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On Monday, I was part of an amazing panel discussion as part of NYU's Summer Publishing Institute. It was inspiring and thought provoking, and I plan to write up some notes and thoughts that came out of that soon.

But not today.

Today I would like to point out two things that made me laugh out loud in my bathrobe, and caused the ALP to shake his head at the wonder and ridiculousness of it all. They involve two of the things I love the most: books and Brooklyn.

First, Shelf Awareness linked to the Green Apple Core, the blog of the amazing Green Apple Books in San Francisco. It seems Green Apple has a fantastic program wherein they recommend one book a month, guaranteed good or your money back. And every month, they shoot a two-minute video promo for the book -- every one of which is freaking hilarious. This month's book is Werner Herzog's Conquest of the Useless, but my favorite video (I watched them all) is for Little Bee.



This cracks me up. What's most awesome is how much fun the booksellers are having making these -- their goofy enthusiasm is infectious, and I can only imagine leads to sales of the featured books. I may have to steal this idea for Greenlight Bookstore someday.

Second, this weekend, as everyone knows, marks that important occasion: the Coney Island hot dog eating contest. The irrepressible Gersh Kuntzman of our beloved local rag The Brooklyn Paper helps to psych us up for the showdown by rocking out with "The Bard of Coney Island" singing that American classic, "Hot Dog Time." (Warning: this is very silly, and if you are not in New York may be totally uninteresting to you. But it is kind of catchy -- I think I may have it stuck in my head all day.)

It's been brought to my attention recently that I've been remiss in updating the ol' blogroll with some of the blogs I actually regularly read, and some of the bookstore blogs that I'm just discovering. So I have gotten at last off my tush and added some of my favorites-- read 'em (at right) and weep.

Book Soup has the best (obscene but true) tagline.

Word has the best Brooklyn stuff, natch.

Bookavore is a fellow Emerging Leaders type, a true book nerd -- her description of how she became a bookseller made me want to be her new best friend.

Wordsmiths has the best ongoing narrative (home town store makes good, moves into the bank building, graphic novels go in the vault!) -- and awesome event photos; they're my newest model for how I want to run my bookstore blog.

there is no gap is the thoughtful stuff you'd expect from Shaman Drum's Karl Pohrt.

Archimedes Forgets is the off-hours (but still awfully booky) project of the ABA's lovely Sarah Rettger.

The Inside Flap is a brilliantly done multi-author blog from the bookstore crown jewel of Wisconsin.

Bookninja is an always prescient Canadian litblog (and the source of half my links these days), run by a poet acquaintance of mine who used to live in New York.

There's more, of course -- explore, explore!

* * *

Today is also my last day as a BookStream employee. I'll be working for the company a bit on a freelance basis, but today I'm wrapping up loose ends and saying goodbyes. It's a bit melancholy, but I've already got new irons in the fire -- meeting to get to, phone calls to make -- in the pursuit of the Brooklyn Bookstore.

What I'm hoping for in between is a little of this. While I can't remember the last time I spent three hours in the tub, like the author of this Guardian piece, I agree 100% with the following proposition:

"Baths are one of the few pleasures body and self can appreciate simultaneously. This is entirely because reading in the bath is the height of civilisation."

It's a bit of a cold wet day in Brooklyn -- after I wrap up the work day, I'm looking forward to a little height of civilization. Since I'm a wimpy Californian, sometimes in the winter the bath is the first time I feel really comfortable all day, and it's all the better with something to read. Jessa Crispin of Bookslut also famously reads in the tub (in Chicago I don't blame her), and I suspect it's a widespread practice among bookish types (it's also as cheap as luxury gets).

My bathtime reads tend toward the New Yorker, or a collection of essays (I'm currently reading Michael Chabon's forthcoming Maps and Legends) -- I find a bit of wit, a turn of phrase, the path of an idea (though not too heavy), is just the thing for winding down in a hot tub. (And I agree with some of the commenters: a glass of red wine "perched death-defyingly on the rim of the sink" can sometimes improve the experience.)

What do you like to read in the bath, if you do indulge? If not, what's your height of reading relaxation/civilization?

Thanks to Brad, her mother's new boyfriend, Gilda is now all set to attend the swanky Our Lady of Sorrows private school. Gilda had wanted to apply on a whim. Now that the pink uniformed experience is right in front of her, she isn't sure she really wants to go!

After a tour of the school, she changes her mind. From creepy Velma Underhill, to the fact that the school looks like an old castle...there are things about this place that give Gilda that hair-standing-up-on-the-back-of-your-neck feeling that can only mean this is the perfect place for a psychic investigator such as herself.

Turns out, one of the students drowned in the lake on campus 3 years earlier. Gilda knows that she is the one to solve this mystery. But what if there are girls around who do not want the mystery solved? Girls that may have had something to do with poor Delores' demise?

Add to the mystery Gilda's unwanted, school chosen big sister Marcie, her mom's loser boyfriend, and an English teacher with the amusing name of Mr. Pante (pantay....not panty!), and readers are in for another Gilda adventure that is sure to please. There is just something about Gilda that I love. She is her own girl, wonky yet somehow sophisticated.

I am definitely looking forward to more in this series.