Book Reviews Photo by Aideal Hwa / Unsplash If reading Adam Wiśniewski-Snerg’s Robot (Penguin Classics, 2021), translated by Tomasz Mirkowicz, makes you think about Stanislaw Lem’s work, you’re not alone. Indeed, both Robot and Lem’s His Master’s Voice (published in Polish just a few years apart) take up the fascinating but insoluble problem of whether or not we’re alone in the universe. One might even call Robot surrealist science fiction and liken it to Kafka’s work, or even Lem’s Memoirs Found in a Bathtub, since the main character spends most of his time wandering around the halls of an underground shelter, unsure of his own identity and his place in the community that has formed following an apocalyptic event on the surface. His identity confusion derives from his “birth” on an assembly line under a kind of bell jar. Given instructions by a mysterious Mechanism to study the people living in the shelter, the protagonist proceeds as if he is a living machine given a modicum of free will (as explained by the Mechanism). Much of the novel focuses on the protagonist figuring out why those around him are living underground and why many of them believe that he is a physicist named Poreyra. Encountering strange “statues” that weigh several tons in one of the shelter’s rooms, he eventually moves through a mirror there into a replica of the stricken city, where time moves at a fraction of the speed experienced in the shelter.... Continue reading at 'World Literature Today'
[ World Literature Today | 2021-11-10 20:14:00 UTC ]
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Joy Buolamwini, author of "Unmasking AI: My Mission to Protect What Is Human in a World of Machines," joins the L.A. Times Book Club on Nov. 14. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2023-11-03 00:31:12 UTC ]
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The Mountains & Plains Independent Booksellers Association's fall conference in Denver was filled with high energy for its 400 total participants, as publishing industry veterans met up with the next generation of booksellers inside and outside the exhibit hall. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-10-10 04:00:00 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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The Booker winning author talks about how his most recent work was inspired by Hilary Mantel, and the way the books world has changed since his debut was published more than 40 years agoToo many people have been dying lately,” Julian Barnes reflects over the phone from his home in north London.... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-09-16 08:00:25 UTC ]
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The R-rated comedy opened to a fifth place showing this weekend, while the comic book movie “Blue Beetle” came in at No. 1. Both were hurt by the actors’ strike. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2023-08-20 17:07:08 UTC ]
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Cultural historian Colin Dickey recommends 10 books with their fingers on the paranoid pulse of American politics. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-08-18 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Jacqueline Wilson is latest writer to wade into debate over changing dated and offensive languageThe publishing industry has been mired in debate in recent years about editing older books to remove content that could be deemed offensive.Even the prime minister became involved in February after... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-08-14 13:30:39 UTC ]
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Rachel Goldstein has been promoted to executive v-p at Penguin Random House Publisher Services, the publisher's distribution arm, which services more than 50 publishers. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-08-01 04:00:00 UTC ]
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The prize-winning poet and novelist on writing and book binding, his wariness of new technology and why literature is the ultimate immersive experienceJO Morgan has published book-length poems on subjects as diverse as the 10th-century battle of Maldon and a future Martian returning to his... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-07-22 17:00:17 UTC ]
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The deal reverses proposed cuts to libraries despite financial strains on the city Continue reading at Crains New York
[ Crains New York | 2023-06-29 16:45:41 UTC ]
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Oh dear. Earlier this month, Publishers Weekly reported on romance readers’ increased appetite for books with “cinnamon rolls” and “golden retrievers” as their leading men—categories that are exactly what they sound like: “sweet, supportive, and kind” (CR) and possessed of “a warm, floppy energy... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2023-06-22 14:24:03 UTC ]
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Alison L. Strayer is an award-winning writer and translator. Her work has been shortlisted twice for the Governor’s General Award for Literature and for Translation. Her translation of Annie Ernaux’s The Years was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize in 2019 and won the... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2023-04-19 08:59:35 UTC ]
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Jack in the Box has never been subtle about its ties to cannabis culture, from its Munchie Meals and Wakey Bakey Hash to its past collaboration with Snoop Dogg's digital media platform Merry Jane. The Southern California-based chain also aired a notorious ad in the mid-2000s featuring a clearly... Continue reading at AdWeek
[ AdWeek | 2023-04-14 12:00:00 UTC ]
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Her science fiction writing won awards. Her tarot books won her a devoted following. And she created DC Comics’ first transgender superhero. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2023-04-13 20:05:34 UTC ]
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Back in 2021, the New York Police Department (NYPD) cancelled a planned deployment of the Spot robot dog [aka "Digidog"] following a public backlash. Now, New York City's current law and order mayor Eric Adams has brought the robot dog back for use in "hazardous situations," The New York Times... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-04-12 06:19:27 UTC ]
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Pollack, who created the first mainstream transgender superhero, Kate Godwin, had been fighting Hodgkin’s lymphomaRachel Pollack, award-winning author, leading authority on tarot and the occult, trans activist and comic-book writer who created the first mainstream transgender superhero, has died... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-04-08 10:45:56 UTC ]
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'The Great Gatsby: The Essential Graphic Novel Adaptation' by Ted Adams with drawings by artist Jorge Coelho is a full-color, hardcover, graphic adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic American novel. A seven-page excerpt. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-04-05 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Children's author fails to prove claim that Excitable Edgar infringed her intellectual property. Continue reading at Media Week
[ Media Week | 2023-04-03 16:40:44 UTC ]
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The new Sustainability Lounge at London Book Fair – its concept led by Elsevier's Rachel Martin – will run throughout the week. The post Rachel Martin on London Book Fair’s Sustainability Lounge appeared first on Publishing Perspectives. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives
[ Publishing Perspectives | 2023-03-31 16:31:23 UTC ]
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It is one thing to treat AI as a tool when it has no scope for emotion. It is quite another when AI has a full suite of emotional responses. Continue reading at The Conversation
[ The Conversation | 2023-03-05 19:19:51 UTC ]
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