Author: Emily Martin

LeVar Burton Opens Up on The Daily Show About Jeopardy and Future Bookish Game Show Plans

On an episode of The Daily Show that aired this past Thursday, September 16, LeVar Burton opened up to Trevor Noah about his time guest hosting on Jeopardy, his campaign to become the host of the show, and his plans for what’s next. Burton confessed that while he once really wanted the Jeopardy host gig, actually being in that position made him change his mind. Burton confessed, “When you set your sights on something, you know, they say be careful of what you wish for, because what I found out is that it wasn’t the thing that I wanted after all. What I wanted was to compete. I mean, I wanted the job, right, but then, when I didn’t get it, it was, like, well, okay, what’s next? And, so, the opportunities that have come my way as a result of not getting that gig, I couldn’t have dreamt it up.” Additionally, Burton hinted that a game show centered around books and literature might be in the works.

Laika to Adapt Colin Meloy Novel Wildwood

Laika president and CEO Travis Knight will be directing a new animated film based on Colin Meloy’s novel Wildwood. Laika, which was founded in 2005, has produced five films to date: Coraline (2009), ParaNorman (2012), The Boxtrolls (2014), Kubo (2016) and Missing Link (2019). This latest effort from Laika will be written by Chris Butler (Missing Link) and produced by Ariane Sutner. Wildwood is currently in production at the studio’s facility outside Portland, Oregon.

Alleged Lock of Emily Dickinson’s Hair is Selling for $450K

Locks of the poet Emily Dickinson’s hair are now being sold on eBay for $450,000. But how was the hair obtained? Where did it come from? How has it been passed through generations to make it onto eBay now? And most importantly, how would the reclusive poet feel about her hair being auctioned off? Some of these questions have answers, but unfortunately Dickinson is no longer around to voice her opinion or give her consent.

The Top Amazon Books Across Time

Amazon has been keeping data on the books it’s sold for the past 26 years. Here are the top books sold on Amazon across time.

Manchester Township Woman Adds Banned Books to Her Free Little Library

Suze Phillips is a 61 year-old woman who doesn’t have any children attending school in the Central York School District, but her neighbors do. And she has a granddaughter who will some day attend school there. So when the school board announced their list of banned books, Phillips decided to take action. The Free Little library that sits in front of Phillip’s house in Manchester Township now has a sign encouraging readers to “share banned books here.” Phillips told CNN, “I decided I needed to not be a coward. I put this where the kids can see it from the bus stop to let the kids know I stand with them.” She has ordered books from the list Central York’s school board decided can’t be used as educational resources, and she plans on adding them to the library. The library has been outside Phillips’ house since 2015, when she created it in memory of her stepfather.

Chuck Palahniuk Serializing New Book on Substack

Chuck Palahniuk, author of Fight Club, has announced a new deal with the fast-growing newsletter platform Substack. His new novel, Greener Pastures, will be published in regular serialized installments on Substack. The first three chapters of the novel will be available for free and will be published on September 27th and October 4th. After that, you can purchase a subscription for $6/month or $40/year.

Here Are the 2022 PEN America Grant Winners

PEN America has officially announced the 2022 literary grant winners. Grant winners were chosen by a panel of esteemed, award-winning writers, editors, translators, and critics. PEN America says that the works chosen “show the potential for lasting literary impact…we look forward to seeing these thought-provoking and challenging examples of literary excellence brought to the world.” For a full list of winners and information about their works in progress, check out the PEN America website.

How to Start Reading Fiction (When You Only Read Nonfiction)

Having trouble enjoying fiction as much as you like reading memoirs, true crime, or other nonfiction? If you want to get into fiction, here are some suggestions for you.

Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Acclaimed Bestseller Braiding Sweetgrass is Being Adapted for Young Readers

Lerner Publishing Group and Milkweed Editions are partnering up to create a young reader’s adaptation of botanist and Citizen Potawatomi Nation member Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants. The young adult version will include illustrations and will be adapted by Monique Gray Smith (Cree), with editing by Shaina Olmanson, the Editorial Director for Young Adult Nonfiction at Lerner Publishing Group. The book is planned for publication in fall 2022.

Hasan Minhaj to Play the Riddler in Batman Unburied

Comedian Hasan Minhaj has joined the cast of the Spotify podcast Batman Unburied as the Riddler. Others joining the cast include Lance Reddick as Batman’s father, Thomas Wayne; Toks Olagundoye as Batman’s mother, Martha Wayne; John Rhys-Davies as Dr. Hunter; and Ashly Burch as Vicki Vale. Batman Unburied is written by David S. Goyer and stars Winston Duke as Bruce Wayne/Batman and Jason Isaacs as Alfred. No release date has been announced for the podcast yet.

English Exam Board Doubles Choice of Books by Authors of Color

OCR, one of the UK’s leading examination boards has added several books by authors of color to increase diversity in the curriculum. Now 28% of texts available for study for OCR’s GCSE and A-level courses will be written by authors of color – the majority of them women. One of the novels newly included in the curriculum is Girl, Woman, Other, the 2019 Booker prize-winning novel by Bernadine Evaristo. In a statement about the changes, Evaristo said, “I feel very privileged to know that my work will be taught in schools alongside other books that broaden our understanding of the role of literature in contemporary society, and which explore what it means to be human from multiple, instead of limited, perspectives.”

The 2021 National Book Awards Longlists Have Been Announced

The National Book Foundation has announced the longlists for the 2021 National Book Awards. The awards are divided into five categories: Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Translated Literature, and Young People’s Literature.

LeVar Burton and Aja Naomi King to Narrate Jocelyn Nicole Johnson’s My Monticello

LeVar Burton and Aja Naomi King will be two of the narrators bringing Jocelyn Nicole Johnson’s words to life in the audiobook version of My Monticello. The two actors are among a slate of several narrators who will lend their voice to the audiobook. Others include Ngozi Anyanwu, January LaVoy, Tomiwa Edun, and Landon Woodson. My Monticello will available in bookstores and on Audible on October 5, 2021.

Hillary Clinton and Chelsea Clinton to Adapt Maisie Dobbs Series

Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chelsea Clinton’s HiddenLight Productions has acquired the film and TV rights to the Maisie Dobbs series—a series of 16 novels that has sold millions of copies worldwide. This marks the first fiction option HiddenLight Productions has acquired. Hillary Clinton announced the news at a Cambridge online event. “One of our favorite books that Chelsea and I have shared over many years is a book about a character called Maisie Dobbs, which is a series about a WWI field nurse who turns into a detective, and we just optioned it,” she said. “It’s an international bestseller by Jacqueline Winspear, and we love the character. It goes from WWI to the Spanish Civil War to WWII. She comes of age in a time of great social upheaval.” No further details about the Clintons’ adaptation plans are known just yet.

Cathy Park Hong Makes TIME’s List of the World’s Most Influential People

Cathy Park Hong, author of Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning, has made TIME magazine’s list of the the World’s 100 Most Influential People of 2021. In a piece for TIME about Cathy Park Hong, comedian, writer, and actor Ali Wong wrote, “I annotated the hell out of Minor Feelings—it’s the kind of book you want to dog-ear and underline. Reading it was such a crazy feeling: I felt so seen that I couldn’t believe that this book existed.”

Instead of School Board, Leander Police Investigate Book Challenge

Instead of requesting the school board review a title taught in school, one Leander parent went directly to the police. Now the police are investigating.

Mahershala Ali to Star with Julia Roberts in Leave the World Behind

Oscar winner Mahershala Ali is joining Julia Roberts to star in the upcoming Netflix thriller based on the Rumaan Alam novel Leave the World Behind. Sam Esmail, the creator of Mr. Robot, is on board to direct. Last year, when the project was first announced, Denzel Washington was rumored to be taking on the role opposite Julia Roberts. Now, it has been officially announced that the role has gone to Ali. A production start date has yet to be announced.

Amanda Gorman Says Hamilton Helped Her Overcome Her Speech Impediment

Amanda Gorman read her poem “The Hill We Climb” on live television at Joe Biden’s presidential inauguration, so it might be difficult to believe she once had a vocal hurdle to overcome. But in an exclusive clip of Amanda Gorman: Brave Enough With Robin Roberts — A Special Edition of 20/20, Gorman opened up about her speech impediment and how the musical Hamilton helped her overcome it. The poet revealed that she used to have trouble pronouncing her “r” sounds, and there was one specific song from Hamilton that helped her practice her R’s: “Aaron Burr, Sir.” Gorman said, “I would listen to the track of ‘Aaron Burr, Sir,’ and try to do it over and over and over again, and I told myself, ‘If you can do this song, you can speak this sound wherever.'” The entire interview airs Wednesday, Sept. 15 at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.

Here’s the 2021 NBA Longlist for Young People’s Literature

The National Book Foundation has revealed their longlist for the 2021 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature. This year’s longlist features ten titles chosen from 344 submissions. The list includes two authors who have been previously recognized by the National Book Awards. Kekla Magoon was longlisted in 2015, and Anna-Marie McLemore was longlisted in 2016. The five finalists will be announced on October 5, and the winner will be announced during an in-person awards ceremony at Cipriani Wall Street in New York on November 17.

The Best Modern Shakespeare Retellings

Shakespeare maybe be hundreds of years old, but the Bard isn’t going anywhere any time soon. Here are 12 of the best modern Shakespeare retellings, adapted from 12 of his most famous plays.

Here’s A First Look At the Upcoming Netflix Horror Film There’s Someone Inside Your House

Netflix is releasing its adaptation of Stephanie Perkin’s YA horror novel There’s Someone Inside Your House on October 6, and you can check out the trailer, the movie poster, and images from the film here. This new slasher film is written by Henry Gayden (Shazam!) and directed by Patrick Brice (Creep). The cast includes Théodore Pellerin, Asjha Cooper, Dale Whibley, Jesse LaTourette, Diego Josef, and Sydney Park. And while the film has yet to be released, director Patrick Brice has already revealed that there are talks of a sequel. “Henry [Gayden] and I are cooking up sequel ideas as we speak,” Brice told Entertainment Weekly. “I think we landed on one that expands on the characters and the themes of the universe and also weaves in some contemporary issues. We’re definitely talking about it. Fingers crossed, enough people watch this. But let Netflix know that we’re ready to have that conversation.”

Michael B. Jordan to Adapt Victories Greater Than Death by Charlie Jane Anders

Michael B. Jordan’s production company Outlier Society is working with Amazon Studios to develop Charlie Jane Anders’ sci-fi novel Victories Greater Than Death into a television series. The novel follows the story of teenager Tina Mains, a seemingly normal high school girl who’s hiding a really big secret: she’s actually a clone from an alien world who carries a beacon that will one day call her back home. Jordan and Elizabeth Raposo from Outlier Society will executive produce the project alongside Charlie Jane Anders, Dan Halstead, and Nate Miller. There have been no announcements yet about who will write the adaptation.

Central York Board Refuses to Lift Book Ban After Series of Protests

On Monday night, the Central York School Board announced that they would maintain their stance on a banned resources list published in August. The announcement follows a full week of student and community protests about the banned list, which included a wide range of materials—from Lalya F. Saad’s Me and White Supremacy to an African-themed cookbook. In response to the list, a Central York High School student group, Panther Anti-Racist Union (PARU), organized protests from last Tuesday til this morning. At a protest before the board meeting, PARU Vice President Christina Ellis said, “There is no reason that I Am Rosa Parks or a pro-diversity coloring book should be on the chopping block.” Other speakers at the protest included the president of the York NAACP, Richard Craighead; commissioner for the City of York Human Relations Commission Rabiya Kahn; diversity educator for York Central Middle School Delma Rivera; and PARU faculty adviser Ben Hodge.

2021 Booker Prize Shortlist Announced

Chosen from 158 novels, here are the 2021 Booker Prize shortlist titles. The books on this list feature six novels that span the globe, from South Africa to Sri Lanka to Cardiff and the United States. 

Jhumpa Lahiri’s Book on Translation Coming in Spring

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jhumpa Lahiri has a new book coming out. Princeton University Press announced earlier today Lahiri’s Translating Myself and Others will be out this spring and will highlight her work as a translator. Lahiri’s new book will feature essays about her experiences translating, the meaning of translation, what it’s like to translate your own writing, and more. “To be a writer-translator is to value both being and becoming,” Lahiri writes in her book. “What one writes in any given language typically remains as is, but translation enables it to become otherwise. Thanks to translation — the act of one text becoming another — the conversation I have been seeking to have with literature for much of my life now feels more complete, more harmonious, and far richer with possibilities.”

Senator Elizabeth Warren Accuses Amazon of Spreading Misinformation About Vaccines

Senator Elizabeth Warren has accused Amazon of spreading misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines after the online retail company promoted a book written by an author the New York Times called “the most influential spreader of coronavirus misinformation online.” Warren has written to Amazon’s chief executive Andy Jassy to enumerate her concerns about Amazon’s search algorithms and how they help spread misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines and cures. Warren says she finds it “deeply troubling” that Amazon is “potentially leading countless Americans to risk their health and the health of their neighbors based on misleading and inaccurate information that they discover on Amazon’s website.”

Warren is calling upon Amazon to immediately review its algorithms, report on how often consumers are lead to misinformation, and come up with a plan to modify the algorithms so that they no longer do this.

In a statement to NPR, Amazon said, “we are constantly evaluating the books we list to ensure they comply with our content guidelines, and as an additional service to customers, at the top of relevant search results pages we link to the CDC advice on Covid and protection measures.”

Book Influencer Zibby Owens Launches Zibby Books

Author, book influencer, and podcast host Zibby Owens is launching her own press, Zibby Books, with Leigh Newman, the former books editor at Oprah.com, cofounder of the Catapult imprint Black Balloon, and senior editor-at-large at Catapult. Starting in January 2023, Zibby Books plans to publish one book per month, focusing on “diverse literary voices.”

Indigenous Owned Bookstores You Need to Visit

Let’s keep supporting independent bookstores! Here are Indigenous owned bookstores in the US and Canada that are totally worth a visit.