Citizen Reader

A weekly selection of reading and book news, sometimes with completely inappropriate commentary.

Infographic: "Characters who take on the hero's journey."

Serial Reader app: delivering daily "bite-size reads."

The "Trainspotting" sequel: Trailer.

M. Night Shyamalan has a new movie starring James McAvoy, who is my absolute favorite Scottish eye candy, but I can't go see it. Uck. That trailer looks creepy as hell.

Sherlock, Season 4: Trailer.

Feel-good link: kids discovering indexes.

What college freshmen are reading.

Read this, and then go buy a book at an independent bookstore. I'm begging you!

Oh, Christ, another book on resilience (also known as "grit"), perhaps my least favorite topic ever. (Perhaps because I don't have any.) And joy of joys, Sheryl Sandberg, she of "Lean In"* and Facebook fame, has written it. Is it all about how it's easier to be resilient when you've got a shit-ton of money? (Yes, I know her husband died. I'm a monster. Blah blah blah. But give me this: lots of people's spouses die too soon and they are not left with shit-tons of money to help pick up the pieces. Even when their spouses don't die, they may not be able to "lean in" to their careers because not everyone gets to leave the kids with top-notch and expensive nannies.)

How millennials interact with online video.

You know, I like LitHub. I was just going to link to this article titled "What should fiction do?" because I like the title. But when I started to read it I got immediately bored. Anyone else?

Author Siddhartha Mukherjee points out that it's hard to write about current medical science because the science is changing so fast.

Michael Crichton died in 2008. So of course a new book from him is going to be published in 2017.

Amazon continues to be your master.

The "machine learning and publishing" debate continues.

Your average librarian was never average. Based on this article about what one twenty-first-century librarian does; I mainly like that the librarian's name is Theresa Quill.

Why publishers need to walk away from Facebook. Hey, I've got an idea: Let's all walk away from Facebook.

How indie bookstores drive book discoverability.

The co-author of the Left Behind (nutjob religious**) series, Tim LaHaye, has died at age 90.

Anne Rice will publish a new Vampire Chronicles novel. Evidently the Jesus books don't pay as well.

After Harry Potter and the Cursed Child ("the 8th Harry Potter book"), J.K. Rowling says "Harry is done now."

The 2016 Booker Award longlist; in other award news, these are the winners of the 2016 Eisner Awards.

Can we get away from the use of pink in "feminist" book covers, please?

Authors as readers' advisors. (Starting with 15 women authors selecting their favorite "overlooked" books.)

*Please note this is a positive review of Sandberg's earlier book. I just like SavvyWorkingGal's book reviews.

**Editorial comment. I couldn't help myself. That's what always ran through my head when I shelved those things at the public library.