Friday, November 19, 2010

In the News This Week

Fridays on the SCBWI blog, I share snippets of and links to some of the publishing/media-related news I've read during the last week that I found interesting, helpful, and/or fun. Click titles to get to the full articles.

This week's news includes PW's coverage of NBA winner Kathryn Erskine's acceptance speech, goodbye to Tricycle Press, a pair of some studies on the teens' dating habits and buying habits (including books), MySpace/Facebook partnership, help with e-reader holiday shopping, and more.


Erskine Wins NBA in Young People's Literature (PW)
Kathryn Erskine was filled with gratitude as she stepped up to the podium on Wednesday night to claim the National Book Award for Young People's Literature, for her novel Mockingbird (Philomel), about a 10-year-old girl with Asperger’s syndrome. She thanked the National Book Awards "for supporting reading and our culture," as well as the judges, her publishing house Penguin, and "readers and friends and supporters and family." She also thanked educators, for teaching children "to think critically and deeply, and think for themselves." And she saved special thanks for her mother, for teaching her not only the "what" of the world, "but also the 'why.'"

Random House to Shutter Tricycle Press
As of January 31st Random House Children’s Books is discontinuing the frontlist publishing program of Berkeley-based Tricycle Press, the 18-year-old children’s book imprint. As part of the change, v-p and publisher Nicole Geiger and her four-person editorial team will leave the company on the 31st as well. Tricycle marketing and publicity manager Laura Mancuso will stay on in the same capacity at RHCB.

A study confirms every suspicion you ever had about high-school dating (Slate)
In the Darwinian world of high-school dating, freshman girls and senior boys have the highest chances of successfully partnering up. Senior girls (too picky!) and freshman boys (pond scum!) have the least. These are truisms known to anyone who has watched 10 minutes of a teen movie or spent 10 minutes in a high school cafeteria. Now, however, social scientists have examined them exhaustively and empirically. And they have found that for the most part, they're accurate. So are some other old prom-era chestnuts: Teen boys are primarily—obsessively?—interested in sex, whereas girls, no matter how boy-crazy, tend to focus on relationships. Young men frequently fib about their sexual experience, whereas young women tend to be more truthful. Once a student has sex, it becomes less of an issue in future relationships.

Teen Girls as Avid Shoppers (AdWeek)
 

Don't blame teenage girls for the sluggishness of consumer spending. In a survey just released by Varsity Brands (which sells cheerleading apparel) and Ketchum Global Research Network, girls age 13-18 identified shopping as their favorite pastime. And the list of purchases they've recently made confirms this isn't just talk. But other parts of the survey may leave you wondering how the girls' immersion in new media leaves them with time to buy things.

You Can Now Log in to MySpace with Facebook (Mashable)
In a move that has been rumored for nearly a year, MySpace users can now log in to the once dominant social network using Facebook. At a press event this afternoon, the two companies announced an expansion of their existing partnership that puts a connect with Facebook button on the MySpace homepage and enables a wide range of personalization and sharing features on MySpace.

Closing the book on Harry Potter (NYT)
A LOT has happened since the screenwriter Steve Kloves began working on his adaptation of the very first Harry Potter book, “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” in the late 1990s.
The three central characters — Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Hermione (Emma Watson) and Ron (Rupert Grint) — have grown up on screen, enduring the twin horrors of Voldemort and adolescence before our very eyes. The stories have become progressively darker and more complicated. And Mr. Kloves has immersed himself so deeply in the world of Harry Potter that by the time J. K. Rowling’s seventh and final volume, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” came out in 2007, he said, he knew the characters almost as thoroughly as she did herself.

Holiday Gift Guide To eReaders (eBook Newser)
The holiday shopping season is here and eReaders and tablets are poised to be the hot items of the season. To help you navigate through all of the devices out there, we have compiled a Holiday Gift Guide To eReaders featuring the latest eReaders on the market. The below list includes eReaders that have come out over the last year and will be hot this season:

Great Holiday Expectations for E-Readers (NYT)
E-readers will be widely available at stores like Target, Best Buy and Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest retailer, and offered at prices that make sense for Christmas gifts—less than $150. Publishers and booksellers are expecting that instead of giving your mother a new Nicholas Sparks novel or your father a David Baldacci thriller in the hardcovers that traditionally fly off the shelves and into wrapping paper at this time of year, you might elect to convert them to e-reading.

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