The Hub

News, Notes, Talk

Guy who loves book bans is publishing a book.

Countless Republican politicians—who have never read anything longer than a pamphlet about how despite what the Bible says, Jesus actually hated poor people—have published entire books. Still, there’s something especially grotesque about Ron DeSantis, governor of the state with the Read more >

By Jessie Gaynor

Your guide to December's free virtual literary events.

Winter is coming, and we are not leaving our homes (but still want to attend book events)! * The Trauma of Caste: A Dalit-Feminist Led Celebration & Discussion December 1 @ 7:30pm EST To celebrate the publication of Thenmozhi Soundararajan’s Read more >

By Katie Yee

Tess Gunty's The Rabbit Hutch is coming to the screen.

The Fall of Tess Gunty (I speak of Autumn, not ruination) continues apace with news that the Indiana author’s much-ballyhooed debut novel The Rabbit Hutch—the story of a group of residents of a low-income housing community in a fictional Indiana town Read more >

By Dan Sheehan

8 new books for your reading pleasure.

Time to get cozy with this perfect octet of new books. * Michael Kimmelman, The Intimate City: Walking New York (Penguin Press) “New York City comes alive in this scintillating collection of conversations between New York Times architecture critic Kimmelman Read more >

By Katie Yee

n+1's Bookmatch has perfect book recommendations for you (and every protagonist in your life).

In case the barrage of Cyber Monday emails from every store you’ve ever patronized (or thought about patronizing, or accidentally landed on while searching for “normal pants”) on the internet has you on the verge of declaring a moratorium on Read more >

By Jessie Gaynor

Merriam-Webster's 2022 Word of the Year is . . . gaslighting.

Ah yes, gaslighting. It’s been with us since time immemorial, but like plenty of other terrible things, it was particularly big this year. “The increase in dictionary lookups for gaslighting is striking,” says Peter Sokolowski, Merriam-Webster’s Editor at Large. “In our Read more >

By Emily Temple

I'm a HarperCollins author. Here's why (and how) I won't cross the virtual picket line.

In days of yore—that is, my childhood in the paper-mill town of Mexico, Maine—a labor strike looked like an ugly affair. Picketing men in steel-toed boots screamed themselves hoarse at every shift change, their righteous anger rising into a sky Read more >

By Monica Wood

10 new books to keep you company on your holiday weekend travels.

New books, or, perfect companions that, when held directly in front of one’s face, might act as a conversational shield against certain family members this Thanksgiving. * Allie Rowbottom, Aesthetica (Soho Press) “Much will be made of how perfectly Aesthetica captures Read more >

By Katie Yee

Lit Hub officially endorses “Goblin mode” as Oxford's Word of the Year.

Because we believe in democracy here at Lit Hub dot com, I felt it was particularly important that you all knew about this upcoming vote: Oxford English Dictionary’s Word of the Year. Yes, that’s right. YOU have a say. For Read more >

By Katie Yee

I beg you, don't buy a novelty notebook for the book lover in your life this holiday season.*

Seriously. They already have too many. They also have too many totes, “old book” candles, library card socks, custom bookmarks, LED book lights. Any number of these is basically too many, except the totes, which don’t count because usually they’re Read more >

By Emily Temple

Exclusive Cover Reveal: Here's the cover for Jenn Shapland's Thin Skin

Literary Hub is pleased to reveal the cover for Jenn Shapland’s Thin Skin, a collection of essays forthcoming from Pantheon Books in August 2023. This collection is Shapland’s latest since her debut memoir, My Autobiography of Carson McCullers, which was a Read more >

By Eloise King-Clements

Meanwhile, Elon Musk's sister has a romance adaptation and streaming company called Passionflix.

It’s not hard to be the less-shitty Musk sibling at this point, so I won’t bang the drum too hard for Tosca Musk and her streaming service Passionflix, which adapts romance novels and distributes them via its streaming platform. Still, Read more >

By Jessie Gaynor

Fans aren’t happy about their $600 autopen-signed copies of Bob Dylan’s new book.

Bob Dylan has once again enraged his core fanbase by going electric. Well, to be more specific, his publisher, Simon & Schuster, got into hot water this weekend after hundreds of fans figured out their one-of-a-kind, hand-signed editions of Dylan’s Read more >

By Jonny Diamond

Are these America’s "most talented but underappreciated" writers?

On Friday, Longwood University announced the finalists for the 2022 John Dos Passos Prize, which is the oldest literary award given by a Virginia college or university, and which honors “one of America’s most talented but underappreciated writers. . . Read more >

By Emily Temple

Oh good, TikTok is breaking into bookselling.

We all know books have the power to move us to tears, and that those tears have the power to move books. Last year, with the sudden rise on popularity of certain titles, the publishing industry realized that BookTok might Read more >

By Katie Yee

Katherine Rundell has won the 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction.

Katherine Rundell has won the UK’s £50,000 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction for Super-Infinite: The Transformations of John Donne, a biography of the poet. Chair of judges Caroline Sanderson said that the decision had been unanimous. “Exquisitely rendered, its Read more >

By Emily Temple