In 1964, A Song of Ice and Fire author George R. R. Martin wrote Marvel icon Stan Lee a fan letter.
A Budding Fan
“If it wasn’t signed by some lawyer, I’d imagine ol’ Gentleman Jack penning it himself, twirling his bushy mustache.”
Earlier this month, Jack Daniel’s wrote Patrick Wensink a cease-and-desist order because the cover of Wensink’s latest novel, Broken Piano For President, bears a striking resemblance to the whisky’s logo. Surprisingly, instead of some whisky-soaked tirade, the letter is really, really nice.
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New Contest from Kirkus Reviews
To celebrate the 80th birthday of Kirkus Reviews, the editorial staff is holding a contest in which the grand prize winner gets a literary tour of New York City. This includes “two round-trip tickets to Manhattan, two nights’ stay at the Library Hotel, two passes to the Greenwich Village Literary Pub Crawl, gift certificates to several of the city’s finest independent bookstores, breakfast at a round table at the Algonquin Hotel, and dinner at Public in SoHo.”
Dear Sugar’s Mugs
Last year, The Rumpus’ “Write Like a Motherfucker” mugs were so popular (um, I’m drinking coffee out of one right now), that this year, they’re offering two.
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“He’s like a Shakespeare.”
How do you “challenge Muslim stereotypes” in film? Add more white actors. The director of a biopic about 13th-century Sufi poet Jalaluddin al-Rumi hopes to have Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Downey Jr. star in the film.
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Of the Tribe
More than ever, we need literature that gives Westerners a compelling entrée into—a way of better understanding—the lives of war-and-terrorism fraught regions. Over at Bloom, T.L. Khleif, recent recipient of a Rona Jaffe award, writes about Jamil Ahmad’s The Wandering Falcon, a collection that immerses readers in the tribal areas of Pakistan prior to the rise of the Taliban. Among other notable honors, Ahmad joins the pantheon of late-blooming male authors who would not have ever published were it not for the stubborn encouragement of their wives.
Punderstrike
At The Hairpin, Alexa C. Kurzius pays a visit to the Punderdome 3000, a monthly “com-pun-tition” that takes place in (where else?) Brooklyn. Among other highlights, the author constructs an alter ego for herself named Pundercat.
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