Did you know that when you buy blank media like CDs or videocassettes in some countries, you pay a small surcharge that is then remitted back to copyright holders (and, then, hopefully to artists). This fee was imposed because it was presumed that some of these items were being used to tape programs off the television or copy other artistic works. We think there’s something like this in the book world, but cannot be certain (in other words, we’ve heard rumblings, but haven’t encountered specifics). Perhaps the time has come to institute a small charge on used book sales — […]

Isn’t this whole thing blatant? In theory, yes. In practice, well, we could do better. Like, oh, hmmm, perhaps the fact that we can’t think of anything should tell us that we can’t do better. But that won’t stop us from mentioning that we’ve officially entered the world of unpaid but very happy online columnists (what, you want our thoughts on the world? With pleasure…). Our first article is up at Romancing the Blog, though posted under the alias given at birth. We work hard to protect our secret identity. Now we’re off to sit in traffic and contemplate potholes.

For the three or four of you who haven’t already read Jennifer Weiner’s posting about her attempts to write an article for the New Yorker (much less get anyone on the phone), now is your chance. If the publication is not on your dream list, well, you can substitute just about any publication or publisher. I heard back from the New Yorker

Let’s face it, writing books is hard. If you don’t believe us, ask anyone. Except those people at dinner parties who think they’ll dash off a romance because it’s easy. Wait until they’ve done their dashing before asking. One key component of writing is life experience. We think that some of the lack of staying in much of today’s chick[final syllable deleted at the request of Booksquare management] is the youth of many of the authors, whereas much of the success of Helen Fielding’s work came from the fact she was looking backward, in a manner of speaking. So of

When we were a wee one, one thing was certain: we were not surrounded by wineries. Flower fields, yes, but the wineries came much later. These days, people not only know how to pronounce “Lompoc”, but they have also been there. Before, it was just a place one drove by as they cruised up the 101. Unless you had a relative in federal prison, but that’s another story. Now the world knows about Santa Ynez and not because of the Chumash Casino. Los Olivos is not just the place Michael Jackson lives. Solvang is more than a place to buy

Now, correct us if we’re wrong (though we’re not), but didn’t we put a ban on any new genre ending with “lit”? Though our memory is fuzzy on the subject, and we’re too lazy to pull out the old search engine, it seems we demanded this practice cease around the time “lad lit” hit the scene. As with all our magic, it appears something backfired: the lads left, but the lit stayed. Probably this is because we can’t twitch our nose without squinting. So after sifting through the discovery that women of a certain age like to read about women