Visit the Mountains of Madness

Posted on March 7, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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I started reading H.P. Lovecraft when I was about 12 years old and finally stopped when the nightmares became to frequent. Of course I went back to the master of the macabre as an adult, but Lovecraft still scares the bejesus out of me. Artist Steve Thomas has turned his fascination with the iconic horror writer into a set of travel-style posters based on Lovecraft’s books. The vintage looking art work belies the mind-numbing terror of the stories that inspired them. If you’d like to own your own copies of the posters, visit Thomas’ webstore.

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Posted in Art, Books, USA, Writing | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Bookmobile On The Hoof

Posted on March 6, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

I always love a good bookmobile story, so I couldn’t resist the tale of Ridwan Sururi and the Kudapustaka, or “Horse Library”. With the donation of 135 books by a friend from Jakarta, the horse farmer decided to start his traveling children’s lending library in December, 2014. Three days each week he makes the rounds of local villages and schools near his home town of Serang in Central Java delivering free reading materials. The story of Sururi and his trusty steed Luna has gotten the attention of social media in Indonesia and the book donations are flooding in for the project.

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Posted in Asia, Books, Libraries | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Mirar Cap Avall

Posted on March 5, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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I never tire of following in the footsteps of German photographer Sebastan Erras as he travels around Europe discovering beautiful tile floors wherever he goes. His latest journey has taken him through Barcelona’s historic neighborhoods and landmarks. We can follow his peregrination via a nifty interactive map.

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Posted in Architecture, Art, Europe, Hotels, Museums, Photography, Restaurants, Tourism | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Support The Book Thing

Posted on March 4, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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The city of Baltimore is known for its rich historical past and contemporary poverty and racial strife. But one of the longstanding bright spots in the port city is the beloved community organization The Book Thing. This free book program has a simple mission—”to put unwanted books into the hands of those who want them.”

This amazing “free store” recycles discarded books and gives them away to anyone who visits their warehouse center. Unfortunately, earlier this week a fire broke out destroying thousands of donated books and causing considerable damage to the facility.

Book lovers can help The Book Thing rebound and get back to the business of giving away books by making a donation on their website or through the Go Fund Me campaign.

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Posted in Books, Bookstore Tourism, USA | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Keep On Trucking

Posted on March 3, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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The Truck Art Project is a clever initiative that offers European street artists the opportunity to transform commercial trucks into rolling works of art. A fleet of ten trucks serve as mobile canvases and itinerant art galleries as they travel throughout Spain. Several of the trucks also house traveling exhibitions of work by artists who have participated in the project.

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Some of the better known street artists who have been involved include suso33, Okuda San Miguel, Marina Vargas, Javier Arce, and Daniel Muñoz. The project is financially supported by art collector and entrepreneur Jaime Colsa.

You can discover more about the Truck Art Project and find out where the mobile galleries will be on the website.

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Posted in Art, Europe, Public Transport | Tagged , | 1 Comment

The Impact of a Book

Posted on March 2, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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Guadalajara-based Mexican artist Jorge Mendez Blake draws connections between the power of literature and the power of visual arts with his monumental installations. In this work he constructed a brick wall on top of a copy of Franz Kafka’s El Castillo.

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Posted in Art, Books, Museums | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Beautiful Machines

Posted on March 1, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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The Gramercy Typewriter Company is an 84-year-old business in New York City run by a father and son team. Founded in 1932, the firm is one of the few remaining guardians of a disappearing technology. Although typewriters seem to be making a comeback of sorts, they’re still overwhelmed in this digital era. If you’ve ever enjoyed the pleasure of an old typewriter, you’ll enjoy this sweet short film about Gramercy Typewriter from director Alden Nusser and London-based Huck magazine.

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Books Break The Shackles Of Time

Posted on February 29, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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Ten Questions Every Writer Needs To Ask

Posted on February 28, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

My first editor criticized me for being “too fond” of adverbs and adjectives. Maybe this infographic created by Andrew Howe would have helped me to understand the nuanced use of adverbs and could have saved me from endless rewrites.

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What Color Is Your Penguin

Posted on February 27, 2016 by Brian D. Butler

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This Spring, Penguin will begin reissuing titles from its Classics series with cover designs in a bold, new color palette. The minimalist format will differentiate books by the original language of publication: orange for English, red for Russian, green for German, light blue for Italian, dark blue for French, and so on. Here’s a list of the initial twenty titles:

THE MASTER AND MARGARITA Mikhail Bulgakov
MRS DALLOWAY Virginia Woolf
THE SECRET AGENT Joseph Conrad
THE GOOD SOLDIER SVEJK Jaroslav Hasek
THE LOST ESTATE Alain-Fournier
THE CALL OF CTHULHU H. P. Lovecraft
THE BETROTHED Alessandro Manzoni
METAMORPHOSIS Franz Kafka
THE NOTEBOOKS OF MALTE LAURIDS BRIGGE Rainer Maria Rilke
THE HOUSE OF ULLOA Emilia Pardo Bazan
FATHERS AND SONS Ivan Turgenev
OUT OF AFRICA Karen Blixen
WALDEN Henry David Thoreau
A PARISIAN AFFAIR Guy de Maupassant
THE BEAST WITHIN Emile Zola
THE COSSACKS and HADJI MURAT Leo Tolstoy
THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO Alfred Russel Wallace
THE RAINBOW D.H. Lawrence
MY CHILDHOOD Maxim Gorky
O PIONEERS! Willa Cather

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Posted in Books, Europe, Writing | Tagged , , | Leave a comment