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British author John Fowles, who wrote masterpieces like The French Lieutenant’s Woman and The Magus, passed away at the age of 79. There have been a number of small articles and obituaries popping up in the media. –The CBC ran this obituary about Fowles. –The Times Online provided this overview of Fowles, including some good [...]

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The setting sun against the cyclone wire fence casts a glare that momentarily blinds me as I open the envelope. It’s late afternoon, clocks are being punched out, and I hear car radios blare from the road as factory workers and pipe fitters screech out of warehouse parking lots. I see an old Camaro, once [...]

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I’ve mentioned my review of Neil Strauss’ current bestseller, The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists. The book has spent six weeks on the New York Times list, was optioned for film production, and has been featured in numerous major media outlets. To go along with that book, I thought it would be [...]

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I just recently noticed that some of our older interviews have fluky formatting in them. I suppose this happened when we changed servers recently. Or maybe it’s been there for months and I just haven’t seen it. Either way, I’ll work on getting those items corrected this week. So if you’re browsing through our past [...]

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Back in early August, I ran a bit about some controversy surrounding the Washington Post book review of John Irving’s most recent novel, Until I Find You. The uproar at the time was that the newspaper ran a book review written by a critic who had a personal relationship with Irving. The newspaper acted to [...]

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There were a whole bunch of changes in the publishing and magazine world last week. Big names leaving positions, big names starting new gigs, changes all around.

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There were numerous reports yesterday about big announcements from Amazon and Random House. First of all, the online retail giant unveiled Amazon Pages. The program allows consumers to view parts of a book online for a fee. Amazon did not provide details on pricing and no major publishers have signed up for the program. Meanwhile, [...]

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A deal was announced yesterday that Harlequin plans to go in circles with licensed plotlines centering on NASCAR. The series begins with a Daytona 500 tie-in novel entitled In the Groove by Pamela Britton due in January 2006. The author’s website states that the heroine of the novel “wouldn’t know a NASCAR star if he [...]

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I’ve recently been re-reading Joyce’s Ulysses so this item caught my eye while I was trawling eBay looking for toast burnt by the stigmata and Britney Spears’ bra… First edition, 11th printing May 1930, the last printing of the legendary first edition of Ulysses, published by Shakespeare & Company. Joyce’s signature is laid in on [...]

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Joe R. Lansdale is one of our most prolific writers. Author of twenty books, and more published short stories than my mathematically challenged brain can count, Lansdale effortlessly moves between the horror, science fiction, humor, western, and literary genres. I’ve only recently begun to delve into his immense pile of work and I think it [...]

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The October/November issue of Bookforum presents two interesting reviews. The first is Sam Lipsyte’s review of The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil by George Saunders. You might remember Saunders briefly describing this new book in our interview back in August. The second is Minna Proctor’s examination of Veronica by Mary Gaitskill. Both are insightful [...]

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Via Bookninja, I learned about this great Wall Street Journal article detailing writers in New Orleans who lost their work in the hurricane. One poor soul, who lost most of his writings to the flood, has now taken to wearing a flash drive on a cord around his neck. Sad story, really.

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There have recently been some interesting defenses of Chick Lit by writers who say that female critics shouldn’t be complaining about all those pink-covered books that feature such emphasis on shoes and dating. Bestselling author Jennifer Weiner said in an article with the San Francisco Chronicle that she minored in women’s studies at Princeton and [...]

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“The Block” in Baltimore is a city block that is home to dozens of strip clubs where Blaze Starr once held court, but that’s not what author Max Barry is talking about in a post on his great website. Instead, he’s talking about overcoming writer’s block. A fan wrote in and said they were stuck [...]

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