The hyperbole on book jackets—both the plot summaries and the lists of adulatory adjectives that go with them—have long frustrated authors, but no one would dispute that a good blurb has crucial functions: it’s a chance to hook readers, and can help them situate a new book within a genre or tradition. Read more
Category: Essays
Jews in Space: On the Unsung History of Jewish Writers and the Birth of Science Fiction
Lavie Tidhar Considers the Past, Present, and Future of Jewish Writers in Sci-Fi and Fantasy. Read more
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For Literary Novelists the Past Is Pressing
For the past two decades, the novels celebrated for defining our time have almost always been books set within our time, from Jonathan Franzen’s voluminous social comedies to Sally Rooney’s smartly self-knowing novels and the seam of contemporary autofiction that has run between them. Historical fiction, by contrast, has not been in fashion. Or, rather, it has been seen as its own fusty fashion, relentlessly uncontemporary and easy to caricature, filled with mothballed characters who wear costumes rather than clothes, use words like “Prithee!” while having modern-day thoughts, and occasionally encounter villains immediately recognizable by their yellow teeth or suspicious smell. Read more
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What We Lose When Literary Criticism Ends
With mainstream media uninterested in books coverage that doesn’t get clicks, writers and readers are being left out in the cold. Read more
Opening a Small-Town Bookstore During the Pandemic Was the Craziest Thing We Ever Did
It’s every book lover’s fantasy. Yet nothing can quite prepare you for the reality of starting any business, even under normal conditions. Certainly, few dreamers think to prepare for the nightmare of a global pandemic that shutters most brick-and-mortar retail, disrupts supply chains, and kills hundreds of thousands of your fellow citizens. Read more
Why Librarians Are Natural Born Detectives
Whether you’re looking for information about an uncle’s will or a homemade poison, the reference desk is the place to go. Read more
The Strange Undeath of Middlebrow
It is odd that anyone still uses the word middlebrow. Like its complements lowbrow and highbrow, it reeks of antique beliefs, specifically the English notion that the brow ridges of pureblooded Anglo-Saxon gentlemen jut out and up in a most lordly fashion. Read more
