And now, a little bit about a world you might be totally unfamiliar with; this piece from The Rumpus is a fascinating, in-depth look at identity politics and eating pork in the Chinese borderlands. Bonus: a complementary piece about what it’s like to be a Chinese-American writer living in china.
Do You Eat Pork?
Back to School
Need your monthly dose of Hilary Mantel? The two-time Booker Prize winner has a new story in the London Review of Books (which you can read at their website). The story is a nice complement to our interview with the author from last year.
My Book Didn’t Influence Terrorism
Ashwin Sanghi first published his book, The Rozabal Line, on Lulu.com under the anagram Shawn Haigins. A revised edition of the book was published by Westland Ltd. & Tranquebar Press much later, and garnered controversy with readers pointing out similarities between its plot and the 26/11 terrorist attack on Mumbai. Sanghi’s response? “Any book based on research could have real life commonalities.”
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Flavorwire’s Top 10 Bookstores in the United States
Flavorwire presents a list of its ten favorite bookstores in the United States and requests that you “buy something fer crissakes.”
What Eats at You
“Define your character’s obsession. Take that obsession and dig up all the language that surrounds it or alludes to it. Rewrite your story using as much of that language as possible.” Molly Prentiss for Amazon Author Insights on using personal preoccupations to bring your narratives to life.
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The Naval Academy’s Reading List for Life
What does it mean that so many faculty members at the United States Naval Academy have recommended Ayn Rand’s work on the “Reading List For Life?”
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Doug Rickard’s Google Photography
Photographer Doug Rickard employs an interesting technique for his “A New American Picture” series: Google Street View. Check out the shots he took while he “virtually [drove] the unseen and overlooked roads of America, to find bleak places that are forgotten, economically devastated, and abandoned.”