book adaptations coming to Netflix in November 2018.

Books in the News

• Erin Morganstern, author of The Night Circus, announces the November 2019 release of The Starless Sea! Let the Muppet arms commence!!
• No surprises here: Oprah picks Becoming by Michelle Obama as her next Book Club selection.
• Malala Yousafzai is working on a new book about refugees.

By the Numbers

• Books-a-Million is hosting its sixth annual Holiday Book & Toy Drive through mid-December.
• Backlist titles and digital audiobooks led to a profitable quarter for 4 major publishers.

Award News

• It’s the final voting round for the 2018 Goodreads Choice Awards.
• 2018 Christy Award finalists & winners.
• Rule changes for the Nebula Awards.

Pop Cultured

• Library of Congress hosts a collection of comic books, movie posters, toys, and other pop culture items.

All Things Comics

• Stan Lee, Marvel comics giant, dies at age 95.
• How a new wave of graphic novels are reviving classic books & promoting diversity.
• The original pages of “Master Race,” a famous comic book story about an encounter between a Nazi war criminal and a Holocaust survivor, is up for auction and initial estimates put the story at $150,000.
• A look at the harassment issues within Marvel Comics.

Audiophilia

• Washington Post’s 5 best audiobooks of 2018.

Best Books of 2018

• Publishers’ Weekly
• Kirkus: Best Fiction
• Amazon
• Wired
• Shondaland
• Washington Post: Nonfiction

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• 20 of the best food books of 2018.
• 50 historical fiction picture books.
• 19 favorite books about pets.
• 50 of the most common TBR books, according to Goodreads.
• 5 books about intersectional feminism.
• 50 must-read microhistories.
• 9 tasty children’s books about food.
• 11 sci-fi and fantasy novels that have something to say about climate change.
• 10 books to commemorate WWI centenary.
• And on a related note, a list of books that envision a world without war.

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• JK Rowling’s former assistant charged thousands of dollars worth of unapproved expenses to a company credit card, including luxury candles, $2000 worth of Starbucks, and a couple of cats. (I am now obligated to gently remind everyone to adopt, not shop!)
• Choose-Your-Own-Adventure-style books for kids are seeing a resurgence in 2018 and beyond.
• An adorable photo of Tom Hanks holding a fussy baby at the Portland Book Festival.
• LGBTQ+ people are being erased from books in Russia under “Gay Propaganda” Law.
• Bette Davis’ ex-husband reported in 1938 that the reason for the divorce was that Bette read too much.
• Gillian Flynn peers into the dark side of femininity.
• Why you should listen to the poetry podcast, VS.
• And 15 must-listen romance podcasts.

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!).

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.

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

“Check Your Shelf” is sponsored by A Blade So Black by L.L. McKinney, published by Imprint.

The fantasy book I’ve been waiting for my whole life. Alice is Black Girl Magic personified.” —Angie Thomas, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Hate U Give Life in real-world Atlanta isn’t always simple, as Alice juggles an overprotective mom, a high-maintenance best friend, a slipping GPA, and an ongoing battle against monstrous creatures in the magical dream realm known as Wonderland. When Alice’s handsome and mysterious mentor is poisoned, she has to find the antidote by venturing deeper into Wonderland than she’s ever gone before. And she’ll need to use everything she’s learned in both worlds to keep from losing her head . . . literally.

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Libraries & Librarians

• An interesting article about how public library reference is increasingly about community service.
• The challenges of tribal libraries.
• As a parting gift to their school, these high school seniors want to create a student library.
• Buzzfeed wants to know hear from you: What’s it like to be a librarian?
• The federal 2019 budget shows big gains for libraries!
• A librarian/reader compares OverDrive, Libby, Hoopla, and 3M ebook services. (Spoiler alert – the librarian/reader is me!)
• What being a school librarian means today.

Book Adaptations in the News

• Season 2 of The Alienist will be based on Carr’s sequel, The Angel of Darkness. 
• Michael B. Jordan set to star in two Tom Clancy adaptations: Without Remorse and Rainbow Six.
• James Comey’s A Higher Loyalty is slated for a possible miniseries.
• Chris Evans will be starring in the Apple drama series, Defending Jacob. 
• What If It’s Us by Adam Silvera & Becky Albertalli isn’t even released yet, but it’s already been picked up for an adaptation.

Books in the News

• Following the success of her Netflix special, comedian Hannah Gadsen will be publishing a memoir called Ten Steps to Nanette.
• Sneak peek of Josh Malerman’s new novel!
• Angie Thomas on why it’s wrong to ban The Hate U Give.
• Lindy West has a new book coming out!
• Paul McCartney has a children’s picture book coming out called Hey Grandude, and I am now going to buy a copy for everyone in my life who has, will have, or may possibly have children.

• There’s going to be a YA novel set in the Alien xenomorph universe, written by Mira Grant, AKA Seanan Maguire! GIMME!
• It’s the 30th anniversary of Matilda, and Mara Wilson has some thoughts on sharing her life with the titular character.
• Stephen Colbert announces a children’s book based on President Trump’s comments post-Hurricane Florence. All proceeds will benefit hurricane relief organizations.

By the Numbers

• Fear by Bob Woodward breaks Simon & Schuster’s first week sales record  – over 1.2 million copies sold.
• Banned Books Week by the numbers.
• The Kuwaiti government acknowledged that it had banned 4,390 books since 2014.
• Women make up only one third of the translated books published each year.

Award  News

• Man Booker Prize shortlist. 
• 2018 Kirkus Prize finalists. 
• Carnegie Medal promises immediate action over lack of diversity – the 20 author longlist for 2017 consisted entirely of white authors. (Also important to note that the Carnegie Medal is judged by librarians, which as we all know is a predominantly white profession.)

All Things Comics

• 25 best queer comics. 
• RL Stine has a new graphic novel series coming out!

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• 25 adventurous books like Percy Jackson.
• 8 historical true crime books that show you the creepier side of history.
• The best suspense novels of 2018 to add to your TBR.
• The most frequently challenged books over the last 5 years.
• 35 women authors who debuted at 35 or older.
• 50 must read books about American politics.
• 10 YA fantasy novels by women of color.
• 50 YA novels about mental illness.
• Gender-bent retellings.
• 18 of the best witchy books to read this fall.
• 50 pirate books to put some YARR MATEY into your life.
• Nonfiction books about abortion.
• The best horror novels from 2018 to read this Halloween season.
• New to romance? Here are 18 places for you to start.
• 17 bisexual women to read on Bi Visibility Day (or any day!)

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• Poetry’s place in the history of banned books.
• How doctors use poetry to promote physical healing.
• Here are the books we’re most likely to secretly give up on.
• A neuroscientist explains what technology does to the reading brain.
• 300 new words were added to the Scrabble dictionary, so yes, go ahead and play “emoji” or “yowza” for super duper points.
• Alyssa Cole wrote a great article for Booklist about the stigma of romance novels.
• A woman receives a shipment  of Dr. Seuss books…20 YEARS after she initially ordered them!
• How The Haunting of Hill House has shaped our ideas of haunted houses.
• And on a related note, how haunted house stories reflect women, trauma, and mysogyny.
• 50+ puntastic book club names.

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!).

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.

And to make it even easier, I’ve picked a couple specific titles that are being released in February 2019. Links direct you to Edelweiss, where you can request a digital advance copy, and nominations are due by January 1st.

• The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls – Anissa Gray (February 19, 2019). “The Mothers meets An American Marriage in this dazzling debut novel about mothers and daughters, identity and family, and how the relationships that sustain you can also be the ones that consume you.”
• That Time I Loved You – Carianne Leung. (February 26, 2019). “In this exquisite American debut, Carrianne Leung evokes the legacies of Cheever and Munro with a haunting depiction of 1970s suburbia.”

And make sure to check out Episode 16 of our Annotated podcast, which talks about how Andrew Carnegie transformed the American public library!

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Thanks for hanging out and we’ll see you again in two weeks!

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter. Currently reading Destiny’s Captive by Beverly Jenkins.

 

PS: Don’t forget to enter to win a custom book stamp for your personal library in our giveaway.

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

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Check Your Shelf is sponsored by Let’s Go Swimming on Doomsday by Natalie C. Anderson.

Forced to become a child soldier, a sixteen-year-old Somali refugee must confront his painful past in this haunting, thrilling tale of loss and redemption for fans of A Long Way Gone and What is the What.

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Libraries & Librarians

• Penguin Random House announces a new eBook lending model for libraries.
• From the Omaha Public Library: Banned Books Week reminds us that the freedom to read is still worth celebrating.
• ALA is seeking feedback on its updated meeting room policy.
• September is National Deaf Awareness Month, and the Association of Specialized, Government, and Cooperative Library Agencies has put together some resources to help create a more welcoming and accessible library environment.
• ALA announced they will be conducting a study to explore public library services for new Americans.
• Neil Gaiman & Chris Riddell: A picture essay on Why We Need Libraries.
• New York Times: To restore civil society, start with the library.
• NPR’s newest podcast, The Keepers, focuses on stories of “activist archivists, rogue librarians, curators, collectors, and historians.”
• Libraries are using mobile kitchens to teach food literacy. This is so cool!
• Should libraries take a stand on 3D printed guns? (Yes.)
• Tips to help you find that book “that has a blue cover and a picture of a dog on it.”
• Libraries as community spaces: An academic and a personal perspective.

Book Adaptations in the News

• The Devil All the Time is being turned into a movie by Donald Ray Pollock starring Chris Evans and Mia Wasikowsa.
• Here’s the first clip from The Hate U Give. And speaking of The Hate U Give, the release date has been bumped up to October 5th!
• Dumplin’ by Julie Murphy is going to be a movie and yes, Dolly Parton is involved!
• Nancy Drew is getting a TV adaptation on the CW.
• Zachary Quinto and Ashleigh Cummings have been cast in the adaptation of NOS4A2 as Charlie Manx and Vic McQueen, respectively. TBH, I never would have pictured Zachary Quinto as Charlie Manx, but oddly enough, it works.
• Oprah is turning Love Warrior by Glennon Doyle into a movie.
• Maggie Gyllenhaal is set to write and direct the adaptation of Elena Ferrante’s novel The Lost Daughter.

Books in the News

• Stormy Daniels is releasing a tell-all memoir on October 2nd of this year called Full Disclosure. Order copies, prepare for holds.
• Daniel Jose Older is working on the third book in the Shadowshaper series!
• Gillian Flynn is working on a new book! What do we know about it?? Absolutely nothing!
• We’re getting a graphic novel adaptation of Jason Reynold’s award-winning YA novel Long Way Down.
• Lauren Beukes has a new novel coming out!! (If you haven’t read The Shining Girls or Broken Monsters yet, they are genre-bending works of trippy horror and suspense, and they’re ah-may-zing).
• Rainbow Rowell is publishing her first graphic novel, Pumpkinheads. Check out the cover here!

By the Numbers

• James Patterson donates $2 million to classroom libraries!
• Fear by Bob Woodward has sold over 750,000 copies in a single day – the first book to do that since Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee.
• Americans are reading more poetry, less fiction.

Award News

• All the juicy behind-the-scenes drama with Man Booker Prize judging.
• All of the longlists for the National Book Award categories have been released!
• Anthony Bourdain posthumously awarded 6 Emmys, including Best Nonfiction Writing.
• The 2018 Anthony Award winners & nominees.
• Haruki Murakami withdraws from consideration from the Alternate Nobel Prize for Literature.

All Things Comics

• First images from the Captain Marvel movie!
• What to know about Captain Marvel before the movie comes out.
• Every superhero movie coming out in 2019. (Which also means you have a year’s worth of displays now!)

Audiophilia

• Alyssa Cole is writing a SFF romance Audible Original novella!
• Royal National Institute of Blind People offers free access to Penguin Random House audiobooks.
• 50 must-read nonfiction audiobooks.
• 10 audiobooks in translation.

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• 8 fantasy books like A Game of Thrones.
• 50 must-read m/m romance novels.
• YA author Nova Ren Suma recommends her favorite YA ghost stories.
• YA books about school shootings. 
• 23 fantasy series for adults.
• 50 must-read books set in space.
• 11 mysteries that don’t start with a dead girl.
• 24 horror movies based on true stories, and the books they were based on.
• 8 memoirs from former Obama staffers.
• 5 reads for Hispanic Heritage Month.
• 10 engaging novels about World War II.

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

First the serious pieces:

• A really interesting piece on domestic violence in romance novels, courtesy of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books.
• Target has been redacting key words in certain book descriptions published on its website, including “transgender” and “queer.”
• The NYT writes about how kidlit authors are taking a political stand.
• Using YA novels to make sense of #MeToo.
• A must-read article about the attitudes towards black girls who like to read.
• The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections is planning to ban free book donations due to concerns about drug trafficking. Prisoners instead are being pushed to buy into an expensive eBook system.

And now for some lighter news!

• Check out this ah-may-zing Slytherin wedding!
• A romance novelist has been arrested for allegedly murdering her husband. But here’s the kicker: She had previously published an online essay called “How to Murder Your Husband.”
• A UK bookseller decided to take an early retirement and raffled off his store to a lucky customer for £20.
• In other bookseller news, the Ripped Bodice Book Store has signed a deal with Sony TV to develop their own romance projects based on their close relationships with romance readers and authors!
• Famous authors and their cats. On a related note, I once held a cassette case that belonged to Ray Bradbury, which was used to store fur from one of his deceased cats as a memento. I love to tell that story at parties…
• Which banned book should you read next?
• Luxury Harry Potter gifts for adults. My bank account hates me right now.
• Break out of your reading comfort zone!

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!).

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.

And to make it even easier, I’ve picked a few specific titles that are being released in January 2019. Links direct you to Edelweiss, where you can request a digital advance copy, and nominations are due by November 20th.

• The Far Field – Madhuri Vijay. (January 15, 2019). “An elegant, epic debut nove from an exciting new talent and Pushcart Prize-winner that follows one young woman’s search for a lost figure from her childhood, a journey that takes her from Southern India to Kashmir and to the brink of a devastating political and personal reckoning.”
• The Kingdom of Copper – S.A. Chakraborty (January 22, 2019). “S. A. Chakraborty continues the sweeping adventure begun in The City of Brass, conjuring a world where djinn summon flames with the snap of a finger and waters run deep with old magic; where blood can be dangerous as any spell, and a clever con artist from Cairo will alter the fate of a kingdom.”
• The World According to Fannie Davis – Bridgett M. Davis (January 29, 2019). “Set against the dramatic backdrop of 1960s and 70s Detroit, novelist Bridgett M. Davis’s stirring memoir tells how her ingenious mother used Detroit’s illegal lottery to support her family.”

 

Thanks for hanging out and we’ll see you again in two weeks!

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter. Currently reading The Last Time I Lied by Riley Sager.

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

“Check Your Shelf” is sponsored by LibraryReads.

LibraryReads, the monthly library staff picks list for adult fiction and non-fiction, draws upon the incredible power that public library staff has in helping to build word-of-mouth for new books, and the important role that libraries play in creating audiences for all kinds of authors.

LibraryReads represents collective favorites–the books that staff at public libraries loved reading and cannot wait to share. This is the 5th anniversary year of the LibraryReads list, so visit libraryreads.org to learn more about how you can nominate titles for the monthly list and to see what the organization has in store for the future.

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Libraries & Librarians

• Millions of historic artifacts have been lost in the National Museum fire in Rio.
• A follow-up perspective regarding Tor’s recent embargo on library eBooks.
• A look at the great work being done by Little Free Libraries in Leeds.
• Utah Library Association steps in to help Washington County Library System come up with better policies after the director ordered all LGBTQ+ displays to be taken down during Pride Month.
• Toronto Public Library has a bedtime story hotline!
• New York Public Library is loaning out ties and other business attire accessories for job interviews. THIS IS SO COOL!
• Do you need more evidence that going fines free is the wave of the library future? Here you go.
• Drag Queen Story Hour brings fun and continued protests.
• And amidst the drag queen controversy, a refresher on what libraries are really for.
• For anyone who’s ever wondered about the library on the International Space Station.
• Penn State Libraries are offering a computer programming workshop for female and gender-diverse faculty and staff!
• Instagram tips for librarians.

Book Adaptations in the News

• There’s a Crazy Rich Asians sequel already in the works!
• HBO is adapting Tom Perrotta’s novel, Mrs. Fletcher.
• Showtime is developing a horror series based on Kill Creek by Scott Thomas.
• Dopesick by Beth Macy has been optioned for TV.
• The first Japanese TV series to debut on HBO Go is Miss Sherlock – watch the trailer here!
• Here’s the first teaser trailer for My Brilliant Friend.
• Sarah Waters on the film adaptation of her novel, The Little Stranger.
• A first look at the Netflix series adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House.

Books in the News

• Snoop Dogg is publishing a cookbook called From Crook to Cook. I honestly don’t know what else I need in my life right now.
• 3 new Harry Potter pop up books are coming this October!
• We’ve seen Tolkien’s last posthumously published book.
• The National Coalition Against Censorship has issued a joint statement with a number of organizations condemning President Trump’s litigation threats against Omarosa’s latest book, Unhinged: An Insider’s Account of the Trump White House.

By the Numbers

• Speaking of Unhinged: it sold over 33,000 copies in its first week.
• One report says that as teens spend more time in front of screens, the amount of time spent reading is declining.
• The results from the Romance Writers of America diversity survey have been released…it’s a first step, but there’s a long way to go.
• Male authors are four times more likely to recommend books by men than by women, according to the New York Times’ “By the Book” column.
• Penguin Random House reports a decline in sales & earnings in the first half of the year, but note a double-digit increase in audiobook sales.
• Traditional publishers are selling a LOT more nonfiction titles than fiction.

Award News

• Teens can now vote for the titles featured in YALSA’s annual Top Ten list.
• The shortlist for the Alternative Nobel Prize has been announced.
• But in their coverage of the Alternative Nobel Prize, The Guardian has focused almost exclusively on the male nominees, even though half of the nominees are women.

All Things Comics

• Celebrating female comics artists.
• 10 women-created comics coming out this fall.
• Comic book hairspiration, because librarians are nothing if not trendy! (And nerdy.)
• 10 adorable comic books about love.

Audiophilia

• Downloaded audiobook sales are up by 36.1% in the first half of the year!
• Mysteries & thrillers that are better on audio. (And FYI, Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou & Will Damron is getting a LOT of word-of-mouth buzz from readers. Keep an eye on this one!)
• 10 of the best true crime books on audio. (Again, Bad Blood is on this list!)
• Short nonfiction audiobooks for your next road trip.
• 12 great YA audiobooks from 2018.
• A Robin Miles audiobook for every mood.
• For your readers who don’t want to say goodbye to summer: 8 great poolside audiobooks.
• Southern audiobooks with decent accents.
• 12 own voices middle grade audiobooks.

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• August may be over, but here are 7 new romances for Romance Awareness Month…and the rest of the year!
• 40 books about family secrets.
• Reading pathways for Nova Ren Suma and Catherynne M. Valente.
• From Paste Magazine: The 50 best horror novels of all time. (And just in time for all your Halloween displays!)
• These are the Top 20 books most frequently left behind at hotels.
• 3 books about Aretha Franklin and soul music.
• Nonfiction books about other books.
• Badass women biographies for kids (Just don’t use the word “badass” in any library displays or book lists…).
• 14 books about everyday criminals.
• 50 must-read children’s series.
• YA books about social anxiety.

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• Holy firewhiskey! There’s a Harry Potter-themed mixology class in New York, and they give you a robe and a WiFi wand to activate areas of your workstation, and it sounds AMAZING!
• NPR gives us “Banned Books on the Run.” And now I want a group of librarians to recreate the album cover for Band on the Run, but with everyone reading a different banned book. Who wants to take this on?
• The drama is brewing behind the scenes at Barnes & Noble.
• A first edition of Pride and Prejudice is selling for over $23,000!
• A calendar of book-related holidays – this would be a great display resource!
• Do you get a lot of questions at the Reference Desk about printing directions from Google Maps? Here are 33 Google Map tricks that might help.
• A year of regimented reading.

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!).

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.

And to make it even easier, I’ve picked a few specific titles that are being released in January 2019. Links direct you to Edelweiss, where you can request a digital advance copy, and nominations are due by October 20th.

• An Indefinite Sentence by Siddarth Dube (January 8, 2019). “A revelatory memoir about sex, oppression, and the universal struggle for justice.”
• Lives Laid Away by Stephen Mack Jones (January 8, 2019). “Detroit ex-cop August Snow takes up vigilante justice when his beloved neighborhood of Mexicantown is caught in the crosshairs of a human trafficking scheme.”
• House of Stone by Novuyo Rosa Tshuma (January 29, 2019).  “A masterful, haunting debut set during the tumultuous beginnings of Zimbabwe that explores the creative—and often destructive—act of history-making.”

 

Thanks for hanging out and we’ll see you again in two weeks!

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter. Currently reading Lady Killers: Deadly Women Throughout History by Tori Telfer.

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

“Check Your Shelf” is sponsored by The Last Hours by Minette Walter.

When the Black Death enters England in 1348, no one knows what manner of sickness it is. Fear grips the people as they come to believe that the plague is a punishment for wickedness.

But Lady Anne of Develish has her own ideas. With her brutal husband absent from the manor when news of this pestilence reaches her, she looks for more sensible ways to protect her people than daily confessions of sin. She decides to bring her serfs inside the safety of the moat that surrounds her manor house, then refuses entry to anyone else, even her husband.

The people of Develish are alive. But for how long?

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Libraries & Librarians

• Employees at a Utah library were asked to take down Pride Month-themed displays and staff buttons due to patron complaints, but several librarians are speaking out against the decision.
• New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture purchases missing Malcolm X writings at auction.
• In archiving and information preservation news, US historians are fighting to prevent ICE from destroying records pertaining to the agency’s treatment of immigrants.
• Here’s a really interesting piece on “imperialist charity” and how the library and publishing communities in powerful countries have donated Eurocentric books to rebuild hurricane-damaged children’s libraries in the Carribean.
• Following the controversy surrounding ALA’s revised Meeting Room Policy, the Intellectual Freedom Committee created a Google Form for library community members (including non-ALA members) to suggest language & resources for the policy. The form is open until August 24th.
• Sonali Dev gives the keynote speech at Librarian’s Day at RWA, and in the last 5 minutes, asks librarians to think about how their library’s collections contribute to ongoing issues of racism and discrimination. It’s a message every library employee needs to hear.
• Archaeologists unearth the foundations of Germany’s oldest library.
• Two Kenyan women are working to restore three Nairobi libraries.
• Librarian Thomas Guignard showcases his Creative Commons photography collection of the most beautiful libraries he’s visited.
• Amanda Smithfield, a Nashville school librarian, is teaching incoming freshmen how to engage in constructive discourse about difficult subjects.
• Two library employees are recognized at a Denton (TX) City Council for saving an unconscious man’s life.
• “I don’t remember the title, but the cover was blue”: The New York Public Library has assembled a team of librarian sleuths to track down half-forgotten books. 

Libraries & the 3D Printed Gun Controversy

As more libraries adopt 3D printer technology for their communities, we’re seeing more ethical and safety-related questions about what patrons can and can’t print using library technology. Right now, the focus is on 3D printed guns.

• ALA’s Best Practices for 3D printing in libraries.
• A judge blocks an attempt to post blueprints for 3D guns online.
• Although there are ethical questions surrounding access to information and library technology, many libraries already have rules in place that prevent people from using the printers to create weapons.
• From the Hartford Courant: Can you print a gun at your library? Not likely.

Book Adaptations

• Leads have been cast for Megan Abbott’s psychological thriller, Dare Me.
• The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street by Book Riot’s very own Karina Yan Glaser has been optioned by Amy Poehler’s production company! All the muppet arms!
• Sophie Kinsella’s Can You Keep a Secret? is being adapted for film.
• Updated casting news for All the Bright Places.
• Here’s the full trailer for To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before.
• From a Buick 8 is the latest Stephen King title to be adapted for film, which I’m super excited about! In my Constant Reader’s opinion, this is one of his most underappreciated works.
• Okay, scratch that, there’s been an even newer Stephen King adaptation announced: In the Tall Grass, which was co-written with his son Joe Hill, has been optioned by Netflix.
• Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery is slated for its first film adaptation, which makes me ask, “How the heck has this never been made into a movie before?”
• Apple has secured the rights to develop Min Jin Lee’s novel Pachinko into a new series.
• Slaughterhouse Five is also being turned into a series.

Books in the News

• Bob Woodward announces a new book: Fear: Trump in the White House. If your patrons were eager for Fire and Fury, they’ll probably be placing holds on this book too.
• Tiffany Jackson is writing a new book that she describes as “Notorious meets Weekend at Bernie’s,” which is the best description of anything ever.
• Veronica Roth is writing her first non-YA book.
• Parkland activists are publishing a book in October about preventing gun violence. 
• Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstack, hosts of the mega-popular podcast “My Favorite Murder,” are publishing a book for May 2019! The book will apparently focus on the lives and experiences of the authors, which is a big part of what’s made their podcast so popular.

By the Numbers

• More than a billion people visited public libraries in 2015. Take that, Forbes.
• Barnes & Noble reports a sales increase in books pertaining to anxiety, self-help, and overall happiness. If your library is anything like mine, you have probably also noticed a similar increase in checkouts and patron requests.

Award News

• Nicki Salcedo wrote one of the most poignant responses to Suzanne Brockmann’s speech at the RITAs. Her essay is well worth a read.
• Finalists have been announced for the World Fantasy Awards.

Pop Cultured

• There’s been a lot of recent controversy surrounding WorldCon and the Hugo Awards, and how marginalized science fiction authors have been treated. Here’s a summary of what’s happened so far.
• Buffy’s getting a reboot with a black lead actress and a black female showrunner, but responses have been mixed. Here’s an interesting take.
• 52 great true crime podcasts.
• Get your wands and your time turners ready: All eight Harry Potter films are coming back to the big screen in honor of Harry Potter’s 20th anniversary in the US from August 31st to September 6! (Flashback to me sobbing with my friends in the theaters at the end of the 8th movie, knowing that my initial Harry Potter journey had come to an end. I may or may not have the same reaction 7 years later.)

All Things Comics

• Season 1 of BBC Sherlock gets a manga adaptation.
• Here’s a list of upcoming YA graphic novels through the end of the year – have you ordered these yet for your library?
• Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower is getting its own graphic novel adaptation.
• I hope no one needs to be reminded that comic books count as “real” reading, right?

 Audiophilia

• Audiobooks. Count. As. Real. Reading. Too.
• Michael Lewis has signed a multi-year contract with Audible to write & produce 4 audio-first pieces. 

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• Publishers Weekly’s Most Anticipated Books for Fall 2018.
• International Sherlock Holmes adaptations.
• Here’s a fun romance subgenre: bodyguard romances!
• Black & indigenous writers you should be reading.
• Fiction and nonfiction about space exploration.
• A reading list for midterm elections.
• If you’re not a fan of history, may I suggest this list of microhistories?
• 50 LGBTQ fantasy novels.
• Board books with a plot.
• Alternate universe Filipino romance novels, for your patrons who really want something new!
• 2018 summer reads by women in translation.
• Scary books for kids & teens.
• Underhyped upcoming SFF titles, which means it’s time for librarians to start their book talking engines!
• Best brainy books of the decade.
• “All the world’s a stage”: 50 books about actors & actresses.
• Books about tough topics for kids.

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• It’s never too late to become a reader.
• The massive community of Booktubers gets a profile in the New York Times!
• Goodreads’ blog posts a conversation between Laura Lippman and Alice Bolin (author of Dead Girls: Essays on Surviving an American Obsession) about the “dead girl” trope in crime fiction. Definitely worth a read, especially if you’re looking ahead at possible trends in mystery fiction.
• Vulture has a series of articles and lists about our culture’s fascination with true crime.
• Rick Riordan doesn’t have time for anti-transgender Internet trolls.
• PBS put together this delightful introduction video to the romance genre.
• The rise of fantasy fiction from East Asian authors.
• Is Instagram changing how you (or your patrons) read?
• Harry Potter’s most irresponsible professors.
• I know every book has its reader and we should never judge anyone’s reading tastes. That being said, I really hope Bigfoot erotica does not become the latest book trend.
• Are all those Goodreads update emails helpful or harmful when it comes to your reading life?
• The ins and outs of Kindle Unlimited.

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!).

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.

And to make it even easier, I’ve picked a few specific titles that are being released in November 2018. Links direct you to Edelweiss, where you can request a digital advance copy, and nominations are due by September 20th.

• My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite. (November 20, 2018) “A short, darkly funny, hand grenade of a novel about a Nigerian woman whose younger sister has a very inconvenient habit of killing her boyfriends.”
• Newcomer by Keigo Higashino. (November 20, 2018) “A new case from internationally bestselling Keigo Higashino —newly transferred Tokyo Police Detective Kyochiro Kaga is assigned to a baffling murder, where nearly all the people living and working in the district have a motive.”
• How Long ’til Black Future Month?: Stories by N.K. Jemisin (November 27, 2018) “Hugo award-winning and New York Times bestselling author N. K. Jemisin sharply examines modern society in her first short story collection.”

Thanks for hanging out and we’ll see you again in two weeks!

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter. Currently reading An Extraordinary Union by Alyssa Cole.

 

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

Check Your Shelf is sponsored by Libby, the one-tap reading app from OverDrive.

Whether you’re traveling around the world or relaxing on your couch this summer, Libby, the one-tap reading app from OverDrive will make sure you always have a good book with you. Instantly access thousands of eBooks and audiobooks for free from your library in just one-tap. Thanks to Libby and your library no matter what time it is or where you are, you’ll always have instant access to your next great reading adventure.

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Libraries & Librarians

• Bartow County, Georgia residents can check out State Park Passes that give them free parking and admission to state parks and historic sites!
• The eBooks Minnesota program offers access to 4,000 eBooks to state residents, even if they don’t have a library card.
• How libraries can help migrant children, with an accompanying book list
• Anonymous graffiti artist Banksy offers support to keep Bristol’s 27 libraries open.
• Fargo Public Library is joining a growing wave of libraries by eliminating late fees for children’s books.
• How to create a classroom library.

Response to ALA’s Meeting Room Policy Interpretation

• ALA very recently updated “Meeting Rooms: An Interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights” to explicitly state that if libraries provide study spaces for public use, they cannot refuse room space to hate groups. I have lots of thoughts about this, many of them angry.
• Many other librarians have shared similarly angry thoughts, including this Twitter thread by librarian Tyler Vachoff.
• The Office of Intellectual Freedom responded to the backlash with this press release.
• Which prompted even more angry responses from librarians.
• If you have thoughts about this (and I bet a lot of you do), you can check out this handy resource created by several librarians on Twitter – it has contact information and email scripts for your ALA leaders and representatives.
• And Rioter Beth O’Brien wrote last year about why neutrality in the library is bullsh*t.

Book Adaptations

• Megan Abbott has not one but TWO books simultaneously optioned for adaptation: You Will Know Me and Give Me Your Hand.
• Netflix is adapting Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie as a TV series.
• Greta Gerwig is following up Ladybird with her own adaptation of Little Women, starring Meryl Streep, Emma Stone, and Saoirse Ronan.
• Check out the first trailer for the Discovery of Witches TV series!
• Oprah casually mentioned on Twitter that she’s producing a film version of An American Marriage by Tayari Jones.
• Here’s a trailer for The Miseducation of Cameron Post.

Books in the News

• Look for a new biography of the late and sorely missed Anthony Bourdain, coming next year.
• Reese Witherspoon picks Next Year in Havana by Chanel Cleeton for her July book club pick.
• Meanwhile, Emma Watson’s book club will be reading its first poetry collection: Milk & Honey by Rupi Kaur.
• South Carolina police object to the inclusion of The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas and All American Boys by Jason Reynolds on local high school reading lists, saying that these books foster anti-police attitudes in teens. Now, I’m no expert, but this seems like a major professional overstep.
• Children of Blood and Bone has been picked as the first book for the Tonight Show Book Club!

By the Numbers

• Print sales are up by 2% in the first half of 2018!
• And on the other end of the spectrum, pleasure reading is apparently at an all-time low in the United States.
• 4 Houston schools receive 27,000 books to restock the libraries that were damaged by Hurricane Harvey.

Award News

• James LaRue, the Director for ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, offers his own perspective on the name change to the (former) Laura Ingalls Wilder Award.
• A group of Swedish authors, actors, and journalists have come together to award an alternative Nobel prize for literature. This comes after the Swedish Academy postponed this year’s prize following allegations of sexual assault within the Academy.

Pop Cultured

• Gone Fishing is a new true crime podcast for all of your crime-solving patrons.
• Expect to see more literary writers in the TV studio.

All Things Comics

• First novels, and now graphic novels! Stranger Things is getting the comics treatment from Dark Horse.
• Steve Ditko, creator of Squirrel Girl and co-creator of Spider Man, passes away at age 90.
• ALA approves a new Graphic Novel Roundtable, which will hopefully mean lots of new graphic novel resources, reading lists, and awards created by librarians, for librarians.
• 7 sexy comics that put the “graphic” in graphic novels.
• 10 short graphic novels & memoirs to read in one sitting.

Audiophilia

• 35 of the best fantasy audiobooks and series.
• Soothing audiobooks to help you fall asleep.

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• Our list of the best books of 2018 so far!
• 20 (yes, 20) dragon shifter romances.
• If you’re new to the grimdark (dark fantasy) subgenre, here are 20 books to get you started.
• Publisher’s Weekly highlights promising debut novels for Fall 2018.
• Book Riot rounded up a bunch of posts about immigrants and the immigrant experience. Consider this your all-in-one resource on an extremely important topic.
• 6 transgender novels written by transgender authors.
• Books about Central America.
• A reading pathway for Tiffany Reisz’s super-intense romance novels.
• 50 must-read books about music.
• Whether you’re into clothes, amigurumi, or fancy granny squares, we’ve got a crochet book suited just for you!
• 50 classic memoirs written by authors of color.
• What is gothic fiction?
• Native American poets you should familiarize yourself with.
• 40 award-winning YA books to keep in your back pocket (and your front pocket). Basically all the pockets.
• I don’t watch soccer, but I bet your patrons do! Here’s a list of books to keep your World Cup readers happy.
• 10 middle grade book about the pioneer life (that aren’t Little House on the Prairie).

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• Why aren’t schools teaching black literature?
• Demos Parneros, Barnes & Noble CEO, has been fired for violating unspecified company policies.
• Goodreads users vote on their picks for the modern “Great American Novelist” – see the results, along with the authors’ most popular books.
• Two interesting posts about the lack of diversity in historical romance.
• How one reader uses her library’s holds list to manage her reading schedule.
• Space-saving bookshelves ftw.
• Do you like bookends? Do you like Harry Potter? How about a list dedicated solely to Harry Potter bookends??
• University of Southern Denmark discovered three poisonous books in its collection.
• A small-town Connecticut restaurant gives away free books to every diner!
• Why were mice so darned popular in 90’s children’s books? Bustle investigates.
• Which literary cat are you??

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!).

Last month, Kelly put together a reference guide for finding these books, along with a database of titles and publication dates to make reading and highlighting these books as easy as can be. Your only work is to read them and talk about them.

There is literally no excuse. Nominations for titles on the October list need to be submitted by August 20. Here are a couple suggestions to get you started:

• Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice. “Moon of the Crusted Snow imagines a small community on the precipice of winter without power or communication where leaders must grapple with control, restore order, and save their people from a grave fate.”
• The Lady Killer by Masako Togawa; translated by Simon Grove. “The Lady Killer leads a double life in the shadow world of Tokyo’s singles bars and nightclubs. By day a devoted husband and hard worker, by night he cruises nightclubs cafes and cinemas in search of lonely single women to seduce. But now the hunter is being hunted, and in his wake lies a trail of gruesome murders. Who is the culprit? The answer lies tangled in a web of clues, and to find it he must accept that nothing is what it seems.”
• White Dancing Elephants by Chaya Bhuvaneswar. “In sixteen remarkable stories, Chaya Bhuvaneswar spotlights diverse women of color—cunning, bold, and resolute—facing sexual harassment and racial violence, and occasionally inflicting that violence on each other.”

____________________

Thanks for hanging out and we’ll see you again in two weeks!

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter. Currently reading Hope Never Dies by Andrew Shaffer.

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

“Check Your Shelf” is sponsored by Dream Country by Shannon Gibney.

A story across countries, generations, and time, Dream Country follows one single African-and-American family pursuing an elusive dream of freedom from Liberia to America back. Told in five different sections, Shannon Gibney spins a riveting tale of the nightmarish spiral of death and exile connecting America and Africa, and of how one determined young dreamer tries to break free and gain control of her destiny.

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Before we dive in…

If you’re attending ALA in New Orleans next week, hop by the Networking Uncommons Saturday morning, June 23, between 8:30 and 9:00 AM. Kelly will be there and wants your input on how Book Riot can better serve librarians. Bring ideas and suggestions for what we might do to make your work even better and easier.

Libraries & Librarians

• Here’s a wrap-up from Book Expo 2018, if you weren’t able to make it this year.
• Grappling with Dewey’s history of sexual harassment in the era of #MeToo.
• The Library of Congress acquires its largest-ever donation of comic books.
• A librarian’s top 5 tips for creating the ultimate home library. Great suggestions for cramming even more shelves into your home!
• 3 Scotland schools are piloting a staffing model that will use students and volunteers to staff school libraries rather than trained library professionals. Parents, teachers, and librarians are not happy.
• A librarian in Hong Kong was accused of tampering with patron accounts & locating their personal information to expedite the return of books she really wanted to read. Please don’t try this at home.
• These Portuguese libraries are infested with bats, but it’s totally cool because bats eat manuscript-destroying bugs! Also the article refers to bats as “flittermice” and that’s now what I’m going to call bats from now on.

Book Adaptations in the News

• Universal options Catherynne M. Valente’s latest novel, Space Opera, with plans to turn it into a music-themed film.
• Joe Hill’s Locke and Key is coming to Netflix!
• 13 Reasons Why is renewed for its third season.
• Donald Glover playing Willy Wonka? Now there’s an adaptation I’d really want to see!
• HBO orders a Game of Thrones prequel, co-created by George R.R. Martin, who I think is either a) actively looking for reasons not to finish the next book in the GoT series or b) having fun trolling his fans. Either way, more GoT universe coming your way!
• Amazon orders limited series based on Colson Whitehead’s award-winning novel, The Underground Railroad. Barry Jenkins (Moonlight) set to direct all 11 episodes.
• FX adapting Victor LaValle’s creepy novel, The Changeling.

Books in the News

• Rainbow Rowell announces a new book for 2020 on Instagram. Start pre-ordering now! (Just kidding…sort of…)
• In other preordering news, J.K. Rowling says that she’ll write a new children’s book after finishing the screenplay for Fantastic Beasts 3.
• Michael Wolf is writing a follow-up to Fire and Fury.
• Laurie Halse Anderson announces Shout, a new book about her own experiences with sexual assault and the reader reactions to Speak that she’s received over the last 20 years.
• Oprah picks her next book club title: The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row by Anthony Ray Hinton.

By the Numbers

• Poetry readers in the US have nearly doubled in the last five years. And when you consider how long it’s been since you’ve seen a copy of Milk and Honey on the shelf, this isn’t all that surprising…
• James Patterson & Bill Clinton’s novel, The President is Missing, has sold 250,000 copies in its first week.

Award News

• 2018 Best Translated Book winners.
• Kamila Shamsie wins the 2018 Women’s Prize for Fiction!
• Lambda Literary Awards announced. This is a great resource for Pride Month, but more importantly, it’s a great checklist of books you should be ordering for for your library.
• 2018 Bisexual Book Award winners.

Pop Cultured

• Stranger Things books are coming this fall and Gwenda Bond is set to write the first one!
• In Other Words, the feminist bookstore made famous by Portlandia’s bookstore Women & Women First, is closing its doors.

All Things Comics

• Never fear, comics newbies – here’s a syllabus to get you (and me) started!
• A librarian talks about the best manga from Shigero Mizuki.
• Recent comics about refugee experiences.

Audiophilia

• 5 YA audiobooks with multiple narrators.
• Or how about some award-winning YA audiobooks?
• This will keep your avid listeners (and you!) busy: 50 nonfiction audiobooks under 10 hours.
• And because we don’t want to leave anyone out, here are 50 fiction audiobooks under 10 hours. These two lists would make for a fun display!
• The best mystery audiobooks for road trips.

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• It’s not too late to put up a Pride display for your YA readers! Here’s a list of 100 LGBTQIA YA novels to get you started.
• 7 must-read YA novels about coming out.
• YA novels with asexual protagonists.
• 50 must-read books about LGBTQ+ history.
• For your romance-reading patrons: 50 military romance novels.
• 10 great books about weddings, just in time for wedding season!
• 13 soccer books for your favorite young World Cup viewers.
• 10 of the best YA feminist fantasy novels of 2018.
• The summer’s best foreign novels, as chosen by Vanity Fair.
• The ultimate summer book preview from LitHub! Which books are being featured on the most lists?
• Upcoming releases by authors of color, as seen at BEA.

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• Simon & Schuster created a voice-activated app to help you figure out which Stephen King novels you’re most likely to enjoy.
• Weird literary relics that people spent beaucoup bucks on.
• #cockygate drama continues, and I can’t believe that’s a real sentence I just typed.
• The health benefits of reading just keep stacking up – now they think reading may actually prevent dementia.
• How to set up book news alerts. Librarians, if you need to up your newsfeed game, here’s a great way to do it!
• Why you should always read the acknowledgements.
• No, your book is not a “guilty pleasure” just because you’re a woman.

Level Up

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!). inks here will direct to Edelweiss digital review copies. These books hit shelves in September, giving you plenty of time to read and nominate by July 20th.

And to help librarians find more diverse titles for Library Reads, Kelly put together this awesome database & reference guide with a list of upcoming diverse books. No more excuses, fellow librarians. Time to diversify our reading suggestions.

• Always Another Country by Sisonke Msimang. “An intimate story of exile and homecoming by the South African author whose TED Talk touched millions.”
• I Should Have Honor: A Memoir of Hope and Pride in Pakistan by Khalida Brohi. “A fearless memoir about tribal life in Pakistan—and the act of violence that inspired one ambitious young woman to pursue a life of activism and female empowerment.”
• Washington Black by Esi Edugyan. “From the author of the award-winning international best seller Half-Blood Blues comes a dazzling new novel, about a boy who rises from the ashes of slavery to become a free man of the world.”

 

Thanks for hanging out! We’ll see you back here in two weeks with another edition of Check Your Shelf.

 

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter

Currently reading The Witch Elm by Tana French.

 

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

Check Your Shelf is sponsored by Bas Bleu Books and Gifts.

Whether you’re a career librarian or simply a lifelong library patron, you can proudly wear your passion for books, card catalogs, and the Dewey Decimal system on your sleeve—er, your lapel—with our Library Enamel Pins. Modeled after a classic yellow library checkout card and a library date stamp, these bibliophilic accessories may be diminutive (each measures about ½”x1″), but they proclaim big love for books when pinned to your jacket, sweater, tote bag, or cap.

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Libraries & Librarians

• 5-year-old Ulysses Stoutenburg raised $100 for the York County (PA) libraries by selling lemonade. Way to go, Ulysses! (The York County government had voted to cut $300,000 from the county library budget.)
• US prison officials rescind a policy that would have made it much harder for inmates to receive books while incarcerated.
• In recognition of Mental Health Month, the Association of Specialized and Cooperative Library Agencies (ASCLA) has an updated mental health toolkit to help make your library a welcoming and accessible space for people who experience mental illness.
• Adulting-101 classes at the public library. (Sign me up for any class about basic sewing skills!)
• Avengers: Infinity War-themed Little Free Libraries coming to a city near you!

#MeToo Updates

(Content warning for sexual assault and sexual harassment)

• Multiple authors, including Zinzi Clemmons, accuse Junot Diaz of sexual assault.
• More publishers are starting to include morality clauses in their author contracts.

Book Adaptations In the News

• Fox is adapting Justin Cronin’s The Passage as a TV series.
• How about a TV series based on The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho?
• Looking for Alaska is coming to Hulu.
• Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 3 is in the works.
• A Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue is coming to the big screen!
• And finally, an interesting post about why we’re still watching The Handmaid’s Tale even though it’s legitimately terrifying.

Books in the News

• Parents and school administrators are divided over this year’s Oregon Battle of the Books, which includes the title George by Alex Gino, a middle grade novel about a transgender girl. The OBOB committee, however, plans to include George as a title for next year’s battle.
• Ronan Farrow expanding on his groundbreaking reports of sexual abuse with a new book, Catch and Kill.
• Kit Rocha (aka Donna Herren & Bree Bridges) has a new series coming out called The Silver Devils, which is pitched as Orphan Black meets The Avengers, but with mercenary librarians. (Everyone needs to get this series on their radar immediately!)
• Tomi Adeyemi announces her second book, Children of Virtue and Vengeance, out in 2019!
• Chelsea Clinton is writing a book for young activists called Start Now!
• New covers and bonus content for the 10th anniversary of The Hunger Games, and I can’t believe it’s already been 10 years since that book was published.
• Scott Westerfeld is doing a spinoff series for The Uglies.

By the Numbers

• The Cooperative Children’s Book Center (CCBC) released its stats on the number of children’s books by and about people of color published in 2017. Good news: the number of diverse books is increasing. Bad news: the number of those books written by Black, Latinx, and Native American children’s authors combined is only 7%.
• The future of Barnes & Noble is in trouble.
• eBook sales fall 10% in 2017.

Award News

• The 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature is being postponed as the Swedish Academy deals with sexual assault allegations.
• The 2018 Agatha Award winners announced, including Hollywood Homicide by Kellye Garrett!
• Nominees for the 2018 Anthony Awards have been announced.
• Bi Writers Association announces the finalists for the 6th annual Bisexual Book Awards.
• Check out the winners of the 2018 Indies Choice Awards!

Pop Cultured

• 14 amazing Wonder Woman tattoos.
• Justina Ireland is writing a Star Wars novel. Um, yes please!
• YA reading recommendations based on your favorite Marvel Cinematic Universe movies.

All Things Comics

• The multiple stages of comic book obsession.
• If you have gamers at your library, try some of these Dungeon & Dragon-themed comics on them!
• 50 must-read webcomics.
• Comics that really need to be turned into video games.
• Nancy Drew gets a queer, intersectional graphic novel makeover!

Audiophilia

• Audiobooks are good for your mental health. I’ll take “News I Already Knew” for 200, Alex!
• Benedict Cumberbatch set to narrate Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, and now I suddenly want to give this high-school-required-reading another shot!

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• Fantasy & science fiction book club suggestions.
• In celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage month, a list of romance novels written by AAPI authors.
• A reading pathway for Robyn Carr’s novels.
• Latina authors to read in the wake of the Junot Diaz accusations.
• And more Latinx authors you really need to be reading right now.
• Best feminist baby books!
• Are you a romance newbie? Check out this list of must-read romance authors and their best books to get you started.
• The best cross-stitch books for all you crafty librarians!
• 50 must-read Canadian children’s & YA books.
• YA titles about teen depression.
• More YA! How about a list of 50 young adult mysteries?
• Book Riot readers’ favorite works of political satire.
• 40 favorite books about dogs. 12/10, would read them all.
• A primer on climate fiction (or cli-fi, if you really want to abbreviate it).
• If you’re caught up on all of your podcasts, try some of these true crime books!

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• There’s a gateway to Hogwarts along the Blue Line in Chicago! (Who knew?)
• Romance author Faleena Hopkins has trademarked the word “cocky” and sent cease and desist letters to all authors using that word in their titles. Courtney Milan gives a summary of the situation on Twitter and the RWA is investigating.
• Do you have a book-buying problem? (Trick question – there’s no such thing.)
• Follow along as the Fab Five try to make over classic male literary characters in Queer Eye for the Classics Guy!
• An interview with Rebekah Weatherspoon, the creator of the website/online community, WOCinRomance (Women of Color in Romance).
• Serialized reading is making a 21st century comeback.
• The oldest cookbooks from libraries around the world.

Level Up (Library Reads)

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!). Links here will direct to Edelweiss digital review copies. These books hit shelves in August, giving you plenty of time to read and nominate by June 20th.

• Don’t Send Flowers by Martin Solares. “A twisty, darkly captivating novel about a police detective hired to investigate the disappearance of a rich businessman’s daughter several years after rampant corruption forced him to retire and made him a target of everyone still on the force in cartel-controlled, northern Mexico.”
• A River of Stars by Vanessa Hua. “A powerful debut novel of motherhood, immigration, and identity, about a Chinese woman who makes her way to California to give her baby U.S. citizenship, and whose harrowing yet heart-warming journey redefines what it means to be an American.”
• Love Interrupted by Reneilwe Malatji. “A diverse chorus of female voices recount misadventures with love, husbands, and in-laws. A collection of short fiction from South Africa.”

 

Thanks for hanging out! We’ll see you back here in two weeks with another edition of Check Your Shelf.

 

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter

Welcome to Check Your Shelf! This is your guide to all things book talk worth knowing to help librarians like you up your game when it comes to doing your job (& rocking it).

“Check Your Shelf” is sponsored by Automated Books, publisher of Divining Another Dream and creator of Google Play App Multiplicity.

Nine-year-old Laiza Wendel can’t remember anything because her memory consists only of events in her future. But for her, the future suddenly begins to look… short. She believes it means she will die soon, but she can’t see how. Her teacher and friends want to help her overcome her new and unusual fear of getting hurt, but Laiza knows that they can’t help unless she shares the secret about how she sees. Will she be able to determine what’s wrong before her world falls apart?

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Libraries & Librarians

• American Institute of Architects & ALA recognize achievement in library design with the Library Building Awards. (Field trip, anyone?)
• How do your patrons keep track of books they’ve already read? One librarian solves the mystery…
• The Fantastic Library in Wetzlar, Germany uses science fiction to help companies predict the economic and technological future.

Book Adaptations in the News

• The Cormoran Strike TV series comes to Cinemax this summer!
• Check out the first full length trailer for HBO’s Fahrenheit 451!
• HBO has also ordered a docuseries based on Michelle McNamara’s best-selling true crime book, I’ll Be Gone in the Dark.
• A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas is coming to the big screen.
• AMC orders a 10 episode miniseries of Joe Hill’s NOS4A2
• Do you love movies about outrageously huge sharks? Steve Alten’s bestseller, Meg, is being made into a movie. Yes, there is a trailer.

Books in the News

• Tana French has a new standalone novel coming out October 9th!! THIS IS NOT A DRILL!
• JK Rowling (er…Robert Galbraith) has finished writing the latest Cormoran Strike novel, Lethal White. No update on a release date yet.
• Ann Leckie announces a new fantasy series. Check out the cover release for the first book, The Raven Tower.
• After revealing her bipolar diagnosis, Mariah Carey announces she his writing a memoir.
• The massively informative Our Bodies, Ourselves will no longer be published.
• Cassandra Clare’s latest (self-published) book, Son of the Dawn, was temporarily de-listed on Amazon because of suspected fraudulent behavior. (Specifically, Amazon did not believe that an author of Clare’s fame would willingly self-publish a book.)

Race and the RWA

Over the last few weeks, there has been a significant amount of discussion around the Romance Writers of America, the RITA Awards, and the lack of inclusivity for authors of color.

• Read the official statement from the RWA addressing the lack of Black representation in the list of RITA Awards nominees.
• Smart Bitches, Trashy Books responds to the RWA statement.
• Courtney Milan, Piper Hughley, and Barbara Ferrer share their thoughts and experiences about being being a romance author of color.
• A romance reader and reviewer talks about the purpose and structure of the RITA Awards.

By the Numbers

• Black-owned independent book stores are on the rise.
• Qatar National Library opens with 1 million books on the shelves.

Award News

• The 2018 Pulitzer Prize winners have been announced!
• Check out the Man Booker International Prize shortlist.
• On a similar note, the longlist for the 2018 Best Translated Book Awards has also been released.
• And if the thought of trying to keep up with so many amazing books during awards season fills you with dread and shame…you’re not alone.

All Things Comics

• Boom! Studios plans its first original Lumberjanes graphic novel. (Great news for all you hardcore lady types out there!)
• 10 NSFW comics you may not want to read at the circulation desk.
• 18 science fiction/fantasy graphic novels sans superheroes, for anyone who’s exhausted just thinking about the upcoming Avengers movie.
• 50 must-read middle grade graphic novels.

Audiophilia

• A short list of erotic audiobooks that you may want to save for solo car trips. *ahem*
• Audible.com has…a horse in the Kentucky Derby?
• 11 business audiobooks for managers and entrepreneurs.

Book Lists, Book Lists, Book Lists

• 6 culinary murder mysteries.
• YA books about divorce.
• How about a list of bilingual board books? (Yep, even your board book collection needs to be diverse.)
• Books about the women of Golden Age Hollywood musicals.
• 50 must-read plays by women.
• Books for fans of Greek and Roman mythology.
• Readalikes for Donna Tartt’s The Secret History.
• 34 page-turners for your summer reading TBR!
• Animal fiction for adult readers.
• 15 WoC poets for National Poetry Month (or any month, really).

Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous

• Mourning the loss of crime fiction author Philip Kerr and literary novelist Anita Shreve.
• These 1923 copyrighted works will enter the public domain in 2019.
• How do you predict a best-seller?
• New Harry Potter covers are being released for the 20th anniversary of the series’ US publication. You may not need to order them for your library’s collection, but they’d look mighty fine in your personal collection…
• Best home library furniture.

Level Up

Do you take part in LibraryReads, the monthly list of best books selected by librarians only? Whether or not you read and nominate titles, we’ll end every newsletter with a few upcoming titles worth reading and sharing (and nominating for LibraryReads, if you so choose!). Links here will direct to Edelweiss digital review copies. These books hit shelves in July, giving you plenty of time to read and nominate by May 20th.

• It All Falls Down by Sheena Kamal (July 3, 2018): Nora Watts, who was introduced in Kamal’s earlier book The Lost Ones, travels from the Canadian Pacific Northwest to Detroit in search of the truth about her dead father.
• Crux: A Cross-Border Memoir by Jean Guerrero (July 17, 2018): The haunting story of the author’s quest to understand her charismatic and self-destructive father, as he crosses from Mexico to California and battles with his internal demons.
• The Incendiaries by R.O. Kwon (July 31, 2018): A young Korean-American woman at a prestigious American university is drawn into acts of domestic terrorism by a group with ties to North Korea.

 

Thanks for hanging out! We’ll see you back here in two weeks with another edition of Check Your Shelf.

–Katie McLain, @kt_librarylady on Twitter

Currently reading Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer