Tattered Essence

For the past seven years Border has been outsourcing its e-commerce function to Amazon. Well, now Borders relaunched its Borders.com web site under its own control.

The site contains many of the same features that the retailer had been beta testing for several months. This includes The Magic Shelf home page which allows browsers to scan 20 rows of books, face out, and click on any title to get more information on the book, few some text or to buy the title. According to Kevin Ertell, Borders v-p of e-business, the Magic Shelf is designed “to make customers feel they’re browsing one of the front tables at one of our stores.”

Borders.com will have a total of 2 million books, DVDs and music in its inventory. In addition, through an agreement with Alibris, Borders will now offer about 60 million used books for sale.

The program for the 2008 London literature festival was announced last week. It will be hosted at venues across the Southbank Centre in July.

Highlights will include readings of new fiction from Colm Toibin and Jenny Diski, Sir Ian McKellen in discussion with Bishop Gene Robinson, and Tony Benn and David Davis debating democracy. Comedienne Josie Long will provide an evening of live comedy. While Zaha Hadid and Antony Gormley will take part in a discussion of urbanism. Poetry will be provided by Wendy Cope, Simon Armitage and Lavinia Greenlaw.

The London literature festival at Southbank Centre runs from Saturday 5 - Saturday 19 July 2008. For further event details see www.southbankcentre.co.uk/literaturefestival

You know what the best time of year is? Winter and that winter holiday season is the best part of the year to me. And I am really talking about all of the great deals that you can get on the day after Turkey Day, which is called Black Friday. And then you get to take the deals that you got and give them away on Christmas Day. What a good time that is! Well, you know, sure it is almost summer time and we just had Memorial Day. But you know what? It is not to early to start thinking about those Black Friday deals. And thanks to black-friday.net you do not have to worry about missing any of them! You see, this is a site that will post up the Black Friday ads as they are available for you to see. And you can actually sign up for an email alert with them so that you do not miss anything. And they have all of your fave places like Best Buy! And the best part is that you can do all of your shopping from home instead of fighting other people at the store. So be sure to check it out today!

The 2008 Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse prize for comic fiction has been announced.

Will Self’s novel The Butt was officially awarded the Wodehouse prize for comic fiction at the Hay Festival. Of course, some say that the suspense had been over since the shortlist was announced last month. Apparently readers of the program for this year’s Hay festival noticed Self described as the ‘winner of the 2008 Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse prize for comic fiction.’

So, there may have been no suspense in the end. But still it is exciting for the author.

How would like to have the chance to win your very own iPod nano just for taking a short online survey? Well, if you are interested in winning your very own iPod nano all you need to do is go and take the quick online survey that Development Dimensions International (DDI) has put up. The survey is targeting people that work in an executive capacity in the health care industry. So that if that describes you then you need to take this survey today! To take the survey, click here. So go ahead and take the survey for your chance to win today!

NPR has released a list worth noting.

Nine First Books that Make a Lasting Impression is the list.

Interestingly enough, I can’t say I’ve heard of the books. Or the authors for that matter. Be sure to have a look at it. And see if you recognize any of the books.