New this week: Karen Russell’s new collection Vampires in the Lemon Grove; buzzed-about thriller The Dinner by Herman Koch; Harvest by Jim Crace; Fight Song by Joshua Mohr; the final novel of the late Maeve Binchy, A Week in Winter; Tara Conklin’s debut The House Girl; and James Lasdun’s non-fiction Give Me Everything You Have: On Being Stalked.
Tuesday New Release Day: Russell, Koch, Crace, Mohr, Binchy, Conklin, Lasdun
Billionaire Book Critic
If you thought Bill Gates was content donating millions of dollars to charities around the world and hiding out in his exorbitantly expensive mansion compound, think again! The Microsoft founder and tech mogul reviews books on his personal blog, Gates Notes–and those reviews actually drive sales. Move over "Colbert Bump," the Gates Bump is here to stay.
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Noble Things
Recommended Reading: A Public Space has new fiction from Roxane Gay, whose novel An Untamed State was recently reviewed for our site by Aboubacar Ndiaye.
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The World Cup of Tabs
You’re probably up to your neck in World Cup coverage, but here are some gems well worth your attention no matter what: Teju Cole created a “Copa do Mundo do Brasil” playlist to set the mood; Pablo Torre’s one-sentence-long summation of Day One in São Paulo; an excerpt from Aleksandar Hemon's The Matters of Life, Death, and More: Writing on Soccer; The New Republic’s round-up of “eleven writers and intellectuals on the World Cup’s most compelling characters"; and, of course, Shaj Mathew's recent Millions review of Brazil’s Dance with the Devil.
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Do Yourself A Favor
"I remembered Def Leppard for their one-armed drummer arrested for spousal abuse. Meanwhile Prince played, like, twenty different instruments while having sex in the backseat of taxicabs, ducking the Antichrist, and shouting for gun control. Also: girlfriend on drums. What’s fair is fair." The Prince-related thinkpieces have mostly subsided by now, but this new piece by Dave Tompkins at The Paris Review will make you glad that people are continuing to write about him.
Dear Diary
Lena Dunham's next book looks to be every bit as divisive as her first. The chapbook, Is It Evil Not To Be Sure?, is a collection of Dunham's college diaries from 2005 to 2006 -- or basically, that recurring nightmare you have that somebody might find and read your journal.
Curiosities
David Foster Wallace stranded on a desert island.Another reason to love Washington Post critic Jonathan Yardley: his refreshingly enthusiastic take on "slacker fiction" and All the Sad Young Literary Men by Keith Gessen, who, admittedly, "scarcely qualifies as a slacker."Paul Auster was a protesting, fence-tearing, rioting crazy '68er, too, it turns out.The phenomenal Burkhard Bilger supplements his New Yorker piece on folk-music field recordings with some audio.Malcolm Gladwell's seemingly endless string of public appearances continues. This one is, intriguingly, a public "book discussion" with the Washington, D.C. chief of police.With some speculating that CBS News is about to close up shop and that Katie Couric is on her way out, rumors are already swirling about the obligatory memoir.Jonathan Franzen answers the question "Do you regret your run-in with Oprah?" in a "Big Think" video. Aficionados of Franzen mannerisms may also enjoy the other fifteen or so Franzen videos that Big Think has available.
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Two Newly-Discovered Sappho Poems
A researcher unearthed two never-before-seen poems by Sappho. To fans of Classics and Greek poetry, this is bigger than the surprise release of Beyoncé’s secret album.
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