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.
“If it wasn’t signed by some lawyer, I’d imagine ol’ Gentleman Jack penning it himself, twirling his bushy mustache.”
The Nervous Breakdown
If you haven’t already, be sure to check out the new books and culture website The Nervous Breakdown. They’ve already got a great interview with Millions favorite Dan Chaon, as well as some interesting essays that I’m looking forward to digging into. I also like their “self-interview” series–where writers ask, and answer, their own questions.
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Jericho Brown and the South
Award-winning poet Jericho Brown discusses how the ongoing push and pull of the South continue to fuel his powerful work.
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The other work of a creative
“What you might call an invisible economy of house sitters exists across the country,” writes Aaron Gilbreath in the Paris Review. His account of the generosity and clean counter-spaces of friends is a humbling reminder of the flip side of creative work.
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A Spider of a Writer
Year in Reading alumna Parul Sehgal’s column for The New York Times debuted last week with her reflections on the great Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal. As she puts it, “He is a spider of a writer: subtle and sly, patient, with invisible designs. He never proclaims — he never needs to. He envelops.” Pair with John Yargo’s Millions essay on Hrabal’s fiction.
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Serializing in the Digital Age
The University of Michigan Press will be serializing two novels on their Facebook account. Previously, authors such as Brandon J. Mendelson have experimented serializing their novels 140 characters at a time. He even has some tips for doing so.
Lady Boxers at the LRB
If you didn’t like Elif Batuman‘s gut-punch to MFA writing (“Get A Real Degree”) in this issue of the London Review of Books, might I suggest Jenny Diski’s cudgeling of self-help lit in the LRB’s Diary essay?
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