I hear online orders are ticking up! Keep it going!!

What is it, what nameless, inscrutable, unearthly thing is it

Last night was the 90th anniversary ceremony of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards. I can’t think of a more relevant time to reflect on books that help us understand race and human diversity. Grateful to the jury led by the brilliant Natasha Tretheway and to the Cleveland Foundation.

today is the last day to apply to be a 2026 Periplus Fellow! application closes at 11:59pm EST

this exists it is called thinking

Also this week in the @bostonglobe.com books section, we mentioned the many local authors who were honored with an American Book Award. Still a very bookish town! www.bostonglobe.com/2025/09/17/a...

The idea that “the civil rights act was a mistake” is a mainstream conservative position we can only tolerate but “defund the police” is a great cancer that must be excised from America for Democrats to win is the actual reason Democrats lose. Sorry.

Some smart publication should reach out to every single person who signed the Harper’s letter and get their comment / explicit no-comment

This is the lead story in the New York Times. If you're in the business of communicating, whether through journalism, commentary, or art, this is the five-alarm fire. People are going to remember who spoke up and who stayed conveniently silent or postured about "neutrality."

I would love to be part of the conversation on MSNBC related to the Kimmel story and it's chilling effects on first amendment, but unfortunately I was terminated by MSNBC for stating that "hateful thoughts lead to hateful words which lead to hateful actions".

The only way forward is to inflict as much financial AND publicity damage on Disney as possible as swiftly as possible. Cancel streaming subscriptions, boycott products, picket, encourage politicians and entertainment figures to shout about this from the housetops. Demonstrate the cost of cowardice.

It turns out centrists who call themselves liberals want right wing things

Congratulations to the winners of this year's American Book Awards! 🎉 🎉 🎉 www.beforecolumbusfoundation.com

Klein earnestly believes we all have to learn to live together even if we "believe different things." For him, it's ONLY about belief and opinion. He is not in a category in which his reproductive rights would be abridged, his marriage would be nullified, his accomplishments dismissed as "DEI." >

Updated second link: blackzonemagazine.com/not-one-but-...

NASA is close to finding out the truth about life on Mars. But the Trump Administration’s proposed budget could leave the mystery unsolved.

My 1st agenting deal. ✨ Dina Nayeri’s brilliant, original, hilarious novel A HAPPY DEATH, acquired by genius editor @kpories.bsky.social at @algonquinbooks.bsky.social, with an expected publication date in early 2027. 🎉 @publisherswkly.bsky.social

Announcing: Viva la Book Review! A brand new nonprofit begun by publishing industry professionals passionate about revitalizing the book review. Learn more about us, and follow us across social media, here: https://vivalabookreview.org/

a really wonderfully considered piece from @nymag.com. cultural criticism is the heartbeat of american cultural production and its history. the form gives tangibility to how we remember and how critique brings us to a place of societal betterment…. there is no life worth living without it.

When I see people online, even in jest, suggest that people living in Republican-controlled states should be abandoned because of their politicians, I feel a deep heartache. New York CREATED Donald Trump and none of y’all are ever talk about it the way you disparage Alabama or Mississippi.

Now available from wherever you get your books—recent poems, in translation, from 34 extraordinary poets living in Gaza (& 4 in the West Bank)—from ⁦‪@CopperCanyonPrs‬⁩

This tactic - pressuring corporations financially until they put a regime friendly voice in charge - is exactly how Orbán took over the free press in Hungary

It’s absolutely wild that the U.S. government straight up murdered a boat of people who presented no threat and were charged with no crime in international waters yesterday and the national media doesn’t seem to be up in arms about that.

please help us spread the word about this mentorship opportunity for writers of color & share it with anyone you think might be interested!

A thoughtful and extremely well-researched deep dive on how Silicon Valley corporations are injecting AI into schools by the multi-talented @vauhinivara.bsky.social (cc @lbyock.bsky.social).

He was brought to the US when he was 12, on a green card. Now, at the age of 62, after serving his time, instead of being sent to his birth country of Jamaica—which was willing to repatriate him—he was sent to Eswatini, a country he has no connection to, and where he might be detained indefinitely.

Cc @democrats.org

Dead chuffed to talk about fall books for the @latimes.com @mtaeckens.bsky.social @ilanaslightly.bsky.social www.latimes.com/entertainmen...

Get the hell off Substack before you literally can’t anymore without blowing up your business

With the way August weather has been, a big fall books preview feels especially appropriate. www.washingtonpost.com/books/2025/0...

As the wildlife urban interface expands and fires become more toxic, Californians have become, perhaps, the canaries in the coal mine, in a world where environmental devastation provoked by climate change is now a commonplace. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/29/o...

My friend @laurenleblanc.bsky.social on the legacy of Katrina and John Updike’s density. oxfordamerican.org/oa-now/what-...

Congrats Nicholas Boggs, whose BALDWIN (FSG) is a $50,000 Kirkus Book Prize finalist and an instant national bestseller: #7 on the L.A. Times bestseller list and #8 on the Washington Post bestseller list! 🎉🎉🎉

We’ve dedicated our entire September issue to the art of the review, featuring 19 writers and an expanded book review section. This issue is our love letter to reviewers—especially those in our pages. Check out the TOC and begin reading! worldliteraturetoday.org/2025/september

Want to read a terrific book set in a repressive, long-ago era when foreigners were suspect and popular entertainment consisted largely of coarse spectacle? Then Stephen Greenblatt’s thrilling new bio of Renaissance poet Christopher Marlowe is for you! My review for the AP: tinyurl.com/4v8axbhw

SUCH A JOY to chat about writing, editing, publishing, and mentorship with @tajjaisen.bsky.social @whichistosay.bsky.social for the Awakeners podcast! (feat. a dramatic reenactment of our very first pitch exchange) @literaryhub.bsky.social

The New York Times thought "Harvard President Might've Paraphrased Instead of Cited Many Years Ago" was the biggest story in the country for multiple days, requiring numerous top headlines and follow-on pieces. Then, as now, a noticeable variable was Black Woman in Prestigious Job.

"More people have walked on the moon than write book reviews for a living," says @roncharles.bsky.social. For @worldlittoday.bsky.social, I spoke with freelance and full-time book critics about the vanishing professional market for book reviews. worldliteraturetoday.org/2025/septemb...

I was in the news business for only 4 decades, so maybe I don't know much. But it seems like the transformation of the U.S. into a police state would be worth a headline and a few paragraphs.

At a time when other publications are eliminating critics, The New Yorker created this stunning portfolio of portraits of our critics, photographed by Richard Renaldi. Critics can be stars if you believe in what they do. Looking good, my friends and colleagues! www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

Our government is torturing this man.

This will be our sixth year offering fellowships—mentoring with Periplus has been a steady source of joy for me, and I have seen the ongoing impact for many writers. If you have any questions after reading the FAQ, let me know (or email peripluscollective at gmail dot com, which uh also goes to me)

This is the drug that is a 100% effective treatment for HIV. this is the one you've been seeing in the news. I would LOVE to see an in-depth discussion of exactly what "clinical, financial, and regulatory factors" are keeping them from essentially carrying a cure to a deadly disease.

As some of you know, I am currently writing a book about the last 80 years of popular culture as it connects to the history of the gay rights movement. The narrative will stop some time before 2025, but--bonus!--you will get to see people say dumb shit like this almost word for word in 1962.

Congratulations to Peter Sien and Marie Arana on the launch of @c-span.bsky.social's "America's Book Club" this fall, featuring luminaries including Stacey Schiff and Jose Andrés at venues like the Library of Congress and the National Archives: www.c-span.org/liveEvent/?a...

Republicans: disappear people off the streets and rendition them to El Salvador, crash the economy, build concentration camp in the Everglades, declare martial law in DC, eliminate cancer and vaccine research, align with Russia, disenfranchise Black people, tank in the polls Political pundits:

The only thing I can say about this paragraph is read it. Sit with it. Read it again. @michaelharriot.bsky.social

📣 applications are open for periplus, a mentorship collective serving writers of color! 📣 if you’re looking for mentorship & more community & you’re a writer of color, you can find more info below. this will be the sixth year our collective is active docs.google.com/document/d/1...