Nicole Dennis-Benn discusses her latest book, Patsy, a novel that explores issues of motherhood, the working class, sexual identity, and immigration, with Concepción de León. The complicated protagonist of the novel makes a series of difficult decisions throughout the book, forcing Dennis-Benn to take on perspectives not always familiar to her. “Sometimes I take breaks, maybe a week or two to really assess, ‘What am I really judging?’ For example, with the motherhood part, I’m judging this woman who absolutely cannot embrace her role as a mother. Realizing I had to really unpack my own upbringing, my own socialization as a Jamaican woman—or a woman, in general—and then move forward.”
Nicole Dennis-Benn Moves Forward
This Isn’t Your Mother’s DoubleX
The debut issue of Candor magazine is like a Sassy for the intellectual set, rife with wit (Emily Gould and Merisa Meltzer discuss Away We Go), intelligence (writer mother Rachel Zucker and woman writer Sarah Manguso speak candidly about identity, motherhood, women’s prejudices and writing), and women’s rights (Atossa Abrahamian considers the rhetoric of the rape victim).
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A Handful of Links
“Though statements have been issued over the years, no one has ever provided full disclosure of the alleged 1974 government experiment called OPERATION EMU (Experimental Mitigated Universe) during which an entire Hollywood film crew, contracted by the government, disappeared in a remote section of Nevada.” Is this Web site a mysterious government coverup of the ravings of a lunatic? Neither. It’s the marketing campaign of a writer shopping his manuscript. (thanks, R.J.)The University of Nebraska Press has a blog. They’ve been plugging away at the blog since January, but I hadn’t seen it until today, when I got an email about it.New issues of The Virginia Quarterly Review and Narrative Magazine are out.
The Art of the Recommendation
Laura Miller at Salon reports on the fine art of recommending books – “too delicate a task to leave to e-commerce robots” – and the literary types who are now stepping in to offer their advice.
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Levente Szabó’s Great Book Cover Project
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Ken Jennings Debunks Space Myths
Because I Said So! author and Jeopardy all star Ken Jennings is debunking space myths all month over at Woot. In his first installment, he looks at just how much money was spent to develop NASA’s “space pen.”
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Jonathan Franzen New Yorker Article
Jonathan Franzen writes of Robinson Crusoe, solitude, and David Foster Wallace in his new article from The New Yorker – but you’ll have to like their Facebook page to read it.
Heti and Didion, Chatting It Up
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