Buildings made of books

Flavorwire has published an image gallery of 10 buildings constructed entirely of books. Above: Home, a self-sustained book igloo designed by Colombian artist Miler Lagos (We've featured this one on Boing Boing before). Dig the rest of Flavorpill's picks here.

Great novels without the first line

Mary Robinette Kowal sez,

Imagine what would happen if the unthinkable occurred. What if the first line were accidentally omitted by the typesetter? Would Moby Dick have been the same if it started, 'Some years ago -- never mind how long precisely -- having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world.'

I put together a little quiz for you to try your hand at identifying these famous books by their second lines. Why?

Because when my novel, Glamour in Glass, comes out tomorrow, it will be missing the first line. We don't know how it happened yet, since the last time my editor and I looked at it, the sentence was there. Somehow, that sentence got omitted between here and the printer. The electronic version is being corrected and future editions will have that line, but for now, there are some collector's editions out there.

That's Mary: when life gives you SARS, make sarsaparilla!

New beginnings – or – What happened to my novel’s first sentence?

Locus Award winners

* Science Fiction Novel: Blackout/All Clear, Connie Willis (Spectra)

* Fantasy Novel: Kraken, China Miéville (Macmillan UK; Del Rey)

* First Novel: The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, N.K. Jemisin (Orbit UK; Orbit US)

* Young Adult Book: Ship Breaker, Paolo Bacigalupi (Little, Brown)

* Novella: The Lifecycle of Software Objects, Ted Chiang (Subterranean)

* Novelette: "The Truth Is a Cave in the Black Mountains", Neil Gaiman

* Short Story: "The Thing About Cassandra", Neil Gaiman (Songs of Love and Death)

* Magazine: Asimov's

* Publisher: Tor

* Anthology: Warriors, George R.R. Martin & Gardner Dozois, eds. (Tor)

* Collection: Fritz Leiber: Selected Stories, Fritz Leiber (Night Shade)

* Editor: Ellen Datlow

* Artist: Shaun Tan

* Non-fiction: Robert A. Heinlein: In Dialogue with His Century: Volume 1: 1907-1948: Learning Curve, William H. Patterson, Jr., (Tor)

* Art Book: Spectrum 17, Cathy & Arnie Fenner, eds. (Underwood)