Afternoon Bites: NY Tyrant, the LA scene, “11/22/63,” and more

Errol Morris has some good things to say about Stephen King’s 11/22/63 in this weekend’s New York Times Book Review, and coins the phrase “the weird quotidian” in the process. (Morris also chatted with King for the paper’s ArtsBeat blog.) Amelia Gray, recently arrived in the city in question, on Los Angeles’s literary scene. At HTML Giant, news of the next issue of New York Tyrant. Alexander Chee on David Mazzuchelli’s Asterios Polyp. Warren Ellis’s “The Near Future of Pop” […]

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Weekend Bites: Nick Cave to MTV, Nonrequired Reading, Wesley Stace, Soros Responds to Glenn Beck and More

Remember that time that Nick Cave told MTV that he didn’t want their stinking award? NY Tyrant takes the Best American Nonrequired Reading books to task at Vice. Wesley Stace talks to the New York Times. The cult of the sentence. George Soros finally responded to Glenn Beck’s (anti-Semitic) frequent attacks. Home cooking with Amy Sedaris. James Franco asks Judd Apatow how to host the Oscars. William F. Buckley on pot. NY Times Sunday Book Review Highlights Joyce Carol Oates’s […]

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Weekend Bites: No Fatalities Reported at Lit Death Match, Favorites of 2010, Crazy Stuff Said at Bookstores and More

At The New York Times: Nobody died at the Literary Death Match, but we love the picture of Clay McLeod Chapman (above) doing his best boogeyman impression. At The Millions: Joanna Smith Rakoff and David Gutowski (Largehearted Boy) talk about stuff they’ve both read in 2010. At The Huffington Post: Another wacky list at HuffPo.  This one is 9 crazy things said in bookstores. At Vice: NY Tyrant interviews Paula Bomer, author of Baby & Other Stories. At Impose: Josh […]

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Weekend Bites: A Nobel Laureates Commute, Blake Butler & NY Tyrant on Franzen, Márquez Used and More

At The New York Times:  Peruvian Nobel laureate, Mario Vargas Llosa, discusses teaching Borges at an Ivy, investing his money, and the killer commute from Jersey to Manhattan: ““It’s very nice. But not if you take the train at 5 or 6 o’clock. It can be a Kafkaesque commute.” At Vice:  Blake Butler and NY Tyrant take HTML GIANT’S “Mean Week” on the road, and trash Jonathan Franzen over at Vice. Hilarity ensues. At Boing Boing: Star Trak characters reading […]

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Considering the Advice From NY Tyrant/Blake Butler/Ken Baumann

I just finished reading “The NY Tyrant Guide to not Being A Horrible Writer in the Year 2010” over at Vice.  Aside from the photo of my buddy Nick Gazin taking a tinkle, and the dozens of anonymous comments, here were the other things about this list that I especially liked. 1.  So I could be pulling this out of my ass, but I am going to guess the advice that “you are neither David Lynch nor Captain Beefheart. You […]

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