Literary Losses Marion Chesney Gibbons, who wrote the Hamish Macbeth and Agatha Raisin cozy mystery series under the name M. C. Beaton and historical romances and mysteries as Marion Chesney, died on Dec. 30, 2019, at the age of 83. Chesney was born in Glasgow in 1936. She married Harry… Read more »
Literary Losses Johanna Lindsey, the bestselling romance novelist whose career spanned more than four decades and over 50 books, died Oct. 27, 2019, of complications of lung cancer. According to the New York Times, her family was “too devastated” to announcer her death publicly until Monday (Dec. 23.) Lindsey wrote… Read more »
Bookish News Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Year for 2019 is singular “they.” (Merriam-Webster) Worth Reading/Viewing ‘I thought you’d like to read this’: the etiquette of gifting books (Elle Hunt, The Guardian) Romance Is a Billion-Dollar Literary Industry. So Why Is It Still So Overlooked? (Samantha Leach, Glamour) Space aging: where… Read more »
Bookish News ‘We Wanted Our Patrons Back’ — Public Libraries Scrap Late Fines To Alleviate Inequity (NPR) Worth Reading/Viewing Sister act: how Little Women has come of age on the big screen (Aida Edemariam, The Guardian) TV and Movie News Beverly Jenkins Is Trailblazing Her Way onto Television (Book Riot)… Read more »
It’s been a while since the last News & Notes, so I have more than usual for you today! Bookish News Translation Pays Off for Amazon, whose Amazon Crossing imprint has become “the most prolific publisher of translated literature in the U.S.” (Publishers Weekly) Sandler, Krasznahorkai, Sze, Broom, Choi Win… Read more »
Worth Reading/Viewing The Evolution of the English Village Mystery, After the Golden Age (Deborah Crombie, CrimeReads) “Libraries are Not the Enemy:” A Guest Post from Wendy the SuperLibrarian on the Macmillan eBook Embargo (Smart Bitches, Trashy Books blog) The hunt for Shakespeare’s library: ‘I couldn’t stop looking if I wanted… Read more »
Bookish News Lost chapter of world’s first novel [The Tale of Genji] found in Japanese storeroom (The Guardian) The Tiptree Award has been renamed the Otherwise Award after controversy over naming the award for James Tiptree Jr./Alice Shelton. Prior winners of the Tiptree Award may use either appellation. (Locus Magazine)… Read more »
Bookish News Nobel Prizes In Literature Go To Olga Tokarczuk And Peter Handke (NPR). The Guardian’s Alison Flood goes into more detail, particularly regarding the controversial choice of Peter Handke. Margaret Atwood and Bernardine Evaristo share Booker prize 2019. (The Guardian) The decision to break the rules and choose two… Read more »
Bookish News In New Filing, Audible Lawyers Insist ‘Captions’ Copyright Case Should Be Tossed (Publishers Weekly) $625,000 [MacArthur] ‘genius grants’ go to Ocean Vuong and six other writers (The Guardian) The others are Emily Wilson, Linda Barry, Jeffrey Miller, Saidiya Hartman, Kelly Lytle Hernandez, and Valeria Luiselli. Worth Reading/Viewing Why… Read more »
Bookish News Amazon Makes ‘Climate Pledge’ As Workers Plan Walkout (NPR; see also Amazon’s press release) 2019 National Book Award Longlists Announced (Publishers Weekly) Tonga to open first public library system with thousands of books donated from NZ (RNZ) Worth Reading/Viewing Margaret Atwood: ‘For a long time we were moving… Read more »
