reading – News Stories About reading - Page 3

Aug 8, 2013 9:39 AM CDT

E-Book Boom Fizzles

Sales growth bottoms out after years of huge increases

(Newser) - The e-book boom looks to be finished, writes Nicholas Carr at the Rough Type blog. He picks up on stats from the Association of American Publishers that show just a 5% increase in sales in the first quarter of 2013 compared to the previous year. That's "anemic,"...

To Help Ward Off Dementia,
Grab a Good Book

study says

Jul 6, 2013 12:18 PM CDT

To Help Ward Off Dementia, Grab a Good Book

Study adds weight to the theory of keeping your brain active

(Newser) - It's not the most startling of conclusions, but a major new study lends weight to the theory that a lifetime of reading and other brain-boosting activities helps ward off dementia late in life, reports the BBC . The study in the journal Neurology tracked about 300 people from their mid-50s...

How to Read
365 Books
in 2013

OPINION

Dec 31, 2012 9:46 AM CST

How to Read 365 Books in 2013

Jeff Ryan did it without shirking daily duties

(Newser) - A book a day, every day, from tomorrow to next New Year's Eve: Sounds impossible, right? Well, Jeff Ryan managed it in 2012—without giving up his job or his family duties, he writes in Slate . Of course, he tweaked the rules a little; some days, he wouldn't...

Best Books of 2012

Hilary Mantel, Dave Eggers among picks from New York Times

(Newser) - The editors of the New York Times book review have made their picks for the year's best fiction and nonfiction works. A sampling:

Bring Up the Bodies, Hilary Mantel: Her novel about Henry VIII won the Man Booker Prize, just like its predecessor.
Building Stories, Chris Ware: This graphic

...

Oprah Launches New
Book Club Next Week

Jun 2, 2012 9:14 AM CDT

Oprah Launches New Book Club Next Week

This time, it will have a digital component

(Newser) - Oprah Winfrey is back in the book club business, updated for the digital age. "Oprah's Book Club 2.0," a joint project of Winfrey's OWN network and her O magazine, begins Monday with the popular memoir Wild, Cheryl Strayed's story of her 1,100-mile hike...

Today's Books Are Too Long

OPINION

May 22, 2012 1:38 PM CDT

Today's Books Are Too Long

Marc Wortman thinks Google is partly to blame

(Newser) - Marc Wortman has several books he keeps meaning to get to, including the recent biographies of Steve Jobs (630 pages), LBJ (736), George F. Kennan (800), and Malcolm X (608). The problem is, he has a life, too, and unless he devotes hours every day to the task, he'll...

America's Most
(Surprisingly)
Well-Read Cities

May 17, 2012 11:27 AM CDT

America's Most (Surprisingly) Well-Read Cities

No. 1 is Alexandria, Virginia

(Newser) - If you think America's bookworms live in New York or San Francisco, think again. Amazon has released its list of the country's 20 most well-read cities, and they hail from such states as Michigan and Florida, reports Reuters . Top honors goes to Virginia's Alexandria, and though Berkeley...

Baboon
'Readers'
Pick Out
Real Words

Apr 13, 2012 11:59 AM CDT

Baboon 'Readers' Pick Out Real Words

Points to instincts behind reading

(Newser) - Don't expect him to pick up a novel anytime soon—but Dan the baboon and five buddies know real English words when they see them. For instance, if Dan sees the letters BRRU, ITCS, and KITE, he'll pick out the last one as the real word, even though...

How Indie Bookstores
Can Battle Amazon

OPINION

Dec 22, 2011 1:42 PM CST

How Indie Bookstores Can Battle Amazon

Time for local shops to go high-tech: Farhad Manjoo

(Newser) - After sparking a debate over the value independent bookstores , Farhad Manjoo is presenting a peace offering. Independent bookstores may be inefficient from a financial perspective, but that doesn't mean they're "doomed," he writes at Slate . If we want to keep such bookstores going, we can't...

Critic Is Off Base: Bookshops Are Vital to Cities

OPINION

Dec 15, 2011 3:44 PM CST

Critic Is Off Base: Bookshops Are Vital to Cities

Salon writer rebuts critique of local stores

(Newser) - Slate's Farhad Manjoo has written a withering critique of local bookshops, arguing that everybody would be better off just buying from Amazon. At Salon , Will Doig begs to differ. Bookstores are about way more than just hawking books, he writes. They "function as communal spaces, which makes them...

Independent Bookstores Should Go Away

farhad manjoo

Dec 14, 2011 1:46 PM CST

Independent Bookstores Should Go Away

They're inefficient and charge too much: Farhad Manjoo

(Newser) - Independent bookstores win a lot of sympathy in their David-and-Goliath fight against big bad Amazon, but Farhad Manjoo of Slate is siding with Goliath in this one. He lights into those quaint corner bookshops as "some of the least efficient, least user-friendly, and most mistakenly mythologized local establishments you...

SAT Reading
Scores Hit
Lowest Ever

Sep 14, 2011 1:14 PM CDT

SAT Reading Scores Hit Lowest Ever

One reason: more students taking the test

(Newser) - One of the three Rs just found a new basement: SAT reading scores fell three points to reach their lowest level on record, the AP reports. The decline took the scores to 497 out of 800, and it was just the second time in the past 20 years that reading...

Kindle to Add
Library Lending
Feature

Apr 20, 2011 2:40 PM CDT

Kindle to Add Library Lending Feature

More than 11,000 libraries have signed up

(Newser) - Kindle users will be able to go to the virtual library soon. A new feature scheduled to launch later this year will allow anyone with a Kindle (or a phone with the Kindle app) to download e-books from their local libraries for free for a limited span of time, USA ...

California Library
May Ditch Its Books

Mar 29, 2011 12:55 PM CDT

California Library May Ditch Its Books

People could still order them, in a system similar to Netflix

(Newser) - New phrase for the digital age: "Bookless library." The California city of Newport Beach is considering just such a beast, reports the Los Angeles Times . Under the plan, the city would remove the physical books from one of its four branches but still keep it open as a...

In Laos, Bringing Books to Children—Via Elephant

Feb 27, 2011 2:37 PM CST

In Laos, Bringing Books to Children—Via Elephant

The story of one American expatriate's local publishing company

(Newser) - In Laos, many children had never seen a book until “Uncle Sasha” came to town. American Sasha Alyson first visited the impoverished country in 2003, and was struck by the lack of books for children. “Many [kids] don't even know what a book is. Sometimes you have to...

Why Our
Kids Need
Jules Verne

OPINION

Feb 9, 2011 1:35 PM CST

Why Our Kids Need Jules Verne

Blogger: His fiction is especially relevant for today's students

(Newser) - Today's students need a little more Jules Verne in their curriculum, writes Good education editor Liz Dwyer. He was born 183 years ago this week, but his fiction "seems more applicable than ever to the 21st-century lives of students," she argues. He's probably an after-thought in the age...

Does Twilight Hurt
Teen Brains?

Does Twilight Hurt Teen Brains?

Conference exploring vampire novels' pull on young minds

(Newser) - A bunch of Twilight aficionados got together last week, but there were no squeals or Edward-induced fainting spells. Rather, a group of scientists, educators and authors met at Cambridge to explore how the vampire craze exemplified by the Twilight series may be shaping young minds, notes MSNBC . Sample session: "...

Why I Won't Buy a Kindle

OPINION

Sep 4, 2010 2:50 PM CDT

Why I Won't Buy a Kindle

A twentysomething explains why she hates e-readers

(Newser) - Unless all the hype is wrong, e-readers like the Kindle are the future—and precisely the sort of thing a twentysomething technophile who loves to read must adore, right? Meet 26-year-old Emma Silvers, who explains in Salon why she's actually a little repulsed by the idea and won't give up...

Google Counts the World's Books: 129,864,880

Aug 6, 2010 11:13 AM CDT

Google Counts the World's Books: 129,864,880

Of course, it all depends on what a 'book' is

(Newser) - After a lengthy and surprisingly complicated discourse on what constitutes a "book," a Google software engineer offers up the day's most bandied-about number: 129,864,880. As in, that's how many books exist in the world. After all, a company in the business of digitizing all of them...

10 Smart,
Entertaining
Beach Reads

Jul 31, 2010 10:52 AM CDT

10 Smart, Entertaining Beach Reads

They're not trashy, but they're still page-turners

(Newser) - Looking for a page-turner to read on the beach, but just can’t bring yourself to buy a trashy supermarket romance novel? Allow Sadie Stein to introduce you to 10 respectable summer reads “that you can show with pride—but will devour like a tween guilty pleasure,” on...