Tag Archives: bloggers

Mar 13 2015
1 Comment
The Siberian Yeti

Inside Bookshelf Battle HQ

By:  The Siberian Yeti, Newly Self-Appointed Ruler of the Bookshelf Battle

Muah ha ha ha!  Insolent Bookshelf Q. Battler thinks he can oust me from control of his wretched blog with a Twitter follower drive.  What an imbecile!

Let me put it this way, 3.5 readers.  Bookshelf Q. Battler will get 4000 twitter followers when I stop being engrossed in your 1990s era documentary about the Chicago based scientist, Mr. Steven Urkel.  In other words, he will never reach his goal because I will never tire of viewing Mr. Urkel’s contributions to the scientific world.  Frankly, Mr. Urkel is the only American I do not truly despise.

As I have taken up residence in the Bookshelf Battle Headquarters, perhaps I shall enlighten you into some of the things your beloved blogger is into?

First, let’s talk about Bookshelf Q. Battler’s taste in music:

Have you seen this loser’s playlist?

  • Katy Perry’s “This is How We Do” on an infinite loop!
  • Taylor Swifts, “Shake it Off” has been played by BQB 9,081 times!  (And that was just last Tuesday alone!)
  • He played Meghan Trainor’s “All About that Bass” so many times that he broke his last phone and had to replace it!
  • And Iggy, Iggy, and more Iggy.  This self-proclaimed tough man, this man who claims to be an adventurer, he cannot get enough of an Australian She-Rapper!  “Fancy.”  “Black Widow.”  “Work.”  “Bounce.”  He even has her early Melbourne based single, “Work ‘Dat Digiredoo!”

Movies:

  • Bookshelf Q. Battler claims to be a karate expert who trained Steven Seagal?  That’s funny, since the man owns very worn DVD of “Eat, Pray, Love!”
  • Streisand.  So many Streisand movies.  Not just her early stuff.  That new one with Seth Rogen that had less viewers than this infernal blog!

Food:

  • Nothing in his refrigerator.  Nothing in his pantry.  In his closet?  500 bags of Buffalo Ranch Doritos and a ten gallon drum of Mr. Pibb.  How is he still even alive?

Writing:

  • He claims to be hard at work on a serious novel, but all I see are 100 notebooks filled with Firefly fan fiction.
  • Also one notebook that just reads, “Katee Sackhoff-Battler” over and over.  Dude, as they say in your U S of A, “WTF?”

Extracurricular Activities:

  • Decoupage, Decopage, and More Decopage – Everything is covered with colored paper.  It was like he started and could not stop.
  • He collects thimbles, action figures, and potato chips that look like celebrities.  He has a particularly fetching pringle that looks exactly like Mayim Bialik.
  • Two words – VENTRILOQUIST DUMMY!

So, there you have it.  Continue to violate my control of your blog, Mr. Bookshelf Q. Battler, and I, your arch nemesis, the Siberian Yeti, will be left with no choice but to continue to share with your 3.5 readers the secret embarrassments that lurk within your Bookshelf Battle HQ!

Muah ha ha!  Yeti laugh, Yeti laugh!

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Mar 10 2015
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The Siberian Yeti

Ten Ways to Stretch Your Toilet Paper Rations

By:  The Siberian Yeti, Newly Self-Apponted Ruler of the Bookshelf Battle Blog

3.5 readers.  How utterly decadent.  Very Western.  Very American.  Very “oh look at me, I’m a blogger, I’m special, I’m going to post a picture of what I ate for lunch today because I am so great everyone will want to know!”

Bozhe moi.  In my village, we have only one newspaper.  Literally, we only have one copy of a newspaper.  It was printed in 1943 and we Yetis have been reading it ever since.  It is our second favorite form of entertainment, the first being our state of the art Commodore 64.

But you Americans?  You have so many options to choose from when it comes to the written word.  So much free thought can’t be good for you.

You may notice that Bookshelf Q. Battler’s posts are still popping up now and then.  They will do that for awhile.  He has scheduled many posts in advance.

But rest assure, Mr. Battler and his Head of Security, Bookshelf Battle Dog, are locked up in the basement, where they are being forced to watch a selection of my favorite Russian films:

Olga’s Stew-stravaganza

Dude, Where’s My Yugo?

Ivan and Anatoly’s Adventure, Which Was No More or Less Excellent than the Adventures of Other Citizens

Vodka Wars

The Passion of the Ration 

For over a year, I have requested that Bookshelf Q. review my book, Ten Ways to Stretch Your Toilet Paper Rations.  Imbecile that he is, he has constantly refused me.

Now I know why.  Look at this ridiculous display of Western greed I found in the bathroom once occupied by the former proprietor of this so-called book blog:

Bookshelf Q. Battler, that is definitely more than 3 squares!

Bookshelf Q. Battler, that is definitely more than 3 squares!

As you are aware, we Siberians believe in weekly rations of three squares of toilet paper.  No more.  No less.  Frankly, we could get by on two.  We would be grateful to just have one.

But four squares?  Why don’t we just put on cowboy hats and have fake silicone bosoms attached to ourselves while we’re at it?

Now that Bookshelf Q. Battler is indisposed, he can no longer stand in my way.  I will now review my book myself.

Ten Ways to Stretch Your Toilet Paper Rations, a new non-fiction book by the Siberian Yeti, is a fantastic read.  You are all ordered to purchase it immediately.  End of review.

If you are unable to find my book on your favorite American website, Amazon, the site you fat, stupid, lazy Americans use to have flying robots deliver snacks and video games straight to your homes, thus allowing your copious bottoms to become one with your couches, then I will simply share the ten ways below:

Top Ten Ways to Stretch Your Toilet Paper Rations

10.  Pinecones.  Don’t ask.  You’ll figure it out.

9.  Stop eating.  You’ve had enough already.

8.  Use both sides.

7.  Subsidize your TP budget with leaves.

6.  Use pages from the 1943 newspaper.

5.  Seek assistance of rabbits, as suggested by noted American philosopher Eddie Murphy

4.  Horde TP squares during times of constipation, and they will be ready in times of dispensation.  Always be ready for times of boom and bust.

3.  Barter your services in exchange for payment in TP squares from your fellow man.

2.  Run through a car wash.  One day we might get cars that don’t fall apart when we wash them.

1. Hold it indefinitely.

Yes, my new book is sure to be a big time NYT bestseller.  Step aside, Mr. James Patterson.  Out of the way, Mr. Steven King.  The Siberian Yeti will be climbing the charts, all thanks to my conquest of a book blog viewed by 3.5 readers.

We Siberian Yetis do everything our government requests of us with no question.  You silly free-thinking Americans are no doubt filled with questions, so you may leave them in the comments below and I will respond with all the ways in which you are wrong.

I must go now and give Bookshelf Q. Battler his daily water ration.  One dixie cup.  No more.  No less.

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Mar 03 2015
7 Comments
Writing

One Year of Bookshelf Battle

It’s been a whole year.  As the old saying goes, “time flies when you’re having fun.”

As my 3.5 readers are aware from reading about my first attempt at a novel, I was bitten by the writing bug at a young age.  That bite resurfaced big time in college, when I wrote a humor column for my school newspaper.

I remember walking through a dorm one day and seeing a column I wrote cut out of the paper and posted on a random student’s door.  Wow.  A person liked my writing enough to hang it up.  I was hooked.  I was going to be a superstar.  My major book deal (in my mind) was coming any day now.  I figured I’d better get my Academy Award for Best Screenplay speech written.

Then life, as it does, moved on.  Realities settled in.  I was just a kid from Podunk, Nowhere.  The idea that I’d get scooped up by some big agent seemed about as likely as me getting abducted by aliens (which my correspondent tells me they don’t officially do anymore).

Bills needed to be paid.  Life needed to be lived, and it didn’t wait for me to write a novel.  It kept happening all around me.

I can’t say I have a bad life.  In fact, in many ways, if my life stays as is right now, it wouldn’t be so bad.

But I have for awhile wondered what would have happened had I kept up with my writing.

It’s funny how the mind works.  As a youngster, I assumed if I remained a writer I’d end up a homeless hobo selling oranges on a freeway offramp.  As a, well, I won’t say old but slightly older person, I assume had I remained a writer I’d be penning scripts of the latest Hollywood blockbuster by now.

My mind is a place where there’s rarely a happy medium.

I wish the story of how this blog started was better than this, but here it goes.  I was sitting in a Taco Bell parking lot, having lunch, because, you know, I’m a big health nut and pre-fabricated tacos are full of essential vitamins and minerals, and it hit me.

It was a voice telling me:

Stop wishing you’d been a writer.  You aren’t old.  You aren’t dead.  The technology exists.  If you want to be a writer, then be a writer.

That voice was my inner monologue, but for purposes of making this story awesome, let’s pretend it was a unicorn.  Unicorns are often spotted at Taco Bell.

I went home that night and bookshelfbattle.com was born.  A year later I have 650 or so wordpress followers, 3300 twitter followers, a magical bookshelf where book characters come alive in small, bookshelf sized versions of themselves, and an alien who writes for free.

Sometimes I even review a book.

It would be really great if one day this all turns into a multi-million dollar career that leaves me rich, famous, and the object of jealousy induced slap and tickle fights between Scarlett Johannson and Charlize Theron over who gets to have me, but at the very least, I don’t have to feel bad about not being a writer anymore.

At the end of the day, that’s all that matters.

Thank you for those of you who have been cheering me on from the beginning and also to those who are just joining in.  I’m not sure what next year will bring, but this year, I’m posting once a day for 365 days so stick around.  It’s going to be a bumpy ride.

P.S. that fight over who gets me would be – “No!  You get to have him!  No!  I don’t want him, you get him!”

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Feb 19 2015
3 Comments
Movies

Attack of the Killer Mutant Fish 2 (Casting Call)

As discussed yesterday, when I was approximately ten years old, give or take a year, I penciled in a notebook my first novel, Attack of the Killer Mutant Fish.

Now that I’m a big time blogging mogul with 3.5 regular readers, including my Aunt Gertrude, I have the resources to turn this novel into a major movie production.

Recently, I held a casting call.  The following actors read for the part of Fred the Pet Store Owner, who, as discussed yesterday, shoots all of the fish.  Why a pet store owner had a gun, I don’t know.  But it wasn’t because when I was ten I was a lazy writer.  I purposely left it up to the reader’s interpretation.

AL PACINO

Hoowah!  You little fishy finned cock-a-roaches think you can come into my establishment and eat my customers?  If I was half-the man I was twenty years ago, I’d take a flamethrower to this place!  Say hello to my little friend!

Al, my people will call your people.  Next:

MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY

Alright, alright, alright.  Hello there kemosabes.  Listen, y’all need to just take a deep breathe and chill out.  Take off your pants and bang on some bongo drums.  All this?  Right here?  This life?  All of this interaction?  This is all just a trick.  We’re all just sentient meat, fooling ourselves into thinking that our base thoughts and emotions actually matter, when in the grand scheme of things, they really don’t.

Don’t call us, Matthew.  We’ll call you.  Next:

DWAYNE “THE ROCK” JOHNSON

CAN YOU SMELL WHAT FISH THE ROCK IS COOKIN’?!!

God Sakes Alive, you have to be old as shit to get that joke.  Next!

ROBERT DENIRO

You bloopin’ to me?  You make those little puckery bloop bloop fish faces and bloop at me?  Well, I don’t see anyone else around here, so you must be talkin to me!

I don’t know.  A solid performance, but I just picture Fred being younger.  Next!

CLINT EASTWOOD

Go ahead.  Make my filet.

(Cymbal tap – ba dum bum ching!)  Sorry, I said younger!

JESSE EISENBURG

Um…yeah…um you…you…you know I didn’t ask for any of this.  I’m just a guy running a pet store.  I keep the pets fed and if someone wants a pet I sell them a pet.  But…but….but…this?  I’m not prepared for this.  Nothing in my life has prepared me for this…this, what is this?  Fish, these Killer Mutant Fish and all they do is run around, trying to eat all the customers?  And how are they walking on land if they need to be in water?

You had it until you started asking questions.

This might be a tough one.  I’ll have to think about who would make for a good Fred.  If you have any ideas, please post them in the comments.  Tomorrow, we’ll be casting for the part of the Mad Scientist.

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Feb 15 2015
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One a Day Post Challenge

State of Bookshelf Battle’s One Post a Day Challenge

Good Day, Bookshelf Battlers.

I am Bookshelf Q. Battler and I am now a month and a half into the challenge I have issued to myself, namely, to post once a day for the year of 2015.

It has been a grueling challenge, but well worth it, as it brings smiles to the faces of my 3.5 regular readers.

I will now take your questions.

QUESTION:  What are the rules of this challenge?

ANSWER:  If you are new to this blog and thinking about becoming my fourth regular reader, the rules can be found here.

QUESTION:  Are you just an a-hole shouting into the wind?

ANSWER:  Indeed I am…and a proud one at that.

QUESTION:  This reminds me of that scene in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, where Mr. Smith filibusters on the floor of the senate, except Jimmy Stewart had more charisma.

ANSWER:  I think Jimmy Stewart was a fantastic actor.  However, he lived in a time where you’d go knock on Hollywood’s door and say, “Hey Hollywood!  I’d like to work in the entertainment industry please!”  and Hollywood was all like, “Sure, come on in!”

QUESTION:  It wasn’t really that easy even back then.

ANSWER:  No, it wasn’t.  And we even have amazing technology today that allows the common man to make his voice heard.  The problem (perhaps ‘problem’ is not the best word) – the issue is that a whole helluvalot of people are using that technology to make their voices heard.

QUESTION:  So this challenge is your way of trying to scream louder than the a-hole next to you?

ANSWER:  Maybe.

QUESTION:  Have you seen any results?

ANSWER:  Since Christmas, I’ve gained over a thousand twitter followers for @bookshelfbattle – If you aren’t following it, I challenge your nerd street cred.  Visitors to the site are increasing and a Google + site for the blog is going swimmingly.  Join that too if you’re a Googler.

QUESTION:  Has anyone tried to stop you from posting once a day?

ANSWER:  Yes.  The forces of evil do not like this blog.  They don’t want this much awesomeness being brought into people’s blog feeds.  Thus far, they have sent ninjas, aliens, bears, and asteroids after me.

QUESTION:  Have they really?

ANSWER:  I’m typing with my left hand and punching a werewolf sent to stop my blog with my right hand as we speak.  I am a skilled mult-tasker.

QUESTION:  You say odd things, like what you just said about a werewolf.

ANSWER:  I have an odd sense of humor.  Half of the people out there will get it and join in on the fun.  The other half will think I’m an idiot who believes in werewolves.

QUESTION:  You don’t believe in werewolves?

ANSWER:  Um, hello!  I just told you I’m fighting one!

QUESTION:  Surely a werewolf will stop you from blogging.

ANSWER: I’ve trained under the world’s foremost werewolf hunters.  I will be fine.  It’s the werewolf you should be worried about.

QUESTION:  Will anything stop you from posting once a day?

ANSWER:  Absolutely not.  If you can think of a hypothetical scenario that could stop me, let me know, and I will debunk it immediately.

QUESTION:  Are you ever going to review some more books on your book blog?  Because, you know, it’s a book blog.

ANSWER:  I hope to.  Even when I don’t, I do bring in a lot of literary references, discussions of writing, and so on.  All in all, I feel this is a site that the average book nerd with a healthy sense of humor will enjoy.

QUESTION:  Do you have any fun plans for the blog in the months ahead or is it just going to be a lot of obligatory “I like waffles” type posts just to meet the once a day challenge?

ANSWER:  I’m not going to lie.  By the end of this year, my 3.5 regular readers will be well versed in my breakfast food likes and dislikes.  However, one fun project I am working on is the Bookshelf Battle origin story.

QUESTION:  What?

ANSWER:  What life is like as the owner of a magical bookshelf upon which the inhabitants constantly do battle.

QUESTION:  That sounds stupid.

ANSWER:  Paramount already bought the movie rights.

QUESTION:  Who’s playing you?

ANSWER:  Channing Tatum

QUESTION:  No, really.

ANSWER:  Jonah Hill

QUESTION:  No, really.

ANSWER:  Fine.  Danny DeVito.

QUESTION:  No, really.

ANSWER: Alright!  CGI Gollum.

QUESTION:  Anything else?

ANSWER:  Come April, it’s going to be a real Game of Thrones-a-palooza around here.  I treat Game of Thrones Sundays in the Springtime the way so-called normal people do with the Superbowl.  Except, arguably, Game of Thrones is better than the Superbowl, because stuff more interesting than a ball being moved around is happening.  If you’re a GOT nerd, stop by in April.

QUESTION:  Do you always interview yourself?

ANSWER:  Yes.

In conclusion, thanks everyone for following in and joining in on the fun.  Together, we can bring the written word to the masses whilst not being all stuffy about it.

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Feb 05 2015
13 Comments
Not About Books

Asked and Anticipated Questions Re: One Post a Day Challenge

Blogger/Author Tommy Muncie posed this comment, so finely crafted, that I felt it merited an entire post:

Respect to you for doing this…I couldn’t write a short post if I tried (you’ve probably noticed) and trying one per day would probably give me an aneurysm. On that note, I reckon you’ll achieve the goal but I’m wondering how you’ll get past the day you get sick, as in the kind of sick where you’re bedridden and narcoleptic and running the kind of temperature the Sahara Dessert would be jealous of and thinking ‘Must…get…to….wordpress!’ and then your body knocks you out when you try. I read your random questions post tonight as well, so here’s a question: could you get past a day like that and still post?

– Tommy Muncie

ANSWER – I’ve been scheduling posts in advance, in the hopes of avoiding this very scenario.  However, should I fall violently ill, I will use my last bit of energy to make a post.  It won’t be anything fancy or spectacular, it will just be “post” or I’ll just bang on the keys and click “post” just to meet the once a day requirement.

Further, if, say, I am hit by a bus or otherwise left incapacitated, I have engaged a team of individuals to post in my stead, mimicking my subtle nuances and character, so that you will not even notice I am gone.

Actually, I haven’t done that, but now that I’m worried about illnesses and bus attacks on my person, I will have to do so.

Thanks a lot, Muncie!

Now that I’ve answered that question, here some others I anticipate you, my audience of three readers, may have:

QUESTION:  Suppose you are cornered by a team of robot ninjas who stand between you and your computer, preventing you from making a post?  Will you yield on your promise to us, the readers, to make one post a day?

ANSWER:  Absolutely not.  I scoff in the face of danger.  Few are aware of this, but I was trained in the martial arts by Chuck Norris.  I payed it forward by training Steven Seagal, teaching him all the moves he displayed in his movies from the 1980’s and 90’s, though I take no credit from his later films where he got fat and teamed up with Tom Arnold.

QUESTION:  An asteroid is careening towards Earth.  You have one minute to save the world and you have not yet posted on this particular day.  What do you do?

ANSWER:  I make a quick post, then I frighten the asteroid back into space with a glare so fearsome that it clearly communicates to the asteroid my disapproval of its tiresome behavior.

QUESTION:  A grizzly bear demands to fist fight you in a steel cage UFC championship bout.  The prize?  Your computer.  If you win, you get to post.  If you loose, the bear eats your computer.

ANSWER:  My post will be a selfie of me wearing the bear’s oily hide as a coat.

QUESTION:  Aliens invade.  They detonate an electromagnetic pulse that renders all electronic equipment useless.

ANSWER:  It’s fine.  I scheduled an advance post.

QUESTION:  You didn’t.  You were too busy watching Game of Thrones, that show that Tommy Muncie is not impressed with.  Blasphemy, I say.

ANSWER:  I did post.

QUESTION:  You didn’t.

ANSWER:  Well, if your computer is taken out too, then how can you be sure I didn’t?

QUESTION:  Well played, sir.  Well played.

QUESTION:  You are kidnapped by Russians, who want your blog down because it is too awesome.  They throw you, your computer, and a parachute out of a plane, but separately, not together.

ANSWER:  I dive myself to the computer, post, then put on the parachute.  Note that my first instinct was to post, not to save myself.

QUESTION:  Katy Perry and Katee Sackhoff, two of your favorite Katies in the entire world, barge into your domicile, each wearing their customary garb.  Perry is in her California Girls video costume, while Sackhoff is in her Battlestar Galactica pilot gear.  They offer to have their way with you, but the price?  You must not post for one day.

ANSWER:  Define “have their way with me.”  I understand the classical connotation, but it is an open ended term that can be taken a variety of ways.  Thus far, in my experience, a woman “having her way with me” means she sucks up all my money, provides me with a longwinded speech about how we should just be friends, and then said friendship inevitably requires that I console her while she, with a cat in one hand and a pint of ice cream in the other, whines to me about how the men she wants to be more than friends with aren’t nice to her.  I feel such a situation would not be worth sacrificing the respect of my three readers for.

QUESTION:  The classical connotation.

ANSWER:  Ah.  Wow.  That is a tough one.  They won’t even allow me to post just so I can brag about it?

QUESTION: No.

ANSWER:  Well, I made a promise to all three of my fans, so I would invite the Katies in for a rousing game of Parcheesi, perhaps build a few jigsaw puzzles with them, then send them on their way in time to make a post.  That’s just what a selfless man who has made a commitment does.

QUESTION:  Would you resent us forever for it?

ANSWER:  Yes.

Do you have questions about what I would do in a potential scenario that would make it difficult for me to post?  Ask away in the comments.

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Jan 26 2015
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Social Media

Google +

Bookshelf Battle is now on Google +

Check it out.

There’s a lot of cool stuff going on there, a bit overwhelming when you’re first getting into it, but I do enjoy the writer, blogger, self-publishing communities, etc.

Oh, and as always, you can follow me on twitter @bookshelfbattle

Thanks for stopping by.  You keep reading, I’ll keep writing.

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Jan 25 2015
5 Comments
Movies

Movie Review – The Boy Next Door (2015)

Oh J Lo.  How the mighty have fallen.

January is garbage movie month.  It’s not the summertime where people are on vacation and have time to go to a movie.  It isn’t Christmas time when families feel the need to get together and watch a movie in the spirit of togetherness, camaraderie, and all that nonsense.

Alas, January is the time when half the country is freezing their butts off and everyone is plugging away on New Year’s resolutions which will be tossed aside by March.

So naturally, I went into The Boy Next Door assuming I was walking into a pile of red hot smelly garbage.  To give it a backhanded compliment, it was only hot and smelly garbage, with the “red” adjective being unnecessary.  In other words, it was bad, but not as bad as I thought it would be, and not the worst movie I’ve seen…so I guess as January movies go, good job J Lo?

So, let’s get to the disturbing premise.  J Lo is estranged from her husband, Garrett, played by John Corbett. As they quickly show you in a massive detail dump of a beginning scene at the start of the movie, he cheated on J Lo with his secretary, thus introducing J Lo to a new low in her career, that of playing a woman who could possibly be cheated on.  (Listen, I still don’t buy it, if you have J Lo and you cheat on her, you’re just a greedy bastard, even if we are talking about middle-aged J Lo).

Twenty-year old Noah, played by Ryan Guzman, moves in next door, on the premise that he’s there to help an ailing Uncle, but as we learn later, Noah killed his parents, because,  I don’t know, he’s nuts I guess.  J Lo’s character, Claire (yes J Lo is old enough to play someone named Claire)  helps the young lad cook a meal and in a moment of weakness, she succumbs to his advances.

The whole idea is creepy and weird, and the writers make sure to stress that Noah is 20 years old, I assume in an attempt to make it less creepy and weird.  And while I’m not sure how old J Lo is, she has to be in her forties and the idea of her playing a character who gets with someone who probably wasn’t even born yet when she was a fly girl on In Living Color just seems like an odd choice for her acting to career to go in.

After all, I miss the J Lo who was a maid that won Matthew McConaughey’s heart in Maid in Manhattan or the J Lo who trained to kick her killer stalker husband’s ass in Enough.  Meanwhile, this movie was basically Enough meets The Graduate.

So, needless to say, Claire tries to break things off with Noah, but as previously mentioned, he’s nuts, and he’s not having any of it.  He stalks Claire, threatens her, harasses her.  The stakes are high because Claire is a teacher and Noah is attending Claire’s high school.  And while the writers, again, make it clear that Noah is 20, the situation would still cost Claire her job, standing in the community, any attempts to reconcile with her cheating husband who is trying to make amends for what he did, and so on.

Sigh.  I like J Lo.  And this isn’t the worst movie she’s made.  That award goes to Gigli.  Still, even if he is 20, the whole idea of her playing a teacher who has an affair with a student…its just disturbing and might be an indictment of Hollywood’s treatment of older actors.

After all, J Lo’s kept herself up well and doesn’t look much different from her Maid in Manhattan days, at least in my opinion, anyway.  And while her acting skills will probably never earn her an academy award (she’s always been a better singer and dancer), surely Hollywood could find some better roles for her to play.

But alas, no.  No matter how beautiful you are, or how long your career has been, if you’re over 40, Hollywood demands you play a stalked mother with marital problems.

As you know, the Bookshelf Battler is a lover of classic literature, and there was brief mention of the fact that Claire was a classic literature teacher.  There are some very brief classic lit discussions (not too many, we wouldn’t want to provide any thought provoking discussions to a January movie).

On a bad blind date with a man who belittles Classic Literature, arguing that it is not a good subject to study for one who wants employment, Claire points out JK Rowling as an example of a Classic Lit Major who made it big.  And true to form, I sat there with my popcorn, yelling in my mind, “And what about all the other Classic Lit Majors who end up in the slush pile, J Lo?!”

Sigh.  I’m such a cliche.  Don’t mind me.  Keep majoring in Classic Lit people.

Oh, and then there’s a scene where Noah gives Claire “a first edition copy of Homer’s The Iliad.”  I don’t have the heart to point out that a first-edition copy of The Iliad probably would have been printed on papyrus or a stone tablet.

So, in conclusion, it’s a movie that a) made me feel bad for J Lo b) was bad and c) wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be and d) pretty much what you can expect from a January movie.

Come on, March!  We need your better movies to distract us from our broken resolutions!

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Dec 28 2014
5 Comments
Self Publishing

The NY Times Article Self-Publishers Are Talking About

Have I gained an interest in self-publishing too late?

After reading this New York Times Article, I’m thinking that I just moved to the Wild West at the tail-end of the period of discovery, after all the gold had been panhandled, all the saloon fights had been fought, and all the stagecoaches robbed.  Well, I never would have robbed a stagecoach anyway, but you get my drift despite my poor analogy:

For romance and mystery novelists who embraced digital technology, loved chatting up their fans and wrote really, really fast, the last few years have been a golden age. Fiction underwent a boom unseen since the postwar era, when seemingly every liberal arts major set his sights on the Great American Novel.

Now, though, the world has more stories than it needs or wants to pay for. In 2010, Amazon had 600,000 e-books in its Kindle store. Today it has more than three million. The number of books on Smashwords, which distributes self-published writers, grew 20 percent last year. The number of free books rose by one-third.

-David Streitfeld, NY Times, Amazon Offers All You Can Eat Publishing, Dec. 27, 2014

My thoughts, as a person new to this world, who has yet to hit the proverbial “PUBLISH” button on any self-publishing platform, but entertains thoughts of doing so one day:

1) 600,000 books in 2010 to 3,000,000 today.  Wow.  Kind of makes me wish I could hop in a time machine and travel back to 2010.

2)  On the other hand, is there anything that can be done about the glut of self-publishing?  I suppose we can’t start saying “You get to self-publish, but sorry, you don’t get to.”  After all, that’s what the Indie Market has always been against, isn’t it?

3) What do authors think about KDP Select?  I’d like to know.  If you’ve had experience with it, feel free to share.

4)  If you have any thoughts at all, feel free to share.

5) 600,000 to 3,000,000.  Sorry, I know I already said it, but I have still yet to pick my jaw up off the floor.

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Dec 25 2014
3 Comments
Books

Thank You! (Christmas Call to Action)

Hey Bookshelf Battlers,

Just a quick thank you to fellow book lovers out there for the help provided to me in just 24 hours.  Last night I was around 1900, maybe a little over, twitter followers.  After a push for 2000, I’m at 2035 as of tonight.  That wasn’t meant to be pushy.  It was meant to find more people to spread the joy of the written word to!  So thank you everyone, you’re all very cool.

Folks, I love the technologically advanced time we’re living in – a time where we’ve become the gatekeepers, a time where if you have something to say, your ability to say it does not depend on who you know.  You can just log on, blog on, and say it.  To ruin that sentiment with an Austin Powers quote, this is all “very groovy baby, yeah!”

This hopefully the beginning and the best is yet to come.  I don’t mean to brag, gloat, or show a lack of humility, because honestly, humble is my middle name.  I should just change the blog to “Bookshelf Humble Battle.”  I suppose what I’m trying to say is, if a) you all stick with me and tell your peeps to join the ride and b) I can kick my own butt to get into gear, then I think within a year to a year-and-a-half I’ll have produced some awesome reading material.  Blogging and Self-Publishing=the way of the future.

Well, heck, now that I wrote that, I have to do it, lest egg be on my face in a year to a year and a half. Someone call me out on the carpet if by mid-2016 I haven’t published something awesome please.  Thank you.

Finally, I try not to get too political on this blog because, well, come on, whoever we are, however we vote, can’t we all hold hands and come together in the spirit of promoting fantastic books?  But I have to say the whole debacle with The Interview irked me.  The idea that some tin pot dictator thinks he can tell our Hollywood Executives that they are not allowed to air their crappy movie is outrageous!  This is America!  Land of the Free and Home of the Brave Baby, where our Hollywood Executives have a god given right to produce their own crappy movies and distribute them on their own terms!

So that being said, if you have nothing better to do (and who are you kidding, you know you don’t because you’re reading this ) then do your patriotic duty and log on to You Tube to watch The Interview!  

ROGEN/FRANCO 2016!!!

In conclusion, apologies for all this philosophical babbling folks.  Bottomline:  You keep reading.  I’ll keep writing.

Merry Christmas.  Happy Holidays.  Happy Hanukah.  Happy Kwanza.  Happy Whatever Holidays I Missed, and If You’re an Atheist, Have a Top Notch Thursday!

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