Adults These Days

“In college, I didn’t realize I was the face of the Diaspora, the embodiment of all the women they thought I was, and who I knew I was. I was from Africa, east and west, a sojourner through the islands of the Caribbean, a daughter of the Second Great Migration of African-Americans from South to North. Perhaps Chaka said it best—to these young men, I was ‘every woman.’ To airport security, I was that woman. The one to be stopped and searched. The one who was suspect. A long-lost daughter whose lineage crossed through Kush—was I carrying Kush now, perhaps, in my hair?” If a ‘Pat-downs, Pissing, and Passport Stamps’ headline isn’t enough to get you to read this great piece from The Literary Hub, hopefully the quote will do.

Today in things you might like to read about animals:  Some birds, apparently, not only mourn their dead but even hold funeral services. And while it’s widely known that the internet is made of cats, Wired dug a little deeper and tried to uncover the root of our collective feline fixation.

In 1998, T.C. Boyle released his first massive collection of short stories, titled, appropriately enough, Stories. Clocking in at 700+ pages, the book illustrated the zany profligacy of one our premier short fiction writers. Now Boyle has released a new collection — titled (of course) Stories II — and with it comes a new trailer.

Gnarly, dude: Leanne Shapton’s reading her new book at a surf shop.

Flatmancrooked knows that writers need money, and commercials.