The Millions
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Startling Places
For the New York Times, Lydia Kiesling reflects on Sara Majka’s debut collection, Cities I’ve Never Lived In: I assumed right away that I knew exactly what kind of book this would be: a book about arty people with complicated personal…
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The Danger in Neat Identifications
For The Millions, Edan Lepucki interviews novelist Dana Spiotta about her latest release Innocents and Others. In addition to exploring the process that went into writing the novel, the two discuss how to construct narrative by trusting instinct and intuition: It has a…
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Learning by Listening
The Millions staff writer Nick Ripatrazone examines literature that “embraces the power of radio” and highlights the sounds of language: Radio is elegiac. Radio is the theater of the mind: our eyes are free to look elsewhere, but the sound bounces in…
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The “Wow” Factor
For The Millions, editor Gerald Howard reflects on his search for manuscripts that “wow.” In addition, Howard explains how books like Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain helped to cultivate his interest in publishing, and explores how the subject matter of literature has changed…
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Kids Books All Grown-Up
…like Franzen’s novels, the Berenstain Bear books might meander, reveling in details alternately informative and irrelevant, but ultimately they’re straightforward tales about family. (Also, as a friend pointed out to me recently, JFran sort of looks like a Berenstain Bear.…
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Joyce’s Forgotten Rival
For The Millions, Austin Ratner documents the relationship between the “forgotten” Irish writer James Stephens and the famed James Joyce. Despite starting as literary rivals, Joyce wanted Stephens to finish Finnegans Wake if he ever lost his eyesight. In addition, the essay examines…
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Making Up for Lost Time
For The Millions, Hannah Gersen recalls past attempts to read Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, and explains why she came up short. The essay also serves as an announcement for a new series, in which Gersen will once again attempt to…
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The “Sealed” Literary World
For The Millions, Kate McCahill reflects on illiteracy in the modern world and checks her privilege for growing up “book-rich”: Books, I realized sharply, suddenly, are too expensive. They’re a luxury item, designated for the rich, for the privileged. Guiltily, I…
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Infinite Cover Redesigns
The Millions shows us the new fan-designed cover for the 20th anniversary edition of David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest, as well as a short and sweet interview with Wallace’s editor and Little, Brown CEO Michael Pietsch.
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Read All These
Why stuff your body with Thanksgiving leftovers when you could be stuffing your bag with used books? It was another reminder that I will surely die before I read all of my books, that my descendants will one day be…
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Growing Up with Books
Over at The Millions, Nick Ripatrazone asked some authors, including William Giraldi and Christa Parravani, which were the books that defined their childhoods and, subsequently, their writing imaginations.
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Marginalized
Why is marking a book indispensable to reading it? First, it keeps you awake — not merely conscious, but wide awake. Second, reading, if it is active, is thinking, and thinking tends to express itself in words, spoken or written.…