What Sleeping With Jane Eyre Taught Me About Pacing

From Jane Friedman: I’ve been sleeping with Jane Eyre, lately—courtesy of The Sleepy Bookshelf, a podcast designed to help me snooze. Except it’s been keeping me awake. I’ve loved this classic since childhood, every reread captivating me as if for the first time. But it soon became clear that I was sharing my bed not so much … Read more

Woke Roald Dahl Will Put Kids to Sleep

From The Wall Street Journal: My late father-in-law detested vague or imprecise language. “Don’t tell me you saw a person,” went his typical complaint. “What kind of person was it? A man or a woman? Tall or short? Old or young?” He, like his contemporary Roald Dahl, came from an era when people valued clarity … Read more

To delight a child

To delight a child, to add a new joy to the crowded miracles of childhood, is no less worth doing than to leave a Sistine Chapel to astound a somewhat bored procession of tourists; or to have written a classic that sells by the thousands and is possessed unread by all save an infinitesimal percentage … Read more

Who are Political Children’s Books For?

From The Drift: “Harriet Tubman was born a slave, and her story could have ended there. Instead, she persisted, escaping from slavery and becoming the most famous ‘conductor’ on the Underground Railroad,” begins the first section of Chelsea Clinton’s baffling 2017 children’s book, She Persisted: 13 American Women Who Changed the World, illustrated by Alexandra … Read more

Offbeat European Children’s Books For Adults

From Electric Lit: I have a confession to make: with nearly half a century behind me, I still read children’s books. The best are truly ageless—think Alice in Wonderland, The Little Prince, Winnie-the-Pooh. No other genre, to my mind, is as consistently capable of reawakening our sense of wonder and joy, of brushing the dust off our … Read more

Survival Strategies for Unsupervised Children

From Electric Lit: We’re called the Crazy 9, but there are not always nine of us. We were nine before la policía took Tuki. We called him Tuki because he loved to dance all weird. Every time he heard the tuki-tuki of electronic music, he flailed his arms and raised his knees like some sort … Read more

Children’s Chorus

From Voices from Chernobyl: Alyosha Belskiy, 9; Anya Bogush, 10; Natasha Dvoretskaya, 16; Lena Zhudro, 15; Yura Zhuk, 15; Olya Zvonak, 10; Snezhana Zinevich, 16; Ira Kudryacheva, 14; Ylya Kasko, 11; Vanya Kovarov, 12; Vadim Karsnosolnyshko, 9; Vasya Mikulich, 15; Anton Nashivankin, 14; Marat Tatartsev, 16; Yulia Taraskina, 15; Katya Shevchuk, 15; Boris Shkirmankov, 16. … Read more

Grisham, Child, Amazon, PRH Headline Lawsuit of KISS Library for Piracy

From Publishers Weekly: Twelve of the Authors Guild’s biggest names are serving as marquee plaintiffs on a new court action filed Tuesday (July 7) along with Amazon Publishing and Penguin Random House in Seattle at the US District Court for the Western District of Washington. The complaint names Kiss Library as a “book piracy entity” … Read more

Why We Can’t Sleep – Uncertain at a Certain Age

From The Wall Street Journal: The midlife crisis has long belonged to men. The revelation that life is finite is apparently so startling to 40- and 50-something males that many behave badly, often by trading in their wives and cars for flashier models with more curb appeal. But as Ada Calhoun writes in “Why We … Read more

Can diversity in children’s books tackle prejudice?

From CNN: Marley Dias says she was tired of reading books about “white boys and their dogs” in school. So at the age of 11, she launched the campaign #1000BlackGirlBooks to identify books featuring people of color as protagonists. Over the past three years, Dias has collected more than 11,000 books. She is in the process of donating all … Read more

The Practical Magic of Joan Aiken, the Greatest Children’s Writer You’ve Likely Never Read

From The New Yorker: In the early nineteen-fifties, before she published any of the novels that established her as one of the twentieth century’s great children’s-book writers, Joan Aiken lived on a bus. Aiken and her husband, the journalist Ronald Brown, had acquired a piece of land on which they meant to build a house. … Read more

10 Little-Known Children’s Books by Famous Writers

From The Literary Hub: This week, Duke University Press is reissuing James Baldwin’s children’s book, Little Man, Little Man. If you had no idea that James Baldwin ever wrote a children’s book, you’re not alone. In fact, quite a number of established literary writers have dabbled in kids lit. Most people know about the children’s books of … Read more

The Dummy That Ruined Your Childhood Is Back

To doublecheck the beginning of the following trailer, PG tried to locate a definitive number for how many RL Stine titles have been published but was unable to do so. A great many is his conclusion. From i09: Even though Jack Black’s R.L. Stine was made out to be the star of 2015’s Goosebumps film, the character … Read more

The Kid’s Book That Connects Me to My Lost Soviet Childhood

From Electric Lit: I twirl a package in my hands, a crumpled plastic sleeve with line after line of stamps and my mother’s neat handwriting. She memorized the list of items approved for mailing to the States by heart. Russian chocolate, gingerbread cookies, newspaper clippings, socks — all okay. No luck on tea bags, CDs, religious paraphernalia. … Read more

Writing and Music: a Not-So-Odd Coupling

From Writer Unboxed: As some of you may already know, in addition to being a highly sought-after shirtless model for romance novel covers, I am also a longtime professional musician, having earned my first money for playing drums at the ripe old age of 14. In fact, music was my fulltime profession until my late … Read more

Authors are collaborating with AI—and each other

From The Economist: Imagine living in a rundown apartment building on the Lower East Side in Manhattan. When covid-19 hits in 2020, you do not have the money to escape to a second home in the Hamptons or the Hudson Valley. Instead, in the evening you make your way up to the rooftop of your … Read more

James Patterson shares his formula for success. It’s pretty simple.

From The Washington Post: Halfway into his memoir, “James Patterson by James Patterson,” James Patterson takes a moment to discuss his writing process. It’s nothing fancy, he explains, and it starts with a folder stuffed with unused story ideas. “When the time comes for me to consider a new novel,” he writes, “I’ll take down … Read more

Why men need to read more novels

From GQ: It’s bedtime, and me and my boyfriend are comparing notes on what we’re reading. I flick through the tomes on his e-reader; it’s science fiction, politics, or politics in space. He’s halfway through Kim Stanley Robinson, following hot on the heels of China Mieville, Vincent Bevins, and Ursula K. Le Guin. He peers … Read more

What Does Book Publishing Stand For?

From The New Republic: Seven years ago, when Amazon was in the midst of a contentious pricing battle with one of the country’s largest publishers, a group of famous authors banded together to make the case that publishing was a crucial industry for the nation’s cultural and intellectual life. “Publishers provide venture capital for ideas,” … Read more

Naming Fictional Characters: 10 Tips to Avoid Pitfalls

From Anne R. Allen’s Blog… with Ruth Harris: The old-school advice for naming fictional characters was to comb the obituaries. But not a lot of people get newspapers these days, so we need other sources of inspiration. For me, spam is turning out to be one of the best places to find unique names. Every … Read more

Self-Cancel Culture

PG doesn’t usually include two items from the same source on the same day, but he’ll make an exception for this one. From The Wall Street Journal: Every day brings news of another “cancellation”—a celebrity’s tweet incites an online mob, an article written in 1987 gets a corporate executive fired. The latest trend is self-cancellation, … Read more

How to Rescue an Endangered Book and Find your Author Mojo

From Anne R. Allen’s Blog… with Ruth Harris You’ve kinda/sorta finished your book/first draft/whachamacallit. In drastic cases, it could even be an outline that’s gone off the rails and landed in a ditch. But. Your original brilliant idea is drowning in a sea of ugly clutter. There are dust bunnies in the corners. An overflowing … Read more

Ken Follett Opens Brexit-Inspired Friendship Tour This Weekend

From Publishing Perspectives: Even as the impeachment inquiry in Washington revs to fever pitch with its battery of public hearings riling Capitol Hill and many of your American colleagues, the Brexit crisis in the UK has gone into a comparatively quiet phase ahead of the December 12 general election. Perhaps that’s the perfect moment for … Read more

Sally Rooney’s Normal People Takes Book of the Year at British Book Awards

From The Bookseller: [At the] British Book Awards 2019 on Monday evening . . . Sally Rooney’s Normal People [won] the coveted Book of the Year award. . . . . Irish writer Rooney triumphed in winning the top gong over Michelle Obama’s Becoming (Viking), which secured two wins on the night: Non-Fiction Narrative Book of the … Read more

The Competitive Book Sorters Who Spread Knowledge Around New York

From Atlas Obscura: The Lyngsoe Systems Compact Cross Belt Sorter hogs most of a drab, boxy basement under an unremarkable office building in Queens—238 feet of fast-flying conveyor belt, like a cross between a baggage carousel and a racetrack. The machine scans the barcodes on thousands of library books an hour, and shoves them quickly, efficiently … Read more

Jack Reacher Still Won’t Quit, 23 Books Later

From The Atlantic: You’re on a plane. You’re on a train. You’re wheeling through American space, and you’re feeling it: the hum of the void, the up-for-grabs-ness of it all. Out here there’s no protection. Good customer service, if you’re lucky, but no protection. Out here there is only the crackling feral mind: dominance, appetite, predation, pitiless … Read more

Pearson encouraged by ‘good first half’ but reports sales fall for PRH

From The Bookseller: Pearson has reinforced guidance that it expects to return to underlying profit growth in 2018 after posting underlying revenue growth of 2% and adjusted operating profit up 46% year-on-year for the first half of 2018. However it reported Penguin Random House – in which Pearson still has a 25% stake – saw sales fall in the first half owing to “softer … Read more

A Well-Contained Life

From The Paris Review: What can’t be contained? Not much. We are given the resources, mental or physical, to contain our emotions and our belongings. Failing to do so often registers as weakness.  The smallest container you can buy at the Container Store is a rectangular crystal-clear plastic box available in orange, purple, and green. … Read more

Resistance is Futile

From studiomcah: Yes, it’s true: after much gnashing of teeth and a token resistance to the inevitable, I decided it was time to do serious experimentation with AI, especially after hearing multiple reports, all good, about Anthropic’s Claude. To be clear, I continue to think the legal repercussions of the training of AI models on … Read more

Lewis Carroll’s Guide for Insomniacs

From The Wall Street Journal: A medley of games, riddles, rhymes and number problems, “Lewis Carroll’s Guide for Insomniacs” is the perfect companion for the wee hours when sleep won’t come. Adorned with a sprightly new introduction by Gyles Brandreth, the British politician, Carroll enthusiast and European Monopoly champion, the little volume is a reissue … Read more

Is Self-Publishing a Good Choice for Authors in 2024?

Anne R. Allen’s Blog… with Ruth Harris: Talk about self-publishing has diminished in the last few years.  Most of the “Kindle Millionaires” that surged onto the scene a decade or so ago have evaporated from indie writing communities. Some of them are, of course, busy writing their next bestseller. But a lot either got traditional … Read more

Kubla Khan

Or, a vision in a dream. A Fragment. In Xanadu did Kubla KhanA stately pleasure-dome decree:Where Alph, the sacred river, ranThrough caverns measureless to manDown to a sunless sea.So twice five miles of fertile groundWith walls and towers were girdled round;And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;And here were … Read more

What Do You Write to Resist?

From Writer Unboxed: I’m reading an essay by Refaat Alareer, a Palestinian poet and professor, called “Gaza Asks: When Shall This Pass?” In his essay, Refaat recounts the times he told stories to his young children during the war of 2008-09 while sheltering them in the part of his house least likely to be hit … Read more

Into the Unknown: Stuck in a Writing Rut? It Might Be Time to Expand Your Comfort Zone

From Writers Unboxed: Like many writers, I’m an introvert. I’m perfectly content sitting in my office alone, in complete silence, for hours on end doing nothing but reading and writing. Crowds make me anxious. Having to make small talk with strangers at parties and business events exhausts me beyond words. If given a choice between … Read more

Print Book Sales Fell 2.6% in 2023 (Still ahead of 2019)

From Publishers Weekly: Helped by a 1.7% increase in the fourth quarter, unit sales of print books fell only 2.6% in 2023 from 2022 at outlets that report to Circana BookScan. The dip was less than many industry members had feared this summer, when sales were steadily declining and were down 4.1% after the first … Read more

Rest and Relaxation

From Almost an Author: As I write this post, soldiers from a local Army base are departing for a time of R&R and to spend time with their friends and family over the Christmas holiday. If you are active duty or a veteran of our military, thank you for your service. There is a special … Read more

Anna Biller on How the Gothic Gives Voice to Women’s Pleasure—and Pain

From Electric Lit: “There are rules for contemporary literature, and I’m breaking a lot of them for a lot of people,” filmmaker Anna Biller told me by phone. Her debut novel, Bluebeard’s Castle, rejects the minimalism that recent fiction sometimes conflates with seriousness: nowhere, here, will you find the anesthetized protagonist, the dead-end job, the lukewarm … Read more

Why Do Publishers Close Imprints?

From Jane Friedman: Imprints have long been getting closed, merged, reorganized, and reborn over publishing’s history, but this summer raised new frustrations and fears among authors about how and why it’s happening. In June, Penguin Random House (PRH) announced they would merge the long-respected Razorbill into Putnam Children’s (retaining the full team in doing so); … Read more

The Greatest Novels of the 20th Century

Prompt: List the 15 greatest English-language novels published in the 20th century, and what each novel was criticized for at the time of its publication and how the initial criticism is regarded today. ChatGPT4: Compiling a list of the “greatest” English-language novels of the 20th century is subjective, but here’s a selection based on their … Read more

How a Collective of Incarcerated Writers Published an Anthology From Prison

From Electric Lit: It would make sense that any history would begin at Stillwater Prison, where so much of the story and mythology of prison in Minnesota also begins. It is where Cole Younger of the famous James-Younger gang did their time, and where they spent their own money to start the Prison Mirror, the world’s oldest … Read more