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Present a copy of The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas. Whoever puts it in their purse is the woman. Whoever pulls their own copy out of their pocket is Gertrude Stein.
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The most beautiful thing I can think of to do with one’s life is to write a novel, even as I feel really ambivalent about the utility of doing it, about the value to myself and to society and to my local community of having written a book.
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A family’s grief traps generations in a search for insight.
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Morowa Yejidé discusses her new novel, CREATURES OF PASSAGE.
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I’m not writing confessionals; I’m trying to write hooks.
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Chris Dennis discusses his debut story collection, HERE IS WHAT YOU DO.
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What I know and don’t know about men matters. What men know and don’t know about themselves matters more.
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Quintan Ana Wikswo discusses her novel, A Long Curving Scar Where the Heart Should Be, delving into the facets of trauma, and her creative processes.
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[W]hat’s more thrilling than making the world more beautiful one haggard, agitated face at a time?
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Melissa Fraterrigo discusses her new novel-in-stories, Glory Days, writing speculative fiction, and how our formative years influence us later in life.
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Whether you are celebrating your father or cursing his name this Father’s Day, here’s a list of very good books about fathers from writers we love.
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John Grisham discusses his advice for young writers, the literary mafia, and why he finally wrote a (literal) beach read.
...moreThe big bad wolf’s name is Big Data. Michael Chabon messes with our memories. Snape was always a little crabby…
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Terry McDonell talks about his new memoir The Accidental Life and his career in the magazine business, which spans the beginning of New Journalism through the digital revolution.
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Leah Kaminsky’s debut novel, The Waiting Room, depicts one fateful day in the life of an Australian doctor and mother, Dina, living in Haifa, Israel. Dina is trying to maintain normalcy as she goes about her work as a family doctor, cares for her son, and fights to preserve her faltering relationship with her husband, […]
...moreApparently, Jonathan Safran Foer wasn’t the only one exchanging emails with Natalie Portman. At The Millions, Jacob Lambert shares excerpts from the supposed epistolary relationship between the actress and no less than American author Cormac McCarthy.
...moreAt the LA Times, Claire Vaye Watkins recounts her realization that she has been writing to appeal to the white male literary establishment: I am trying to write something urgent, trying to be vulnerable and honest, trying to listen, trying to identify and articulate my innermost feelings, trying to make you feel them too, trying […]
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All the same, I’m as much a slave to necessity as anyone here. Fear and desire rule the heart. The paycheck has me leashed and basically obedient.
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The Rumpus Book Club chats with Colin Winnette about his new novel Haints Stay, writing ambiguity, and playing against the expectations of genre.
...moreThe rapture may have been a bust, but our obsession with the apocalypse shows no signs of letting up. NPR’s Jason Heller explains why post-apocalyptic fiction will stand the test of time: The world feels more precariously perched on the lip of the abyss than ever, and facing those fears through fiction helps us deal […]
...moreA good story resides in a world all its own, and I wanted to have the reader understand quickly what this world was like, a world where some people like Toño “La Perra” Becerra have a hard on for violence and some others, like “The Judge” Vallejo…go about inflicting violence like a sacred, god given […]
...moreHere’s why I think that Philip Roth and Cormac McCarthy are opposites: Roth is a builder, and McCarthy is a destroyer. Over at the Ploughshares blog, Lily Meyerin tells us why she thinks that Philip Roth and Cormac McCarthy, named by Harold Bloom as two of the most important living American writers, should be considered “literary […]
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In Episode 6 of The Rumpus Late Nite Poetry Show, Dave Roderick chats with poet Oliver de la Paz about his new collection, Post Subject: A Fable, video games, and his weirdest writing habit.
...moreFor Electric Literature, noting that character shrugs and smiles are usually crutches in fiction, Matt Bell analyzes Cormac McCarthy’s use of smiles in Outer Dark, providing “a good reminder that very few rules hold up everywhere, and that great writers are constantly breaking or disregarding the guidelines that get parroted so often in our writing […]
...moreCombining The Exorcist, New Jersey, and James Baldwin, among other things, Nick Ripatrazone reviews William Giraldi’s new novel, Hold the Dark, at The Millions. He contemplates Giraldi’s place in contemporary Catholic literature, using his fiction, alongside Cormac McCarthy’s and Christopher Beha’s, to draw larger claims on religion, the manifestations of Satan, and realism.
...moreChipotle is getting into the publishing business. Vanity Fair reports that the burrito chain’s cups and bags will feature very short stories from authors like Jonathan Safran Foer, Toni Morrison, George Saunders, and others. Shortly after the announcement, Slate published Cormac McCarthy’s “rejected” story.
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If you enjoyed Timothy Leo Taranto’s first and second rounds of literary puns, check out these new illustrations of such essential authors as Juneau Díaz and Karen Mussel
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Throughout the film’s first act, Scott and screenwriter Cormac McCarthy present a culture of testosterone, then spend later scenes toying with this impression…
...moreThere’s this deeply cool new magazine about literature and rock music called Radio Silence, which we reviewed back in June, and they recently posted an essay titled “The Bottom” that will just about cave your head in. In it, Jim White writes about how a Cormac McCarthy novel saved him from a surreally devastating heartbreak—and plunked […]
...moreThis morning, a Cormac McCarthy impersonator showed up on Twitter, duping some twitterers until Vintage and Anchor confirmed that it was not the real McCarthy. In fact, the writer does not own a computer. You can check out the collection of “fake” tweets.
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