“’When I finish reading one of her stories, I always feel understood and somehow forgiven for being human,’ Mr. George said. ‘It may simply come down to wisdom. Like the greats, Edith has it.'” Steve Almond gives an overview of Edith Pearlman‘s writing and publication history for The New York Times Book Review in the wake of the release of her latest collection, Honeydew, which Josh Cook recently reviewed for The Millions.
“Forgiven for Being Human”
Bad Titles
“There’s something to be said for allusive titles: they can be intriguing and draw you in. And obscure titles at least make a change from the current trend for The Woman Who Climbed out of Her Car and Mowed the Lawn. (I made that one up, though it could be a bestseller). But when it comes to titles that are simply misleading, there are just far, far too many.” In a piece for the Guardian Moira Remond considers some of the most misleading and misunderstood book titles, such as John Williams‘s Stoner (which our own Claire Cameron wrote about here.)
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Terrific Ham
“Terrific ham. The best. Terrific eggs. Were they green? Who knows? So many years.” In case you missed it, the best tweets from yesterday’s #TrumpBookReport trend. Pair with our own Claire Cameron‘s translation of Lauren Groff‘s Fates and Furies for Twitter.
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Words came in, marked for death.
The New Yorker has been hosting a Twitter game show, and this time around the contestants were words and in a macabre turn each word was berated by the audience, the people calling out for the death of that contestant. One word was forced to ultimately bite the bullet and will no longer be welcome in the magazine’s next issue. Tragic.
“Old Jazz Record!”
You may have heard that Haruki Murakami has a new book on shelves. Woody Brown reviewed it for The Millions last week. Over at Electric Lit, Lincoln Michel invites us to play Murakami Bingo, created by Grant Snider, once again. It might also be a good time to read Ben Dooley on 1Q84.
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10 More Books to Read Just Because
Since we’re deep into the season of “year end” lists, here’s a list of ten great novels written by women that didn’t get a lot of critical attention this year. That isn’t to say that aren’t a ton of other books deserving of this distinction, just that these are some really good ones. Go list-crazy and pair with our own Year in Reading series.
Sharing the Shelf
Did you join Emma Watson’s feminist book club? Katy Waldman did, and she has some thoughts on the Shared Shelf. We have our own feminist hate-read book club with Nicole Cliffe, Michelle Dean, Roxane Gay, and more.