- Just a quick links post for today–heading into three-day working weekend on Secret Project.
- Still overwhelmed by everyone’s reaction to the sexism and self-promo piece. An author who doesn’t know where to get started on this whole promotion thing? The wonderful Saundra Mitchell has re-posted a series of incredibly helpful links on just that.
- There’s another great Jennifer Weiner interview at the Huffington Post, by the way.
- The New York Times rounds up the latest sleep research in fascinating fashion. Get your winks, or have a dirty brain.
- Really interesting, smart piece from Ruthie Knox at Wonk-o-mance on “Writing Reality” in romance: “Also, and more to the point, there is a way in which we tell ourselves — we, as romance readers and writers and editors, pretend among ourselves — that this kind of policing is not harmful, when it is, actually. It’s harmful to our culture, our social fabric, to perpetuate a narrow idea of who is and isn’t allowed to be sexy, what is and is not sexually okay, what can and cannot be permitted romantically.”
- Yael Goldstein Love asks Should ‘Women’s Fiction’ Have Its Own Category at the WSJ in a thoughtful piece: “To the extent that we care about good fiction getting written and provoking the pleasure it warrants, the consequences of viewing literature as male by default are getting in our way. For a writer to travel as far as her talent can take her, she must have the sense that she owns her art. And for a reader to be able to travel that full length along with her, he, too, must not doubt her right of full ownership.”
- Tess Monaghan writes about disappearing older women at Open Ticket: “Marie Weinberg, C’est Moi.”
- New Meghan McCarron story! “Terrible Lizards” at The Collagist. Get it into your brain.
- Genevieve watches the new Flowers In The Attic movie for the AV Club: “The 1987 feature film was a diluted fumble—incest is replaced by a few chaste clinches—but it doubled down on camp, letting the Dollanganger kids publicly punish mom and giving Cathy two separate opportunities to look to the sky and scream, “Noooo!” Lifetime refrains from either of those over-the-top flourishes. But restraint is probably this new production’s biggest problem.”
- Christopher put his one and only published poem up online. You should go read it.
- And, lastly, a couple of nice new blog reviews of The Woken Gods this week, at the Summer Reading Project and from Beth Kemp at Thoughts from the Hearthfire. Kemp writes: “Fabulous use of mythologies to create a world where the gods of various pantheons are alive and well and seriously dangerous. I found Kyra’s quest gripping and was quickly invested emotionally.” And I beam madly.
- Have a nice weekend, everyone!