Authors
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What They Knew #25: Proust on the Miracle of Reading
“Reading is that fruitful miracle of a communication in the midst of solitude.” – Marcel Proust Continue reading
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The Kingdom of Publishing
My biweekly trips through the New York Review of Books are often filled with pleasure, amusement, fascination, and appreciation. And then there are those rare occasions when I’m completely befuddled. I think I understand most of Jason Epstein’s tribute to Roger Straus (of publishing house Farrar, Straus and Giroux). But what to make of this… Continue reading
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Popova on Schopenhauer
The great Maria Popova takes a look at our favorite dismal crank Schopenhauer. (If you haven’t read Schopenhauer, start reading! Unless you’re one of those people who view cloudy days as a personal offense against your nature.) Popova’s article looks at Schopenhauer through a particular lens, asking whether he “presaged” today’s Internet writing on headline-and-slideshow… Continue reading
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Small Press Shoutout: SALT Publishing!
Back again with another small press shoutout! This week we hop across the pond to look at Salt Publishing, which for 15 years has been independently dedicated to creating “A New British Fiction Movement.” Why are they called Salt? Maybe it’s an acronym? Maybe it’s a tribute to the number-one spice? Meat preservation? The taste… Continue reading
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Jacke’s Jacket: New Blurb
It’s a great day in Jacke news – a new blurb from the fabulous Ronica Dhar! Jacke Wilson’s work has for many years engaged me with its themes about the Midwest, politics, and contemporary culture. Alternately full of intrigue or expertly rendered deadpan comedy, Jacke’s stories (or perhaps satires? I’d have to ask Jacke to… Continue reading
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Small Press Shoutout: Other Press!
Back again with another small press shoutout! This week we look at Other Press, which focuses on authors with a “passion to discover the limits of knowledge and the imagination.” Oh boy! The editors of Other Press come with some gilded resumes indeed. Here’s an excerpt from Publisher Judith Gurewitch’s bio: Born in Canada and… Continue reading
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Welcome, Nook Readers!
Fans of Barnes & Noble, your days of waiting are OVER. The Race: A Novella is ready and available for sampling and purchases on your favorite Nook product. My thanks again to Mark Coker and the folks at Smashwords for the distribution platform. It’s great to be able to reach all my readers, on whatever… Continue reading
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The Celebrated Yarn Spinner of Whatagenius County
Ben Tarnoff takes an insightful look at Mark Twain’s push to employ his humor for something deeper than mere entertainment. Mark Twain loved frontier humor, the impish wit and yeasty vernacular, its fondness for the gargantuan and the grotesque. He also understood its deeper value: not merely as entertainment but as a survival tactic. Twain… Continue reading
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Terrible Poem Breakdown: Another Apologia (of Sorts)
Some thoughts on the Terrible Poem Breakdown series, which continues to be one of our more popular sets of posts here on the blog. Even though I try to make it clear that the poets have expressly consented, it seems I risk being viewed as too negative. Readers, I get it: poets deserve our empathy,… Continue reading
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The Failure of the Unpublished Author: Dead or Dying?
We’re fans of failure on this blog (as we are in life). And of course, The Race: A Novella has a failed lawyer as one of its pole stars. Now Tim Parks brings things full circle with a look at failed writers, which of course we’re HUGE fans of as well, when we’re not self-hating them. (Oh boy… Continue reading
Jacke Wilson 