Do you use a typewriter to tell the world you are serious scribe in the old-school mold, but do you also secretly adore the comforting glow, futuristic lines, and easy diversions of your iPad? Finally, USB Typewriter lets you have it all.
The iTypewriter
The Story of My Friend
"[T]here are no creative writing programs in Mexico, so people rely on the infinite patience of their friends." Valeria Luiselli and Laia Jufresa, longtime readers of each other's work, in conversation over at BOMB Magazine. See also: our review of Luiselli's The Story of My Teeth.
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Visiting Main Street
What happens if your town's reputation was made by an author who hated it? Sinclair Lewis grew up in Sauk Centre, Minnesota and scathingly satirized it in Main Street (our Modern Library Revue of it), but it's the town's only claim to fame nearly a century later. At The Morning News, Matt Ray Robison visits.
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Next Up, Denmark
After waking us up to their favorite Brazilian novelists, the editorial board at Granta is turning its gaze to Norway. In the first issue of Norwegian Granta, you'll find a slew of stories by illustrious contributors (among them Jennifer Egan, Roberto Bolano and Alice Munro) alongside new stories from authors native to the country. At Granta’s website, you can read an interview with the magazine's online editor, Ted Hodgkinson.
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Tuesday New Release Day: Plumly; Nakamura; Carroll; Waite; Kooser; Carrère; Berryman
Out this week: The Immortal Evening by Stanley Plumly; Last Winter We Parted by Fuminori Nakamura; Bathing the Lion by Jonathan Carroll; Sometimes the Wolf by Urban Waite; Splitting an Order by the former Poet Laureate Ted Kooser; Limonov by Emmanuel Carrère; and The Heart Is Strange by John Berryman, which I wrote about as part of our Great Second-half 2014 Book Preview.
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Harry Potter Before Harry Potter
"The Books of Magic makes The Lord of the Rings, The Avengers, Harry Potter, and even Twilight all look like entries in the same broad genre of tween-superhero fantasy, in which someone insignificant gets mighty powers, fights the forces of evil, and ultimately triumphs. ...The pop culture landscape starts to look like an endless row of Tim Hunters, the same successful formula applied again and again." From The Atlantic, a look at how Neil Gaiman's The Books of Magic prefigured the runaway success of Harry Potter and the modern YA fantasy-adventure craze.
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Appearing Elsewhere
Fence has a new web site. And a new fall issue! My story “The Art of Forgetting” appears online, alongside new work by Ariana Reines, Mary Jo Bang, and Thomas Israel Hopkins.
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Tuesday Links
The LBC has named its next pick. It's a fantastic, epic, funny book. Visit the blog for all the details.Forbes rounds up the most expensive books sold at auction in 2006. The top ten include five atlases, but according to the slide show that accompanies the story, a Shakespeare First Folio brought in the most: $5.1 million.Darby's blog turns two and he cleverly uses this fact as an excuse to link to some Swedish librarians."Which f**king road would you live on?"So sad. A spelling bee training book with typos.
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