The Los Angeles Review of Books launched a test website yesterday, with an essay, “The Death of the Book,” by Ben Ehrenreich, an impressive list of contributing editors, and an intriguing list of forthcoming articles, including essays by Jonathan Lethem (on Norman Mailer), novelist Grace Krilanovich (on Californian suburban youth) and work by many other literary stars from around the world. The Review was founded by editor and University of California professor Tom Lutz, and will have a full website online by the end of the year, followed by a quarterly print edition, and a book publishing series. Lutz describes the Review as being “Like Los Angeles itself . . . a mashup of elite and popular cultures, old and new, sunshine and noir, unafraid to embrace the full range of reading.”
Francesca “Frannie” Stabile has become the Village Voice’s new web editor, replacing Zach Baron, who has moved to The Daily.
The long-form journalism website Byliner has a lengthy report by Jon Krakauer on the inaccuracies in activist Greg Mortenson’s increasingly less heartwarming book Three Cups of Tea, whose publisher, Viking, has announced that it will “carefully review the materials with the author.” Mortenson explains to Outside magazine that the true story is "really complicated" and his co-author and publisher talked him into simplifying and compressing multiple trips and events into a smooth story. Mortensen now admits that he “should have taken off several months and really focused on the book. But I was trying to raise a family, be gone most of the year, and work 16- to 20-hour days without stopping.”
From the New Yorker, an excerpt from the 2011 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan, and a profile of the author from The Millions.
