John Jeremiah Sullivan’s new book, The Prime Minister of Paradise, now has a UK release date: June 9, 2016. Read our own Bill Morris’s review of Pulphead.
New Release Date for JJS Book
What’s Wrong with a Readable Book?
There is a controversy brewing right now in Britain about readability and excellence in literature. Apparently, being “readable” is no longer a compliment.
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Sorkin Takes on Steve Jobs
The Social Network writer Aaron Sorkin has signed on to adapt a biopic about Steve Jobs (not to be confused with the Ashton Kutcher one) which will be based on Walter Isaacson’s biography of the same name. Meanwhile, as the news was announced, Sorkin gave a memorable commencement address at Syracuse University.
The Most Boring Man in the World
“With thirteen other diners, the two professors of English first prepared and then made their way through eight courses, including beef broth, haddock, steak, mutton, chicken, and chocolate profiteroles….The dinner was a recreation of one eaten 132 years earlier, in one of England’s grandest country houses. Among the guests at this first dinner was George Scharf, founding director of the National Portrait Gallery in London, a man not especially famous in his own day and virtually unknown in ours.” Love Among the Archives brings us into the world of George Scharf, a bachelor affectionately deemed “The Most Boring Man in the World.”
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Thoughts and Prayers
For the L.A. Review of Books, a conversation on gun violence, "thoughts and prayers," and Shannon Watts’s new book Fight Like a Mother, which chronicles the founding of grassroots action network Moms Demand Action.
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Black on all Sides
“The company has forged a chain uncommon in mainstream publishing: an unbroken line of black women, from the novel’s protagonist, via the author, to the editor, to the art director who created the cover art (featuring a black woman).” Meet the trio of Black women at Kensington Publishing who are changing (modernizing) the traditional lily white romance genre.
Story Time
The Portable Story Series is accepting submissions to their inaugural contest, judged by Year in Reading alumna Kate Christensen. The theme is hunger, the genre is fiction, the word count is 2000-4000 words, and the deadline is March 28, 2016. The contest benefits three charitable organizations.
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“Hardly Shakesperean at first”
Recommended Reading: Ted Widmer on the miscellaneous writings of Abraham Lincoln.