| Dear book clubbers, I hope you had a good time chatting about The Death of Vivek Oji with Akwaeki Emezi yesterday (including the bonus reveal that I have been mispronouncing the title this entire time). If you couldn't make it, or you just want to relive the magic, we'll have a video of the event available on the site sometime next week. New business! We'll be spending May reading Gold Diggers by Sanjena Sathian. It's a propulsive, immersive debut novel that deals with over-achieving high schoolers, ambition, alchemy, and a big question: "What does it mean to be both Indian and, like, American?" Despite how flippant her characters may be about that question, Sathian always approaches it with her eyes open. The result is a tender, affectionate novel that manages to be a love story and a cautionary tale and a heist story all in one. We'll have tons to talk about. | | | | | Friday, May 14: Discussion post on Gold Diggers published to Vox.com Wednesday, May 19: Virtual live event with author Sanjena Sathian. We'll send you an RSVP link as soon as it's available. Watch this space! | | | THE LATEST IN BOOKS AT VOX | | | The big story in book publishing over the past couple of weeks has been the rape allegations against Blake Bailey, author of a major new Philip Roth biography. It is a very sad, very complicated story, and I have an explainer of the whole thing here. | | | NOTABLE BOOKS COVERAGE AROUND THE WEB | | | Here's some of the best writing about books and related subjects published across the internet in the past two weeks. - Former members of the Trump administration are starting to land book deals. At the New Republic, Alex Shephard argues that the ensuing controversies show that publishing has lost track of its values.
- Becca Rothfeld has a much-discussed essay in Liberties Journal on what she's describing as "Sanctimony Literature." For me, this one is a particularly maddening combination of perceptive analysis and a refusal to ever imagine that anyone could feel sincere emotion, but I think if you approach it in good faith it is the kind of essay that is fun to fight with in your head.
- At the Common, Vox Book Club author Susan Choi rereads Lolita, tracking the way "the ghost of impervious, gum-chewing Lolita occluded that of even ghostlier—almost invisible—Dolores defiled."
- It strikes me as likely that if you are the kind of person who subscribes to a book club, you are probably the kind of person who has fond feelings for the Oxford English Dictionary (guilty). At LitHub, Pip Williams explains how she developed a feminist history of the OED.
- Jhumpa Lahiri wrote her last novel in Italian. Now, she's translating it back into English. At Words Without Borders, she explains how she approached the project.
Happy reading! Constance | | | |
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