The latest installment of Housing Works Bookstore Café’s biweekly podcast features a conversation between James Wood and László Krasznahorkai. (We interviewed him for our site last year, too.) The Hungarian author’s next book, Seiobo There Below, was highlighted in our Great Second-Half 2013 Book Preview.
Wood and Krasznahorkai in Conversation
Sink Review
Recommended Reading: Sink Review.
The Common’s first year in print!
The Common will be celebrating its first year of publication later this month at NYU's Carter Journalism institute. The celebrations will include a reading from Stephen O’Connor and a performance by the Dog House Band, aka that literary rock group consisting of Sven Birkerts, James Wood, and other writerly musicians.
What the Bestseller List Says about 2017
Slate books and culture columnist Laura Miller looks at what this year's bestseller list tells us about 2017. One of her conclusions, "2017 was the year that the very concept of a best-seller became even more dubious." After reading her analysis, check out our Year in Reading lists, whose authors found joy in reading and viewed it as one of the few good things of this year, even if the bestsellers of the year didn't reflect those feelings.
Bookless in Laredo
As of last week, Laredo, Texas, a city of 250,000 people has no bookstore. A sign of the coming apocalypse or a great business opportunity? You decide.
Zora Turns 127 Tomorrow
Not familiar with Zora Neale Hurston or just need to brush up in preparation for her birthday? Liz Dwyer has got you covered. "Through the #MeToo movement we’ve read the stories of how calling out sexual harassment and the patriarchy has ruined women’s careers. Similarly, Hurston was shunned and derided by many of her male compatriots in the Harlem Renaissance for creating one of the first strong, black, and sexually aware female protagonists of 20th century American fiction." Hooked yet? After you finish, read this essay by our own Jeffrey Colvin on visiting Zora's birthplace and his sister.
Which Book Can Save Your Life?
Freedom, The Imperfectionists, and The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet were some of the biggest books of the year, both literally and among our readers. But which one of them could stop a bullet for you? Electric Lit posts a video of the necessary research.
Great 2013 (Genre) Book Preview
Some readers wanted more genre titles to appear in our Great 2013 Book Preview – even though, cough cough, literary fiction is a genre. Well, perhaps this will sate their cravings. Charlie Jane Anders rounded up 54 books she and the rest of the io9 writers are “dying to read in 2013.”