What Is Short Story Month and Why Is It in May? Carolina Ciucci digs into the origin and history of Short Story Month, with some reading suggestions and links to information about the short story as a literary form. Categories: Literary History, Writing As the Supreme Court Weighs Roe vs. Wade, These Novels Offer Perspective […]
How Literature Depicts the Chinese Cultural Revolution Here’s an engaging article that illustrates one of the major themes of Life Stories in Literature: how dominant—and dominating—societies control the historical narrative and attempt to erase the voices of individuals and marginalized groups. Dee Das writes: When we talk about the Chinese Cultural Revolution, we mostly zoom
Introduction Here are two more novels I read in April. Since almost all of the books on my TBR shelf now relate to Life Stories in Literature, it’s not surprising that they share many of the same themes. In his 2020 novel The Boy from the Woods, Coben introduced Wilde, who had been found living
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This was the Top Ten Tuesday topic for March 29, 2022, but it grew into such a big topic for me that I didn’t complete it on time. Today’s topic is Books with [___] On the Cover, but since I’m not much into covers I’m substituting this one instead. Introduction When I began to think
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Over the Past 25 Years, the Big Publishers Got Bigger—and Fewer A report from Publishers Weekly: As 2022 began, the U.S. trade publishing business was dominated by what has been called the Big Five—Simon & Schuster, Penguin Random House, HarperCollins, Hachette Book Group, and Macmillan. Before the Penguin–Random House merger in 2013, that group was
Let’s call April mystery book month. Here’s what I’d read. At the Malice Domestic convention April 22 to 24, devotees of traditional mysteries will present the Agatha Awards. On April 28 the Mystery Writers of America will hand out the annual Edgar Awards. Therefore, Michael Dirda asks, “Shouldn’t April be designated National Mystery Month?” He continues
Falling by T.J. Newman Simon & Schuster, 2021Hardcover, 304 pagesISBN 978-1-9821-7788-1 When Bill Hoffman arrives at Los Angeles International Airport to pilot Coastal Airways flight 416 to New York, he expects a routine day. It’s not until the plane is in the air that he learns today will be anything but routine. When he receives
Ngaio Marsh I read a lot of mysteries as well as a lot about mysteries, and Ngaio Marsh is one of the names of mystery writers that comes up most often. I’m therefore embarrassed to admit that I’ve never read any of her books, especially because she is known as one of the four “Queens
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Celebrate National Poetry Month with these 6 books April is National Poetry Month. Launched by the Academy of American Poets in 1996, National Poetry Month has become one of the largest literary celebrations in the world, reminding us that poetry is an art form for everybody. Categories: Reading, Writing Kafka the hypochondriac “Franz Kafka believed
This week is a freebie, which means we get to come up with our own topic. I tend to think that writers, like most people, get better at what they do with practice. Over the years I’ve read a number of debut novels that I found particularly striking because they demonstrate a high level of
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