After finishing two "projects" back-to-back, I wanted something a little lighter. And I had just the thing: The First Assistant, by Clare Naylor and Mimi Hare. I read the original right around this time last year. In re-reading that post, I was a little surprised at all I had to say about chick lit ...

After I finished Helen of Troy two weeks ago, I went to the library. I was following up two excellent suggestions from my sister, but as neither of them were in stock, I proceded to rampage through the stacks like a drunken sailor (or drunken English major at least), checking out books as lofty as T...

Tomorrow and Tuesday are the American Association of Museums' annual Museum Advocacy Days. This year, the need is especially urgent as zoos and aquariums have been barred from competing for economic stimulus funding, history and art museums were nearly excluded, and museums nationwide have been feel...

This week's Booking Through Thursday: I recently got new bookshelves for my room, and I’m just loving them. Spent the afternoon putting up my books and sharing it on my blog . One of my friends asked a question and I thought it would be a great BTT question. So from Tina & myself, we’d like to k...

I finished the wonderful Helen of Troy by Margaret George a couple of days ago. Reading the afterword was pretty embarrassing, though. Did you know that there's no evidence that any of that really happened? That's right, all my concerns about the story not being historically accurate were misplaced....

The flea market in the summer has its good weeks and bad weeks. Sometimes, it's table after table of crap they couldn't pay you to take. Other times, you have to make several trips back to the car because of all the great stuff you've gotten, and later on, you can't quite believe your luck. On the s...

I was attracted to The Archivist's Story by Travis Holland because of the title. Museum and archive people are invisible to the average person. Most people who visit museums and archives aren't aware that the institution's entire collection is not on display, nor that there's a tracking and storage ...

Today's Booking Through Thursday is a bit different, more discussion-oriented and less of everyone putting forth their individual ideas. And it's all about the future of the book. I am in my early thirties. And already, I've seen a fair number of things come and go. I remember floppy disks that actu...

There is something odd about Ann Brashares' first adult novel, The Last Summer (of You & Me), and I figured out what it was about a quarter of the way through. It's not just the title, which makes you wonder which of the three main characters (sisters Alice and Riley and their beachhouse neighbor Pa...

I've talked before about how difficult it can be to pull off a good historical novel. It's even harder when the novel has a broad scope: when you're talking an entire lifetime, for example. It's easy to contort your characters into trying to hit all the major newsworthy events. So, it's to Laurie Gr...