LibraryThing: State of the Thing - August

LibraryThing: State of the Thing Dear {NAME}, Welcome to the August State of the Thing. We've got exciting news about our newly redesigned Charts and Graphs section, 2,436 free books, and some disturbing reports of censorship from the wider book world. If you'd rather receive a plain-text version, [edit your email preferences](. You can also read it [online](. You can like LibraryThing on [Facebook]( and follow [@LibraryThing]( on Twitter for up-to-the-minute site news and updates. Charts and Graphs We’ve just launched [Charts and Graphs](, our newly redesigned and expanded Stats section. We have retained all of the old stats, and added twenty-nine pages of new and colorful charts and graphs. Tabular data is available with each chart or graph, and links are provided to your catalog, so that you can use this new feature to improve your records. You can now filter everything in your Charts and Graphs section by collection, read date, or a combination of the two, and our new Share button allows you to easily post various charts and graphs on social media. It’s informative, pretty and mobile-friendly. Come [take a look](NAME}/overview), [join the discussion](, and explore your catalog on a whole new level! Here are some examples of the new charts: //www.librarything.com/stats/ablachly/gender//www.librarything.com/stats/ablachly/physical List of the Month Come join LibraryThing’s List of the Month project, as we create a new thematic book list each month. Like all of our [Lists](, the List of the Month draws upon the knowledge of the LibraryThing community, while also aiming to provoke discussion around each theme. See our new [wiki page]( for a complete List of the Month list, and join us over in our [new group](, for further discussion of the project. August List of the Month. Our August List of the Month is dedicated to cookbooks that reflect the cuisine of each member's home country or region. Whether home signifies the place where one was born and raised, or the place where one now lives, is left for the member to decide. Head over to our list of [The Cookbooks of Home]( to add your top five choices. Check out other recent Lists of the Month: - March: [Favorite Science Fiction by Women Authors]( - April: [Recommended Nature Writing]( - May: [Must-Read Maine Books]( - June: [Favorite Caribbean Books]( - July: [Best Beach Reads]( The Talk of LibraryThing What conversations are going on in our groups? - Fans of the Heritage Press have been discussing their [Favorite Paper]( (and printing techniques) over in the [George Macy Devotees]( group. - Members have been tracking [Where in the World Their Books Take Them](, in the [Mystery and Suspense]( group. - Flora-loving readers have been considering what their neighborhoods would look like [Post Homo Sapiens](, in the [Gardens & Books]( group. - Collectors have been describing the [Interesting Treasures]( that they have recently found, in the [Gothic Literature]( group. Speaking of Groups, if you're new to LibraryThing, there's a group for that: [Welcome to LibraryThing](21)! Free Books! Early Reviewers is our program where you can win free advance copies of books to read and review. This month we welcome the Israeli publisher, Niv Books, which is participating for the first time. Explore the full list and [sign up to request books](. Our August batch of Early Reviewers has 2,436 copies of 80 books. The deadline to request a book is August 30th, 6pm Eastern time. Did you win a book recently? When you receive your book, make sure you head over to your [Books You've Won]( page to mark it received. After you've read your book, add your review to LibraryThing. First, add the book to your LibraryThing catalog. Then click the pencil-shaped "edit" icon next to the book, or click "edit book" from the work page. Type your review into the Review box, and click "submit" to save it. Reviewing your books gives you a greater chance of winning books in the future, while neglecting to review lowers your odds. For more information, vist the [Early Reviewers Help Page](. Book World News Awards and Prizes. The winners of the 2021 [Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards](Award) were [announced in late July](, with [Gene Luen Yang]( taking home three prizes: Best Publication for Kids and Best Adaptation from Another Medium for [Superman Smashes the Klan](, and Best Publication for Teens for [Dragon Hoops](. Other award winners included author [Ed Brubaker]( and artist [Sean Philips]( in the Best Graphic Album–New category for [Pulp](, and [Adrian Tomine]( in the Best Graphic Memoir and Best Publication Design categories for [The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist](. British author [Claire Wilcox]( has won the [PEN Ackerley Prize 2021]( for her [Patch Work: A Life Amongst Clothes](. Established in 1982, and meant to honor the memory of author and editor [J.R. Ackerley](, the [PEN Ackerley Prize](20Prize) is given out by [English PEN](, and recognizes the best in British literary autobiography. The [Booker Prize Longlist](Prize+Longlist) for 2021 [has been revealed](, with thirteen books in the running for the UK’s most prestigious literary award. These include: [A Passage North]( by [Anuk Arudpragasam](, [Second Place]( by [Rachel Cusk](, [The Promise]( by [Damon Galgut](, [The Sweetness of Water]( by [Nathan Harris](, [Klara and the Sun]( by [Kazuo Ishiguro](, [An Island]( by [Karen Jennings](, [A Town Called Solace]( by [Mary Lawson](, [No One Is Talking About This]( by [Patricia Lockwood](, [The Fortune Men]( by [Nadifa Mohamed](, [Bewilderment]( by [Richard Powers](, [China Room]( by [Sunjeev Sahota](, [Great Circle]( by [Maggie Shipstead](, and [Light Perpetual]( by [Francis Spufford](. The 2021 winners of the [Sir Julius Vogel Awards](Julius+Vogel+Awards), given out to the best in New Zealand science fiction, fantasy and horror writing, [have been announced](. Winners include [Octavia Cade]( in the Best Novel category, for [The Stone Wētā](; [Chloe Gong]( in the Best Youth Novel category, for [These Violent Delights](; and [A.J. Fitzwater]( in the Best Novella/Novelette category, for [No Man’s Land](, and the Best Collected Work category, for [The Voyages of Cinrak the Dapper](. COVID-19 Updates. The book world continues to be affected by changing Covid-19 conditions. A number of events have been cancelled in the American South due to the spread of the Delta variant in that region, from the annual [Mississippi Book Festival]( to [Boucheron](, a mystery convention that was to be held in New Orleans this year. Other book gatherings, from the [Portland Book Festival]( to [Bloody Scotland](, have opted for a hybrid approach to their events, while the National Book Foundation has announced [a limited in-person award ceremony for this year’s National Book Award winners](, to be held in New York City in November. Workplaces are struggling to find the right approach to employee safety, as Hachette [cancels its plans to reopen offices for a hybrid work schedule](, ViacomCBS (current owner of publisher Simon & Schuster) [delays the return of workers to their offices until October](, and the New York Journal of Books announces that it is [shifting to an entirely virtual work model](. HarperCollins’ plan to reopen their offices in New York in October [is still in the works](, but Amazon has announced that [their offices will not reopen until January of 2022](, at the earliest. Publishing & Book Sales. Back in [December]( we reported on the proposed [purchase of Simon & Schuster](—the third largest publisher in the United States—by Penguin Random House, currently the largest publisher in the country. Then in [April]( we discussed HarperCollins’ plan to [buy the trade division of Houghton Mifflin](. Continuing the trend of increased consolidation in the publishing world, it has been reported that [Hachette is to buy Workman Publishing,]( one of the largest independent publishers in the industry. We reported in [last month’s edition]( of the State of the Thing that book sales were on the rise in the [USA](, [UK]( and [Italy](, and can now add [Canada]( and [Spain]( to that list. Censorship on the Rise. In less positive news, censorship appears to be on the rise in the book world, with some headline-grabbing examples from around the globe. In Hong Kong, five members of The General Union of Hong Kong Speech Therapists [have been arrested for their role in creating a series of picture books]( thought to be critical of the Chinese government. In Belarus, [the Justice Ministry has dissolved PEN Belarus](, an organization working to protect freedom of expression in that country. In Hungary, the government has [restricted the sales of LGBTQ children’s books](, declaring that they can only be sold in blank wrappers. Hot on LibraryThing - [I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump’s Catastrophic Final Year]( by [Carol Leonnig]( - [Not a Happy Family]( by [Shari Lapeña]( - [Billy Summers]( by [Stephen King]( - [The Cellist: A Novel]( by [Daniel Silva]( - [The Paper Palace]( by [Miranda Cowley Heller]( - [False Witness]( by [Karin Slaughter]( - [Six Crimson Cranes]( by [Elizabeth Lim]( - [Razorblade Tears]( by [S.A. Cosby]( - [She Who Became the Sun]( by [Shelley Parker-Chan]( - [The Personal Librarian]( by [Marie Benedict]( - [The Final Girl Support Group]( by [Grady Hendrix]( - [A Psalm for the Wild-Built]( by [Becky Chambers]( - [The Forest of Vanishing Stars]( by [Kristin Harmel]( - [Falling]( by [T.J. Newman]( - [Dream Girl]( by [Laura Lippman]( - [The Sweetness of Water]( by [Nathan Harris]( - [Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch]( by [Rivka Galchen]( - [Victories Greater Than Death]( by [Charlie Jane Anders]( - [The Therapist]( by [B.A. Paris]( - [The Bone Code]( by [Kathy Reichs]( Hot in Libraries Here's what's hot so far in August across thousands of public libraries in the United States. This data was collected by Syndetics Unbound, a LibraryThing/ProQuest project to enrich the library catalog. The search data is fully anonymized the day it is collected. For more information about Syndetics Unbound, please visit [Syndetics.com](. TinyCat [TinyCat]( is the online catalog for small libraries, created by LibraryThing. It turns your existing LibraryThing account into a simple, professional, web-based catalog. Live Demo. To learn more about TinyCat, join Kristi for a live demo Wednesdays at 1pm Eastern. Webinars are now on Zoom, so make sure to use our new [link to attend](. You can also check out our playlists of Tiny Tutorials on [LibraryThing's YouTube channel](, where Kristi walks you through various features of TinyCat in 30 seconds or less. If you'd like to schedule a webinar at another time or if you have other questions about TinyCat, you can reach Kristi at tinycat@librarything.com. That's all for the Thing this month! Happy reading, Abigail This message was sent to {NAME}. Click to [edit your email preferences or unsubscribe from future emails](.