This year is all about #readwomen2014 and #weneeddiversebooks. Faint Promise of Rain, the debut novel from Anjali Mittar Duva, satisfies all these criteria. The book is just out from SheWrites press and is set in the turbulent, caste-driven setting of the Mughal empire. Read an excerpt over at Bloom.
Raining Granduer
The Other Bill of Rights
“I can read whatever I want. No one can stop me. I can help other people read what they want. And no one can stop them.” Zoe Fisher for The Rumpus about being “a horny queer teenager” who found her home in libraries. Pair with a controversial piece from our own pages this week by Douglas Koziol, a bookseller exploring what to do with “a book that you not only find objectionable but also believe actually dangerous in the lessons it portends amidst such a politically precarious time?”
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Some things
Kate Atkinson’s editor at Little Brown, Reagan Arthur, has posted at the LBC blog and there’s some good Q & A going on in the comments.I just surreptitiously spy on people reading, but Ed – prompted by an idea from Sara – marches right up to them and quizzes them on their literary knowledge.Been enjoying a couple of new (new to me, anyway) book blogs recently: Using Books Weblog and BookLust.
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Miss Whatsit
Director Ava Duvernay has found the lead for her film adaptation of A Wrinkle in Time. Thirteen-year-old Storm Reid will play the lead role of the character Meg Murry, joining a cast that includes Mindy Kaling, Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon.
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Guerilla Reading
Does literature belong on the streets? Thanks to some forward-thinking initiatives like the Coffee Sleeves Conversation at Coffee House Press and the Chicago-based project “Poem While You Wait,” (in which poets stationed around the city produce original, on-demand poems for five dollars a piece) literature is finding its way to the masses.
“Maybe a mixtape will help.”
Recommended Reading: Rafe Posey’s Rumpus essay, “Coming Out, Again and Again, in 27 Easy Steps.”
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