Attention Babysitters Club fans: at 5:30 EST tonight, Scholastic will be holding a live Twitter party with author Ann M. Martin. Maybe it’s finally time to find out if Claudia ever finished middle school, yes / yes?
Friends Forever
Jim Crace Takes Home the IMPAC Award
Three cheers for Jim Crace, who just took home the 20th annual IMPAC Dublin Literary Award! If you remember our coverage of the shortlist, you’ll know that the Harvest author beat out TransAtlantic author Colum McCann and Americanah author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, among others.
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Nothing Has to Be Blown Up
“One of the joys of literature is that we can always push back against established ways of speaking and seeing—and nothing has to be blown up.” Mark Z. Danielewski, whose latest novel, the first installment of a 27-book series called The Familiar, has just been released, writes for The Atlantic‘s “By Heart” series about “signiconic” writing, the orneriness of his work and the graphic novel Here. Pair with our 2012 interview with Danielewski.
Redefining Speculative Fiction
“In a genre that has long been dominated by white men and Western mythological tropes, Ms. Okorafor’s stories, which feature young black girls in starring roles as superheroes and saviors of humanity, have been hailed as groundbreaking.” The New York Times shines a spotlight on Nnedi Okorafor and other African American science fiction and fantasy writers building on -and popularizing-a tradition of African and African American folklore in the sci fi and fantasy genre.
(Not) A Restaurant Review
The Morning News is asking writers to visit restaurants and then write about the experience, so long as the piece they write adheres to two criteria: “1) it is a restaurant review” and “2) it is not a restaurant review.” First on deck: Roxane Gay, whose novel Untamed State was recently reviewed for our site.