The American novelist, whose latest work is a fake biography of an avant-garde artist, on growing up in Mississippi and why her fiction has ‘never actively involved cellphones or the internet’Catherine Lacey, 37, is the author of three previous novels, including The Answers, currently being adapted for television by Darren Aronofsky, and Pew (2020), about a nameless amnesiac of ambiguous race and gender. Her new novel, Biography of X, set in a parallel America, follows a widow untangling the life story of her wife, an avant-garde artist known as X. The New York Times has called it “sprawling and ambitious… strange and dystopian”. Lacey, one of Granta’s best young American novelists in 2017, was speaking from her home in Brooklyn.Which part of the book came first: the alternate history or the fake biography?I liked the idea of writing a fake biography and the biographies I like best are usually written by someone with some kind of compromised perspective. I thought the worst person to write a biography would be a surviving spouse with a bit of a grudge, but I didn’t want to get into the heterosexual dynamics of a man writing about a woman or a woman writing about a man; it had to be two women. At the same time, I wanted the novel to be set in the mid-20th century but I wasn’t interested in writing about the actual struggles a prominent lesbian couple would have gone through in that time. So my alternate history grew out of that problem. I thought, if I have an America... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2023-04-01 17:00:01 UTC ]
Best of Young British Novelists 2023 ‘If Wales win tonight, everything will turn out okay.’ – Wales The post Thomas Morris appeared first on Granta. Continue reading at Granta
[ Granta | 2023-10-25 14:51:57 UTC ]
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Best of Young British Novelists 2023 ‘He was grumpy in a way that I enjoyed. It reassured me that he was easily displeased – he was discerning, I thought.’ – Circles The post Anna Metcalfe appeared first on Granta. Continue reading at Granta
[ Granta | 2023-10-25 14:45:13 UTC ]
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Best of Young British Novelists 2023 ‘The monstrous years of my late teens lay lined up alongside the rest of my life like bullets in a gun.’ – Theories of Care The post Sophie Mackintosh appeared first on Granta. Continue reading at Granta
[ Granta | 2023-10-25 14:39:37 UTC ]
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Ananda Devi Wins the 2024 Neustadt Prize News and Events [email protected] Tue, 10/24/2023 - 18:02 Ananda Devi, winner of the Neustadt International Prize for Literature. Photo by J. F. Paga, courtesy of GrassetNORMAN, OKLA. (Tuesday, October 24,... Continue reading at World Literature Today
[ World Literature Today | 2023-10-24 23:02:22 UTC ]
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Three novelists reimagine Mary Shelley’s life and loves and her most famous creation. Continue reading at New Yorker
[ New Yorker | 2023-10-02 10:00:00 UTC ]
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Writing about pop culture and current technology is always a gamble, pitting critique of the present against longevity, a story that will still feel relevant after we’re gone. But for novelists (present company included) who were exposed to the Real World before the, um, real world, reality TV... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2023-09-27 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Authors have entered a war over words with OpenAI for using their books as ‘training’ feedstockBattles between human and artificial intelligence are no longer science fiction. The strikes in Hollywood led by the united guilds of actors and screenwriters have a common, intangible enemy: the... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-09-23 15:03:31 UTC ]
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If one thing kept me coming back (and back) to Homeworld, it was skirmish mode. Setting up a quick (“quick”) battle against the CPU would often rob me of a whole weekend while at college. Homeworld 3 sees a new mode arrive on the second sequel, a roguelike-inspired multiplayer co-op called War... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-08-25 15:30:05 UTC ]
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In this post-Fleabag world, publishing has become obsessed with the inner turmoils of messy millennials – but isn’t it time they pulled themselves together? Meet the novelists subverting the clichesYou’ve probably come across this woman: she is unfulfilled in her career, has been abandoned by at... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-08-08 15:19:43 UTC ]
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The freshly announced “Booker’s dozen” of titles longlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize is making its way around the literary internet, so let’s see what the morning tides have brought in. There are four debut novelists on the list, and Irish writers nabbed a record four out of the 13 nominations... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2023-08-01 14:43:06 UTC ]
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Previously nominated authors Sebastian Barry, Tan Twan Eng and Paul Murray join 13-strong field including four debuts• Irish writers, debuts – and groundbreaking sci-fi: the Booker longlist in depthA longlist of 13 “original and thrilling” books offering “startling portraits of the current” are... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-08-01 08:00:00 UTC ]
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They interrupt narrative and disrupt plot – no wonder novelists have been slow to warm to mobile phones. But a new generation is putting technology at the heart of their workWhat do you call a phone when it rings in a fictional world? “Mobile” and “cell” are old, “smartphone” is almost a... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-07-22 10:00:09 UTC ]
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Ask ChatGPT about comedian Sarah Silverman’s memoir “The Bedwetter” and the artificial intelligence chatbot can come up with a detailed synopsis of every part of the book Continue reading at ABC News
[ ABC News | 2023-07-12 22:32:35 UTC ]
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Ask ChatGPT about comedian Sarah Silverman’s memoir “The Bedwetter” and the artificial intelligence chatbot can come up with a detailed synopsis of every part of the book Continue reading at ABC News
[ ABC News | 2023-07-12 22:32:31 UTC ]
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I was surprised to read this morning that Milan Kundera, the eminent Czech novelist best known for The Unbearable Lightness of Being, died yesterday at the age of 94. Mainly because I thought he was already dead. For a generation of literary types (Gen X in particular), Kundera was the cool,... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2023-07-12 15:34:43 UTC ]
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It’s back and here to ruin our savings and increase the gadgets in our homes. Yes, Amazon Prime Day isn’t entirely about headphones, tablets and wearables, but for Engadget staff… well, it feels like it is. Prime Day deals on tech are typically only matched by Black Friday and Cyber Monday... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-07-11 11:15:13 UTC ]
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Sarah Silverman is suing OpenAI. On Friday, the comedian and author, alongside novelists Christopher Golden and Richard Kadrey, filed a pair of complaints against OpenAI and Meta (via Gizmodo). The group alleges the firms trained their large language models on copyrighted materials, including... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-07-10 17:53:22 UTC ]
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Two bestselling novelists filed a suit against OpenAI, claiming the company used intellectual property to 'train' its artificial intelligence chatbot. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2023-07-01 14:28:47 UTC ]
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Annapurna Interactive is developing a game based on the iconic science fiction film Blade Runner. The game’s set between the events of Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049, so you can get some closure as to what Deckard was doing before meeting up with Ryan Gosling in an abandoned casino or... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-06-29 19:38:28 UTC ]
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Apple is borrowing a marketing tactic from Twitter pirates. The company made the unusual move of uploading the entire first episode of its series Silo to the social platform, allowing anyone there to watch the opening installment for free. The gambit follows Twitter’s move to allow longer video... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-06-27 18:24:03 UTC ]
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