“Internet-centrism, then, treats ‘the Internet’ as an object that acts on society from outside, rather than a technological form that emerges from within a particular social and political situation.” The Los Angeles Review of Books reviews Evgeny Morozov’s latest critique of the digital age, To Save Everything, Click Here.
The Internet Is For
Google Books: Embargo Breaker
At The Washington Post, Craig Fehrman points out that FSG inadvertently broke its own embargo on Jimmy Carter’s White House Diary when a preview of the book showed up on Google Books.
●
●
Fitting Room Drama
Recommended: This excerpt from Jessica Anya Blau’s new novel.
●
●
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya’s Love Stories
“[Ludmilla] Petrushevskaya doesn’t write about isolated acts of depravity; she writes about universal ones,” says Michael Robbins in his review of There Once Lived a Girl. “What’s scary about her narratives is their implication that only the thinnest film, which might rip at any time, separates us from the chaos and breakdown they describe.” Our own Janet Potter also reviewed Petrushevskaya’s work this week, and she focused on the romantic hopes of its characters. “What’s remarkable,” Potter writes, “is not the love they find, but the fact that they’re looking for it.”
●
●
Poolside Romance
Recommended Reading: Roxane Gay’s short story about a summer romance, “The Year I Learned Everything,” at Rookie. “He’s the best-looking of the bunch so you can imagine how ugly his friends are.”
●
●
But When Will They Play “Free Bird?”
Meanwhile, in NPR’s recording studio, classically trained violinist Aleksey Igudesman and pianist Hyung-ki Joo perform the most original rendition of “I Will Survive” you’re going to hear all year.
●
●
“Everything’s been said, but it needs saying again.”
The Oxford American compendium of best ever southern words.
Sheepoetry
“The idea was that the words would form a meaningful haiku – or ‘haik-ewe’ as Valerie called it – however they were viewed on the backs of the grazing sheep.”
●
●