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The Rumpus
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“A Bitter Cup of Tea” Worth Drinking
Electric Literature has a new review up for Rumpus columnist Jerry Stahl‘s latest book, Happy Mutant Baby Pills: Jerry Stahl’s Happy Mutant Baby Pills is a hurricane of comedic and satirical horrors involving drug abuse, violence, manic lovers (including their manic sex lives), and…
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Of Mice and Machines
Ever wonder what John Steinbeck would make of angel investors and Google? McSweeney’s contributor Thomas Scott has reimagined Steinbeck’s classic Of Mice and Men, taking George and Lennie from the fields of Great Depression-era California to modern-day Silicon Valley.
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All Roads Lead to Writing
Over at The Millions, Rumpus contributor Nick Ripatrazone looks at the many and varied paths that bring writers to the profession and considers the benefits of time spent studying subjects other than creative writing: Although I have drifted toward the science…
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Fiction in the Digital Age
Serialized fiction is experiencing a resurgence, and we have technology to thank. Back in 2012, The Silent History brought the serialized novel to our iPhones (check out our interview with co-author Kevin Moffett here). And now, there’s Wattpad. The New York Times takes…
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Weekly Rumpus Fiction: Jill Hanley
The next Weekly Rumpus features fiction from Jill Hanley. Here’s an excerpt: Lola stepped into the kitchen to find her mother standing at the sink, showing no signs of tears. She could still remember how hard, loud, and ugly her mother’s…
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Next Letter for Kids: Lemony Snicket
If there’s any time to sign up for Letters for Kids, it’s definitely now!
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Fate, Chance, and Student Loans
Does everything happen for a reason? That’s the question writer Laura Leigh Abby had to ask herself after a car accident allowed her to graduate with an MFA degree loan-free: For most of my life I’ve been doing things without worrying…
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Keep It Lit
The oldest independent black bookstore in the country, San Francisco’s Marcus Books, is in danger of closing. But if the owners can raise $2.6M, the San Francisco Community Land Trust will buy the building and allow the shop to remain as…
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The Decline of Punctuation?!…
We live in a heyday of punctuation. “Call this what you will—exclamatory excess, punctuation inflation, the result of the Internet’s limitless expanse—it is everywhere,” writes Megan Garber at the Atlantic. But perhaps not for long—with the rise of image-based expression…
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By Any Other Name
I try to be open about who I am. I’m not interested in having a blank slate; I’d rather everyone just know what’s on mine. Maybe people think I’m hiding from my past by being Anna. No, far from it.…
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Gregor Samsa Dreams of RoboCop
Susan Bernofsky, in the introduction to her new translation of Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, compares Gregor Samsa to famed American literary character Willy Loman. Over at the LA Review of Books, David Burr Gerrard praises the translation but disagrees that this is…
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Weekly Rumpus Fiction: Johnny Alfi
The next Weekly Rumpus features fiction from Johnny Alfi. Here’s an excerpt: She once gave me her number outside Abbot’s Habit Coffeehouse. She once proposed that she and Nora get matching tattoos of peaches on their ass cheeks. Instead, she…