Mr. Black, a political and civil rights activist, educator, historian, prolific author and revered elder statesman and griot of Chicago’s Black community, died Wednesday. Read more
Author: GR
Sally Rooney Declines to Sell Translation Rights to Israeli Publisher
The Irish novelist Sally Rooney said on Tuesday that she would not allow the Israeli publishing house that handled her previous novels to publish her most recent book, “Beautiful World, Where Are You,” because of her support for Palestinian people and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Read more
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I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness by Claire Vaye Watkins
In the spirit of Edward Abbey, Hunter Thompson, and Joy Williams, Watkins has forged a desert tale of howling pain and a chaotic quest for healing mythic in its summoning of female power in a realm of double-wides, loaded dice, broken glass, and hot springs. Read more
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Sue Grafton’s Alphabet Novels to Be Adapted for Television
A TV adaptation of the late Sue Grafton’s million-selling Kinsey Millhone mystery novels, a prospect the author once swore she would return from the dead to prevent, is now in the works. Read more
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Philadelphia poet Sonia Sanchez has won the Gish Prize
The poet, educator, and activist was selected for the $250,000 cash award “in recognition of her ongoing achievements in inspiring change through the power of the word.” Read more
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Abdulrazak Gurnah Is Awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature
The Tanzanian writer who moved to Britain as a refugee in the 1960s was honored for his “uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism.” Read more
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‘Noir Alley’ host celebrates cinema’s double crosses and doomed characters
Eddie Muller’s book, Dark City, chronicles film noir from the ’40s and ’50s. “A lot of factors … go into making something of film noir,” he says, including, a “very dark vision of existence.” Read more
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A Chinese Classic Journeys to the West: Julia Lovell’s Translation of “Monkey King”
EXCEPT FOR THE one error I spotted on its cover, Julia Lovell’s new translation of Monkey King: Journey to the West is the best English edition of the classic Chinese fantasy novel, Xi You Ji (literally “west journey record”), I have ever read. If you wish to understand why Monkey King has been a fixture in Chinese popular culture for no fewer than five centuries, then look no further. Pick up this edition and you will join the 1.5 billion people who, to paraphrase Neil Gaiman’s comment on the tale, share in their DNA an intimate knowledge of the havoc-wreaking Monkey’s herculean journey westward to find a special collection of Buddhist sutras in India. Read more
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Supply-Chain Snarls Delay Books
The churning disruption in the global supply chain, which has touched everything from minivans to dishwashers to sweaters, has now reached the world of books, just as the holiday season — a crucial time for publishers, and a period that can make or break the entire year for an independent bookstore — approaches. Publishers are postponing some release dates because books aren’t where they need to be. Older books are also being affected as suppliers struggle to replenish them. Read more
The Owner of The Mysterious Bookshop Built His Dream House
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man in possession of a good 60,000 books must be in want of a very big house. At some point in the mid-1980s, Otto Penzler, the indefatigable founder and proprietor of The Mysterious Bookshop, the Manhattan store specializing in fictitious tales of crime and espionage and whodunits of a high order, could no longer ignore the evidence: His personal collection of first editions had outgrown his office, and cartons containing the overflow were stashed in a pal’s garage. They needed a room of their own. Read more
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