It’s been quite awhile since my last Bookmarked! post, and I’m glad to say it’s back with a vengeance.

Article 1. I’m going to start off with an article in Design Observer entitled Bandwidth of Books. In it Alice Twemlow quotes Gabriel Zaid’s So Many Books: Reading and Publishing in an Age of Abundance, where he tells us that we’re all growing exponentially ignorant, being in a day and time where we produce 1 book every 30 seconds.

“If a person read a book a day, he would be neglecting to read 4,000 others and his ignorance would grow 4,000 times faster than his knowledge.”

This sets a backdrop to the rest of the article: how the opening up of new media has freed prited publications to explore ‘increasingly idiosyncratic obsessions — the more quirky, obscure and esoteric, the better’.

Article 2. Darren Rowse recently interviewed Tim Ferris, author of The 4 Hour Workweek. Interestingly enough Tim talks about blogs and the unique position bloggers have when it comes to publishing bestsellers. Big question mark right there – but he goes on to explain what he did to build up hype for his book, as well as to dispel a myth or two bloggers seem to have about publishing.

Blooks

Scott McKenzie emailed me two weeks ago to tell me about his blook, Rebirth. I was in the middle of writing the Ultimate Blook Guide on Novelr then, so I couldn’t do a Bookmarked! post, what with all the drafts pinned up in WordPress and so on so forth. But I’ve taken a look at it and Scott has done a few pretty unique things – for one he’s got a competition running to name a character in the sequel to Rebirth.

… I am not very good at thinking up names for characters. Those of you who knew me pre-Rebirth will recognise some of the character and place names and I’ve been contacted by an ex-colleague who was ‘pleased’ to find out I’d named a stately home after him.

I chuckled as I read that.

Scott also has Rebirth out for sale through Lulu. Admittedly the writing isn’t as polished as something you’d get from a bookstore, but as far as blooks go this isn’t too bad. I just wish I’d more time to read it thoroughly.

At the other end of the spectrum is Wilf’s World. It is cute, bright and chirpy, and I’ve finally figured out where it got its appeal from – its narration! Definitely not new, as far as children’s books go, but very refreshing from all the love stories and thrillers you get on the web. ‘Wilf’ talks about his life and his favourite inventions with such charm I can’t help but smile.

Now if only he’d do something about that bright green background. =)

Article 3. The New York Times asks: Are Book Reviewers Out of Print? A question I haven’t thought about in awhile. We all know that newspapers are facing shrinking subscription numbers, what with the web as a distribution channel that paper can’t fight. So it’s only logical that the public turn to the net for book reviews. And where exactly on the net?

Get this – litblogs.

I’m starting to feel chirpy myself.

Viva le revolution!