I’m looking forward to getting into John Taliaferro’s book called All the Great Prizes: The Life of John Hay, from Lincoln to Roosevelt. Young John Hay was an aide to President Lincoln. Throughout his career, he became friends with the important people of the era: […]

Everybody is talking about Thomas Piketty’s new book, Capital in the 21st Century. My copy is on order. Here is the book description from Amazon: “What are the grand dynamics that drive the accumulation and distribution of capital? Questions about the long-term evolution of inequality, […]

“Good writing involves obsessing over punctuation marks” writes Kathryn Schulz in a post at Vulture. “It’s 1 a.m., you’ve got a 5,000-word piece due the next day, and for the last twenty minutes you’ve been deliberating about the use of a semicolon versus a period […]

Dominic Smith of The Millions wanted to find out how many Americans are currently at work on a novel. He sifts through all of the available government and publishing data and comes up with a number. Click through the link to find his conclusions. With […]

This year’s lists are out. The New York Times has made their picks of the best of the year. Writers at the Atlantic have each chosen their best reads as well. Do you have a favorite book from 2013? My favorite from the year was […]

Great advice from Tim Sanders: Buy 50 books a year; read 200 samples. And share what you are reading with others. “This will create a positive feedback loop in several ways. First, people will reciprocate with their own recommendations or personal experiences. Share enough, and […]

Book lovers will enjoy this program released by the BBC called The Beauty of Books. The series “combines human stories, expert interviews, book illustrations and historic archive to reveal the beauty of books.” The four episodes examine the impact of paperback books, illustrated volumes, medieval […]

I recently stumbled across this literary gem courtesy of Tim Ferris’ blog. It’s a letter that Edmund Wilson once used to send to those who requested his time. A noted critic, essayist and journalist, Wilson is the recipient of both the Presidential Medal of Freedom […]

Fred Kaplan shares his thoughts about what it is to be a biographer. “They record the arc of a life. But they try to give it form and shape, the way we all as individuals try to give form and shape to our lives.” Courtesy […]