Reading Copy Book Blog

This year from August 7-10 in Salinas Valley, California will be the 28th annual occurrence of the Steinbeck Festival; this years theme is Steinbeck in Mexico.

Over a third of John Steinbeck’s work is either set in Mexico or features characters of Mexican descent. From 1932 until the mid 1950s, he wrote often about the environment, history, culture and politics of Mexico. This is some of his best work: Sea of Cortez, an environmental classic written with Edward F. Ricketts; The Pearl, a novella about aspirations of poor fishermen; Viva Zapata!, about Mexican revolutionary hero Emiliano Zapata, directed by Elia Kazan. Mexican American characters appear in Tortilla Flat, Sweet Thursday, The Wayward Bus.

If you want a free pair of passes to the festival all you have to do is enter our contest.

The contest closes at 2 p.m. (PDT) on Thursday, July 24, 2008.

Upon their inception in the 19th century postcards were simply meant to be a cheap, fast way for people to exchange short messages. However as the decades rolled onward this invention of convenience was transformed into medium of social commentary and an essential aspect of vacationing. From the hills of Hollywood to the beaches in Brighton tourists scrawl “Wish you were here!” on the back left hand side of images taken from the world’s most visited destinations.

The earliest postcards had an undivided back which was entirely reserved for address information forcing the sender to fit their text in the white space on the front next to the image. It took until 1907, nearly 50 years, for the “divided back” card that we see today to come into use in the United States, but when it did the popularity of postcards exploded.

This period from the development of the divided back until the outbreak of World War One has been called The Golden Age of Postcards; and is considered one of the main defining eras. The next era was called the Linen Era and lasted from about 1930 to the early 50s; cards were printed on textured paper similar to linen cloth, which allowed the increased use of bright colours in the designs. Finally by the 1950s the modern “chrome” postcards, which usually contain photos on glossy paper, began to dominate the market and have done ever since.

Throughout these three main eras many smaller and more localized fads ensued. America’s “White Border Era” resulted after World War One and the devastation of Germany’s high end printing industry (which had dominated the Golden Age) as well as high production costs and increased competition in America; the result was the implementation of a thick white border around the picture of American cards to save on ink costs. There were also the French Erotic postcards of the early 1900s, the French and Belgian Hand Tinted cards and the English Seaside or Saucy postcards which were first popularized in the 1930s.

Deltiologists, as postcard collectors are called, collect for a variety of reasons. Some are attracted to a particular era or style of postcard, and for some it is a certain region or topic of interest. A baseball collector might collect postcards related to the sport as a way to augment their interest in the game, or a historian might collect cards from a city or neighbourhood to show how it has changed over the years.

While these factors can affect the value and collectability of cards, sometimes the most dramatic increases can be attributed to what is written on the back of a postcard rather than what was printed on the front. The personal messages and signatures on a postcard from celebrity personalities like Mark Twain or William Burroughs (seen below) can be a final personal touch that book collectors or fans of celebrities seek out as their collections crown jewel; items like these can command thousands of dollars for a single card.

If you are interested you can see the Top 10 most expensive postcards sold on AbeBooks

For everyone in the UK the London Literature Festival is on now though to the 19th of July, 2008. There is an awful lot going on at the festival, you can view the full program here. Or if you are like me and can’t make it to London, take the Guardian London Literary Quiz.

We have a contest up and running now for students. We are giving away a Nintendo Wii to one randomly drawn person who fills out our online survey.

Just go to our textbook contest page to enter

The popular Science Fiction author died over the weekend in an apparent suicide. Disch not only crafted great SF novels like Camp Concentration and 334, but he also wrote the popular children’s book The Brave Little Toaster, and was celebrated as an insightful critic. His book The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of overviews 20th-century science fiction.

Update: You can listen to a podcast of possibly the last interview ever conducted with Disch here, thanks to Ed Champion.

Officials at a North Carolina prison are looking to throw the book at inmate, Victor Martin for writing novels while doing time.

While it’s not illegal to write in prison, publishing seems to be another matter.

Prison officials are shutting [Martin] down, saying his novels violate a policy that bars inmates from conducting business behind bars. Prison officials say the policy is in place to protect prison safety.

Martin, a 32-year-old habitual felon with several theft-related convictions, says the policy violates his right to free speech.

Martin’s attorneys are challenging the policy, which they say prison officials have used to claim Martin’s manuscripts and discipline him for writing.

Martin’s novels about a high-rolling criminal named Unique have picked up a small fan base among online buyers including his most recently released Unique’s Ending

When giving out an award, or doing any public speaking it is best to read your lines carefully and whatever you do … don’t do this

J.R.R. Tolkien’s two children are embroiled in a bitter lawsuit with New Line Cinema over unpaid royalties from the three Lord of the Rings movies.

According to the LA Times, “Tolkien licensed motion picture rights to United Artists back in 1969 for a low six-figure sum and 7.5% of the gross receipts.” however New Line has not actually paid any money to the Tolkien kids or the charitable trust fund.

The article explains how law suits are nothing new to New Line and that none of this will be solved for years because the courts are too backed up…. but the interesting bit is RIGHT at the end…

Of course, the Tolkien’s do have one giant club in their arsenal. Part of the remedy they’re seeking is to terminate New Line’s rights to Tolkien’s books, including the two “Hobbit” films, which are now in the works with “Pan’s Labyrinth” director Guillermo del Toro.

“I think they have every right to terminate, ” says Eskenazi. “If New Line engaged in gross misconduct, which I believe they did in this case, are you forced to continue in business with them?”

So we will have to wait and see how this plays out…

In Brittan the Norfolk city council has been secretly undertaking an £82,000 sting operation to eradicate a scourge that has plagued the county and left its citizens cowering for far too many years… over due library books.

I would hate to see what they do if you don’t pay your parking violations.

The books listed here were the top 10 best selling books on AbeBooks.com for the month of June, 2008

1) Big Russ and Me by Tim Russert
2) Wisdom of Our Fathers by Tim Russert
3) Change Your Brain, Change Your Life by Daniel Amen
4) Dreams of My Father by Barack Obama
5) The Pillars Of The Earth by Ken Follett
6) The Red Car by Don Stanford
7) A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle
8) Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson
9) The Wordsworth Dictionary of Culinary and Menu Terms by Rodney Dale
10) Night by Elie Wiesel

Toni Jordan, who novel Addition was just selected by Richard and Judy for their summer reading list picks her top 10 flawed romantic heronines

1. Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare
2. Prudence Merridew in The Perfect Rake by Anne Gracie
3. Ayla in The Valley of Horses by Jean M Auel
4. Lucinda Leplastrier in Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey
5. Dorothea Brooke in Middlemarch by George Eliot
6. Harriet Vane in Gaudy Night by Dorothy L Sayers
7. Lisa Palmer by What Was Lost by Catherine O’Flynn
8. Christabel LaMotte and Maud Bailey in Possession by AS Byatt
9. Miss Haversham in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
10. Esther Evans in Welsh Girl by Peter Ho Davies

An Indiana teacher was suspended for 18 months for teaching from the bestselling book The Freedom Writers Diary. Apparently one member of the teachers union disagreed with the fact that the book contained some swearing, because you all know what a little colourful language will do to an inner city kid!

The Writers Diary, a series of true stories written by inner-city teenagers, was put together by a teacher, Erin Gruwell, and has been celebrated as a model for transforming young lives. It was made into a film with Hilary Swank last year.

Connie Heermann, a teacher for 27 years, sought permission to introduce the book to her students last autumn after attending a training workshop held by the Freedom Writers Foundation. “If you read the whole book you will see how these inner-city students grow and change and become articulate, compassionate, educated young people who want to do something good in their lives despite the environment in which they were raised,” she told the Guardian. “I thought my students would very much relate to those kids.”

Spanish chef and cookery author, Simone Ortega, died yesterday at the age of 89. Ortega was the author of 1,080 Recetas de Cocina which sold over 3 million copies, until his death in 2002 she was married to publisher José Ortega Spottorno, son of famous philosopher José Ortega y Gasset and founder of the Spanish daily newspaper El País.

Their daughter, Ines Ortega Klein, has followed in the footsteps of her mother to become something of a celebrity chef and is also a cookbook author.

So what’s the number one book in the UK right now? The Outcast by Sadie Jones. The book received the Richard and Judy treatment last week and took off - here is our interview with Sadie from earlier in the year.