Lessons in Curating. Lessons in Culture. (Free subscription) | yesterday
TEN authors from the most recent "Best of," lists at the New York Times have read at Happy Ending! Congratulations, everyone! 'The Invention of Air: A Story of Science, Faith, Revolution, and the Birth of America' By STEVEN JOHNSON 'The Song is You." By ARTHUR PHILLIPS 'Do Not Deny Me: Stories' By JEAN THOMPSON 'Don’t Cry: Stories' By MARY GAITSKILL 'Everything Ravaged, Everything...
Perpetual Folly (Free subscription) | yesterday
Here's the list of the New York Times 100 Notable Books of the Year . Surprises? I'm happy to see Brad Leithauser's new book, The Art Student's War , but I didn't know it was out yet. The review will appear on Nov. 27. There are a bunch of short story collections, including those by Wells Tower, Jean Thompson, Daniyal Mueenuddin, Aleksandr Hemon, John Updike, Kazuo Ishiguro, Antonya Nelson, Paul Yoon,...
MediaBistro.com (Free subscription) | 11/24/2009
Sick of political memoirs yet? Get revenge at New York magazine with the Political Fictions Contest . Between now and Dec. 7, the magazine is accepting short stories, movie treatments, or mini one-act plays about real life political figures--Washington DC fan fiction. The contest will help promote the new issue's short political fictions by writers like Mary Gaitskill and Paul Rudnick . The best stories...
Iron Caisson (Free subscription) | 11/15/2009
I am all for spreading the good word about Great Books by Women that Publisher's Weekly Missed in 2009 , but for some reason Guerrilla Girls on Tour (not to be confused with Guerrilla Girls ) published the open-edit WILLA wiki list as their own. And sans link, so readers don't know they can add their own titles. W-e-i-r-d. They tell us they'll give WILLA a shout out tomorrow, but in the meantime, I...
The Huffington Post (Free subscription) | 11/11/2009
Some people think that models aren't so smart...but think again! Models like Alek Wek, Irina Pantaeva and Jillian Shanebrook are accomplished authors, so much so that they'll soon be the subject of a course at Princeton. Next semester, the university will offer "Model Memoirs: The Life Stories of International Fashion Models." Here's the course description from the registrar's website : Explores...
MediaBistro.com (Free subscription) | 11/06/2009
With over 2.3 million Americans currently incarcerated, prison outreach is a vital vocation. Today's guest on the Morning Media Menu was Jackson Taylor , the novelist and Mediabistro teacher who has directed PEN's Prison Writing Program for the last 20 years. Taylor shared his experiences working with hundreds of imprisoned authors and creative writing mentors. The writing program will be celebrated...
MediaBistro.com (Free subscription) | 11/06/2009
Today's guest on the Morning Media Menu was Jackson Taylor , the novelist and Mediabistro teacher who has directed PEN's Prison Writing Program for the last 20 years. Taylor shared his experiences working with hundreds of imprisoned authors and creative writing mentors. The writing program will be celebrated on Monday at Breakout: Voices from Inside --a fundraising event with appearances by Mary Gaitskill...
The Written Nerd (Free subscription) | 11/04/2009
I don't often include pitches for others' events on this blog, but I've been thinking lately about the necessity of giving back, in light of all the support I've received for my own dreams. If you're a New Yorker, consider attending this event on Monday -- it's a great literary lineup, and a shot at hope for those most in need of it. The Jerome L. Greene Performance Space at WNYC Presents BREAKOUT:...
MediaBistro.com (Free subscription) | 11/02/2009
As another Monday winds down, here are some odds and ends from the day's publishing news... Next week, Mary Gaitskill , Eric Bogosian , John Turturro , and others will read from stories written by inmates for PEN's Prison Writing Program . Author Stephen Fry defended Twitter and the Internets in a video interview about a generation of kids growing up online. In a True Slant interview about "...
Maud Newton (Free subscription) | 11/02/2009
John Turturro, Mary Gaitskill, and Eric Bogosian gather Monday, 11/9, to read works from PEN’s Prison Writing Program.
Emdashes (Free subscription) | 10/20/2009
Pollux writes : This year marked my first ever New Yorker festival. It was also my first time in New York City, unless I'm counting a stopover on the way to South America and the time I was there to mark my second birthday. More momentous than my second birthday, which involved plucking buds off a large potted plant in a hotel lobby, was my introduction to my first event at the festival: short story...
Emdashes (Free subscription) | 10/17/2009
Emily Gordon writes : We're in full Festival mode , Paul went back to his hotel just to draw about the Mary Gaitskill and T. C. Boyle event , and we're tweeting like the mid-flight rockin' robins we are, but in between bites of our hors d'oevres, you're going to want some equally tasty tapas, and that you can find at the official Festival blog , at which the co-author of our soon-to-be-upgraded-to-first-class...
Of Books and Bicycles (Free subscription) | 10/16/2009
I finished this book about a week ago and have thought of it off and on since then, and I’m still not entirely sure what I want to say about it. There were times when I thought it was incredibly moving and insightful, times when I thought it dragged a bit, times when I [...]
East Bay View (mostly a food blog) (Free subscription) | 10/12/2009
Not a pure response to this , since my working definition of "of the decade" is more flexible. Though the Brits are overrepresented (too much reading of the Guardian) my list is more internationalist than the Millions list, plus I like some picture books a lot. Comics aside, there's very little genre fiction on the list: I find it hard to work out what's worth reading, as recommendations,...
Sound of the City (Free subscription) | 09/14/2009
We could tell you that this recording is from yesterday's day-ending, valedictory finale to the Brooklyn Book Festival, at which Don't Cry (and "Secretary") author Mary Gaitskill politely ...
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