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Congrats to Sara V, who won Hot Hands (College Fun and Gays #1) and Grade-A-Sex Deal (College Fun and Gays #2) by Erica Pike!

Congrats to Darcy, who won Lesson Learned by Lillian Francis!

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Contests

• Joyfully Jay’s giving away The Amethyst Cat Caper by Charlie Cochet. Contest closes March 13, 11:59 pm EDT.

• Blodeuedd’s giving away a copy of Black Howl by Christina Henry. Contest closes March 15. US only.

• SE Culpepper is giving away three signed copies of Question Mark (Liaisons #2). Contest closes 10 pm CDT, March 15.

Bookity

• New releases and more: Literary Escapism (UF/PNR), AAR (romances), the Book Binge (romances), and Tor.com (PNR).

• Authors have started a petition asking PayPal to stop censoring legal fiction and author’s free speech. The National Coalition Against Censorship and the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression are planning to put pressure on PayPal, too.

• VacuousMinx on why she’s boycotting Dreamspinner Press.

• Book linkity from ReadReactReview. M/m romance, publishing, and writing linkity from Becky Black.

• The DABWAHA is almost here! Fill out your brackets March 11 through 13, then start voting on March 14.

• Bookwyrm Knits has information on a reading challenge for Kelley Armstrong’s Women of the Otherworld series.

• Tank bookmobile.

• Turn an old book into a jewelry box. (via CRAFT)

• How fast do you read? (Thanks, Jase!) I only got 533 words/minute – I think I’d do a lot better on a test using a contemporary example. 🙂

• Lifehacker has some tips for getting in more reading time for those who don’t have enough time to read.

• Smart Bitches takes a look at some “WTFTROUBLE” level romance book covers. (NSFW! But really funny!)

• Better book titles…

• Don’t wait until the last minute to check out your books at the library…

• Eden Winters shares a day in the life of her swag from GayRomLit.

Ebookity

• The US Department of Justice plans to investigate Apple and the Agency pricing publishers for ebook price fixing. Apple comments on the allegations.

• “Trick Question: When is the top selling ebook in the Kindle Store not the top selling ebook?”

• Random House raises library ebook prices. A lot.

• A Harris Poll found that almost 30% of US adults are using ebook readers.

• 10 reasons ebook reading isn’t perfect. (via Consumerist)

• Tablet sales seem to be affecting sales of ereaders and PCs.

• Unsurprisingly, tablets offer more distractions from reading than do ereaders.

• Dear Author’s favorite non-reading Android applications.

• How to make reading on a computer less unpleasant.

• How to deal with Adobe DRM.

Think, Do, Make, Learn

• Daylight Saving Time starts this weekend in the US and Canada. Beware – it could be deadly!

• One side effect of the mild winter is that maple syrup will probably be more expensive.

• The infamous Anoka-Hennepin School District has settled lawsuits brought against it by students who were bullied.

• Recent college graduates are making 8-11% less than they did a decade ago.

• Female people, if you’ve always wondered what kind of vibrator you should get, now there’s a handy flowchart to help you decide. (via The Mary Sue) (NSFW)

• The Oreo is a century old! And… there have been 500 billion Oreos sold during that century.

• Why walking is the best exercise.

• All sorts of things you can do to improve your online privacy.

• A staple remover might make adding keys to your key ring less frustrating.

• Build your own self-regulating automatic plant watering system.

• Add a usb drive to your Swiss Army knife.

• Make a marble run on your fridge! (via CRAFT)

Cookity

• Double LEGO cupcakes. (via CRAFT)

• Red velvet cupcakes with cheesecake and streusel topping. (via The Kitchn)

• Make your own chocolate syrup.

• Ricotta salata citronette salad dressing.

• Roasted chickpea fajitas. (via The Kitchn)

• Almond-cranbery quinoa breakfast cookies (not gluten-free, alas). (via The Kitchn)

• Lentil sliders. (via The Kitchn)

• 10 vegan breakfasts

• 10 make-ahead breakfasts

• 6 savory pancakes

• “Healthy eating for people who hate cooking.”

Gluten-Free

• 2012 Best of Gluten-Free winners: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5.

• How to transition to a gluten-free life.

Crafty

• Large Hadron Collider quilts.

• Amazing knitted Olympic athlete scarf. (via Cabled Sheep)

• Needle-felted Lorax. (via CRAFT)

• Knitted zippered hand warmers. (via CRAFT)

• Night biking gloves with integrated LED arrows. (via CRAFT)

• Crocheted Matthew McConaughey. (NSFW? for crocheted tush)

Cool

• Tiny flying robots playing the James Bond theme… (Thanks, Donna!)

• Evolution depicted via crayon animation.

• A LEGO minifig is one LEGO executive’s business “card”. (via The Mary Sue)

• LEGO Tank Girl! (via The Mary Sue)

• LEGO space shuttle launch.

• Huge Hogwarts model.

• Art from the “Star Wars Identities” exhibit.

• Victorian Star Trek. (via The Mary Sue)

• Dr. Who vs Sherlock Holmes.

• TARDIS in a bottle.

• Mashup: Toy Story and The Shining.

• Lorax Chucks.

• Paper sculptures.

• Minneapolis cake!

• How clever is the Butter Saver?! Definitely ordering some as gifts and for myself.

Cool or Wha…?

• Hammock tent.

• United States of Cast Iron.

• Bird’s nest bed.

Wha…?

• “Pink slime” is in 70% of supermarket ground beef in the US?!

• You’re getting really scary over there, Wisconsin – now a bill has been proposed to make single parenting child abuse. Plus more on the bill that repealed equal pay for equal work.

• Las Vegas growth, 1973-2011.

• Beef straws.

• Creepy wedding cake topper.

• I got nothin’… Still nothin’…

LOL

• Stephen Colbert on contraception.

• xkcd on tumblr and on those cryptic computer error codes. (Make sure you hover your mouse pointer over the comics for additional text.)

• 15 funniest autocorrects from February.

• Ouch!

• It looks like an exceptional blanket fort, doesn’t it? So colorful inside!

• This is me when you ask to use my computer.

• Maybe Mordor for your next vacation?

• Wil Wheaton’s comment on an, um, interesting book about Wesley Crusher. (NSFW!!! NSFW!!!!) (via The Mary Sue)

• Hmm. Good point about exercise. 😉

• How a dog’s brain works.

• When your cat won’t stop meowing…

• How many cats will it take to ease your broken heart?

• Naughty black kitty!

• BatCat!

Teh Cute

• Kitten! Bald eagle and baby! Otters! Baby otters! Hippo and baby! Baby ferret! Tiger and babies! Tiger and babies! Baby clouded leopard! Baby tiger! Tigers! Tigers! Leopard and baby! Baby leopards! Baby skunk! Lioness and baby! Lioness and baby! Dog and bunny! Kitten! Kitten!

Reading Update
Heart in Hand by salifiable. free online. Very good m/m romance about two hockey players on rival teams who become friends – and more – through an unusual turn of events. I got sniffly more than once while I was reading this one. What didn’t work so well for me were all the hockey details in the last third of the book, which got to be a bit much. (Note that this is, as Kate puts it, set in an alternate universe and features two real-life NHL players.)
Private Eye (Liaisons #1) by SE Culpepper. ebook. reread. Very good m/m romantic suspense about a PI who gets involved in the case of a missing teenager when he’s contacted by a cop who’s a friend of the family. Too bad the extremely hot cop is straight… I’m looking forward to the sequel and wondering how SE’s going to get me invested in Mark.
Waking Up Naked (Sex Sells #2) by Kim Dare. ebook. Very good kinky m/m romance about a guy who wakes up naked and hungover in a strange bed with no idea how he got there. And when he eventually does figure out where he is, things don’t go so well…
Songs You Know by Heart by Dr. Noh. free online. Good short m/m romance about a wealthy jerk of a businessman with a taste for rough sex who offers to blow the straight guy who mugs him in the park, never expecting to see him again…
Technicoloured Something by Zebbie. free online. Good m/m romance about a prickly gay architecture student who’s in a wheelchair. He’s not happy that his partner for a major class project seems to be bicurious and hitting on him.
Second Wind by Mickey S. free online. Good m/m romance about a widower with a young son and a conservative family who becomes friends with a gay man and finally acknowledges the feelings he’s always had for men. It doesn’t go over so well with his family… This story suffered from excessive name use during conversation and could definitely have been shorter, but it was sweet anyway.
Here Comes the Corpse (Tom & Scott #9) by Mark Richard Zubro. Good gay mystery which starts with Tom and Scott’s getting married. Too bad Tom finds a body in the bathroom at the reception.
File Under Murder (Tom & Scott #10) by Mark Richard Zubro. Ok gay mystery in which Tom finds a severed head in a file drawer at the clinic for gay teens where he volunteers. This one was kind of dull, and Scott was nearly absent from the story.
Everyone’s Dead But Us (Tom & Scott #11) by Mark Richard Zubro. Ok gay mystery in which Tom and Scott vacation at an island resort and bodies start turning up everywhere. This was beyond silly, actually. And what the heck is up with the book blurb, which says that, “Tom Mason, former Chicago area high school teacher, recently made a public splash by marrying his long-term lover, former professional baseball player Scott Carpenter.” The problem is that, as far as I remember, neither of them has retired from their professions. Their wedding a few books back was timed after the end of the baseball season. The next book is set at the school where Tom teaches, and it sure sounds like he’s still teaching. The blurb on GRs matches the blurb on the dust jacket.

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“Oh oh… what was that scary noise?!” -Mayhem