Mark's Book Blog: Fun Little Post

Saturday, January 1, 2011

Fun Little Post - HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Just a fun little post on some of my favorite book blogs.

Lots of people love GoodReads. GoodReads is a great book social network and recommendation clearinghouse. Lots of recommendations, plus you can keep track of what you and other subscribers are reading and have on their reading lists. Arguably the best book recommendation blogs.

Omnivoracious is Amazon's book blog. Some great features including a compendium of weekend book reviews (from the New York Times, Washington Post, etc.), highlights on different types of newly-released books (including Graphic Novel Friday) and up-to-date reports on book award nominations and winners.

Always the equal opportunity guy, Barnes and Noble Review is also worth a look. I particularly enjoy the weekly emails that arrive on Friday. The site contains reviews, lists and articles regarding new and upcoming book releases. Also, like Five Books below, B&N also has posts of five books on all types of subjects from wine to Mark Twain to skyscrapers.

I really like Books on the Nightstand. I download the podcasts from iTunes and listen to them when I run. Two book lovers with different tastes host 20-30 minute podcasts on different types of books. They do a few shows at year end on holiday gift ideas. They're not hyper-technical (take a pass on the podcast "comparing" different e-readers) or hyper-intellectual. They are also excellent on kids' books.

A good friend steered me towards Five Books. Each day, the site's editors interview a renowned authority who discusses his or her area of expertise and provides their choice of the best five books to read. Often, the recommended books are on a particular topic (science fiction, books about cooking, etc.). A nice bite-sized blog.

If you like mysteries, check out Partners and Crime. The site is for an independent bookstore in Greenwich Village and has recommendations for the "top crime novels," as well as reviews of first novels and other information for the reader and book collector.

Really love McSweeney's (link to About McSweeney's Page). Founded by Dave Eggers (Zeitoun, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius), McSweeney's publishes books and literary magazines. I found McSweeney's as the publisher of The Instructions. Not a whole lot of free content but some otherwise great information.

Modern Library has a bunch of Top 100 polls and specializes on the best fiction and non-fiction in history. The site specializes on information about truly historical works.

I am always looking for fun blogs, so please forward any that you frequent.

Live long, read and prosper. We'll leave the lights on for you.

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Mark's Book Blog

Welcome to Mark's Book Blog!

Why did I set this up? Several reasons.

1. I'm constantly asked for book recommendations. I often cannot remember what I've read recently and, consequently, struggle for a recommendation. This will keep me up to date.

2. We're all busy. Sometimes I forget what I liked and what I didn't like about a book I read a month or two ago. As a result, this blog commits me to memorialize a book shortly after reading the book.

3. I, too, want book recommendations from those I trust (so I may or may not read your recommendation). From this blog, you can see what I've liked--you may not like my taste, may never come back to the blog--that's ok. If, though, you like some or all of what I like, tell me. And, more importantly, tell me what else I'd like!

Here's my recommendation scale--I will rate all books I read (subject to my ability to rate a book that I stop reading for good reason). The recommendation scale has gone through many iterations since inception of the blog and is effective for all books recommended on or after December 29, 2009. For the recommendation scale applicable to books recommended prior to that time, go here.

This blog uses a "grading" system. In order to accomplish the blog's goal of "recommending" books, the grading scale works out like this:

A - Highly recommended

B - Recommended

C - OK, you might like it

D - A waste of time

F - A HUGE waste of time

If a book, let's say it's a sports-themed, non-fiction book, earns a recommendation in the "A" range, the blog post will note that the book is "Highly recommended for fans of [we'll just insert the sport of tonsil hockey here as a placeholder]." In other words, even an "A" recommendation may not be a book that I suggest you read. It depends on your tastes. Certainly some books in the "A" range will be recommended to all.

One other note. I am generally a stickler for grammar and punctuation (for using made-up words like "stickler," not so much). As I've stated in various posts, I am well aware that this blog does not utilize the well-established "underline book titles" convention. There are some places where book titles are in quotes. There are other places where book titles are merely capitalized. While I apologize in advance for being such a heathen as to ignore this convention, it bothers me. It really does. This is the kind of stuff that keeps me up nights. Seriously. I decided, however, about 50 posts in that I would make the lack of consistency in the identification of book titles the consistency for the site. Therefore and henceforth, I will utilize whatever convention I want in any willy nilly fashion I see fit.

Mark

Mark's Book Blog

Saturday, January 1, 2011

Fun Little Post - HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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Mark's Book Blog

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