Book #3 (actually #2) and #5 of 2026: The Removed and The Devil is a Southpaw by Brandon Hobson. I was so impressed by The Removed I ordered a class set to teach next semester. Hobson's new novel is something much more strange and unsettling. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2026/01/two-...

Book #2 of 2026: The Master Butchers Singing Club by Louise Erdrich. At least I think I got the year right this time. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2026/01/the-...

My story "Ice Man" is up at @mrbullbull.bsky.social today. It's about mothers, memories, miracles, and why you shouldn't stow away in the landing gear of an airplane. Many thanks to BULL for publishing it:

Fascinating to reread this NYT piece from ~3 months ago on how Maduro was willing to give Trump the oil and other economic goodies. If so, I return to my basic question here: what was the point?

accidentally murdered a bunch of crows and now I can't figure out how to tell anyone about it

Book #1 of 2025: War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. I am on track to read 365 books and 700,000 pages. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2026/01/war-...

Discovered today that the book blog @grnpointer.bsky.social and I started, 50 Books Project, predates Goodreads by nearly a year.

Pleased to say my story "Touch Tank" is in the newest issue of @SmokeLong today. It's about getting married to a fish. www.smokelong.com/stories/touc...

Whew, this archival clipping about Greg Bovino’s father

Book #121 of 2025: Olav Audunsson: Crossroads by Sigrid Undset. The third book in a tetralogy that's (almost) as good as Kristin Lavransdatter. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/12/olav...

We went to Greg Bovino’s mountain hometown and his last posting along the Mexico-California border — and also traced his family tree. Here’s the American story of an immigrant coal miner’s great-grandson turned scourge of foreigners chicago.suntimes.com/the-watchdog...

this is like a capsule summary of the problems with a singular focus on quantifiable data

Book #120 of 2025: Ice Palace by Edna Ferber. Edna's "Alaska Novel" mostly fails to do what she did for Texas in Giant and Oklahoma in Cimarron. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/ice-...

Great story!

Read this story by my friend Chris if you want to feel some stuff!

My story "White Ibises" is out this week in storySouth. It's about sex, birds, and being a bad parent. Read it, if you want! storysouth.com/stories/whit...

I would rather have a world where we all trust each other and accept that a few people will take advantage of it than a world where folks have to perform disability constantly in order to get the help they need. Let kids have an extra 30 minutes on the test, jesus fucking christ

Book #119 of 2025: Ada, or Ardor by Vladimir Nabokov. Maybe my least favorite of his--like a long joke you have to know three languages to get. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/ada-...

Book #118 of 2025: Knots by Nuruddin Farah. I found this stunningly poorly written, but with the addition of Somalia, my "Countries Read" list is up to 114. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/knot...

Our government is disappearing people and subjecting their families to unimaginable terror.

Book #117 of 2025: Owls Do Cry by Janet Frame. An almost Joycean novel from the New Zealand great. One of those books that makes you go "Oh, I have to read everything this person ever wrote" fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/owls...

“I asked ChatGPT” “I asked Claude” I asked this horseshoe crab and he said your ass wouldn’t have lasted two seconds in the Triassic

Books #114, #115, and #116 of 2025: Three books I read in (and on the way to) Puerto Rico. Didn't think much of the history, but both Ferre and Lalo's novels gave me an interesting new perspective on the island. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/thre...

it is almost as if accommodating and conceding to far right ideas legitimizes them and signals to voters that the far right is a legitimate choice for governance

Book #113 of 2025: Lili is Crying by Helene Bissette. Oulipo-y. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/lili...

they’re forcing kids to read “the caine mutiny,” because of wouk

Muted this. Y'all fight it out without me

It's hard to describe how disorienting it is to see this many students absent. My only mental reference point is the weeks leading up to school getting canceled due to COVID-19, when students were starting to stay home due to illness or out of precaution. CBP/ICE is a plague.

Anti-Christ

This is what guys like Yglesias, and everybody else making hay about Kamala supporting transition care in prisons, want to happen everywhere.

Book #112 of 2025: Baltasar and Blimunda by Jose Saramago. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/balt...

Book #110 of 2025: The Nenoquich by Henry Bean. Really enjoyed this book, which came from my McNally Editions subscription. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/the-...

Christianity Today is an influential magazine in Evangelical circles, and it's a noteworthy signpost that they're doing stories like this because it's the kind of story that pops bubbles.

Book #109 of 2025: Mouthful of Birds by Samanta Schweblin. Does anyone remember how to write a short story fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/11/mout...

andrew cuomo ran one of the worst political campaigns in modern history but i think my favorite part was in this ai ad, the pregnant bill cited chatgpt as a source and a chatgpt phone walks onto the screen and goes “that’s right”

I don’t know how many times I’ve watched this video. I don’t know how we’ve gotten to the point where men in full balaclavas can abduct daycare teachers while they’re watching children. But I do know that this isn’t sustainable. Abolish ICE. There is no way to reform this.

TRIBECA ALREADY EMPTY. THOUSANDS OF PATAGONIA VESTS ABANDONED. SOHO HOUSE TAKEN OVER BY EXOTIC ZOO ANIMALS. BATTERY PARK SHAKE SHACK NOW A BISEXUALS-ONLY CERAMICS STUDIO

Free tattoo ideas

This is a bit from a Naipaul novel btw

also while we’re at it a bodega is distinct from a sheetz! fuck you!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I do not regret to inform you that we are going to win

zohran: good morning rama my wife rama: hello mamdani

Book #108 of 2025: Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter by Mario Vargas Llosa. With the addition of Peru, my "Countries Read" list is at 113. I've also now read 58/128 Nobel laureates. This was good. fiftybooksproject.blogspot.com/2025/10/aunt...

18 years today since we moved into this house here on the shore in Newfoundland. The view out the front window hasn't changed in any way

Why yes I think driving down Trump's approval would be helpful in the midterms! If Ds had let the hazy concept of "salience" cloud their thinking, they might not have engaged on Abrego Garcia, missing the chance to bring his #s down on his "strong" issue,which did happen against your advice.

noteworthy that rather than funding experiments into challenging conservative message domination on the local level or building between-election outreach capacity at the state level, centrist donors are throwing millions at what amount to online factional battles among a couple dozen people

One important thing about this analysis is that nobody gives a shit what's in a party platform.

My main takeaway on the “moderation” debate is that Democrats would be better served by other debates besides left-right positioning, like how to develop new valence issues (corruption!) as wedge issues, and how to get attention for their policy proposals in the first place