This week I go into how Perfection is the polar opposite of The Anthropologists, plus my favorite details from Graydon Carter's new memoir... What I read this week Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico, translated by Sophie Hughes It's fitting that Perfection has a glowing blurb from Ayşegül
In Solvej Balle's 7-volume series the interminable day is a rainy one in November. Which immediately made me wonder if Balle is a GNR fan. What I read this week On the Calculation of Volume (Book I) by Solvej Balle, translated by Barbara J. Haveland In my mind
Alas, AI doesn't have feelings but it really deserves to feel embarrassed. Or the people who've built it should. What I read this week Searches: Self-Hood in the Digital Age by Vauhini Vara I love this book for many reasons, but I particularly love it for
Who hears a bunch of songs about working dead end, soul crushing jobs and is like, voila! The world needs a business book about leadership! What I read this week Audition by Katie Kitamura Katie Kitamura is one of my favorite contemporary writers partly because she makes me feel so
What the world absolutely doesn't need right now: a MrBeast/James Patterson collab What I read this week Trauma Plot by Jamie Hood "Why should I make my rape book artful? Why be cowed by this obligation. Shouldn't trauma be a mess?" A work
I spent a lot of Careless People interrogating why I found Sheryl to be so much more evil than Mark. What I read this week Stop Me If You've Heard This One by Kristen Arnett This is the book I have been waiting for Kristen to write. She
Why yes, I will take my victory lap for Chuck Schumer's book tour being postponed. What I read this week The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami There was no way this book wouldn't feel prescient, but the fact that I chose to read it the week
I'm a real sucker for novels about writing novels What I read this week Theory & Practice by Michelle de Kretser A novel about what a novel can do and be? Very much my shit. De Kretser's seventh book is set in Melbourne in the 1980s,
The music issue What I read this week Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist by Liz Pelly We've heard this story before, but it makes my head explode every time: tech bros who don't particularly know very much about
This week I veer into personal essay territory in a book review (sorry!) and I give the finger to Substack. What I read this week A Gorgeous Excitement by Cynthia Weiner I'm embarrassed to tell you exactly how much this novel is my shit. Way back in the
On that one time I saw Donna Tartt wearing a killer pantsuit What I read this week One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad Here is the book on the war in Gaza that I've been waiting for. Omar El Akkad'
Now on Ghost! What I read this week You Didn't Hear This From Me: (Mostly) True Notes on Gossip by Kelsey McKinney Only recently I went to a party to celebrate Kelsey's triumphant run as the host of the podcast Normal Gossip. A friend told me
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A brief goodbye to Substack Please forgive how short this newsletter is today. I’m in the process of transferring my Substack account over to Ghost and if all goes according to plan, you won’t notice much of a change. Paid subscribers won’t have to do anything (except
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A book ban isn't a badge of honor; it's a serious violation of fundamental rights by small-minded people who want to be the arbiters of taste and morality for all.
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I'm so, so sorry but I used the word "gaslighting" in this newsletter and I might do it again.
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Happy new year. Who can say what 2025 has in store for us, but I know for sure there will be good books. Allow me to shout about my friends for a bit?
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Churning out a bunch of shit products in order to make a quick buck is not the answer to any of the book world’s problems.
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My favorite audiobooks of 2024, my least anticipated books of 2025, and more...
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I stand by the fact that end-of-year lists are meaningless, and yet. We live in a specific media landscape. So...
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Yesterday, within the space of minutes, I saw two pieces of info on Bluesky that made me, once again, despair for the state of media — and book coverage, specifically.
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The scale and scope of the right wing book bans are absolutely not the same as the relatively few cases of book bans from the left. Let’s stop with false equivalencies!
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How can publishers possibly protect authors, librarians, booksellers, and teachers from hate, from vilification, from criminalization, while simultaneously publishing the architects of such plans?
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I have no idea what will happen today or tomorrow or next week, but I know that 2025 will have good books (including mine!), and that's not nothing.