5am and it’s me and the birds. This is how I like it: when the house is sleeping. Outside, the low rumble of sanitation trucks. A lone scooter screeches down the block. Sometimes helicopters hover. A different kind of writer might pause to name the local birds (mourning doves, blue jays), open an ornithology app,
What does it take to create a literary activism story? A lot of time, energy and effort. Not every story about book censorship or library challenges makes the cut for the weekly link roundup, as each story is examined for as much context and insight as possible. For news to be reported, time and energy
How many 2026 Read Harder Challenge tasks have you completed so far? There is a wide range of answers to this question, although the most common response was 12: On track to complete all 24 tasks by the end of the year! However, the trend seems to be that most of us are a little
Salvador Dali, El Mago, courtesy of Taschen, via another person In the early 1970s, producers Albert R. Broccoli employed artist Salvador Dali To create a tarot deck for the upcoming James Bond film live and Let Die. Based on Ian Fleming’s 1954 novel of the same name, live and Let Die was released in 1973
Today, the DAG Foundation announced the winners of its second annual DAG Awards, which award $20,000 to a visual artist, a writer and a musician “whose work expands the possibilities for American art.” Specifically, the DAG Prize for Literature is intended to “support writing that offers significant innovation – for example, at the level of
Today’s Special Book Deal $1.99 one last stop By Casey McQuiston GET THIS DEAL $3.74 a mysterious legacy By Kamila Cole GET THIS DEAL $1.99 city of others By Jared Poon GET THIS DEAL $1.99 wake up in the fire now By Jarrett DePier, illustrated by AJ Dungo GET THIS DEAL $2.99 The Vanishing Cherry
The 2025 Shirley Jackson Awards were announced at ReaderCon 35 on Saturday night, July 11. The awards are presented to the best horror, dark fantasy and psychological mystery books published in the previous year. This year’s hosts and guests of honor for the ceremony were P. Jelly Clark and David Gerrold. Each year, the Shirley
The best of literary internet Today: In 1930, about 6,000 Spiritualists gathered at the Royal Albert Hall for a memorial to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, including his relatives. Medium Estelle Roberts sent a private message to Doyle’s widow, which she confirmed to be genuine. Article continues after ad
my version of elizabeth was written by a man named Gilbert Cordier and published by Gallimard in 1946. This novel did not take off much and eventually disappeared from circulation. Sixty years later Gallimard reissued it under an altered title. La maison d’élisabeth. Now, almost eighty years after its initial publication in France, it has
I first started reading Grace Paley a few weeks after her second novel was published, as I sought refuge from refreshing Goodreads from waiting for the Booker Prize committee to call. Reading the five-page excerpt “Love” and then re-reading it several times, I had tears in my eyes – it was a perfect picture of