DEBORAH CROMBIE: When I was just a year out of college, long before writing a crime novel was even a glimmer in my imagination, I took a course in book and magazine publishing at Rice University in Houston. It was modeled on a well known course at Radcliffe, which is also now sadly defunct. The six week Rice course was divided into three weeks focused on magazine publishing and three weeks focused on book publishing. It seems odd to me now that the two were given equal attention, but maybe that is just because I write novels.
This got me thinking, however, about the demise of print periodicals, and wondering how many of our Reds and readers still subscribe to, or buy, print magazines. We subscribe to several: Bon Appetit (food, duh,) The Economist, Rolling Stone (although I never have any idea who most of the artists are, sigh,) and my daughter gives me a subscription to D Magazine, which I read mostly for the local food scene coverage.
These, however, are what keep me going to the bookstore every month!
UK Country Living (my fave!,) UK Homes and Gardens, English Home–I will buy anything British on the rack. And I do legitimately count them as research–many interiors and exteriors have stealthily made their way into my books! I also keep stacks of old issues, because they help transport me to whatever season is happening in my book in progress.
You can't subscribe to these in the U.S., but I know approximately when my nearest B&N gets them in, and I plan a jaunt to the store accordingly. And, of course, once I set foot in the store, I never manage to walk out without a book or two as well. I also love looking at all the magazines I don't buy.
So how about it, dear Reds, do you still subscribe, or impulse buy, print periodicals? Or do you read everything online?
P.S.: And here's an interesting fact for you–I read somewhere recently that the best place to have your book featured is in the CostCo Connection, which goes out to more than 14.5 MILLION members every month!!!
LUCY BURDETTE: I used to LOVE magazines–Ladies Home Journal, Redbook, MS Magazine, Cosmopolitan, Bon Appetit, and more. My mother loved them too and would retreat to her room to snack and read when she got home from teaching and wasn’t quite ready to face the four of us. Now the only thing we subscribe to is the Sunday Times. I miss those magazines but I couldn’t keep up with them, especially living in two places. By the way, my first ever subscription was to Tiger Beat. Oh how I loved reading those!
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Our once-upon a time subscriptions included Highlights for the kids, Sports Illustrated for Ross and Time magazine for me. Time is still doing good articles, but a weekly news magazine today sounds like using telegrams to communicate long distance.
However, I still subscribe to The Atlantic online because I love their long-form journalism. And you can take my monthly print copies of HOUSE BEAUTIFUL and HGTV MAGAZINE when you pry them from my cold, dead, etc. Beside having better quality images than you can get on a screen, there’s also the delight of opening the mailbox and seeing, instead of bills and sales flyers, something I actually want to read!
DEBS: I hope HGTV is on the newstands--I'm going to look next time I hit the magazine racks at B&N!
JENN McKINLAY: My magazine of choice is Atomic Ranch! It’s all about mid century modern architecture and interiors and I love it so much! Other than that, it’s knitting magazines. I have a ridiculous amount - Vogue, Noro, etc. - and now I’ve added Little Looms for my weaving obsession. I do want a subscription to Prevention. I used to read it all the time when I was a hospital librarian and I miss it. There’s something so calming about sitting outside with a magazine and a cup of coffee and enjoying a bright sunny day.
RHYS BOWEN: I grew up with magazines: first Girl and a couple of other British girl’s magazines. The first one I had a subscription to was Private Eye, the satirical magazine of the Sixties. For years we had National Geogaphic, Redbook, Ladies Home Journal, Time, Consumer’s Digest, various travel magazines, Alfred Hitchcock and probably others I have forgotten. Now we spend half the year in different states my magazines are limited to those I get through Amazon Prime as well as Smithsonian online. But I really miss National Geographic.
Magazines are a treat when I’m traveling in Europe. All those English country living ones.
HALLIE EPHRON: When I was growing up we subscribed to magazines, too. LIFE. LOOK. TIME. NEW YORKER. And of course we got a morning AND an evening paper delivered.
And wasn’t the one good thing about going to the dentist, getting to read the latest copy of PEOPLE? Now I haven’t a clue who those people on the covers are.
I’ve let our subscription to THE NEW YORKER lapse… we had stacks of them, unread, which I finally composted. But I loved that magazine and credit it with ideas for at least three of my mystery novels.
I still get the BOSTON GLOBE delivered and subscribe to the online versions of THE NEW YORK TIMES and THE WASHINGTON POST …. AND I subscribe to my local town newspaper which needs all the support it can get.
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I adore THE NEW YORKER–there is always something unpredictably great, or surprisingly interesting. They do stack up, though, that’s for sure. We get NEW YORK, and I’m not sure why, but it’s fun and hip. I used to get InStyle and Martha Stewart Living and Real Simple and what was that briefly terrific one for women? Not Ms., but there was another one. Remember? It was great until they ruined it. (I will pause here while you think of all the other things that fall into that category.)
I used to love Bon Appetit, and had a massive stack of them, all bookmarked. And then ignored. PEOPLE is for the manicure place, too, but NO idea who is on the cover, so agree. My book THE OTHER WOMEN came right from a People Magazine, though, so thank you, People.
(And let me add that it is much easier to use a recipe from a magazine than from a website.)
DEBS: Weirdly, although I use Bon Appetit online for recipes, I hardly ever cook from the print version!
How about you, dear readers? Do you still get magazines in your mailbox, or pick them up at the grocery store or bookstore? (It is a treat when I have to go in our CVS and get to look through the magazine and paperback display!) And, if not, do you miss them?
Oh, and does anyone remember the magazine Hank is talking about?
REDS ALERT!!! Flora is the winner of an ebook from Tina Whittle!! Send me your email or address, Flora, at deb @ deborahcrombie dot com, and I will pass along to Tina! Congratulations!!
We always had print magazines in the house when I was growing up . . . and I still prefer print to web-based magazines. We keep up our subscriptions to Astronomy, Guideposts, Air and Space Smithsonian . . .
ReplyDeleteOh, who's the astronomer in your household Joan?
DeleteStargazing is something we both enjoy . . . .
DeleteAll of those sound so interesting, Joan!
DeleteThe only one I ever subscribed to as an adult was TV Guide. But I let that lapse years ago and haven't subscribed to any new ones since.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up, TV Guide was (when it was still a digest-sized publication) a weekly magazine we picked up each week.
ReplyDeleteFor my own personal reading I had wrestling magazines like Pro Wrestling Illustrated, Inside Wrestling and more.
I had Sports Illustrated as a subscription magazine from the time I was 12 until I dropped it last year amidst going from a weekly to a monthly publication and using uncredited AI BS to "write" some stories.
For music magazines I had RIP, Hit Parader, Guitar Playing for the Practicing Musician and my favorite one, Metal Edge. I'm sure there were others as well. As an adult I had Classic Rock, Rock Candy, Metal Hammer and Kerrang!
For TV/Movies, I was really into Starlog magazine which dealt with science fiction and fantasy.
For comic books, I loved Comics Buyer's Guide.
I had subscriptions to Ireland of the Welcomes and Scotland the magazine for a number of years too. Oh, and I subscribed to Yankee magazine for a year or two in recent years. Plus Mystery Scene magazine, of course.
These days, I don't have any subscriptions in print form. I will pick up the occasional issue of The Strand, Ellery Queen or Alfred Hitchcock if there is an article that piques my interest or an author I like has a short story in an issue.
I have the e-subscription to Blues Blast magazine and The Big Thrill from ITW. I do pick up the occasional issue of Back Issue magazine which deals with comic books.
The one magazine I would like to get but it doesn't seem to get carried here in the US is Sherlock Holmes magazine. It's a British publication (obviously) and I can't seem to find a shop in my area that carries it OR will even get a copy in for me. And trying to get a subscription from overseas is a bit more hassle than I'm willing to put up with.
I'm sure I've missed many magazines that I read in the past but I did cover the big names I think. There used to be a shop in New Bedford called Newsbreak (which was the 2nd shop with the name, the first being in Swansea) where I'd get magazines. But the pandemic ended up being the final nail in the coffin of the New Bedford store. Oddly enough, my friend's record shop is now located in that spot.
You are a magazine fiend Jay--and such a broad collection! I had forgotten to mention all the mystery-related magazines...
DeleteI just thought of another couple of magazines that I had a subscription to when I was a kid. Boy's Life magazine and Ranger Rick. Both came about from when I was involved in Scouting.
DeleteAnd I just thought of a couple more magazines I used to have subscriptions to as well. For movies this time: Premiere and Movieline.
DeleteWe had TV Guide, too, Jay--didn't everyone?--and I read it religiously!
DeleteI used to love Condé Nast Traveler! So much armchair traveling! I still get Westways through our AAA membership and Los Angeles magazine in print. For the most part the quick read, not too heavy niche has been filled by social media. Ugh!
ReplyDeleteI know, what a waste, right?
DeleteLisa, I hadn't really thought about how my "reading niche has been filled by social media" as you say. One thing I used to do was go to my local library and they have stacks of hundreds of magazines from the newest to older editions. Maybe I'll revisit that section.
DeleteWouldn't it be a treat to take some of that social media time and just go and sit in the magazine section of the library, and browse?
DeleteWhen I was growing up my parents subscribed to TIME, which I read cover to cover. My father was a foundation executive who helped DeWitt Wallace in his charitable giving and so we always had Reader's Digest, which I also loved. American Heritage, the magazine of U.S. history. National Geographic. TV Guide. Dad commuted to New York City so each weekday evening he would bring home his own NYT, plus often pick up the Post and Daily News for me. Those were the years of Watergate and Son of Sam and I followed both with forensic attention.
ReplyDeleteThese days my husband and I have online subscriptions to the NYT, the Washington Post, the Guardian U.S., The Atlantic, and the New Yorker. Though we had the NYT and the New Yorker earlier, we picked up the others during the first Trump years and have appreciated their political analysis. I second the endorsement of The Atlantic for their long-form investigations of contemporary issues. The only thing that comes in the mailbox is our local paper, which we are happy to support but sadly we often forget to open. (Selden)
I forgot to mention LOOK magazine. My earliest "reading" trauma was seeing the photographs of barely restrained police dogs leaping at teenagers during the Children's March of 1964. I was five.
DeleteOMG, that sounds terrifying Selden!
DeleteI'd love to subscribe to The Atlantic, at least online because I'm always seeing things I want to read but am blocked by the paywall.
DeleteGreat topic! Growing up we had Life, News week, and Time plus Mad Magazine, which we kids especially enjoyed. My sisters and I also subscribed to 17 for a while. Does anybody else remember cutting out a picture of a model with a certain haircut and taking it to the hairdresser, and then being terribly disappointed that you didn't come out looking like the model?
ReplyDeleteNow we subscribe to the Boston Globe and our local newspaper in print, and the New Yorker.. I occasionally go on binges subscribing to the print Alfred Hitchcock and Ellery Queen Mystery magazines, because I write short stories and enjoy reading them. But I always get too far behind and cancel my subscription. I'm honored to have been published several times in each!
Oh, all too many times with that haircut thing! Remember the Wedge, made famous by Dorothy Hamill? The inventor of the style just passed away, and I was thinking about when I had my hair that way. Or had an allover perm that just made me look like a poodle. Sigh.
DeleteWhen I was in third grade we moved into my aunt's house, while my uncle spent five years in Argentina working on nuclear power plants. My older boy cousins left all their magazines: Boy's Life, Mad, and a small mountain of comic books. I was in hog heaven! I'm sure part of my warped sense of humor stems from those days in fourth and fifth grades spent trying to make sense of Mad Magazine's zaniness!
I had both of those hairstyles Karen! Edith, I'd forgotten about Mad magazine. Our family used to put on shows from the stories in that magazine and made our parents sit through all of it:)
DeleteThis cracked me up, Edith!! Cutting out the hairstyle pictures!! What fun that was.
DeleteThe first magazine I ever subscribed to was Ingenue, when I was about 15. Cheryl Tiegs was about my age when she appeared on the cover. Later I read Seventeen, and even later, Glamour. Cosmo, of course, in the swinging 1970's, especially the horoscope issue! Then Psychology Today and Discover, the super cool science magazine, and later, National Geographic. I know, tectonic shift, right?
ReplyDeleteWe have subscribed to The New Yorker for 30 years--their long reporting is fantastic, but gave up on a bunch of others: Newsweek and Time, plus a bunch of single interest ones, like Threads and Sew News--both of which I wrote for at least once. I think Sew News is defunct; I actually looked for it at Joseph Beth last night. I have subscribed to Mother Earth, Fine Gardening, InStyle, and picked up a boatload of shelter-type magazines (house porn) while we were thinking of building a house.
Now most of our reading is online, except for The New Yorker, CostCo Connection, our Kentucky utility magazine (which is surprisingly interesting), and various university magazines: NYT, Washington Post (both of which are currently on probation with me), Rolling Stone, Mother Jones, The Atlantic, and The Guardian. My daughter promised to share her Economist subscription with me, but I haven't seen that password yet!
Ingenue!!! I'd forgotten that one, too! And of course Cosmo was SO sophisticated and it had articles about SEX! I felt so daring reading it.
DeleteGood ole Helen Gurley Brown. She revolutionized and empowered American women.
DeleteIf a magazine subscription is online, I don't read it - it gets lost in all the other open tabs on my laptop.
ReplyDeletePut a physical magazine in front of me at breakfast or lunch and I'm happy. REAL SIMPLE, HGTV, an occasional fashion magazine or the NEW YORKER.
My family shares subscriptions.
Yes, I have the same problem with the online stuff, Becky. So many open tabs, argh!! And I love reading the print mags at breakfast and lunch, too. It makes the meal seem like a treat.
DeleteGreat subject Debs!
ReplyDeleteI am on the lookout now for HGTV magazine, because lately I've been watching Unsellable Homes (with twins who sell homes in the Seattle area).
Hank was the magazine Cosmo?
I used to get subscriptions to Reader's Digest but now we get AARP, Westways, Nature, two alumni magazines (PAW and UCLA). I've been thinking lately about getting the Smithsonian.
PAW, is that Princeton? me too:)
DeleteYes Lucy! I love that magazine. It is one of my favorites. My husband is class of '65 so we are going to his 60th union this year. I know! I love seeing how the college as changed from all male (mostly white) students, to women, and now such amazing diversity.
DeleteI used to love magazines! Starting maybe when I was about 12 I read the magazines before my mother had a chance. In high school one of my career ideas was to work in a magazine test kitchen. It wasn't until I finished college and started teaching that I realized that wasn't going to happen.
ReplyDeleteThe only magazine I subscribe to now is Readers Digest and it is getting too hard to read. They insist on using white ink on colored portions of the page, not on every page, but enough to make reading it a chore.
Reading a magazine online has never appealed to me but I can see the advantages, particularly being able to enlarge the text. At my library now people can drop off magazines they have finished with and that is how I sometimes get to look at a People or Consumer Reports. Last week I got a real treat - someone let an older copy of Piecework, a magazine devoted to 'Preserving the Legacy of Needlework.' A very interesting article caught my eye - it was about the little doll that had been carried by an eight-year-old Donner Party survivor. All about how the doll was made and what the clothes were was fascinating. As were some of the other articles. It was much more than a how-to magazine.
Judi, I had to quit reading Cincinnati Magazine for the same reason. They literally used 6-point type, not just in captions, but in text, and with little contrast. Too much work, trying to read it.
DeleteI remember reading PEOPLE or HELLO magazine while waiting in the grocery checkout aisle.
ReplyDeleteI used to have a subscription to CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC magazine when I was studying geography at university.
Foodie magazine subscriptions have come and gone. FINE COOKING, BON APPETIT, EATING WELL. Many of them no longer exist, even online.
Also hard copy mystery fiction magazines have gone poof in recent years.
Goodbye to MYSTERY SCENE, DEADLY PLEASURES.
Grace, seeing your post about cooking magazines made me think about America's Test Kitchen Magazine. I cooked the recipes from it quite often and found that they always came out really well.
DeleteI never read the ATK magazine but I own several of their cookbooks!
DeleteI miss the mystery magazines, too, Grace.
DeleteI definitely miss Mystery Scene magazine. I think even the website is gone now too. And though it is online only, they are reviving Suspense magazine which I'm happy about.
DeleteI love magazines. I used to get US News and World Report, The Atlantic, Bon Appetit, Food and Wine, the New Yorker, National Geographic. Now it’s just The New Yorker, Milk Street, and Yankee Magazine in print, and both The Boston Globe and The Financial Times in print.
ReplyDeleteAll the usual: New Yorker and Atlantic plus on-line Washington Post and New York Times. I'm writing about fictional seventies MCM houses and a "butter yellow hundred-year old colonial" and will have to pick up some specialty magazines for reno and furnishing ideas. It's tricky--not authentic, not reproduction, but enough to convey the original spirit of the houses.
ReplyDeleteFor your MCM houses, you'll have to check out Jenn's recommended Atomic Ranch. I'm really intrigued by that one, even though I don't live in one and and MCM is not likely to feature in one of my books!
DeleteI had to google MCM and got... "Man Crush Mondays"! I'm sure it means something else.
DeleteNo more print magazines for me. I felt too guilty and oppressed by the stacks of magazines that I would never read. In the past, I subscribed to Mother Jones, the Utne Reader (which I think became Yes), and Baseball Digest. My son's Bridge Bulletin still arrives here regularly, although he's in Chicago. He says he reads it to see who died. I have an on-line subscription to The Atlantic, but I find downloading complete issues overwhelming, so I just read stories each day that are linked in The Atlantic Daily newsletter.
ReplyDeleteOh, I remember the Utne Reader! I took that, too!
DeleteSince 2019 it is digital only.
DeleteOh wow, thanks for this reminder Gillian. Growing up, when the internet didn't exist, the Basketball Digest, Football Digest and Baseball Digest magazines were a boon for this sportswriting fan. I even got a couple of letters printed in Basketball Digest. And that reminds me that I also read Pro Football Weekly for a number of years too.
DeleteThe reply directly above is actually mine. I got distracted at work when I was typing that reply and managed to type in Gillian's name rather than my own. ARGH!
DeleteYou do nit need to download articles from tbe Atlantic. Read all the articles from their app.
DeleteFaith Lang - Some of us are dating ourselves with what we used to read. :-) I'd forgotten TV Guide until one of you mentioned it! No print magazines...I am sure some of them would be lovely to have but frugality for reasons of finance and the planet prevent me. But maybe once in awhile....you've all go me thinking!!!
ReplyDeleteThat's a good point about the environmental impact of mailing magazines Faith.
DeleteOne solution to that and also to save money, is many libraries have magazine subscriptions they keep and generally back copies can be checked out. The current copies can be viewed at the library.
Growing up we had TIME, LIFE, and SEP. Because we lived on a farm, there were also various farming magazines. For a couple of years, some well-meaning relative gave my sister a subscription to AMERICAN HERITAGE while she was in high school; I doubt if she ever read it (being far more attuned to SEVENTEEN and the ilk) but I would occasionally glance at it. When i was twelve, my brother gave me a subscription to MAD magazine as a Christmas present but by that time MAD was but a pale imitation of its early issues. My mother would pick up TV GUIDE weekly, as well as occasional women's magazines.
ReplyDeleteIn my heart of hearts, magazines meant FICTION magazines and I would buy as many mystery and science fiction magazines as I could find: EQMM, HITCHCOCK, THE SAINT, MIKE SHAYNE, MANHUNT, AMAZING, ASTOUNDING/ANALOG, ASIMOV'S, GALAXY, IF, F&SF, FANTASTIC, and any of the quirky magazines that Bob Lowndes was editing on a shoestring (which is why I had the issue with Stephen King's first story). For a number of years I subscribed to about a dozen fiction magazines. Problems with mail delivery put a stop to most of that (especially with EQMM, HITCHCOCK, ANALOG, and ASIMOV'S: when those magazines moved to Dell Publications, delivery became erratic and fully one-quarter of the issues never arrived, and many of those that arrived came so late that I never knew when (or whether) I would get them; when I finally knew that an issue was not coming, I would contact the company, only to be told that all issue of what I was missing had been pulped but they would just add however many issues I missed to my subscription -- for an obsessive such as myself who wanted every issue I had been promised, this was just too much and let the subscriptions expire. I then took my chances on finding the monthly issues on newsstands, a task that became more and more difficult as time passed. Eventually I gave up on the fiction magazines altogether, buying only an occasional old copy if I ran into one at a thrift store. When OMNI stopped publishing, they move my subscription to DISCOVER, something I did not want. When Ed Gorman left MYSTERY SCENE, I renewed my subscription but never got a copy. I also tried subscribing to a number of smaller magazines but never received copies.
In the past, I subscribed to two major newspaper: the BOSTON GLOBE and the WASHINGTON POST, depending on where I was living. There is no major newspaper on the Florida Panhandle where I am now living and I greatly miss this. The local newspapers offer little and the community newspapers greatly lack the "sense of community" that I had found in other areas of the country.
Today I only subscribe to two magazines (I also get the AARP magazine every month, but it in essence, subscribe to me, rather than me to it): THE WEEK (which I find essential to my understanding of the world, thanks to its balanced reporting). and LOCUS (the newsletter of the science fiction community). Again, the problem with mail delivery here rises: THE WEEK is published on Fridays and I get my copy at any time time over the following week, and LOCUS comes out the first of each month and my copy will arrive anytime between the fifth of the month and the seventeenth (if I'm lucky); at least one in recent months my copy arrived a full month and a half late. (My subscription to LOCUS also comes with a digital subscription, but I find reading that -- or any other magazine or newspaper -- online to be cumbersome and frustrating. I have a deep-seated NEED to read physical copies.
Newsstands are completely different from when I was younger and are now festooned with special interest magazines that appear slick and glib, with little substance, and basically repeating articles about every five years because their readership changes about that often, or their readership has leaky memories. Admittedly, if I were a foodie or a crafter, I might have a different opinion but I'm not. I'm just an old curmudgeon yelling at those danged kids to get off of my lawn.
That is the problem with weekly news magazine and the speed of the news cycle these days, Jerry. We have that issue with our subscription to the Economist.
DeleteI do remember subscribing to Tiger Beat as a teen. I bought a subscription to Glamour(?) for The Girl. She loved looking at the fashion.
ReplyDeleteBut now? Not so much. The only magazine I read with any regularity is the alumni magazine from my college and that only comes once a quarter.
Hallie, I agree I loved all the well-mauled magazines in the various waiting rooms, and have been one of those horrible people who ripped out the recipe! I used to love the long stories in Redbook – does it still exist? We would sneak (well cruise through) the main waiting room in the Children’s hospital in the evenings when on shift, to see if there was a good magazine to be read ‘between tests’. It would be returned as we passed by the lobby on the way home. I was also one of those people who dropped off my home subscriptions to any and all waiting rooms.
ReplyDeleteAs for now – no subscriptions. My sister gets a few and we read them after she is finished. A friend in Book Club gives us her husband’s second hand – Cdn Geographic, Wildlife photography, History (boring), and they circulate through the bathroom reading rack and then recycling. When my sister was in hospital, a friend of hers gave her two gardening magazines. Talk about Garden-porn! Loved all the plants and flowers even if they could only be grown in California. Most of my reading now is done through the computer from the libraries – easy to download and I can zoom-in to see or read details. The Print Screen function lets me collect interesting looking recipes.
The reason for the library rather than a paper copy – I can read it. In the paper copy, the font is smaller and smaller, and often grey rather than black, and all the magazine-putter-togethers must be 20-year-olds with excellent sight as impossible to see in the small font and the colour-on-colour choices – pale yellow font on lime green background – nope can’t see that! Another case of just because you can, doesn’t mean you should!
Yesterday the libraries abandoned the use of Overdrive, and I fear that I have lost my audiobooks. I tried to download Libby to the computer, but let’s be reasonable here – it is really difficult to walk around and work with a CPU and a Monitor in your pocket. It said it had to be “mobile’, so I tried to load it on the i-pod, previous method. Apparently ipods are too dumb to install Libby – WHATTTTT? So tried it on my dumb iphone (6) which it accepted, BUT it then can’t find the library (s). Besides we don’t pay for data – have to do more research (and put up my blood pressure) today. Oh yes, and you need wifi earbug-things to hear it – no string and ear phones.
Maybe I will just rob a bank and get a subscription to Audible – at 15$ a book, it gets expensive quickly. At least they download to the ipod.
Thanks to whoever suggested Louisiana Longshot by Jana DeLeon – I laughed myself silly!
Oh, Margo, what a shame about Overdrive! But if you can manage it, I absolute love my Audible subscription. There is lots of free content, and they have sales on books and also sometimes on bundles of credits.
DeleteMargo, I think it was me who mentioned Louisiana Longshot! I not only enjoyed the humor of it, but love that it’s the beginning of a long series. I love when that happens!! — Pat S
DeleteI also recommended Jana Deleon. I just finished #25 and have two more left. You won’t be disappointed in the rest of the series. She finds new and different ways to keep the stories funny and unpredictable. I would have liked to read them more slowly so I could enjoy them longer but as soon as I’ve received one I can’t stop until I finish it.
DeleteMargo, I'm seeing this very late and you may never get this. But I have Libby on my iPhone 6 and just upgraded to a 7 and have it. Do you have a laptop? I can't deal with phones, so I entered all the information for Libby (libraries, library card number, etc.) on my laptop and then installed the app on the phone and presto, it was all transferred to my phone. (Selden)
DeleteFor many years I looked forward to receiving my monthly Architectural Digest magazine but sadly now it is filled with way too many advertisements and not enough features. It was difficult for me to finally stop subscribing but I did save some of their past issues because I loved their covers and related articles; i.e., Clint Eastwood and his Carmel -by -the-Sea home and Tehama Golf Club and their special "Hollywood At Home" issues which were filled with interesting articles about current and past "movie stars" such as Diane Keaton, Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Bob Hope, etc. It was always entertaining to see their selections of interior design over the decades. Although I no longer subscribe to AD I did buy its latest issue last month when it featured Jennifer Garner and her home. I also no longer subscribe to Martha Stewart Magazine but I still buy the Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas issues. The only magazines I subscribe to now is The Cottage Journal and Cape Cod Home. I love architecture and interior design and anything about gardening so current miscellaneous publications about those subjects usually find their way into my hands. Spending time in front of magazine racks for an hour or so in Barnes and Noble is a fun pastime for me while making my final selections.
ReplyDeleteI'm with you on that, Evelyn. I love spending time in the magazine section at B&N. The selection is fascinating!
DeleteMagazines! I loved them, and the scent that wafted out from the shiny pages. Don't know what it was, but it was unique. Alas, I no longer receive any. The last was Vanity Fair which I loved, but never seemed to have enough time to read.
ReplyDeleteYes, the scent of magazines, so evocative. Although the ones with the perfume ad inserts usually had to have those pulled asap.
DeleteMy friend Gigi had a random subscription to Vanity Fair in the last couple of years. When she'd read them, she'd pass them along to me and I enjoyed them.
I just remembered that when we were teenagers, my father added a bit of a newsstand/candy store area to the Store. Every time period - it varied as it could be weekly or monthly - magazines that were past their sell-buy date would be pulled. The idea was to rip off the front cover and return to the salesman for reimbursement, and the magazine was to go to the dump (no recycling then). My father would them bring home - the comics, magazines and pulp-fiction (Harlequin Romances). We would sort through the collection, read what we wanted and then the rest went off to the dump, dump, dump. (Technically it was illegal for us to have this 'literature' with no sale.)
ReplyDeleteIt was like Christmas every day - and I read a lot of things I would not have otherwise. There was always something to read at the breakfast table - oh, and in that other reading room with the porcelain furniture.
What a wonderful opportunity you had, Margo! A treasure trove indeed!
DeleteLove magazines still and currently don't subscribe to any. My main gripe with our local library is that the magazines we get are the same ones (but smaller selection) as the other library in our system. It would be great if the person in charge would tailor these to each community's tastes.
ReplyDeleteIn the past, budget allowing, I subscribed to a few magazines--Bon Appetit, Tricyle: the Buddhist Review, Poets & Writers, and Archaeology. As a kid, I read any magazine I could get my hands on.
I love your selections, Flora. All of those I would like to read!
DeleteAt Christmas every year I scour the magazine racks at b&n and pick out a few interesting ones for my kids. They make great gifts. I no longer subscribe to any, but I do miss my Gourmet Magazine.
ReplyDeleteYes, me, too. They folded in 2009.
DeleteOh, memories! Growing up, we subscribed to Reader's Digest, Time, Life, and Nat Geo, which my grandmother and I adored and would read together every month. My three month older boy cousin had a subscription to MAD when we were teenagers and now that's what I associate so strongly with him. My teenage treasures weree Seventeen and Glamour. Glamour now, sadly, is online only. They stopped their print edition in 2019.
ReplyDeleteYoung adult and post college it was mostly foodie; Food and Wine, Bon Appetit, and Gourmet. Oh, how I loved Gourmet. That was in the Laurie Colwin days, and I enjoyed as much for the writing as the food. Also Smithsonian. Why did I drop that, I wonder? I may, if I can cancel Rolling Stone, subscribe again.
Oh, and my mom took Prevention for years.
DeleteAnd I forgot the early writing years! Writer's Digest!
DeleteWriter's Digest was always so interesting. Loads of great articles and interviews.
DeleteI forgot about National Geo, a mainstay in my childhood home, and Ms. during my grad school years. One year my mother's only sibling gave us a subscription to Prevention, which nobody really wanted, but my mom didn't have the heart to tell her baby sister we would rather not have it.
DeleteAs a child we had an annual subscription for National Geographic gifted every year. I can't remember who sent it , maybe my Dad's parents. Sunset magazine covered travel and cooking. Grandma had Good Housekeeping on the coffee table. And catalogs. Clothing catalogs.
ReplyDeleteI used to buy Sunset in the grocery store when an issue looked interesting, and I still have some of the specialty cookbook issues they put out.
DeleteMy very first magazine subscription was a Walt Disney comic book thing my mom found for my aunt to give me. I was about seven, I think, and loved it! I moved onto Tiger Beat, which I also loved. My husband bought me my first subscription to People magazine when we were dating which I have had ever since, though I have made the decision to not renew it when it expires in January. Over the years I’ve had subscriptions to Newsweek, Smithsonian, TV Guide, Utne Reader and many more. Right now the only print magazines we get are our alumni magazine, AARP, Westways (AAA’s magazine), Costco and Vanity Fair (the latter is my husband’s subscription; after his mother died, he transferred it to his name/address and has continued to subscribe). I get online subscriptions to WaPo and The NY Times when there’s a good deal. During the first Trump Administration, I read both of those religiously. Perhaps I need to see what kind of deals are being offered currently. — Pat S
ReplyDeleteWhat a timely post! I have just been going through some boxes in my garage and have a ton of magazines I have saved - Gourmet, Bon Appetite, Country Living and Cooking Light. I have copied recipes I want to try and then am donating the magazines to Goodwill. I hope others can enjoy them as much as I have. I don't cook too much but love to bake. And, there's nothing better as a way to cut calories than just reading recipes. I can imagine what they taste like without the calories! I also have some Good Housekeeping magazines from the 1950's which I will keep. To read the ads for women are so funny and unbelievable such as how to keep yourself fresh and clean (douche with Lysol!!) to keep your husband from straying! And, all the women are wearing high heels and aprons in the kitchen.
ReplyDeleteLysol, seriously?? Ack!!!!
DeleteLoved the magazines in England. Somehow their version of our women's magazines seemed better, though.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, I never seem to have time to read the NEW YORKER magazines and I have stacks after stacks of magazines. I glanced through them and put aside those with articles that I wanted to read. It helped me whittle down the stacks.
These days the only magazines I want to read are CONSUMER REPORTS and the newsletter NUTRITION ACTION.
When I was growing up, we subscribed to numerous magazines, some for for my parents and some for for us kids. I couldn’t begin to list them all. In addition to our local newspaper which was delivered to us, we read about three or four other newspapers that my dad picked up on his lunch break, and then brought home. A number of those newspapers no longer exist. My grandmother (my mom’s mother) always had magazines for kids at her house. She had Highlights, Jack and Jill, some that I can’t remember, and Mad Magazine! (She also had lots of comic books!)
ReplyDeleteI do subscribe to some print publications, and I have an online subscription to the New York Times. I’ve been mulling over getting an online subscription to the Washington Post. I subscribe to some publications that are online only.
Once a week I go to the library and read some magazines that I can’t afford to subscribe to, or used to receive. I’ll borrow any that I don’t have time to read at the library. I cut back on print publications in order to reduce some of the clutter here at home.
DebRo
The whole idea of a "woman's magazine" (like Redbook or Good Housekeeping or Ladies Home Journal) has gone by the wayside. Now it's about food or fashion or sports... Interesting to see so mamy people mention Atlantic. Where I used to read Consumer Reports now I read the New York Times WIRECUTTER. And in place of Gourmet Magazine, New York Times FOOD. Surely there's MORE stuff out there, just in different formats.
ReplyDeleteApparently Women's World is still going strong, Hallie! Sometime commenter Kait Carson just sold a short story to them, and my publisher gets ads and short features in there for my books.
DeleteI used to read Women's World religiously (bought at grocery checkout!) and if I remember I even submitted a couple of short stories, although they weren't accepted. What a fun reminder!
DeleteYes, Hallie, Wirecutter and NYT Food are my go-tos as well. I LOVE my NYT Recipe Box. I made Pasta Amatriciana from that last night and it got a big thumbs up!
DeleteHallie, I had Wirecutter included in my NYT subscription that I let lapse when my deal expired. I did, however, subscribe to Consumer Reports online when we were remodeling our house so I could get recommendations for appliances. I do still have that subscription. — Pat S
DeleteMagazines that came to our home when I was a kid: Newsweek, Look, Saturday Evening Post, Redbook, McCall's (ruined by Rosie O'Donnell), Ladies Home Journal, Boys Life, Jack & Jill, Calling All Girls, National Geographic TV Guide. I started reading Cosmo in college and kept at it until I was married and got tired of the gushy breathless style of writing. I used to take Smithsonian, Texas Highways, and Texas Monthly but let them run out. I just don't read magazines like I used to. Right now I get Southern Living and Garden & Gun, both regional magazines. I may or may not renew.
ReplyDeleteRedbook used to have an all fiction issue every August. That was wonderful!
Pat, I think I submitted to Redbook, too. Of course in those days I had no idea what on earth I was writing. Very atmospherice pieces with zero plot, most likely.
DeleteTexas Monthy was one of the sponsers of the Rice program I took. They were such a big deal in those days.
I forgot about Good Housekeeping and Reader's Digest. It seemed like GH had an article about Princess Di every issue
DeleteCalling All Girls was a big one when I was a child. Forgot about that! (Did that have the article “Boy, was my face red” about embarrassing moments? I remember that one in particular.)
DeleteI had subscriptions to a number of magazines in the past, but for various reasons no longer read them. I liked Good Housekeeping for their articles, columns and some of their fiction. They had a gingerbread house competition at Christmas time where readers would submit pictures of their creations and I always enjoyed the creativity of the contestants.
ReplyDeleteThere was also the GH guarantee which featured their doing a Consumer Report type analysis of different products and then would recommend and stand by the products they felt lived up to their ads.
I no longer read the magazine because they have changed their focus, the columns I liked are gone as is the fiction and a number of other features I liked.
I used to read several financial and business magazines, Time, Discover even the women’s supermarket magazines. A lot of them have discontinued publication, gone on line or don’t provide the same amount of content or cut back on the number of issues they publish.
I was particularly disappointed in the size of magazines such as Time and Discover both of which I would read from cover to cover even when some of the articles might not have not been about subjects that I wouldn’t ordinarily read. It would take several hours to read each of them because I was always learning something new and there were a lot of subjects I discovered.
Now the content is a fraction of what it was and I can probably finish the two of them together in an hour or less. I don’t read either one regularly.
Approximately 10 to 0.
That's so disappointing...
DeleteIt was the reduction in “meaty” material that made me decide not to renew my subscription to Time. I miss what it used to be.
DeleteDebRo
I was at the main branch of the recently remodeled Cincinnati Public Library this morning. While wandering around to admire the changes I found the periodicals section, which is really nice. They have two long walls of magazines, 20-25' long each, at right angles, with four shelves of materials. Lots of nice seating nearby, too, including to an outdoor area.
ReplyDeleteApropos of this conversation!
I will have to check out our library's periodical section, Karen.
DeleteHank, do you mean More magazine? Some years back they did a wonderful aricle on Jaime Lee Curtis showing her before and after all the fixing up she gets for pictures. Really pointed out how unreasonable it is to devalue yourself because of "famous" people's pictures.
ReplyDeleteI get several food magazine still.
My husband's favorite is The Week.
MORE!! Yes, yes yes, that's exactly right. Thank you!
DeleteWe had an assortment of magazine subscriptions when the kids had to sell them for fundraisers. The one I held onto the longest was Readers’Digest. I loved Highlights growing up and had that for my kids too. Who can forget the stacks of National Geographics that we weren’t allowed to cut out of?
ReplyDeleteAnd you all remind me of Mystery Scene, which I used to love (and write for!). SO sad that it went away.
ReplyDeleteSo say all of us who read and/or got the thrill of writing for them!
DeleteOne of my favorite things about flying used to be buying a few magazines before boarding, with The New Yorker always being one of them. Vanity Fair was usually in there, too, and as my on I felt I needed to hide was the least sophisticated People. I think I'm still subscribed to Vanity Fair online and maybe Mental Floss and The Atlantic. Oh, I also get a magazine, The Kentucky Monthly, in the mail, since one of my longest and best friends often has an article in it. I've given up on house decorating and food magazines.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up, I think my first magazine was Tiger Beat, like Lucy. Then came Seventeen, and in college the infamous Cosmopolitan. That's one I didn't read at home. My mother subscribed to magazines such as Good Housekeeping and Redbook and Reader's Digest and Life. She had save all the Life magazines, and when we were going through my parents belongings, there were stacks of them in the basement. I too a good-sized stack, and I need to look through them again to see what I have. I remember one on Marilyn Monroe. What a history of our country that magazine was.
Yes, wasn't it? I wonder if those old issues are valuable now?
DeleteLove magazines, although I try hard not to subscribe these days. Downsizing and need desperately to do Swedish death cleaning. But always had them growing up, National Geographic, fashion mags, movie mags, etc. My recent glossy favorites were something called 1900 and Bungalow, but don't think they are still publishing. I subscribe online to the NY Times, and was thinking of getting ones for the LA Times and Washington Post, but due to the craven anticipatory silencing of the latter two I nixed that idea. Julia's idea of The Atlantic seems like a good substitute. I also adore Adirondack Life.
ReplyDeleteOh, I LOVED American Bungalow! (since I live in one!) I used to buy it in the bookstore but never had a subscription. Oh, dear, it looks like it stopped publishing in 2023. How sad. It was such a cool magazine.
DeleteI used to love them. Now, I get just one, three times a year. Canadian Quilter. Because...Quilting!
ReplyDeleteI subscribe to several magazines. Time, Vanity Fair, People, Smithsonian, Town and Country, Britain-the official magazine, Discover Britain, Bay Area Consumer’s Checkbook, several dog related ones, Consumer Reports & their On Health, Nutrition Action and several health journals.
ReplyDeleteI still subscribe to Consumer Reports, TV Guide, and Cooks Illustrated along with Tufts New England Medical Center Nutrition Newsletter and Harvard Women’s Health. That is it for print. Online, I get my local newspaper paper as the price for the print copy went up to over $1000 per year for a delivered subscription. There are enough emails that fall into my inbox from places that I could subscribe to, so why bother! Alicia Kullas
ReplyDeleteI grew up on magazines, National Geo, Readers Digest, McCall’s, etc. Our family doctor had all the glossies; Cosmopolitan before it went Helen Gurley Brown, British Punch and The New Yorker where I picked up a life long love of cartoonists like William Hamilton, Searle, Thelwell. Doctors visits were a treat because of this!
ReplyDelete