[{"id":276061,"date":"2026-08-21T14:59:59","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T18:59:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/?p=276061"},"modified":"2026-08-21T14:59:59","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T18:59:59","slug":"heres-whats-making-us-happy-this-week-11","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/heres-whats-making-us-happy-this-week-11\/","title":{"rendered":"Here\u2019s what\u2019s making us happy this<\/em> week."},"content":{"rendered":"

Summer isn’t over\u2014in fact, we rue the hater who throws in the beach towel before Labor Day. But there is a definite wind down spirit to late August. Afternoon storms gather steam on a dime, scuttling picnic plans. In New York, people begin to trickle back from their vacations. We’re all a little tired. Bracing for back to school.<\/p>\n

So no better time, in this staffer’s opinion, to revive our weekly gratitude round-up<\/em>!\u00a0This Friday, we offer you some of the people, places, and things that are keeping this fragile ship afloat through the late summer slowdive.<\/p>\n

The author and activist Arundhati Roy<\/strong> has been lighting my grey afternoons. And I’m not the only one fanning out\u2014in Current Affairs<\/em><\/a>, the writer Sharmistha Jha<\/a> recently published a praise note to Roy’s morally courageous canon. That piece led me to revisit her debut, The God of Small Things<\/em><\/a>. Which is, happily, just as terrific as I remembered.<\/p>\n

My own week was further<\/em> Roy-pilled by a recent dispatch from Delhi, where the Booker-winning author is currently chronicling the student-led Cockroach Janta protests against the Modi government. Roy’s report on the growing movement made for a galvanizing read in last week’s Equator<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

“The young have given us a gift,” she said of the protestors. “It is up to us all, every one of us to make what they have done matter.” At a moment when I find myself looking up to artists who truly practice their politics, this gauntlet hit like a gift.<\/p>\n

On the steamier (but still thrilling!) front, Jane Schoenbrun’s<\/strong>\u00a0thoughtful slasher Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma\u00a0<\/em>made for a perfect night out.<\/p>\n

Just like their previous films\u2014and, eek, their fiction!<\/em>\u2014this joint is smart, surreal, inimitable, and oh-so-lushly imagined. As fun to talk about after as it is to watch. I won’t spoil the real fun, but you should know that the movie includes the year’s best needle drop. An unhinged bit of seasonal spice.<\/p>\n

And last, here’s something you might lend your ears to. Sophie Vershbow and Rudi Greenberg<\/strong> are the bright-eyed (eared?) hosts of It Was a Book First<\/a>, <\/em>a new podcast contrasting film adaptations and their literary source material.<\/p>\n

A recent episode<\/a> on the new indie film Late Fame<\/em>\u2014which was adapted from an Arthur Schnitzler short\u2014made for perky dish-washing company. And the hosts are self-proclaimed cine and biblio-philes respectively, so there’s some fun friction when it comes to discussing each medium’s strengths.<\/p>\n

Alright, friends. Wishing you a weekend full of inspiration, eye candy, and good company. We’re grateful for you!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Summer isn’t over\u2014in fact, we rue the hater who throws in the beach towel before Labor Day. But there is a definite wind down spirit to late August. Afternoon storms gather steam on a dime, scuttling picnic plans. In New<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17066,"featured_media":276066,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[43102,43201,43093,43092,43098,43445,43646],"tags":[111923,10061,101565,2108,107468,7902,20649,95689,105647,48273,72388,111922],"class_list":["post-276061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-biography","category-book-news-newsandculture","category-film-and-tv","category-newsandculture","category-style","category-technology","category-the-hub","tag-arthur-schnitzler","tag-arundhati-roy","tag-book-podcasts","tag-books","tag-equator","tag-film","tag-honestly-thought-it-was-spelled-tindr","tag-jane-schoenbrun","tag-late-fame","tag-nice-things","tag-sophie-vershbow","tag-teenage-sex-and-death-at-camp-miasma","book-the-god-of-small-things"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5rKFr-19OB","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Untitled-design-26.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17066"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=276061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/276066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}},{"id":276000,"date":"2026-08-21T06:30:46","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T10:30:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/?p=276000"},"modified":"2026-08-21T09:12:04","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T13:12:04","slug":"lit-hub-daily-august-21-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lithub.com\/lit-hub-daily-august-21-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"Lit Hub Daily: August 21, 2026"},"content":{"rendered":" TODAY: In 1762, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu is born. <\/span>\n