Category Archives: books

What Do You Do With a Problem Like Salman?

He’s back in the news, folks. After a recent spate of badly written books, (perhaps the world’s most famous living) novelist Salman Rushdie is once again in the center of controversy after Britain awarded him a knighthood on Saturday, June 16th. Once again, Iran is at the helm of the controversy, being one of the first countries to publicly announce that Britain’s honoring “one of the most hated men in the Islamic world” is a clear insult to Islam. And once again, the conflict is centered around Satanic Verses.

The situation, of course, . . .

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My Night with Kurt Vonnegut

I don’t know if I could call it a “date” per se, but he was there, I was there, there were candles on the table and pasta on plates.

Well, to be fair, there were about seven other people and I may not have been sitting the furthest away from him, but it was close. He had come to our school to speak, and as a recent member of the Forum Planning Committee, I snuck in on the pre-lecture dinner reservation. It would be an exaggeration to say that he and I had a conversation that night, but he did . . .

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Hodgman for Free

The Areas of My Expertise As of 2:49 PM CMT, John Hodgman’s The Areas of My Expertise audiobook is available as a free download on iTunes. But for how long . . .

You may have seen Hodgman as the winning, deadpan, occasional correspondent on The Daily Show. He’s also been recently immortalized as “PC” in the back-and-forth PC v. Mac ads.

The book, my friends Dan and Salma say, is hilarious. I’ve got my download, hopefully ready to make the long, long flight to India seem . . .

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The Lazy Man’s Version of Posting

What with the move and all—thanks to Salma, Dan, Kris, and Sarah—I haven’t had a lot of time to write. (Summary of my new apartment: I really like living off the ground again.) So here’s a short post, a roundup of what I’ve been watching, reading, and listening to this week:

Merry Krismix: For which I have Kris to thank. This is Kris’s half of our mix CD exchange, and compared to mine, it has a lot more, you know, mix. The 16 Horsepower, Go Team!, Asha Bhosle, and Gorillaz songs are my favorites. Plus, “Rudie Can’t Fail” reminded me . . .

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Literary Sleuthing Question

Dear 12apostrophes readers and writers: Is there a literary version of IMDB? If not, what’s the most thorough site you know to look up books and authors? (Don’t say Amazon). I’m particularly interested in a database that lists an author’s works chronologically, as opposed to one that compiles reviews of their works. Both would be great though.

You’re all literary types—would you mind using the comments section to make some suggestions?