A book is a book, and what do you do with a book? Read it of course. There are obviously different types of books – those that are informational and those that are fictional or non. However, if you’re looking for a summer read that is going to offer you something different from the ordinary, then I have some unique options for you!

Everyone is familiar with the traditional “book report” assignment. However, a Los Angeles-based organization has recently put a new spin on this old classic through “The Art Book Review.” Instead of reading traditional books that require a basic synopsis, this organization provides willing writers with a contemporary art book. The writers then write a review of the art within the book, and post their reviews on their “webzine”. So, if you have an interest in art and want to see what the reviewers have to say then I highly recommend this site. Even better, if you’re interested in becoming a reviewer, contact “The Art Book Review” so others can read your perspective!

My next suggestion isn’t too out of the ordinary, as the list I am about to suggest consists of “traditional” books. However, it is the content within the books that makes them so different, as well as hilarious. There really is a book out there for everything, and I mean everything!  This list of “11 Weird Books That Really Exist” offers a variety of books that range in topic from dating advice, to becoming a top-paying perogi maker. So, if you’re looking for a good laugh, or just a book that almost no-one else will have on their summer reading list, I highly recommend checking out this list – or making up your own!

Summer allows you the time to sit back and read for pleasure. However, that can get old after making it through a few books. If you’re looking to spice up your summer reading list check out some of these sites, and let us know what kind of unique books you’re reading this summer!

There’s something to be said about a good book. Finding a book that captivates your attention to the extent that you want to ignore all other obligations so that you can continue reading is one of the greatest feelings in the world. With summer rapidly approaching, now is the perfect time to start getting together a good “book list”. To help you capitalize on your down time with some great books, I’ve compiled a list including a few of my favorites that are great reads when laying  on the beach, by the pool, or just in your bed at night!

Bossypants by Tina Fey:  I absolutely love Tina Fey. I loved her on Saturday Night Live, and Mean Girls was hands down one of my favorite movies while in high school. Therefore, when her autobiography Bossypants came out, I knew I had to read it. As to be expected, Fey is able to hilariously tell the story of her childhood, her time spent on Saturday Night Live, and the creation of the popular tv series, 30 Rock.  Even if you aren’t very familiar with who Tina Fey is, I highly recommend this book if you’re looking for a light read that will keep you laughing throughout.

The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein: Just as the back cover of this book says, this is the happiest sad book that I have ever read. The book is told from the perspective of Enzo, a dog who has lived a full life and who believes in the Mongolian legend that if he is prepared for death, he will be reincarnated as a human. Enzo is a loyal companion to his race car driver owner, Denny, and shares his observations of human life as he sees Denny experience marriage, parenthood, and death. Reading a book written from such a unique perspective is eye-opening and moving, and I highly encourage this book.

The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf: This is Gudenkauf’s first novel, and my only wish is that I could erase my memory so that I could read this book over and over again. I read it on a long plane ride and couldn’t put it down for one second. It’s a mystery thriller about two seven year old girls, Calli and Petra, who go missing one night. Calli is a selective mute who hasn’t spoken in three years, and Petra is Calli’s closest friend - who often serves as Calli’s voice. To find out exactly what has happened to their children, the families of these two girls must face some of their darkest secrets to reveal what possibly could have happened that night. The storyline of this book will captivate your attention, and leave you begging for more with the turn of each page.

The Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins: I actually wound up watching the movie before reading the first Hunger Games book, but I cannot say enough good things about this series. You won’t be able to put these books down! The entire series includes The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay. The storyline takes place in the distant future, in which the nation of Panem is divided into twelve poor districts that are ruled by the wealthy Capitol. As punishment for a prior rebellion against the Capitol in which all districts were defeated, the Capitol hosts the annual “Hunger Games” in which one boy and one girl, between ages 12 and 18, are randomly selected to participate. Everyone in the nation watches the televised game, and the “tributes” are forced to fight to the death. The trilogy follows the life of Katniss Everdeen, her experience as a tribute in the Hunger Games, and the symbol she becomes for the district members of the nation of Panem. Even if you’ve already seen the movie, I highly encourage you to pick up The Hunger Games series, and get to reading!

I hope you enjoy these books as much as I did, and if you’re interested in purchasing any of them they are all available on the biggerbooks website. Leave comments sharing some of your favorite books, and let us know where you’ll be doing most of your reading this summer!

     Who’d have ever thought that when the internet swept the world, the digital revolution would follow on its heels. Overnight, digital technology grew by leaps and bounds and everything changed. Suddenly, the face of movies and music changed with the ability to transmit over the internet. Great bastions of entertainment started finding that they were now dinosaurs in the digital world of bytes and bits. You could rent movies from a website and watch them on your computer screen immediately, no longer having to worry about returning a DVD to the right store before the time ended. The movie simply played and the disappeared from your hard drive. Music could be purchased as full “albums” or single songs.

     Then, the world of publishing fell into the sites, thanks to Amazon and other stores. The birth of the Kindle spawned a host of other devices – the Nook and the iPad, to name but a few – and the ebook revolution exploded with such a force that the traditional publishing world still hasn’t recovered from the backlash. Suddenly, you didn’t have to go out to the book store and you didn’t have to wait for delivery. The book store came to you and the digital copy transmitted to your device or your computer.

     The face of publishing changed. And it’s still changing. Where, before, a “self-published author” was once looked upon as a hack, a wannabe, a couldn’t-hack-it in the “real world”, there is now an “indie author” who has complete control over his or her product – from the writing and editing, to the cover art and marketing – and is far more accessible to the fan and reading public. So many traditionally published authors have gone indie thanks to the storefronts of Amazon, Kindle, Sony, etc who promote indie books.

     The hardest changes have been in that format – from physical book to digital ebook. If you thought the contest between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney got heated, you ain’t seen nothing yet. The two camps of traditional book readers and ebook readers is still debated in often insulting terms, neither side yielding to the possibility that both can co-exist in this modern world. Traditional book readers fight tooth and nail for those hard covers and paperbacks, claiming a terrible sterility in the ebook and craving the smell, touch, and feel of the physical copy. They can’t understand the draw of ebooks, can’t understand what “moron” would read one. They poo-poo indie authors still, fight hard for the old ways of publishing.

     But the ebook revolution will not die easily, if at all. Where independent films and music has found their niches and flourish, even winning Oscars and Grammys, so will ebooks. Even the indie published books. When it becomes so easy to carry one’s entire library in a device that fits neatly in the purse or briefcase, to purchase those books anywhere and not have to make the trip out of the comforts of home or wait for days to read them, that genie can’t be put back in the bottle. And now that textbooks have begun to follow suit, soon students will be coming to class with mighty ebook reader in hand instead of the backpacks loaded to the brim of books for classes. No more hunched backs for these students.

     As Timbuk 3 once noted, “The future’s so bright, I have to wear shades.” The ebook revolution can only get brighter. We should probably make sure the shades we’re wearing are prescription. 

Jesse V Coffey is the author of Salt of the Earth, The Brothers Cameron: An Opportunity for Resentment, and A Wager of Blood, all released as ebooks for all ebook devices. Her next release is set for December 2012, the historical fantasy The Savior. She can be reached at author@jessevcoffey.com.

A few weeks ago a friend of mine took me to an awesome place in Baltimore. It’s called The Book Thing of Baltimore (link to http://bookthing.org) and it’s a pretty magical place. Basically, they get book donations from anyone who is trying to get rid of books and then on Saturday’s and Sunday’s from 9-6 you can go peruse their selection (there are LOTS of books) and take however many books you want for free! Free books, guys…. they’re free! Going to The Book Thing of Baltimore made me start thinking of other awesome places that are generous with their books.

There’s actually a similar company in the UK called “Books for Free.” They started their store to attempt to prevent books from going to landfills. They say that as long as you don’t throw them away, you can take them.

I happened upon this picture (http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m7jkihsOI01qa2se0o1_500.jpg) on Tumblr and I thought it was pretty awesome. ReLitNY.org collects gently used books and then hands them out to people who need/want them once a month. I think this idea is particularly great for New York because with the limited amount of space they have they can just rotate their books in and out of the program and share with other people.

My all time favorite bookstore is one that I don’t even know the name and location of. (http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m24tq9iaRK1rnu5aoo1_500.jpg) This picture has circulated around the Internet for a while now and it is so inspiring to me. The fact that this store has books for sale but is offering to give them away for free is so…so precious! I adore generous people and I feel like when others a generous is inspires others and they can pass on the good vibes. Basically I just feel like we all need to be nicer to each other. Okay, okay, I’ll stop now.

What I also think we need more of is free books. Who’s with me!?

If you’re reading this blog I’m going to assume you’re probably an intense book nerd or my dad. For those of you who aren’t my dad, prepare yourselves because your bank account is about to suffer.

I love clothes, I love shopping, I love eating, and I love books. To be able to put any of those things together is like heaven for me. I have broken this down into lists of awesome book themed things and I hope you’re geeking out about it as much as I am!

Book Accessories:

An awesome site that sells book themed clothes is outofprintclothing.com! Here’s a Wizard of Oz themed example. (http://shop.outofprintclothing.com/The_Wizard_of_Oz_book_cover_raglan_pullover_p/l-1039.htm)

Out of print also has cute accessories likes this Gatsby phone case (http://shop.outofprintclothing.com/The_Great_Gatsby_iPhone_case_p/p-1001.htm) and if you can’t find the case you want on there, I’m sure Etsy.com will have the one you’re looking for because Etsy has everything.

Edible Book Things:

I found this on Pinterest and unfortunately there was no recipe, but don’t these Hunger Game cupcakes look delicious?! (http://media-cache-ec6.pinterest.com/upload/277956608221339895_RCTqx8SJ_c.jpg) I’m sure you can make whatever kind of cupcake tickles your fancy and then you can get creative with the decorations. If you make some book-ish pastries please send us your pictures!

For those of you 21 and above there is a Fred and George Weasley drink! (http://pinterest.com/pin/266979084130759992/) Fred and George are perfect so I’d assume their drink would be as well.

Random Stuff:

Do you ever sit down to relax and read a good book and people just keep coming up to talk to you? It’s the worst, right? You just want to tell them to go away! Well now you can do just that without being rude. But one of these books sleeves over book and I bet you’ll get a lot less interruptions. (http://pinterest.com/pin/54958057922843186/)

I’m not really an outdoorsy person, but I’d totally go camping if I had a tent like this. (http://pinterest.com/pin/54958057923292037/) I would be sleeping in a large book! I could never pass up that opportunity.

This is my favorite thing out of all the things. I’ll let the picture speak for itself. (http://pinterest.com/pin/54958057923378806/) I want everything in that picture set up exactly in that way. Then I would be completely content.

That’s all I have right now but I’m sure I’ll think of some other things and probably post them some other time! If you’re looking for some more book related things you should check out our Pinterest. Follow us at Pinterest.com/BiggerBooks.

I recently turned 20 and I’ve been feeling all nostalgic and weepy about the fact that I’m “growing up.” I heard about the book What I Know Now by Ellen Spragins through a friend and I adored the idea.

Basically the book is a compilation of letters that famous/successful women wrote to their younger selves at a complicated time in their lives. It was a really quick read because the letters aren’t long and I could blow through them in a few hours, but the length isn’t the awesome part. The awesome part is reading about how these awesomely influential and inspiring women once struggled with finding themselves too! I think about that all the time. I try to get all deep and I think to myself, “Who am I, where am I going in my life, what should I do in the future, how do I find myself, etc., etc.” Reading all of those letters assured me that I don’t need to know the answers to everything right now.

The book served its purpose. It inspired me and made me feel better about myself, so I encourage you to read it as well if you need a little advice and life assistance! 

Going back to school is pretty upsetting (to me at least) because I’m forced to do things like homework, speak in front of the class (the WORST), and learn in a way someone else thinks is best. That includes reading books that I wouldn’t normally choose for myself.

Sometimes I end up enjoying books that I’m forced to read in school, but a lot of the time I just read it because I’m obligated to and then I move on without looking back. I then read a book of my choosing because being forced to read something I didn’t want to read gets me in the mood to read ALL OF THE BOOKS that I like.  

Since I feel a lot of sympathy for you readers that are back at school I figured I would share my list of books that I always tend to go for when I am avoiding doing my actual schoolwork.

Some Classics: Classics are fabulous and there is no denying that. Most of the time when we’re required to read books in school they are classics, but quite a few resonated with my friends and me and became favorites. Some of those are Anna Karenina, Catcher in the Rye, The Great Gatsby, and Macbeth.

Summer-y Books: No matter what season we’re in, I always get the urge to read summer-y books. The urge is particularly strong in the beginning of the school year because although I’m longing for sweater weather and hot cups of tea, I desperately wish I was still summer so I could live life without the existence of school.

All-time Favorites: Harry Potter. Duh. Never gets old.

Guilty Pleasures: Normally I try to maintain the mindset that I don’t have any guilty pleasures because I don’t want to feel guilty about anything that brings me happiness, but then Fifty Shades of Grey came along. I am aware of its flaws, but no matter what anyone says about this book I will always read it when I need a mood boost.

I hope you enjoy my list/it gives you ideas! If you have any back to school favorites, feel free to share. 

At first I thought it was just me who adores quotations from books and respected authors, but after asking some friends I’ve realized that a lot of people share the same feelings. This got me thinking; what is it about books and authors that make these quotations mean more to us than if we heard them from someone in every day life?

When I was talking to friends about this they told me their thoughts. One said that when you come across a profound thought from a book you’re able to insert yourself into the life of the character and see how they can succeed. Those quotations can give us a way to live our lives because we can see how they work…they give us hope.

Another friend told me that they’re meaningful because when it’s written in a book or put into words by an author they’re immortalized forever. You can constantly go back to look at the quotation for reference whenever you need to.

Here are some of the quotations that are the favorites of my friends and myself:

“Happiness can be found in even the darkest of times if one only remembers to turn on the light.”—Harry Potter

“We accept the love we think we deserve.”—Perks of Being a Wallflower

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”—Dr. Suess

“Art and love are the same thing: It’s the process of seeing yourself in things that are not you. It’s understanding the unreasonable.” —Chuck Klostermam

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. “—Dr. Suess

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”—The Great Gatsby

“Your past is just a story and once you realize this it has no power over you.”—Invisible Monsters

“Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.”—Oscar Wilde

“When did the future switch from being a promise to being a threat?”—Invisible Monsters

“Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it.”—Henry David Thoreau

“There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.”—Friedrich Nietzsche

I obviously have plenty of quotations that I hold close to my heart and try to live my life by. Does anyone else have any favorites? Let us know in the comments section!

I recently came across an article published on BookRiot.com and I fell in love with everything about it. The article, which can be read here, contained a list of boys from books that are dreamy beyond belief and belong in an edition of Tiger Beat.

Some of the boys on this authors list include Augustus Waters (sa-woon), Ponyboy Curtis (obvs), and Tiny Cooper (adorable man in every way). After reading this list I was inspired to make my own! Here are a few men that I think deserve a spread in a teen magazine.

Charlie from The Perks of Being a Wallflower: He is adorable in every sense of the word. He’s so genuine and smart that you just can’t help but love him! I’d plaster my room with his poster any day.

Ron Weasley from Harry Potter: He’s loyal, he’s funny, he’s sweet, and best of all, he’s ginger.

Jay Gatsby from The Great Gatsby: Sure, he can be a little over the top, but you’ve got to give him credit for never giving up on his one true love.

Christian Grey from Fifty Shades of Grey: He’s one of those guys that gorgeous, troubled, and you just want to hug him and tell him everything will be okay. On top of that, he’s a sex god.

Conrad and Jeremiah from The Summer I Turned Pretty: They’re those high school boys that every girl dreams about. They’re gentlemanly, they have an adorable relationship with their mother, and they’re just. so. precious.

Any man from any Nicholas Sparks book: Cheesy, yes. Cliché, yes. But we all need a little bit of that from time to time.

Who do you guys think should be in a literary version of Tiger Beat and what makes boys from books so much better than boys in real life?! Let us know in the comments!

About a month ago I became a vegetarian. I have tried being a vegetarian before, for no particular reason, and it just didn’t stick. I would do well for about two weeks and then remember that bacon exists and I’d give up. It even became a joke in my family. When I informed my father that I’m a vegetarian again he asked if it was going to last until the weekend because he needed to know what to make my sister and me for dinner. This time it’s different, though, because this time I read Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer.

In this book Foer begins by explaining that he really began to look into the meat industry because he was expecting a child and he wanted to be able to not only feed him well, but also pass down good stories and beliefs to him.

Foer doesn’t try to sway the reader one-way or the other, he just presented the facts. The problem is that the facts are incredibly shocking. You’ll have to read the book to get the full affect, but it’s crazy…crazy enough to convince me to stop eating meat.

I would most definitely recommend this book to anyone who wants to be better informed about the food they’re fueling their bodies with. And the great part about it is that it doesn’t just focus on the food, it focuses on the stories and meanings behind it.