Read to Respond: Global Migration
Duke University Press has launched the Read to Respond Global Migration reading list, a curated collection of recent books and journal articles that examine migration through lenses of labor, climate, security, gender and race. All journal articles and special issues are freely accessible through July 15 2026, while book introductions are available at no cost and full titles can be purchased on dukeupress.edu. The initiative aims to counter misinformation by providing educators, students and the public with scholarly resources that foster nuanced debate on one of today’s most pressing social issues.
9 Little Odysseys That Don’t Go Very Far, and That’s the Whole Point
The article spotlights a curated list of nine contemporary novels that stage “little odysseys” – confined, often domestic journeys led by women. It argues that these modest narratives, ranging from Lucy Ellmann’s thousand‑page single‑sentence saga to Margaret Atwood’s feminist retelling...
How La Copine's Founders Left L.A. to Build a Culinary 'Oasis' In the Desert
La Copine, the desert‑side restaurant founded by former Los Angeles chefs Nikki Hill and Claire Wadsworth, is releasing a new cookbook, *La Copine: New California Cooking from an Oasis in the Desert*, on April 28. The book translates the restaurant’s seasonal, desert‑inspired dishes—ranging from...
Poetry Review: ‘Creature Feature,’ by Dean Young
Dean Young’s posthumous collection *Creature Feature* showcases his signature surreal, reckless verse, reflecting the chaotic attention economy of the digital age. The review highlights Young’s lifelong embrace of imperfection, noting his prolific output from the late 1980s through a heart‑transplant‑inspired...
Sonya Walger on Writing a Multifaceted Novel of Marriage and Adultery
Sonya Walger, known for her acting career, discusses her second novel *Wifehouse*, which uses adultery as a lens to dissect marriage and competing narratives. She argues that a third‑party character exposes hidden tensions, allowing each spouse to confront their own...
Listening to the Earth Radical Romanticism for a Time of Ecological Crisis Mark S. Cladis
Mark S. Cladis’s new book *Radical Romanticism* re‑examines the Romantic tradition as an ethical imagination that intertwines democracy, religion, and ecological concern. By juxtaposing European Romantics such as Wordsworth and Shelley with Black and Indigenous thinkers like Du Bois, Hurston, and...
My Lover, the Rabbi by Wayne Koestenbaum Review – as Fierce and Strange as Anything You’ll Read This Year
Wayne Koestenbaum’s new novel *My Lover, the Rabbi* unfolds in 188 ultra‑short chapters that blend queer obsession with avant‑garde prose. The story follows an unnamed antique furniture restorer’s fixation on a rabbi, spiraling into a labyrinth of sexual detail, mystery, and...
The Black Death by Thomas Asbridge Review – a Medieval Horror Story
Thomas Asbridge’s new book, The Black Death, offers a sweeping survey of the 14th‑century pandemic, estimating roughly 100 million deaths and a 50% mortality rate in many regions. The work emphasizes the plague’s truly global reach, stretching from Sicily to West...
Books Changed My Life, Says Queen's First Reading Hero
Selina Brown, founder of the Black British Book Festival, was named the UK’s first National Reading Hero and received the inaugural Queen’s Reading Room Medal from Queen Camilla. The festival, which began in Birmingham in 2021, now stages its flagship...
Peter Schrag Dies at 94; Wrote of Dangers of California’s Populist Streak
Peter Schrag, longtime Sacramento Bee opinion editor and author of the 1998 book "Paradise Lost," died at 94. His book warned that California’s prolific voter‑initiative process empowers older, wealthier voters while marginalizing working‑class and minority communities. Schrag argued this dynamic...
An Oral History of… Biff, Chip and Kipper
Biff, Chip and Kipper debuted in 1986 as part of the Oxford Reading Tree and have become a cornerstone of early‑grade literacy worldwide. Co‑created by writer Roderick Hunt and illustrator Alex Brychta, the series now exceeds 800 titles, is translated into...
Martha Stewart's Favorite Cookbook Of All Time Is Hands Down A Classic
Martha Stewart named the 1931 "Joy of Cooking" as her sole kitchen reference, praising its timeless utility over her own titles. The cookbook, self‑published by Irma Rombauer for $3,000, sold over 50,000 copies by 1942 and surged to 60,000 sales...
Department of the Vanishing Review: Johanna Bell’s Lyrical Novel Is ‘Monumentally Memorable’
Johanna Bell’s *Department of the Vanishing*, winner of the 2025 Tasmanian Literary Award, reads like a found‑footage documentary that fuses poetry, archival documents, and striking imagery. The novel follows archivist Ava Wilde as she catalogs extinct bird species, weaving climate...
The Winner of the First James Patterson & Bookshop.org Prize Is One of Last Year’s Buzziest Titles
Bookshop.org and bestselling author James Patterson launched their inaugural prize for debut novels published in the United States within the past year. Virginia Evans’ epistolary work, The Correspondent, was named the winner, with Milo Todd’s The Lilac People as runner‑up....
In “Discipline,” Larissa Pham Explores Predatory Art-World Mentorship
Larissa Pham’s debut novel *Discipline* (Random House, 2026) uses autofiction to dramatize a former painter’s entanglement with a predatory professor‑mentor. Drawing on Pham’s own experiences of sexual assault by powerful art figures, the book places that trauma at the core...
Isabel Klee’s ‘Dogs, Boys and Other Things I’ve Cried About’ Lands At UCP
Isabel Klee, a social‑media star with roughly two million followers, is turning her debut memoir *Dogs, Boys and Other Things I’ve Cried About* into a television series after Universal Content Productions (UCP) secured the rights. The book, slated for an...
What’s the Place of Humans in a World Redefined by AI? Steve Toltz’s New Novel Has some Ideas
Steve Toltz’s new novel A Rising of the Lights follows Rusty Wilson, a former child psychologist whose government job is usurped by an AI system called DUPIN. As Rusty grapples with divorce, unemployment and a society saturated with technology, the...
Mumbai Author Lindsay Pereira on the Fractures of Migration in His Latest Novel, Super
Mumbai author Lindsay Pereira’s new novel *Super*, released by HarperCollins India, delves into the personal and societal fractures caused by the surge of young Indians seeking stability abroad. Drawing on his academic background in 19th‑century Indian literature, Pereira blends rigorous...
Appointment in Paris by Jane Thynne
Jane Thynne’s "Appointment in Paris" is the second installment of her Harry Fox and Stella Fry series, moving the duo from pre‑war Vienna to wartime Paris in 1940. The novel pivots from the literary‑mystery tone of "Midnight in Vienna" to...
The End of the Sahara
Saïd Khatibi’s *The End of the Sahara* marks the first Algerian crime novel reviewed on the site, set in an unnamed city during the turbulent weeks before the October 1988 riots. The murder mystery of nightclub singer Zakia Zaghouani unfolds through...
What Am I, A Deer? — Polly Barton’s Love Letter to Karaoke
Polly Barton’s debut novel “What Am I, A Deer?” uses karaoke as a lens to explore obsession, performance, and the fantasies that drive human action. The story blends humor and pathos, turning a familiar pastime into a study of identity...
Rob Grant (1955–2026)
Rob Grant, the 70‑year‑old British science‑fiction writer and television producer, died on February 25, 2026. He co‑created the cult‑hit TV series Red Dwarf and authored several bestselling tie‑in novels, including Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers and Better Than Life. Grant also...
Classic Fantasy Felines: Tailchaser’s Song by Tad Williams
Tad Williams’s 1985 debut, *Tailchaser’s Song*, imagines a fully cat‑centric fantasy world where felines worship cat‑gods and speak in song. The novel blends Tolkien‑style world‑building with original languages, naming rituals, and a hero’s quest to rescue a lost love. While...
Melissa Wright on the Balance of Darkness, Wit, and Whimsy in Romantasy
Melissa Wright, a prolific YA and fantasy author, has launched “A Necromancer’s Guide to Grave Mistakes,” the opening volume of her “Grave Magic and Other Forms of Courtship” series. The novel reimagines Cinderella as a necromancer who accidentally raises the...
He Said He Was an Oligarch’s Son. The Lie Had Tragic Consequences
Zac Brettler, posing as Zac Ismailov, claimed to be the son of a late Russian oligarch and asserted an inheritance of roughly $265 million. After his mother in Dubai evicted him from the family’s luxury assets, he relied on the fabricated...
A New Book Finds Parenting Inspiration in the Animal Kingdom
Elizabeth Preston’s new book, *The Creatures’ Guide to Caring* (Viking, $30), uses animal parenting examples to illuminate human child‑rearing. The author blends humor with scientific research, from beetles that regurgitate food to fish fathers that release oxytocin, showing how caregiving...
Chasing Freedom — Simukai Chigudu on the Trail of Rhodes and Mugabe
The Financial Times piece titled “Chasing Freedom — Simukai Chigudu on the trail of Rhodes and Mugabe” is currently locked behind a subscription wall, so the full interview and analysis are not publicly available. The page only displays promotional pricing,...
Is the Household Obsolete? Charlotte Perkins Gilman on Economy, Androcentrism, and the Socialization of Care
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, best known for "The Yellow Wallpaper," was also a pioneering feminist economist who argued that women’s confinement to the home was a socially engineered, not natural, condition. In her 1898 essay "Women and Economics" she broadened the...
Frothing Mad
Union election petitions with the NLRB more than doubled from 2021 to 2024, driven largely by millennial and Gen Z workers in the service sector. Noam Scheiber’s *Mutiny* argues that college‑educated employees at Starbucks and Apple felt betrayed by meritocratic...
8 Revolutionary Novels and Stories by Arab Women
The article spotlights eight groundbreaking novels and stories by Arab women, ranging from Nawal El Saadawi’s iconic *Woman at Point Zero* to contemporary works like Areej Gamal’s *Mariam, It’s Arwa*. It highlights how these books portray women as custodians of...
An Exclusive Excerpt From Yann Martel’s New Novel, Son of Nobody
Yann Martel’s fifth novel, Son of Nobody, opens with a vivid scene in Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum where protagonist Harlow Donne discovers archaic ostraka containing a boustrophedon inscription that hints at a lost Trojan epic. The excerpt blends classical scholarship with...
Interview: Sunwoo Jeong
Sunwoo Jeong, a Korean‑American linguist‑author, discusses her Uncanny Magazine story “Permanent Press,” a surreal tale set in a neon‑lit laundromat that explores choice and longing. She describes how the story evolved around the character Jo and how everyday observations of...
Upward Bound by Woody Brown Review – Extraordinary Debut From a Non-Speaking Autistic Author
Woody Brown’s debut novel *Upward Bound* offers a vivid, empathetic portrait of a Los Angeles adult daycare that houses a diverse disabled community. The story follows Walter, a non‑speaking autistic protagonist, as he navigates communication challenges, personal aspirations, and fragile relationships...
Ed Lin on Writing a Novel About the Plight of Filipino Migrant Workers in Taiwan
Author Ed Lin spotlights the systemic exploitation of Southeast Asian migrant workers in Taiwan, where nearly one million foreign laborers sustain key sectors despite high visa costs, broker fees and language barriers. Recent government actions—including a legal rights assistance program...
Book Review: ‘The Ending Writes Itself,’ by Evelyn Clarke
Evelyn Clarke’s debut novel, *The Ending Writes Itself*, is a collaborative thriller by bestselling author V.E. Schwab and screenwriter Cat Clarke. Set on a secluded Scottish island, seven writers are invited by the reclusive literary titan Arthur Fletch, only to discover...
Book Review: ‘Hexes of the Deadwood Forest,’ by Agnieszka Szpila
Polish author Agnieszka Szpila’s "Hexes of the Deadwood Forest" has been released in English for the first time, translating a 2022 bestseller that sparked a stage adaptation in Warsaw. The novel mixes ecofeminist critique with explicit, surreal sexual encounters involving...
Book Review: ‘American Fantasy,’ by Emma Straub
Emma Straul’s sixth novel, *American Fantasy*, follows a four‑day cruise populated by 2,172 passengers, 1,500 crew members, and the aging members of fictional 1980s boy band Boy Talk. The story blends fan‑con vibes with adult summer‑camp antics, offering nostalgic pop‑culture...
Book Review: ‘Corto Maltese,’ by Hugo Pratt
Fantagraphics has released a new English edition of Hugo Pratt’s 1967 graphic novel collection, “Fable of Venice and Other Adventures,” reviving five classic Corto Maltese stories. The volume reintroduces the swashbuckling anti‑hero sailor amid wartime backdrops, while the review underscores...
Most Self-Published Books Fail. These Marketing Strategies Help Entrepreneurs Win
Self‑published books face a high failure rate, but entrepreneurs can turn them into profitable assets by adopting an "authorpreneur" mindset. Treating the manuscript as a business requires a clear purpose, niche focus, and a structured marketing plan. Effective promotion meets...
Discover Gadsby: The 50,000-Word Novel Written Without Using the Letter E (1939)
Ernest Vincent Wright’s 1939 novel *Gadsby* is a 50,000‑word lipogram that avoids the letter “E,” the most common character in English. Wright self‑published the work, which tells middle‑aged John Gadsby’s effort to revive his decaying hometown, ultimately becoming mayor as...
Kristin Grogan on Stitch, Unstitch
Kristin Grogan’s new book *Stitch, Unstitch: Modernist Poetry and the World of Work* examines how early‑twentieth‑century modernist poets grappled with the meaning of labor amid radical social upheaval. Using a Marxist‑feminist framework, she analyzes five poets—Ezra Pound, Lola Ridge, Langston...
How the World Became a Book in Shakespeare’s England
Jonathan P. Lamb’s new book, *How the World Became a Book in Shakespeare’s England*, reveals how early‑modern England’s everyday language was saturated with book‑related metaphors—cover, page, volume, folio, and more. By tracing this lexicon across drama, pamphlets, sermons, and scientific...
Want to Write Better? 3 Books to Improve Writing Skills
The article highlights three essential books—Stephen King’s *On Writing*, Strunk & White’s *The Elements of Style*, and Anne Lamott’s *Bird by Bird*—as practical guides for anyone looking to sharpen their writing. It argues that writing is a skill that can be taught...
Griefdogg Review: Michael Winkler Pulls Australian Fiction in Brave New Directions
Australian author Michael Winkler’s second novel, Griefdogg, follows the surreal transformation of hydrologist Jeffrey into a self‑designated family pet after inheriting a seven‑figure sum (approximately $1‑$9 million). The book employs a non‑chronological, stream‑of‑consciousness narrative peppered with Australian colloquialisms, scientific digressions and...
Mike Mignola Reveals New Graphic Novel 'Uri Tupka and the Devils'
Mike Mignola’s new graphic novel "Uri Tupka and the Devils" arrives on November 16, 2026, published by Dark Horse Comics. The 104‑page hardcover continues the "Lands Unknown" anthology, following Uri Tupka’s quest for pre‑creation secrets after the events of "Uri...
Ben Lerner’s Transcription and the Literary Readymade
Ben Lerner’s fourth novel, Transcription, arrives as a slim, tripartite work that interrogates the boundaries between autofiction, artifice, and the digital age. Structured around interviews with an elderly poet‑translator and his son, the narrative weaves failed iPhone recordings, deepfake transcripts,...
Weekly Bestsellers, 6 April 2026
Danielle L. Jensen’s sequel "The Traitor Queen" entered the bestseller arena this week, reaching as high as #6 on Publishers Weekly and appearing on three major lists. Matt Dinniman continues to dominate, with six hardcover titles and one paperback charting,...
Dispelling Fantasies: Authors of Color Reimagine a Genre by Joy Sanchez-Taylor
Joy Sanchez‑Taylor’s *Dispelling Fantasies* critiques the Eurocentric, patriarchal foundations of mainstream fantasy and highlights a decade‑plus surge of speculative works by authors of color. By foregrounding characters who are non‑white, gender‑nonconforming, or asexual, the book argues for a reimagined genre...
2025 BSFA Awards Winners
The British Science Fiction Association announced its 2025 award winners at Eastercon’s Iridescence event in Birmingham. E.J. Swift’s When There Are Wolves Again took Best Novel, while Tade Thompson’s The Apologists earned Best Shorter Fiction. Neil Williamson’s Blood in the Bricks won Best Collection, and Una McCormack’s Doctor...
Jacob Siegel’s Error-Filled Book On ‘Censorship’ Got Fact-Checked. He’s Calling It Censorship.
Jacob Siegel’s new book, *The Information State*, inflates the scale of the Election Integrity Partnership’s activity, claiming it flagged roughly 22 million tweets for removal. In reality, the partnership reported fewer than 3,000 tweets, with only a handful actually taken down....