Smart Bitches, Trashy Books

Sony Reader Accessories: A Shopping List

There are a few things I’ve used with my Sony Readers that I’ve found supremely useful, and it occurred to me that this list might be of some use to other folks, too. So, behold, a List! With Illustrations!

Software: Calibre. I can’t praise it enough. I have a Mac, a PC, and Hubby’s PC, and Calibre loaded on all of them. By keeping my eBooks on an accessible external drive, I can access and load books from any location, regardless of operating system, and oh, how I love it. If I get another pet, it’s going to be named Calibre Excelsior.

Did I just hear the sound of every animal rescue person near me hiding their animals and moving away from me?! Come on now - I’m awesome! Two of my cats are named after the original Iron Chef!

Skins: If you’ve got a Sony 505, you can skin that baby, and turn it all sorts of funky colors. I love the look of the burled wood one. You can also put stickers all over the included cover (OMG KINDLE II: MATZOH EDITION, DID YOU HEAR THAT?! AN INCLUDED COVER?! *swoon*) and make it funky fresh that… read more »

The Simon Kernick is Awesome Photoshop Contest: Results!

As you’ll see from the poll results, our winner for the Simon Kernick is Awesome Photoshop Contest, BY ONE VOTE, was:

sent in by Diane, who has some serious Photoshop powers. Diane, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)me and I shall send you a $50 gift certificate to the bookstore of your choosing.

Second place went to:

sent in by Sarah.  .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)me for your $25 gift certificate to the bookstore of your choosing.

The entries were pretty spectacular if you want to see them all again.

And to all the new Simon Kernick fans among us, here’s another video of the man himself:

Finally, a big fat raspberry to the person who thought of putting Dan Brown’s name on Kernick’s cover in the first place.

Bite Me by Melissa Francis

AJ has the hots for Ryan, but as the story opens, Ryan’s dad is about to marry her mom, and so now it’s all icky stepbrotherlust. Whoa.

Could have stopped there - plenty of conflict. But no, there’s more!

AJ is a vampire and she can’t tell anyone. Not even Ryan knows. And she’s able to live among humans with a great deal of subterfuge. While she has some problems controlling her fangs and lust for havoc and blood, she’s pretty much totally covered. She has younger siblings, and Ryan has younger siblings, and even though the sibs never snack on her hemopopsicles by accident (where does she hide them?), it’s all paranormal Brady bunch up in there.

Could have stopped there - plenty of conflict. But no, there’s more!

Weird shit starts to happen. AJ and Ryan have a falling out and Ryan acts like a total priss ass diva (more on that not-heroic behavior in a minute) and then this random Scottish housekeeper moves in and starts hanging window boxes and cooking up a storm. And yes: there’s “dinna” and “wee lad” and a mention of how one… read more »

Friday Videos Do Like Canadian Humor

Sarcasm will get you many frequent flyer miles.

Chew Issue #1 by John Layman and Rob Guillory

Chew‘s premise is morbid, hilarious and delicious: in the near future, chicken has been outlawed in the United States because of an uncontrolled outbreak of avian flu. Or is it? Is it instead a gigantic governmental conspiracy? Regardless, chicken parts are now the hottest thing on the street, because as one characters observe: “You outlaw chicken, and only outlaws have chicken.” The FDA (minor quibble: why the FDA, and not the USDA?) is now in the vice business, cracking down on illicit chicken deals—and this isn’t even a metaphor for prostitution. It’s literally chickens, dude.

Enter Tony Chu. Tony Chu is a cibopathic police detective. He takes a bite of something, and he knows things. Psychic impressions of the life-cycle of the food flood him: the things done to the food, where the food came from, all of it. It’s bad enough when it comes to fruit and vegetables; eating meat is, uh, intense. (The one thing that doesn’t trigger his ability? Beets. Tony Chu eats a lot of canned beets.)

Then Tony discovers one day that his ability has unusual applications. You know. Should he, like, eat part of a perp. Or a murder victim.

And that’s when the… read more »

I Am Mr. X.

For awhile now, folks have been wondering who Mr. X from Quartet Press could be. I decided it was my mission, no, my duty to figure this out. Surely I could do it, right?

Not so easy, it turns out. I bombarded poor Kay Meyer with questions and queries, and even decided that a visual photo hunt was in order.

Me: is this him?

Kat: No.

Me: is this him?

Kat: No.

Sony 505 Review: Ranting, Comics, and Reporting by Randi the Nerd Heroine

Randi has some problems with the page lag on the Sony 505. It’s an eInk thing, I think - they all do it: Kindle, Sony. ALL THE COOL KIDS are doing it, ALRIGHT?!!

Randi also has some commentary on the swirly arrows of doom.

Randi also has some ranting to do about the software—which is part of the reason I set up the Test Drive. The learning curve can be steep, and the process of setting up the Reader can be challenging. Especially if you’re frequently greeted by the Swirly Arrows of Doom:

I don’t read manuals until something goes wrong. Sometimes this has led me into trouble. (Remind me to tell you the story of the day I got HAL’s new internal DVD drive) Most times, and with most of today’s technology, you can plug in and go. That actually really impressed me with Johnny. Plugged him in, loaded the software, and away we went.

Now the software. The ebook Library software sucks so hard. It’s slow, which may be HAL’s fault - he is six years old poor guy which… read more »

Goddess of the Hunt by Tessa Dare

At one pivotal scene in this novel, I made the following note: “The hottie, the twit, in the wardrobe.”

I loved so much about this book. I loved the writing, the fact that Dare doesn’t waste a word or rely on cliches or even every-so-skimmable words when writing even a kissing scene. It reminded me of Deirdre Knight’s Butterfly Tattoo, or Meredith Duran’s novels. These are books so carefully, intricately constructed that if I caught myself jumping ahead, I made myself go back and re-read because each word was careful and precious. I want to admire the tapestry, but I have to pay attention to the delicacy and confidence of every tiny stitch. Such is the writing in this book.

He bent his head by slow degrees, until his brow rested against hers.  They traded the same breath back and forth.  And when his lips finally bridged the last bit of distance between them, it felt like the end of a kiss rather than the beginning.

Don’t stop now, there’s more:

And then there had been that terrifying moment in the orchard.  Not the yawning black minute when he’d… read more »

Sony 700 Review: by Test Driver Billie Bloebaum

I never expected it to happen, you know. But, that’s the way these things are, right? Just when you least expect it: POW! right between the eyes. 

My first glimpse of my love nearly took my breath away: slim, sleek, and clad in black leather, this was a package that was easy on the eyes. I quickly found out, too, that my love was sensitive to touch. Of course, some touches brought forth a faster response than others, but I quickly learned just how to touch to elicit the reaction I was seeking.

Unfortunately, I also soon learned that my love and I faced communication problems. There were walls between us and until I found a way around them, I knew I wasn’t going to get what I wanted. A little massaging and finessing, though, and I managed to breach those walls and expose my love to a world of romance.

Now my love and I spend evenings companionably together, eagerly devouring books and highlighting passages we find touching or funny or unintentionally hilarious or making note of over- or incorrectly-used words… read more »

Six free ebooks… that are free anyway!

Thanks to Lee for the heads up: Barnes and Noble invites you to download their Free ereader software to your iPhone, iPod Touch, Blackberry, PC or Mac (thanks for the compatibility, folks) - and as a bonus you get six free books.

Which books?

Oh, hold on to your library card, because wowser. You get:

The Last of the Mohicans

Sense and Sensibility

Little Women

Dracula

Pride and Prejudice

“plus a handy pocket dictionary,” which, gee. Thanks.

So I get a dictionary and six “free books” that are free anyway. Are you kidding me? Yo! Curious ebook readers! There are over 100,000 titles available at Project Gutenberg, formatted for a variety of reading devices. All free of charge!

Barnes and Noble gets the chutzpah award of the day for that one.

Sony 700 Review: by Test Driver Sandra Coburn

Sandra says:I never seriously considered purchasing a digital book.  For the price, you can buy quite a few paperback books.  Digital books are not significantly less expensive than printed books, so it would take hundreds of books to realize the savings.  Netbooks, though not as convenient and compact as digital book readers, have a lot more power for a similar price.

Besides, I simply love a paper book.  You can’t take a digital book to the beach or in the bath or by the pool (or in the pool, as I have been known to do).  Electronics tend to rebel against sand and water.  If I drop a paperback book, I might bend a page, but if I drop a digital book, well, it might not be pretty. How does an author autograph a digital book? My favorite autographed books, if I don’t drop them in the pool, can be passed on to the next generation. 

This brings up the issue of licensing.  I am 100% against piracy, but if I buy a book, a song, or a computer program, I would like… read more »

Dude Watchin’ With the Brontes

I love Kate Beaton. I love her so hard.

I think the essence of that comic can be summed thusly: It is a truth universally acknowledged in Romancelandia, that a single brooding man in possession of a dickbag nature must be in want of a Magic Hoo-Hoo to reform him.  Nice dudes are nice, but dickbags are (generally speaking) easier to write when one is looking for fodder for generating conflict, and more exciting to read about. This is why I’m tipping my hat to Patricia Gaffney, Barbara Samuel, Laura Kinsale, Jennifer Crusie, Sharon and Tom Curtis and all the other authors who do a great job of creating heroes who are incredibly hot but aren’t brooding, damaged dickbags.

People Magazine - Our Favorite Books Giveaway Winner

And the winner of the Holy Crap We’re In People Magazine - Let’s Celebrate by Giving Away a Ton of Books is….

Which corresponds to:

SoraAGH. Congrats SoraAGH - please, email me with your mailing address and our favorite romances shall be yours.

Thanks for celebrating with us and for entering our contest—now I have a hella-long list of books to try. That one thread will keep many a curious romance reader broker than broke.

Doc Turtle: Dark Lover by JR Ward

He’s back! After the splendid members of the Bitchery recommended many, many books for Dr. Turtle, aka SBiT Patrick, the choice was Dark Lover by JR Ward. Behold: Chapters 1-5. Let the mhahgic begihn!

If you’re not familiar with the styling’s of DocTurtle’s romance blogging, he reviews the book chapter by chapter. Ergo: SPOILERS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD ARE BELOW THE FOLD OK?!?!!

Hey, all!  DocTurtle…or SBiT Patrick…or whatever we decided I should be called on this blog…here, ready to say a few words about my latest reading assignment for SBTB, J.R. Ward’s Dark Lover, the first of a long series of Black Dagger Brotherhood novels and my first paranormal romance.  This book features vampires, vampires, and…more vampires.  They’re terrifying and ferocious, but they’re sexy as hell.

I started the book last night, I’m about eight chapters in now (the first five are blogged about below), and as a paranormal newbie the first question I have is to what extent Ward elects to adhere to the “canonical” vampire mythology, if there is such a thing?  I also wonder to what extent the amount of sex and violence Dark Lover has… read more »

Patricia Briggs’ Online Extravaganza

To celebrate the 2nd anniversary of her message boards, Patricia Briggs’ online community is organizing a crazy month of giveaways beginning at midnight tonight:

Starting Sunday, July 25th and running through Tuesday, August 25th, there will be a give away each week. You can enter each week for a new chance to win the books for that week, but please, only one entry per week. The giveaway will culminate with five grand prizes: three copies of Hunting Ground, the second book in the urban fantasy Alpha & Omega series; the hard cover compilation of the Mercy Thompson graphic novel mini series, Homecoming, and a single edition, Mercy’s Garage mug. There are some limits on international shipping, so please check each week’s giveaway for exact details.

The current schedule of books to be given away (subject to change):

week 1 : Dragon Blood, Dragon Bones (US edition) week 2 : When Demons Walk (US edition), Steal the Dragon (US edition, new cover art),  Cry Wolf week 3 : Moon Called (US edition), Blood Bound (US edition), Iron Kissed (US edition), Bone Crossed (UK edition), issue #4 of the Mercy Thompson comic mini series,… read more »