In the world of literature, writers shouldn’t have to pay editors or agents to read their work, and that seems to be behind the failure of the $100,000 Sobol award, as reported by the AP:
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Join the conspiracy
Are you a book worm? A word-aholic? A devourer of novels? A poetry peruser? Are you big on biographies? Knowledgable about nonfiction? Passionate about prosody? Or even an academician on a mission? In short, are you a reader?
If so, then you’ve found the right place: The Times Union Books Blog: A conspiracy of smart people.
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Why I quit reading “Against the Day”
By now all the initial hoopla surrounding Thomas Pynchon’s “Against the Day” has died down, with the reviews coming in mostly mixed. So I feel I can finally confess that even though I was among those to receive an advanced readers copy, complete with my name and the name of the Times Union imprinted in thick magic marker, I gave up around Page 199.Giving up is not something that gives me pride, but when I realized that I didn’t know who I was reading about or, really, what was going on, and was searching my house for a really big piece of paper to map out the family trees of the book’s characters, I realized that the book had escaped me.
I’ve enjoyed reading Pynchon before, including Gravity’s Rainbow, The Crying of Lot 49 and, especially, Mason and Dixon, but I don’t consider myself a huge fan of his work. I even gave up on Vineland.
Basically, the book wasn’t leading me anywhere — just showing me some rather clever and mildly humorous scenes, and connecting them with long expositions that spanned who knows how much time (I’m sure someone out there is busily trying to figure that out).
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Albany Project reading “Three Men in a Room”
An outfit calling itself The Albany Project, which seeks to return New York State Government to its rightful owners – the people, is starting an online book club, with its first book being Three Men in a Room: The Inside Story of Power and Betrayal in an American Statehouse by Seymour P. Lachman (w/ Robert Polner).
Go here for more info: http://www.thealbanyproject.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=104
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A new release from Christopher Ringwald
Former Times Union reporter, author and visiting scholar at The Sage Colleges Christopher Ringwald has a new book, “A Day Apart: How Jews, Christians, and Muslims Find Faith, Freedom, and Joy on the Sabbath,” which is now available from Oxford University Press.The book received a STARRED review in the January issue of Booklist, which called it “a valuable contribution to interfaith studies.”
In conjunction with the book, Ringwald also will be holding various public events:
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That’s interesting
The tireless book reviewer and editor Bob Hoover at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette tries to make the word “interesting” interesting again with this short list of books:
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Where’s ’shaggy dog’ come from?
The Guardian in London says the Oxford English Dictionary is looking for help. They’ve got about 40 words they don’t know the origin to, and are opening it up to the public. The article, of course, is written in England for Brits, but that doesn’t mean Americans can’t get involved. Click here for more info about the OED word hunt.
Here’s what the guardian says:
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Latest issue of Albany Poets art/lit mag now available
Here’s some news from the Albany Poets blog:
The sixth issue of Albany Poets’ art/lit magazine, Other, is now available. We are now in the process of getting them out to coffee shops, bookstores, and any other location that is willing to carry it. We have posted all of the poetry on the Other website.
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A blog worth a look
This blog is based in faraway Houston, Texas, but it is written by Patrick Kurp, a former Times Union reporter:
http://evidenceanecdotal.blogspot.com/
He bills his blog as “A blog about the intersection of books and life. ”
Take a look.
