This Sunday night CNBC shines the light on Amazon with the premiere of Amazon Rising. From the press release: CNBC tells the story of a shrewd visionary named Jeff Bezos who bet his fortunes on the exploding internet and created one of the most admired and feared companies in the world. Today, Amazon sells everything from accordions to zippers – nearly $80 billion worth a year – and has changed the way we shop, bringing goods to our doorstep faster than we ever imagined. Correspondent David Faber reports on a powerhouse that has upended the publishing and retail industries, and...
A Book Lover’s Lexicon
Using the informal Japanese word “Tsundoku,” which refers to the act of buying books and letting them pile up unread, as a jumping off point Molly Schoemann-McCann at the Barnes and Noble Book Blog comes up with 15 new words for the bibliophile. Afficted When something terribly sad has just happened in a book you are reading, and you want to burst into tears, but you know that you’ll feel ridiculous trying to explain yourself if anyone asks. Example: “I was so deeply afficted by the ending of Eleanor & Park that I had to bite my wallet to keep...
Picturing Haruki Murakami’s Women
Portland-based artist Johnny Acurso celebrates some of Haruki Murakami's most memorable female characters in his triptych painting 'Murakami's Women'. "Granddaughter" from Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World "Sumire" in Sputnik Sweetheart ' "May" from The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle The originals were painted in oil on illustration board. Prints are available here
The Libraries of Chinguetti
It was once known as seventh holy city of Islam. It was also called the "City of Libraries" and home to the cultural elite of West Africa. Now Chinguetti is in the process of being swallowed up in its entirety by the desert and will disappear in a few generations. Less than ten libraries and thousands of rare books remain including important Islamic manuscripts on religion, science and literature. I hope an army of conservators and preservationists are on their way. More at Messy Nessy Chic: The Lost Desert Libraries of Chinguetti
Doctor says: Read aloud to kids from day one
For the first time the American Academy of Pediatrics has weighed in on early literacy education and have come to recommend that reading aloud to your child should begin at birth. That's right at birth! Not when they start talking or walking but when they start breathing. They have asked the 62,000 pediatricians in the U.S. "to become powerful advocates for reading aloud, every time a baby visits the doctor." As the the piece in the New York Times on the announcement reminds us: According to a federal government survey of children’s health, 60 percent of American children from families with incomes...