Please note that there have been some minor changes to the YALLFest schedule for this Saturday. In particular, the Industry Insiders Panel at 1 pm has been cancelled, and some personnel changes have been made to the Zombie Attack Panel at 5 pm. Please click the YALLFest! link above to see the updated schedule.
YALLFest This Saturday!
Monday, November 7, 2011
YALLFest 2011, a FREE event featuring 26 of the country’s top YA authors is Sat., Nov. 12, 10 am to 6 pm. This is Blue Bicycle Books’ largest event ever. Adding up all the volunteers/writers/donors/and more, just the number of people working alone ranks in our all-time Top Five shindigs.
A spin-off of last year’s Capital Bookfest, YALLFest narrows the focus to the Young Adult genre. So who do we expect to come?
- People between the ages of 8 and 25.
- People who know anyone those ages.
- People who have ever been or would like to someday be those ages.
- People who like locally-owned businesses, especially bookstores.
- People who like pie.
- People who like books, especially novels, and love how novels create a world in the reader’s mind, something that starts when we stop having picture books read to us and start curling up alone with Nancy Drew and a flashlight, continuing through adulthood, Macondo, East Egg, the streets of Dublin…
Click the YALLFest! link above or visit www.yallfest.org for more information.
Come one, Come YALL!
Monday, November 7, 2011
We are truly grateful for all the authors who are coming to Charleston this weekend just for what we think will soon be the nation’s top Young Adult book festival. It’s an amazing, wide ranging group, former soccer moms and teachers, graduates of Yale, Williams, Harvard, Brown, Columbia who love spinning rich stories, natural talents like Isaac Marion, author of Warm Bodies, whose bio proclaims he’s never won an award and never went to college.
A few can’t miss events:
10 am The middle grade panel featuring Pseudonymous Bosch (ask any fifth grader). Will he finally reveal his true identity? Use a voice modulator? Proxy?
1 pm David Levithan, co-author of Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist.
2 pm Ellen Hopkins – much revered author of gritty novels-in-verse.
3 pm Lisa Brown and Adele Griffin in full Victorian regalia, will create an on-the-spot ghost story, with your help. Adele is a two-time National Book Award finalist, and Lisa is the author of How to Be and Vampire Boy’s Goodnight, which I’d rank with just about anything Maurice Sendak ever wrote. She’s also the author of these terrific 3-panel Book Reviews in the San Francisco Chronicle.
4pm HollYAwood Panel – Kaleb Nation, author and YouTube sensation, will moderate this panel about the transition from page to screen, while a crew films the first episode of his new reality show, Kaleb’s Nation.
5 pm Zombie Attack Panel, Dave Stohl, Head of Worldwide Studios, Activision Video Games will be on hand just days after the release of the latest Call of Duty release, with free giveaways.
Come early and stay for the YA Smackdown at 6pm. Full schedule and festival map right here.
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Recently Acquired
Monday, November 7, 2011
A few new treasures decking our halls in time for the holidays:
The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac. First edition, first printing. Viking, 1958, hb., 244 pp., in very good dust jacket with original price of $3.95 intact, some rubbing on front and back panels, and photo of ‘Ti Jean’ on the back panel. Black cloth covered boards with green and white lettering, excellent shape.
A previous owner’s book plate, a woodblock of witches and goblins that reads “Bring your witch to the Halloween Masquerade, at the The Dil Pickles in Tooker Alley under the Green Light 31st,” is on front paste-down. $995.
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, early Book Club Edition, Lippincott, 1960, hb., 255 pp. Dust jacket in good condition with mylar cover, minimal edge wear and small smudge on front, rear panel has author photo by Truman Capote. $250
The Big Rock Candy Mountain by Wallace Stegner. SIGNED Franklin Library limited edition, 1978, hb., 733 pp., leatherbound. $250
Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk, SIGNED first edition, Doubleday, 2002, hb., 260 pp. dust jacket in fine condition. $125.
Barrel Fever by David Sedaris, signed bookplate. First Edition, Little,Brown, 1994, hb., 196 pp. dust jacket in fine condition with mylar cover. $175
Small Beer by Ludwig Bemelmans, The Viking Press, 1939, hb., 186 pp. dust jacket in good condition with two repaired tears on the front cover and some corner wear. Charming illustrations. $75.
Parsley by Ludwig Bemelmans, SIGNED, 2nd printing. Harper, 1955, hb., 47 pp. Dust jacket slightly worn, fraying at edges with a tear on back. Beautiful color illustrations. $195.
Secrets of the Ninja by Ashida Kim, Paladin Press, 1981, hb., 153 pp. with fine dust jacket. “To become a Ninja, one must accomplish four things: one must be strong; one must know; one must dare; and one must be silent.” $23.
The Little Leather Library Collection, 1920-1924, 3. x 4-inch “Poor Man’s Library” of classic literature, bound in imitation red leather. Stuff stockings with some of these 23 titles, including: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Poems by Robert Browning, A Child’s Garden of Verses, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Short Stories by de Maupassant.. $10-$40.
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Book-Launch for Kwame Alexander’s Acoustic Rooster Nov. 10!
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Poet and author Kwame Alexander will be signing copies of his new children’s book, Acoustic Rooster, on Thurs., Nov. 10 from 6-7:30 pm. Kwame is also the founder of Capital Bookfest, the predecessor of this year’s YALLFest on Nov. 12.
Kwame’s new musically-themed book follows a jazz-loving rooster on his quest to win glory in the barnyard talent show, and also includes a glossary of musical terms.
Signed Gone with the Wind
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Recently acquired!
Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, first edition, first printing, signed, $19,900.
Macmillan, 1936, signed in black ink by Mitchell on the front free endpaper, as was her custom. With all first printing, first issue indicators: “Published May, 1936” on copyright page, rear panel has GWTW listed second in the right-hand column. Price-clipped dust jacket is in protective mylar cover, has some small wear on the top and bottom edges and some wear at the corner and fold stress points, otherwise is in near fine condition. Grey cloth-covered boards, binding and pages are essentially as new. Comes in a custom grey slipcase with 1936 Macmillan booklet.
“It is the song of the fallen, unregenerate Troy, the one sung in a lower key by the women who had to pick up the pieces of a fractured society when their sons and husbands returned with their cause in their throats.”
— Pat Conroy
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Lisa Wells signs Yeah. No. Totally Sept. 22!
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Blue Bike welcomes author Lisa Wells Thurs., Sept. 22, 5:30-7pm to sign her new book Yeah. No. Totally (Perfect Day, pb. 127 pp., $10).
Her book offers a searing portait of a generation on the brink, told through a collection of overheard stories the author has been gathering for years. With a voice at once angry, soulful, fearless, and anarchistic, Wells pulls no punches. From the self-conscious nights at the bar to the shores of a river that no longer exists, from internet message boards to motel rooms, Wells has been watching and listening, and her book reveals the bristling truths she has uncovered.
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YALLFest 2011 Exhibitor Info
Thursday, September 8, 2011
YALLFest 2011 will feature a full day of stimulating talks by award-winning writers, live music, games, and a bustling Literary Marketplace. This fun, family-oriented, cultural event brings together hundreds of booklovers and authors of all ages. Authors, publishers, companies with book-related products, and other businesses interested in becoming a YALLFest 2011 Exhibitor should submit an application by Mon., Oct. 3, 2011 (YALLFest 2011 exhibitor form). Payment is accepted via check or online.
Please contact Jonathan Sanchez at 843.722.2666 or jonathan@bluebicyclebooks.com with any questions.
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Marjory Wentworth signs Taking a Stand, Oct 1!
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Blue Bike welcomes back S.C. Poet Laureate Marjory Wentworth this fall to sign her new book co-authored with Juan E. Méndez, Taking a Stand: The Evolution of Human Rights (Macmillan, hb., 256 pp., $27). Join us at the store Sat., Oct. 1, 5-7pm to hear firsthand about the authors’ experiences with human rights violation and the research process for this profound analysis.
Taking a Stand offers forth an authoritative and incisive examination of torture, detention, exile, armed conflict, and genocide. Drawing on their experiences with the United Nations, Méndez and Wentworth offer a new strategy for holding governments accountable for their actions, providing an essential blueprint for different human rights groups to be able to work together to effect change.
Marjory Wentworth is a Pushcart Prize-nominated poet whose has worked extensively in human rights for organizations such as the UN High Commission for Refugees in Geneva, Switzerland; The Whole World Institute of Boston; and Church World Service in New York. She lives in Charleston, South Carolina.
Juan Méndez is the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture. Previously, he served as the first Special Advisor to the Secretary General of the United Nations on the Prevention of Genocide and is the former president of the International Center for Transitional Justice. He spent 15 years at Human Rights Watch and is currently a visiting professor of Law at Washington College of Law. He lives in New York City.
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Jennifer Niven signs Velva Jean Learns to Fly , Sept. 17!
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
In town for SIBA, Los Angeles author Jennifer Niven will stop by Blue Bicycle on Sat., Sept. 17, 5-7 pm to sign her new book, Velva Jean Learns to Fly (Penguin, pb. 432 pp. $15), the second installment in her acclaimed Velva Jean series. The first book, Velva Jean Learns to Drive, published in 2009, received rave reviews and was quickly optioned by Warner Bros. for a television series that later won an Emmy.
In the new book,Velva Jean Hart hits the road to pursue her dream of singing at the Grand Ole Opry. She leaves behind rural Appalachia, fuelled by the memory of her late Mama telling her to “live out there.” But after a string of auditions, she begins to lose hope- until her brother pays her a surprise visit and treats her to a flying lesson that ignites a brand-new dream: to become a female pilot. Funny, poignant, and utterly unforgettable, Velva Jean Learns to Fly will have fans cheering all over again.
Jennifer Niven is the daughter of award winning author, Penelope Niven, and the author of four titles. Her first book, The Ice Master, has been translated into 10 languages and received numerous awards, including Italy’s esteemed Gambrinus Giuseppe Mazzotti Prize for 2002. She has appeared in in Newsweek, Entertainment Weekly, Talk, Glamour, The New Yorker, Outside, The New York Times Book Review, The London Daily Mail, The London Times, and Writer’s Digest, to name a few.
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