Jack Handey tells NY Times readers how to find the humor section in a bookstore. One deep thought: Some scientists bemoan the fact that it’s so hard to find humor in bookstores. But I prefer to look at it philosophically. I think it was Robert E. Lee who said, “It is well that the Humor section is so terribly hard to find, lest we laugh too much.”
Once there was a city where everyone had the gift of song. Once there was a city where people did not look one another in the eye. Once there was a man who happened to buy God’s overcoat. The View from the Seventh Layer is a rich, ethereal collection: here are fables, ghost stories, romances (among them a sci-fi adaptation of “The Lady with the Pet Dog”), personal histories, anxieties of influence, and spiritual bursts — even a choose-your-own-adventure for the soul. These stories unfold in worlds just shy of our own, where metaphors take literal form. Each explores the […]
According to this recent study, fiction makes you more empathetic–and therefore less socially awkward. If you’re British, you can even use those bookish charms to find love on PenguinDating, “where book lovers meet.” From the Penguin Blog: Sure, some of us might be trapped in joyless, loveless relationships with people who get upset because we were looking at online dating websites, even though it’s for PERFECTLY REASONABLE reasons like fabricating a picture of a King Penguin with a match.com profile KATE. But there are others out there yet to find that special joyless, loveless relationship in which to get trapped. […]
In his essay “No” (Kenyon Review, Spring 2008), Brian Doyle both asks and answers that question of questions: Why do editors say no, anyway?
Pick up the current issue of Tin House and read “Fresco, Byzantine,” a story by FWR contributor Natalie Bakopoulos. They had come of age in such places, those island prisons—during the Nazi occupations, during the civil war, throughout the fifties, and now—and now some were growing old there. This issue, “Political Future,” also features fiction, nonfiction, or political-literary commentary from the likes of José Saramago, Thomas Franks, Francine Prose, Wallace Shawn, Cynthia Ozick, Dorothy Allison, Charles Baxter, John Barth, Junot Díaz, George Saunders, Lydia Davis, Lydia Millet, and others.
Welcome to the world, FWR. And welcome, world, to the booksite. Here’s hoping we can shine some love on that oft-misunderstood genre called fiction. You can read about our mission here and check out reviews, interviews and essays. We welcome ARCs from publicists and submissions from writers. This blog is going to be a hodge-podge of book news, recommendations, links, reviewlets, and discussions. I make no promises about being fair, balanced, consistent, or completist, but I hope to keep things interesting. Here’s to the lovely and fearless Marissa, who made this site possible, and to all FWR contributors for suspending […]
