I’ve written before about By Heart, a series at The Atlantic in which authors write short pieces about their favorite passages in literature. This week, our own Edan Lepucki — whose new novel you may have heard about thanks to Stephen Colbert — writes about the metaphors in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. (FYI, Margaret Atwood wrote a Year in Reading entry for The Millions.)
Body Language
The New Yorker on The Late American Novel
The folks at The New Yorker’s Book Bench offer their take at The Late American Novel: Writers on the Future of Books. (Spoiler Alert: Katherine Hepburn gets a shoutout.)
The Summer Rooster Crows Soon
We are longtime fans (and participants) of The Morning News‘s Tournament of Books, and so were thrilled to learn they’re starting up a summer book club with a ToB twist. Join them in reading Katie Kitamura‘s A Separation and The Night Ocean by Paul La Farge, starting in just a week and a half.
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Not the Same
Few things are more individual than your feelings about e-books. Dustin Illingworth can’t stand them — as he puts it, “books are meant to be handled and smelled.” At Full-Stop, he writes about what this preference reveals about himself. You could also read our tribute to e-book pioneer Michael Hart.
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The Believer Book Award
To add to the awards lists, Believer has announced its editors’ shortlist for the Believer Book Award, which looks to acknowledge “the strongest and most underappreciated” novels of the year. The shortlist includes Danielle Dutton’s Sprawl; Kira Henehan’s Orion You Came and You Took All My Marbles (reviewed for The Millions); James Hynes‘ Next, Grace Krilanovich’s The Orange Eats Creeps (reviewed for The Millions); and Paul Murray’s Skippy Dies (reviewed here).
Ecstasy/Despair
Shouldn’t you be busy writing? Here’s an illustrated guide to some of the common anxieties many of us feel when we’re not writing.
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