It took me a little longer than I expected to slot all the winners for the The Great Unsung YA 2010 Giveaway because:

1. I’ve never done a giveaway with such a huge amount of entrants before, and
2. I wanted to make sure the winners got one of their top three picks.

After a little game of musical chairs, I was able to accomplish #2 in all except one case!

So without further ado, here are the lucky winners, thanks to random.org:

1. Alexa Nagasue and a BONUS copy for Shesten Melder: Gamma Glamma by Kim Flores
   (A special thanks to the author for sending over an extra copy of an uncorrected proof so Shesten could get the bonus win!)
2. Annika Dalton: The Secrets of the Cheese Syndicate by Donna St. Cyr
3. Kat Drennan: My Life from Air-Bras to Zits by Barbara Haworth-Attard
4. Keira Gillett: The Thirteen Curses by Michelle Harrison
5. Lisa Gibson: The Puzzle Ring by Kate Forsyth
6. Mary Bell: Unsigned Hype by Booker T. Mattison
7. Melanie Goodman: Border Crossing by Jessica Lee Anderson
8. Sabrina Horande: Trudy by Jessica Lee Anderson
9. Stacy Walker: Year of the Horse by Justin Allen
10. Susie Sharp: The Death-Defying Pepper Roux by Geraldine McCaughrean

Congratulations, all! Details are on their way via email.

Photo by A Christmas Story House Gift Shop.

At my day job, my official title is “Sustainability Specialist.” I am the only person at my company with that title, so most of the time I’m not exactly sure what I’m supposed to be doing.

But there’s one week out of the year where I am certain of my place in the world. And that’s Earth Week. I coordinate a week’s worth of events for more than 2,300 employees at our corporate campus.

We tried a new event this year, called Trash-to-Treasure. The idea is that you bring in items from home that you don’t want or need anymore, others do the same, and then everyone can browse the lot and take whatever they want for free.

It turns out free stuff goes over awfully well.

When Books Become Trash

At this event, we had a section for books needing new homes. I didn’t recognize most of the titles there, the bulk of which were romances. But three stood out to me:

1. Twilight
2. A hardcover thesaurus
3. A Word 97 user manual

#1 was gone even before the event officially started, snagged by a woman who looked to be in her mid-20s. She had already read the book but didn’t own a copy. Just as I was opening my mouth to sing the praises of The Hunger Games and Graceling, she scurried off with the bane of good writing and modern womanhood clutched to her chest. Damn.

#2 and #3 didn’t find new homes, so they got boxed up with all the other leftovers and taken to the Island of Misfit Books, aka Goodwill. I don’t have high hopes for the Word 97 manual, poor thing. The thesaurus may find a new home if it’s lucky.

What’s a Green Book Lover to Do?

Many unwanted books just sit on a shelf somewhere, not getting used or read or picked up for months, even years. That depresses the heck out of me. It’s one reason that I love sites like PaperBackSwap because the book you no longer want will end up in the hands of someone who does want that specific title.

But what of the old user manuals and thesauri? Is there any way to prolong their usefulness before chucking them into the recycle bin?

Your Turn

What do you do with misfit books?

And while you ponder that, I’m going to get started on the Biggest Review Backlog Ever. I hope the Earth will be okay with one less Sustainability Specialist for a while.

p.s. The Great Unsung YA 2010 Giveaway has ended, but in the craziness of Earth Week I didn’t pick the winners on Monday night. I will this weekend!

Photo by SpecialKRB.

A few weeks ago, more than 75 bloggers posted their Unsung YA Heroes picks—unsung books we love and think deserve more attention from the world of YA readers.

It was so much fun that we’ll make the Week of the Unsung an annual event, each day focusing on a different genre. But there was just no way I could wait another year.

So in the meantime, I’m giving away copies of 10 of the top 12 most obscure picks from Unsung YA 2010. These books haven’t been made into movies, and they haven’t sold millions of copies. But what they lack in hype, they make up for in awesomeness.

A big thank you to all the authors and publishers who made this giveaway possible!

The Books to Win!

1. A Is For Angst by Barbara Haworth-Attard (also published as My Life from Air-Bras to Zits)
   Picked By: Erin Explores YA
2. Border Crossing by Jessica Lee Anderson
   Picked By: The Hate-Mongering Tart
3. The Death-Defying Pepper Roux by Geraldine McCaughrean
   Picked By: Gaskella
4. Gamma Glamma by Kim Flores
   Picked By: Archimedes Forgets, Biblio File
5. The Puzzle Ring by Kate Forsyth
   Picked By: Beyond Books
6. The Secrets of the Cheese Syndicate by Donna St. Cyr
   Picked By: The Hate-Mongering Tart
7. The Thirteen Curses by Michelle Harrison
   Picked By: Beyond Books
8. Trudy by Jessica Lee Anderson
   Picked By: The Hate-Mongering Tart
9. Unsigned Hype by Booker T. Mattison
   Picked By: Semicolon
10. Year of the Horse by Justin Allen
    Picked By: Arch Thinking

How to Enter

1. Fill out the Google form below by Monday, April 12, at 11:59 pm CST. Leaving a comment on this post does not enter you in the giveaway.
2. You can earn up to 5 entries per person:
   • Make a Promise (+1 entry)—Pledge to read one unsung YA book in 2010, and tell me the title. See the full list here or links to each blogger’s list here.
   • Link Back (+2 entries)—From a post on your blog, link back to this giveaway and mention what Unsung YA Heroes is. Feel free to also link to the wrap-up post.
   • Tweet (+2 entries)—Tweet about this giveaway.
3. Pick the top 3 titles you’d like to win. Wherever possible, I will honor the winners’ preferences.

U.S. and Canada entries only, please.

But Wait…There’s More!

This won’t be the only Unsung YA giveaway! I’ll update this post to link to other giveaways as they’re announced. If you posted an Unsung YA list (or even if you didn’t!), please join in with your own giveaway. It can be as easy as giving away a copy of an Unsung YA title you already have lying around the house. Then just drop me a line with the link to your giveaway post so I can list your giveaway here.

Below, I list the Unsung YA 2010 titles offered up in each giveaway, but giveaways marked with +++ at the end of the titles list are also giving away additional titles. Bonus!

• The Bibliophilic Book Blog—Ballad and Lament by Maggie Stiefvater +++
  Deadline: April 15
• Bites—Fade to Blue by Sean Beaudoin, Jessica’s Guide to Dating on the Dark Side by Beth Fantaskey +++
  Deadline: April 6
• Bloody Bookaholic—Another Faust by Daniel and Dina Nayeri, Ash by Malinda Lo, Give Up the Ghost by Megan Crewe +++
  Deadline: April 18
• Everything To Do With Books—The Dust of 100 Dogs by A.S. King
  Deadline: March 30
• I Heart Monster—The Faerie Path by Frewin Jones (part of the First in a Series Six-Pack giveaway), Silver Phoenix by Cindy Pon +++
  Deadline: April 15
• in which a girl reads—Willow by Julia Hoban +++
  Deadline: April 17
• Karin’s Book Nook—City of Bones by Cassandra Clare +++
  Deadline: March 27
• Not Enough Bookshelves—Jellicoe Road and Saving Francesca by Melina Marchetta +++
  Deadline: March 28
• Presenting Lenore—Genesis by Bernard Beckett +++
  Deadline: March 31
• Read Into This!—After by Amy Efaw, Perfect You by Elizabeth Scott +++
  Deadline: April 15
• Steph Su Reads—Audrey, Wait! by Robin Benway, Good Girls by Laura Ruby
  Deadline: March 19
• This Purple Crayon—Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan, The Singer of All Songs by Kate Constable, What My Mother Doesn’t Know by Sonya Sones
  Deadline: April 12
• T.V. and Book Addict—Absolutely Maybe by Lisa Yee, Thanksgiving at the Inn by Tim Whitney +++
  Deadline: April 1
• Wastepaper Prose—Ballad by Maggie Stiefvater +++
  Deadline: April 10
• wicked walker—Cracked Up to Be by Courtney Summers, Numbers by Rachel Ward, Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow by Jessica Day George +++
  Deadline: April 16

About two weeks ago, I got this cold, maybe flu, thing. Runny nose, fever, aches all over.

Just as I started to feel better, the fluey bits decided they wouldn’t be content to use my body as their own personal disco club and leave it crumpled on the floor like a dirty tissue. Oh, no. They had to leave behind a sinus infection.

But full disclosure: I don’t really know what I’m talking about because…

1. I’m delirious from a fever that’s lasted two weeks.

2. I haven’t seen a doctor yet. (I do that as a last resort, which is obviously well past now. But it didn’t hit me until Friday night during a dinner that I could not force myself to eat, when I blubbered to my husband that I shouldn’t have waited so long, and the blubbering just made me more congested. So I go on Monday.)

I’ve never been this sick for this long. So sick I’m not even interested in reading from my sick bed.

What I really want to be doing is posting about the Unsung YA giveaway I have all ready to go, but this is about the most I can bring myself to craft out of thin air. The sooner I get better, the sooner you get your fabulous giveaway.

Your Turn

What’s your favorite trick for getting over a cold/flu/sinus infection?

Or howzabout some tips for thanking a spouse who’s been taking care of the house plus a two-year-old all by his lonesome?

(Here endeth the whine.)

Photo by jamelah.

I want one web site where I can go to:

1. Look up a book title and see all ratings and reviews combined into one list. Example: See how Google Books combines reviews from Amazon, Goodreads, and a couple other sites. But I want them all—LibraryThing, Shelfari, Powell’s, IndieBound. Everything in one place, but with duplicate ratings/reviews from one user across multiple sites culled to just one entry from that user.
2. Enter my rating and review for a title in one place and have it automatically pushed to all the sites of my choice. Currently, I manually post my ratings and reviews on this blog, on LibraryThing, and on Goodreads. The gating factor is my time, so I haven’t been posting reviews to other sites like Amazon and Powell’s, even though I would like to.
3. Get recommendations for books I will probably love, based on the ratings of other users with similar taste as mine. LibraryThing’s recommendations are okay, but Goodreads seems closer to achieving this with their Compare Books feature because you can find users with similar taste based on ratings of the same books. But Goodreads is missing the step of then extrapolating a list from all similar users of recommendations for titles you might like.

Is This Too Much to Ask?

It looks like Google is continuing to add new features to Google Books, as recently as January. And they’ve already tackled the first item on my wish list in their Google Maps interface, such as how they aggregate restaurant reviews into one place. Could they be the first to cross the finish line on that feature?

Your Turn

Have you seen any of these features on my wish list? Tell me and make my day!

Would you be interested in using these features? Or do you have other features on your own wish list?

Photo by Spatch.