Counterbalance

The Technology Will Save/Kill Us

I've had many conversations over the past few months about the frenzy that's taken hold of so many in publishing and those in the broader conversation about books. I'm sure you have too. The alarmist attitude is what's...most alarming. I've much more to say on all of this, but in order to really get a sense of how the freak-out has ramped up in recent weeks, it seems a solid foundation of the madness is required before we can begin to talk about all of this in earnest. I stopped doing link roundups long ago, but the pace of this "oh no technology is killing us" meme has me reconsidering. I'd like to archive the madness somewhere and I can't think of a better place to start doing that than here.

Here, then, is a roundup of recent links that run the gamut of the "this is so good" to "oh no it's all over for books" madness I'm fascinated with. I expect this will be one of many such roundups in the coming months:

• E-Books Make Readers Less Isolated from NYT
• Moving On from Seth Godin
• Ads in Books Debate Divides Twitter from GalleyCat
• iPads & Kindles are Better for the Environment Than Books from The Washington Post
• E-Book Price War Absurd from The Bookseller
• The Billionaire and The Book Lover from New York Magazine
• Books Have Many Futures from NPR

I've got a ton more, but this is as good a place to start as any. I may even get uber-crazy and start a scoreboard for pro & anti tech articles...that's how nutty it's all become. 

What headlines have made you want to pull your hair out lately?

Reader-Writer Moment #479 (Updated)

Robin Black's short story collection If I Loved You, I Would Tell You This is scrumptious. Depth in story, depth in character, interesting way of getting us from point A to B every time. I've not read stories like this in a long time and I'm wondering why people aren't jumping up and down about this collection. Black has a rare ability to capture those moments in our lives that we can't quite admit to ourselves, an ability to see clearly that which often goes unsaid but is deeply felt. I read many books each month and often admire the writing or the story but don't feel connected to the work on a personal level. Not so with this collection, not so. 

A few passages that resonated with me in particular and that showcase Black's ability to beautifully capture nuance and unspoken emotions:

"If only, Shiroyama dreams, human beings were not masks behind masks behind masks. If only this world was a clean board of lines and intersections. If only time was a sequence of considered moves and not a chaos of slippages and blunders."

                                        
 

"Family life. Looking back, it seems like a dance, a four-person minuet comprised of steps toward and steps away, approaches and retreats, ending, finally, with each of them standing entirely alone."

                                      
 
"She always loved this time of day. George also loved this time of day. Some of their best hours together had been passed sitting in this room, her living room, both of them reading, waiting for the sun to drop from view, the daylight to fade, staying there, in that early darkness together, not switching on a lamp, not yet. Tacitly agreeing to fight the evening off. Fight every ending off. Live within all the transitions for every possible second."

           from Robin Black's If I Loved You, I Would Tell You This

Gorgeous, no? Get thee to a bookstore.

Update: Yikes! Gracious readers have pointed out that the first passage above is, in fact, NOT from Robin Black's short story collection. What is it from? David Mitchell's A Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet. How do I know this? Because I screwed up the order of my Kindle "Clippings"...something I have trouble with often. I never know if the quote I want is before or after the book information. Much as I'd like to blame Kindle's UI (seriously, you should look into that Amazon), I have to hang my head rather shamefully and take the blow full-on. Wow. So - yeah. Although the "Shiroyama" character should have been a tip-off...I mistakenly quoted David Mitchell and called it Robin Black's work. So. Embarrassed. You. Don't. Even. Know. But if I had to accidentally mistake your work for another's...um...not bad, eh? :) 

Roundtable Time?

I haven't done a proper roundtable here in a very long time.

I'm missing proper roundtables in the same way I'm missing long-form blog posts.

Want to get all retro with me and do a roundtable on something fantastic or not or both?

Or we could get uber-geeky and somehow roundtable via Foursquare & Skype.

Hmmmmm. Holler back.

Vermin Cometh

It's the beginning of a new month and much as I wanted to start August with a clean slate, all my to do's neatly left behind in July...it's not going to happen. The good news? Instead of wallowing in a mile-long to-do list that will likely carry over into the fall, I'll be heading to Vermin on the Mount tonight for some excellent readings and literary banter.

If you're game, would be great to see you at The Mountain, 8pm.