Category Archives: photos

October 20, 2015   DG&B   backstory, photos, social media, social networking  
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Hello Instagram!

IMG_5811Introducing our brand new Instagram account: DGLMstagram!

You’re already following us on Twitter and Facebook, right? Now you can get an inside glimpse at all the excitement of the day-to-day life at a literary agency in pictures, as well as words. Expect to see book covers, author events, artfully arranged office supplies, holiday cupcakes, and more.

As you can see…we’ve already posted our first picture. What else do you want to see on our Instagram account? What are your favorite kinds of posts that other publishers, authors, or agencies share on Instagram? Let us know in the comments!

April 10, 2015   Rachel   art, fun, photos, Rachel S., recommendations, social media, taste  
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#READBOOKS

I won’t lie, one of the biggest reasons I was so excited to get a smartphone (it’s been a little over a year, happy anniversary!) was because I wanted to see what this “Instagram” business was all about. I’m a little embarrassed to say that I think it was the first thing I downloaded onto my brand new iPhone and promptly forgot about all the other cool things the phone could do.

But, I digress. Because what I really wanted to highlight was the absolute beauty that are the Instagram accounts of publishers, booksellers or simply the literarily-obsessed. Books, as we know, are wonderful things mainly because of the stories they tell, the gorgeous writing, the action, suspense, emotion and wonder.

But books are also pretty. Readers are enigmatic. Jokes and signs about books are witty and fun. Authors are real people with interesting lives. When I saw this Huffington Post compilation of top notch literary Instagram accounts, I promptly explored each and every one—and then dove into the search even further, so pretty much my entire feed for a little while was pictures of and about books. Which, if I’m being totally honest, it totally a-okay.

What I also found in my search was that aside from being purely visually entertaining, these posts and photos can actually be really, really helpful in figuring out what books to read next, discovering new authors and getting news about what the next big literary sensation is going to be.

Searching hashtags with author names, publishers and imprints, genres, or more specific ones like #FridayReads, #BookClub, #WhatShouldIRead is both really fun (it’s like a research adventure!) and informative.

Social media has become a huge factor in the way books and authors are marketed and promoted and the ways to do it are becoming more and more diverse and manifold. Where Facebook, Twitter and even Tumblr can be seen as obvious go-tos, Instagram is less of a first thought. In reality, it’s rich with possibility. Books are visual, tangible objects and that, as well as the calming image of an open book or someone reading, should be celebrated.

Do you guys have any great bookish accounts you can recommend me? I’m always looking!

October 16, 2013   mhoogland   fun, Mike H, multimedia, photos, video  
0

Me and books

When I get into a book

When I hate the ending

How I turn the page

What I think

End result

August 20, 2013   mhoogland   art, favorites, fun, lists, Mike H, opinion, photos, trends  
3

Less is more

I judge books by their covers. Literally. And so does everyone else.

Lately, I’ve handed down some pretty harsh judgments. Not many covers have really called to me in recent months. In fact, the covers that catch my eye tend to be the least obnoxious, the ones with the simplest designs and quietest colors.

For instance, check out Boris Kachka’s HOTHOUSE.

 

 

I mean, c’mon. That’s a pretty cool cover. Nice color contrast and some fancy text. This book has absolutely everything going for it. Check out Jane’s post, and you’ll see what I mean.

 

What about this one?

 

 

Chad Harbach’s THE ART OF FIELDING has a pretty similar style to Kachka’s HOTHOUSE, and again, I love it. When in doubt, you can’t go wrong designing a book cover with some nice colors, and flowing script.

 

Once again, less is more:

 

 

One of my all-time favorite reads, too. But I’ll get to that in another blog.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: this guy just doesn’t like book covers with pictures. Wrong!

 

 

One chair leaning against another chair: that’s some real stuff. Simple yet beautiful.

And the minimalist cover to end all minimalist covers:

 

In case you missed it:

 

Who wouldn’t want to pick this book up and see what it’s about? ONE RED PAPERCLIP by Kyle MacDonald may just have the best cover of them all.

So I guess I’m a minimalist. (What would my parents think?) How about you guys? What are some of your favorite book covers?

October 06, 2011   Stacey   authors, fun, photos, Stacey  
1

Baby pictures of your favorite authors

It’s fall in New York (my favorite season), and my obsession with pictures, especially of my kids (first day of school, with pumpkins, in costumes!), continues as I start to think about holiday cards.

This won’t get you published, but I thought it was worth sharing this fun link tweeted by a client of mine that shows baby pictures of a number of famous authors. It’s kind of neat to see writers like Salinger and Fitzgerald (looking like an adorable baby girl!) captured in images of their youth.

If any of you aspiring authors achieve this level of fame and success, do you have a picture from your childhood you’d like to share with your fans? Send them our way. I’m conjuring images of my own kids captured in photos when they were small glancing at their books, sometimes staged with my authors’ books, sometimes upside down, but at least we are trying to encourage a love of reading and books at a young age!

My oldest daughter with a galley of one of my books in 2006

March 31, 2011   Michael   art, libraries, Michael, photos  
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On a lighter note

I feel like everyone’s been so serious on the blog this week, and I’m nothing if not a contrarian (no I’m not!).  So this week, nothing but some gorgeous, pseudo-educational fun from me.  Have you ever wondered: what’s the world’s largest indoor 360-degree photograph?  I’ve been wondering for years, but I’ve been too lazy to look it up.  Fortunately, Shelf Awareness pointed me in the right direction today, over to 360 Cities, a site full of panoramic images.  But this is the record holder: a photo (actually many photos stitched together) of the Strahov Monastery Library in Prague.  You can actually get close enough to see the titles and authors of the books, and the level of detail in the painting is spectacular.

No existential questions here.  Just enjoy the beauty of books.

May 28, 2010   DG&B   contest, fun, Lauren, photos, reading  
7

Building enough bookshelves

by Lauren

“I would be most content if my children grew up to be the kind of people who think decorating consists mostly of building enough bookshelves.” Anna Quindlen

While I can’t speak for Anna Quindlen’s children, I think that those of us here seem to have gotten it right! Thanks to everyone who sent in their bookshelf photos. I’ll start here with mine, and then follow me after the jump for some from DGLM agents and blog readers!!

As I mentioned, I added a new bookcase to the family recently, so the first is haphazardly organized and covered in knickknacks, photos, and mementos. The second actually has some organization to it: Baby-sitters Club and Little House books on the bottom; galleys in the middle; and the top shelf is a combination of books I represent (which I really have to get better about bringing home, because there’s a lot missing), books I sell rights for, and books I’m eager to read that are ready to move up to the majors: the bedside table pile. I actually moved the bedside table pile on top of the bookcase for photo purposes—that’s the pile on the left that’s topped with my brand new Room by Emma Donoghue galley. Those are the books I’m in the middle of or desperate to read next. The pile beside it are the books that I don’t own (though some of those are intermingled elsewhere as well) and have to remember to read and give back. At a glance, it seems about half of those are Jim’s!

Miriam and Stacey kindly took photos for me of some of their books—and they’re delightful for totally different reasons.

Miriam’s I love for the display table, which is an idea I’ve already stolen for my dream library with the rolling ladders.

Stacey’s I love because they’re not bookshelves at all. Having moved in the not too distant past and with 4 young kids at home, Stacey’s books actually currently live in a closet. Something about the haphazard stacks makes me think of used bookstores, and I kind of want to stop by her house and flip through to see what’s there.

We also got some great photos from you guys, so I’m putting my favorites up here:

Mary Witzl sent her photo in part as a call to action. Bonus points for the adorable cat sneaking into the photo!

We’ve got plenty of bookshelves in our flat back in the U.K., but where we’re living, we’ve got only teetering piles stacked up on shelves. I’ll send a photo, though. Maybe that will shame my family into tidiness.

Alice Pope sent us one of eight (jealous!!).

Here is one of eight bookcases on my house, this one mostly dedicated to picture books. I have a 2 YA/MG bookcases, a nonfiction bookcase, a cookbook bookcase, an adult fiction bookcase, a classics bookcase, and the boy’s bookcase full of PBs, board books and Captain Underpants.

(He only reads things from my PB shelves under close supervision.) :)

And yet…there are still piles of books on the floor of every room and a 2 rather precarious piles on my nightstand. Think I should get a Kindle?

Lynn sent a jealousy inducing photo of one small part of her personal library—not only does the shelving shown far exceed my paltry bookcases, but the full library can’t be viewed because the books have to be shipped back from her “private beach” to Paris!

Aww!! I should have taken a wide view of my library before we dismantled it! No, we didn’t have rolling ladders that I, like everyone else here, dream of having, but I did have my stepping stool placed discreetly behind a door in case I needed to get something from the top two shelves.

Vicki sent us her two bookcases and dresser-top collection, firmly refusing to get on board with my bookshelf envy. I should learn to be so zen. My favorite part of these photos is how cozy the stuffed animals look nestled in among the books. It’s like a book forest.

Just two bookcases in my room, but I think I have enough room for what I need. As you can see, the shelving on the left is much more spread out, so it still has a lot of room to expand. Plus I still have the tops of both bookcases.

I also have a shelf of writing-related books and my HP collection on my dresser. I’ll be very worried if I run out of room completely.

Though Bill Peschel isn’t helping, because he sent this link to a blog feature about his personal library, which inspires “envy and despair,” as critic Heidi MacDonald so rightly put it.

Thanks to you all for sharing, and I’m mentally filing away some ideas for when I have endless space and money (that day will come, right?). As for the winner, it’s a very tough call, but I have to say that Lynn’s mere fragment of her library so dwarfs my collection and comes closest to my dream library—and she even has a step stool from which she might someday be able to upgrade to rolling ladders—so congratulations! Drop me a line at labramo@dystel.com to tell me what sort of books you enjoy, and I’ll send you something to add to your already impressive collection!

May 14, 2010   DG&B   contest, fun, Lauren, photos, reading  
12

At home on the shelves

by Lauren

One of my deepest home decor desires is to line my walls with bookcases.  I grew up in a house where bookshelves were everywhere you looked, but New York City apartment living isn’t necessarily ideal for the literary pack rat in me.  I’m probably not going to fulfill my dreams of Beauty and the Beast-style rolling ladders any time soon. 

That said, I’ve happily just added a new bookcase to my collection, so for right now, my shelves just barely hold all the books in my apartment, so long as I don’t bring home the stacks of books obscuring the window by my desk here or the ones boxed up at my mom’s.  The box of Babysitter’s Club books I just bought from a stoop sale (Books #1-44 plus various specials for $20!  A total bargain!) really ate up all the space I had left after moving the floor stacks onto the bookcase.

So when I read the comments on Rachel’s post last week, I was envious of the enormous size of your to-be-read piles.  Those numbers don’t count all the already-read books you probably possess!  Do any of you have a real personal library?  Or walls upon walls lined with shelves?  Just massive stacks threatening to topple?  Books strewn about here and there, to be picked up on a whim?

I’m a big fan of the New Yorker‘s Book Bench blog’s 1,000 Words feature, where people send photos of books out in the wild, so I’m asking you, dear readers, to send photos of your lovingly curated or totally ramshackle collections.   Email your photo as an attachment to news@dystel.com with the subject line “Book Shelves”, and then comment below to tell us about your personal library!  We’ll feature some of our favorite photos here on the blog—and I’ll see if I can’t convince some of my colleagues to share their own images.  The person who sends in my favorite photo (or the first person to demonstrate their ownership of the enviable rolling bookshelves) will get a copy of something from my bookshelves–making room for me to bring home the copy of Sebastian Junger’s War I just got.