Please Don’t Drool On The Books When You See This

Today while browsing the “books” tag of blogs, I came across a post on Two Muffins In An Oven about bookshelf porn.  I kid you not.

While there are no nudes or risque *ahem* activities, book lovers will definitely get a lot of pleasure from this website.

Bookshelf Porn is a collection of amazing photos of bookshelves, libraries, bookstores, and other bookshelf-related things from across the world.  It’s impossible to count how many pictures there are, but you can keep scrolling down the page for a while without running out of pictures or getting bored.

Here are a few of my favorites:

via home-designing.com


via home-designing.com

via spaces-in-between

Book Christmas Tree at Gleeson library (San Francisco)

via bookstorecouture

via nopnop

via bookshelves

and finally….

via nevertotwice

^Jay (the boyfriend), this last picture goes out to you

I hope you all enjoyed these pictures (and many more at Bookshelf Porn) as much as I did.  I also followed them on Twitter, so check them out there too.

I’ve posted once or twice about it, but for those who haven’t seen yet — I now have a Twitter account @booksandboston.  I’ll be Tweeting when new posts are updated, so follow me for another way to stay updated with my blog.  Also, I’m hosting a giveaway which you can sign up for here.  Check it out!

What books did you ask Santa to bring?

My Christmas wishlist mostly consists of books this year.  There are far too many to list, but some titles include The Hunger Games trilogy, Everything Is Illuminated, Gone With The Wind, Middlesex, and Sarah’s Key, to name a few.  My mom was a bit overwhelmed when I emailed her the full list, so I’ll spare you the pain.  I want to hear what books are on your wishlist.  I’m going to play Santa’s helper for one lucky person and deliver a book via The Book Depository.

Over the past few weeks I’ve won a few awesome giveaways.  I’ve been wanting to thank the hosts and link back to their blogs, but I’ve been incredibly busy with finals.  Since there are still a few pending giveaways that I have entered, I decided to wait until the end of the year.  At the end of December I’ll do a big wrap-up post of giveaways I’ve won and the generosity of each host.

Until then, I’ve decided to host my own giveaway! I had wanted to wait until I had 50 subscribers, but 45 is just so close and it’s almost the holidays So, here it is:

1 lucky winner will win:
- A book of their choice from The Book Depository*
*the book must be under $20

The Book Depository provides free shipping internationally, so this contest is open to any country on this list.

Mandatory Entry:
+1 – You must be a subscriber of this blog.  I know this is going to be annoying to some people, but since part of this giveaway is to thank my wonderful followers I’m going to insist that you fulfill this requirement to be eligible to win.  Regardless of if you have already been following me or if you are a new subscriber you need to to comment on this post telling me that you subscribe and answering the question “What book(s) did you ask Santa to bring?” to receive this mandatory entry.

Bonus Entries: (you must make an additional comment on this post for each bonus entry so I know you did it)
+1 – Follow me on Twitter @booksandboston
+1 – Tweet about the giveaway (please leave a link to the Tweet in your comment on this post if you do this)
+2 – Make a blog post about the giveaway

Don’t forget to comment for each entry! The bonus entries are completely optional and not required, but will give you a better chance at winning.  The only mandatory entry is that you are a subscriber and comment.

You must leave an email address.  If your email address is not easily found on your blog or profile, please leave it with your comment in this format: booksandboston{at}gmail{dot}com.

The contest will close on December 17th at 11:59pm EST and I will announce a winner using Random.org on December 18th.  The winner will be notified via e-mail to choose their prize and provide an shipping address.  If the winner does not respond within 5 days of being notified, I will choose a new winner.

Unfortunately, it looks like it’s too late for the winner’s book choice to arrive before Christmas, but I hope it will be a nice present anyway.

Ready…Set…Go! Let the giveaway madness begin

Book Review Request Etiquette

Today I had the honor of getting my very first request to review a book on my blog. I opened the e-mail excitedly and looked forward to this awesome opportunity.

However, my excitement disappeared when I read For: Blog Name That Isn’t Books And Boston.

I continued on to read Dear Blog Name That Isn’t Books And Boston.

Then, I skimmed past an excerpt of the novel, some mumbo-jumbo about the author, and finally got to the ending line of I would be very honored if you would consider my novel for a review on Blog Name That Isn’t Books And Boston!

I was not pleased.  Yes, I understand that this mistake was not personal and likely due to some silly technical error, but I found this very unprofessional.  If I was an author trying to self-promote my book I’d like to think that I would exercise a bit more tact and make sure I actually get the bloggers’ names right when sending out mass requests for book reviews.

I have to admit, I sent the author a bit of a scathing reply.  It wasn’t completely mean, but it pretty much summed up what I said here about professionalism and all that.  I concluded with saying that if they were in fact trying to contact me and not Blog Name That Isn’t Books And Boston, they should write back so we could discuss the possible book review.

Shortly after sending this I received another e-mail.  The author was extremely apologetic and explained that they must have incorrectly inserted the e-mails into the program they use to send out book requests.  Honestly, I started to feel like a bit of an a**hole.  Here I was being rude to this individual who made a mistake that I just as easily could have done.  I have absolutely confused names multiple times.  Still, in a professional setting you do need to be careful.

Then, I noticed this sentence in the 2nd email:

I would be very honored if you would review Book Name for Books in Boston!

Granted, it is a very small error, but I stopped feeling like an a**hole immediately.  For those who didn’t notice, the author’s second reply (in which they were apologetic about the previous error) addressed me as Books in Boston, when my blog name (as I said multiple times in my reply to their first e-mail) is Books And Boston.  Maybe I’m just being a b*tch, but you’d think after the first error an author would be extra careful to use the correct name the second time.

I think I’m not going to bother replying to this e-mail.  Needless to say, I’m not doing the review.

For all you authors out there, what do you think? Am I just being a b*tch? (I promise I won’t get mad if you say I am – I’m really curious about other people’s opinions on this).  Do you make sure to be extra careful about things like this when sending out e-mails? And for other book bloggers – have you ever encountered a similar situation with book review requests? How might you have handled this differently?

To the author who wrote me: If you happen to read this, I do understand that you made a mistake, but it was careless.  I don’t want an additional apology, but be aware of this in the future.  Careless mistakes DO affect the professional image you are trying to portray.  Also, I have not listed your name or title of your book because I am not trying to call you out or injure your reputation at all.  The e-mails provoked a necessary discussion on proper etiquette though, so that is why it is being posted here. 

Let’s Talk Tweets

I finally did it. I have officially joined the world of Twitter.

Now, can anyone tell me what a Tweet is?

Ha. But seriously, how do I do this? I’m still figuring it out (still waiting for my confirmation e-mail actually) and I’d appreciate any tips!

You can now follow me here: @booksandboston but don’t expect anything noteworthy just yet.

Also, sorry for the long gap between posts! I had 2 huge papers due this week, but now that they’re out of the way you can expect some more regular posts from me.  I’ll probably be posting again later on today.

Please comment with any suggestions you have for a novice Tweeter (is that even the right term?) and also if you have a Twitter account that I can follow =) Happy Tweeting!

Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s Latest Novel

Carlos Ruiz Zafon once again brings us back to The Cemetery of Forgotten Books and the Sempere & Sons bookshop in his latest novel “The Prisoner of Heaven”.  El Prisionero Del Cielo was published in Spain two days ago.  I’m really wishing my Spanish skills were a bit better right now since I’m pretty sure the few years I spent studying Spanish in high school won’t get me through this.  I do want to get a copy of The Shadow of the Wind and his other books in their original language at some point though.

The Prisoner of Heaven will be translated into English and available in the UK on July 21, 2012.  I’m not sure of the U.S. release date yet.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s official website states:

“The Prisoner of Heaven returns to the world of The Cemetery of Forgotten Books and the Sempere & Sons bookshop. It begins one year after the close of The Shadow of the Wind when a mysterious stranger enters the shop, looking for a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo.”

This joins Zafon’s other books The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel’s Game which both revolve around the Sempere & Sons bookshop in Barcelona, Spain as well.  The Shadow of the Wind is my ultimate favorite book so I’m really excited to read the latest in this series.