I came across so many interesting articles this week that it’s hard to limit my list. Here are some of my favorites. On the Centennial of Iris Murdoch’s Birth, Remembering a 20th-Century Giant The intensity of Murdoch’s gaze, boring into you from the dust jackets of her many novels, seemed a promise of the books’ […]
Here are some of the articles that got me thinking over the past week. On Impact Stephen King experienced (celebrated doesn’t seem like the appropriate word) an anniversary last week: 20 years since the automobile accident that nearly killed him. He wrote this article for The New Yorker a year after the accident. The Weird,
These are some of the literature-related articles from around the web that caught my eye over the past week. Quartzy HALF OF ALL TRANSLATED BOOKS IN THE US COME FROM JUST NINE COUNTRIES This one caught my eye because I’m trying to read more books translated from other languages this year. The good news:
Preparing the annual list of people from the writing whom we lost over the year is the least favorite of my year-end blogging tasks. Rereading the list always painfully takes my breath away. Ursula K. Le Guin, 1/22 Barbara Wersba, 2/18 Lisa Garcia Quiroz, 3/16 Philip Kerr, 3/23 Anita Shreve, 3/29 Drue Heinz, 3/30 Sergio
Remembering Those We Lost in 2018 Read More »
Ten years ago, the arrival of the recession combined with Amazon’s deep discounts seemed to herald the end for independent bookstores. But in the past few years they’ve made an improbable comeback. At Third Place Books, which opened its first store 20 years ago, the key to success is community. Source: Seattle bookstores were doomed.
Fall is the time for “big books,” whatever the page length, and some of the top fiction authors from around the world have new works coming, including Ian McEwan, Zadie Smith, Margaret Atwood, T. Coraghessan Boyle, Rabih Alameddine, Emma Donoghue, Jonathan Safran Foer and Michael Chabon. Ann Patchett, owner of Parnassus Books in Nashville, Tennessee,
Rich season of fiction expected this fall Read More »
From a new novel by Julian Barnes to the film of The Girl on the Train, from the most hotly tipped debuts to Henning Mankell’s farewell essays – everything you need to know about the literary year ahead Source: Books in 2016: a literary calendar Calendar contains dates for appearances in the U.K.
Books in 2016: a literary calendar Read More »
As e-book sales remain stalled at some 25 percent of the market, hardcovers and paperbacks held steady at a time digital has upended the music, film and television industries. Source: From coloring books to Harper Lee, a good year for the physical book | The Seattle Times
From coloring books to Harper Lee, a good year for the physical book | The Seattle Times Read More »
10 Famous Authors’ Favorite TV Shows In an era when it’s impossible to open a web browser without stumbling across another “Is television the new novel?” piece, we couldn’t help but wonder, Carrie Bradshaw-style, just what our favorite writers watch in their spare time. See what shows the following authors like: Zadie Smith S.E. Hinton
On Novels and Novelists Read More »
E. L. Doctorow, The Art of Fiction No. 94 Novelist E.L. Doctorow, who died recently, participated in this interview with George Plimpton that was published in the winter 1986 issue of The Paris Review. Here’s a quotation from Doctorow that I particularly like: One of the things I had to learn as a writer was
On Novels and Novelists Read More »
