Book News: Pottermore, the Shelf Pod, Father's Day Reading, and Used Bookstores

I know this is surprising, but there are actually book blogs and websites that do a weekly book news post -- like, real ones. By the Wall Street Journal and such. But I know you like mine the best, because I leave in the interesting and leave out the boring. But The New Yorker's The Book Bench does an excellent job of wrapping each day, so I have to give them credit for alerting me to a couple of links this week:

• It's been all over the place, but Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling launched a new website this week called Pottermore, and Potter fans went crazy wondering what's coming (via The Hollywood Reporter). Entertainment Weekly linked to a YouTube account that shows a countdown to the big announcement.
• A fantastic op-ed piece from the Washington Post details the writer's struggles with biblio-amnesia -- you know, the state of not remembering what you read. I suffer from this on an extreme level; although I don't want to re-read anything (ever), I never remember character names or details just days after finishing a book.
• I love the NBC comedy Parks and Recreation, and this fall a book "written" by fictional character Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler's character) will hit shelves, detailing all the secrets of small-town Pawnee. It's sure to be funny, as The Hollywood Report, well... reported.
• Possibly the coolest house for book-lovers in the world, a home has been created in Japan in which all the walls are shelves, called the Shelf Pod.

The Guardian offered up a list of the 100 best non-fiction books this week, and then more than 500 commenters added to it. Check it out if you are either a non-fiction fan or looking to read more from this genre.






Daddy and Mom, this week @ the beach



NPR's Three Books... series focuses on fathers this week in  preparation for Father's Day this Sunday. I have, hands down, the best father of all time. Just ask anyone -- he never makes an enemy, and everybody loves him. USA Today reviewed The Reading Promise, a memoir by a woman whose father read to her every night for nine years. My daddy didn't do that, but he fostered my love of reading in other ways -- one of my best reading memories is when he brought me home a robin's egg blue clip-on reading light (for the side of my bunk bed) and a copy of the Nancy Drew mystery Trouble in Tahiti.

My favorite book store is a used one, McKay's Used Books with locations across Tennessee (Chattanooga, Knoxville, and Nashville). This week the LA Times spotlighted used book store the Last Bookstore in downtown L.A. which moved into a 10,000 square foot space recently, defying recent trends in which brick and mortar bookstores have been closing doors rather than opening them. I have a feeling most new purchases of books may be moving online, while stores like McKay's and the Last Bookstore are here to stay.

I may have mentioned my love for celebrity memoirs once or twice, but this memoir has my aunt super-excited. Galleycat announced this week that Carole King will be writing a memoir that will be published next spring, titled A Natural Woman. My mom and her sister have been lifelong Carole King fans, and my aunt is truly the non-fiction reader in our family. She posted this on Facebook earlier in the week to let us know about it (so she was actually the news breaker for me, not Galleycat!):

As you know by now if you've read the blog this week, I have been basking in the sun on the beach and by the pool. We leave bright and early tomorrow, and home will be a nice place to be for a while. Until Africa, anyway. Perhaps I can finally get some reading done once I'm home!

I have read three books this week: Wicked by Sara Shepard, The Bone Yard by Jefferson Bass, and The Murderer's Daughters by Randy Susan Meyers. I'm still listening to Live to Tell by Lisa Gardner and A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness. I expect I'll probably finish Live to Tell on the ride home tomorrow. Audio books are the best thing that could ever happen to someone like me who gets car sick within minutes of reading in the car! So thank you, Audible.