Amazon has unveiled its “Kindle Singles” store. Says Amazon: “Typically between 5,000 and 30,000 words, each Kindle Single is intended to allow a single killer idea — well researched, well argued and well illustrated — to be expressed at its natural length.” In practice, this appears to mean short stories as well as journalistic pieces that have (perhaps) been expanded upon. For example, a piece from n+1 is included, “Octomom and the Politics of Babies” by Mark Greif. Amazon writes that in this piece Greif “updates his insightful essay from last spring, where only the journal’s 10,000 readers had access to his dead-on critique of the American media culture that produced its own eight-headed monster.” Bottom line: Amazon is fishing for higher quality content at the low price points that Amazon readers have come to crave.
‘Kindle Singles’ Have Arrived
Celebrating Camus
Albert Camus fans, it’s time to plan your trip to New York. A month-long celebration of the author’s first visit to the city will be taking place from March 26th through April 19th. If you’re celebrating from home, read our review of his American Journals.
Cuba’s Newest Voices
Recommended Reading: Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo collected sixteen short stories from sixteen authors among Cuba’s “Generación Año Cero” (Generation Year Zero), which is a “movement of writers who began publishing in 2000.” The anthology, which is available for free online in both English and Spanish, features illustrations from Cuban artists El Sexto and Luis Trápaga.
It Was Nothing, Really
W.H. Auden lived a secret life, not as a man with a second family or an illicit habit but as, weirdly enough, a genuinely kind human being. He paid for a friend’s costly operation and camped outside the apartment of a woman who suffered from night terrors until she felt safe enough to sleep on her own again. So why did the poet want to hide his good deeds? He claimed he didn’t want to be admired for basic decency.
Cow Country
Deep Springs College in Eastern California is a “bonkers, hyper-isolated, working cattle ranch slash all-male two-year university” that caters to the Lonely White Male mythology. Deep Springs alumni have been awarded, among many other honors, Rhodes and Truman Scholarships, MacArthur “genius grants”, Pulitzer Prizes, and an Emmy. And now, dear readers, they’re building a women’s college which promises to be every bit as unique as its forebear. Yay?
Roald Dahl and the Hilariously Bad Grades
A newly released Roald Dahl collection, The Missing Golden Ticket and Other Splendiferous Secrets, includes a secret ending to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and excerpts from the author’s hilariously bad report cards. Wrote one teacher about Dahl in 1931: “A persistent muddler. Vocabulary negligible, sentences malconstructed. He reminds me of a camel.” (via Galley Cat)
Sinking (and Swimming) as a Debut Novelist
At The Nervous Breakdown Marie Mutsuki Mockett writes about being uninvited from a reading in New York and other obstacles to promoting her first novel, and how she channeled her creativity to take charge of her own PR.
A Radical Vision
Recommended reading: this brilliant and thorough profile of Toni Morrison from the New York Times Magazine, complete with a video of Morrison reading from her upcoming novel, God Help the Child.
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