10 alternative book covers

Produced to promote a new competition, these covers are excellent. I particularly like this one for A Tale of Two Cities.

Full details of the competition are here. The closing date is 19th April

A scary statistic...

There are now more pound shops than book shops in the UK, according to the Local Data Company:

"In the year to the end of October, there was a 14.2pc increase in pound shops taking the total to 3,005, according to research for The Daily Telegraph undertaken by Local Data Company, which tracks shop numbers in 487 town centres.

This is in contrast to the 2,705 book shops in the same area. Book shops have suffered from a decade of unrelenting competition from supermarkets and the internet. This year Waterstone’s has trimmed the number of stores it operates."

I'd love to see some other stats - surely there can't be more bookmakers than book shops?

All the more reason to support your local book shop!

Long Live The Book

This is a short film made by AbeBooks apparently in response to the 'I Hate Reading' group on Facebook, which alarmingly has nearly 450,000 members...

Long Live The Book!

Penguin Threads

Penguin Threads is a sumptuous new set of 3 books, with covers hand embroidered.

The three titles are The Secret Garden, Emma, and Black Beauty.

See more at the artist Jillian Tamaki's website. As you can see, both the front and back are embroidered, although from what I can see, the books you can actually buy will be embossed rather than hand embroidered (because that would be pretty impractical). They're available to buy from October.

Thanks to Beth for the link!

Name your favourite book, and donate to the Ministry of Stories

The Ministry of Stories is a reading & writing centre for young people, based in Hoxton.

Modelled on Dave Eggers' Pirate Supplies Store in San Francisco, it "provides a free space for fresh writing by young people. Here in Hoxton we provide workshops and one-to-one mentoring. The services are provided by volunteers: local writers, artists and teachers, all giving their time and talent for free.

The MoS is inspired by young people, and aims to inspire them to transform their lives through writing. We work closely with schools, supporting the work of teachers, but our great benefit is that we provide one-to-one mentoring for young people to enjoy imaginative stories, improve language skills, increase abilities in communication, add to social and educational confidence."

To donate money through Just giving, visit this page and donate the amount that your favourite book costs. Stephen Fry picked one of our previous reads, The Confederacy of Dunces as his favourite, so presumably donated £8.99.

Donate - it could change someone's life.

The Waterstones / Grazia quiz for World Book Day

On Saturday 3 of us went to Waterstones in Piccadilly to take part in the book quiz for World Book Day, sponsored by Grazia. (Grazia run their own book club in the magazine).

It was interesting to see so many other book groups in one place, and it was great to see so much free booze on the table!

The quiz was about 7 rounds (characters, pictures, first lines, missing vowels etc) and was great fun.

David Nicholls was there, and we managed to ask a couple of quick questions about the film of One Day. ;-)

We didn't win, but we didn't come last either, and in our defence there were only 3 of us...

Copycat Covers

The covers of books say so much (for example the 'Dragon Tattoo' books, or 'One Day', which we're reading this month, but more and more books seem to be using similar pictures and themes on the covers - for example these two, which use the same stock photo, but cropped and coloured differently:

You can see a bigger collection of similar examples here, and here is link to other examples where the picture is different, but the theme is very similar (a spade in the ground, a chair in an empty room). Just how little time to publishers take over the cover design,,?

Book Frames

A great idea from Suck - frame your favourite book (standard paperback size only). £`12, inc P&P.

World Book Night book give-away

This is a very strange (but completely real) promotion.

As part of World Book Night on 5th March next year, British publishers are providing books for people to give away.

They've produced a list of 25 titles, ranging from poetry to fiction. Anyone can apply to receive a package of 48 copies of 1 title, and then give them away.

The titles include 6 of our previous reads - All Quiet On The Western Front, Beloved, Cloud Atlas, Life of Pi, Stuart - A Life Backwards, and Curious Case of the Dog in the Night Time, and one of our futures - One Day.

You need to fill in the application and say why you want the books, and who you'd give them to.

20,000 people will get to give away 48 books each.

See the books here

Apply to be a giver here

More background in this article in the Guardian

Women Running From Houses

This blog has a great collection of classic book covers from pretty trashy paperbacks.

With the blurbs too - for example:

The Lock by Janet Lovesmith (Paul W. Fairman)

published by Popular Library

Copyright 1972

SOMETHING

FROM THE WORLD BEYOND

WAS STALKING

YOUNG LYN COURTNEY -

The lock was huge, rusted, ungainly. It guarded the

tomb that lay behind the old house - the tomb of the

ill-fated Gantry clan. Lyn Courtney, who had come to

work at Gantry Hill, became fascinated, haunted by

that lock. Her fears, her hopes, her fantasies cnetered

around it.

Could it explain the puzzling behavior of good-looking

Christopher Gantry? The mystery of beautiful, volatile

Lila? The invisible creature that even now was stalking

young Lyn? She must find out - if it wasn't already

too late ,,,

QUEEN-SIZE GOTHICS are a new idea. They offer the

very best in novels of romantic suspense, by the top

writers, greater in length and drama, richer in reading

pleasure. Each book is guaranteed to be:

"READING FIT FOR A QUEEN"

Packabook

Packabook is a new(ish) website that provides a list of novels set in different counties.

It's a great resource if you're trying to get inspired pre-holiday, and seems to have a pretty imaginative and varied list.

For example this is the selection for books set in Spain

Ex Libris book plates

This is a stunning set of Ex Libris (from the library of...) book plates of the famous.

If you want to get your own, and it's very tempting, this would be a good place to start. (Or you can print off your own at this site here)

Book Group Tours

We've just had an email from this company offering themed literary tours for book groups.

Get in touch with them if you're interested in Agatha Christie, Ian Rankin, JK Rowling or more.

Sadly they don't yet offer James Frey's LA...

The Wave Pictures - Sweetheart

How great is this? A music video made entirely out of second hand books. The music's not bad either!

The Wave Pictures - Sweetheart from Ben Reed on Vimeo.

From The Wave Pictures

Star in a Penguin TV ad

From an email from Penguin:

Calling all readers!

We need YOUR help to star in a TV ADVERT to launch our author on PRIME-TIME NATIONAL TELEVISION.

In October 2010, Penguin will be putting their biggest advertising campaign of the year behind an exciting debut author. We can't reveal who the author is, but you'll be surprised and delighted when you find out!

If you have a passion for brilliantly written, comic women's fiction in the best Readers' Group tradition, or simply have a love of discovering new authors, we want to hear from you.

We'll be compiling a long-list of interested readers who will then be interviewed over the phone, via Skype or in person. A selection of you will get an EXCLUSIVE look at this much coveted manuscript to read and react to.

After second interviews the final 6 readers will be chosen to STAR IN OUR AD, where they'll have a chance to meet and interview our mystery author! We'll also be giving our 6 stars £100 WORTH OF PENGUIN BOOKS and a SIGNED FIRST EDITION of the book.

To enter, write 50 words about why, as a member of a Reading Group, you like to discover new authors. Email your answer to marketing@penguin.co.uk along with your name, age and location.

You will need to be available to come to London for the shoot on 7th September. We will cover your travel expenses but not accommodation.

CLOSING DATE: Friday 23rd July

Beautiful book covers

From a collection here.

I particularly like these two:

Review of the TV Book Club

We wrote about the new TV Book Club in January when it was first announced. Now, 3 weeks in, it's finally a proper discussion of books.

The first two weeks felt pretty weak and frustrating because too much time was spent on the celebs (Chris Evans and Alan Davies) with the book under discussion squeezed into too much time at the end. Also the interaction between the panelists seemed a bit false.

The third week was a lot better, though. Either by luck or design Gok Wan wasn't there, and one fewer person in the studio made it easier for the others to really get stuck into the book. They also seemed more natural together, and acting more like passionate readers and less like celebs ticking demographic boxes. You don't need to people to be famous, just to have strong opinions, articulately expressed.

For example, I really like Newsnight Review (now re-named The Review Show) on BBC 2, and as you get used to the people on it you look forward to seeing what they're going to think of the items under discussion. The classic line up of Tom Paulin, Tony Parsons and Alison Pearson in the late 1990s was really successful despite the fact that at the time none of them were well known before being on the show. I really wanted that for the TV Book Club, and although they've gone the celeb route, I really want people like Nathaniel Parker and Laila Rouass (neither of whom are really known to me) to live up to that. Hopefully by the time they get onto Matthew Quick's The Silver Linings Playbook I'll be anticipating the stands they'll take on different aspects of the story.

Anyway, it's now starting to feel like a real book club, rather than a plugging machine, and I'm actually looking forward to seeing what they make of Juliet Naked, the only one of the books on the list that I've actually read.

For another example of the TV Book Club, have a look at what they do in Australia. They really get stuck in!

Rent an Author

This is a neat idea from the US - the charity 826Boston, which is dedicated to helping students aged 8-18 (no, I can't work how they got to '826Boston' either).

Raise $1,000 and your book group can have a well known author at your book group.

Any London authors want to try something similar? We can't guarantee to raise $1,000, but we can feed you lots of cheese...