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Dracula Daily Returning May 3
If you haven’t heard of
, let me fill you in on one of the more unexpected and delightful internet things to happen in the book-adjacent world in the last few years. First: if you also didn’t know that Dracula by Bram Stoker happens over the course of six months, from May to November. Matt Kirkland thought it would be cool to send an email each day that something happens in Dracula with the section of the book that happened on that day (hooray for public domain). And the thing caught on—to the tune of more than 234,000 subscribers as of last count (see what I did there). It is clever, enterprising (there is now a book of Dracula Daily), and, for a reader, a terrifically easy way to make reading a part of your morning coffee routine.O. Henry Short Story Prizes Announced
I live for this announcement. I am not an avid reader of single-author short story collections, but I do like reading short stories. So the O. Henry Awards, and its corresponding book, is an eagerly-awaited rite of spring for me. I like seeing writers I know in longer form fiction work on a more condensed scale, but what I really like is to read someone new to me. Not sure I know a better way of doing that than with these types of awards. (Side note: O. Henry is a top 5 cool/memorable writer name. Is he, and these awards, even 37% as well-known if the names is like James Roberts? I wonder about these things.)
Two Takes on Books as Trash
In the first instance, it is more literal: books are physical objects and sometimes they gots to go. This piece is not exactly Kondo-mind, but it’s not not-Kondo mind. It is much more basic than “does this give you joy?”—it is “books are things and some things are not worth keeping or donating.” Disagree? Well then what would YOU do with a 1997 copy of Ebay for Dummies? It’s ok.
In the second piece, books are trash figurative. AI-generated, scrapped, copied textual shovelware that clogs up the works of the digital book world. It’s a good behind-the-scenes look. Essentially, we have low costs of entry (you can just upload your crap to Amazon or wherever for free), low costs of production, SEO-farming, and disinterested retailers to thank for this junk. A modest proposal: it should cost you $10 bucks or something to upload your book. I am guessing 99% of these “books” don’t even make that.
The 24 Best Book Covers of 2024 So Far
Pretty books. Striking books. And in way, I am glad that my favorite book cover of 2024 so far didn’t make the list because it gives me an excuse to drop it in here.
If you’re into TikTok, I am messing around on the BR account a little. Be merciful. Also interested in ideas for the stuff to make.