Jane Litte's Blog, page 892

REVIEW: Diverse Energies edited by Tobias Buckell and Joe Monti

Dear authors,

When I first heard the premise of this anthology, I was thrilled. Science fiction and dystopia stories about multicultural characters and worlds written by diverse authors? Sign me up! I say science fiction and dystopia because I’m not entirely sure how this anthology is being marketed and to be fair, the lines are blurred in the young adult genre.

[image error]That said, while the stories featured diverse characters and worlds, I thought the overall tone of them was similar. In other words, t...

Guest Post: Authors Against Bullying by Mandy Roth

The story of the Canadian teen who committed suicide because of bullying—but not before she told her story via a YouTube video— has hit me hard. What makes the matter even worse are the comments on the video by trolls. Some are so hateful, so horrific that simply typing them out to include here would make me ill. The horrible comments, the fact a young girl was driven to suicide (she is not the only person to have taken their own life due to bullying) and the countless other accounts/forms of...

Friday Film Review: Pride and Prejudice (1940)

[image error]Pride and Prejudice (1940)

Genre: Romance

Grade: C+/B-

What?! A grade less than fabulous for one of Jane’s masterpieces? Sorry but yes. While I enjoyed some aspects of this interpretation there are just too many eye popping, “oh, tell me they didn’t just do that!” issues for me to overlook. Had I seen this before some of the more recent TV/Film versions of the story, I would probably have cheerfully overlooked or not even noticed the face-palm moments but as it is, Hollywood did a number on it.

“...

Friday News: Eighth Circuit limits free speech for students; Amazon video buyer beware, 99 LifeHacks

Publishing Dealmaking: Romance On The Rise – RT had a nice summarization (and chart) that breaks down the deals reported at Publishers Marketplace. Details of interest to our crowd:

Children’s sales, including Young Adult and middle grade books, have slowed considerably.


While mystery stories are not selling as well as in previous years, science fiction/fantasy and thrillers are on the rise.


Sales in romance and woman’s fiction projects have doubled! RT Book Reviews

Eighth Circuit Overturns Prel...

Daily Deals: From King Arthur to President Lincoln, romances and biographies

[image error] Lincoln by David Herbert Donald. $ 2.99

From the Jacket Copy:

David Herbert Donald’s Lincoln is a stunningly original portrait of Lincoln’s life and presidency. Donald brilliantly depicts Lincoln’s gradual ascent from humble beginnings in rural Kentucky to the ever- expanding political circles in Illinois, and finally to the presidency of a country divided by civil war. Donald goes beyond biography, illuminating the gradual development of Lincoln’s character, chronicling his tremendous capacity...

REVIEW: Love Notes by Avis Exley

Dear Ms. Exley:

I bought this book because I have read several about a male singing star but not a famous female one and I wanted to see how successful the reverse worked. Erika Fenn is an American based pop star who retreats to England, her homeland, for a mental health break. There she runs into an old lover, Aiden Thirstan (an unfortunate name because I kept thinking of Thurston Howell from Gilligan’s Island). Aiden and Erika connected before she became famous but their budding romance was...

REVIEW: Hunk for the Holidays by Katie Lane

Dear Ms. Lane,

I rarely believe in insta-love and, in general, holiday stories leave me cranky. I didn’t think I’d like this book—even the title made me smirk (although the guy on the cover is seriously hot). But Hunk for the Holidays entertained me. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a good time.

[image error]The beginning of your novel is almost exactly like that of Lisa Kleypas’s Suddenly You (published in 2001.) In both books, a strong-willed businesswoman hires, for the night, an escort. The man who turns u...

Thursday News: Dumb senate questions; Claire Felicie’s pictoral study; Amazon’s WhisperCast

Actual U.S. Senate Debate Question: “Have You Read Fifty Shades Of Grey?” – “This was a real question posed to Kirsten Gillibrand and Wendy Long, two women running for U.S. senate in New York, during their only debate.” Oh America. What is wrong with you? Buzzfeed

Amazon Launches New Tool to Help Schools Manage Their Kindle Collections – One of the biggest publishing fights will be over the hearts and minds of students. Pearson just bought EmbanetCompass, a company that helps colleges and univ...

Daily Deals: Freebies and discounts for the hard bitten detective lover to the contemporary romance reader

[image error] Almost Perfect by Patricia Rice. $2.99.

From Jacket Copy:

Cleo Alyssum would do anything to transform herself into the kind of mother her young son needs, but she’s learned from hard experience that people only wreck her life, making it tough to prove that she deserves her son back. Celebrated cartoonist Jared McCloud is just the kind of sexy, artistic, impossibly bull-headed extrovert who can shatter her carefully constructed serenity and ruin her chance to be perfect. But how can she avoid...

REVIEW: The Second Seduction of a Lady by Miranda Neville

Dear Ms. Neville,

I’ve enjoyed all four books in your Burgundy Club series so when I heard you were starting a new series and putting out a prequel novella, I snapped it up from Edelweiss. Set in the English countryside in 1793, The Second Seduction of a Lady is a story of reunited lovers.

[image error]The novella begins with Austen-style omniscient narration which tells the reader that Eleanor Hardwick’s record for common sense is nearly unblemished. The one blemish, as it turns out, is Max Quinton. Eleano...