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Meet James Moloney, author of The Beauty is in the Walking (Angus&Robertson, HarperCollins) James Moloney is a statesman in the world of Australian YA and children’s books.  The hilarious Black Taxi and Kill the Possum for YA and Dougy, Swashbuckler and Buzzard Breath and Brains  for children are among my favourites of his books. I store his […]

What's the verdict on this week's marvel books?!

The start of a new week brings work, school, and yes more Secret Wars branded books from Marvel. Today Buzzfeed had the exclusive reveal as Marvel is set to bring the 1602 universe to the event with Asgard’s favorite assassin, Angela.

1602: Witch Hunter Angela brings the Neil Gaiman created character to the Neil Gaiman created timeline for a rewrite of some real world history. The series will be co-written by Kieron Gillen and Marguerite Bennett with main story art by Stephanie Hans. Also included will be five page backup stories drawn by various artist not yet named.

When asked for plot details Bennett had this to say, “Queen Elizabeth has been recently murdered, King James has ascended the throne, and throughout the entire country there’s a persecution of those who are considered witchbreed, which is the 1602 equivalent of mutants. We’re combining this history and this flourishing time of Western literature with the mythology of the Marvel universe.”

We’ll also be seeing new 1602 versions of characters such as Bucky Barnes and the Guardians of the Galaxy. No series length or release date was given.

Angela, the character created by Neil Gaiman in another lifetime as part of the Spawn universe, will be receiving her own ongoing series later this year from the creative team of Kieron Gillen, Marguerite Bennett, Phil Jimenez and Stephanie Hans.

I don’t know how we reached this point either, but that’s a packed lineup of creators up there. Jimenez is superstar enough, and his presence bodes well for the project. Gillen and Bennett will co-write the series, with Hans working on a back-up strip which’ll appear in each issue. That looks like her work on the cover as well.

The book will follow the character – revealed to be Thor and Loki’s sister in an Original Sin miniseries which either has or hasn’t started yet – as she decides to head off and make a name for herself in the Marvel Universe, primarily through the method of slashing people up and presumably growling at them a whole lot.

An ongoing series, the book will be edited by Wil Moss, and start in November.

By Richard S. Grossman

Because Europe accounts for nearly a quarter of the world’s economic output, this question is important not only to Europeans, but to Africans, Asians, Americans (both North and South), and Australians as well. Those who forecast that the United States’s relatively anemic five-year-old recovery is poised to become stronger almost always include the caveat “unless, of course, Europe implodes.”

So, can we stop worrying about Europe?

Recent signs have been encouraging.

Consider the following graph, which shows the spread between the yields on the 10-year bonds of several European countries and those of the German government. Because the German government’s finances are relatively healthy—and Germany is thus viewed as being quite likely to pay back what it owes—it is able to borrow money more cheaply than most of its neighbors. For 10 years loans, the German government pays interest of about 1.5%, which is among the lowest rates in Europe.

Before the European sovereign debt crisis erupted 2009, spreads were not especially wide. In 2008, the Greek government paid between 0.25-0.75% more to borrow money for 10 years than the German government. When the sorry state of the Greek government’s finances became public, however, the spread between Greek and German yields soared to more than 20% and the European Union (EU) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) were called in to bail out the Greek government. Ireland, Portugal, and Spain also received rescue packages (as did Cyprus), while Italy appeared to be headed down the same road. Note the wide spreads between these governments’ borrowing costs and those of the fiscally virtuous Germans.

During the last year or so, Greek, Irish, Portuguese, and Spanish spreads have shrunk considerably — not to their pre-crisis levels, but far below their sky-high levels of 2010-2012 — suggesting that doubts about the sustainability of European governments’ debts is receding. The decline in spreads is due in part to the austerity measures adopted as a condition of the EU/IMF bailouts, which have improved the budget outlook among the fiscally weaker countries. German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s April visit to Greece was widely seen as an effort to show support for fiscal austerity and economic restructuring adopted by the Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras.

Angela Merkel – Αντώνης Σαμαράς, 2012. Photo by Αντώνης Σαμαράς Πρωθυπουργός της Ελλάδας. CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

In other positive news, Markit’s European purchasing manager’s composite index for March (released on 23 April 2014), which is considered a proxy for economic output, rose to a nearly three-year high. The index shows a continuous expansion of business activity since last July and forecasts that a backlog of work will lead to further growth in May.

Despite these positive signs, Europe is not out of the woods.

Unemployment remains stubbornly high, due, in part, to austerity: over 25% in Greece and Spain; over 15% in Portugal and Cyprus; and over 10% in France, Ireland, Italy, and a number of other countries.

Although prices are rising slightly in the European Union on average, Greece, Spain, Portugal and a few other European countries are experiencing deflation. Moreover, overall inflation in the EU is below that in the United States, leading the euro to appreciate by between 2-3% against the dollar since the beginning of 2014 and putting a crimp in European exports. Further, Europe’s flirtation with deflation increases the real burden on debtors. During inflationary times, debtors are able to repay their debts in money that is losing its value; deflation forces debtors to repay in money that is gaining in value.

The European economy is improving. But several indicators show that plenty can still go wrong. So let’s not stop worrying yet.

Richard S. Grossman is Professor of Economics at Wesleyan University and a Visiting Scholar at the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University. He is the author of WRONG: Nine Economic Policy Disasters and What We Can Learn from Them and Unsettled Account: The Evolution of Banking in the Industrialized World since 1800. His homepage is RichardSGrossman.com, he blogs at UnsettledAccount.com, and you can follow him on Twitter at @RSGrossman. You can also read his previous OUPblog posts.

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Image credit: Graph courtesy of Richard Grossman. Used with permission.

The post Can we finally stop worrying about Europe? appeared first on OUPblog.

        

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Marvel are kicking off a weekend of announcements today with news about some Original Sin tie-ins. The main Original Sin series will see The Watcher get shot up something rotten, his eyeballs getting ripped out, and everybody finding out deep and dark secrets which previously only Uatu knew about. It’s like superhuman wikileaks, basically. And amongst the tie-ins has just been announced a five-issue miniseries from Jason Aaron, Simone Bianchi, Al Ewing, and Lee Garbett: Loki and Thor: The Tenth Realm.

Those would be the creative teams for Loki: Agent of Asgard and The Mighty Thor, of course. The storyline also concerns another character, however – the noted Angela, fresh from her stint in the Guardians of the Galaxy. After a lot of wondering about why she was important to the Marvel Universe, and why it was such a big deal that she arrived, courtesy of Neil Gaiman, into Marvel Comics… it appears the answer has finally come.

She’s Odin’s daughter. Making her the sister of both Thor and Loki. Uh-oh! In this five-issue miniseries, Angela will be heading across for a family reunion, causing problems for Thor, Loki – and also for Odin. You have to imagine that Frigga won’t be particularly thrilled, either.

Marvel note that the series will be numbered as Original Sin #5.1 across to #5.5. It’ll start this July.

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Although once known for combative rhetoric and an aggressive stance, McFarlane Toys CEO Todd McFarlane sounded a conciliatory note when asked about the return of Angela in the pages of ULTRON WAR #10. McFarlane once fought a bitter lawsuit over the ownership of Angela with Neil Gaiman, and perhaps the settlement included a non-disparagement clause?

“Neil Gaiman and I had a resolution in our legal dispute, and as part of that he ended up with the rights of Angela,” the Spawn creator told Newsarama. “Whatever Neil chooses to do with something that he owns is at his complete and utter discretion.”

“The health of the industry is based upon having good stories and good characters, and a wide customer base,” McFarlane said to Newsarama. “If bringing some of these characters back to the fold in a meaningful way adds to that, then it just strengthens our industry.”

“Good stories that entertain are something that we all should applaud on any level,” McFarlane said. “Whether we’re doing it directly at Image Comics, or at our competition, it helps keep our industry that we love alive. I will sit back and be as interested as anyone else.”

Spirals have always been one of my favorite shapes.

Once, at some corporate training sessions I had to endure, everyone had to pick a favorite shape.

Then, the presenter proceeded to analyze people based on which shape they chose. People who chose circles were dependable, people who chose squares were organized.

When the presenter got to the spiral, she said, “You really don’t want to have ANYTHING to do with these people. They’re a little crazy.”

That was reassuring.

But I feel better knowing that if I’m crazy, so are a lot of beautiful things in nature. Many of them are described in Swirl by Swirl: Spirals in Nature (Houghton Mifflin Books for Children, 2011) written by Joyce Sidman and illustrated by Beth Krommes.

The book has been well received. It has won too many honors to list here, but highlights include starred reviews in Publishers Weekly,  Kirkus, Booklist, The School Library Journal and Horn Book Magazine. It also was a highly commended title by the CCBC.

But let’s see what an actual reader thinks. Take it away, Angela!

——————-

Today’s reviewer: Angela

Age: 6

Things I like to do: Swim, color in coloring books, play outside with my daddy and my friends, plant flowers, jump rope, watch movies and ride my scooter.

This book was about: Different things in nature that have spirals either on their bodies or when they curl their bodies to make spirals.

The best part was when: I found all the different animals in the artwork on the pages.

I smiled when: The two Asian elephants were lined up, and the front elephant picked up a branch in its trunk to make a spiral. Then the second elephant made a spiral out of its trunk to hold the front elephant’s tail.

I was surprised when: The European hedgehog curled up to protect itself from a red fox.

This book taught me: There are spirals all over in nature that I never noticed before. I learned a lot from this book. Did you know the rose is a spiral and so is a chrysanthemum?

Three words that best describe this book are: “Colorful.” “Interesting.” “Educational.”

My favorite line or phrase in this book is: “A spiral reaches out, too, exploring the world. It winds around and around.”

My favorite picture in this book is: The two pages that have a lot of flowers on them.

Other kids reading this book should watch for: All the fine detail in each of the paintings. All different things from nature are hidden in the artwork on all the pages.

You should read this book because: You will enjoy the cool artwork and wonderful words. You will learn all about spirals and how they are hidden in nature.

——————-

Thanks, Angela! Very nicely done.

If you’d like to learn more about author Joyce Sidman, you can visit

This is for a friend in Los Angeles.

The American Dialect Society has announced that the Word of the Year for 2007, as voted by members at its annual meeting, is subprime. It’s a sturdy choice, given how much media attention has circulated this past year about the financial crisis in the housing sector blamed on mortgage loans made to high-risk borrowers with credit ratings that are less than prime. Subprime (sometimes hyphenated as sub-prime) might not be as flashy as some previous selections by the ADS, such as truthiness in 2005 (comedian Stephen Colbert’s term for “truth from the gut” unencumbered by facts) or plutoed in 2006 (’demoted or devalued in the manner of Pluto losing planet status’). Nonetheless, the word has an intriguing history, even for people like me who aren’t terribly fascinated by the lending practices of banks.

(more…)

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As we move more towards digital forms of information in libraries, I’m always interested in watching the “libraries as places that lend stuff” role evolve. We’ve seen tool libraries and toy libraries. Seattle Public Library used to lend reprints of paintings and, I think, sculpture. Now libraries in Arlington Virginia are lending out Kill-A-Watt electricity usage meters to help people figure out what’s sucking up all the energy in their houses.

All Arlington branch libraries now have Kill-A-Watt electricity usage meters available for check-out. You can check availability or reserve one through the normal online Library catalog. The meters are listed under “kill-a-watt” and “electricity usage meters.” The devices measure the amount of electricity used by home appliances. You simply plug the meter into the electrical outlet, plug the appliance into the meter, and take a reading after one hour.

[thanks jude!]