Categorising fiction may help to sell books, but it says little about how writers write or readers readIn her Reith lecture of 2017, recently published for the first time in a posthumous collection of nonfiction, A Memoir of My Former Self, Hilary Mantel recalled the beginnings of her career as a novelist. It was the 1970s. “In those days historical fiction wasn’t respectable or respected,” she recalled. “It meant historical romance. If you read a brilliant novel like I, Claudius, you didn’t taint it with the genre label, you just thought of it as literature. So, I was shy about naming what I was doing. All the same, I began. I wanted to find a novel I liked, about the French Revolution. I couldn’t, so I started making one.”She made A Place of Greater Safety, an exceptional ensemble portrayal of the revolutionaries Danton, Robespierre and Desmoulins, but although the novel was completed in 1979, it wasn’t published until 1992 – widely rejected, as she later explained, because although she thought the French Revolution was the most interesting thing in the world, the reading public didn’t agree, or publishers had concluded they didn’t. She decided to write a contemporary novel – Every Day Is Mother’s Day – purely to get published; A Place of Greater Safety emerged only when she contributed to a Guardian piece about writers’ unpublished first novels. Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2023-11-27 12:30:00 UTC ]
Haley Mlotek’s new memoir finds a fresh way to talk about the dissolution of a marriage. Continue reading at The Atlantic
[ The Atlantic | 2025-02-21 17:15:00 UTC ]
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Erin Steele’s memoir, Sunrise Over Half-Built Houses: Love, Longing and Addiction in Suburbia, chronicles the life of an isolated, self-conscious Canadian teenager growing up in middle-class British Columbia to loving parents who are simultaneously present and absent. As young Erin grapples with... Continue reading at Electric Literature
[ Electric Literature | 2025-02-21 12:00:00 UTC ]
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This round of mystery and thriller news is filled with upcoming adaptations. Plus, there’s a must-read memoir and The Da ... Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-02-19 13:00:00 UTC ]
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Haley Mlotek’s new book provides neither catharsis nor remedies for heartache, but rather a tender exploration of human intimacy. Continue reading at The Atlantic
[ The Atlantic | 2025-02-19 12:30:00 UTC ]
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Susanna Hoffs, along with bandmates Vicki and Debbi Peterson, spoke about new book "Eternal Flame," recalling key events in the Bangles' chart-topping run in the 1980s and how the band shaped their lives. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2025-02-18 18:48:12 UTC ]
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I know some people like to march to the beat of their own drum and aren’t really interested in what ... Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-02-18 13:30:00 UTC ]
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Rich Benjamin’s new book Talk to Me explores the coup that overthrew his grandfather, the president of Haiti, in 1957. Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2025-02-15 10:00:00 UTC ]
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Three dynamic queer characters carve a place for themselves among Gilded Age New York's elite in Olivia Wolfgang-Smith's MUTUAL INTEREST. Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-02-14 12:30:00 UTC ]
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A big-name picture book adaptation of the Grimm fairy tale “Hansel and Gretel” goes to HarperCollins, Margaret Atwood brings a memoir to Doubleday, Sourcebooks picks up the memoir of the daughter of Gisele Pelicot, and more in this week’s book deals. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2025-02-14 05:00:00 UTC ]
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The multi-award winning feminist author Margaret Atwood (The Handmaid’s Tale) has announced that she will be releasing her long-awaited memoir ... Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-02-12 19:59:13 UTC ]
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“I am determined to keep writing, it has never mattered to me more.” Hanif Kureishi on trauma, recovery and what it means to be a writer. | Lit Hub Memoir Just in time for Valentine’s Day: 25 writers explain the anatomy of a good sex scene. | Lit Hub Craft Pankaj Mishra on nationalism,... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-11 11:30:21 UTC ]
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The Lit Hub Author Questionnaire is a monthly interview featuring seven questions for five authors with new books. This month we talk to: * Justin Haynes (Ibis) Shane McCrae (New and Collected Hell: A Poem) Haley Mlotek (No Fault: A Memoir of Romance and Divorce) Maggie Su (Blob: A Love Story)... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-11 09:57:52 UTC ]
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This story about a child with cerebral palsy is badly misleading – and a slap in the face for families like oursAmazing news from Netflix: there is an extraordinary treatment available for children with very severe neurological disabilities, one that, given the appropriate level of parental... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2025-02-11 08:00:11 UTC ]
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I’ve known Lauren Markham’s writing since her first book, The Faraway Brothers, came out in 2017. Then, a couple years ago, I got to know her a bit more as a person when a friend emailed the two of us and another writer to ask our thoughts on writing (and teaching) journalism versus memoir or […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-07 09:57:40 UTC ]
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In Sarah Chihaya’s memoir Bibliophobia, we enter into the moment of her breakdown—an event that she has seen on her horizon since childhood, but also seemed impossibly remote. As a child of Japanese and Japanese-Canadian immigrants to the US, Chihaya’s parents “didn’t really believe in the... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-06 09:56:18 UTC ]
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Historical fiction centering *The* Woman behind the Harlem Renaissance, a tropical rebel gets her duke, and more of this month's best book club books. Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-02-04 13:30:00 UTC ]
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Sarah Chihaya’s unconventional memoir charts her troubled relationship with the literature that formed her. Continue reading at The Atlantic
[ The Atlantic | 2025-01-31 13:00:00 UTC ]
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Edmund White’s The Loves of My Life, Dorian Lynsky’s Everything Must Go, and Liz Pelly’s Mood Machine all feature among the best reviewed nonfiction titles of the month. Brought to you by Book Marks, Lit Hub’s home for book reviews. * 1. The Loves of My Life: A Sex Memoir by Edmund White... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-01-31 09:58:15 UTC ]
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