Lit Hub Weekly: September 24 - 28, 2018

• The National Book Foundation’s 2018 5 under 35 honorees have been announced. | The Washington Post
• “The point, she’s saying, is to last, to make love a habit, a collaboration that regenerates itself by doing.” Hilton Als on Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith. | The New Yorker
• “It’s a hell of a thing to feel—to grow the food, serve the drinks, hammer the houses, and assemble the airplanes for people with more money to eat or drink or live in or fly around in, while you and the people you know can’t afford to go to the doctor.” Read an excerpt from Heartland by Sarah Smarsh. | The Nation
• Joe Moran on how to write a great sentence—and why it’s the most important element of writing. | The Guardian
• “While the novelist might rejoice in his subject, some readers tend to yawn—really, another story of some tedious nobody?” In defense of minor characters. | Commonweal
• A first edition of Leaves of Grass and a signed, pirated copy of Mark Twain’s Sketches are among Robin Williams’ collection of rare books, up for auction in New York next week. | Fine Books & Collections
• “Lessing never apologized for the choices she had made, but she never seemed quite settled with them either.” On Doris Lessing and what it means to be a “free woman.” | New York Review of Books
• From folk paintings to an exquisite corpse by Leonora Carrington, a brief tour through Diane Williams’ art collection. | The Paris Review
• “Instead of a theory of male anger, we have a growing literature in essays and now books about female anger, a phenomenon in transition.” Rebecca Solnit on three new books about women’s anger. | The New Republic
• “When an artist as introverted as Knausgaard looks at the wider world, what does he see?” A profile of Karl Ove Knausgaard, at the end of his Struggle. | The New Republic
• “One day Presto and Zesto, good friends, took a walk and ended up in Limboland. They didn’t mean to go there, who would go there, but they had a lot on their minds.” Maria Popova on Maurice Sendak’s new posthumous children’s book. | The New York Times
• “Post-modernity is multiracial (I hate the word diversity; I’m so sick of it!), it’s multicultural—aesthetically, politically, sociologically.” An interview with Margo Jefferson. | The Millions
• From Henry James to National Geographic to Ayn Rand (“as low as you can get re: fiction”): What Flannery O’Connor read. | Lapham’s Quarterly
• Don’t quit your day job—or at least know that it doesn’t make you any less of a writer to have one. Laurie Patton against the myth of the “unified identity of the writer.” | The Millions
• “She had to overcome a mountainous obstacle . . . Her plan to do nothing.” A profile of Deborah Eisenberg. | The New York Times Magazine

Also on Lit Hub:

They don’t want to know: Rebecca Solnit on Brett Kavanaugh and the denial of old white men • Writers write. And also, they don’t? 25 famous writers on writer’s block • Surrounded by 11 acres of guns, Ben Fountain reports from the NRA’s annual convention • Jodi Picoult would really like Brett Kavanaugh to read her new novel • The best book covers of September • A conversation with Deborah Eisenberg, in which we learn why she is “the Gerald Ford of fiction writers” • Who gets to be depressed? Sarah Fawn Montgomery on teaching the literature of “mad women” • Sally Field on bringing Norma Rae to Cannes • On the fossil wars: it’s science vs. commerce, dinosaur edition! • Patrick deWitt on the surreal joy (and terror) of seeing your novel onscreen • William Faulkner: two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, all-time worst postmaster • Of Nietzsche and the horse: John Kaag on life, death, and the temporary pathos of distance • Why Gordon Lish’s influence lives on most powerfully in his lineage of Jewish American writing • Nick McDonell on the casualties of American wars • Kristen Arnett: librarian and tech whisperer? From camcorders to flux capacitors, the librarian’s struggle with technology is never done • “Update on Werewolves.” A new poem by Margaret Atwood • Boomers vs. Millennials, in fiction and in life: Daniel Torday and Malcolm Harris on generational divides, Karl Marx, and data • Restlessness, revolution and three generations of women in Tehran • Could abstract mathematical logic be the key to making Twitter less of a hellscape? • Keeyanga-Yamahtta Taylor on why we need Howard Zinn now more than ever • Abigail DeWitt on the fraught project of translating the trauma of others into fiction • The sandwich that helped feed Puerto Rico when FEMA failed. Chef José Andrés on getting to work in the aftermath of Maria • The Lit Hub staff’s favorite stories from September

Best of Book Marks:

Five Famous Faulkner Fables: Classic reviews of the Nobel Prize-winning Mississippian’s most iconic novels • Waiting for Eden author Elliot Ackerman shares his five favorite books that straddle life and death • The Great American Read: Heroes—classic reviews of America’s favorite heroic journeys, from Nineteen Eighty-Four to The Hunger Games • This week in Secrets of the Book Critics: Martha Anne Toll on John A. Williams, Well-Read Black Girl, and Dust Bowl fiction • Helen Macdonald on ravens, Joyce Carol Oates on Ottessa Moshfegh’s sleepy anti-heroine, Rebecca Solnit on the literature of female rage, and more Book Reviews You Need to Read This Week • 10 controversial classics for Banned Books Week: from the obscene Ulysses to the satanic Harry Potter • Our literature in translation columnist Heather Cleary selects four small wonders for National Translation Month • Kate Atkinson’s new WWII novel, Deborah Eisenberg’s first short story collection in twelve years, and Ben Fountain’s dispatches from Trump country all feature among the Best Reviewed Books of the Week

New on CrimeReads:

13 crime podcasts perfect for fall listening, featuring new programs and new seasons of old favorites •  Anna Lee Huber recommends 10 crime novels featuring women in espionage, all set between the world wars •  Reed Farrel Coleman reflects on the meaning of alcohol in crime fiction, and why he decided it was time for Jesse to get sober • Bruce Riordan on the evolution of the police procedural on screen, from Bullitt and The French Connection to Zodiac and The Wire • “What’s the point of fiction if it doesn’t allow the imagination full play?” Kate Atkinson on her new spy novel and why she loves a good secret • “When it comes to political thrillers, maybe women tend to imagine ourselves in dystopias, if we imagine ourselves at all.” Lisa Brackmann on the meaning of the political thriller in the age of #metoo • Kyle Mills on the evolution of the action thriller and how authors keep up with the latest threats in a world full of dangers and ever-changing enemies • CrimeReads editors scour the streaming services for the best new arrivals in crime, mystery, and thrillers • Benet Brandreth, crime writer and dialogue coach for the Royal Shakespeare Company, on the dangerous lives and many duels of Elizabethan playwrights • Writers and crime nonfiction collectors Michael P. Daley and Jack Womack talk true crime and the nature of curiosity • Dueling playwrights, the invention of the Boston crime novel, Sara Gran’s favorite crime books, and more: our favorite pieces of the month • More than soup lines: L. A. Chandlar on writing a crime series that captures the subtleties and flair of 1930s New York City • Scandi noir, Catalonian dark comedy, a Columbian conspiracy thriller, and more: September’s best international crime fiction