Writer of We’re Going on a Bear Hunt is a ‘passionate linguist, gifted humanist, national treasure and ambassador of gibberish’ Read more
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Author: GR
How Review-Bombing Can Tank a Book Before It’s Published
The website Goodreads has become an essential avenue for building readership, but the same features that help generate excitement can also backfire. Read more
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Quietly Hostile by Samantha Irby
She never wallows in loathing, self- or otherwise. Instead, she lets us all in on the joke. And what a joke it is … Calling Quietly Hostile a collection of essays is a bit limiting. These 17 pieces are more like essays crossed with stand-up bits, and that punchline-driven rhythm serves the book spectacularly well … Irby dexterously plays both sides: the awkward people-pleaser and the snarky cynic. Like a cartoon character in a tennis match against herself, she races back and forth between self-deprecation and scalding humor, never once missing a stroke. People may be shallow, Irby is more than happy to point out, but she’s right down there with them — quietly hostile, sure, but also loudly irresistible. Read more
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30 Author Names You Might Be Mispronouncing
You’ve seen their names on the front of your favorite books, but how exactly do you say those names? Read more
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Two Debut Books Win Orwell Prizes for Political Writing
Peter Apps’ magnificent account of the Grenfell fire tragedy and Tom Crewe’s historical novel about pioneering Victorian gay rights advocates will each receive £3,000. Read more
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Umberto Eco: A Library of the World
The Italian journalist, critic, philosopher, professor of semiotics, medievalist, bibliophile, and best-selling novelist, Umberto Eco (1932-2016) takes us on a journey through his Milanese library of 50,000 volumes, and, more impressively, the library of his mind. Best known for his novel, The Name of the Rose, Eco is a vastly prolific, witty, and original thinker — and talker — who holds forth on topics as wildly diverse as the value of reading low-brow books, the origins of fascism, the psychology of conspiracy theorists, reading on paper versus digitally, the importance of discarding useless memories, truth versus lies, great fakes, and brilliant mistakes in history. “To be intellectually curious is to be alive. And believe me, a lot of people are not alive.” – Umberto Eco. Watch trailer
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Nine Books That Will Actually Make You Laugh
Let’s be honest: What passes for funny in book marketing falls beneath the standard just about everywhere else. The number of published works that say “Hilarious!” on their cover but turn out to be merely quirky—or the dreaded wacky—is enough to make a reader cynical. Read more
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Taking a Late-in-Life Victory Lap, Thanks to His Novel’s ‘Lunatic Energy’
Robert Plunket’s 1983 novel, “My Search for Warren Harding,” was out of print for decades — but remained stealthily influential. Its reissue has catapulted him out of retirement. Read more
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Read Your Way Through the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands
The poet and novelist Luis Alberto Urrea thinks the borderlands are the most interesting book in the world, being rewritten every day. These are his recommendations. Read more
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Barbara Kingsolver Wins the Women’s Prize for Fiction for Second Time
Winning for Demon Copperhead, a ‘deeply powerful’, US-set Dickens update, the American novelist becomes the first writer to win the contest for a second time. Read more
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