Golden Books

There are the great childhood books called the Golden books and at the left is a link where you can buy some of them.  Then there are the ones that were suggested that never made it.  Here are those titles:

You Are Different and That's Bad

The Boy Who Died From Eating All His Vegetables

Dad's New Wife Robert

Fun Four-Letter Words to Know and Share

Hammers, Screwdrivers and Scissors: An I-Can-Do-It-Myself Book

The Kids' Guide to Hitchhiking

Kathy Was So Bad Her Mom Stopped Loving Her

Curious George and the High-Voltage Fence

All Cats Go to Hell

The Little Sissy Who Snitched

Some Kittens Can Fly

That's it, I'm Putting You Up for Adoption

Grandpa Gets a Casket

The Magic World Inside the Abandoned Refrigerator

Garfield Gets Feline Leukemia

The Pop-Up Book of Human Anatomy

Strangers Have the Best Candy

Whining, Kicking and Crying to Get Your Way

You Were an Accident

Things Rich Kids Have, But You Never Will

Pop! Goes The Hamster...And Other Great Microwave Games

The Man in the Moon Is Actually Satan

Your Nightmares Are Real

Where Would You Like to Be Buried?

Eggs, Toilet Paper, and Your School

Why Can't Mr. Fork and Ms. Electrical Outlet Be Friends?

Places Where Mommy and Daddy Hide Neat Things

Daddy Drinks Because You Cry

Mommy's Pills Taste Just Like Candy

Learn How To Fly With Just a Ladder and a Pillowcase

Mark Twain Best Seller - Copyrighted?

From this link we hear -



Mark Twain's autobiography, to be officially published for the first time 100 years after his death is already looking like it's going to be a best seller. The book comes out on November 15th, but it's already near the top of the bestseller lists on both Amazon and Barnes & Noble thanks to pre-orders. If you weren't aware, Twain (real name Samuel Clemens), wrote this autobiography towards the end of his life, but demanded that it not be published until 100 years after his death (some of it, he demanded be withheld for 500 years). Allegedly, he did this so that he could say what he wanted without worrying about the people he spoke ill of ever finding out.  And while it's sure to be a hit, the folks putting out the book are claiming a brand spanking new copyright on the work:

Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 1 Copyright© 2010, 2001 by the Mark Twain Foundation. All Rights Reserved. Transcription, reconstruction, and creation of the texts, introduction, notes, and appendixes Copyright© 2010 by The Regents of the University of California. The Mark Twain Foundation expressly reserves to itself, its successors and assigns, all dramatization rights in every medium, including without limitation, stage, radio, television, motion picture, and public reading rights, in and to the Autobiography of Mark Twain and all other texts by Mark Twain in copyright to the Mark Twain Foundation.

I was thinking about this for a bit, and I'm pretty sure the Foundation is (mostly) wrong. According to the handy-dandy copyright term and public domain chart for the US, unpublished works from authors who died before 1940 are in the public domain. That would indicate that most of the work should be in the public domain. Separately, even if we look at the chart for published works, a work published in 2010 is supposed to be granted copyright for 70 years after the death of the author. We're 100 years after the death of the author -- so, again, it should be public domain
 
I still plan on reading it.

Books I have read in the past couple of weeks

Fly Boys - James Bradley
Bradley is the author of Flags of Our Fathers which he wrote after learning his father was one of the original erectors of the flag on Iwo Jima.











The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo - Steig Laarson.  This is an entertaining novel that took a bit to get into but was well worth it.













The Professional - Robert Parker.  Another entertaining novel featuring Spenser, the PI from Boston.  This series was made into a series on TV a while back starring Robert Urich.  This was my airplane book on the flight back from San Francisco.










The Colonel - Patrick A. Davis.  Another novel in the thriller genre.  No redeeming moral qualities, just idle entertainment.

Recent reading (in the past two weeks)

Everything I Want To Do is Illegal by Joel Salatin 

Excellent reading for anyone who is interested in sustainable agriculture, our food supply, and fighting the bureaucracy.










Epitaph For A Peach by David M. Masamoto

A delightful read about one year in the life of a peach farmer as he tries to save an heirloom peach.











Founding Father - The Story of Joseph P. Kennedy by Richard Whalen

 An interesting biography of a complex man.  I learned a lot about him.











Intellectuals and Society by Thomas Sowell

This is an indictment of the intelligentsia in this country and the rest of the Western world.