Speakeasy

The newest place to buy the latest besteller is a vending machine. Irish company Novel Idea Vending machines originally came up with the concept as a ‘mini-bookshop’ that would sell books 24/7 in all the usual vending machine haunts. The idea has since been adapted to sell magazines as well. The bias will no doubt be towards already-branded authors, commercial powerhouses like John Grisham, Danielle Steele and John le Carre, but with the books trapped behind half an inch of plexiglass, the whole scheme is really going to give new meaning to ‘judging a book by it’s cover.’

That’s kind of the problem, isn’t it? While I quite like the idea of 24-hour books, a vending machine isn’t exactly a satisfying shopping experience. You can’t get a feel of the paper, or skim-read the first chapter to see if it grabs you, or even read the blurb. And I don’t want to think about what the inside of a vending machine will do to that new-book smell.

There is a fun video floating around the blogs at the moment from a writer on how they used to imagine the writing process working. You can see it here. Oh, if only it were that easy.

…Here are some things people sent me over email, that I didn’t actually receive until our connection to the net was re-established.

The link is through a comics writing site, but Robert McKee’s 10 Commandments for Writing apply to all styles, genres and types of writing. Yes, even yours. For example, at number two:

Thou shalt not make life easy for the protagonist. Nothing progresses in a story, except through conflict.

Seriously, everyone recommends McKee’s Story (his textbook on writing). It’s good.

Another thing I received this morning was this little tidbit about a new re-make of Sherlock Holmes, by master of the British lad caper, Guy Ritchie. (Actually, this was news back in June, but we missed it). Updates have Robert Downey Jr as Holmes, and suggest Guy Ritchie will focus on Holmes’ physical prowess (which is something he hasn’t exactly been known for in the past).

More book-related movie news: the release date for the new Harry Potter flick has been pushed back almost eight months. Fans are outraged.

And scientists (or possibly academics) have adjusted the CT scan, used medically to photograph internal organs, to use on delicate manuscripts. According to this article, they’re extremely excited about the potential deciphering and translation of a library preserved by the explosion of Mt Vesuvius. It’s the only surviving library of Western antiquity, and, archeologically-speaking, finally reading the fragile, charcoaled works will be quite the thrill.

Abebooks.com has put together an interesting article about the things people leave in books they sell or donate to second-hand stores. Items include from 40 $1,000 bills, a Mickey Mantle baseball card, a diamond ring, a tiny book of pornography, and much more.

…try Big Cozy Books.  

Via BoingBoing.

I thought it was just a rumour. I was wrong.

Watch and learn.

Points to consider:

1. Try not to take form letters as an insult. The average publisher/agent has to deal with hundreds of manuscripts, and doesn’t have time to write individual notes to all of them, so don’t take it personally.

2. If you sent something that just took "the entire weekend", you’re lucky to get a form letter.

3. Threats of grevious bodily harm and death are not a good idea. You might end up talking to the police.

Now, here at AWM, we use computers all the time. However, we are in no position to recommend computers to people, or even know what they’re called other than ‘computers’. (I can tell the difference between a Mac and a PC, and that’s about it.)

So yes, like most of the known universe, we do most of our writing on the ‘puter. But when you’re on the bus, and that perfect short story idea just bubbles up out of nowhere, you don’t really whip out your PC and start typing, do you? Or, I guess you could if you had a laptop or something. But mostly you just carry around a notebook, right?

Perfect for recording little sentence fragments, conversations you overhear, words and phrases that stick in your mind, even songs you think might be good to write with, a good notebook is a nerdy but necessary accessory for most of us. And like all good accessories, prettier is better. Here’s some of our favourites:

Moleskine - not so much pretty, but classic and classy. Comes in a billion different sizes and shapes, too.

Paperchase - I found their website a bit annoying at first, but they’ve got some funky covers, and lots of different sizes. Sold in Australia mostly through Borders.

Galison - Order online. These are pretty.

Ex Libris Anonymous - These are great; the company takes old books, rips the pages out, and re-binds them as notebooks. They look super-cool.

Field Notes - Not pretty, but very nifty-looking.

Brass-etched Steampunk Notebooks - No idea if you can buy these from him, but I’m sure I don’t need to explain why they’re awesome. And yes, I know it’s a do-it-yourself guide. I’d just prefer to buy than make…

Via Alley - Neat little things.

Kikki.K - Cute. Their stores also stock Moleskine.

And if you have the time to hand-sew your own, this 100s and 1000s notebook looks neat!

And there’s heaps more. It’s worth shopping around for a notebook you like, rather than grabbing any old thing out of the newsagents. Like so many things in life, aren’t you more likely to spend time with your notebook if it’s good-looking?