But Daddy I Love Him is a standout anthem that explores a doomed love affair
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This originally appeared in our Today in Books daily newsletter, where each day we round up the most interesting stories, news, essays, and other goings on in the world of books and reading. Sign up here if you want to get it.
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The Most Beautiful Libraries in the World
In my time on the bookish internet, I have seen a beautiful library or two. And most of the libraries in this round-up have come across my IG/FB/Twitter at some time or another, but a couple are new to me. I lean toward liking modern libraries better (I know I am in the minority on this one) for actual use, rather than for photographing. Among these, the Beitou Public Library in Taiwan seems to be the best of both worlds: a new modern, eco-friendly building that leans on historical style.
2024 Young Lions Fiction Award Finalists
I was pleasantly surprised to see that I had read four of the five finalists for this year’s Young Lions Award for Fiction. There are many years where I am lucky to have read one. I can complete the list with relish by reading Eskor David Johnson’s Pay As You Go. Monica Brashears’s House of Cotton was one of the more striking debut novels I have read in awhile, but all of these finalists are terribly exciting. And young.
Between the Book Club and BookTok
Terrific story about what happens when a little, out-of-the-way bookstore suddenly finds itself the object of online attention. A quiet, intentionally digital-free silent reading hour turned into a mini-phenomenon when a TikToker noted Page Break’s little event as one of the best free things to do in Montreal. And now it is overrun to the point of needing a reservation system. Not sure that there is a moral here so much as a microcosm of online fame: no one has exactly the amount they want, really.
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In Case You Missed Yesterday’s Most Popular Book Deals
Previous Daily Deals
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Yan Lianke at the Salon du Livre, 2010. Photograph by Georges Seguin, via Wikimedia Commons. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 DEED.
When I talk to non-Chinese readers like yourselves, I often find that you are interested in hearing about what distinguishes me as an author but also what distinguishes my country—and particularly details that go beyond what you see on the television, read about in newspapers, and hear about from tourists.
I know that China’s international reputation is like that of a young upstart from the countryside who has money but lacks culture, education, and knowledge. Of course, in addition to money, this young upstart also has things like despotism and injustice, while lacking democracy and freedom. The result is like a wild man who is loaded with gold bullion but wears shabby clothing, behaves rudely, stinks of bad breath, and never plays by the rules. If an author must write under the oversight of this sort of individual, how should that author evaluate, discuss, and describe him?
To address this question, we will first consider the distinctive conditions faced by contemporary Chinese authors.
I. Light and Shadows Beneath a Half-Open and Half-Closed Window
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Welcome to Read this Book, a newsletter where I recommend one book that needs to jump onto your TBR pile! Sometimes these books are brand new releases that I don’t want you to miss, while others are some of my backlist favorites. This week, let’s talk about a stellar sophomore novel from Lisa Ko.
Memory Piece by Lisa KoWhen I first read Lisa Ko’s debut novel The Leavers, I felt completely consumed by the story of a young Chinese American man who had been adopted by white parents. Ko possesses this ability to flesh out her characters with such care and attention to detail. So the moment I heard that her second novel, Memory Piece, was coming out, I knew I had to get my hands on a copy. It’s the 1980s, and three friends — Giselle Chin, Jackie Ong, and Ellen Ng — come of age determined to make their mark on the world. Giselle Chin is a performance artist, and even locked herself in a mall for an entire year, chronicling her experience for art’s sake. Jackie Ong is a programmer who creates her own social media space in her spare time. Ellen Ng is an activist, working to create a communal space for marginalized folks in need of a home. The three women make their own ways in the world, each moving in and out of each other’s lives, for better or worse. The novel moves forward in time from the 1980s to the 2040s, showing the changes in the friends’ lives through the decades. I particularly loved how all three friends are so different, each with their particular quirks and interests. They fight, make up, and fight again, creating a unique friend group that holds up through the tests of time. Audie award-winning narrator Eunice Wong performs the audiobook beautifully. Each viewpoint character is distinct, each with her own narrative voice. I felt consumed by their story and found excuses to keep listening until the very end. Memory Piece is a must-read for anyone who loves women’s coming-of-age stories or complex, decades-long female friendships. |
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A series of mishaps and misfires have dogged the festival in 2024
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Earlier this year, several users began to note that the “News” tab on Google was disappearing. It wasn’t one time here or there. It was noticeable enough that several outlets reported on the issue. Indeed, Google’s experiment in disappearing the “news” feature wasn’t a bug. It was a goal.
Filtering to news results is still available on Google for me, but this week, I noticed something I never had appear before. In researching “young adult novel” news for the “What’s Up in YA?” newsletter, refining my search to a specific date range — April 11 through April 15, 2024 — and to the news tab, this is what popped up:
Since when, Google, does refining a search mean that I would like loads of results that do not include the news I’m looking for? Apparently, to Google, this is the future of search.
To say the results were garbage would be a deep understatement. I could not find any news because my results looked like this:
There are pages of results from foreign, questionable websites that are nothing but “deals” on book titles. Repeating the search a day later, the results looked similar, with pages of links to individual Barnes & Noble stores and their upcoming events. None of this is news, and indeed, none of this even shows up when you do a general Google search — the news tab specifically has become completely garbagified (or, as Cory Doctorow would note, enshittified).
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Welcome to the wonderful world of horror poetry! What’s horror poetry, you ask? Well, it’s more or less what it says on the tin. It’s poems that incorporate elements of horror into them, whether that be a terrifying monster, a psychological scare, or a chilling setting, much in the same way a horror movie or horror novel might. These poems come in all different forms and lengths too, from a Shakespearean sonnet to a pages-long free-verse to anything in between. The Bram Stoker Awards, run by the Horror Awards Association, even have a category for superior achievement in poetry!
Some classic examples include Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market” and Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven,” which I’m sure many of us had to read in English class at one level or another. A more recent example is “To Live in the Zombie Apocalypse” by Burlee Vang, a poem about survival and adaptation to a new world. There are many more examples out there for anyone who might like to explore this fun and frightening intersection of horror and poetry.
For anyone wanting to check out a collection or two in this realm, check out these eight horror poetry collections to get you started!
Underworld Lit by Srikanth ReddyA novella-length prose poem, Underworld Lit delves into academia, mythology, and mortality through the lens of a college professor in the midst of a mid-life crisis. It’s both funny and scary as it plays with form, including quizzes throughout the poetry. This story will take you from normal life to the classroom to various underworlds and their horrors! |
Into the Forest and All the Way Through by Cynthia PelayoThis Bram Stoker award-nominated and highly emotional collection is full of true crime poems about different missing and murdered women. While this topic might not be everyone’s cup of tea, it’s impactful as the author pays tribute to the women at the heart of real crime. |
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