Being a former musical theater kid will always be a part of me. Around Halloween, I like to watch or listen to Stephen Sondheim’s 1979 stage musical, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. The movie has good performances, but I prefer the play. Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter are talented actors but the wrong voice types for the roles, in my opinion. Mrs. Lovett and Mr. Todd should be, respectively, a powerful alto and baritone....
Condom dresses and space helmets have debuted on fashion runways. A dead body becomes the trend when a coat made of human skin saunters down fashion’s biggest stage. The body is identified as Annabelle Leigh, the teenager who famously disappeared over a decade ago from her boyfriend’s New York City mansion. This new evidence casts suspicion back on the former boyfriend, Cecil LeClaire. Now a monk, he is forced to return to his dark and absurd childhood home to clear his name....
I was so ready. “I would make a little poster to introduce myself and keep it on my desk!” I exclaimed. “Come out from behind the desk and talk to people! Ask kids how their day was when they get out of school!” Flash forward six weeks: I’m working at the library and I’m loving it. And the families in our community know who I am! Kids tell me how their day was when they get out of school!...
Outstanding comic books, manga, graphic novels, and more were voted on by a group of professional creators, publishing professionals, librarians, and comic book retailers who were chosen by ReedPOP and the Harvey Awards Executive Committee. This year’s awards were coordinated by Chris D’Lando, Camilla Di Persia, and Eden Miller. The winners are as follows: Book of the Year “Best long-form graphic novel or collection that demonstrating excellence in writing, art or cartooning showcasing great representation of the form....
There have been many adaptations of A Christmas Carol, among them stage plays, movies, and my favorite: radio dramas. Not to mention all of the various audiobooks, many of them performed as audio dramas. In fact, with so many options, it can be difficult to choose a way to consume this quintessential Christmas story. The first stage production, A Christmas Carol: Or, the Miser’s Warning!, opened in February 1844, about two months after the novella was published....
2022 has brought out an excellent assembly of titles, combining books and audiobook narrators to create something new and unique. From poetry to memoir, there’s something out there for lovers of all genres. Sometimes, an audiobook narrator will carry an entire book, like Natalie Naudus in Fiona and Jane. Perhaps, a full cast will create an epic feel to an audiobook, like The Candy House by Jennifer Egan. Or maybe it’s a memoir writer performing their own story, like Viola Davis in Finding Me....
Now, this is by no means a comprehensive list of Beatles cameos in comics. For starters, I’ve limited my scope to Marvel and DC — and specifically to their superhero comics, meaning no Stan Lee Presents: The Beatles Story (it’s a real thing), no MAD Magazine appearances, etc. I’m also not interested in the many uses of the Beatles in background shots and collages meant to evoke “Hey! It’s the ’60s!...
One such similar place that has begun to gain the attention of bookish people is Discord. Originally a sight designed for people to connect over video games, Discord has quickly grown to be a popular chat room for all types of experiences and hobbies. You can join massive servers with strangers or just make a small one for you and your friends. Discord does it all. It wasn’t long after Discord got big that people began using it for book clubs....
Almost any topic can fall under the social-emotional learning umbrella. Self-awareness is approached with books about listening to our body, recognizing cues for stress or anxiety, and using breathwork or coping strategies when upset. Interpersonal skills are addressed by discussing boundaries, celebrating community, and practicing scripts for dealing with conflict. There are great lessons available to help teach these skills, but almost every single one of them starts with a good book....
I moved around quite a bit during my time as an undergrad student in NYC. It was part of school policy that we changed dorm rooms every year, which was irritating but let me experience different neighborhoods in Manhattan. My favorite neighborhood I lived in, though, was actually the one I moved to after I had stopped living in the dorms, in my last year at school. I lived in the 140s in Harlem, just a few blocks away from a small bridge that connected to the South Bronx....
But I’m trying to read outside my comfort zone and Stefan Stern of the Financial Times blurbed The Box as an, “Ingenious analysis of the phenomenon of containerization.” Phenomenon of containerization? Hunh? This was the book for me! The world economy and I are worlds apart. Or so I thought. “The box,” the ubiquitous, charmless, standardized shipping container that fits easily on ship, train or semi, makes possible the cheap flame-resistent made-in-Thailand Frozen-movie themed pajamas I just bought off the Target clearance rack because my kids, like capitalist herd animals, have moved on from Frozen to The Lego Movie to The Box Trolls....
Station Eleven opens on a snowy night in Toronto as a famous Hollywood actor, Arthur Leander, dies onstage from a mysterious flu while performing in King Lear. Mandel then moves between the early days of the pandemic and 20 years later in a world with few survivors left. We meet a cast of characters who knew Arthur, including a child actress named Kirsten. Kirsten later journeys between the remnants of society fringing Lake Michigan, performing Shakespeare in the Traveling Symphony....
So what is it about the haunted house that spans media types? What is it about the concept that transfixes both audience in the land of imagination, and truth seekers in the science world? Why is this one of those subjects that bridges the gap between fact and fiction? And how do we define a haunted house, really? One might argue that the pesky property in question has to be brimming with unwanted spectral roommates....
One of the first things I learned in my research is that nursery rhymes are often many centuries old, so it’s difficult to know their origins, never mind their meanings. In fact, some researchers suggest that the alleged political origins of many nursery rhymes are pure nonsense. So, by necessity, this article is less about pinning down the One True Meaning behind any given nursery rhyme and more about exploring the different ways people ascribe significance to the meaningless and ridiculous....
Uh, no. It turns out The Rainbow Fish is actually pretty messed up. Let’s go page-by-page, shall we? Pfister starts the book off with the narrator describing how beautiful the Rainbow Fish, who does not otherwise have a name, is. He has laser focus on the physical beauty here, but I’ll give him that, since it’s a metaphor. Okay, cool. Before long, we learn the Rainbow Fish’s beauty is the source of his woes....
Find below a wide range of fun, clever, and insightful book stickers. Not included are literary quotes, but pretty much everything else goes. This list is not comprehensive—how could it be?—but you can supplement the gems here with these bookish stickers from last summer or these rad bullet journal supplies for readers. These are the good kinds of stickers and not the kind you’ll be sighing about being unable to remove from the cover of your favorite book....
I must confess one thing: sometimes I’m interested in an audiobook as much for the narrator as I am for the book itself. Other times I get an audiobook because I want the book and am downright delighted to realize one of my favorite narrators is reading it. A great narrator makes all the difference when it comes to getting lost in the book. They can make an okay book better....
When I asked him why he assumed my favorite book was suitable for children (as I am not a child anymore), he just shrugged. He wasn’t really sure. He even found it in the fiction section, not the young adult section. Yet, he assumed it was okay for a young person to read. (Don’t worry boo, you’re forgiven.) I think I know why this happened. There is a tendency to classify women as young adult or middle grade authors, despite the actual content of their books....
“Recently we asked the BuzzFeed Community which Harry Potter movie mistakes really bothered them, and people focused in on all the differences between the books and movies that felt contradictory, confusing, or just pointless. Here are those frustrating differences.” Why. Weren’t. Child. Lily’s. Eyes. Green!? “I said earlier that the book itself didn’t matter but there are some reads better-suited to calming anxiety than others. Anything involving a character racing against time or in a dicey situation is too much for me....
After browsing these TikTok bookish DIYs for a while, I noticed a pattern. There are super easy crafts that you can do with a computer and a printer. These are mostly inspired by books. There are others that use books to make some decorations as well. There are those that are for decorating your shelves/books and, funnily enough, I saw plenty of TikToks about making books. Again, they all have different degrees of difficulty, but I chose eight that I think most people can make at home without a problem!...
