novelist, essayist, teacher
Jeff Bezos, who owns Amazon, who owns Goodreads (among a bunch of other things) now.
Well, I just did it. I hit the “delete my account” button on Goodreads. I did this with much regret, because I’ve loved being a part of that community.
Since Amazon bought it, however, I just don’t feel I can stay. I did stay on the for past week or so, to let some of the people there know I’d be leaving. Now, well, I’m gone.
If you value books and the people who write them, I beg you to read this article from the NYTimes and then to alter your buying habits accordingly.
Sadly, we writers fear that if consumers don’t start a grassroots movement to support us, in another few years there may be no more decent books out there — consider what the article says has already happened in Russia: . . . in the country of Tolstoy and Chekhov, few Russians, let alone Westerners, can name a contemporary Russian author whose work regularly affects the national conversation.
On this snowy morning, rather than spend my time out frolicking with the Rescuepoo in the drifts (which I promise I’ll do in a few minutes, really, Dog… try and be patient!) I feel compelled to enter into the ridiculous fray surrounding what may be the most unlikely literary pairing I’ve heard in a long time — Elizabeth Gilbert and Philip Roth.
There’s a WONDERFUL essay in the New Yorker by Avi Steinberg, concerning the dust up, which you really should read if you’re interested in writing and/or writers at all. It is wise beyond it’s pages. I read it this morning and by, gosh, it got me thinking.
Chief Theresa Spence
I have been wondering, over the past days, how to tackle the subject of Chief Theresa Spence’s hunger strike, the “Idle No More” movement, and the treatment of First Nations people by the Canadian government. My disappointment in Prime Minister Harper and his government grows with every hour.
I am a Canadian with English, Irish and Mohawk blood. Because the Mohawk part of me comes from my father’s side of the family tree and Mohawk’s are a matrilineal people, I received my name and my clan from an Ojibwe Elder. I am proud of being Canadian and proud of my genetic heritage.
Winter Solstice. The longest night. The darkest time.
After the sorrow of this particular month, with the senseless slaughter of innocents a week ago today, and the mass insanity of doomsday cults, perhaps we may be forgiven for not quite believing the light will ever return. The darkness seems so impenetrable, so impossible to shift. We lie beneath it, inert, struggling to breath.
But the word ‘solstice’ as defined by the dictionary is “a furthest or culminating point; a turning point”. It means that we have gone as far as we can go in a certain direction, into the dark or away from the light, and now we will return. But as in any journey, things never look the same. We are changed by our experience. As T.S. Eliot said,
Thanks to everyone for their kind wishes and support during this terrible storm. The Best Beloved, the Resucepoo and I are all fine. The power came back on Thursday, and internet connection and phone came back yesterday.
The Jersey Shore after Hurricane Sandy
We lost about a dozen trees and the fence was knocked down, but that’s all. It was a terrifying storm. Just before the sun set a tree in our back garden, with a trunk about a foot and a half around, snapped in the middle like a dry chicken bone. Then the transformers began blowing. Green and blue sheets of light in the distance. Trees flapping like demented crows. We knew the power wouldn’t last and sure enough it didn’t. We slept huddled together in the dining room, which seemed the safest room in the house. It was a long, loud night, with trees coming down all around.
We wake up this morning to more dreadful news. Riots and attacks in Libya, Yeman, Egypt. Good people dead. Intolerance and ignorance exploding everywhere.
I am prone, as I have said before, to the droops. The world gets me down. Some days more than others, and these days cruelty, selfishness, intolerance, ignorance and self-righteousness abound. An election year in America is enough to make one want to go back to bed and hide under the covers until it’s all over — and that’s without dreadful things like the killing of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other staffers happening.
I’ve been meaning to write a blog for a few days now, but I keep starting and then stopping. There seems so much to say, about many things: the US election, my ‘magical uterus’, hurricanes, what constitutes rape, gun ownership and now this — the mob of Israeli Jewish teenagers who beat an Arab teenager unconscious this month while hundreds watched and did nothing to help. That one left me speechless, especially when I read one of the young men, when arrested, told reporters outside court, “For my part he can die; he’s an Arab.”
Sigh.
"I've got a few things to say to you."
When I answered the phone someone asked, “Is this Lauren Davis, the author?”
“It is.”
“Well, then,” said a woman’s voice best described as brittle with tension, “I have a few things I want to say to you.”
I intuited they weren’t going to be compliments. My heart did a little rhumba. “Is this Donna?” I asked.
Oh, Penguin, you’ve found my soft spot. Books, books, beautiful books, as alluring on the outside as you are on the inside.
Take a gander at these beauties:
The Major Works of Dickens in the new Penguin Classics boxed set
Penguin has come out with special edition classics, with stunning covers created by acclaimed designer Coralie Bickford-Smith. Their web page says, “Penguin Classics presents beautiful hardcover editions of the world’s favorite books. Featuring gorgeous patterns stamped on linen cases, colored endpapers, and ribbon markers, these are rich and sumptuous volumes that continue what will be one of the most coveted sets of books ever produced.”
