Yesterday on Facebook, Roxane Gay announced that she has been hired to write an advice column for the New York Times.
Bestselling author James Patterson donated $1.75 million to public-school teachers to help improve their classroom libraries.
The Portland, Oregon, book festival Wordstock has released the lineup of this year’s event, which will take place on November 11. Author who will participate in the festival include Mac Barnett, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Carson Ellis, Jeffrey Eugenides, Adam Gopnik, David Grann, Jenny Han, Daniel Handler, Claire Messud, Tom Perrotta, Danez Smith, Lidia Yuknavitch, and many more.
In response to the announcement of Graydon Carter’s retirement, The Awl promptly came up with a list of replacements, naming “10 women who should edit Vanity Fair.”
Novelist and poet Ben Lerner has written an eloquent and moving tribute to John Ashbery: “The obituaries seem intent on noting that he ‘aroused controversy,’ that he has his detractors. I can’t even muster feelings of partisanship about his poetry; I just feel pity for those who haven’t, for whatever reason, been able to accept the gift of his work.”
John Steinbeck’s stepdaughter has been awarded more than $13 million in a lawsuit arguing that other family members had prevented film adaptations of the author’s work.