Book Notes: Rowling, Goodreads, and a brilliant bookcase

Book Notes highlights bookish news, reviews, curiosities and gossip spotted across the blogosphere. May the drama be with you...

That new J.K. Rowling book

The Casual Vacancy has been described as crass and cheerless, but written by a skilled hand. But after reading the New York Times' fantastically well-done review of the book -  Darkness and Death, No Magic to Help - I know I am going to be avoiding it. And not because I don't adore J.K. Rowling... but because I am just not that into depressing, dark and overly-realistic books. Call it a character fall, but just don't make me read it.

Other than the NYT Review, there has been some rather good coverage of the book in the pro-world. Check out The Guardian's reservedly critical review and  EW's Shelf Life's J.K. Rowling's 'The Casual Vacancy': 10 NSFW lines you would NEVER see in a Harry Potter book.

Badreads

A lot of bloggers have been addressing the Goodreads problem lately, and frankly, it's about time. Yes, I do use Goodreads and I use it quite a bit - but I have always had trouble with the site. It has always seemed too... commercial. And frankly, that whole GR bullies B.S. earlier this year still has me rather unsettled.

Sarah, over at Clear Eyes, Full Shelves, has written a nice piece about the reader disconnect going on at Goodreads: Has Goodreads Forgotten Readers? VacuousMinx also wrote a step-by-step post on how Goodreads is catering to authors rather than readers. Both really good posts to check out, even if you plan to remain a Goodreads die-hard!

The Tetris Bookcase

I found out about these rather brilliant bookcases while watching one of Priscilla (from The Readables - brilliant channel, check her out if you haven't already). If you are anything like me, every time you get a new bookcase it fills up within a week... and then it's back to IKEA. Well, this bookcase grows with your collection. Take a look - it's awesome (albeit prohibitively expensive).