Posts by author
Kathryn Sukalich
-
Learning to Look Closer
Over at Brain Pickings, Maria Popova talks with cognitive scientist Alexandra Horowitz about her new book On Looking, which is about the way sensory awareness impacts our perception of reality. The two discuss how “a writer is a professional observer”…
-
Who Has the Right to Our Stories?
At the New York Times, novelist Roxana Robinson considers the criticism fiction writers receive when they write stories far from their own experience. Some people ask, “Do novelists have the right to write stories that aren’t their own?” Can someone…
-
A Sea of Heroes
In the New York Times Sunday Book Review, Colum McCann, author of Let the Great World Spin and the new novel TransAtlantic, talks about which books made him laugh, which made him cry, and which he’d like to live in.…
-
Little Free Library Battle: 9-Year-Old vs. City Council
In Leawood, KS, a 9-year-old was forced to remove the Little Free Library he built in his family’s front yard because it’s considered an “illegal detached structure.” After he takes the issue to the city council next month, he may…
-
A Reading with Music and Pictures
In an interview with the New York Times, Neil Gaiman discusses his upcoming reading at Carnegie Hall where he will read from his novella, The Truth Is a Cave in the Black Mountains. What’s so special about the reading? It will…
-
A Book Voyage with No Guide
As the number of Americans who read books has declined, those who do read have begun wearing t-shirts, carrying tote bags, and sticking magnets on their fridges declaring their love of reading. Some book lovers even perform “book stunts,” reading…
-
Is Writing About Writing Really Forbidden?
Over at Electric Literature, Kristopher Jansma wonders why we tell students to avoid writing about writing. Perhaps, he suggests, we tell students not to write about writing because we think they should be going out and getting new experiences to…
-
Political Fiction, Without a Capital P
Political fiction can come across as heavy-handed, but avoiding all politics in writing may overlook the fact that people lead political lives. Over at the Atlantic, author Molly Antopol talks about how reading the fiction of Grace Paley taught her…
-
The Hashtag That Changed BookCon’s Lineup
The inaugural BookCon event just took place in New York City in conjunction with the publishing industry’s annual trade convention. When the event’s entirely white lineup was first announced, the #WeNeedDiverseBooks Twitter campaign drew attention to the problem and led…
-
21st Century Poetry Written in 1964
The 50th anniversary edition of Lunch Poems, the collection written by Frank O’Hara in 1964, has caught attention recently over at The Atlantic. The book has always been important to New Yorkers, and evidently it still is—in 2012, it was…
-
How to Keep Writing That First Novel
The odds that your first novel will ever be published may not be great, but some new writers do manage to get published. NPR Books asks Chad Harbach and Tara Conklin about the process of writing and selling their first…
-
Why Libraries Matter
Love libraries? So do we. Know someone who thinks physical libraries will eventually disappear? Have them watch this mini-documentary, Why Libraries Matter, over at the Atlantic. A look at a day in the life of New York City’s public libraries…