Surfacing (and a mini-rant)

Feeling semi-human again, for the first time in about a week. Thanks so much for the get well wishes, everyone. My cough still lurks like an unwelcome house guest, hiding around corners and leaping out at me at inopportune moments, particularly when I have to talk out loud. Fortunately I work at home all day and do most of my work communication by e-mail.

I've spent most of this week in a slug-like state: sleeping, reading, watching videos, and sleeping some more. In this manner, I've read or watched the following:

- Watched the first season of The Tudors (thanks, Reid!). I've been fascinated by King Henry VIII since reading Alison Weir's The Six Wives of Henry VIII, and that led to my obsession with Elizabeth I (and several biographies and movies about her). I would love to do a Tudor-theme book for young people someday, except there have already been so many.



- Read through my Canon Rebel XTi manual several times. Since getting my camera, I haven't been well enough to go out for a good long photo shoot yet, so have been comforting myself by reading technical specs instead. I did take a brief walk through a cemetery earlier in the week (see above) but was somewhat feverish at the time so couldn't properly enjoy it. Once I catch up with work and my cough eases up, I'm hoping to take a longer walk later this week.

- Re-read Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

- Read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which arrived at 2:03 pm on Saturday. I think I scared the postman.

I had already seen a semi-spoiler in a newspaper headline last week (what were they thinking?!?); it's hard to avoid them when I have to research publishing news for Writersmarket.com every day. Anyway, I LOVED the book. I won't say more about it for fear of spoilers but also because there are already so many interesting discussions going on online already. If you've finished the book, do check out my friend Allison's interesting observations, for instance. Sherman Dorn has also started a Facebook group called Harry Potter Loose Ends, for those interested.




Above: freshly picked chocolate mint leaves, in prep for making tea.

Link O' The Day (and a mini-rant)

Why Harry Potter Won't be a Bestseller by Michael Glitz: excellent piece. Do read it!

It SO galls me that the New York Times has decided that kids' books don't count when it comes to their (main) national bestseller list. Yes, there's a separate list for kids' books, but why not have a separate "adult books" list as well? And keep the bestseller list for, well...the BESTSELLERS, regardless of genre or age range?

Once I've caught up with work and e-mail, I plan to write up a proper rant about this for Inkygirl.

Thanks to Ray for pointing me to Michael Glitz's article.

By the way, this isn't an excuse for you Harry Potter haters out there to do your usual rant about the quality of the book, etc. The New York Times bestseller lists aren't a reflection of any particular book's quality; they're about hard numbers/stats.

As Glitz points out in his article:

"This isn't just about bragging rights for J.K. Rowling. This is about accuracy and fairness...and about the next Harry Potter. One major reason the books became a phenomenon in the first place was because they broke onto the New York Times bestseller list."

I'm working on a letter to send to Clark Hoyt at the New York Times.





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