HarperCollins is publishing Zora Neale Hurston’s book about the last survivor of the slave trade. Barracoon is comprised of Hurston’s 1931 interviews with Cudjo Lewis, a former slave who was brought to the US in 1860 on one of the last recorded slave ships, and will be released next May.
Literary Hub has released their list of their favorite books of the year.
This weekend, Cornel West published an article renewing his critique of Ta-Nehisi Coates, calling Coates “the neoliberal face of the black freedom struggle.” The article quickly spurred commentary and criticism on Twitter, with the New Yorker’s Jelani Cobb saying he was “frankly embarrassed by @CornelWest’s threadbare commentary,” and white supremacist Richard Spencer saying of West, “He’s not wrong.” When all was said and done, Coates decided to quit Twitter, leaving his one-million-plus followers with this message: “Peace, y’all. i didn’t get in it for this.”
Move over, People. AARP: The Magazine has become America’s most-read print magazine, with 38.3 million readers.
Verso is giving away a free e-book of highlights from their 2017 catalog, including excerpts from China Miéville’s October: The Story of the Russian Revolution, Alex Vitale’s The End of Policing, and David Neiwert’s Alt-America: The Rise of the Radical Right in the Age of Trump.
Edward St. Aubyn talks to The Guardian books podcast about his new novel, an update of King Lear that tells the story of a powerful patriarch at the head of a global media company.