Earlier this month, I told you how Neil Gaiman asked readers to choose which of his novels publisher HarperCollins would post online, at no cost to readers. The decision to post a full novel online is part of a larger effort by the publisher to test the waters of online distribution

Gaiman announced American Gods a few weeks ago as the title chosen by fans in a fairly one-sided poll, and offered some thoughts about the selection.

I don’t think I would have put up American Gods as a first choice for free book myself — mostly because a) it’s really long and b) it divides people. As far as I can tell, for every five people who read it, one loves it utterly, two or three like it to varying degrees, and one hates it, cannot see the point to it and needs convincing that it’s a novel at all. (Quite often the last person really likes some of the other books I’ve written, if they ever pick up anything else by me ever again.) But that’s the fun of democracy, and American Gods has won more awards than any other single thing I’ve written.

This week, the novel went online in its entirety, presented within a beta-version "Browse Inside" reader on the HarperCollins website. While the presentation looks manageable at first glance, the trial run isn’t without its share of quirks.

Loading time is significant at the start, and fast readers will probably be discouraged by the delay as each new page is loaded into the reader. The pages are displayed as images of the actual novel’s pages, instead of text documents, and there doesn’t seem to be any way to magnify the images for easier reading. Readers also need to read the entire novel on the HarperCollins site, as there isn’t any downloadable version available.

BoingBoing’s Cory Doctorow had this to say about HarperCollins’ grand experiment which, I believe, sums up my own impressions of both the project and concerns about its future implications:

Unfortunately, the "security" has also undermined the experiment’s value as a tool for getting better intelligence about the market. This isn’t going to cost Neil any sales, but it’s also not going to buy him any. We take our books home and read them in a thousand ways, in whatever posture, room, and conditions we care to. No one chains our books to our desks and shows us a single page at a time. This experiment simulates a situation that’s completely divorced from the reality of reading for pleasure. As an experiment, this will prove nothing about ebooks either way.

If any one outcropping of the cultural skyline of Fort Worth, Texas, can be said to state a case for a Bold New Millennium, it is the 2002 landmark address of the Modern Art Museum, designed by the architect Tadao Ando as a sculptural statement in itself. The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth is at once the oldest such museum in Texas – chartered in 1892 – and handily the newest in aspect. I spend a great deal of time there for both workaday and leisurely purposes: The Modern’s art-film theatre is descended from an imports-and-independents movie program that I developed during 1996–2002 at one of the downtown movie houses, and my jazz trio performs at the Modern as a matter of routine. Full disclosure, and all that.

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Arnold Drake was born on this day in 1924. Drake was best known for his work on Deadman and Doom Patrol but he also co-created the 1950 picture book It Rhymes with Lust, which may many consider the first American graphic novel. Drake also wrote the screenplay for a 1964 horror movie, The Flesh Eaters. Sadly, Drake died on March 12 of last year.

Joyce Brabner was born on March 1, 1952. A writer of political comics, she collaborated with her second husband, Harvey Pekar, on his series American Splendor and on the Harvey Award-winning graphic novel Our Cancer Year. Brabner also worked with Alan Moore and Bill Sienkiewicz on the anthology Brought to Light. She edited the anthology but wrote one of the two stories, Flashpoint: The La Penca Bombing.

Did you know that in the English speaking world, there’s a tradition that women may propose marriage on leap years? Yep. Surprise!

While it has been argued that the tradition was initiated by Saint Patrick or Brigid of Kildare in 5th century Ireland, it is dubious as the tradition has not been attested before the 19th century. Supposedly, a 1288 law by Queen Margaret of Scotland (then age five and living in Norway), required that fines be levied if a marriage proposal was refused by the man; compensation ranged from a kiss to a pound (money, nothing kinky– they didn’t have S&M in the 13th century) to a silk gown, in order to let the girl down easy.

Because men felt that put them at too great a risk, the tradition was in some places tightened to restricting female proposals to the modern leap day, February 29.

In modern times, of course, we knows this as Sadie Hawkins Day, made famous by the denizens of Dogpatch in Li’l Abner— although that takes place in mid-November, one can never be too careful when being chased by dames. You’ve all been warned.

Here’s a good illustration of the difference between subjectifying and objectifying comic book characters. 

On the one hand, io9 reports on a paper published by feminist comics blogger Karen Healey (who’s writing a dissertation on the fan culture of American superhero comics) and Terry Johnson on the Comparative Sex-Specific Body Mass Index (BMI) in the Marvel Universe and the “Real” World. 

As you might expect, the BMI range for the fictional women is much less varied and more unrealistic than the other three groups (fictional men, real men, real women), particularly if these characters are supposed to be athletes.  You can think up any in-story explanations you want, but they only cover up the limited range (or imagination) of many artists who draw these characters.

On the other hand, there’s DC’s iconic female character Wonder Woman.  Seen here as portrayed by Lynda Carter and as part of the newly-revealed Alex Ross cover for the book The Age of TV Heroes, to be published in November by Two Morrows, WW has certainly had her share of objectification and questionable storylines, even from her inception.

But she’s also been more of the subject of her own story than any other female comic book character, inspiring not only countless feminists but avid collectors as well. One of them, Kyall Coulton, has created an entire site of WW memorabilia, The Ultimate Wonder Woman Collector’s Guide.  The site currently features over 1200 items, the largest online index of its kind, as well as short biographies of participating collectors.  And the categories!  Everything from original art to jewelry, bedding, food items, clocks and watches, even cookie jars!  (If you’re seeking contributor Joel Thingvall’s famed WW gallery of original and commissioned art, it’s accessible from the links page.)  You can even enter a trivia competition to win a memorabilia pack! 

Recent coverage by the NY Times and other mass media can only inspire more collectables to come.