In exciting micro library news, Book Riot reports that the 50,000-th Little Free Library was “planted” on November 4th, doubling the number of Little Libraries in the U.S. a year and a half ago. We’re all in agreement that big libraries are more vital than ever, though, right?
Little Libraries that Could
John Jeremiah Sullivan Reads
John Jeremiah Sullivan's NY Times essay "You Blow My Mind. Hey, Mickey!" was a big hit last June. Next October, FSG will publish Pulphead, his second collection of essays. To tide you over until then, you can listen to The Paris Review's Southern Editor read an excerpt from his Disney piece.
Reading for Representation
In 2013, only 93 of 3,200 children's books were about black characters, according to a new study. "Children of color remain outside the boundaries of imagination," Christopher Myers writes about the absence. In a follow-up piece, his father and fellow author Walter Dean Myers examines the paralyzing effect under-representation can have on readers. "Books did not become my enemies. They were more like friends with whom I no longer felt comfortable. I stopped reading," he writes.
●
●
The 12th Caine Prize
NoViolet Bulawayo has won the 2011 Caine Prize for African Writing for her story “Hitting Budapest" (pdf).
A Giant Otter
Depending on your perspective, this is either the best or the worst pairing of speaker to content there is: Benedict Cumberbatch reading Kafka’s Metamorphosis for the BBC. As always with Cumberbatch, the reading is a nice complement to our own Elizabeth Minkel on Sherlock.
●
●
McCarthy’s Inspiration
Cormac McCarthy is inspired by scientists, but did you know the author inspires drone doom bands?
●
●
Tuesday New Release Day: Ogawa, Iyer, Irving
New this week: Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales by Yoko Ogawa and Exodus by Lars Iyer (both were covered in our big book preview). John Irving's In One Person is out in paperback.
●
●
From Isolation to Affluence
“It’s likely Lucia would have felt more comfortable watching a bull be gored in a Mexico City arena or huddling among winos on a corner in Oakland than she ever felt at her first place on posh Mapleton Hill.” Elizabeth Geoghegan for The Paris Review on Lucia Berlin, whose A Manual For Cleaning Women is out now.
●
●