Looking to amplify the taste of your favorite dish? Ditch the black pepper, writes Sara Dickerman, and instead opt for chili-based hot sauce. I vote Sriracha.
RIP Black Pepper
Monday Linkday
Don’t bother looking for that book you need, a robot will do it for you. Will browsing disappear as robots take over libraries?Mad Max Perkins, “currently a senior executive for a major New York publisher,” has entered the world of blogs. Who is this masked man?Moleskine, maker of the world’s greatest notebooks, has added the Story Board Notebook to its ever expanding line of notebook products. “Advertising creatives, graphic designers, filmmakers, and cartoonists” rejoice!I enjoyed reading an excerpt of Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found by Suketu Mehta. A good pick for anyone with an interest in the subcontinent.
Jonas Take Me Somewhere We Can Be Alone
We knew she was trouble when Taylor Swift joined the cast of the Weinstein’s adaptation of The Giver. Billboard reports that Swift has signed on for an unspecified supporting role along with Jeff Bridges, Meryl Streep, Katie Holmes, and Alexander Skarsgard. The movie will start filming in Cape Town next week.
Joseph Roth’s Letters
“Among the 457 letters in Joseph Roth: A Life in Letters, there is not one love letter,” begins Stefany Anne Goldberg’s review of the author’s collected–and often outright misanthropic–correspondence.
2011 in Physics Books
Every year brings a fresh new crop of popular books on physics and cosmology, or so they say. 2011 was no exception, featuring books on dark matter and dark energy, the Large Hadron Collider, time, the multiverse, cosmic mortality, a bit of history, biography, and even a celebration of “fringe physics.” Here is a list of top ten picks.
The Debut of Two Fancy New Faces
Two journals started the week by showing off their fancy new faces. Gigantic launched a new web site for the magazine, featuring a chapter from Shya Scanlon‘s Forecast 42 and new fiction by J.A. Tyler. The Barnes & Noble Review debuted a toothsome redesign along with a sobering essay on book publishing by former Executive Editor-in-Chief of Random House, Daniel Menaker.
Illustrated Joyce
Stony Road Press has teamed up with the James Joyce Centre to release a limited edition handmade book, “reproducing the original 1914 text” of “The Dead,” and featuring really interesting hand printed illustrations by Robert Berry. Check out some examples here, here, and here.
Just In Time For Valentine’s Weekend
Katia Grubisic reviews The Poetry of Sex, which is Penguin’s new “carnal compilation” covering everything “from love-making to hay-rolling to cuckolding.”
“This Website is Pretty Good…”
I had no idea Kanye read The Millions. Apparently, he’s not that impressed by our recent comments about him.