Lovely linky things

In honour of Valentines Day—and in the absence of reviews to post—we’re spreading the link love around!

Lovely book things

First, a big congratulations to the City of Sydney librarians who put together an excellent Library Lovers event at Customs House last Thursday. I’m told the event was booked out. Rather than hiring professional actors, library staff did the readings—from Greek poetry to an excerpt from Kiss Me, Annabel by Eloisa James to one of my favourite poems, Close Reading, which we were lucky enough to be able to publish here at Book Thingo last year.

The Australian Romance Readers Association today launched its new website designed by Australian author Paula Roe. If you’re an ARRA member, the newsletter also came out today and in my column I talk about why I like reading the end of the book first. Also, it looks like the Annual ARRA Readers Awards Dinner is set for May 15 in Sydney. No details on the venue yet.

If you only have a couple of minutes, check A Regency Romance in 2 minutes by SirenoftheStorm:

Heroine: Everyone knows that reformed rakes make the best husbands, because they have the four qualities women desire most in a husband: sexual prowess, commitment issues, promiscuity, and a diverse selection of venereal diseases!

6: Then you’ll like us! We’re total man-whores!

7: We use our bad-boy charm to seduce women into our grasp, take them deep into the woods, and ravish them!

5: We do this in a completely consensual and ecologically responsible manner, of course.

All: Of course!

Go click on the link. It’ll be worth it, I promise you.

Over at Vook, you can pick up Love, Love, Love: Shakespeare in the City:

Ten of Shakespeare’s most beautiful sonnets are enhanced here with funny, heartfelt, and passionate videos that showcase the enduring power and disturbing immediacy of love as it is actually experienced. To see everyday people struggling simultaneously with their own personal emotions and with Shakespeare’s eternal poems is an amazing way to bring substance and magic back to a holiday that’s lost a little luster over time.

Mills & Boon is giving away 10 free ebooks, one from each of its lines, to celebrate the anniversary of its ebook program. There are 2 billionaires, 2 mistresses (that’s convenient!), 3 pregnancies/babies, 1 rake and 1 player. I’m curious about Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourne—it looks steampunkish. Has anyone read it?

Booktopia is celebrating its 6th birthday with up to 80% off selected books. Check out their discounted romance titles here.

New and upcoming book things

Ann Somerville has self-published the sequel to Remastering Jerna, one of my keepers for 2009. Games & Consequences is available from Smashwords:

Playing games with other people’s lives is a thrill. But then you have to pay the consequences. That’s what Jerna discovers when he’s caught up in a dangerous plot and charged with murder. He’ll need all Ria’s brains and bravery, and the help of a honest but disillusioned cop, to escape the terrible trap ensnaring him.

On her blog, Somerville has indicated that all profits from the sale of this book will go to the Haitian Earthquake Relief.

Fleur McDonald’s second book, Blue Skies, is due for release in April. Here’s a peek at the blurb:

Armed with an honours degree in Agribusiness, Amanda Greenfield dreams of employing all the skills she’s learnt at college to help her father turn the family farm from a debt-ridden, run-down basket case into a thriving enterprise.

Then tragedy strikes with the death of Amanda’s mother in a car accident. Wracked by grief and guilt, and wearied by the long struggle to keep Kyleena a going concern, Amanda’s father argues that they should sell up and get on with their lives away from the vagaries of drought and fluctuating stock and crop yields.

Having inherited half the farm from her beloved mother, whom she also grieves for, Amanda determines to summon all her strength, grit and know how to save Kyleena. Along the way she faces mixed fortunes in both love and life…

Charlaine Harris will be at the True Blood events in Sydney and Melbourne this September, and she’ll be going on a book tour. I don’t know her schedule yet, but I suspect it won’t be long until Hachette releases more details. Tickets start at $100 for a day pass.

Lovely blog things

There’s a profile of me over at Wordsville, run by the lovely Paula Grunseit. She runs a regular blog feature called Book Tweep, profiling tweeters. She asked some very interesting questions and I talk about how I got into romances.

I’ve recently discovered the book addiction that is called Goodreads. You can find our profiles here: Decadence, Kat, Wandergurl. I’ve added a widget on the sidebar to show the books in my To Be Read/Reviewed pile. I’m also in the process of decluttering my bookshelf, and I’m using Goodreads to catalog books I no longer want to keep. Then it’s free books, yay! Watch this space.

All Romance and OmniLit are running the 28 Days of Heart campaign throughout February. ARe, the digital bookseller that owns All Romance and OmniLit, will release one new novella each day of the month. These stories will be offered exclusively on AllRomance.com and OmniLit.com as individual eBooks. All proceeds from the sale of these novellas (10k-20k words) will be donated to the American Heart Association. At the same time, they will be profiling 28 romance bloggers—Book Thingo was invited to participate, although I don’t know if we made it to the final list. Some of my favourite romance blogs have already been featured so it’s worth checking out. (Source: 28 Days of Heart press release)

Lovely e-things

REDgroup Retail, which includes Angus & Robertson, Borders and Whitcoulls, announced late last year that their online bookshops will start selling ebooks in May. They’ll be serviced by Kobo, a spin-off from Indigo Books, a Canadian book retailer. They expect to launch their digital content with up to a million titles, including books, magazines and newspapers. (Source: REDgroup press release)

If, like me, you’re itching to get an ebook reader but can’t decide between the main candidates—especially with the iPad looming in the horizon—paidcontent.org and Wired both have some good comparison charts between the Kindle and the iPad.

BeBook recently announced its newest ebook reader, the BeBook Neo, which is being promoted as ‘the first ebook reader which allows you to browse for books directly from the device and not just in one shop.’ The Neo ships in March but is available for pre-order for $569 (excl GST) with free shipping.

Happy Valentine’s Day, everyone! I hope your day—and your fiction—is filled with all sorts of romantic things.

Photo credit: Love Plant by adspark (via stock.xchng)