Dee Reads

The annual Texas Book Festival is in the books 📚, pardon the pun.  This past weekend has come and gone, along with the authors and programming from Austin.  I sincerely wish I could report a rousing success, as in my two previous years attending, but I'm going to give you it to you straight.  I trust that it was what you expect.   My brother and I arrived in Austin Friday afternoon with our schedules in hand and our hearts set on some great author panels, discussions with fellow readers, and an eye-opening new books.  Without a doubt we found some of those things, but after eight sessions over the two days, I must admit I was a bit disappointed.  In half of the presentations, the authors never discussed the content of their books, didn't read an excerpt, nor did they promote the purchase of their work.  Instead they expressed their political views, society's failings, and their ideas for remedying those ills.  In fact, in a session with one ...

Hold onto your hats, it's windy 🌬 out there!  You might get blown off your reading course, take a left turn, and land on a stack of graphic novels or comic books.  For this week's blog, I have asked my eight year old granddaughter to join us for a discussion of all things in the arena of graphic novels.  A solid foundation might be the place to start.  Do you know what a graphic novel is?  I didn't until Maggie started talking about it and delving into the stories she enjoyed.   Encyclopedia Britannica defines a graphic novel in this way: "A graphic novel, in American and British usage, a type of text combining words and images—essentially a comic, although the term most commonly refers to a complete story presented as a book rather than a periodical."   That seems pretty simple, straight-forward even, but there’s more to it, as I was so primly informed. In fact, Maggie would dispute the “essentially a comic” phrase. She loves graphic novels and...

Readers, I'm so sorry to disappoint, for the most part myself, but I lost this week's entire blog.  I was giving it the once over before I published and a huge clap of thunder exploded in the sky over my home.  My laptop blipped and a blog on graphic novels was vaporized.  To provide some content, I believe valuable content, here is some additional promotional material for the Texas Book Festival .  I trust you're not tired of hearing about it!   Free to the public!   Yes, FREE, because of these great sponsors , including Texas's own: I'm looking forward to two days of authors talks, books browsing and great informal conversations.  Here's the schedule:  https://texasbookfestival.org/schedule/. My brother and I will be there.  I hope you can join us. "Book friends are the best friends."