“From the very first sentence, we still find the familiar wicked slant of Cooper’s perennial knack for penetrative dialogue (in more than one sense, and  with a degree of simultaneous awe and terror that I believe is unmatched in fiction), though the trajectory of it has been bent again.” Blake Butler reviews Dennis Cooper’s new novel The Marbled Swarm. (We’ll be hosting Cooper in conversation with Brandon Stosuy in two weeks.)

• At Tin House’s blog: the first installment of Rob Spillman’s culture diary, with appearances from Arctic Monkeys, Terese Svoboda, Boris, Justin Vivien Bond, Zadie Smith, and more.

• Alexander Chee will be editing an electronic imprint for the Asian American Writers Workshop called “Hot Asian Singles.”

• At the LA Review of Books, Marjorie Perloff on John Cage.

• Joyland South is a go; at Joyland’s blog, Brian Joseph Davis chats with guest editor Jim Hanas.

• Via WORD, Edan Lepucki on the newly-opened Athens, Georgia bookstore Avid Bookshop.

• Robert A. Caro’s fourth biography of Lyndon Johnson drops next May.  If this one covers the Beejer’s long-haired era circa ’72, we’re sold.

• The Brooklyn Historical Society finds that Boerum Hill was built upon a Native American burial ground (at Fourth Ave and Smith!), says The Measure.