Vacation slide show

Some photos from our trip to Manistique, Michigan (it's in the UP, eh). It's a very small town and I'm related to a large percentage of the population. We try to get up there every summer to visit my grandparents. We usually rent a cabin on Indian Lake (from Sunset View Condos). Actually, the first photo up there was taken from just outside our cabin.

Little Nooks from Great Books

The Kruger Collection at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln is a really amazing collection of miniatures. If you can't make it there in person, you should at least check our their online gallery.

Above you see a room from Harry Potter that is part of the "Little Nooks from Great Books" exhibit (image courtesy of the Kruger Collection).

The Kruger Collection of Miniature Furnishings and Decorative Arts is pleased to announce a traveling exhibit of miniature rooms based on popular children’s books. The exhibit, “Little Nooks from Great Books,” features scenes from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone; Little Women; Little House on the Prairie; Peter Pan and Wendy; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Felicity Learns a Lesson: A School Story. Specific scenes include the cabin interior from Little House on the Prairie and the Gryffindor common room from Harry Potter, among others.

The exhibit, coordinated through Lincoln Public Schools Media Specialists or Gifted Facilitators, helps to promote reading and educates children about historical interiors. “Little Nooks from Great Books” will travel to seven LPS elementary and middle schools during the 2008/2009 school year.

Such a Pretty Fat by Jen Lancaster

Jen Lancaster cracks me up. I read her blog as well as her books. Plus she's from Chicago!

A NOTE FROM JEN LANCASTER:

"To whom the fat rolls…I'm tired of books where a self-loathing heroine is teased to the point where she starves herself skinny in hopes of a fabulous new life. And I hate the message that women can't possibly be happy until we all fit into our skinny jeans. I don't find these stories uplifting; they make me want to hug these women and take them out for fizzy champagne drinks and cheesecake and explain to them that until they figure out their insides, their outsides don't matter. Unfortunately, being overweight isn't simply a societal issue that can be fixed with a dose healthy of positive self-esteem. It’s a health matter, and here on the eve of my fortieth year, I've learned I have to make changes so I don't, you know, die. Because what good if finally being able to afford a pedicure if I lose a foot to adult onset diabetes?"

The Book Deal: A Great Book Website

I actually met Alan Rinzler at last year's Publishing on the Web conference in Monterey, California. I could tell right away (even though I was desperately sleep-deprived) what a smart and interesting person he was, but I was embarrassingly ignorant of his seriously impressive career.

Anyway, his website is chock full of great stuff: from stories about working with authors such as Hunter S. Thompson and Toni Morrison, to blog features that take an inside look at writing and publishing.

The Book Deal is a blog for writers and book people, with a veteran insider’s views on the strange and inscrutable way books are published and the big changes going on in the business today. Look here for my take on the challenges and opportunities writers face in the world of digital and print book publishing, the mysterious process of acquisition, development, sales, and marketing, how agents and publishers conspire and compete behind the scenes to find the best new authors, and other special features.

Posts range from how to write an attention-getting book proposal, to developing a selling “hook” and building a winning author platform. We’ll also be inviting colleagues and experts to comment on specific aspects of publishing, such as book and cover design, agenting and niche marketing.

Sedaris, When You are Engulfed in Flames

I was particularly looking forward to this one since it includes an essay about quitting smoking. I was not disappointed. I think Me Talk Pretty One Day is still my favorite, though.

He tests the limits of love when Hugh lances a boil from his backside, and pushes the boundaries of laziness when, finding the water shut off in his house in Normandy, he looks to the water in a vase of fresh cut flowers to fill the coffee machine. From armoring the windows with LP covers to protect the house from neurotic songbirds to the awkwardness of having a lozenge fall from your mouth into the lap of a sleeping fellow passenger on a plane, David Sedaris uses life's most bizarre moments to reach new heights in understanding love and fear, family and strangers. Culminating in a brilliantly funny account of his venture to Tokyo in order to quit smoking, David Sedaris's sixth essay collection will be avidly anticipated.

Send good thoughts . . .

My dad is having bypass surgery tomorrow. He reports (sadly) that the hospital will not bring him a vodka martini on the rocks (with a twist or an olive—he's not picky) even though studies have shown the therapeutic benefit of one drink per day. He's such a health nut.