A Looking Ahead to the New Year Weekly Link Round-Up

 

The week between Christmas and New Year's Day has always been a rather contemplative one for me. I take stock of the past year and look ahead to the new one. Denis and I are enjoying getting out and doing things that don't involve doctors, but this enjoyment is a double-edged sword for me.

"Out and about" means that I don't have my feet up as much as I should, and although my problem leg has almost healed, now the other one is showing signs of wanting to go haywire. I've got to get my legs up, blast it, and since blogging can consist of hours of sitting at a computer, I'm going to have to cut down on my posts. 

The most immediate cutback will concern my annual reading statistics posts with all the graphs. Those things are very time-consuming, and I'm just going to have to cut back. Methinks I'll only go into detail on a couple of things and then hit the highlights on some of the rest. But that's just one week's solution.

 

While I go back to contemplating...

Enjoy the links! Happy New Year! Here's to another twelve months of fantastic books to read!

►Books & Other Interesting Tidbits◄

• The low down on the greatest dictionary collection in the world.
• See what your brain does when you look at art.
• 1987: The thrilling-est year in Hollywood history.
• There's nothing better than a good bad guy.
• The mainstreaming of historical fiction.
• Toward the next literary mafia.
• This is the word of the year, according to Merriam-Webster.
• From local, to global, to gone: On the rise and fall of Borders Books.

 

►Book Banning & Censorship◄

• One parent got 444 books removed from a Wisconsin school district. (And I'll bet she's feeling mighty proud of herself.) More from a local newspaper.
  
• A new PEN America report document the "Scarlet Letter" effect of book bans.
• Has the Prattville library board been stacked with Clean Up Alabama friendly appointees?
• A new parent group pushes back on Texas book bans.
• A Pennsylvania library director resigns after the board removes issues of Out, the LGBTQ+ magazine.
• A "Fight Book Bans" Act has been introduced in the U.S. Congress.
• In addition to the "Fight Book Bans" Act, a "Books Save Lives" Act has been introduced to the U.S. Congress. More from HuffPost.
  
• The Arkansas Republican who wanted to suspend funds to libraries suing the state has been confirmed to a library board.
• Fighting book bans in Kentucky schools-- and beyond.
• Banned book tables are a frequent sight at many bookstores, but are they helping the authors who need it most?
• Orange County (Florida) school district pulls 673 books from teachers' classroom shelves.
• A North Dakota library obscenity law reignites old debates, but does little to change what's on shelves.
• Two years of efforts to ban books are taking a toll on school librarians in Missouri.
• A central Arkansas school district will reinstate access to the library's digital learning tools.

►Channeling My Inner Indiana Jones◄

• Is the world's oldest pyramid not in Egypt or the Americas, but in Indonesia?
• Why eels were such a popular food in medieval times.
• Cult temples and a sacrificial pit have been unearthed at an ancient Roman camp in Germany.
• A 4,000-year-old tomb discovered in Norway may contain the region's first farmers.
• How money transformed medieval Europe.
• Baboon DNA from ancient Egypt reveals the location of a mysterious port city not shown on any maps.
• 2,000 ancient clay stamps used to seal official Roman documents have been discovered in Turkey.
• A stunning 2,700-year-old sculpture has been unearthed in Iraq.

 

►Channeling My Inner Elly May Clampett◄

• Chimps go through menopause. That could shed light on how it evolved in humans.
• Galápagos giant tortoises are ecosystem engineers.
• Why dozens of North American birds will soon get new names.
• Millions of sterile fruit flies will soon be dropped on Los Angeles.
• California's surfboard-stealing sea otter has given birth to a pup.
• The smallest wild cat in the Americas is also the cutest bad omen.
• A study has found that a starfish "body" is just one giant head.
• Orcas sank another boat in Europe after a nearly hour-long attack. More from Smithsonian Magazine.

 

►The Wanderer◄

• An oil spill dumped as much as 1.1 million gallons into the Gulf of Mexico, raising concerns about wildlife.
• See the newest underwater sculptures residing on the floor of the Caribbean.
• These fifteen photos capture the beauty of the northern lights.
• Crime & the City: Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight.
• How bougainvillea conquered the world.
• Soar through the Himalayas with fifteen photos of Nepal.
• I wouldn't mind visiting the Jones Confluence Point State Park.
• Most Canadians live south of Seattle and other map surprises.

 

►Fascinating Folk◄

• The Black sailor, Lionel Licorish, whose heroic actions during a shipwreck made him an instant celebrity of the Roaring Twenties.
• How children's book author Leo Lionni urged his readers to be change makers.
• The master forgers who saved thousands of lives during World War II.
• How James McNeill Whistler captured life in the big city.
• These may be the last photos ever taken of Florence Nightingale.
• Meet Es Devlin, the woman who set the stage for Beyoncé, the Olympics, and the Royal Opera House.

 

►More Best of 2023 Lists◄

• 45 of Google's top trending searches of 2023.
• The biggest literary stories of the year.
• CrimeReads: The best international crime novels of 2023.
• CrimeReads: The best espionage novels of 2023.
• The Washington Independent Review's 51 favorite books of 2023.
• Deadly Pleasures: Most highly rated debut mystery and thriller fiction of 2023.
• Crime Spree Magazine: What women liked in 2023.
• Literary Hub: The ultimate best books of 2023 list.
• The New York Public Library's top checkouts of 2023.
• CrimeReads: The best crime and suspense anthologies of 2023.
• CrimeReads: The best historical fiction of 2023.
• The books Smithsonian Magazine loved in 2023.
• CrimeReads: The best traditional mysteries of 2023.
• CrimeReads: The fifteen best psychological thrillers of 2023.

 

►I ♥ Lists◄

• A reading list of difficult women in historical fiction.
• The best and worst tropes in murder mysteries.
• Five books with righteous female rage.
• Five books that explore family and kinship in Native American communities.
• Historical novels set in New England.
• Ten books to read if you liked Lessons in Chemistry.
• Nine British mysteries that even the most dedicated sleuths haven't read.
• Nine of the best film adaptations of Agatha Christie's mysteries.

That's all for this week! Don't forget to stop by next Friday when I'll be sharing a freshly selected batch of links for your surfing pleasure.

No matter how busy you may be, don't forget that quality Me Time curled up with a good book!