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Piece Of Children’s Book Reflects The Loss In Oklahoma Town

Categories: childrens-books, News, Picture Books Tags: , , ,
By HulaMonkey on May 23, 2013

Reprinted CNN iReport By jaredbowieXV  05/22/13

In the debris filling the yards of the Moore, OK, neighborhoods surrounding those devastated by the F5 tornado Monday, Mark Toney, a volunteer helping with tornado clean-up, had an incredible find: a simple page from a children’s book.

A simple page with incredible meaning.

It showed a cartoon-image of a house, with these words below it:

“I remember my old house,

it’s rooms so bright and wide.

It’s halls will echo for all of time,

with the laughter heard inside.”

The children’s book’s page had an amazing impact on Mr. Toney. “It more than likely came from a house that had been demolished, he said, “and then I thought about how many houses were full of laughter and memories. It reminds me of the laughter and memories yet to come in the new houses that will be built. The memories are truly found in the heart, not the house. It really reminds me of LifeChurch.tv’s recent series, ‘Bless This Home’.”

CNN PRODUCER NOTE     Jared Bowie was with Mark Toney, a fellow volunteer from LifeChurch.tv, when Toney found a telling page from a children’s book amidst the debris at a house in Moore. ‘Somehow that page was in someone’s yard. It was just incredible,’ Bowie said. He was stunned at the symbolism: ‘I was looking at it, and how it’s scratched off, it almost looks like the tornado is going down the house.’

This isn’t the first symbolic photo Bowie has shared with iReport. Remember his stunning image of a cross with a tornado in the background?
- zdan, CNN iReport producer

To read more CLICK HERE

Life Lessons From ‘The Wizard of Oz’

Suzanne Gerber tweeted, “You can’t call too many people true visionaries, but JEAN HOUSTON is one of them.” We at BookTrib couldn’t agree more.

Jean has written close to 30-books—her most recent is THE WIZARD OF US—she has worked with leaders in 108 countries, and she reaches millions of people throughout the year through her teleseminars, lectures, and symposiums.

Head over to NextAvenue.org (a PBS website) and check out Suzanne’s Q&A with Jean Houston.

We are giving away one copy of WIZARD OF US right here!

To enter, go read the NextAvenue story and tell us one new thing that you learned from “Life Lessons From ‘The Wizard of Oz’” in the comments section below. On Tuesday, we will select one lucky winner.

 

Tweet this page for an extra entry!

 

Cosmopolitan And Harlequin Announce Ebook Partnership

We wanted to share exciting news that Harlequin released this morning at 9 a.m. EST.

Harlequin has signed #1 New York Times bestselling author Sylvia Day in a seven-figure two-book deal, which will launch a new line of books, ‘Cosmo Red Hot Reads from Harlequin’.

The two books are going to be titled, Afterburn (available August 15, 2013) and Aftershock (available November 15, 2013), which will feature two “fun, fearless Cosmopolitan-type heroines as well as delicious, dangerous heroes,” states Sylvia in the press release.

About Sylvia Day: Sylvia is a #1 New York Times bestselling author and #1 international bestselling author of more than a dozen award-winning novels sold in 39 countries. Best known for her erotic Crossfire series (featuring Bared To You), a main competitor against 50 Shades of Grey. Author’s website.

About ‘Cosmo Red Hot Reads from Harlequin’: Harlequin will publish two original ‘Cosmo Red Hot Reads from Harlequin’ per month, beginning in August 2013. The novels will feature strong narratives centering on modern young women living the free-spirited and outgoing lifestyle espoused by the international magazine. The ebooks will bear both the Cosmopolitan and Harlequin logos on their covers and will be shorter in length (approx.. 30,000 words per title). Available wherever e-books are sold. Original press release.

Link to Press Release

BookTrib’s Membership Drive

Categories: News Tags: , , , ,
By mckenziem on March 7, 2013

We are looking to expand our book-loving community.

BookTrib has a lot of exciting, new things coming up – from live chats to secret giveaways to new Fresh Ink bloggers – and we want to make sure that everyone is invited.

In traditional BookTrib style, you can win free books while helping us spread the word!

Here’s what you do to sign up:

1. Send this email to your friends:

Join Booktrib.com by clicking here so that we both can win free books! (Make sure to fill in your address so that they can easily send your winnings to you.)

2. Once your friend has confirmed with you that they’ve signed up, proceed to Step 3.

3. Come back to this page, fill out the form, and we’ll know that you’ve completed the process.

And remember, the more members we have, the more titles we can bring you, free of charge!

Have a Friend Sign Up- Win a Book!

Be The Change Meditate Online Conference

Categories: News Tags: , , , , ,
By mckenziem on March 1, 2013

The Experts.

Goodness includes:

  • Happiness Is An Inside Job with Ed & Deb Shapiro
  • Aligning to Love with Marianne Williamson
  • A Mindful Nation with Congressman Tim Ryan
  • The Meditating Brain with Richard J. Davidson
  • Loving Kindness with Sharon Salzberg
  • Being Surprised by Oneself with Gangaji
  • Miracle of Universe with Gabrielle Bernstein
  • Attention in Action with Tara Stiles
  • Just do it! with Brian Johnson
  • Everything Is Meditation with Robert Thurman
  • Expanding the Mind To New Possibilities with Mark Becker
  • Soul Food with Deva Premal & Miten
  • Abiding in Being with Robert Holden
  • Waking up to the Truth with Eli Jaxon-Bear
  • Meditation is Kindness with Andy Puddicombe
  • Passionate Presence with Catherine Ingram

… +15 other awesome sessions.

Your Hosts.

Ed and Deb Shapiro know a thing or two about meditation. They have been doing it for over 40 years and are totally dedicated to sharing, teaching, and writing about it. They believe meditation is of value to everyone: Yogis do it, Christians do it, Buddhists, Jews, Hindus, Muslims and atheists all do it, and you can do it too! Ed and Deb are the award-winning authors of the Be The Change Meditate Online Conference companion book: Be The Change, How Meditation Can Transform You and the World, foreword by the Dalai Lama.

Ed grew up in New York City and trained in India as a Swami—a Meditation and Yoga Master—at the Bihar School of Yoga. Deb grew up in London and began meditating at the age of 15. By the time they met each was exploring what it meant to live a truly spiritual life, free of doctrine.

Ed and Deb are featured columnists on Oprah.com, HuffingtonPost.com, and vividlife.me, where they host their own LIVE radio show, Going Out Of Your Mind. See them at: EdandDebShapiro.com

 

To learn more about the Be The Change Meditate Online Conference, and to claim your FREE ticket, click here.

Superstorm Sandy Pummels Northeast

Categories: News Tags: , , , ,
By mckenziem on November 1, 2012

I’m sure many of you are aware that “Tropical Storm” Sandy hit the East Coast pretty hard this weekend leaving a death toll of at least 11. Luckily all of us here at BookTrib are safe, but Sandy’s wrath has left our team scattered about in various locations around CT that offer all the modern conveniences needed to keep the site running smoothly. Despite being caught in the eye of storm, we’re happy to announce that even though we’ve been confronted with many obstacles such as power outages, flooded roads, etc., BookTrib is up and running and is dedicated to providing the content you love, on a site you love!

We send our best to those severely affected by this superstorm, and hope that we can all rebuild and find a new normal as soon as possible.

Audiobooks.com Launches a Spotify for Books

Categories: News Tags: ,
By on January 25, 2012

by Sarah Kessler (Mashable)

Movie and music sellers have proved that selling their content on an unlimited, monthly basis can be appealing to consumers. Now Audiobooks.com hopes to prove the same for books.

For $24.95 a month, the service will give users unlimited access to its library of 11,000 audio books through its website and an HTML5 mobile app.

Though Amazon-owned competitor Audible has a monthly membership, it relies on a credit system that give users access to a certain number of books per month depending on the fee. Audiobooks is the first service we can find that is streaming books using a monthly model.

There are some tradeoffs in opting for the monthly subscription. Audiobooks has about 11,000 titles available while Audible has 100,000. Three of the top five New York Times bestselling non-fiction books and two of the five bestselling fiction books are available on the former platform, while all ten books are available on the latter. In the unlimited streaming model, you pay for access to the books. If you lose your account, you’ll lose the access. Audible sells books that you download and keep.

On the other hand, you can sample as many Audiobooks books for as long as you want at no additional cost. That’s pretty handy for anyone who misses browsing shelves.

Audiobooks might be launching a new price model for streaming audio books, but it’s not new to the space. It’s actually a product of Simply Audio Books, which has used a similar unlimited rental model for audio books on physical discs since it launched in 2003.

Continue reading…

E-Book Library Borrowing Hits Record Pace

Categories: News Tags: , , ,
By on January 20, 2012

by Matt Hamblen (Computerworld)

Holiday sales of new tablets and e-readers have catapulted e-book borrowing at many of the nation’s libraries, raising the question of how libraries can keep up with demand — especially when some publishers still balk at e-book lending.

The demand for e-books at some major public libraries more than doubled so far in December and January compared to a year ago, causing frustrations for e-book users and librarians alike.

“Demand for e-book borrowing has definitely gone up…dramatically recently,” said Laura Irmscher, collection development manager for the Boston Public Library, the nation’s oldest with a central library and 26 branches. She said e-book borrowing demand at the Boston libraries more than tripled in December, compared to December 2010. For the first half of January, more than 700 people a day tried to borrow an e-book, or added their name to a long waiting list for some of the more popular titles.

At the New York Public Library, 2,907 e-books and materials were checked out on Dec. 26, 2011, nearly double the 1,523 checked out on the same date in 2010, said Miriam Tuliao, assistant director of collections strategy for the library. In all, the New York Public Library has 22,000 unique e-book titles.

Libraries see increased demand

For the past three years, as e-book readers have gained popularity, librarians have noticed a big uptick in e-book borrowing each January. But this month has been especially busy. Most librarians and analysts attribute the growth to the sales of new tablets such as the Amazon Kindle Fire or the Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet, and continued strong sales of the iPad 2, as well as black-and-white e-readers selling for well below $200.

One analyst at Barclays said 5.5 million Kindle Fire tablets were sold in the fourth quarter, higher than earlier estimates by analysts that between three million and five million would be sold during that period.

While many e-book titles are available for borrowing at public libraries, there is usually a long virtual line for the most popular books.

At libraries surveyed by Computerworld in New York, Chicago, Washington and Los Angeles, e-borrowers of John Grisham’s The Litigators had to join a long waiting list. In Boston, 150 people were on a list for one of the 15 available copies of the Grisham e-book. Long waiting lists apply for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo as well.

Some in the e-book reading public have been disappointed by the shortage of the popular books in libraries, complaining that the e-reader and tablet industry is biased toward getting the public to buy an actual book rather than borrow it. A blogger at Actuarial Opinions complained that “practically all of the e-books are checked out, and the waiting list is usually 20+” for the New York Public Library.

Continue reading…

World Book Night is Still Looking for “Book Givers”

Categories: News Tags:
By on

by Bob Minzesheimer (USA Today)

Organizers of the American version of World Book Night, who plan to give away 1 million books on April 23, are still searching for passionate readers to serve as “book givers.”

Since announcing the program a month ago, organizers say they are about one-third of the way toward a goal of finding 50,000 “book givers” who would each give away 20 books to people who are not normally readers.

The campaign, modeled on a British book night last March, features 30 titles chosen by booksellers and librarians. It’s a wide range of titles, including Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games, John Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany, and, in English and Spanish editions, Junot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.

The coalition of publishers, booksellers and others organizing the event is accepting online applications to be one of the ” book givers.” The application asks a few questions: Which book would you give away and why? To whom? And where? The deadline is Feb. 1.

Speaking at a meeting of the American Booksellers Association in New Orleans Thursday, Carl Lennertz, director of World Book Night, said that based on the early applications, “the public got the idea right away.”

Among the locations proposed are Veteran hospitals, Native American reservations, nursing homes, women’s shelters, food pantries, military bases, prisons, Little League fields and New York’s Staten Island Ferry.

Continue reading…

Engage: Apple’s New Tools for Interactive Books on iPad

Categories: News Tags: , , ,
By on January 19, 2012

by Tim Carmody (Wired)

Engagement is a big word in education. It combines both objective participation and subjective emotion. It’s one of the few psychological terms in education that links students, teachers and content. So it’s not surprising that in promoting the iPad as a tool for education, Apple touted the device’s ability to engage students.

Because they’re so engaging: okay, let’s just drop the bull and say it, because they’re cool — Apple sells a lot of iPads for education. At Thursday’s event, Apple’s Phil Schiller said that 1.5 million iPads were in use in education settings, leveraging more than 20,000 education applications. Today, Apple’s giving away brand-new tools that ensures the company will be able to sell many, many more.

iBooks 2: Reinventing the textbook

Apple’s first announcement is an update to its primary reading application for iOS: iBooks 2 is available in the App Store for iPhone or iPad today. (Disappointingly, there’s no move to make a desktop client for Mac or Windows.)

A few of the new textbooks’ features are standard fare when it comes to electronic books. For instance, it’s easy to highlight and annotate text just by swiping, or tap words to define them.

Obviously, the iPad’s primarily differentiator from an e-reader is going to be its ability to display full-color, interactive, multimedia content: not just audio and video, but also three-dimensional diagrams that can be touched, rotated, explored.

iBooks 2 adds familiar iOS gestures to interacting with these textbooks: not just tapping to select or pinch-and-spread to zoom, but also rotation to switch between text and multimedia — exactly the same way you would switch between list view and cover flow browsing music on an iOS device.

It also adds a few new views of its own: for instance, turning notes, highlights and annotations into a series of browsable index cards.

iBooks Author: Keynote’s bookish cousin

Other than these alternate views, the new iBooks are through-designed: authors define and lay out their own text and graphics. iBooks offers more authorial/editorial control than we’ve seen in any competing e-book platform.

The books are created in iBooks Author, a free application for Mac. (No app for Windows. Sorry! Apple’s still got to sell some desktops, too.)

Even though it was tipped as a “GarageBand for e-books,” a better analogy might be a “KeyNote for e-books,” or “Pages on steroids.” It’s much closer in interface and philosophy to the template-based text-and-information apps of the iWork suite than it is to the media-driven apps of iLife. It’s not a remix machine as much as it is a layout and presentation engine.

iBooks Author even leverages Keynote to effectively drag-and-drop Keynote presentations to become interactive elements in e-books. Designers with a little more in the way of coding chops can build widgets in HTML5 and JavaScript.

From there, there are two important buttons at the top. One lets you preview the book on an iPad; the other publishes it to the iBookstore.

Continue reading…

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