A Making Hay While the Sun Shines Weekly Link Round-Up

 

Things are heating up here in the Sonoran Desert, like they always do in May, and Denis and I have been focusing on enjoying our favorite outdoor places before it's too hot. We've already made another trip to the Desert Botanical Garden, and this week we've wandered through the Phoenix Zoo because I had to see the baby flamingos and other additions to the exhibits. Of course, I'll be sharing photos, so there will be those to look forward to while we try to see if there are other places we can visit before we have to switch to indoor venues. Meanwhile, I'm dusting and straightening and adding a new addition to my library that a friend sent.

 

Denis and I aren't the only ones wearing out our camera batteries at the Desert Botanical Garden!

 

Enjoy the links!

►Books & Other Interesting Tidbits◄

• Chris McGinley on Appalachian literature and noir.
• Ian Hamilton on the joys and sorrows of finishing a series.
• Why descendants of Holocaust survivors are replicating Auschwitz tattoos.
• Which mystery subgenre should you read based on your zodiac sign? (They didn't get mine right.)
• HarperCollins made a tiny tweak to its book design and has saved thousands of trees as a result.
• eBook and digital audiobook use is up 286% in K-12 schools since 2019; 20% since 2022.
• A guide to the people you run into at every reading.
• How Ben Franklin invented the library as we know it.
• Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, and Ben Kingsley are set to star in a film of Richard Osman's The Thursday Murder Club.
  

 

►Book Banning & Censorship◄

• Louisiana HB 777 would criminalize librarians and libraries who join the American Library Association.
• The Idaho legislature approved a bill to regulate library content for minors.
• A recent poll shows that conservatives reject book banning but still hate critical race theory.
• Governor Cox signed a bill making it easier to ban books from Utah schools statewide. However, Utah officials are unsure how to enforce this new ban retroactively. It will probably mean more work for public schools.
• A Tennessee bill would give civil standing to sue school districts over "inappropriate" books.
• The Metropolis (Illinois) Library's antique furniture is to be returned from a local church. (And you thought all this book banning only concerned books...)
• Alabama Republicans try to "criminalize librarians simply for doing their jobs."
  
• Librarians fear new penalties, even prison, as activists challenge books.
• "It's been devastating": A Q&A with the top librarian fighting the GOP's book bans.
• The New Hampshire book banning bill passes the Senate with all-Republican support.
• These were the most challenged book in America last year.
• Five publishers join the lawsuit to stop the Iowa book banning law.
• Censorship is a hammer looking for a nail.

 

►Channeling My Inner Indiana Jones◄

• Archaeologists have discovered 2,000-year-old rock art in Brazil.
• Obsidian blades with food traces reveal the first settlers of Rapa Nui had regular contact with South Americans 1,000 years ago.
• "Britain's Pompeii" reveals a Bronze Age village frozen in time. More from Live Science.
  
• A vessel off the Florida Keys has been identified as a British warship that sank in the 18th century. More from Smithsonian Magazine.
  
• The 4,300-year-old tomb of a palace official has been found in Egypt. More from Live Science.
  
• Colombia will recover an iconic shipwreck holding billions in treasure.
• Archaeologists have made an incredible 7,000-year-old discovery at the bottom of a lake in Italy.
• A treasure hunter using a faulty metal detector discovered England's largest gold nugget worth $38,000. 

 

►Channeling My Inner Elly May Clampett◄

• "She's bouncing the ball!" On the uncanny way octopuses play.
• Tent-making bats.
• Winners of the 2024 British Wildlife Photography Awards.
• Watch a senior aquarist "dance" to salsa music with a friendly giant Pacific octopus. 
• Watch a sneaky dog steal a Cheeto from an unsuspecting hamster.
• Five animal hybrids that truly exist in nature.
• A study has found that dogs can understand the words for several objects such as toys and leashes. (And any dog lover didn't need a study to know that they can understand a lot more words than that.) 
• The man who "invented" the Labradoodle called the dog crossbreed his biggest regret. 

 

►The Wanderer◄

• The royal family is opening Balmoral Castle to the public for the first time in history.
• What the geography of the Earth will look like in 300 million years.
• The curse of the Viking Sally, the Baltic's most ill-starred ship.
• How King's College added 438 solar panels to a 500-year-old chapel.
• Why several cities in Germany have fake bus stops.
• The Nepali Army is removing trash and bodies from Mount Everest.
• Why is it so common to see just one shoe, not two, on the side of the road?
• A juice company dumped orange peels in a national park. Here's what it looks like now.

 

►Fascinating Folk◄

• The Victorian ladies who smuggled a mummy case out of Egypt.
• Hello, Elizabeth Fenwick: Getting reacquainted with a crime fiction great.
• Barbara Newhall Follett: the child novelist who later vanished into thin air.
• Don Winslow reflects on writing his final novel.
• The genius of Georgette Chen.
• How David Attenborough went from delighting at the natural world to pleading for its future.
• The noteworthy fears of ten famous figures.
• How McKenna Jordan became the owner of a mystery bookstore like no other.
• C.J. Sansom, author of the Shardlake novels, has died at the age of 71.
  

 

►I ♥ Lists◄

• Five of the best books about social media.
• Nine thrillers to read if you like Breaking Bad.
• Five great murder mysteries set in college towns.
• Eight of the most unlikely amateur sleuths in fiction.
• Nine of the best bookish gifts for poetry lovers.
• Mysteries about translators.
• Ten of the best new non-fiction books released in April 2024.
• Fifteen nature books to read this spring.

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!