Lit Hub Daily: December 14, 2017

• Tracy O’Neill on growing up in thrall to a great American heroine: Tonya Harding. | Literary Hub
• Kyoko Mori looks back on a lifetime of running, and navigating the fine line between body and mind. | Literary Hub
• Brandon Taylor on the Alabama special election results: “Political victories don’t put food on the table.” | Literary Hub
• Ask the Publicists: 20 questions (and 20 answers) for the debut writer. | Literary Hub
• The time W.H. Auden wrote a bunch of poetry for a short art film about running. | Literary Hub
• A close reading of the best opening paragraph of all time: what makes Shirley Jackson such a genius? | Literary Hub
• “Few writers have been so conscientious of the ways that societies are defined by the nuances and omissions of their language.” On the miscellanies of Ursula K. Le Guin. | Book Marks
• Heidi Julavits, Ruth Franklin, Vivian Gornick, Parul Sehgal and others on women and power in the workplace. | The New York Times Magazine
• Meet ten poets whose debut works came out this year, including Eve L. Ewing, Layli Long Soldier, and Kaveh Akbar. | Poets & Writers
• “Some real talk: most writing isn’t worth consuming.” Against reading everything. | The Walrus
• My creative process is similar to my living process: An interview with Melissa Febos. | Hazlitt
• “How can we best respond to Mary’s hideous progeny now, after so many bewildering transformations?” On the many adaptations of Frankenstein and their impact on the original work. | The New York Review of Books
• “The truth about the wretchedness of book-writing finally comes tumbling out.” Jennifer Senior on the surprising charms of acknowledgements sections. | The New York Times
• The Final Take (we hope): cats reacting to “Cat Person.” | The Cut

Also on Literary Hub: David Grossman at Brooklyn Public Library’s “Message From the Library” series · Activists and those afflicted by gun violence speak out in · 20 questions (and answers) for the debut writer