“In his column, Manjoo goes on to call out virtual reality for being ‘a lonely, anti-social affair’—but, hey, isn’t that what reading a novel used to be? I mean, before we figured out how to make books ping and arouse competitive instincts by flagging favorite passages of readers who got there before we did. (I don’t mean to harp on Farhad Manjoo or to denigrate his excellent work; his reticence is shared by others in both legacy and new media cautioning against VR.)” It looks like VR is in desperate need of good storytellers.
Virtual Fictitious Reality
The Kiss
Check out a piece from Year in Reading alum Rebecca Makkai about an important kiss at Guernica Mag.
Sonya Chung at McNally Jackson 3/10
Millions Contributor Sonya Chung will read from her just-released novel Long for This World at McNally Jackson Books, 52 Prince Street, NYC, on March 10 at 7pm.
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Goodreads launches “Ask the Author” feature
Goodreads has launched a new Ask the Author feature, allowing readers to ask the likes of Margaret Atwood, Khaled Hosseini, and Jesmyn Ward questions “about the new worlds, ideas, and people they’ve discovered in books.”
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2011 in Physics Books
Every year brings a fresh new crop of popular books on physics and cosmology, or so they say. 2011 was no exception, featuring books on dark matter and dark energy, the Large Hadron Collider, time, the multiverse, cosmic mortality, a bit of history, biography, and even a celebration of “fringe physics.” Here is a list of top ten picks.
Writing toward Home
“The home I grew up in will never exist again, and this is why I write so much about home, perhaps. Because I lost mine,” Jesmyn Ward told Roxane Gay in an interview for The Toast. They discussed Ward’s new memoir, Men We Reaped, her writing process, and how she deals with being labeled a “black woman writer.”
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Drinking JJS While Reading JJS
One of the best parts of last month’s Cullman Center discussion between John Jeremiah Sullivan and Wells Tower was watching JJS carry on the conversation while sipping from a highball glass of whiskey. The essayist’s Southern roots and Irish ancestry of course make him no stranger to potent potables, which is why Danny Nowell’s “John Jeremiah Sullivan” cocktail is so appropriate.
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