Ok, so Lit Hub doesn’t actually have a literal mailbag, but we do get a ton of emails. Though most of them are some combination of belligerent and aloof, we occasionally get earnest requests for help, generally of the smalltown Read more >
On Tuesday, the National Book Critics Circle announced its 30 finalists for the 2022 National Book Critics Circle Awards, which celebrate the best books of the year in six categories: autobiography, biography, criticism, fiction, general nonfiction, and poetry. The finalists Read more >
You can keep your presidential inaugurations and your state funerals, here’s the commission every self-respecting poet really dreams of. NASA has asked U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón to craft an original poem that will go on the spacecraft Europa Clipper on Read more >
Donald Trump, no stranger to lawsuits, is starting one of his own against Bob Woodward and publisher Simon & Schuster, claiming they had no right to release The Trump Tapes, an audio “book” consisting of 20 recorded conversations between the Read more >
January goes out strong: these books from Ursula K. Le Guin, V (formerly Eve Ensler), Deborah Levy, Ben Okri, and more hit shelves today. * Ursula K. Le Guin, The Lathe of Heaven (Scribner) “A rare and powerful synthesis of Read more >
Yesterday, the American Library Association announced the winners of the 2023 Carnegie Medals for Excellence. In fiction, the winner was Julie Otsuka for her most recent novel, The Swimmers. This brilliant book starts out at a community pool; it invites us Read more >
Today I learned that Channing Tatum is writing a “fun and sexy” romance novel with Roxane Gay. And you know what, that is fun and sexy! Yep—Tatum is expanding from children’s books (and this) into something a little more grown-up. Read more >
At a ceremony in New York on Thursday, Villa Albertine announced the winners of the first Albertine Translation Prize, which honors “the best contemporary French literature in English translation,” as selected by a committee of independent professional experts. “Together with Read more >
The man largely responsible for one of the great rock anthems of the 1980s, “We’re Not Gonna Take It,” told an interviewer recently that he’s writing a novel about toxic masculinity. It’s called Frats, and as Dee Snider (who’s 67!) Read more >
Lovers of gorgeous prose and ghost-soaked literary fiction rejoice: two-time National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward’s next novel officially has a release date. Let Us Descend, Ward’s first novel in five years (since 2017’s Sing, Unburied Sing) will be published by Read more >
On Wednesday, the 41st John Dos Passos Prize was awarded to Uruguayan American writer Carolina De Robertis (The President and the Frog; Cantoras; The Gods of Tango) by Longwood University. The Dos Passos Prize is the oldest literary award given by a Read more >
Prime Video dropped an official teaser trailer for the new Daisy Jones & the Six series today, featuring “Regret Me,” one of 24 original songs created for the show based on song lyrics written by the book’s author, Taylor Jenkins Reid. (Lesson Read more >
Hello there. Perhaps you clicked on this link because you have heard people cite Shakespeare on the necessity of killing all the lawyers and wonder if it’s a myth. Or maybe you suspect it’s one of those misquoted aphorisms, the Read more >
Florida—a state whose governor recently signed a book deal with HarperCollins’ Broadside Books—has, incredibly, descended even further into dystopia as HB 1467, a bill signed into law in March, went into effect. The law disallows teachers from making decisions about Read more >
Do you know the name J.R. Moehringer? Even if you don’t, I can guarantee you’ve heard of the books he’s written: maybe Open, Andre Agassi’s memoir? Or how about Shoe Dog, with legendary Nike founder Phil Knight? No? Ok, fine. Read more >
There’s nothing Hollywood loves more than existing IP—thus, the Oscars are historically adaptation-friendly. Last year, 50% of the Best Picture nominations were based on books and plays; in 2016, it was 63%. According to Adam Morgan at the Chicago Review of Read more >
The internet is awash in rankings (hi!) of virtually anything and everything you can think of. This, of course, includes literary journals, those wonderfully hopeful, underfunded labors of love that serve as beacons of potential to otherwise benighted short story Read more >
The nominations for the 95th Academy Awards are here! Overall, it’s a good batch, with only a few glaring omissions. Let’s break it down. And watch the Academy Awards on Sunday, March 12, 2023 at 8:00 PM ET. BEST PICTURE All Read more >
Today, Chicago-based arts organization United States Artists announced their 45 2023 USA Fellows, a group that includes four Writing Fellows, each of whom will receive an unrestricted cash award of $50,000. Previous USA Writing Fellows include Kiese Laymon, Claudia Rankine, Read more >
Cat Person, the Emilia Jones- and Nicholas Braun-starring movie adaptation of Kristen Roupenian’s mega-viral 2017 New Yorker short story about a twenty-year-old woman who has a brief and unpleasant fling with a shlubby manchild his thirties, premiered at Sundance on Saturday. Read more >
