2022 Pen America Finalists Announced

Publisher’s Weekly has a complete rundown of the 65 authors and translators competing in 11 awards for 2022. The winners will be announced on Monday, February 28.

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Artistic Photos Capture Locations That Inspired Southern Fiction

The New Yorker’s website recently published a book review of Tema Stauffer’s photography collection Southern Fictions. Stauffer explores some of the places that influenced and shaped the work of William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, and more. The article also shares one of the more memorable – if horrible – Faulkner legends. Suffice it to say that…

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Subscribe to the Great Reads Newsletter

I write a monthly newsletter about the books I’m reading. Please check it out if you like books. During the pandemic, like everyone else, I took up baking. I’ve never been good at it – I follow recipes as inspiration and not guides and, as I discovered, baking is a science. So for months, I…

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Slushpile Reborn

My friend Scott McKenzie and I started Slushpile, a site about books, in 2005. Over the years we’ve sort of pulled back from updating and, as a result, the site has gone stale. I think it’s time bring it back. The site is about reading. We’re readers and writers and we love to review books…

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The Dirt: Filthy

Let me start with two things: 1) I’m glad I don’t have to code this post, because the amount of ö and ü I’d have to type in this band’s name would drive me to an insane life of unabashed hedonism, and 2) I wish I had to code this post. But seriously folks, although…

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