Are you the type of reader who craves the food described in novels like our own Nick Moran? Then take The Guardian’s “Food in fiction” quiz. Sample question: “According to the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland, what kind of food is eaten tomorrow, yesterday, but never today?”
Voracious Reading
Infinite Summer: Reading D.F.W. in Concert
The Infinite Summer online book club, brain child of Matthew Baldwin, has finally completed Infinite Jest. To celebrate, they are reading Dracula. Steven Lowman briefly interviews Baldwin at the Washington Post blog Short Stack.
●
●
Appearing Elsewhere
A slightly different version of my story “Salt Lick” (originally published in 2006, in the Los Angeles Times Magazine) is now at Flatmancrooked.
●
●
Writing Isn’t For Everyone
“I hate to break it to you but everyone does not, in fact, have a book in them.” For The Outline, literary agent Kate McKean writes about the difference between good stories and good books—and what it takes to write the latter. Pair with: an essay on the books that fight back
(Do Not) Steal This Book
Everything you’ve ever wanted to know (but were afraid to ask) about book sales — from what the heck even constitutes a sale, to standard print runs, to author earnings per sale — from Lincoln Michel at Electric Literature.
Covering Lolita
Disappointed by how few of the dozens of official book cover designs of Nabokov’s Lolita “correspond thematically to the novel,” blog Venus febriculosa is holding a book cover design contest (pdf) to create a new cover for Lolita and is awarding a $350 prize. (Thx, John)
Ice Cream Etc.
Recommended Reading: Chris Powers on the short fiction of John Updike. Pair with James Santel on Updike’s Collected Stories.
●
●