-
The 10 Most Recent Dispatches
- The Bat Segundo Show: Agnieszka Holland
- The Bat Segundo Show: Stephen Fry
- The Bat Segundo Show: Deborah Scroggins
- Komen for the Cowards: Betraying Breast Cancer
- The Bat Segundo Show: Susan Cain
- Forgotten Writers: Dorothy Uhnak
- Dwight Garner’s Revisionist Ignorance: Ayaan Hirsi Ali
- Forgotten Writers: The Novels of John P. Marquand
- The Situation in American Waffles
- The Bat Segundo Show: Elliot Perlman
Modern Library Reading Challenge
On January 10, 2011, Managing Editor Edward Champion pledged to read the top 100 fiction books from #100 to #1. Read about his progress as he makes his way through the Modern Library canon!
84. The Death of the Heart (January 6, 2012)
85. Lord Jim (November 30, 2011)
86. Ragtime (October 30, 2011)
Books To Jump Up and Down Over
The Call by Yannick Murphy: The always interesting author of Here They Come and Signed, Mata Hari returns with a novel that whips up a worldview from a rather quirky set of limitations: namely, the call logs that a veterinarian maintains as his son is unexpectedly put into a coma and an unforgiving economy denies him work. What emerges is a surprisingly optimistic, often funny, and very moving account on how one family uses acceptance and forgiveness as a way to atone for hard knocks. (Bat Segundo interview with Murphy)
Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber: Forget Franzen and Eugenides. If you're looking for a social novel that counts, Diana Abu-Jaber is the author you're looking for. Building from the free-form exploration of consciousness and identity in Crescent and the gripping procedural structure of Origin, Abu-Jaber's latest novel is her finest, equally fluent with gutterpunk culture and smarmy real estate men. It has been suggested by The Washington Post's Ron Charles that you will likely gain some pounds while reading this novel. This is certainly true. Abu-Jaber's description of food is so precise that it often made me want to do more cooking. But I very much admired the way in which Abu-Jaber presents all her characters as unwitting victims of rough capitalism, which permits them some dignity even as they perform terrible acts.
The Last of the Live Nude Girls by Sheila McClear: This memoir isn't so much about the decline of the Times Square peepshow, as it is about one young woman's efforts to pull herself up by by her bootstraps when presented with few economic options. Filled with self-introspective candor and a quiet dignity, McClear's story is one that might befall any of us in these volatile times. While McClear does get back on her feet, her book leads one contemplating the terrible fates of other young women now moving to New York and falling into deadlier vocations. (Bat Segundo interview with McClear)
Lethem, Jonathan Archive
-
Lethem Meets Litbloggers
Posted on September 18, 2007 | 7 Comments(Photo credit: Caryn) -
More Lethem, More Copyright
Posted on March 26, 2007 | No CommentsNew interview with Amy Benfer. -
Generation Divide
Posted on February 8, 2007 | 1 CommentJonathan Lethem: “Novelists may glance at the stuff of the world too, but we sometimes get called to task for it. For those whose ganglia were formed pre-TV, the mimetic... -
Lethem Audio
Posted on November 3, 2006 | No CommentsThe audio geek in me has always wondered how an audio book gets produced. Well, over at Galleycat, Sarah gives us an idea of what goes into an audio book... -
Lethem & Schatzberg
Posted on November 2, 2006 | No CommentsJonathan Lethem (one of the good Literary Jonathans) sends word that he’s hosting an 826NYC fundraiser. The movie is Scarecrow, which I contend is a pretty good flick with Hackman... -
Ugliest Girl in Landscape?
Posted on August 24, 2006 | No CommentsJonathan Lethem interviews Bob Dylan. -
In Lieu of Meaning
Posted on October 25, 2005 | No CommentsLitkicks offers a contrarian take to the Lethem-Birnbaum colloquy. Legion (via Brandywine Books). Hemingway and Dos Passos, war buddies. (via Rake) At Galleycat, various folks comment on this Elizabeth Royte... -
Birnbaum Alert
Posted on October 19, 2005 | No CommentsBob “He Puts the Cream In Your Coffee But Asks You First In Case You Take It Black” Birnbaum talks with recent MacArthur fellow Jonathan Lethem. There’s also a sweet... -
An Open Note to Maud Newton
Posted on May 26, 2004 | 4 CommentsIn response to this: Avoid the hoopla and the hate and be you. It’s almost Memorial Day Weekend and people all over the nation are freaking out. Probably some unspoken... -
Shorties
Posted on January 7, 2004 | No CommentsAnd the Whitbread goes to Mark Haddon’s The Very, Very Curious Incident of the Dog Who Was Let Out by the Baja Men in the Morning, Afternoon and Night Shortly...