Welcome back to Wednesday Links! This time we have some really awesome things to show you, hopefully to soften this kind of unhappy news for Nook users.
On March 15, which is a week from now, Barnes & Noble will be limiting the content offered to its users, as well as doing away with certain apps altogether:
From 15 March, customers will also not be able to rent or purchase video content from the NOOK video store, which will be closed down completely on 30 April. If customers want to keep the content they’ve already purchased, the need to transfer content to other providers.
If you’re in the UK, things are even worse as Barnes & Noble will no longer be offering e-books across the pond.
…
Who doesn’t love free books, especially for kids in need? Anything that fosters reading in children is a-okay by me. Check out some details from part of the ConnectED initiative, sent to us by Gloriamarie:
More than $250 million worth of e-books are soon going to be available to kids in need — for free.
And these aren’t just any titles. A handful of major publishers have signed on to the program, so these are thousands of popular, award-winning books handpicked by the Digital Public Library of America’s Curation Corps.
It’s part of President Obama’s ConnectED initiative to bring broadband Internet and educational materials to kids around the country. The New York Public Library agreed to take on the task of creating a special e-reader for this new program.
…
It’s DABWAHA time, which is our very own March Madness-esque tournament for romance novels. Feel free to check out the list of current nominees, and if you don’t see your favorite book from 2015 on the list, feel free to nominate it for our Reader Category!
…
If you enjoyed Carrie’s review of Fresh Romance #1, I have good news! Fresh Romance has officially launched a Kickstarter to produce a special paperback edition:
Each FRESH ROMANCE story that has been digitally released will be compiled in this brand new print edition. The book will be 224 pages and printed in a 6×9 paperback format, although if we hit our goal early in the campaign, it may get upgraded to a hardcover. While we may offer other editions of this book to the direct market, only books bought through this Kickstarter will have the Special Edition cover by Kevin Wada! Plus, Kickstarter backers will get their copy of FRESH ROMANCE VOL. 1 before anyone else!
Various tiered rewards include stickers, digital editions, art prints, and even a one-year subscription to Fresh Romance‘s digital issues. The campaign has less than a week left and around $16K to go!
…
We’ve all had some crappy relationships and when they come to an end, I’ll be the first to admit that I fantasize about going Waiting to Exhale on the guy. Artist Laura Stokes also knows that feeling and took to making “Revenge Dioramas,” and the more outlandish the better:
The scenes, which are made up mostly of action figures, depict worlds where women rule and the men who scorned them drool, or perish in a dinosaur attack.
“I made them as hyperbolic as I could,” Stokes said. “Not just ‘your ex gets hit by a bus’ but ‘your ex gets eaten by prehistoric crocodiles and then dropped into a volcano.'”
I don’t know about you, but I’d definitely buy some prints of these dioramas.
…
What better way to end than with some pretty awesome, though maybe slightly impractical shoes. UK apparel company, Irregular Choice, is going to collaborate with Disney to create an Alice in Wonderland themed shoe collection for Disney’s upcoming Alice Through the Looking Glass:
The collection will feature a mix of flats and heels showing familiar characters like Alice, the Cheshire Cat, and the Mad Hatter as well as imagery and quotes from the original 1951 film. Despite the collection’s release before Disney’s Alice Through the Looking Glass on May 27, imagery from the live-action movies is not featured in the line.
I also discovered that Irregular Choice did a Star Wars themed collection and there goes all my money!
…
Sarah: And last but not least, we have a new Lady!
Whenever I look at stock photo sites for images, I do a few searches to see if any photographs of women of color that fit the style of the Pink Palace have been added. Finding photographs of women of color that aren’t insulting in some way and that fit the retro style of the existing imagery can be a challenge – as we detailed with the reveal of our first Lady of Color.
Usually there are very few retro-styled images that would work – but I was very excited to find this one! The whole series is terrific.
AND HER SHOES. I’m a little sorry our masthead images aren’t full-length shots because SHOES OH MY GOSH.
I want those. Do you want those? I do. I want two pair.
This model is wonderful, too. She gives great book side-eye:
And her smile is beautiful, too. Should you be looking for similar images, there are several in this series.
As you click through various pages of the site (and thank you for doing so!), you’ll see our new Lady with the others. And I’m going to keep looking for images of women of color to include, so if you see any that might work, please email me!
…
What awesome links have you seen this week? Share the love!
She is awesome! Polka dots and red shoes – so cool.
Love the new lady.
The revenge dioramas are hysterical – but – darn if we wouldn’t be lambasting the creator if it was men making women-eaten-by-dinosaur dioramas.
I don’t even know what the solution is to that (allow everyone to be hyperbolic across the board?), but, um, yeah.
I noticed the new SB yesterday and think she’s fabulous. Love the blue glasses.
Should note that the Fresh Romance is specifically for the Kickstarter special cover edition, but that our good friends at Oni Press (“Another Castle”! Woot!) will be issuing a paperback edition in mid-August that isn’t part of the Kickstarter deal. Fund or not fund, we shall have print Fresh Romance anyway. 🙂
I think those are close to the first pair of glasses I got when I was 7. My mom insisted on plain blue, and I was devastated because Cindy had red & white candy striped cat-eye frames with rhinestones. I didn’t even get one lousy sparkle. Sigh.
I stumbled across The SetUp Wizard last night and read all the entries in one go ! Hogwarts has finally hired an IT guy to bring them into the modern world and it’s HILARIOUS.
http://thesetupwizard.tumblr.com/tagged/setupwizard/chrono
Very fun new lady! This will make me keep picturing the SBTB writers as having stepped out of a time portal from the 1960s. Mission… accomplished?
Keep the shoes, I want that polka dot dress. I want it bad.
Congrats on the new lady. Great book side-eye indeed!
Love the new lady! Polka dots! Those shoes! That smile! Some looks are timeless and classic for a reason.
I noticed she’s not wearing spectacles. We contact lens wearers appreciate the inclusiveness of the new addition.[g]
As someone who bought eBooks at Borders, I strongly urge anyone who bought digital content at B&N to make several personal backups, including to a cloud server, while you still can. If something happens and you need to reset or replace your device, you might lose your content unless you have your own personal backups to reload. It’s better to do it now than to wait until they announce an impending closure. At that point, there will be a lot of people scrambling to download their files and the site can get overwhelmed. If you miss the deadline because the site crashed, you’re out of luck. Don’t forget to rename your files so that you can identify the contents without opening every single file you own. Good Luck!
…ummmm…. The name is Gloriamarie, actually. “Who doesn’t love free books, especially for kids in need? Anything that fosters reading in children is a-okay by me. Check out some details from part of the ConnectED initiative, sent to us by GloriaMarie”
Congratulations on a new SB. Sounds like fun. Which raises the question, what are the criteria to be a SB? How about a senior citizen SB?
I’m so sorry Gloriamarie – totally my bad. I think autocorrect and I got into a fight about this one. Apologies!
Thank you. Now about my question?
Beautiful new lady! I really appreciate the commitment to diversity on this site.
[…] Bookity linkity from Smart Bitches. […]
The imagery at the top of the site? I’m always on the lookout for more images that fit the retro style of the masthead and that inclusively reflect the people who read romance and read the site each day. If you see an image that might work, please let me know!