The truth about book prizes, why Amazon is like an old-fashioned library and how much famous writers really earned from their journalism …Periodically, signs go up saying that Grub Street is closed to through traffic. Observers speculate that the street is being redeveloped as gentrification forces the former inhabitants to move out, or else that the closure may be due to the expansion of the neighbouring university’s English department. Older heads are shaken in what had been the local pub but is now a coffee’n’crafts shop: there used to be more life in the place, they mourn, when bohemian writers could dash off a review against the clock to pay for their round. Even if Grub Street is eventually reopened, it will never be the same again, and anyway it will probably have been renamed “Creatives Crescent”.Such cliches and exaggerations are characteristic of this genre of lament. Like most keening for the good old days, these threnodies are not pieces of dispassionate historical analysis: they are attempts to compensate for so much that is disagreeable about one’s own time by inventing a more or less idealised version of the past. Still, it is worth wondering why “Grub Street” should be the form taken by paradise lost in this case. After all, the street originally so named in London (it was real before it was metaphorical) came to be the home of that kind of “grub” defined by the OED as “a person of mean abilities; a dull industrious drudge; a literary hack”. Even allowing... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2016-01-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
The Web magazine will publish an expanded look at books on the first Saturday of each month, as stand-alone book review sections in newspapers have dwindled. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2012-03-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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With care and craft, the novelist and essayist seeks to summarize Andrei Tarkovsky's 1979 art film 'Stalker,' finding elements that will keep the non- cinéaste onboard.Zona Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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A creepy professor eavesdrops on a woman's therapy sessions and becomes obsessed with her.By Blood Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The death of language is explored via plague-carrying children and their horror-struck parents in a wildly inventive tale by Ben Marcus.Spend too much time with 24-hour news networks and it's easy to feel that exposure to that much talk can make you sick. Taking the idea a few steps further,... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-24 00:00:00 UTC ]
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In 'Enemies: A History of the FBI,' Tim Weiner ('Legacy of Ashes') offers a scathing indictment of the FBI, before J. Edgar Hoover and since.Each week, the FBI sends reporters an email of "top ten news stories" that it hopes will hit the headlines. The press releases usually highlight crooks... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Tracie McMillan takes us to agricultural fields, Wal-Mart and Applebee's, where she works short stints and tries to eat healthfully on meager pay.The American Way of Eating Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Thomas Mallon's novel deftly paints a picture of 1970s America and adds an imaginative back story to the characters.Watergate Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The author's short stories paint vivid pictures of growing up Filipino American.In a smoke-stained San Francisco hotel room, Felix Starro is making fake blood. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-17 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Foursquare and Yelp upload names, e-mail addresses and phone numbers, sometimes without explicit permission. Continue reading at PC World
[ PC World | 2012-02-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The murder of Oakland journalist Chauncey Bailey and a family's violent rise to prominence is given gripping life.On a morning in August 2007, a slender masked man ran up to Chauncey Bailey on an Oakland sidewalk and fired two shotgun blasts at the journalist. The first slug tore through Bailey... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2012-02-11 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Four more publishers have signed up with Faber Factory Plus, Faber's new sales force for... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-02-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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As Barnes & Noble fights for its future, the publishing industry is holding its breath. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2012-01-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Kate Mosse, Hari Kunzru and the Guardian’s literary editor Claire Armitstead are to... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-01-18 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Joanna Ellis, former marketing director at Faber, is to join The Literary Platform as associate... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-01-12 00:00:00 UTC ]
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TV presenter Stephen Fry is to judge an international competition, launched by literature and... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-01-10 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Aperture, a nonprofit foundation dedicated to promoting photography, is gearing up for a big year in 2012. In addition to celebrating its 60th anniversary this year, it has teamed with Paris Photo, the annual French photography fair, to launch The PhotoBook Review, a new biannual publication on... Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2012-01-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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An MP has joined the Bookseller Association's calls for the government to respond to the Mary... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-01-04 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The Booksellers Association has welcomed Mary Portas report into the future of the high... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-12-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Mainstream has bought a book aimed at guiding modern single girls on their search for love, to be... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-12-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Doncaster campaigners are considering applying for judicial review over library closures,... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-11-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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