Leigh Brackett; YA novels; Ellen Page

From Tom Piccirilii about my post last night re Stranger At Home by Leigh Brackett::

Believe it or not, Ed, STRANGER AT HOME as by Sanders actually is in print. Those Black Mask Online dudes have it available in a POD edition.

Amazon.com: Stranger At Home: Leigh Brackett, George Sanders: Books

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From Galleycat

Twilight Versus Y.A. "Chippies"

"I hate Y.A. novels; they bore me. That's a disappointing fact of my reading life, because never have I had such an intense relationship with books as when I was a young girl," wrote Caitlin Flanagan in the Atlantic--launching a thousand Y.A. blog posts in the process.

Flanagan's essay praises the Twilight series (the second-most popular book among college kids) for its careful treatment of sexuality and relationships. At the same time, she bashes other popular stories like Gossip Girl ("these chippies could make a crack whore look like Clara Barton") and The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants ("female empowerment as it's currently defined by the kind of jaded, 40-something divorcees who wash ashore at day spas with their grizzled girlfriends").

Ed here: There's more but why bother. She's so clearly wrong on so many counts a comment isn't necessary.)


-------------------------------Sorry Ellen Page you're not good enough
New York magazine today:

"In an effort to provide the shadowy cabal known as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences with some much-needed transparency, AMPAS executive director Bruce Davis agreed to be questioned under hot interrogation lights about his organization's mysterious recruiting methods by the New York Times.

(more)
..... AMPAS has gone on the defensive to combat the perception that its voting branch is too old and too conservative. In fact, the opposite seems to be true; the Academy instituted a new, stricter admissions policy way back in 2004 with the intent of making the membership younger, hipper, and more culturally diverse (more Benetton, less Brooks Brothers).

(more) However, it seems that they may have gone too far, as rumblings have begun that the "new" criteria is too strict. No longer is an Oscar nomination sufficient enough to earn you an AMPAS bid (case in point: sexually ambiguous buzz magnet Ellen Page).

(more)
...nowadays, potential AMPAS nominees must take to brownnosing current members in order to gain admittance. Namely, The Lives of Others director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's composed this gratuitously treacly ode to the Academy: "Every time I walk through the doors of the academy building, I experience what I would imagine a pious Catholic could feel as he walks through the portal of St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome" (ew).