A comic book store in Nova Scotia is holding their first Ladies Night tomorrow; only women will be allowed in, only women will be working in the store, and a few local female cartoonists will come in to talk about their work. On the one hand, I like the idea of this, cause I know how intimidating it can be for girls to walk into a comic book store the first time. On the other hand… I wish we didn’t need things like Ladies Night to make it *not* intimidating.

To be honest, my first experiences with comic stores were pretty good. I never felt intimidated or scared to walk in, but I kind of have a feeling that was because the ones I visited in the Netherlands were aimed at a less geeky crowd. Those shops were full with the European comics and stuff like Donald Duck and Suske and Wiske, which are aimed at quite a young audience.

As a girl pursuing the more geeky pursuits though, there have been quite a few occasions where I can relate to being a bit intimidated by entering a new unknown place, be it a store, school, or networking event. The first thing that came to mind when hearing about the Ladies Night was my own experiences going to board game stores and fantasy stores. It happened so often that they were only filled with guys, all staring at me as if I was some weird alien creature that didn’t belong there… and then acting as if I couldn’t possibly know what I was talking about because I was a girl.

Same goes with studying computer science at university, being 1 of 5 girls and 90 guys. There’s one encounter that still riles me up, and I wish I had said something at the time. I had just completed an assignment, one that a lot of people was struggling with and had it signed off by the student assistant. I was pretty chuffed with myself, being one of the first people to have finished it. Moments later that was ruined by the student assistant telling another (male) student: “if she can do it, you certainly can”. Most of it wasn’t that bad, especially cause I proved pretty quickly that I was smart and belonged there (but again: why did I have to prove I belonged there?).

What annoys me though is that stuff like that still happens. Since moving to London, I’ve visited the Forbidden Planet tons of times. I love the place, it’s filled with wonderful geeky delights, and if I could I’d buy everything that caught my eye. And yet… almost every single time I go there by myself I get hit on. Okay, I kind of get that (geek store, geeky girl, chances of possible perfect match increases). But half of the time they open with something along the lines of whether I “needed help in finding a present” or something else that completely neglects the fact that I might be there for myself. The thing is it almost always happens when I’m browsing the comics. If I’m at any other part of the store (like the fantasy/scifi books section or the manga section) that type of stuff doesn’t happen. It’s as if most geeks have accepted that girls are into geeky things, like fantasy and manga, but comics… then it’s suddenly “you don’t belong here”.

Seriously, guys? Why assume straightaway that a girl doesn’t belong there? I thought that by now it should be obvious for guy geeks that the geek girl does exist, but it’s moments like I’ve described above that some guys are completely oblivious to that fact. And it’s those guys that are making it difficult for new geeky girls to feel comfortable with being a geek and going to places like comic stores. I know there are tons of guys out there who do understand and don’t make stupid remarks like those above to girls, but it’s that small oblivious group that do that mess it up for everyone.

So to wrap things up: yeah, I like the idea of the Ladies Night. It’s a great way to get those girls involved who never dared stepping into a comic book store filled with mainly guys. But the mentality of some of the guy geeks out there has to change; they have to realize that girls can be into comics (and whatever other geeky pursuits), and that they have a right to be at comic stores without being stared at as some weird seven-legged two-headed panda. Until then, things like Ladies Night will have to be around to get girls who get intimidated, along to comic stores.

I’ve never really gotten the whole Moleskin thing. I mean, I love notebooks and own tons of them, but I’ve never seen the appeal of specifically the Moleskin notebooks. They don’t seem any more special than any other notebook, right?

Well, this line of Moleskins might just convince me to finally get one. They came out last year October some time, but somehow I managed to miss them. The Passion Moleskin collection is specially designed for your life passions; so far, there are six different categories: Book, Film, Music, Recipes, Wine and Wellness. Each journal has dedicated pages for the different passions. For example, Recipes has 6 separate sections for appetizers, first courses, main dishes, side dishes, desserts, cocktails, while Film has alphabetically organized sections to fill in.

I do like the idea of these, but I still would really want to see these in real life before getting one. Especially the Film and the Book ones seem appropriate for me, but I wonder how the pages exactly look like and how they’ve been labeled.

Each of the journals are available on the Moleskin website for £15.99.

I love love love this! This was posted ages ago on Boing Boing and various other sites, but it’s worth a repeat for those of you who mightn’t have seen it. It would fit perfectly in my sitting room:

Designed by Marcos Breder.

Another book of which I haven’t even read it’s predecessor yet (The Shadow Queen), but which I’m already coveting:

Shalador’s Lady is the fifth stand-alone book after Anne Bishop’s Black Jewel’s trilogy. It will be released in March 2010.

I’ve blogged about one of these type of bookcases before, and I still love the idea of a bit of personal space within the shelves where you can curl up and read you book. Also, loving the little coffee mug shelf!

Via The Blog on the Bookshelf

I was sent a review copy of this book a couple of weeks ago (hmm, actually it might have been months ago, now I think about it), and I’ve only now finally had the chance to write my review about it. I had never came across Lenore before, but when hearing it was like an “unholy union between Tim Burton and Dr Seuss” I just knew I had to try it.

Lenore: Noogies is the first volume of Roman Dirge’s Lenore the Cute Little Dead series. It’s a collection of 1-3 page mini stories, starring Lenore, a 10 year old dead girl who lives in a mansion with her creepy friends. The stories are delightfully dark and twisted, with a weird dark humour. A part of me knows some of the jokes are just gruesome, but I can’t help but find it funny.

Some of the comics are twists on known stories like children’s songs, games, and nursery rhymes, turning them into something more macabre, like the Raven and the Crooked Man. Other stories just have unexpected dark endings, like Little Bunny Foo Foo. Here’s an example:

It’s a great book for those of you that are dark and twisty. It’s not everybody’s type of humour, but if you liked the above example, this might be something for you.

Lenore: Noogies is available on Amazon.co.uk for £7.75.

I got my first Secret Santa present a couple of days ago for one of the Book Bloggers Secret Santas I’m participating in:

The Lion of Ireland from Morgan Llywelyn! Thank you, Secret Santa. I have no idea who sent this to me, but I know I’m going to like it. I can’t wait to find out what my Secret Santa person thinks of what they’ll receive.

From the designer’s website:

The strings of the book-harp are a play of light and statics, three-dimensional picture and bookend, transparent and complete simultaneously. Depending on the angle of the literary instrument it seems once closed, sometimes translucent – and turns to life upon passing. It captures the passer-by at the corner of his eye and draws attention to itself, the variegated content, or out into the sky.

I do like the look of this, would love to have a flat with something like this built in:

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danieleski – $13.57 on Amazon.com, £16.49 on Amazon.co.uk, £16.48 on Book Depository

I got my brother this book last year and it’s pretty amazing. I still have to read it, but my brother was addicted to it the moment he laid eyes on it.

Here’s the description from Amazon:

Johnny Truant, a wild and troubled sometime employee in a LA tattoo parlour, finds a notebook kept by Zampano, a reclusive old man found dead in a cluttered apartment. Herein is the heavily annotated story of the Navidson Report. Will Navidson, a photojournalist, and his family move into a new house. What happens next is recorded on videotapes and in interviews. Now the Navidsons are household names. Zampano, writing on loose sheets, stained napkins, crammed notebooks, has compiled what must be the definitive work on the events on Ash Tree Lane. But Johnny Truant has never heard of the Navidson Record. Nor has anyone else he knows. And the more he reads about Will Navidson’s house, the more frightened he becomes.

From what I understand it’s a story within a story. You get to read Johnny’s experiences as he tries to uncover what happened, yet at the same time you’re reading the actual Navidson Report that Johnny is reading.

Besides that though the book is full of interesting elements to make the reading experience unique. For starters, the words in the book are arranged to echo the feeling of the what is written. When characters are navigating a claustrophobic maze-like sections of the house’s interior, the text is dense, confusingly packed into small corners of each page. Later, when a character is running desperately from something, there are only a few words on each page for almost 25 pages, causing the reader to flip quickly through the pages to frantically figure out what happened next.

Another example is the font choices. Each narrative of each separate person has a different font, with the main character in Courier, another in Times, and two others in Bookman and Dante. Also the colour of certain words are changed, although this depends on which version of the book you have (there are 4 versions: black/white, blue, red, and full colour).

What intrigued me the most though was that there are also secret hidden messages in the book. Stuff like taking the first letters from sentences to form a secret message. I still haven’t read it myself, so I have no idea how much of these codes are in there, but I love the idea behind it.

If you’re looking for something unique to give at Christmas, this is a great book. It’s perfect for the person who likes complex stories and figuring out things. Also: cool for the designer in your life, or anyone who likes typography.

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danieleski – $13.57 on Amazon.com, £16.49 on Amazon.co.uk, £16.48 on Book Depository

Sometimes it’s weird how some memories can just stick by you. I exactly remember when I picked up this book for the first time. It was during my second visit to London and I was browsing the books in the basement at Murder One. In the secondhand section I came across the second part of this series, and was annoyed to find out it was a second part. No way I was going to buy a second part first! Of course, some moments later I found the first one too, and I bought both books.

The Banned and The Banished series is one of those series that not many people have read. And it’s a shame cause it’s one my favourites. It’s being offered for free at the moment on Suvudu as a pdf, so it’s a great chance to check it out and see if you like it. Here’s the description:

On a fateful night five centuries ago, three mages made a desperate last stand, sacrificing everything to preserve the only hope of goodness in the beautiful, doomed land of Alasea. Now, on the anniversary of that ominous night, a girl-child ripens into the heritage of lost power. But before she can even comprehend her terrible new gift, the Dark Lord dispatches his winged monsters to capture her and bring him the embryonic magic she embodies.

Fleeing the minions of darkness, Elena is swept toward certain doom—and into the company of unexpected allies. There she forms a band of the hunted and the cursed, the outcasts and the outlaws, to battle the unstoppable forces of evil and rescue a once-glorious empire…

Elena the main character has a form of blood magic, unlike any I’ve seen in other books. Besides that there are a slew of other characters each with their own element of power; you have the wood nymph, the wind elf, etc. It seems pretty standard at first, but you slowly discover how much story and world building has gone into this. As the story progresses, the relationships and background stories get more and more complex, which I loved.

I enjoyed the first and the second books, but it’s the third one that completely got me hooked. Before that it was just one of the many enjoyable books I read. With the third one it became addictive to read. I read that one in almost one sitting, only stopping for food and sleep. And then I had to wait half a year for the fourth book… and had the same experience. Same with the final fifth book.

Of some writers I love the books as long as the series continues, but the moment it ends I’m frustrated with the conclusion. Not with The Banned and the Banished. It’s one of the most satisfying fantasy series I’ve read, where the world building, cliffhangers and mysteries don’t disappoint.

I hope I haven’t hyped up this book too much, but it really is one of my favourite series. Check it out on Suvudu.