Sunday Afternoon Visits: August 12

So, it turns out that when one stays completely away from the blogs for two weeks, a lot of new and interesting posts pile up. Here is my attempt to catch up:

• Liz Burns and Sophie Brookover are writing a book. Liz says "It's called Pop Goes the Library: Using Pop Culture to Connect With Your Whole Community, and the good folks at ITI are going to publish it, sometime in 2008." They are seeking input from people who work in libraries. If you have something to say about the relationship between pop culture and libraries, you can find the survey here.
• A new "pay it forward" idea is making the rounds of the Kidlitosphere. The original idea came from Overwhelmed With Joy, transferred to the Kidlitosphere by Cloudscome, and then taken up by Big A little a and Fuse #8. The idea is to re-distribute great books, in the form of ARCs and review copies, via monthly drawings. Libby from Lessons from the Tortoise is also in, as is Kris from Paradise Found. As for me, I'm in complete support of the idea, but I just can't commit to a new monthly project right now.
• Over at the Scholar's Blog Spoiler Zone, people are discussing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
• FirstBook has been asking people "what book got you hooked". More than 100,000 people responded, and FirstBook recently published a top 50 list. Wendy from Blog from the Windowsill has turned the list into a meme, in which you indicate which of the 50 books got you reading (and which you don't remember). I took a quick scan, and came up with only 7 that I don't remember reading at all.
• HipWriterMama asks us to honor ourselves, with a specific exercise, saying: "I know this may seem like a hokey exercise, but if anything, I hope it will give you affirmation of your strengths and all things that you're good at."
• Alan Silberberg has a priceless photo on his blog, of seven happy girls, in a swimming pool, all holding copies of Pond Scum. It's adorable.
• Camille offers tips for "newbie read-alouders" at BookMoot. She also suggests some favorite read-alouds for groups of kids, and asks readers to submit their suggestions. Do share, if you have any favorite titles.
• A relatively new blog, Bottom Shelf Books, has a funny two-part interview with the characters from Punk Farm. Also via Bottom Shelf Books, a man apparently smuggled a monkey onto a flight recently, by hiding it under his hat. There is no conclusive evidence that the hat was yellow, but Minh has a good picture.
• Congratulations to Cynthia Lord for achieving a childhood dream. Rules was featured on the cover of the recent Scholastic Book Club catalog. Cindy describes her own past experiences with the book club, and then says: "So yesterday, when I opened my mailbox, I almost cried. Because I wish I could show this to that little girl skipping down the hill from the bus stop with her three, glossy-new books, probably having already started reading one on the bumpy bus ride home". She brought a hint of a tear to my own eyes.
• ReadRoger has what really ought to be (but won't be) the last word on Laura Bush's planned children's book. I'm not as down on celebrity children's books as some people (MotherReader comes to mind). If, say, a sports figure publishes a book, and kids read that book because they love the sports figure, and they get the message that this admired sports figure thinks that books are cool, I'm ok with that. But I'm dead set against message books (where the book is primarily a vehicle for some heavy-handed message), and when I hear about a book in which kids who don't enjoy reading learn the value of books, I am very skeptical. Which is too bad, because I think that Laura Bush is a genuine advocate for literacy and books. I just think that this one sounds like one that might alienate kids, as Roger so concisely points out.
• Via Miss Erin, I learned that Emma Watson (famous for her role as Hermione Granger) has apparently been cast as Pauline Fossil in a new BBC movie based on Noel Streatfeild's Ballet Shoes. Like Erin, I adore Ballet Shoes, and I look forward to seeing the BBC movie version. You can find more details here.
• And finally, this simple little post over at BookMoot really resonated with me. In Book Stack of Reproach, Camille laments the books she has yet to read, and the ones that she's read and enjoyed but not written about. Oh, how I can relate! I've been having a lot of headaches lately, and although I can read for short periods, I find that the concentration required for writing a coherent review, well, it just isn't there. But soon...

And that's it. I can't tell you how nice it feels to be caught up with the doings of the Kidlitosphere.