I was lurking around the net, familiarizing myself with children’s books from the 1940’s (per one commenter’s suggestion) and I ran across an news tidbit saying the UK publishers are going to start rating children’s books. Just like the movies, though this seems more aimed at “reading level” than content. Though, surely, there is some of that too.
The age ranking will go: Early (for five years plus), Developing (7 plus) Confident (9 plus) and Fluent.
When gift buying for nephews, I always wonder which book to get. The reading abilities and tastes seem so hard to figure out at that age. Honestly. I have more faith in my local bookseller’s knowledge about what would be a good purchase, but this would seem to be a step in the right direction to help the clueless (such as myself).
LibraryThing is hosting SantaThing this year. For $25, you get to play Secret Santa to someone. Which means you peruse a user’s library, decide what book(s) they must have/would enjoy and then tell Library Thing. They’ll buy and ship the book(s) for you and your done!
All the while, someone else is looking through your library/blog and turning in a list for you to get. What a cool idea! Though, it might be kinda scary what someone might send me based on their “impression” of my collection.
The downside, there is only one day left to decide, as the deadline is December 13th at high noon!
I ran across this pretty good analysis of Amazon’s Kindle just after I ran across a cool new (to me anyway) book blog The Written Nerd. That Kindle post almost had me crying! To quote one line…
“Kindle combines your love of reading with your even bigger love of putting your book down so it can recharge for three hours.”
The Birmingham Public Library has posted a stocking full of podcasts. They feature local librarians’ reviews and recommendations for gift-worthy reads this season. Looks like they’re using PodBean and it loads verrrry fast! So it’s no hassle to cruise them all rather quickly. Very cool!
