Sean Manning boldly declares Vegas: A Memoir of a Dark Season — John Gregory Dunne’s first novel — to be “the best book about Sin City ever written.” And yes, he knows what you’re thinking. He really does think it’s better than Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Skip The Hangover III. Read A Book Instead.
How Could You Like That Book?
“On the other hand, I do spend endless hours mulling over the mystery of what others like. Again and again the question arises: How can they?” Tim Parks asks us why we enjoy reading what we read at The New York Review of Books. For Millions readers’ favorites, check out October’s Top 10.
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Garth Greenwell’s Rules for Weathering the Artist’s Life
Over at Lit Hub, Garth Greenwell shares his commencement speech for Bennington College, in which he shares his "seven very opinionated thoughts "on weathering the artist's life.
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More Baffler
We recently noted the return of The Baffler. Robert Birnbaum recently interviewed the magazine’s new publisher John H. Summers.
Eisenberg Wins the PEN/Faulkner
Deborah Eisenberg has won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction for The Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg. (Eisenberg profiled at The Millions.)
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Iowa’s Online Advanced Fiction Seminar
This fall the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program is offering a free, 7-session live online Advanced Fiction Seminar. The course will run from September 16 through October 28, and it will be taught by fiction writer Nate Brown. Best of all? It’s open to anyone with an internet connection. Applications are due September 6th.
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a multitude of drops
There is a very long trailer for the Cloud Atlas movie, which comes out in the fall. Unfortunately, Kevin Bacon isn’t in it.
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The Onion Remembers Salinger
The Onion headline Bunch Of Phonies Mourn J.D. Salinger: “In this big dramatic production that didn’t do anyone any good (and was pretty embarrassing, really, if you think about it), thousands upon thousands of phonies across the country mourned the death of author J.D. Salinger, who was 91 years old for crying out loud.”