This newsletter was sent to all of the subscribers on Jim’s list (2,962) on Friday, Dec. 21, 2018. The Christmas holiday season, Hannukah, the winter solstice, the beginning of the college football bowl season — they all collide for the next couple of weeks, provoking an increase in shopping, singing, television watching, and • Read More »
Tags: 10 rules of writing, Barbara Kingsolver, Bret Harte, CrimeReads.com, Elmore Leonard, Free Air, libraries, Louisa Hall, newspaper scoop, Sinclair Lewis
This newsletter was sent to all of the subscribers on Jim’s list (2,984) on Friday, Nov. 30, 2018. The theme of writing — good writing, I hope — permeates all of my newsletters, but this week you may notice another: caricature. I have tried this art form from time to time with varying degrees • Read More »
Tags: Bret Harte, caricature, James Gillray, King George III, libraries, Mark Twain
Colombia is not all drugs and drug lords and gangs and violence. There are people like Luis Soriano, a Spanish teacher in rural La Gloria Colombia, who loves books, understands their value, and wants the young people of his region to have access to them. Soriano put his dream on the back of two donkeys, Alfa • Read More »
Tags: BBC, biblioburros, libraries
What are libraries about? Neil Gaiman and Chris Ridell have put together this pretty neat picture book that solidly answers that question. Sit back and take a look. You will enjoy this. Source: Neil Gaiman and Chris Riddell on why we need libraries – an essay in pictures | Books | The Guardian
Tags: Chris Ridell, libraries, Neil Gaiman, The Guardian
This newsletter was emailed to everyone on Jim’s email list (2,644) on May 18, 2018 A summer head cold attacked me this week, making life miserable for a few days, but I tried not to let it slow me down too much. The major woodworking project that I mentioned last week was completed and • Read More »
Tags: dulcimer, Ernest Hemingway, Hernando Colon, Jack Whicher, Jean Ritchie, Kate Summerscale, LeRoy Lad Panek, libraries, Mary Wollstonecraft, Metta Victoria Fuller Victor, Rita Mae Brown, Saville Kent, The Dead Letter, The New Journalism, The Origins of the American Detective Story, The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher, Tom Wolfe, watercolor, woodworking
Hernando Colón (1488-1539), the illegitimate son of Christopher Columbus, spent much of his life traveling around Europe — and later America — amassing what was then the largest private library in the world. His goal was to collect all of the knowledge of the world into one place (Seville, Spain, as it turned out) because • Read More »
Tags: Hernando Colon, libraries, library
This newsletter was sent to everyone on Jim’s email list (4,067) on Friday, April 20, 2018. Finally, the crimson clover has started to bloom (about a month late, due mostly to cold weather). Agriculturally, that’s the big event in our lives this week. The bees have started to work the clover, and now, maybe, the • Read More »
Tags: A Higher Loyalty, Andrew Pettegree, Ann Rule, Blount County Public Library, Bookriot.com, Brand Luther, Fatal Vision, Isaac Asimov, James Comey, Joe McGinnis, Katie McLain, libraries, Library of Congress, Martin Luther, The Stranger Beside Me, Thomas Jefferson, watercolor, writer-in-residence