(My NaNo wordcount: 33572)
At last, another bookbits! I’ve technically been on vacation the last two weeks (ha!), which is why this comes a full two weeks after the last one (and it doesn’t even include all the news from the past five days, since that would make for an overlong post and I still have 1667 words to write on my own Next Bestseller)(to be continued, I believe the term is). I’ll start with a very late (no pun intended) news flash that came in about half an hour after I clicked on Publish for the last one:
Michael Crichton died on November 4th, at age 66, from throat cancer. I doubt you don’t know the man, for surely you’ve heard of (if not necessarily read) Jurassic Park, The Andromeda Strain, and ER? One novel is still set to be published posthumously, probably in March 2009 (no title as yet).
- Awards! The World Fantasy Awards were announced in the first week of November. Guy Gavriel Kay won Best Novel for Ysabel. Click here for the full list (there are so many I can’t list them singly here, sorry!). The winners of the National Best Books 2008 Awards were announced also, and since these are determined by subject, I’ll also just give you the link… And finally, the 2008 Dylan Thomas Prize for Young Writers for was won by Nam Le for his short story collection The Boat.
The Guardian copied Bookninja’s cover redesign (or rather rebranding) competition, and here are their results.
- Quiz! (I do love these don’t I…) Also a bit out of date, but nonetheless fun: the Presidents of American Literature Quiz, by the Guardian, of course. I scored 8 out of 14, and I should have known the one about Carter Beats the Devil because I loved that book!
- Since I just had a stay-at-home vacation-of-sorts, I couldn’t resist this link featuring many “trouble travel” books: books about hotel rooms with bugs, sight-seeing tours dominated by the stench of nearby farms, and many a food poisoning. I imagine they would be lovely to read on your comfy couch, with a blanket over your lap and nibbling a chocolate Sinterklaas letter!