Does a writer make the city or does the city make the writer? At Grantland, Michael Weinreb discusses why Elmore Leonard is the ultimate Motor City writer and discovers Leonard’s Detroit. “Without his books, the city would still have suffered the same hellish decline. But because of him, that suffering was rendered into an art form all its own.” Pair with: Our own Bill Morris writing against Detroit’s ruin porn reputation.
Elmore Leonard’s Detroit
Good Morning, Poems
A dozen lullaby poems written by Goodnight Moon author Margaret Wise Brown were recently unearthed in an old trunk, and the trove is slated to be published in the United States soon.
NaNoNoMore
For all my fellow NaNoWriMo failures, here's how not to write a novel, romance or otherwise.
Talking with Makkai
BOMB Magazine sits down with Rebecca Makkai, author of Music for Wartime and The Hundred-Year House. “People love to underrate plot, because it makes them sound like they’re beyond it, like plot is best left to Danielle Steele.“ For more Makkai, check out our interview with her.
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The World of Books
"If they are honest with themselves, authors of color know what stories they’re supposed to tell, and know that attempts to move beyond those stories are not so often accepted." Matthew Salesses on the danger of cultural homogeneity in the world of books, over at Literary Hub. Pair with Salesses’s Millions essay on novel writing, inciting incidents, and beginnings.
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Laura Miller on Self-Publishing
In Salon, Laura Miller discusses the brave new world of self-publishing: "You've either experienced slush or you haven't, and the difference is not trivial."