Everyone’s been there: the bookstore event at which the reader drones on and on. The Observer shares some reading horror stories (and a few successes). Sarah McNally of NYC’s McNally Jackson bookstore says, “The traditional reading format is broken.”
On the Reading That Drags On and On
November Is the Month for Madrileños
Late November brings work of another favorite Madrileño to the forefront. The final book of Javier Marías‘s Your Face Tomorrow trilogy, Poison, Shadow, and Farewell, will be published at the end of the month by New Directions. The incomparable Marias will make two New York appearances, a reading at the 92nd St Y (with Paul Auster) and a conversation with Paul Holdengräber at the New York Public Library.
The Reality of Slang
“What makes a word ‘real’?” Should groan-inducing words like “adorkable” be counted? Anne Curzan, language historian, gives a Ted talk about the human element in dictionaries and the importance of slang.
Fictional Characters Read Fiction
Dan Humphrey, a character on Gossip Girl, names his top 10 books of 2009.
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Koestenbaum on Levé
Humiliation author Wayne Koestenbaum takes a page out of our own Mark O’Connell’s book to review Édouard Levé’s Autoportrait.
“The dead don’t care about much”
Philip Connors‘ essay about his brother, published in Lapham’s Quarterly, is truly heartbreaking.