you are here: Home » Book Chat

eBook Bundles in the Kindle Store

eBookNewser has been doing some digging in Amazon’s Kindle store and they’ve discovered over 200 “bundled” items. The book bundles range in price from .99 to $79.99. Intrigued, I decided to check this out for myself. The bestselling bundle is Gena Showalter’s “Lords of the Underworld Bundle,” which includes the first four books in that series for $9.99. By my calculations, those four ebooks would run you $19.60 if you bought them separately, so that seems like a pretty good deal. I browsed through about 100 bundles, and most seemed to be romance, which makes sense. People used to buying cheap paperback romances can now get them for an even lower price on their Kindles. Plus, as an added bonus, you don’t have to worry about the half naked man on the book cover when you’re reading in the coffee shop because, for all anyone knows, you could be reading [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Sep 2

2010

COMMENTS: 0

CATEGORY: Book Chat

TAGS: ,

MOCKINGJAY Discussion and Spoilers

SPOILER ALERT: Warning! Major spoilers for Mockingjay ahead! This post is intended to be a place to discuss everything that happened in Mockingjay. If you haven’t yet read Mockingjay, check out our spoiler-free review. So now that we’ve finished Mockingjay we’re (Jose and Kristen) dying to talk about it! Let’s start with our general thoughts about the book and then move on to some of the specific events. Jose: Well, I talked about my feelings about the book in my review, but overall I have to say that I really liked it and thought it was a great piece of dystopian writing. Kristen: Mockingjay just blew my mind. I mean, what an EPIC way to end a trilogy. It was hard to read at times, but I respect the fact that Suzanne Collins didn’t try to sugarcoat the war or make Katniss warm and fuzzy. She genuinely surprised me too. [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Jose

POSTED ON:

Aug 30

2010

COMMENTS: 13

CATEGORY: Book Chat, Featured

TAGS: ,

Bookstore Bingo: People Say the Dumbest Things

Have you seen the Bookstore Bingo hashtag (#bookstorebingo) on Twitter? Booksellers have been sharing the most ridiculous comments and dumbest questions they get from customers, and, oh my god, they are hilarious. I mean, how do you even respond to questions like “Who wrote Jane Austen?” or “Do you have the sequel to The Diary of Anne Frank?” The Shelf Awareness blog and The Huffington Post have good roundups of the comments, but here are a few of my favorites. This first one is from Kelly O’Connor McNees, author of The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott. Aren’t these hilarious/disturbing/mind-boggling? The one about the bible is my favorite—it had me laughing so hard I was practically crying. What’s your favorite? Follow me on Twitter @kristendaemons

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Aug 27

2010

COMMENTS: 1

CATEGORY: Book Chat, Featured

TAGS: ,

Censorship Goes Beyond Book Banning

I’ve been following the news about the Teen Lit Festival in Texas with increasing frustration because few things irritate me more than censorship. The situation is this: best-selling author Ellen Hopkins was invited to take part in the Humble, Texas Teen Lit Festival that’s happening in January 2011. On her blog, Hopkins says she had visited two high schools in that school district before and was happy to be invited back. After she accepted the invitation, a school librarian (!) and a few parents took matters into their own hands and convinced school Superintendent Guy Sconzo to rescind her invitation. So why uninvite one of the most popular authors in YA literature? Hopkins writes about serious subjects like drug abuse and suicide, which make her a frequent target of book banners. One of her most popular books, Crank, is based on her own daughter’s struggle with drug addiction. When fellow [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Aug 26

2010

COMMENTS: 2

CATEGORY: Book Chat

TAGS: ,

Would You Buy a $625 Cookbook?

There’s a new cookbook coming out in December, but, with a hefty price tag of $625 bucks, I can guarantee you won’t find it on my Christmas list. Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking is the work of Nathan Myhrvold, a former chief technology officer at Microsoft, and his twenty-person team at The Cooking Lab. The six-volume set intends to be the go-to reference for molecular gastronomy. According to the book’s summary, the authors “have achieved astounding new flavors and textures by using tools such as water baths, homogenizers, centrifuges, and ingredients such as hydrocolloids, emulsifiers, and enzymes… Imagine being able to encase a mussel in a gelled sphere of its own sweet and briny juice. Or to create a silky-smooth pistachio cream made from nothing more than the nuts themselves.” Mmmm…mussels in gelled spheres—just like grandma used to make. While I’m probably not going to whip up [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Aug 20

2010

COMMENTS: 2

CATEGORY: Book Chat

TAGS: ,

Trend Alert: Amish Romances Are Hot

If you think all romance novels have covers displaying a shirtless Fabio clone embracing a woman with heaving bosoms and are filled with torrid sex scenes, think again. The hottest trend right now in the romance genre is the “Amish inspirational,” which are books with chastely dressed women on the front and no sex inside. Yep, that’s right, kissing is about as racy as it gets in an Amish inspirational. But, for many readers, that’s very appealing. As a recent article in USA Today says, “In our sex-soaked society, nothing seems to inflame the imagination quite like the chaste.” USA Today isn’t the only publication to notice the rise in Amish romances. The Wall Street Journal and Business Week have also written about the publishing trend. From reading the articles, it seems like an Amish woman falling in love with an outsider is the basic plot of most of these [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Aug 18

2010

COMMENTS: 1

CATEGORY: Book Chat, Featured

TAGS: , , , , , , , , , ,

Everybody Loves YA Books, Right?

Pamela Paul recently wrote an essay for the NY Times Sunday Book Review about how popular Young Adult books are among adults. I have to admit that my first reaction to this topic was to roll my eyes and think about how this has been discussed to death over the past ten years. The NY Times isn’t always the most relevant source either (case in point: their recent article about these newfangled things called blogs). The thing is, the author so eloquently talks about her love of the YA genre and her obsession with The Hunger Games, that I realized she is woman after my own heart. I appreciate that she doesn’t act embarrassed or apologetic about her tastes in literature. She also really nails the appeal of YA books, which is basically that they have fresh, engaging storytelling that lacks the cynicism found in adult books. I couldn’t agree [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Aug 16

2010

COMMENTS: 2

CATEGORY: Book Chat

TAGS:

Twilight Saga Spoofed in VAMPIRE SUCK (Poll)

On August 18, 2010 Vampires Suck, a movie inspired by the hit Twilight series is released in theaters. Check out our sister site Daemons Movies to learn more. I feel like Hollywood thinks every popular movie warrants a spoof (Harry Potter, 300, Scream, Pirates of the Caribbean, etc, etc). People will definitely watch it based purely on the rule that if you get enough people to like something enough, sooner or later an anti-community will emerge. Here’s the question I’m throwing to you: who is more lame, the fans or the anti-fans or should I say Twi-Tards vs. Anti-Twi-Tards? Please cast your vote below. Here’s some more info to help you make up your mind: Twi-Tards:Overly enthusiastic fans that pledge allegiance to either Team Edward or Team Jacob. Will often camp overnight for sightings of the actors that play the characters. Some ‘Twi-Tards’ have difficulty distinguishing the actors from the [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Amie

POSTED ON:

Aug 13

2010

COMMENTS: 3

CATEGORY: Book Chat

TAGS: ,

Are eBooks More Eco-Friendly Than Printed Books?

One argument I’ve heard against e-readers like Kindles and nooks is that they are environmentally unfriendly when compared with the printed book. This argument always seemed counterintuitive to me because of all the paper, and therefore trees, required to make books. On the other hand, e-readers require electricity to run and will likely end up in landfills when they are obsolete. So which is more eco-friendly? G Magazine, an Australian publication, recently decided to investigate this issue. They looked at the “environmental burdens associated with producing, storing, shipping and selling traditional print books” versus the “electricity e-readers consume and the materials they’re made from.” Their verdict is that e-readers appear to be greener. In fact, they cite a study that says if you actively use e-books in place of printed books, a “Kindle could save you an average of 168 kg of greenhouse gas emissions a year.” The catch is [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Aug 12

2010

COMMENTS: 1

CATEGORY: Book Chat

TAGS: ,

Regular Books Dead in 5 Years?

Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the One Laptop Per Child Foundation, stirred up some controversy at a tech conference in California last week when he said that the physical book will be dead in five years. He doesn’t mean they will go away completely, just that ebooks will become the dominant form. He used the recent news that Amazon is selling more Kindle books than hardcovers to support his claim. Man, it’s been a rough week for books. First, Barnes & Noble announced it’s thinking about putting itself up for sale, and now this. While I love ebooks and was quick to embrace their convenience, I think calling physical books dead is a little harsh. There’s something special about holding a book in your hands that an ereader will never replace. Browsing the bookshelves at the library or bookstore is also an experience that can’t easily be replicated online. I frequently [...]

Read More »

AUTHOR: Kristen

POSTED ON:

Aug 10

2010

COMMENTS: 2

CATEGORY: Book Chat

TAGS:

Next Page »