What We're Reading – October 2019

Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine EvaristoSince studying Lara as a student, I have been a fan of Bernardine Evaristo’s work, and am delighted to see her win the Booker Prize this year. Girl, Woman, Other follows the lives of twelve black characters with different backgrounds and experiences, most of whom identify as female, living in London. I’ve enjoyed getting to know them through my reading and seeing how their lives are linked or overlap in different ways. What I found particularly interesting about this book is how each character responds in their own way to the universal questions of self and identity, particularly the tensions between personal, public and political gender discourse and the effect it has on the relationships the characters have with others. This feels like a very important book, and a must-read if you’re interested in what’s happening in UK fiction today.Rachel Stevens, Director LiteratureCommon People - An Anthology of Working-class Writers (ed Kit de Waal). An exceptional collection of essays, poems, memoir and short stories celebrating working-class life, culture and literature. There are many highlights, but I especially recommend Lisa McInnery’s essay ‘Working Class: An Escape Manual’, which considers how working-class writers and artists are co-opted into other identities when they achieve success. Debut author Adam Sharp’s ‘Play’, a memoir of his relationship with a substance-addicted father, is poignant and deftly handled - he’s a writer to... Continue reading at 'British Council global'

[ British Council global | 2019-10-30 09:49:28 UTC ]

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Review: Mariah Carey's memoir is her best performance yet

'The Meaning of Mariah Carey,' the pop star's tell-some memoir, sparkles and entertains and explains its subject, despite a few too many I-don't-know-hers. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2020-09-23 15:38:47 UTC ]
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Mueller revisionism, and the culpability of the press

Under a presidency that, perhaps more than any in recent memory, tends to be rendered in starkly moralistic terms, there is perhaps no better case study of the rise-and-fall character arc than Robert Mueller. Where the right always hated Mueller’s probe into Trump, Russia, and the 2016 campaign,... Continue reading at Columbia Journalism Review

[ Columbia Journalism Review | 2020-09-23 12:32:09 UTC ]
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Mental Traveler

THE FOLLOWING IS an excerpt from W. J. T. Mitchell’s Mental Traveler: A Father, a Son, and a Journey Through Schizophrenia, a memoir about Mitchell’s son Gabriel, who struggled with schizophrenia for 20 years until his suicide at age 38. The excerpt makes reference to Carmen, Gabriel’s sister, a... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books

[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2020-09-23 12:30:11 UTC ]
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NSC Official Details a Politically Tainted Review Process for Bolton Memoir

In a bombshell letter filed with the court this week, attorneys for the National Security Council official who led the prepublication review of John Bolton’s bestselling memoir 'The Room Where It Happened' confirmed the official's position that the book was cleared of classified information... Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-09-23 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Editing Justice Ginsburg

An editor recalls the experience of working with Justice Ginsburg to bring an unpublished memoir to print.  Continue reading at The Paris Review

[ The Paris Review | 2020-09-22 16:44:31 UTC ]
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Why Aren’t There More Books About Asexuals?

Science journalist and debut author Angela Chen remembers the first time she saw the word “asexuality”—online, on the Asexual Visibility and Education Network (AVEN). I don’t remember the first time I saw the word, though I know I first used it in the negative—as in, I may have “weird” views on... Continue reading at Electric Literature

[ Electric Literature | 2020-09-21 11:00:38 UTC ]
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Book Deals: Week of September 21, 2020

Custom House goes big on a debut, Nicole Maines sells a memoir to Dial, Crown pays seven figures for a new one from Deepak Chopra, and more. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-09-18 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Absolute snack Stanley Tucci is writing a memoir about his life as a foodie.

There are very few celebrities whose meals interest me. (Yes, I do hate Instagram, thank you.) But here’s one: Stanley Tucci, who announced today that he’s working on a memoir called Taste: My Life Through Food. Publisher Gallery Books described it as “intimate and charming reflection of Tucci’s... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-09-17 18:45:33 UTC ]
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First Volume of Barack Obama’s Presidential Memoir to Come This November

Former President Barack Obama's memoir A PROMISED LAND will be published on November 17, 2020. Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2020-09-17 16:53:16 UTC ]
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Barack Obama's new memoir will arrive right after the presidential election

President Obama announced Thursday that his forthcoming memoir, 'A Promised Land,' will take readers inside his White House. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2020-09-17 15:24:24 UTC ]
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The first volume of Barack Obama’s memoir is getting a 3 million copy printing this November.

We’ve known for a while that Barack Obama would be coming out with a new memoir. Today his publisher confirmed that the book, A Promised Land, will be released soon after the November elections. The former president isn’t a stranger to the pen. His first memoir, Dreams From My Father: A Story of... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-09-17 14:22:21 UTC ]
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Stanley Tucci food memoir pre-empted by Fig Tree

Penguin General imprint Fig Tree has bought a food memoir by actor and author Stanley Tucci in a 24-hour pre-empt. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-09-17 13:32:25 UTC ]
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Barack Obama's Memoir Is Finally Here — At Least The First Part Of It

"A Promised Land," to be released Nov. 17, weighs in at a whopping 768 pages. Obama said it's "a fun and informative read." Continue reading at HuffPost

[ HuffPost | 2020-09-17 12:30:43 UTC ]
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Black Childhood as Idyll: On Vivian Gibson’s “The Last Children of Mill Creek”

THIS PAST APRIL, the Cleveland-based indie press Belt Publishing released The Last Children of Mill Creek, a memoir by Vivian Gibson. At just 150 pages, the book is a spare, elegant jewel of a work, chronicling the author’s childhood growing up in segregated St. Louis in the 1950s. In 1959, when... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books

[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2020-09-17 12:30:03 UTC ]
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Obama’s Memoir ‘A Promised Land’ Coming in November

The former president’s publisher plans to release the book after the 2020 election and has ordered a first U.S. printing of 3 million copies. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2020-09-17 10:00:08 UTC ]
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Virago to publish artist Riva Lehrer's 'important' memoir

Virago has acquired Golem Girl, a memoir by artist Riva Lehrer who was born with spina bifilda, which has already won acclaim from writers including David Mitchell heralding it "a hymn to life". Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-09-16 22:53:10 UTC ]
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Native American poetry anthology vibrates with powerful voices

U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo serves as lead editor of this new collection, which showcases a range of poems as vast as the continent. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-09-16 19:52:14 UTC ]
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Native American poetry anthology vibrates with powerful voices

U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo serves as lead editor of this new collection, which showcases a range of poems as vast as the continent. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-09-16 19:52:14 UTC ]
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Native American poetry anthology vibrates with powerful voices

U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo serves as lead editor of this new collection, which showcases a range of poems as vast as the continent. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-09-16 19:52:14 UTC ]
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Story of ‘bloodthirsty unicorns’ brings debut author record publishing deal

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[ The Guardian | 2020-09-16 13:34:54 UTC ]
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