“Although I didn’t realize it at the time, I myself was no stranger to being othered.” Over at The Literary Hub, Carla Bruce-Eddings recounts some reading lessons from her teenage self. For a bit of perspective from the other side, here’s our own Nick Ripatrazone on teaching high school and college.
Teenage Daydream
Entering Lovecraft Country
“Lovecraft Country doesn't just race along, it tears, demanding that you keep turning its pages without interruption. I read the second half of the book while walking in my neighborhood, holding the book with one hand and clutching bags of groceries in the other, and then finishing up in bed with a small LED lamp after my wife had fallen asleep. It's one of those books.” Cory Doctorow reviews Matt Ruff’s Lovecraft Country at BoingBoing.
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The Book Peddlers on Mumbai’s Streets
Sonia Faleiro takes a look at the “book boys of Mumbai” who participate in India’s quasi-illegal pirated book market. (It’s an issue also discussed in Akshay Pathak’s most recent dispatch on Indian publishing.) Faleiro notes that books often appear on the streets as soon as they’re released to stores – and also that by 1999, as much as “20 to 25 percent of all books sold in the country were pirated.” Meanwhile, the former production editor in me wonders, how the heck are they re-printing these books so quickly?
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Drawing Straws
Recommended Reading: How to tell if you’re in a Shirley Jackson story.
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Sex, Drugs, and Anniversaries
"For that reason, it’s hard to imagine coming to this book for the first time, and experiencing it in the same way as that college senior back in 2003." The Outline on the 15-year anniversary of Chuck Klosterman's Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs. (Read our review of the king of pop culture's newest book.)
Book Boredom
Laura Miller discusses what she didn't read this year.
James Tate in Hypertext
This week in book-related infographics: a hypertext tribute to the late poet James Tate, organized by Electric Literature and featuring "personal memories of Tate, commentary about his work, and recordings of some of his most meaningful poems."