What’s it like to have Jacques Barzun edit your first novel? Besides terrifying, of course.
In Defense of First Novels
Why Pick One?
Does what you read affect your sex life? Does it help you come of age? Is it therapeutic?
●
●
Read these hard and fast
A publisher in Buenos Aires is trying to give debut authors a leg up by… printing their books with disappearing ink?
●
●
Rocking Out With the Goon Squad
Jennifer Egan loves music just as much as her protagonists in A Visit from the Goon Squad. Westword, Denver’s alt-weekly, asked Egan what her five favorite songs are. The playlist includes everyone from Iggy Pop to Cat Power. We think Bennie Salazar would approve.
●
●
Indie Reads
The Guardian publishes an interview with my favorite indie bookstore, Harvard Book Store in Harvard Square, Cambridge, MA. Looking for book recommendations? Check out our Great Second-Half Preview.
●
●
Jack White, Publisher
Recommended reading: Lauren O’Neal writes for the LA Review of Books about analog music, Millennial poetry and Jack White‘s foray into publishing.
A Visual Mind
To get a full sense of the legacy of William Blake, you need to see his paintings alongside his famous poems. The Wordsworth contemporary did much of his best work — including the covers of his own collections — with a brush. At the New York Review of Books blog, Jenny Uglow pays a visit to a new exhibition at Oxford.
The Ethics of Illegal Downloads
None other than Randy Cohen, “The Ethicist” of the New York Times, has decided that illegally downloading an e-book version of a book for which you’ve already paid full price in hardcover is “not unethical… subsequent downloading is akin to buying a CD, then copying it to your iPod.” He adds, “Sadly, the anachronistic conventions of bookselling and copyright law lag the technology.”
●
●