Out of a field of 73 books, the Story Prize has announced its finalists for 2008: Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri (Alfred A. Knopf) Demons in the Spring by Joe Meno (Akashic Books) Our Story Begins by Tobias Wolff (Alfred A. Knopf) I am surprised by the Joe Meno nomination, but also delighted because […]
I used to enjoy the LA Weekly on a regular basis — consult it for book readings, check out the interviews of literary folk and/or original fiction in its pages, find out how local politicians were squandering money and cultivating corruption. But alas, as Marc Cooper describes in great detail in LA Weekly: The Autopsy […]
The New York Times has an lively, quote-filled and entertaining article in the recently created genre of Depress-Lit: All terrible news about the publishing industry, all the time. It’s “Puttin’ Off the Ritz: The New Austerity in Publishing.” What amused me were the quotes. The first, from the literary agent Amanda Urban, who represents Cormac […]
Apparently something called a Wovel (Web + Novel, get it? Get it?) is the new incarnation of online storytelling. It’s like Choose Your Own Adventure books: at the end of each section, readers get to vote which direction the story takes. Check out the Underland Press website for an example in progress. Maybe even cast […]
Let me whet your appetite for short fiction in 2009. Below is a list of ten upcoming short story collections, most of them coming out in the first six months of the year. Some heavy hitters, some favorites, some in translation, some from bigger publishers and some from smaller publishers. In a word, Variety. 1. […]
Frequent readers of this blog will know that I found Chris Adrian’s short story collection “A Better Angel” to be one of the more fascinating short story collections of 2008. Which is why I decided to do an in-depth 2500-word review. In a reviewing culture that rarely gives space to short fiction, and space, when […]
This blog will be on break this week because I’ll be in San Diego for a few days, considering 2008 and making up goals for 2009. Happy New Year.
Just in time for the Christmas-day debut of the Brad Pitt/Cate Blanchett film, Jacket Copy has a multi-blogger discussion about the Scott Fitzgerald short story The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I’m one of the voices in this discussion, so please pop over there as the posts roll out over the next couple of days.
In the hearty spirit of good holiday fun, I offer this sweet Christmas bah-humbug, gleaned from John Updike’s “The Twelve Terrors of Christmas,” which is illustrated quite well by Edward Gorey. The First Terror: 1. Santa: The Man Loose-fitting nylon beard, fake optical twinkle, cheap red suit, funny rummy smell when you sit on his […]
This Christmas, if a regular hardback won’t please your hardcore bibliophile friends, RainTaxi, the venerable book review mag, has an auction going down on Ebay. All proceeds not only get you great stuff but let you support the magazine at the same time. Books on the auction block included autographed books from Sherman Alexie, Matthew […]
