“The so-called ‘alt-right’ is white nationalism repackaged as retro-chic, and its discourse constantly invokes nostalgia for a golden age in the Confederate South when racism when reigned supreme. The leaders of this project will need to be very careful that they don’t end up just creating a Disneyland for racists.” A coalition of local businesses in Monroeville, Alabama, Harper Lee‘s hometown, plan to open a major tourist attraction built around the late author’s home and fabrications of fictional locations featured in To Kill A Mockingbird. Critics are dubious, reports The Guardian. Perhaps, in lieu of a trip, you’ll accept this essay by Robert Rea about his literary pilgrimage to Lee-land?
Harper Lee Land
“To me, Godspeed is more than just a band, it’s an idea.”
Canadian post-rock outfit Godspeed You! Black Emperor will soon release their fourth studio album, 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend!, and it’s definitely worth checking out. You can stream the record over here. The band was also recently interviewed for The Guardian, too, and this entire post should keep you occupied for a while.
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Adam Bomb and Friends
Max Axe here. I was seven years old when the Garbage Pail Kids debuted and quickly became all the rage, so news that this Garbage Pail Kids book - with an introduction by creator Art Spiegelman - is hitting bookstores now is transporting me back to my schoolyard days. (Also, how did I not know until now that Spiegelman was behind GPK?)
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Oddest Titles of the Year
Nominees for The Bookseller Diagram Prize for the Oddest Title of the Year have been announced. My favorite, which to me is not odd at all actually, is Bacon: A Love Story. Scatology abounds in this list, including: Peek-a-poo:What's in Your Diaper, and The Origin of Faeces.
Believing in the Bookternet
Recommended Viewing: Year in Reading alumna Rachel Fershleiser's TED talk "Why I heart the Bookternet" on building reading communities through the internet. "The more tools that we get for communication and collaboration, the more we're taking reading and writing — these really solitary pursuits — and building communities around them for connection and conversation."
Little Fiction’s Book Preview; Le Translation Preview
On their Tumblr, Little Fiction is previewing some of the books being released in 2014-2015 by authors they’ve recently worked with. Meanwhile, Chad Post put together “Le Translation Preview” to promote some international work being published this July. Think of both lists as complementary compendiums to our Great Second-Half 2014 Book Preview.
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“Time is the substance from which I am made.”
Yesterday was Jorge Luis Borges' 112th birthday, and you can celebrate belatedly by reading his Paris Review interview and his treatment in The New York Review of Books.
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Real People
"Here is the last and biggest piece of advice I have: If you have a story that you want to tell, but you’re afraid that someone in your life is going to feel wounded, whether that feeling is justified or not, fair or not, tell it anyway." Emma Straub, who recently wrote about her Year in Reading, gives some advice on fictionalizing real people in an essay for Rookie.