How to use this Page

We're feeling festive here at YABC. So we've decided to give away a gift from Writer's Yardsale to one lucky book lover! (Up to a $30 value!)

The Yardsale has an awesome selection of t-shirts, mugs, posters, notebooks, and more with great designs for the book lovers, writers, and the English teachers in your life. Win an item just for you or someone you love!

Here's how it works:

Simply leave a comment at the bottom of this post with a link to the item you want ohsomuch from The Yardsale. (Must be $30 or less. We'll pay the shipping to any US address!) Tell us why it's the perfect gift for you or a friend/family member. That's all there is to it!

We'll pick a name at random using Random.org, then contact you so we can get your item to you ASAP.

Get your entry in today -- this contest closes at midnight on Monday, December 12th. Hopefully just enough time to order your gift and have it arrive before December 24th. (If the shipment time doesn't matter to you, just let us know in the comments.)

So get cracking! You only have 4 days to choose an item and comment here with a link.

Personally? I love the "I Read Banned Books" tote bag. And the "Reading is Sexy" mug. And the "I Like Big Books and I Cannot Lie" t-shirt. And the...okay, you get the hint.

Ready? Set? Comment!

Click here to browse the entire Writer's Yardsale collection and pick your favorite item!

Display Comments Add a Comment

I just came across this fantastic quote and had to share it with you.

Wear the old coat and buy the new book ~ Austin Phelps

I just had to share it with you.  It's great isn't it?

You know I have so many friends who are obsessed with new clothes, bags, make up, shoes...

Of course I like to look nice and do enjoy buying new clothes but it's nothing compared to the thrill I get going into a book store and choosing a new book.  I love it.  I love the smell of a new book.  I love the feel of a new book. 

If I had to choose ~ Yep, I'd choose a book.

How about you?

Add a Comment

The clock is winding down, but there is still time for you to win your very own 2010 Book Lovers calendar by reminding us of your favorite author and their birthday!

Read more about the contest and share your favorite author’s birthday here. So go ahead – post a comment, help us remember all those fabulous authors who wrote the books that make us smile and take a chance at winning a 2010 Book Lover’s calendar!

Add a Comment

Every March we celebrate the birthday of the beloved Dr. Seuss.  Classrooms everywhere read Oh, the Places You’ll Go! and kids parade around in those classic red and white, striped top hats.  It is a day of fun for all.

This year, we are wondering, why stop at celebrating the birthday of only one of our favorite    authors? Let’s kick off the next decade of books and fabulous authors yet- to-come by remembering the birthdays of our favorite authors!

And as an incentive, we are giving away 10 copies of  the 2010 Book Lovers calendar, complete with author birthdays, stories about our favorite classics from Sails for the South Seas to Of Mice and Men, and pictures that every booklover wishes they could hang on their kitchen fridge! Plus, each copy helps First Book provide new books to children in need.

Want to get your own copy of the 2010 Book Lovers calendar?

Here’s how you can: post a comment mentioning your favorite author and their birthday by 11:59 pm ET on December 28^th. Ten participants will be chosen at random to receive their very own Book Lover’s 2010 Calendar.

Post a comment and help us celebrate all of the authors who wrote those books that make us smile!

Calendars can also be purchased by visiting www.bookloversstuff.com

Add a Comment

Ben and Jerry’s is considering creating a library-themed ice-cream flavour! How cool is that? What a great way to remind people every day about libraries and books….

And how did this get started? By a librarian and book-lover, of course. Librarian Andy Woodworth put up his idea on Facebook and has more than 4,400 people signed up to support it. Woodworth hopes the library-themed ice cream will raise awareness of libraries “in the face of stagnant or slashed state, county, and municipal budgets”.

Some of the proposed flavors are:

• Gooey Decimal System could combine dark fudge alphabet letters with caramel swirls in hazelnut ice-cream;
  
• Dusty Stacks could be a layered ice-cream with speckles of cocoa in every layer;
  
• Li-Berry pie could mix lime sherbet with raspberry sauce and pie-crust pieces;
  
• Overdue Fine as Fudge Chunk could drop fudge brownies and white chocolate coins into milk chocolate ice-cream swirled with caramel.

The list has me grinning! How about you? Does it appeal to you?

If you could design a library- or book-themed ice cream flavor, what would it be?

I think I would go for an Anne of Green Gables ice cream, with raspberry and lime swirls.

Display Comments Add a Comment

Penguin UK has launched a dating website for book readers. Their tag is “PenguinDating–where book lovers meet.” It’s an interesting idea–readers are often passionate about reading and the specific books they love–so why not see if they can find a match?

Photo: Bitzi @ Flickr

According to the Bookseller, Penguin says the site offers readers “a place to meet and indulge in the age-old art of writing love letters.” Members will write about the last book they read in their profile, and can search other people’s profiles for mentions of their favorite books.

That sounds neat to me. I love writing and reading letters, and if you’re looking for love, why not try to find it through one of your passions, if books is one of yours? Somehow it sounds more appealing to me than those regular match sites, which often look quite unappealing to me. It’s the book focus that makes it seem nicer, some how. Though it’s the kind of thing that I think should be free.

Anna Rafferty, Penguin’s online marketing manager, told the Bookseller, “At Penguin we believe that the books we cherish and read over and over, those that we feel a deep emotional connection with, say something defining about us and the type of people we are.” I agree with that wholeheartedly.

It looks like PenguinDating is UK based, so people in other countries may be out of luck. I also wonder if they include lesbian and gay book lovers, or if the site is strictly for heterosexual book lovers. I’d like to think that they don’t exclude.

What do you think? Is PenguinDating appealing? Unappealing? Don’t care?

Thanks to the swivet for the link.

Display Comments Add a Comment

It's not about building schools, it's about building communities of content creators and learners. Very powerful and long overdue. We're still not at the tipping point, but it's coming. As passionate book lovers, we are open and receptive to the wild, sometimes chaotic new worlds that great books reveal to us. Readers ARE lifelong learners.

How marvelous it would be if our schools could embrace an engaging, imaginative world of learning investigations previously available only to a lucky few. No longer is reading just a necessary skill for "book" learning, it is a critical skill for life in the 21st century where everyone has the opportunity to write and publish their own stories and to learn from each other by working collaboratively toward common goals.

How can each of us push the education bureaucracy away from test-taking to creating dynamic learning environments that stimulate the love of learning? Perhaps for some kids, it's not through traditional printed books at all, but the multi-media world of story available through technology. How do we as story passionistas embrace other delivery systems?

Add a Comment