READ ALL ABOUT IT
Since 2012, I’ve been writing about books. And the act of reading. And the importance of story and narrative. But, mostly, the underlying theme of all I write is how taking a moment to stop and digest some longform text — instead of scrolling, instead of watching a video, instead of multitasking — can be one of the most grounding things we can do for ourselves. Here’s the one-stop online home for all this writing.
You can read more about me and my work by moseying over here. Want to peruse periodic “essay drops” — excerpts from my work-in-progress essay collection about Homesickness? Here ya go.
Yu & Me (and a Bookstore Dream)
Whew, what a story. Retail is such a tough business; bookstores among the hardest of the bunch. (Any booksellers following here can attest, I’m sure.) Marketing folks are no dummies: They know that ensconcing their product with verbiage that connotes “community” or “authenticity” is the way to go. My son recently bought a pack of Italian ices, and the slogan is “Treat your REAL self.” Similarly, Oatly oat milk uses one whole side of a carton to promote its mission to “build a better society for people.” Well, ok! But at their finest, bookstores truly are the real deal, no fancy marketing required.
ChatGPT vs. Authors
Perhaps you’ve seen the headline that authors such as George Saunders, Jonathan Franzen, and Jodi Picoult are suing OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, for copying authors’ work “wholesale, without permission or consideration.” ChatGPT works by digesting and regurgitating information found online (fair game, I guess), but AI critics have argued that Google, Microsoft, etc. also feed their systems pirated books found online.
Station Eleven
Station Eleven was published in 2014, so I’m wondering what all the pre-2020 readers thought of this, Emily St. John Mandel’s “pandemic novel.” I can’t stop thinking about it. Not just because of the mentions of contagion, incubation periods, symptoms, and quarantine that are all so eerily familiar. Those phrases will resonate with a post-2020 reader in a different, more concrete way.
