Smatterings

If there are two books making the review rounds in a big way this week, they are CHRISTINE FALLS by Benjamin Black aka John Banville, and THE POST-BIRTHDAY WORLD by Lionel Shriver – as they should, for both are fantastic in different ways and offer much food for thought. The Boston Globe’s Chuck Leddy reviews the former while Heller McAlpin at the LA Times reviews the latter.

Patrick Anderson declares David Corbett’s BLOOD OF PARADISE to be on par with serious contemporary fiction.

At Bloomberg, Charles Taylor reviews the Banville/Black novel as well as new offerings from Cara Black and Richard Hawke.

A new survey reveals what Britons buy…and then don’t read.

Newsweek’s Malcolm Jones talks about boomer lit, large print and other disparate points in the hope of getting some cohesion out of the subject.

Garth Hallberg makes some good points about n+1’s recent essay attacking bloggers, but when the essay in question can’t be bothered to do the bare minimum of research to back up extremely general, overbaked objections, it’s hard to take them seriously on any level.

Duncan McLean, in his first interview in 10 years, tells the Scotsman why he changed directions from author to jewelry firm manager to playwright.

Here’s the Stephen Hunter profile in the Baltimore Sun that’s provoked a fair bit of discussion on the Memory Project.

And finally, just…no.