The Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction has been running for 25 years, recognizing the best work of non-fiction each year with a tidy sum of £25,000. This year, to celebrate its quarter century, the prize looked back on its previous Read more >
Neil Gaiman has his first full-length album coming out, a collaboration with Australian indie string quartet FourPlay called Signs of Life. Gaiman, obviously, has tried his hand at all kinds of writing—adapted myth, tv, comics—and has now written a record’s Read more >
Sarah Holland-Batt spoke at an Australian royal commission in 2019 on the poor state of aged care on behalf of her father, who had Parkinson’s and died in 2020. She later worked her experiences into a collection, The Jaguar, that Read more >
Across the pond this morning, the good people at the Women’s Prize for Fiction—one of the literary world’s most high-profile and prestigious awards—announced the 2023 shortlist, which includes both former winners and three first-time novelists. This year’s shortlist was selected Read more >
Ah, now I see why Republicans want to ban books and defund libraries. According to JSTOR Daily, a young Mao Zedong was an ardent library patron who loved hanging out with books so much he briefly became an assistant librarian. Read more >
Lloyd Devereux Richards’ debut thriller Stone Maidens was published in 2012, received by a largely indifferent world until Devereux Richards’ daughter Margueritte posted a TikTok about her dad, aged 74, last year. Nearly overnight, the mystery novel about an FBI Read more >
Remarkably, the end of April is already almost here. But, of course, there are many reasons and ways to enjoy these last few days of the month. You might acknowledge the birthdays of certain literary legends, like Defoe (the 24th), Read more >
The American Academy in Rome, America’s oldest overseas center for independent studies in advanced research in the arts and humanities, has announced the winners of the 2023-24 Rome Prize, which aims to gift its recipients with “time and space to Read more >
Today, the Gotham Book Prize, a new annual award created during the first year of the pandemic to honor and support the best writing about New York City, announced its 2023 winners. This year, the prize will be increased from Read more >
Hug an author today! Fifty-four percent of debut authors responding to Bookseller survey said the process had a negative impact on their mental health—equally likely to feel bummed out whether they pubbed with a Big Four or an indie publisher. Read more >
Well this doesn’t sound right at all. In an op-ed today at The Guardian, David Robson makes the case that “expressive” writing can make you healthier, and not just through some vague sense of personal satisfaction. In suggesting that writing Read more >
Today, the American Library Association has published its annual list of the Most Challenged Books—those most often targeted for banning in schools and public libraries. As you may already know if you’ve been paying even the slightest bit of attention, Read more >
So now you know. Steven Knight, who created noted bad-hair show Peaky Blinders, revealed his ultimate ambitions for Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations in a finale that had it all: shootouts, weird kissing scenes, attempted suicide, a spot of angry horse-shoe Read more >
Hilary Mantel died last September at age 70, but a memorial service just this week revealed something of use to those who miss her words. The Guardian’s Saturday Paper will be publishing excerpts from an unpublished project mashing together Jane Read more >
Tomorrow is Earth Day, our annual reminder to spare a thought for our spinning planet lest we destroy it completely. Come on guys, how will we read outside if there is no outside left? If you’re lucky enough to be Read more >
Shh shhshh! Jack Thorne, who adapted Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials for TV, has the conch! Along with the production company behind Sex Education, Thorne will be adapting William Golding’s Lord of the Flies for a BBC TV series, Deadline Read more >
Did Amazon get the idea for The Rings of Power from J.R.R. Tolkien’s vast legacy, comprising over a dozen books, or did they steals it from LA dude Demetrious Polychron? That’s what Demestrious Polychron would like to know. PCMag reports Read more >
Ethan Schmidt-Crockett, who I guess has made a name for himself “protesting” “woke” stores, was recently kicked out of an Arizona Barnes and Noble for quietly bullying the Pride Display. Schmidt-Crockett, alongside his unnamed sidekick, filmed himself prowling through Barnes Read more >
Last night, the $35,000 Aspen Words Literary Prize was awarded to Jamil Jan Kochai for his collection, The Haunting of Hajji Hotak and Other Stories, following a suite of Afghani characters between modern-day Afghanistan and contemporary America as they grapple Read more >
One more reason to love the New York Public Library—the Young Lions Fiction Award, which was founded by Ethan Hawke, Jennifer Rudolph Walsh, Rick Moody, and Hannah McFarland, and recognizes American fiction writers 35 and under with a $10,000 prize. Read more >
