paper trail

Simon & Schuster editors start new imprint; Lindsey Hilsum on the current state of war reporting

Lindsey Hilsum

The Guardian talks to Lindsey Hilsum about war reporting, diaries, and In Extremis, her new biography of foreign correspondent Marie Colvin. “I think Marie’s killing . . . marked a watershed when it became unacceptably dangerous for many editors to send reporters into those situations,” Hilsum said of Colvin’s death in 2012. “It seems to me that with this nexus of corrupt governments and organised crime that investigative journalists are under more threat now than at any time in my career.”

Simon & Schuster editors Jofie Ferrari-Adler and Ben Loehnen are forming a new imprint at the company. Avid Reader Press will begin publishing its own books late next year.

Ballantine Books has bought the rights to Into the Dark, the first book to “chronicle last summer’s rescue of the Wild Boars soccer team from a flooded Thai cave in the actual words of everyone directly involved,” Deadline reports.

Faber will publish a new short story by Sylvia Plath early next year.

Anne Lamott talks to the New York Times about cat allergies, spirituality, and what topics she considers “universal.” “I don’t write stuff I don’t think is universal,” Lamott said. “If I write about my butt or my body or my, you know, challenges with self esteem or my raging ego, I know it’s universal. I mean, some people go, Really? That’s sick. You should get help instead of writing about it.”

Tonight at the Brooklyn Public Library, Kiese Laymon presents his new book, Heavy: An American Memoir.