Smugglers’ Stash & News

Hi folks, and welcome to another Sunday roundup on The Book Smugglers!

First, we’ve got a few announcements…

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

Last Sunday we set up a reader opinion survey about how we could make The Book Smugglers even better for you good folks in 2010. You’ve spoken, and we’re listening! Based on your responses, we’re implementing a few changes around these parts. We’re definitely going to try to deliver more reviews – especially reviews of fantasy, YA, romance, and SF. We’re going to keep it up with more giveaways – and we’ll try to make them accessible to those outside the US and UK when possible. We’ve also resolved to deliver more joint reviews – in fact, we’re setting a tentative goal of at least three per month (we’re aiming for one joint review per week).

We’ve also made some technical changes to the site. Because we know internet connections vary, and load time on our site can take a while, we’ve cut down on the clutter and have cleaned house. You may have noticed that our blogroll has vanished – but fret not! It’s not really gone. Because we read a LOT of truly exceptional book blogs, author blogs, and publisher websites, and because we don’t want to be forced to pick and choose whom to display on our blogroll, we have simply decided to move the whole thing to a separate page. In the upper-right corner of our right sidebar, you can find the link to our blogroll. We’ve also tried to cut down on the image/plugin clutter on our main page, so hopefully this will help folks with slower internet connections access our site. We think we’ve figured out the no load image problem in our feed (which seemed to affect about a quarter of the people who responded to the technical questions part of the survey) – so hopefully there are no further feed malfunctions. **NOTE: If your feed images still aren’t loading, please let us know in the comments.**

FINALLY, we got a few comments about accessibility and the limited search capability on our site. To solve that issue, we’ve implemented a fancy advanced search plugin, which you can access again in the top right corner of our right sidebar. The advanced search allows you to search the site by Book Title, Book Author, Post Author, Category, Tag, and/or keywords.

We have further plans to streamline the site and improve accessibility, but this is what we’ve got so far, and we hope it helps!

Other News

Last week we hosted a stop on author Elizabeth Eulberg’s Blog Tour for the release of her novel The Lonely Hearts Club. AND, for those interested, the blog tour closes this week with a shnazzy giveaway opportunity! Here’s the info:

Join The Lonely Hearts Club author Elizabeth Eulberg and Amy of MyFriendAmy for a Twitter party Wednesday, January 20, between 8:30 and 9:30 p.m. EST!

• Be sure to follow Elizabeth @ElizEulberg and Amy @MyFriendAmy before the party!
• Join the fun! No one expects you or your tweets to be perfect; we’re just happy you made it to the party!
• Anyone who tweets during this hour using #LonelyHeartsClub is entered to win a limited edition Lonely Hearts Club t-shirt!
• Watch for questions from @MyFriendAmy and win awesome prizes including an iPod shuffle, $50 iTunes gift card or $25 VISA gift card!
• To join the party, you can use our official party tweetgrid or just search #LonelyHeartsClub on Twitter.
• Ask Elizabeth questions or chat with other partygoers about how excited you are to read LHC—just use the tag #LonelyHeartsClub in all of your party tweets! (This is added automatically in TweetGrid.)
• Please don’t post any spoilers and don’t forget to pay attention to the time zones, the party starts at 8:30pm EST.

In other interwebs news, the fabulous folks at Alert Nerd are hosting yet another awesomefantasticsuperfabulous Mega-blog Crossover Event!

Last year, it was “What’s Your Scott & Jean?” Day. This year, it’s all about True Geek Confessions. Here’s the event info:

True Geek Confessions

The Date: February 17

The Background: Unpopular opinions: we all have them. Sometimes you stand alone in loving a super niche-y run of a popular comic book series (like Sarah and her Tefe Holland thing). Sometimes you’re the only person on the entire planet to ’ship a certain ’ship. Sometimes you simply Do Not Get a movie the rest of your geeky brethren is falling all over themselves about. And because a lot of fandom is about sharing loves and hates and communing with your fellow geeks, this can feel awfully lonely. But perhaps if we confess our most unpopular opinions for all the internet to see…well, we’ll feel just a little bit better.

Here’s what you do: On February 17, write up a blog post with your own True Geek Confession. Send your link to sarah AT alertnerd DOT com. We will add you to our master list blog post and you can link back to said post. It will be exciting and wonderful and will hopefully not provoke too many “die in a fire” type arguments.

We are so freakin’ excited! Both Ana and I are ready to bare all – what about you? Last year’s Scott & Jean event was so much fun, we cannot wait to participate again! If you’re interested, make sure to check out the Alert Nerd site, and sign up!

This Week on The Book Smugglers

Down to business! On Monday, Ana reviews awesomely nerdy, post-modern YA novel An Abundance of Katherines by John Green.

Tuesday, Thea (finally, for real this time) reviews Kelly Meding’s debut Urban Fantasy novel, Three Days to Dead. HINT: It’s a pretty damn good UF debut.

On Wednesday, Ana takes on Graphic Novel Irredeemable by Mark Waid, with artwork by Peter Krause and published by Boom! Studios.

And then on Thursday and Friday, we have an awesome spotlight with Paranormal Chick-lit/Urban Fantasy novelist Molly Harper. On Thursday, we review her Jane Jameson/”Nice Girls Don’t…” series – Nice Girls Don’t Have Fangs, Nice Girls Don’t Date Dead Men, and Nice Girls Don’t Live Forever. On Friday, Molly Harper stops with a guest post about her Inspirations & Influences, AND she also sticks around to answer YOUR burning questions. And bonus – we’re also giving away TWO complete sets of the books! All you have to do to enter is make sure to stop by and ask Molly a question.

Phew. It’s another busy week! Until tomorrow then, we remain…

~ Your Friendly Neighborhood Book Smugglers