it's the first day at standing school for Wright, Zeldin, and Burgum

This is really sad. My sister went to Hampshire.

I for one think it's about time that marine mammals get the fearmongering media treatment once reserved for sharks nypost.com/2026/04/06/s...

Solanum lycopersicum / Tomato, c. 1690-1730, by #AlidaWithoos (Dutch, c. 1661/2-1730). Held at Wageningen University & Research, images.wur.nl/digital/coll... #womenartists #artherstory #hernaturalhistory #FreshTomatoDay #NationalFreshTomatoDay

😂

When I think of radical left groups, I definitely think of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Social movement scholar here again. So, why protest? Nihilists were out yesterday arguing that "protests don't do anything." A short 🧵:

"When I go into that voting booth, I think about three important things: What the man on the pamphlet looks like, what the name of the man on the pamphlet is, and whether or not that man is trapped in the pamphlet and needs help to get out."

My latest review, out today in @wirobooks.bsky.social: "who among us hasn’t at some point gaped at our beloved and thought, “How is it that I’m even WITH you?” before once more remembering the how and the why." A thought-provoking memoir-in-essays from Lynette D'Amico.

This man did far more fighting for the US than anyone in the cabinet or the White House. And he died one day after being taken to an American concentration camp. One day. www.reuters.com/world/asia-p...

Sometimes we paws our reading to watch the wind

Lynette D'Amico (MEN I HATE out now from Mad Creek Books) in conversation with her husband P.Carl about his book and now hers, which shares her perspective on the transition he documented in BECOMING A MAN. www.full-stop.net/2026/02/17/i...

The Death Penalty Is Even More Horrifying Than You Think www.nytimes.com/2026/03/13/o...

Congratulations to @jsanchez-taylor.bsky.social on DISPELLING FANTASIES (Ohio State UP) being shortlisted for the British Science Fiction Association awards! locusmag.com/2026/03/2025...

“If something weird happens to me, or I overhear a weird thing, or somebody says something weird to me and it disturbs me, that, to me, is a good opportunity for an essay." CITY OF TOYS out today from OSU Press! Thank you @matternews.bsky.social! matternews.org/culture/word...

want some context on that Times Higher Ed article on authors and publishers? Check out this thread linking to great #FeedingtheElephant posts:

Glenwood Springs Co. July 1984. photo by Mark Williams. I was apparently working on a song that became Maps & Legends. Thanks Mark!!

Have you ever seen a snake eat a mouse and thought how unpleasant it must taste? How their mouths mostly come into contact with fur and nothing delicious? Don’t feel too bad for them. Most snakes barely have any taste receptors. Most don’t even have the genes for tasting umami or sweetness.

“A teacher of standing, a poet, tells her class, Never put stars in your poems, and some of the students write this down. And some stop writing after a year or two. And some get married or take jobs selling pharmaceuticals.” —Stephen Kuusisto, “Erasing Stars” @coppercanyonpress.bsky.social

Congrats to my friend and colleague extraordinaire Elizabeth!

I can't get over this number: in 2007, there were 360,000 newspaper jobs. Now, there are 80,000. "My local paper sucked!" Sure. What sucks even more? The void. "I get all my news from the Guardian!" No, the Guardian doesn't report on your town council, your school board, local cops.

Every time I see Buttons the passenger pigeon at @ohiohistory.bsky.social I feel like I commune with him a little and feel so sad

Seeing @people.com include Lynette D'Amico's exquisite, funny, cutting memoir, MEN I HATE, on its books page in the new issue is super cool and … definitely one of the biggest surprises of my career! Book World may be gone but dammit, we still have People. ohiostatepress.org/books/titles...

Fetid Rivalry

“Sun Ra: Do the Impossible” debuts tonight on PBS. Great companion reading below from Michael Lowenthal @pbs.org @ohiostatepress.bsky.social @rafertess.bsky.social "The possible has been tried and failed. Now it’s time to try the impossible." — Sun Ra

This is the point that I wish everyone could see more clearly. The problem is hed & dek, which are all most people see.

"I also want authors to know that a book can still succeed in the absence of traditional reviews, and while the acknowledgment that comes with a review is fantastic, its impact is not certain." open.substack.com/pub/derekkri... @derekkrissoff.bsky.social

I’d mix it up a bit. Cats are the gorgeous stoners who maintain a firm suspicion of the world and cuddle selectively. Dogs are the restless, tamed man-eaters who eat absolutely anything including books. One howls at the moon; the other admires it.

"As the AI agents played—1,000 games per set of rules—the researchers tracked how the pieces moved. Then they compared the moves with the levels of wear on areas of the board, tracing which gameplay seemed to replicate grooves on the stone."

I'm pretty proud of this poem I made out of the euphemisms that companies used to describe the ICE occupation in corporate communications. Also read the whole story: racketmn.com/corporate-co...

So I wrote this "don't panic quite so much about the data center boom" newsletter that turned out to have posted on the day of the endangerment finding rule change. Is this bad timing--although unintentional--on my part? Yes. Yes it is.

"There are still plenty of places to read about literature, many of them excellent.... But they are produced for an audience that already knows it cares about literature. The books section of a newspaper plays an altogether different role. It does not cater to aficionados; it seeks new recruits."

I'm going to write one long thread over the next couple of days about the people I worked with at the Post. They deserve the extra time and attention. I'll start with someone you likely know well: @roncharles.bsky.social 1/TK

A few weeks left to submit your story collection to the Grace Paley Prize for Short Fiction (which comes with $5,500 and publication from us, Mad Creek Books): awpwriter.org/AWP/Contests.... Submit your manuscript by the end of the month! @ohiostatepress.bsky.social

memoirland.substack.com/p/the-memoir... Great interview. It's always nice to get a peek at my work through an author's eyes: "[Mad Creek has] an amazing commitment to publishing creative nonfiction, with a focus on essays." @saribotton.bsky.social

Uh, catalog, not calendar

Check out the Ohio State University Press spring 2026 calendar! Memoir, essays, poetry, comics studies, sci fi studies, rhetoric, classics, narrative … email me at [email protected] for exam & review copies. #academicsky #comicsstudies #teamrhetoric bit.ly/3M0yBiJ_s

This is an incredible short piece.

Apropos of nothing, I just learned that my great-great-uncle dated Gene Stratton Porter back when she was just Gene Stratton

I have thought long and hard about starting up a new books publication, given how much criticism has been cut across the board. The business model is really difficult. The return on investment is low. We used to be okay with some parts of media not growing rapidly year over year forever.

i know that this is an unpopular take, but everyone starting their own newsletter as a revenue stream is not a sustainable model for writing and reporting or for people who love and want to pay for media.

the Post news is gutting for many reasons, but I can’t help focusing on the books section—how great it was, and how essential. So many worthy books barely get reviewed. I’ve had authors reach out to thank me because mine was the only post-pub coverage they got. Just awful for readers & for writers.

Hello, looks like independent publishers should beef up our books coverage. If you're into the idea of joining the @flaminghydra.com collective and writing a book review each month (800-2000 word range), please send us your ideas and some clips to [email protected]

Democracy dies in broad daylight under billionaire ownership

All the smartest, best people I know are broke and losing their jobs, while the stupidest, meanest, most vicious and violent people are thriving. It’s awful, and of course it’s just one part of the terrible times we’re in. If you feel as hopeless as I do, go read a story, poem, or essay today.

I'll say more before too long, but for now: Thanks to anyone who has ever read and supported the Post's books coverage.

Shit. "Honestly, the worst aspect of this impoverishing, family-wrecking, confidence-crushing ordeal is that it will inspire David Brooks to write an essay about the hubris of American media."

Another Lego shark has been found! It was discovered on Sunday by Emma Fraser Trecurno at East Portholland beach in Cornwall. It's one of 51,800 Lego sharks that fell into the ocean on 13th February 1997. Picture credit: Emma Fraser Trecurno

The judges, it seems, are fucking pissed. It’s a nice thing to see.