• Over at The Rap Sheet, someone has somehow convinced James Ellroy to blog: “I’m James Ellroy, the demon dog of American literature, the author of sixteen books, twelve novels, a full length memoir, a book of short stories and two journalistic collections. Masterpieces, all.” Only the demon dog himself could get away with such argot. (via Sarah)
• The Kenyon Review joins the list of this year’s awards who hand out honorariums to the obvious choices. Could Philip Roth be next?
• A new biography may solve the mystery of Agatha Christie’s 11-day disappearance. What was it? In a nutshell: quaaludes.
• More on the Bechdel/Thompson fiasco from the Marshall Democrat-News. (via Brockman)
• Ursula K. Le Guin on the new Susanna Clarke book: “These are all elegant, entertaining stories, and many readers will be untroubled by the airy incoherences found in ‘The Ladies of Grace Adieu.’ Or else, they may simply say, with Tom Brightwind, ‘Who cares?'” Count me in the latter camp. (via Gwenda)
• SF Site has the scoop on a remarkable new overview of Philip Jose Farmer’s work.
• Better late than never: Paul Collins on the closing of CBGB.
• This week’s New Yorker offers a new story by Aleksandar Hemon.
• America’s Ten Dumbest Congressmen. What? No Lieberman?
• Bill Murray was bored. So he ended up hanging out with college kids. “The alcohol ran out very quickly when word got round that he was with us.” In other words, being in the presence of Bill Murray causes people to drink.
• Bon Jovi and James Brown at the same time? Wrong. So very, very wrong.

© 2006, Edward Champion. All rights reserved.