Things to read on a snowy day

Photo by Keith Dotson

Well, it's snowing here, anyway.

1) For those of you who, like me, had yesterday off for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, here's the text and video of the I Have A Dream speech. Writers, take note: remember that post about breaking the rules? Remember when I said that it's all about what you can get away with? A badly written version of the same speech would have an editor writing REP in the margins for all those repeated uses of the word dream, especially that line that says "It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream." In awkward hands, enumeration and repetition is endlessly boring. In the right hands, it becomes the number one top speech in the history of the U.S.

2) While we're on the subject of race, go read:

• White Readers Meet Black Authors
• Reading in Color
• The Rejectionist's Homework for White Folks post (and all accompanying links)
• And, WTF, Bloomsbury? I thought we already had this discussion. Knock it off.

3) While we're on the subject of snow, here are my daughter's favorite winter books:

• The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
• The Snowy Day by Anna Milbourne
• Katy and the Big Snow by Virginia Lee Burton
  
• Olivia Helps with Christmas by Ian Falconer
• 365 Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental
• The Cat in the Hat Comes Back by Dr. Seuss

4) Nerds rejoice! Neil Gaiman and Amanda Palmer are getting hitched! If you haven't read Gaiman's work, in particular American Gods, you are missing out.

5) Stephen Elliott writes about his D.I.Y. Book Tour.

6) My most recent reads: Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy (memoir of a poet, about her Ewing's sarcoma and the accompanying facial disfigurement) and Truth and Beauty by Ann Patchett (memoir of a novelist, about her friendship with Lucy Grealy). A good pairing; I read Patchett's book first.

WHAT ARE YOU READING?

ETA: Justine Larbalestier on the new Bloomsbury debacle