Fiction

Monday Miscellany

Breakfast with Dr. Seuss                       In honor of the upcoming movie The Lorax, green eggs and ham at IHOP Dmitri Nabokov, Steward of Father’s Literary Legacy, Dies at 77 Dmitri Nabokov, the son of Vladimir Nabokov, who tended to the legacy of his father with […]

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Monday Miscellany

Because I was sick for much of last week, this week’s entry is short. Stories don’t need morals or messages Salon’s Laura Miller caused a flurry of comments recently with this article about a post on the New York Times education blog. In that post the parents of twins talked about taking their kids’ third-grade

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“V” Is for Vengeance by Sue Grafton

Grafton, Sue. “V” Is for Vengeance (2011)Putnam, $27.95 hardcover   ISBN10: 0399157867   Audiobook by Random House Audio. Narrated by Judy Kaye  While shopping at a department store, Kinsey witnesses a woman obviously stealing some expensive merchandise. She reports what she has seen to a store clerk, who then notifies security. Kinsey hangs around to

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New Material Added to Notes in the Margin

Yesterday I added the following new material: The Sue Grafton Page The Dennis Lehane Page The Minette Walters Page Most of this material is actually “old” notes that I’m just now getting around to posting after moving the site. But the review of “V” Is for Vengeance by Sue Grafton really is new.

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Monday Miscellany

Happy New Year! Novels and Television Recent news that HBO plans to adapt the works of William Faulkner for television has prompted critical discussion of the suitability of novels for this kind of medium translation. “The novel and television are commingling as never before. And it’s about time,” declares Laura Miller in TV and the novel:

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“Still Alice” by Lisa Genova

Genova, Lisa. Still Alice   Simon & Schuster, 2008   ISBN: 1439116881  Simon & Schuster Audio.  Narrated by the author Highly Recommended As the book opens, Alice Howland, Ph. D., a cognitive psychologist at Harvard, works on a peer-review evaluation of an academic paper submitted for publication in a scientific journal. She is disturbed by

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2011: The Literary Year in Review

It’s New Year’s Eve, a good time to look back on what’s happened in the literary world this year. Here are two more “best books” lists I think I’ve missed, NPR’s choices of The Best Music Books of 2011 and 2011’s Best American Poetry. Britain’s The Telegraph provides comprehensive coverage in The Literary Year 2011.

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Monday Miscellany

If your life is anything like mine, you’re swamped right about now with holiday preparations and festivities. This week’s installment of Monday Miscellany, therefore, will be mercifully short. An Introduction to Psych You Up. Literally. Maria Konnikova is a woman after my own heart. At Scientific American she has just introduced her new column, Literally

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The Snowman by Jo Nesbø

The Snowman by Jo Nesbø My rating: 3 of 5 stars Although I did find the story compelling, the beginning of this book really dragged for me. I imagine the slow, drawn-out opening might not be such a problem for Norwegian readers who have followed Harry Hole through the 6 previous novels, but coming in

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Monday Miscellany

When novels change history As with so many concepts in literature, the French have an elegant word for it: uchronie. For Anglophone readers and writers, we have to make do with such unwieldy terms as “counterfactual novels”, “alternate timelines” and “allohistories” to describe these books. Uchronie is a neologism modelled on Utopia – a “no-time”

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