The Waiting Game Weekly Link Round-Up

 

All's quiet on the Kittling Front. As I write this, the ultrasound on my leg is in two days, and I'm looking forward to getting that over with. Denis and I are well and feeling sassy.

The news stations here are saying that our monsoon season has been wetter than usual, but it certainly hasn't been in this neck of the woods. It's spit rain for a minute two or three times here, and that's it. We've had to run a hose out to trees and shrubs to keep them from dying. 

Since nothing much is going on here, and since I'm in the midst of books by two of my favorite authors, I'm going to leave you with another t-shirt from my virtual wardrobe.

Enjoy the links!

►Books & Other Interesting Tidbits◄

• Critically acclaimed books were unavailable at the New York Public Library as budget woes hit June buys.
• From Bridgerton to Ripley, Netflix's latest hit adaptations have also boosted book sales.
• A room of one's own: In praise of seclusion in the service of craft.
• The addition of footnotes to texts by historians began long before their supposed inventor, Leopold von Ranke, started using them.
• Romance novels are shaping teenagers' views on love and relationships-- thanks to social media.
• Does America still care about authors?
• In Canada, Indigenous publishers preserve stories in print as book sales rise.
• How does the world's largest library decide what becomes history?

 

►Book Banning & Censorship◄

• A new Lake Travis (Texas) Independent School District library policy highlights parental involvement and bans harmful material.
• I thought we'd been rather quiet here in Arizona... A Maricopa resident wants a "code of conduct" for LGBTQ books in the library.
• Wisconsin's battle with "parental rights."
• The chilling effects of Georgia's "divisive concepts" law.
• Want to ban books? The Durango (Colorado) Public Library just made it tougher.
• The Lodi (California) Unified School District has dissolved its controversial book review committee.
• The Dayton (Ohio) Metro Library has and always will protect and promote the right to have access.
• Three St. Charles (Missouri) County libraries are no longer facing closure.
• Another book ban battle emerges in Florida with high stakes for the First Amendment.
• Alpena County (Michigan) moves to fire library officials over sexually-themed youth books.
• Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin "is shamefully appointing Meg Scalia Bryce" who "supports book banning, discrimination against LGBTQ students," etc. "to the State Board of Education."
• A Florida county has abolished its library board.
• A North Idaho library network declined to change its policy on kids accessing materials.
• Inside the two-year fight to bring charges against school librarians in Granbury, Texas.
• More states are passing book banning rules.

►Channeling My Inner Indiana Jones◄

• A fossil find has revealed that Neanderthals cared for a six-year-old with Down Syndrome.
• 12,000-year-old Aboriginal sticks may e evidence of the oldest known culturally transmitted ritual in the world.
• 4,000-year-old rock art in Venezuela may be from a "previously unknown" culture.
• A trove of tombs sheds light on how ancient Egyptian families lived-- and died.
• The long-lost homestead of King Pompey, an enslaved African who gained his freedom, has been found in colonial New England.
• Theodore Roosevelt's long-lost pocket watch has surfaced at a Florida auction house.
• Amateur historians have unearthed a long-lost Tudor palace visited by Henry VIII and Elizabeth I.
• A 6,000-year-old burial mound in the Czech Republic may be one of the earliest funeral monuments ever found in Europe.

 

►Channeling My Inner Elly May Clampett◄

• The secret of why Greenland sharks live so incredibly long has finally been revealed.
• Watch chatty Beluga families migrate with these stunning live cams in Canada.
• Why have so many whale remains been found on the ocean floor near Los Angeles?
• Look into a "mega-den" of 2,000 slithering rattlesnakes with this live stream in Colorado.
• Nearly half a million "invasive" owls, including their hybrid offspring, are to be killed by the U.S.
• Two young orcas rammed a sailboat off the coast of northern France-- 800 miles from the "attack" hotspot.
• The Chicago building where nearly 1,000 birds died in one night last fall is installing bird-safe window film.
• A severely injured giraffe with a "very twisted" zigzag neck has been spotted in South Africa.

 

►The Wanderer◄

• How the potato changed the course of world history-- twice. 
• CNBC names Texas the worst state in America for quality of life in 2024.
• Here's why most tornadoes occur in the U.S.
• Unraveling the mystery of Agatha Christie's country retreat.
• Botanists vote to remove a racial slur from hundreds of plant species names.
• Is Venice's controversial entry fee working?
• The world's greatest places of 2024.
• The countries and states that laugh the most-- and least-- online (with maps).

 

►Fascinating Folk◄

• Free George R.R. Martin from The Winds of Winter.
• The real story behind the Baltimore deaths that inspired Lady in the Lake.
• Photographer Clark Dunbar attends powwows to take evocative portraits of Native Americans in full regalia.
• How golden peacocks on a dining room wall destroyed a longstanding friendship between James McNeill Whistler and Frederick Leyland.
• Ten surprising public figures who dreamed of Olympic gold.
• Peng Shepherd on writing a choose-your-own-adventure speculative mystery.
• William Saxon, a little-known Civil Rights activist, refused to give up his bus seat four years before Rosa Parks did.
• Brothers Peter and Paul Wentworth asserted their right to free speech in Tudor England.

►I ♥ Lists◄

• Fourteen pop science books for the curious mind.
• Fifteen novels about epic vacations.
• Nine novels set in bookstores.
• Twenty perfect she shed ideas for book lovers. (Why call this "she shed" ideas when I know plenty of male book lovers? In fact, none of the choices are overtly feminine.)
• Six chilling crime fiction novels featuring child narrators.
• Fifteen books about Appalachia to read instead of Hillbilly Elegy.
• Eight "One Last Heist" mysteries and thrillers.
• Ten of the best bookish goods for back to school.

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!