Mario Vargas Llosa, the Peruvian novelist who combined gritty realism with playful erotica and depictions of the struggle for individual liberty in Latin America, while also writing essays that made him one of the most influential political commentators in the Spanish-speaking world, died on Sunday in Lima. Read more
Fantasy Novels for People Who Think They Don’t Like Fantasy
Interested in dipping your toe into the genre? The author Leigh Bardugo recommends books that can get you started. Read more
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States Challenge Trump’s Effort to Dismantle Library Agency
In a lawsuit, 21 state attorneys general argued that the steep cuts to the Institute of Museum and Library Services violate the Constitution and other federal laws related to spending. Read more
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A New Translation Breathes Fresh Life Into Baudelaire
A new dual-language translation of Charles Baudelaire’s The Flowers of Evil offers English readers the best way of appreciating the poet who helped invent modernity. Read more
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Irish Crime Writer Ken Bruen Dies Aged 74
The author published more than 50 works including the acclaimed Jack Taylor crime novels. Read more
The Adaptation of ‘Small Things Like These’ Makes Its Streaming Debut on April 8th
Oscar winner Cillian Murphy delivers a stunning performance as devoted father Bill Furlong in this film based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Claire Keegan. While working as a coal merchant to support his family, he discovers disturbing secrets kept by the local convent — and uncovers truths of his own — forcing him to confront his past and the complicit silence of a small Irish town controlled by the Catholic Church. Watch trailer
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NaNoWriMo is No Mo
The nonprofit behind National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, has announced that it is shuttering. The closure follows a period of turbulence which included disputes over the organization’s stance on AI and its content moderation, as well as what NaNoWriMo described in an announcement as financial challenges. NaNoWriMo was launched by Chris Baty in 1999 as an online community centered around its flagship annual monthlong novel-writing challenge, in which participants attempted to write 50,000 in 30 days. It continued to grow year over year—at its height, hundreds of thousands of writers around the globe participated in the challenge, facilitated by scores of volunteers who oversaw online forums and local gatherings—and became a 501(c)(3) nonprofit in 2005. Read more
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The Essential Tanith Lee
The eclectic, prolific author wrote more than 90 novels — primarily fantasy and science fiction, but also horror, erotica, mysteries and historical fiction. If you’ve never read her work, here’s where to start. Read more
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Before QAnon and the Deep State, There Was Iron Mountain
“Report From Iron Mountain” was soon revealed as a hoax. But it was so good a hoax, so deft and deadpan and precise in its aim, that nearly 60 years later, it retains a certain hold on the public consciousness. The story of this report — who conceived it, what they intended and why it endures, like toxic waste leaking from a metal drum — is the subject of “Ghosts of Iron Mountain,” an excellent new book by the British journalist Phil Tinline. His fast-paced account is often entertaining but never loses sight of where it is heading: toward a moment, our own, when conspiracists and crackpots have seized the levers of power. Read more
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The Best American Poetry of the 21st Century (So Far)
No list can be comprehensive or infallible, but we did not approach this one lightly. After considering various criteria, we landed on work that felt consequential. We were looking for poetry that had struck its readers, for whatever reasons, as unforgettable, enduring, and influential: maybe because it came as an unexpected gift from a friend or loved one, or in the form of a classroom discovery; maybe because it reframed the world in such a way that culture or society felt foundationally shaken. Maybe it was just because, to paraphrase Emily Dickinson, it takes the top of your head off. Read more
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