He makes our heart sing

We had a very fun night celebrating the publication of Josh Bazell’s Wild Thing. Here he is at The Strand, in conversation with Malcolm Jones of Newsweek/The Daily Beast, where, among other things, he discussed his childhood love of 75-cent paperbacks, why he found a serial killer’s x-ray a hopeful sign for humanity, and the […]

What it is all about: a great writer’s great new novel

It’s publication day for George Pelecanos’s newest thriller, WHAT IT WAS, and we couldn’t be more excited. You can read Janet Maslin’s terrific review here, and you can also read (if you subscribe) this Wall Street Journal article about the novel’s unconventional three formats and prices. Or you can check out George himself, via our […]

When mothers and daughters leave each other

I try not to be too bossy, but I’m going to have to insist that you read this beautiful and moving excerpt from Caitlin Flanagan’s GIRL LAND, which ran in yesterday’s New York Times Magazine. As mothers have been saying since time began: You’ll thank me later.

Resolutions, Revisited

I really went out on a limb with my 2011 resolutions. Let’s see how I did: 1. To do more of the things I don’t do enough.  Three times a week, in the name of cardio fitness, I now do something that involves loud, often terrible music, and is not karaoke. 2. To do less […]

A Rich start to the New Year…pun intended!

We can’t imagine a better way to start the week, let alone a whole year, than a Shouts and Murmurs column by Simon Rich in the New Yorker. Especially when we’ve got Simon’s novel, What in God’s Name, coming in August.  But that’s not all! This week’s New Yorker piece is part of a collection […]

Happy news, with a Twitter twist

Our new editor Laura Tisdel is so new – “How new is she?” Thank you, folks – her business cards still haven’t arrived. But that didn’t stop her from leaping into action last week, and buying a terrific debut novel at auction. We are all thrilled that Laura’s first acquisition brings Gabriel Roth to our […]

Turn, turn, turn

Publishing has its seasons, marked by catalogs and sales conferences and holiday tie-ins, and less predictably by the coming and going of the people behind the scenes.  Today, when the calendar and thermometer leave no doubt that we are in the dead middle of summer, I feel a tinge of autumnal melancholy as I say […]

Headlines We Love

And essays we love more—Google Alerted us to this fun essay by Michelle Rafferty on the Oxford University Press blog: “Read Bossypants Like a Fancypants.” “We’re going to trick our book clubs into thinking we’re literary geniuses,” she proposes, by applying key elements of modern literary criticism—Irony, Imagery, Allusion, Allegory, and, of course, Sexual Politics—to […]

Ya Gotta Believe

Apparently this is a saying most associated with the Mets (thanks, Google!), but to me it’s both the punchline to an old Doonesbury comic strip and the unofficial rallying cry of nearly everyone who works in publishing. At a writers’ conference this weekend I was repeatedly asked by aspiring writers if it’s true that first […]

2011, Resolved:

To do more of the things I don’t do enough. To do less of the things I do too often. To master the tripod headstand. I’ll report back in December!