Category Archives: Featured Blog / Website
Super Scholar’s 50 Most Influential Books of the last 50 Years
The editors at Super Scholar have put together an impressive list of the 50 most influential books of the last 50 years. 50 books people have been impacted by from the last 5 decades – a wonderful reading list for those who want to discover the ideas people raved over.
In compiling the books on this list, the editors at SuperScholar have tried to provide a window into the culture of the last 50 years. Ideally, if you read every book on this list, you will know how we got to where we are today. Not all the books on this list are “great.” The criterion for inclusion was not greatness but INFLUENCE. All the books on this list have been enormously influential.
In no particular order from Super Scholar:
1. Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart (1958), as the most widely read book in contemporary African literature, focuses on the clash of colonialism, Christianity, and native African culture.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
2. Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1979) reinvented the science fiction genre, making it at once sociologically incisive as well as funny.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
3. Robert Atkins’ Dr Atkins’s New Diet Revolution (1992, last edition 2002) launched the low-carbohydrate diet revolution, variants of which continue to be seen in numerous other diet programs.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
4. Richard Dawkins’s The God Delusion (2006), drawing on his background as an evolutionary theorist to elevate science at the expense of religion, propelled the neo-atheist movement.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
5. Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind (1987) set the tone for the questioning of political correctness and the reassertion of a “canon” of Western civilization.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
6. Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code (2003), an entertaining thriller, has been enormously influential in getting people to think that Jesus is not who Christians say he is and that Christianity is all a conspiracy.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
7. Dee Brown’s Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (1970) transformed the way we view native Americans as they lost their land, lives, and dignity to expanding white social and military pressures.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
8. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) more than any other book helped launch the environmental movement.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
9. Noam Chomsky’s Syntactic Structures (1957), laying out his ideas of transformational grammar, revolutionized the field of linguistics and at the same time dethroned behaviorism in psychology.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
10. Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Successful People (1989) set the standard for books on leadership and effectiveness in business.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
11. Michael Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box (1996), though roundly rejected by the scientific community, epitomizes the challenge of so-called intelligent design to evolutionary theory and has spawned an enormous literature, both pro and con.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
12. Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel (1997), in employing evolutionary determinism as a lens for understanding human history, reignited grand history making in the spirit Spengler and Toynbee.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
13. Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose (1980) examines, in the context of a mystery at a medieval monastery, the key themes of premodernity, modernity and postmodernity.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
14. Victor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning (1962) provides a particularly effective answer to totalitarian attempts to crush the human spirit, showing how humanity can overcome horror and futility through finding meaning and purpose.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
15. Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique (1963), in giving expression to the discontent women felt in being confined to the role of homemaker, helped galvanize the women’s movement.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
16. Milton Friedman’s Capitalism and Freedom (1962) argued that capitalism constitutes a necessary condition for political liberties and thus paved the way for the conservative economics of the Reagan years.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
17. Daniel Goleman’s Emotional Intelligence (1995) showed clearly how skills in dealing with and reading emotions can be even more important than the cognitive skills that are usually cited as the official reason for career advancement.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
18. Jane Goodall’s In the Shadow of Man (1971), in relating her experiences with chimpanzees in the wild, underscored the deep connection between humans and the rest of the animal world.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
19. John Gray’s Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus (1992), in highlighting and elevating the differences between men and women in their relationships, challenged the contention that gender differences are socially constructed.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
20. Alex Haley’s Roots (1976), by personalizing the tragic history of American slavery through the story of Kunta Kinte, provided a poignant challenge to racism in America.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
21. Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time (1988, updated and expanded 1998), by one of the age’s great physicists, attempts to answer the big questions of existence, not least how the universe got here.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
22. Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 (1961) etched into public consciousness a deep skepticism of bureaucracies, which in the book are portrayed as self-serving and soul-destroying.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
23. Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962, last edition 1978) changed our view of science from a fully rational enterprise to one fraught with bias and irrational elements.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
24. Harold Kushner’s When Bad Things Happen to Good People (1981) transformed people’s view of God, exonerating God of evil by making him less than all-powerful.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
25. Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) served as prelude to the civil rights advances of the 1960s by portraying race relations from a fresh vantage—the vantage of an innocent child untainted by surrounding racism and bigotry.
[Amazon Link] – [Wikipedia Link]
For 25 – 50 please follow the link to the Super Scholar article:
http://www.superscholar.org/features/50-most-influential-books-last-50-years/
5 Things Writers should Do before Release Day from Author Inara Scott
Inara Scott, author of Delcroix Academy: The Candidates, recently contributed a post to the blog A Guide to Literary Agents which struck me as poignant for everyone with aspirations of publication. Entitled 5 Things Writers should Do before Release Day, the post names 5 things you should be doing now in preparation for the business of publication when it comes around. The tips are must-dos for success with today’s social networking market and proposes a constant online connectedness with that market through formats other than your novels. I liked the advice and feel it’s a perfect way to continue to know your audience in times that change pretty quickly. Keep checking back on the blog A Guide to Literary Agents because you’ll find loads a good advice from those in the know – it’s a blog to bookmark.
Here is the quick list of Scott’s tips:
- Website
- Book Bloggers & Blog Tours
- Social Networking & Blogging
- Blurbs
- Bookmarks
Read the full post: 5 Things Writers should Do before Release Day
7 Awesome Websites for Readers
There are a lot of books out there vying for your attention and it can become overwhelming to choose a new novel or non-fiction read. Here is a list of 7 websites that are gauranteed; to provide you with all the information you need about books old and new, to connect you with your favourite authors and other readers, and help you broaden your reading tastes.
1. Book Browse
Book Browse – your guide to exceptional books. Indeed it is an exceptional guide to good
books and you’ll find fantastic recommendations, all the normal book info as well as an excerpt to read. Book Browse is known for its reliable recommendations as it does not accept payment for book listings. Looking for a book others have recommended, then head on over to Book Browse.
Book Club Buddy – where authors and readers connect. This website is more about 
connecting with your favourite authors, reading their interviews and other author related info. Everything you need for your book club is available; the aforementioned author info, reading guides can be downloaded and of course there’s plenty of great book info too.
3. Fiction DB
Fiction DB – your guide to authors and books. Fiction DB is a great site for readers looking
specifically for info on Authors’ bibliographies and book series. The site also has all the normal info like book descriptions but it also brings together reviews from other sites. Fiction DB has an interactive component so join up and share what you’re reading and what you recommend.
Flashlight Worthy Books – handpicked book recommendations on hundreds of topics. 
Flashlight Worthy Books is all about book recommendations and for this purpose also has an interactive component. The format through which this site has chosen to recommend books is through book lists. Anyone can contribute a list and there are thousands available. One list, for example, is entitled ‘10 Books that’ll make you wish your flight would never end.’ and has a good mix of classic and contemporary fiction. So, this one is for list lovers.
5. Good Reads
Good Reads, as the name suggests, is filled with info on good reads. I love this website
because, as it is an interactive community site, you get to interact with other readers (including authors who also love to read) and keep a bookshelf filled with books you’ve read, want to read and your rating for that book. There are lots of books too, the database seems huge so you’ll find all the books you’ve loved and all those you plan to love. Great info on upcoming releases is also available – actually there’s so much info and so much to do on this website that you have to go and check it out if you even remotely like to read. Lilolia is a member of GoodReads so if you’re a member link up with me!
Library Thing is very similar to Good Reads. It is an interactive community site where you can
display your book shelf and add your book reviews. It is a great place to link up with other readers and get up to date info on books and authors. Lilolia is also a member of LibraryThing so if you’re a member link up with me and let’s talk books!
What Should I Read Next is a very simple but thorough search engine that asks you to input 
the last book you read and enjoyed and then provides you with a list of books that are recommendations based on your input. I really like this little site as it is a superb way to expand your reading choices to include new authors and novels. Give it a try, you won’t be disappointed.
And there you have it guys. As always if you know of any other sites that readers would enjoy, please leave us a link in the comments.
5 Useful Blogs for Writers to Follow
There’s a lot of information on the web and there’s equally as much support for writers out there too – you just might have to sift through some garbage before you find the pearls of wisdom. So, I want to share with you 5 blogs that I think will help you with many aspects of getting your work published.
The Book Deal – An Inside View of Publishing is a blog by Alan Rinzler, a consulting editor, that provides a great deal of technical information and suggestions concerning the use of editors, rewrites, literary agents, book marketing and other tools to make your manuscript publishable. He provides editing services and gives a lot of good tips about which changes you can make in your manuscript to make it better. I really like this blog and I think many of you will find it helpful just as the many comments on his posts evidence the usefulness of his info to writers trying to get their work published. Check it out.
2. Query Shark 
Query Shark is all about revising your fiction query letters so you have a better chance of making an impact with publishers, editors etc. It is a wonderful service and all you have to do is read some of the past query letters to get an idea of what is expected of you (and also not to repeat mistakes that query shark has already noted) and then follow the directions for query letter submition. If you are at that stage in your writing where you are getting ready release it to the world then prepare yourself in the query letter department by letting query shark pick apart your draft letter.
The Writers’ Zone is a section of the Writers’ and Artists’ website which provides author advice. You’ll find info for every stage of the writing process from writing tools all the way through to marketing your book. There are links and giveaways and a whole lot of priceless stuff – you’ve just got to sift through it all but it’s definitely a valuable resource. It’s also a place for you to connect to the industry so look out for events, opportunities to mingle and get some advice. Check it out.
Rants and Ramblings is the blog of literary agent, Rachelle Gardner. This blog is very popular and I can tell you that it is very informative but most importantly it provides support and more than a couple of reality checks for writers seeking both representation and publishing contracts. The blog will help you get an idea of what it takes to work in the industry and how to do the most you can for your writing process and manuscript submittion. I recommend following this blog regularly.
5. Red Room
The Red Room is where the writers are. Connect with published and famous authors, contribute your own writing and seek out advice. This is a place to meet, mingle and work on the craft of writing. I think it is a good community to belong to if you are serious about writing because of the large range of member/writer experience. It will push you to do your best work (it should) and there are so many ways to get involved and as many mediums of information at your disposal. Go, join, you’ll love it if you love reading and writing.
And there you have it folks. If you know of any other great blogs/sites for serious writers, please leave us a link in the comments.
