• Congratulations to the winners of the city's Civic Partner grants, which are selected by the Office of Arts and Culture. You can read more about the grants at Capitol Hill Seattle and find a list of all the recipients here, but Seattle-area literary organizations recieving grant money includes APRIL, Arcade magazine, Book-It Repertory Theatre, Clarion West, Copper Canyon Press, Floating Bridge Press, Hedgebrook, Jack Straw Foundation, Lit Crawl Seattle, Hugo House, Seattle Arts and Lectures, The Raven Chronicles, and Town Hall Seattle. Grants range anywhere from a couple hundred bucks to tens of thousands of dollars.

• The New York Library Association has added a few names to its Writers Hall of Fame. The living recipients are Roger Angell, Roz Chast, Samuel R, Delany, and Stephen Sondheim. Deceased recipients include Maya Angelou, Jean Craighead George, Don Marquis, and Grace Paley.

• Delightful weird fiction publisher Small Beer Press has published a lovely blog post celebrating the fact that two Small Beer titles have been chosen as staff recommendations by Christina at Ravenna Third Place Books. "It’s pretty great as a publisher on (near!) the east coast to see our books as staff picks on the west coast," the post explains. Seattle loves Small Beer titles; if they ever look into leaving Massachusetts, we think they'd be a great fit here in our city.

• President Obama has nominated a new Librarian of Congress. Hopefully, those ninnies in the Senate won't delay the process the way they're threatening to delay the Supreme Court nomination. On Facebook, Obama writes,

Today, I'm nominating Dr. Carla Hayden to be our 14th Librarian of Congress. Michelle and I have known Carla since her days working at the Chicago Public Library, and her dedication to learning and education is unparalleled. More recently, she's been hard at work revitalizing Baltimore’s struggling library system as the CEO of Enoch Pratt Free Library. Last year, during the unrest in Baltimore, Dr. Hayden kept the doors of the Pratt open as a beacon for the community. Her understanding of the pivotal role that emerging technologies play in libraries will be essential in leading the Library of Congress as it continues to modernize its infrastructure and promote open access and full participation in today's digital world. Finally, Dr. Hayden will be the first woman and the first African-American to hold this position in its 214 year history – both of which are long overdue.