Get Caught Listening Video Contest

The Audiobook Publishers Association is sponsoring a video contest as part of the Get Caught Listening Campaign. 

Someone always has to do a jaunty rap bit it seems…

This one proves a first line can make or break an audiobook.  I recognized only a few.  ”It was the best of times…” is not included.  

 

I like this one but it seemed to be going someplace funnier… 

Oprah has forgiveness in her heart for Franzen

It’s not exactly on the level of peace in the Middle East–maybe a better comparison would be to the day that George Steinbrenner and Yogi Berra buried the hatchet–but in the book world it’s a big deal.

–Marjorie Kehe in the Christian Science Monitor

over my long week-end, the book world was abuzz with the news that Oprah did indeed pick Franzen’s “Freedom” for her book club.  she explains:

In his latest novel, Jonathan Franzen returns to fiction with a comic and tragic epic of contemporary love and marriage. Freedom captures the temptations and burdens of liberty: the thrills of teenage lust, the shaken compromises of middle age, the wages of suburban sprawl, the responsibility of privilege. Charting the characters’ mistakes and joys as they struggle to learn how to live in an ever-changing and confusing world, Freedom is an indelible and deeply moving portrait of our time.

we’ll have to presume that an agreement to appear in person for Oprah’s Book Club was prearranged with Franzen.

not to worry, we have 80 more copies on order.

(via Shelf Awareness)

posting by marin

take a deep breath, hold it, breathe out, relax..

Library Journal’s collection development feature for September is relaxation and meditation.  My hazy memory of the last time I helped a customer try to locate materials on this subject, was that this stuff can be hard to find.

I select media so I was happy to see a small segment devoted to media both CD and DVD.  I’ve submitted a cart for both music for meditation as well as DVD on the topic.  These should  be in the catalog sometime later this month.

Music for meditation

title	artist
ALL ONE	KRISHNA DAS
CHAKRA HEALING	DEAN EVENSON
DAKSHINA	DEVA PREMAL
DIVINAURA	AEOLIAH
DR. ANDREW WEIL PRESENTS VIBRATIONAL SOUND HEALING	KIMBA AREM & ANDREW WEIL, M.D.
ETERNITY	DEUTER
HEALING THE HOLY LAND	DEAN & DUDLEY EVENSON
INTO LIGHT	DEVA PREMAL
IRELAX: LEAVING THE WORKDAY BEHIND	VARIOUS ARTISTS
KOYASAN: REIKI SOUND HEALING	DEUTER
LOVE SONGS TO THE DARK LORD	BHAGAVAN DAS
MANTRAS FOR PRECARIOUS TIMES	DEVA PREMAL
MEDITATION MOMENT	DEAN & DUDLEY EVENSON
MUSIC FOR BABIES	STEVEN HALPERN
MUSIC FOR ZEN MEDITATION	RILEY LEE
RELAXATION SUITE	STEVEN HALPERN
SHAKUHACHI WATER MEDITATIONS	RILEY LEE
ULTIMATE MOST RELAXING NEW AGE PIANO	VARIOUS ARTISTS

DVDs to help you unwind

title

ESOVISION – AFRICA

ESOVISION – BIRD SONG

ESOVISION – CANYONS

ESOVISION – CARIBBEAN DREAMS

ESOVISION – CELTIC DREAMS

ESOVISION – DESERT OASIS

ESOVISION – ETERNAL ICE

ESOVISION – FLOWER MEADOW

ESOVISION – LIJIANG RIVER

ESOVISION – MOUNTAIN HIGH

ESOVISION – NIAGARA FALLS

ESOVISION – OUT OF AFRICA

ESOVISION – RAIN FOREST

ESOVISION – SAHARA

ESOVISION – SAND DUNES

ESOVISION – SAVANNA

ESOVISION – THE FOREST

ESOVISION – THE SEA

ESOVISION – WATER MEADOW

ESOVISION – WINTER WONDERLAND

Esovision is the publisher of these videos, so I suspect that when they land in the catalog the titles  will just say “winter wonderland” or “water meadow” making the subject headings important in finding this material.

Watch a little preview of Caribbean Dreams.

posting by jim

Librarians: prepare

Linda Holmes of NPR wrote: Why the next big pop-culture wave after cupcakes might be libraries in the blog Monkey See.  She shares many great videos about libraries found on the web:

Old spice guy on Libraries:

• Brigham Young University homage of the Old Spice ad
• If you have been living in a cave and haven’t seen it, here is the original commercial
• UW iSchool students singing Lady Gaga

Holmes writes that Libraries are getting a lot of exposure right now.  Why?  Some of her examples:

• Librarians know stuff
• Librarians are green and local
• Libraries will give you things for free

(M)ark my words, once you’ve got Old Spicy on your side and you can sell a couple of YouTube parodies in a couple of months, you’re standing on the edge of your pop-culture moment. Librarians: prepare.

posting by Lorraine

brings new meaning to getting Lost…

Sawyer reading Lancelot (with credit to ABC TV)

in a good book.  i may have given up on the show (i stopped watching this year, despite enduring season 2), but i can certainly appreciate the nod to literature.  as fans of the show know, “Lost” is full of books which has sparked speculation on the meaning of the particular books chosen, as well as book clubs.  executive producers and writers for the show, Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse, self-identify as readers.  Lindelof explains:

We pick the books with a great deal of meticulous thought and specificity and talk about what the thematic implications of picking a certain book are, why we’re using it in the scene and what we want the audience to deduce from that choice.

“The Stand” had a heavy influence on beginning episodes.  some of the titles that impacted or were referenced on the show include “Watership Down,” “The Odyssey,” “Catch 22,” “The Fountainhead,” “Alice in Wonderland,”
and “A Wrinkle in Time” to name a few.  the unofficial count is more than 70 books over the 6 seasons.  there is a lot of time on the island to read.

(via Shelf Awareness)

posting by marin

watch your back Black Eyed Peas

the students at Ocoee Middle School, with the help of Full Sail University, created a flash mob interpretation of the Black Eyed Peas “I Gotta Feeling” called “Gotta Keep Reading.”  it caught the attention of Oprah – the Black Eyed Peas did a flash mob performance of their song to kick-off this season of The Oprah Show.

Oprah interviewed the students on Friday’s show via satellite and delivered the news that along with the help of a corporate sponsor, the school’s library will receive 2,000 new books and brand new computers.  pretty cool.

(via American Libraries)

posting by marin

New reality show: The Real Forks, WA??

The Wrap posted ‘Twilight’: The Reality Show? stating that our own Forks, WA (location of the Twilight books) may become the setting of a new reality show.  This project is being considered because of the interest in all things related to Stephenie Meyer’s series.

Possibilities for the structure of the show include focusing on a group of high-school students (the real life Bella!), following one or more families who live in the town or a “Real Housewives” model, in which cameras tag along with several interesting personalities in the town.

The Peninsula Daily News wrote about the turn out for the audition.

The small logging town of Forks has been inundated with Twilight Fans over the last couple of years.  The Forks Forum posted on Dec 30th that the visitor arrival count is up almost 500% at the Forks Chamber of Commerce for 2009.  Both the Forks Forum and the Chamber of Commerce websites have specific links to Twilight related materials.  Check them out.

If you want Twilight memorabilia see Dazzled by Twilight where you can shop online or at the two locations (Forks and Port Angeles). 

My inlaws live near Forks and I have watched the Twilight phenomenom grow in the area.  Some of my favorite places to find different (locally made) Twilight gifts or “Bella Blend” coffee is the Forks Thriftway and the Chinook Pharmace & Variety.

via Shelf Awareness

posting by Lorraine

stop the presses

errrr, scratch that, start them up again.  it looks like there is a future for Kirkus after all:  an undisclosed buyer is in talks to continue the publication.  DailyFinance announced the resurrection and included a couple of memos, both internal and official (see below), from managing editor Eric Liebetrau:

———————-
From: Liebetrau, Eric
Date: Tue, Jan 5, 2010
Subject: news regarding Kirkus Reviews

Dear colleagues-

I am writing to let you know that Kirkus is working toward an arrangement with an acquiring company to continue the publication of our outstanding pre-publication reviews journal. Details will be forthcoming in the next 2-3 weeks, but for now please begin sending galleys to the appropriate editors immediately. We will publish a second issue in January, and then reassess the situation and hopefully continue publication in February and beyond.

Given the time frame, we cannot accept adult galleys with a publication date of April 1 or earlier. Please only send titles publishing May and beyond. For more details on children’s and YA submissions, please contact Vicky Smith.
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask, and please pass this along to colleagues, assistants, interns, etc.

Thanks

eric

(via Facebook and confirmed by PW)

posting by marin

mickey mouse wants to get in your smartphone

Wall Street Journal and Mashable both had stories about the new technology called Keychest that the Walt Disney Company are eyeing as a way to get Mickey, Donald, Goofy, and the Disney character du jour into your smartphone, pc and television.

Via Mashable:

“Think of the service kind of like Microsoft’s Zune Marketplace — content you buy via your set-top box would also show-up on your mobile phone or on your computer. The advantage is that the content can be easy to access from multiple devices from the user, but the content provider ultimately has control over who gets to watch the content (making piracy much more difficult).

Even content purchased on physical media, like Blu ()-ray or DVD could still work with the Keyset system, because a customer could either type in (or in the case of Blu-ray, have the key transmitted over the Internet) a code that would then “unlock” viewing options for that product on different devices. For consumers, this would be like the iPod friendly digital downloads that now come packaged with many DVDs or Blu-ray discs. Only instead of a download, you could access the content over the cloud.

Of course, all of this content seems to be based on the idea of ubiquitous connectivity. How consumers would (or if they could) access content when not online (say you’re on a trip or in the car) hasn’t been discussed.”

What this means for the future of physical formats like blu-ray and DVD is anybody’s guess, but certainly one of the goals of a plan such as this is to push the movie download into the consciousness of mainstream America.  Having that happen would have trickle down effects into the library market which potentially would be a good thing.  As always though, the library market will be a much, much lower priority for distributors such as Disney whose primary audience is the consumer market.

And speaking of watching television on your PC.  As a huge Husky fan, I was absolutely incredulous a couple weeks ago when the Huskies who were coming off their amazing upset over USC weren’t available on local television.  Yeah, yeah, I know I’m the only one that cares, but stick with me…  So I’m googling like mad to find out what’ s going on, and I came across (imagine the sound of trumpets and a ray of divine sunshine) Justin TV, which had the game on one of it’s streaming channels.  I don’t pretend to know much about Justin TV, but it’s definitely cool and if you’re ever bored and have your laptop or a Windows mobile smartphone take a gander, there’s loads of entertainment, sports, live streams of technology conferences, and other good stuff.  And not to be a hater, but you can’t access Justin TV on your iPhone or iPod touch because Apple won’t allow you to use Flash on your device.  Can you say Fail?

posting by jim

Audio books and Teens.

According to a consumer survey compiled by the  Audio Publishers Association, “young listeners are the fastest growing market segment,” and that 53% of teens have listened to an audio book.

With this growing listening population, it is good to consider the 2009 Amazing Audiobooks for Young Adults compiled by YALSA:

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian by Sherman Alexie

The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson

The Burn Journals by Brent Runyon

Curse of the Blue Tattoo: Being an Account of the Misadventures of Jacky Faber, Midshipman and Fine Lady by L.A. Meyer

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

The Compound by S.A. Bodeen

The Declaration by Gemma Malley

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis

Fairest by Gail Carson Levine

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

How to Build a House by Dana Reinhardt

Lock and Key by Sarah Dessen

Nation by Terry Pratchett

Night of the Soul Stealer by Joseph Delaney

Sebastian Darke: Prince of Fools by Philip Caveney

Skybreaker by Kenneth Oppel

Slam by Nick Hornby

Story of a Girl by Sara Zarr

Tallgrass by Sandra Dallas

A Thousand Never Evers by Shana Burg

Under the Jolly Roger: Being an Account of the Further Nautical Adventures of Jacky Faber by L.A. Meyer

Sno-Isle has all of the titles in the list except The Burn Journals which is on order.

Going beyond the information about teen listeners, it is interesting to note that the APA survey also found that:

•  70% of listeners preferred unabridged recordings.
• The top five genres were: Mystery/Thriller/Suspense; General Fiction; Science Fiction/Fantasy; Biography/Memoir; and Classic Fiction.
• Listeners 18-24 prefered Science fiction/Fantasy while those over the age of 35 prefered Mystery/Thriller/Suspense and General Fiction.

via School Library Journal

posting by Lorraine