Book Reviews Photo by Dominik Scythe / Unsplash A new book by a Nobel laureate and Booker award-winning author always brings with it a sense of trepidation. Will the new novel live up to the already established high expectations? Klara and the Sun (Knopf, 2021) is particularly tricky because it revisits questions about life in posthuman futures, explored partly in Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go (2005). However, Ishiguro’s new novel and its nonhuman narrator, Klara, weave a spell on the reader from the opening pages that continues to be all-absorbing. We forget that the narrator is a robot and remain involved in the vicissitudes of her life, till the final pages when she is waiting for an end to her powers by the slow decline of her electronic circuitry. As we are immersed in the trajectory of Klara’s life, Ishiguro invites us to explore the question of what it is that constitutes us as human. To what extent can machines approximate the qualities of a human, and is there anything unique in the human mind in a world where artificial intelligence is increasingly powerful? The novel begins with Klara being displayed in the window of a store selling AI “friends” to children. Klara is very observant and records her perceptions in her memories for future use. She forms an instantaneous bond with Josie when she comes in to check out AI friends and then waits for many weeks for Josie to come back and take her home as promised.... Continue reading at 'World Literature Today'
[ World Literature Today | 2022-03-01 21:50:34 UTC ]
The events will showcase writers and speakers from countries in Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa to UK audiences, and feature up-and-coming UK writers selected as part of Granta's Best of Young British Novelists 2023 list.This specially selected event series brings together our work with the... Continue reading at British Council global
[ British Council global | 2024-05-24 10:51:02 UTC ]
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Bookshop and arts centre run by Salmon Poetry is saved from closure after raising more than €60,000 from 700 individualsA bookshop and arts centre run by a prominent Irish poetry publisher has been saved from closure after a GoFundMe campaign raised more than €60,000 – enough to buy new premises... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2024-05-13 15:18:10 UTC ]
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5 Questions for Ethel Rohan, by Michelle Johnson Interviews [email protected] Tue, 04/16/2024 - 08:28 Ethel Rohan’s second novel, Sing, I, was published by TriQuarterly Books on April 15. The novel’s heroine, Ester Prynn, works in a convenience... Continue reading at World Literature Today
[ World Literature Today | 2024-04-16 13:28:17 UTC ]
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During the summer of 1896, a poster of a redheaded woman riding a bicycle appeared in bookshop windows and newsstands in cities across the United States. Sporting a fashionable outfit, the cyclist gazes blankly beyond the viewer, seeming to exert little effort. Though her body occupies most of... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2024-04-03 08:55:47 UTC ]
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She became an award-winning author of children’s books and young-adult novels despite debilitating health issues and the murder of her father. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2024-03-27 20:06:57 UTC ]
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Bird is the award-winning author of seven books, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning book that served as the basis for Christopher Nolan’s film 'Oppenheimer,' which won seven Academy Awards last night, including best picture. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2024-03-11 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Just as Engadget was hitting publish on its first posts, I was putting a freshly minted English degree to use working at an indie bookshop in Los Angeles. In seemingly unrelated news, Amazon had just reported its first profitable year after switching from selling books to selling “everything”... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2024-03-08 14:15:57 UTC ]
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Who among us hasn’t wished that they could get paid to just sit and read for a little while? No strings, no work-related tasks involved—just good old fashioned American currency in exchange for reading a book of your choosing, for pleasure. Well, fellow dreamers, I have good news! Perelandra... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2024-03-06 17:56:29 UTC ]
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There’s a new online bookstore in town—and this time it’s helmed by RuPaul. Yes, that RuPaul. (Reading being, after all, fundamental.) Allstora, announced today*, is a membership-based bookstore that offers a profit-split to authors. RuPaul serves as Allstora’s Chief Creative Officer and... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2024-03-04 16:45:28 UTC ]
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Before running the bookshop, Yeongju had never considered whether she was suitable to be a bookseller. She thought, rather naively, that anyone who loves books could be one. It was only when she started her own bookshop that she realized she had a serious shortcoming. She fumbled questions such... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2024-02-23 09:44:53 UTC ]
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10 Questions for Hwang Bo-reum, by Michelle Johnson Interviews [email protected] Tue, 02/20/2024 - 10:01 Photo by Seong Ji Min Clayhouse Inc.Hwang Bo-reum’s debut novel, Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop, translated by Shanna Tan, was published... Continue reading at World Literature Today
[ World Literature Today | 2024-02-20 16:01:47 UTC ]
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“I pulled the Fitzgerald off a shelf in the bookshop where I had a summer job. It was so delicious and joyful to read, I could canter through it with such bright and sudden pleasure, that it felt almost criminal.” Continue reading at The Paris Review
[ The Paris Review | 2024-02-01 15:52:46 UTC ]
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This conversation is a combination of two discussions, one on November 9th 2023 at the event of Philip Pullman receiving the Bodley Medal at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, and the other on November 10th 2023 at a launch event for Philip Goff’s book Why? The Purpose of the Universe at Blackwells... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2024-01-19 09:54:28 UTC ]
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'Publishers Weekly' is proud to recognize Valerie Koehler, owner of Blue Willow Bookshop in Houston, and Charley Rejsek, CEO of BookPeople in Austin, as our 2023 People of the Year. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-12-15 05:00:00 UTC ]
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To the members of the literary community we lost this year, we say a last thank you, and goodbye. You will be missed. * “Belated literary star” Edith Pearlman, who broke out with Binocular Vision at the age of 74, died on January 1. She was 86. Suzy McKee Charnas, award-winning author of... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2023-12-14 09:51:11 UTC ]
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A founder of the St. Mark’s Bookshop in the East Village, he prided himself on stocking titles that were not “too popular” and stayed in business for four decades. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2023-11-23 01:12:36 UTC ]
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Academic and intellectual British novelist A.S. Byatt, author of POSSESSION, has died at 87 in her home due to unknown causes. Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2023-11-17 16:23:21 UTC ]
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To celebrate the launch of the new Guardian Long Read magazine this week, join the Long Read editor David Wolf in discussion with regular contributors Sophie Elmhirst and Samanth Subramanian• The Guardian Long Read magazine is available to order now• The best stories take time. The Guardian Long... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-11-15 05:00:09 UTC ]
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12 Books for Tolerance and Understanding (2023), by The Editors of WLT Lit Lists [email protected] Tue, 11/14/2023 - 14:07 For years, a prognostication by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe appeared on the masthead page of World Literature Today: “These... Continue reading at World Literature Today
[ World Literature Today | 2023-11-14 20:07:42 UTC ]
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I first heard of Willa Cather as a teenage bookseller in North Denver, at a new, used, rare, and antiquarian bookshop that had once been a mechanic’s garage. At the bookstore, there was an entire section of Cather’s famous works, which I had labeled meticulously with colored markers on scraps of... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2023-11-14 10:00:45 UTC ]
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