New Books

I got seven new books in the mail today. Most of them are work-related, but a few are just for fun.

Work-related books
I recently read a post about the five must-read books for bloggers over at Freelancing Help. I'm planning to launch a blog for my business in the next few weeks, so I was very interested in this list. As it turned out, one didn't appeal to me or seem applicable and one was available to test-drive from my public library. The remaining three looked valuable, weren't available at my library, and as I mentioned before my town is quickly running out of local bookstores (even the chain types), so I ordered them online:

• Launch: How to quickly propel your business beyond the competition by Michael A. Stelzner
• Clout and the Art and Science of Influential Web Content by Colleen Jones
• The Accidental Creative: How to be brilliant at a moment's notice by Todd Henry

I'm also branching out from my previous profession as strictly a technical writer to try my hand at journalism. But, as I've discovered, journalism is a whole different ballgame from technical writing, so I've been educating myself partly by jumping right in and partly by reading lots of books. Today's delivery included Journalism Next by Mark Briggs. It mostly covers journalism on the internet, which is what I'm most interested in.

Fun books
I've been wanting to read Les Miserables for quite awhile. I finally did some research into which translation was the best and settled on the most recent one by Julie Rose. I'm hoping to read this by the end of the year--I've seen the musical several times and it seems like a very fall-ish story.

I also picked up Born to Buy by Juliet B. Schor. I plan to have kids someday and would like to have a better idea of what makes their little brains tick. Some of the marketing that's currently aimed at kids horrifies me and I hope if I know more about it, I'll be better equipped to deal with it when my kids are the ones being marketed at.

Finally, we've lived in our house for over two years now and still have lots of bare walls. So I picked up an Edward Gorey poster book. It's got the "A is for Amy who fell down the stairs" illustration, which I'm totally hanging in my office!