Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with books and resolved

Great texts on pop culture?

mediocritease — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 15:08:00 -0800

Can anyone recommend a good text on pop culture history/studies? I'd love to take a college course on the subject, but I'm not currently enrolled anywhere. I'm also impatient and I want to get right on it. I did a brief search for any similar questions on AskMeFi and didn't find anything. Nor do I check this site daily, so if it's been asked before then I've missed it and I apologize. Your help will be greatly appreciated.

Jesus wants you to have good sex.

fuzzbean — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 01:28:17 -0800

I'm looking for some Christ-centered sex-positive how-to books. For a friend. No, really. I have a very Christian friend who will be getting married soon. I'd like to give her some sex-positive material for her wedding shower, but I'd also like to be respectful of her beliefs.

Are there any good Christian sex-positive books out there? The Guide to Getting It On is definitely on my shopping list, but I'm a little worried it'll be too much of a muchness for her and just get chucked in the back of the closet. Any recommendations?

I'm in Seattle and can make a trip out to Babeland before the shower. We also have a variety of large independent and not-so-independent bookstores out here. U-District, Cap. Hill, or downtown are all accessible, but I probably don't have time to order online.

Recommendations for wounded yet likeable men in books.

beautifulcheese — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:21:09 -0800

Book recommendations: Recently I have discovered that I really enjoy a certain type of flawed character in television shows. Think Gregory House on House or Dr. Cal Lightman on Lie to Me. Wounded inside with a tough smart exterior that push people away with sarcasm or slight jerkish behaviour. Help me find examples in literature so I can continue my current obsession when I shut the tv off. I'm not sure if I'm explaining exactly the type of character that I like but that is the closest that I can get to. I've read a previous thread about bad but good characters but it just referred to tv shows.

Any recommendations? Or a way to better word what character type I'm actually looking for to help me search would also be helpful.

What books would an industrial engineer find it to be useful?

Carius — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 05:59:40 -0800

Books recommendation for an industrial engineer My friend is an industrial engineer who would like to read more "useful" non-fiction books.

I know she really like
The Toyota Way
The Machine That Changed the World

She also like a book about efficiently sorting boxes in a warehouse.

I already exhaustively searched thoroughly through ReadMe for similarly title, but have no luck.

Bonus: She will also be working in China next year.

So oh wise mefi please help her out!
Thank you for any suggestions!

Do I ask the publisher for a new copy or would that be stupid?

trixare4kids — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:57:55 -0800

Book Collectors: Is my new signed collector's edition book more or less valuable with a cutting machine error? I received a wonderful present: A signed collector's edition of "Under the Dome" by Stephen King. It also came with a set of collector cards. The set came directly from the publisher. So I'm not really a book collector, but I'm delighted to have this copy.

I noticed that there are about 10 pages that were cut wrong. The cutting machine left a triangle shaped tag on the top corner of these pages.

I took a picture so you can see what the error looks like.

Do I ask for a new copy or is it better to keep this one -- just in terms of future value?

Small press. No, not THAT small.

256 — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:47:42 -0800

As a writer trying to press into the next stage of my career, how can I emphasize in my publishing history that "small press" isn't always a euphemism for "vanity press"? Having recently completed the first draft of the manuscript for my debut full-length novel as well as a query package for a non-fiction book, I find myself about to embark on the quest for a literary agent. There is no shortage of general advice, guidance and hearsay on this subject available online, but I have a more specific problem.

It comes in the form of my publication history. I have had a couple of semi-regular paid freelance gigs writing for print lifestyle magazines. I've also made a few fiction sales to minor magazines, both print and online. No problem.

The problem is that I also wrote a novella. I thought it was pretty good, good enough to see print, but I also knew that novellas are a really hard sell. In fact, from an unknown writer, they're an impossible sell.

I lamented this fact (with no ulterior motive; I can be quite dense when it comes to business sense) to a friend of mine who was the proprietor of a successful local independent record label and events promotion company. He asked if he could read the manuscript.

Long story short, his label offered to publish the book, provided that I would come on board without charging a fee to help them make it happen. We signed a contract (which involved no financial risk or obligation on my part) and the label basically dumped some money in my lap and said "bring us a print run."

I then did all the things that someone self publishing with money from their own pocket would do and, in the end arranged for a small perfect bound print run of 500 copies. We had a launch event and I promoted the book online. The label sent me on a reading tour of Canada and the northeastern USA. The books were sold at these events, online, and were on the shelves in a few dozen, mostly independent, bookstores in the USA and Canada.

We ended up selling out completely and having to do a supplementary print run of 250 to meet demand. Eventually, that sold out in entirety as well. Both the label and myself ended up with a decent amount of money in our pockets. It was the first and last book they ever published and the label has since closed down shop.

Anyway, the problem is that there doesn't seem to be any elegant way to compress this nonstandard publication experience into a query letter. On the other hand, I think this is my most significant publishing experience and, when properly framed, reflects quite well on me as both a writer and as someone who is willing to work to promote my own work.

My goal is to:

1. Make it clear that this was not an instance of self-publishing or vanity press.

2. Maintain professionalism by not shoehorning too much autobiography into the query package (as I have done in this post).

3. Most importantly, not misrepresent (or look like I'm trying to misrepresent) this publication as something more than it was.

I fear that if I just list it as "Title of Work," Label, Year as though the label were a conventional publisher the agent or publisher may simply not have heard of, then I'm violating #3. On the other hand, if I do something like "Title of Work," Label (Small Press), Year then I'll be violation #1 unless I violate #2.

Am I overthinking this plate of beans?

when Wikipedia articles fall short, it's time for a book

bluishorange — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 19:49:48 -0800

Have you read an informative, engaging book on German history? If so, what is it? After visiting Berlin last year, I became quite interested in German history. In particular I was fascinated by the city of Berlin itself, WWII and the events leading up to and following it, and the Berlin Wall years.

The 20th anniversary of the fall of the wall has me thinking about it again, so I've decided it's time to stop my casual internet reading and move on to a proper book. I read very little nonfiction, so I'm hoping for something that's not too dry. But I was an English major, so it doesn't have to be, you know, a kids' book or anything. Also, military strategy puts me to sleep.

I know this is a very broad subject to ask for A book about, but as of now I'm just trying to get my feet wet. Anything helps. Thanks!

Socially Awkward

Garden — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 12:02:46 -0800

Does anyone know of some good reads on conversation and social skills? I'm not suggesting that you can learn these subjects entirely by a book, but what I'm looking for is some methods to make communication a little bit easier when meeting someone or groups of people. It's rather embarassing, but I'm getting more and more uncomfortable with meeting new people as time goes by. The strange part is that when I'm around friends or family that I know, I come off as articulate, thoughtful, and at times funny.

This all disappears when I'm meeting new people. I'll either wait for someone else to say something or I'll just go completely blank.

I've seriously considered trying hypnosis for this problem as I can't stand how uncomfortable I am when I'm in these types of encounters. I don't even understand why this has become such a problem for me, but it is getting worse.

I'll ususally plan some questions for when I'm in these situations, such as checking out the news or making sure to ask people open-ended questions, but boy do I have a hard time when it comes time to do it. I'll completely forget what I had planned out and then I'll get stressed when people ask me questions.

After the encounter is over, I'll be able to think about a ton of different things I could've asked or responses I could've made.

Unfortunately, when I'm in these situations my brain seems to shut off and all that I keep thinking is remember to smile, don't talk about yourself, pay attention to the people's body language, don't be so serious.

If anyone has some suggestions on books or methods that they've used to get over this, please let me know.

Back when it was OK to read fantasy novels in English class....

otolith — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 13:02:32 -0800

Okay, fantasy novel ID two-fer. Book One: people live in villages that are suspended on the side of an enormous cliff and a girl is born who has wings. Book Two: set in a world made up of bits of earth suspended in a void, cape-fighters, a spider-god.... I read both of these books sometime around 1992-93.

More on book one: specifically, the villages are attached to the cliff by the roots of enormous plants or trees. The axiom "measure twice, cut once" is used when setting up the plot, to underscore the precision it takes to engineer the support system for the villages out of these roots. The title of the book may have been something like "_____ Descends" or "_____ Falls", where the blank is the name of the winged, female protagonist. I seem to recall that the book had sort of a "Ursula LeGuin" feel, rather than a more standard fantasy novel.

More on book two: the bits of earth suspended in the void are of varying sizes, some are big enough to hold whole cities. The plot involves a thief stealing something of great value from a castle or mansion, then trying to escape with it. In the void surrounding the floating earth are "vampires", which, in this book, are small parasitic creatures. There is a character who is a "cape-fighter", who fights using a weighted cape that maybe has some blades on it. There is also some kind of spider-god who lives on one level of the void and I seem to remember the book ending on his "world". This book definitely had the feel of being a book in a larger series and I recall that it maybe wasn't very well written.

I was reminded of the first book over a year ago while reading about the hanging coffins in China and then the second book popped to mind as something I read at about the same time. It's been killing me that I can't track these down.

Please suggest books, movies or shows like Bel Canto

reenum — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 09:44:26 -0800

I loved the plot of Bel Canto by Ann Patchett. Any recommendations for similar books, shows, or movies? I loved how Patchett's book showed hostages and hostage takers forming a sort of community within their besieged compound.

I also remember an essay with a similar theme by P.J. O'Rourke. It involved him being stuck in a hotel with a bunch of foreign correspondents during a bombing and talked about how they coped.

Any suggestions?

books? why do you need books?

fifilaru — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 21:02:27 -0800

Library of the future? I run a small community college library (70,000 books, budget after salaries of $150,000). The college is part of a large state university system. Our chancellor is convinced that within the next five years or so all of the books at the Library of Congress will be digitized and online for free. He wants a plan for the library about how we will deal with the coming digital revolution. He asked me what I am going to do with all the room once I get rid of the books in a few years.

Our library is pretty good with technology. We have 20 new or newish computers for students to use, loan Kindles, have Blu-ray DVD players and large HD televisions. In addition to the physical, collection (70K books) we have access to large article and e-book databases.

Can anyone direct me to studies of the libraries of the future? Does anyone have any ideas what I should tell him? I am very good at putting things together and creating impressive reports. I am just having a bit a a problem wrapping my mind around this.

Non-fiction books that resemble notebooks

wannalol — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 17:44:40 -0800

I am looking for a certain type of non-fiction book. These books are very often instructional with the words handwritten (or typed with a font that imitates handwriting) and the illustrations hand-drawn giving the book the appearance of a photocopied notebook. Two examples of this type of book are Getting Started in Electronics by Forrest M. Mims III (example page) and Complete Guide to Fishing Skills by Tony Whieldon (example page). I love these books for their aesthetical quality rather than the subject matter per se so welcome suggestions that cover any topic.

Biography series for kids?

whitearrow — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 16:02:47 -0800

When I was a kid, I remember a series of biographies in the library, either in the kids or YA section. They were short biographies of American figures, and I'm sure I read all the ones with female subjects. Can anyone help identify this series? I'd love to have some of these books for my niece when she's old enough. I definitely remember biographies of Phyllis Wheatley, Louisa Mae Alcott, Abigail Adams, Clara Barton, Juliette Low, and other 18th and 19th century figures.

These weren't picture books. They were straight up prose, definitely for 8 and up.

What hilarious book should my book club read?

indiebass — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 15:56:12 -0800

BookClubfilter: I'm tasked with picking the next book. I have some ideas, but could use the Hive's help. It's a group of pretty literary folks (English teachers and the like) and only about eight of us. We've read some heavy stuff lately and I'd like to switch gears to something lighter, and preferably funny. We've read, in reverse order:

Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson
Mother Night, by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Revolutionary Road, by Richard Yates
Last Night at the Lobster, by Stewart O'Nan
Johnny Got His Gun, by Dalton Trumbo
A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole

So we just did Sci-Fi (Snow Crash), so I def want to avoid the genre. I was considering "The Coup" by Jamie Malanowski, "Boomsday" by Christopher Buckley and "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith.

If anyone has any experience with any of these books OR can recommend a modern, humorous book that'd be good for discussion I'm all ears. I can answer any questions, of course. Thanks hive mind!

Surf/skate book recommendations?

EnormousTalkingOnion — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 13:18:37 -0800

Are there any great books about surfing or skateboarding?

Books please!

Go Banana — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 21:10:41 -0800

Recommend some great literature in the Steinbeck tradition. I'm looking for some great books in the style of East of Eden. Big, lush narrative fiction spanning generations. I'm meh on Isabel Allende, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, John Irving, Barbara Kingsolver and Lawrence Hill. Big fan of M.M. Kaye, Robertson Davies, Somerset Maugham, and obviously John Steinbeck. My overall taste in books varies widely and I read voraciously. I tend to get bored quickly, however, and need something really gripping to bother finishing a book. I'd prefer generally uplifting to hopelessly tragic. I also enjoy period fiction (gothic, Victorian) and have a secret weakness for trash literature (Valley of the Dolls). Thank you for your recommendations!

What well-known novels lack any character description aside from names?

odinsdream — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 13:05:32 -0800

What well-known novels lack any character descriptions aside from names?

I can't think of any famous hellholes.

Jason Land — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 23:58:13 -0800

A friend of mine is writing a memoir about traveling to every country in Europe at the age of 23. He wants to compare being stuck in a crappy part of Romania to a well known literary or film hellhole. We can't think of any. In the book he's talking about being stuck in a crappy part of Romania for 20 hours, instead of the short layover he expected. He used the placeholder of Amity Island (Jaws). This obviously doesn't fit as it's a pleasant place with the exception of the killer shark in the water.

We can't seem to think of anything that most everyone (of the US literary audience) would be able to recognize. We're thinking of things like Silent Hill, Sleepy Hollow (in the story, not the real life place). I feel like we're both missing something super obvious. It can be from any pop culture reference, as long as most people will get it.

Would a suitable solution be something like "East Germany, circa 1960"?

Oldschool kids' history.

cmyk — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 07:34:14 -0800

Long-lost childhood books: a history book printed after one of the World Wars. I don't know the title or author, but I'll tell you everything I remember. Hivemind, please help me find it! The book was six or eight inches tall, about two inches thick. It was a red canvas hardcover. It probably had a dustjacket originally, but mine had long since lost that. I think the page edges were also dyed red, but I'm not sure. No bookmark-ribbon, that I recall.

It was a Eurocentric and kid-friendly view of world history, starting with cavemen and going all the way up to one, if not both, of the World Wars. It spent time in the Fertile Crescent, went through Greece and Rome, Dark Ages, Renaissance, discovery of the Americas, the Hundred Years' War, all of that. It wasn't a textbook, it was just a sort of historical... reader, or primer. It was made to be read for fun.

Each chapter covered a specific event, or period in time. They started and/or ended with little rhyming couplets and bits of doggerel that were about the events in the chapter. There were also little black-and-white line drawings (not plates, just printed into the body text) of a man in each chapter. He had a name, I think, and as you read through history, you'd see the little cartoon guy in different clothes, or in important places, things like that.

The last chapter focused on what sorts of things might be found in the future. It was well before the 1950s space obsession, so it wasn't going on about hovercars and jet backpacks.

One distinct thing I do remember: towards the end of the book, when it got into "recent" history, it made mention of some kind of vaccination scar - polio, I think, or maybe smallpox - that, "if you look on your arm, you'll see it." I remember this because I didn't have one, but my grandmother did, just like the book described it.

I realize this is a longshot, but any clues would help. I've been wondering about this for years.

There's a rat in the drain!

speeb — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 06:32:10 -0800

[Book/Story-filter] Trying to place a book or maybe short story from my youth (child of the late 70s-80s). The only thing I can remember is a guy going swimming at the Y. He thinks he sees a towel stuck in the drain at the bottom of the pool, but once he gets down there he realizes it is a rat coming out of the drain. It could be a really popular book for all I know. I just know that it scared the crap out of me and still freaks me out to this day a bit. Any ideas?

October book suggestions

CZMR — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 12:52:42 -0800

Woohoo, it's October! Lets get some Autumn/Halloween reading suggestions! There was this from last year and I thought it was a decent thread but hopefully we can get a few more suggestions.

I'll start off with a few -
Dracula - Bram Stoker
House of Leaves - Mark Z. Danielewski - Although the Leaves in the title doesn't relate to autumn, I kept envisioning it taking place during the fall. And not to mention it is a terrifying novel that will scare you for the Halloween season.

What's the best book about indie music?

bibliophibianj — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 14:21:18 -0800

Calling all music Mefites: Can you recommend any good books about indie music or musicians? My boyfriend loves music and enjoys reading about it and the people who create it. I know indie is a vague genre, but that's how I'd describe his taste in music. He likes a pretty broad range of artists, but favorites include The Fall, The Manic Street Preachers, Kate Bush, The Long Blondes, and Joy Division (He already owns Touching From a Distance, though.). He also likes festivals, so a history of festivals (especially in the UK) might work, too. Any ideas for books that might appeal to him? Thank you for your ideas.

Oh, I'm not sure it's relevant, but this is for a 6-month anniversary gift. We've been to lots of concerts together & met at a bookshop, so a music book seems appropriate. But I've never given an anniversary gift before, so if you think this is a bad gift idea, let me know before I cause a disaster!

Long lost children’s book search

goml — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 11:21:56 -0800

I am looking for a young child's easy reader book from the late 1960s/early 1970s about a bear and his bus. I am 99.999% certain the title is Bumper Bear’s Bus. It had a light blue hardcover that was kind of watercolory in tone and if I remember correctly the cover has a picture of a very cute and fuzzy brown bear and a bus. He may have been wearing a yellow smock/vest/bus driver’s jacket.

I am more than 100% without a doubt positively certain the bear’s name is Bumper (because I had such a difficult time saying BumpeR, instead of BumpeW and I remember my Mom helping me with my “R’s” to say BumpeR, so I am absolutely positively certain without one iota of doubt in my mind that the bear’s name is Bumper).

Bumper Bear drove the bus around town, and I believe the story was about the people Bumper bear picked up for rides on the bus or where they were going on the bus, or things they saw along the way – you get the idea...

Places I've already looked: I’ve asked every member of my family, people around my age (40), I’ve checked used bookstores in person, searched every book finder web site I can think of, looked on google, ebay, half, random sites – NOTHING - Not one mention anywhere, but I KNOW this book existed because I once owned a copy.

Please let my first ever askme question help me find the first book I ever read!

Do you know what book this is?

magnoliasouth — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 13:25:29 -0800

Please help me figure out what book this is. This is something that has driven me insane for years. I mean, YEARS. I cannot remember the name of the book, nor the author's name. I thought the author was a Nora someone, but I'm not certain. I remember the book being touted as "another" of her books, so she evidently has more than one. The cover also oddly said it was about "modern life" which I found odd since the setting was actually in the fifties. I think it would have been better described as modern thinking. Sadly, I cannot remember when I read it. I would say somewhere between 1985 and 2000, but could have been as late as 2006. Yes that is a big span of years, but I just cannot remember.

It's about a single mom who gets a job as a manicurist, I believe. She bought a house in a subdivision that was subdivided out of farmland. Her husband had an affair and left her. She got some sort of assistance in buying the house. All the neighborhood women were typical neighborhood 50's women and kind of looked down on her due to her single mother, Elvis fan status.

The man across the street wanted her badly as did every man and male teen in the area. In fact, near the close of the book we discover that she was sleeping with the son of the man across the street, a teen who actually was in love with another teen girl.

The first time the teen saw her, she was mowing the lawn with a ponytail in her hair and listening to Elvis. He told her son, who was younger that just about everyone in the neighborhood, that his mom was different or something. He was indicating she was hot, but not exactly saying it. Even though her son was young (like about 8 or 10) he understood what the teen was meaning.

One friend or acquaintance in the book was a heavy woman. All the neighborhood women talked about her behind her back about her weight. She actually began losing weight, but was still wearing her old and now baggy clothes. The main character noticed her weight loss and told her how great she looked. New thin woman began crying because she realized that no one at all had ever noticed or complimented her, but the one person who did was "the enemy."

That night, or soon thereafter, new thin woman left her husband (and children) and disappeared. It was later discovered that she was working somewhere in town like at a clothing store, make-up or perfume counter or something. She finally agreed to see her husband and children.

Someone did something deliberately bad to main character's son. I can't remember who it was nor what they did, but what made it a very weird thing was what main character did in return. She made a wax voodoo doll of sorts of the offending person and melted it. That came right out of the blue and didn't appear to fit properly into the book. It was just the most bizarre thing, which is why I remember it so well.

In any case the overall tone of the book is similar in nature to Pleasantville. It has that 50's to progressive mentality thing.

Sorry for the long description, but I wanted to provide as much information as possible. I seriously hope someone, ANYONE can help me.

I've posted it to the group at Library Thing, I've done searches, I tried everything in an article I found online that tells you "How To Find A Book Without Knowing The Title Or Author" and everything else.

I think the only way I will ever find this book, is if someone else has read it and knows what I'm talking about.

Can't remember book title/author

Anon Ymous — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 04:17:00 -0800

I'm looking for a book I read in year 6 (1995), and I loved, but can't remember much about it. I think it was "world of O", or "secret of O", or something along those lines, but searches on that don't come up with hits on Google or Amazon. I remember that on the cover, the O had a sinuous line through it (like the yin/yang symbol), and there was a bit where the guy was given special gloves and socks that allowed him to cling on to a sheer cliff face (might have been a deep hole instead, not sure). Does anyone recognise this book? Help appreciated :)