Here's a list of bookish links from this week that you might find interesting.
- At LambdaLiterary, Victoria Brownworth takes on male/male fiction, The Fetishizing of Queer Sexuality: "If you aren’t familiar with M/M fiction here’s what it is: Straight women fetishizing the lives of gay men [...] fetishizing the sexuality of others is still a blatant form of sexism, homophobia, racism. When you fetishize another’s sexuality, you make them less than. You make them Other."
- Publishers Weekly asks Is Alyson Close to Sale? "The financial troubles at gay and lesbian house Alyson Books have been quietly bubbling up over the past few months as stories of unpaid advances and never published books circulated on blogs and in publishing circles. That quiet was officially broken Wednesday when Michael Musto published a piece in the Village Voice about his book being taken "hostage," as he put it in his headline, by the publisher."
- GalleyCat provides a Facebook page to publicise your new book. "Using this Facebook page, we will assemble a weekly list of all the major fiction and non-fiction releases, a recurring feature that will help us alert our readers to new books and help us cope with the overwhelming flow of publicity materials we receive [...] Authors, publicists, editors, and readers can all make use of this new section of our Facebook page--posting about new and upcoming books. Just add a brief description of the book and link so readers can find the book online."
- At E-Reads, agent Richard Curtis asks, Author, What's an Author? "Can you produce a vook? What skills will you require to make one? And will you be more of a writer when you finish it?" What do you think?
- From Mike Shatzkin, publishing consultant, comes The printed book's path to oblivion. "Nicholas Negroponte made headlines last week when he was quoted as saying that the printed book would be “dead” within five years. A deeper dive into what Negroponte actually said clarifies that he doesn’t mean there wouldn’t be any paper books anymore after 2015, but that the ebook would become the “dominant” form by then. I think even that might be going too far [...] But for those who question the idea that the switch from paper to screens will ultimately be just about total, let me offer a way to think about it."
- The Guardian has been running a Summer Fiction Special, short stories from some of the big names of contemporary fiction: Hilary Mantel, Roddy Doyle, Téa Obreht, David Mitchell, and more. I haven't read any yet; I've been saving them for this weekend. If you enjoy any of them, let me know.
- Via Lisa Gold, researcher extraordinaire, the BBC's archive of audio and video interviews with and insights from the true giants of British literature: Virginia Woolf, Elizabeth Bowen, PG Wodehouse, EM Forster, William Golding... A true treasure chest.
- The Orbit Books blog has been running a nifty rundown of changing fashions in fantasy novel artwork. Dragon colour this year? Green. Fantasy heroines? Abs in, stilettos out.
- And over at Sterling Editing we have our usual weekly links of interest to emerging writers. My favourite is probably Sugar's post: "So write... Not like a girl. Not like a boy. Like a motherfucker."
Have a fine weekend.
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My blog now lives here:
http://nicolagriffith.com/blog/
