Category Archives: reading

February 06, 2015   Lauren   characters, Lauren, opinion, reading  
9

You like me! You really like me!

“That the question of likability even exists in literary conversations is odd…Certainly we can find kinship in fiction, but literary merit shouldn’t be dictated by whether we want to be friends or lovers with those about whom we read.” – Roxane Gay, Bad Feminist

In reading Bad Feminist recently, I nodded my head so vigorously on so many occasions that I’m lucky I didn’t sprain my neck.  Among the calls to arms and insights and gems was the above quote, perfectly summing up my distaste for the prevailing wisdom on “likable” protagonists.  I mean, sure, there are books I don’t like and that I don’t recommend because of it.  But to reject a book because you don’t like the main character?

It’s an absurd objection to literature—often shorthand, I suppose, for “this book didn’t resonate with me and I need a thing to pin that on”—and totally irrelevant to whether or not one even likes a book.  If the book isn’t working, the unlikeable protagonist is going to stick out like a sore thumb to be sure, but I find it pretty hard to believe that anyone has never loved a book where they didn’t like the protagonist.  Gone Girl isn’t a massive bestseller because we all think Amy seems swell and Nick like the husband of our dreams.

I like my friends.  I like my family.  I like my colleagues.  Perfect to have brunch with, certainly, but you want to know a secret?  You couldn’t pay me to read a book about nearly any of them.

Likewise, I’m happy to read about a serial killer, but I’m not going to buy any BFF heart necklaces for us to wear.

So I’m with Ms. Gay–let’s stop talking about the likability of protagonists as if that’s what really matters.

January 30, 2015   Rachel   classics, literary, Rachel S., reading  
0

Reading the past

Channeling the sixteen-year-old in me (the sixteen-year-old that I most certainly was), when I saw a Buzzfeed quiz* today that would reveal which affliction of La Belle Époque would lead to my untimely death, I really had no choice but to click and take it immediately.

I’ll be honest, I was a little disappointed with my result: broken heart. As a Moulin Rouge obsessed teenager, I thought it the height of elegance to die gracefully and beautifully of tuberculosis (or, as I like to call it, the galloping consumption) much like Satine, the main character. She coughed so daintily, looked so beautiful to the end and, of course, had Ewan MacGregor, the starving playwright, torn to bits at her demise.

Though I’ve since moved on from such childish fantasies (mostly), and I know that tuberculosis is neither a pleasant nor desirable thing to contract, it did get my mind reeling on all the reasons why I love that era and the literary movements that go along with it. Second only to the English Romantics (hello masterful Wordsworth, arrogant Byron and poor, poor sickly Keats), the French Belle Époque is an era of literature that I love dearly and tend to forget about until I’m reminded. I thank the one comparative literature course I took in college as well as any French teachers who tried to get me to read de Maupassant and Baudelaire in their original forms for introducing me to realism, naturalism and even the little bits of Modernism (I’ve read one half of one book of In Search of Lost Time and I consider that an accomplishment).

Such literature strikes a real chord—telling of a world on the precipice of something so different and alive than had ever before been described. Giving heed to experimentation that had theretofore been snubbed and extolling the beauty in the smallest and most quotidian of objects or actions. It’s been years, honestly, sadly, since I’ve given my books from this era a real look, but even reading the names of authors and poets—Zola, Rimbaud, those already mentioned—elicits a visceral reaction that whisks me back to visions of Parisian department stores and muddy alleys that are described with such clarity and honesty by these writers.

I’ve been trying to avoid using the word “romanticize” since I’ve also referenced the Romantics today, but I can’t any longer. Sure, I romanticize the era, seen through the rose colored tint of artwork and nostalgic whims of a reader in today’s fast paced, technology-obsessed world, but there is also an inherent liveliness to the work itself. Filled with urgency and excitement (and not without a heavy dose of nostalgia of its own), the literature of La Belle Époque is at once dreamy and intensely relatable.

My musings aside, do you have any favorite literary movements that still get your heart racing and brain whirring even if you don’t read them regularly?

 

*stop panicking, the quiz is here.

January 29, 2015   John   food, fun, John, reading  
1

Breakfast reading

When I was a kid, breakfast was a family affair, but a mostly silent one. Every weekday morning, my parents would read the New York Times, while my sister Jane and I stared bleary-eyed at the box of cereal between us on the table. At some point, though, we kids started to read on our own, and I distinctly remember a period of reading chapter books and novels over my Cheerios—Judy Blume’s Freckle Juice comes to mind, as do the Basil of Baker Street mysteries by Eve Titus. By high school, Jane and I moved on to the Times as well, and so the quiet was only occasionally interrupted by someone asking for a different section of the paper, which suited me fine—to this day, I’m hardly what you would call a Morning Person…

Now, for the past six years, breakfast at our house has been much more rambunctious, thanks both to my wife Julia’s early riser tendencies and the two motor-mouth sons I somehow ended up with. But while I can’t get away with hiding behind the paper, we mostly keep the peace by reading picture books and early readers aloud to the boys. Not a bad solution, but hardly ideal for a morning grump like me.

And so, imagine my excitement when I was able to snap this picture at the breakfast table last week: 

IMG_3724

Yep, that’s my son reading Harry Potter on his own. To himself. In silence!

Aside from the obvious parental pride here, plus my hope that breakfast reading helps develop his reading skills, I can’t tell you how nice it is to have the morning noise cut in half. I’ve even been able to sneak a peek at the paper once or twice while Julia reads to our younger boy! That said, I know the day of full independent breakfast reading is about three years off, but I can see the finish line in the distance…

Anyway, I’m curious—do other families read over breakfast like this? And if so, is it a conscious family activity or one born from a need to quiet down a noisy horde of morning people?

January 23, 2015   Lauren   Lauren, picture books, reading, suggestions  
0

Hooray for picture books

I represent very few picture books, but in my personal life I’m deeply indebted to them.  As I’ve mentioned countless times, my nephews are my favorite people on this planet, and at 6 and 3, their primary bond with me these days is over reading bedtime stories.  The older one started associating me with reading pretty early on in life, and through an aggressive campaign of reading fun things loudly in his vicinity (often while lying on the floor so he’d be tempted to come over and torment me by climbing onto my back), I’ve gotten the little one on Team Aunts Read Books as well.  Now thanks to a couple strategic buys by my mother in advance of our gathering at her house this past weekend for her birthday, the kiddos are begging for some videos I’ve promised to send of me reading their two favorites from the bunch.  As they were leaving to head back home on Monday, they were devastated to cut our last reading session short at only two books, so I promised to combine their two favorite things about me: reading fun books and watching videos on my phone.

But while I was very excited to discover This Book Just Ate My Dog! this weekend, which very cleverly uses the physical book and encourages interaction, one thing I did find myself wanting was some more children’s nonfiction.  When Martin Luther King came up with my older nephew, he was sort of familiar with him from some things he learned in kindergarten last week, but pretty confused about the role of water fountains in history.  As we discussed, I realized I was struggling to explain Dr. King’s legacy to a child who doesn’t understand race much less racism, or to get him interested in anything beyond the fact that he won the Nobel Peace Prize (which both children were very excited to learn they could watch a video of on my phone.  Injustice and civil rights fly above their head, but they know all about prizes and medals from the absurd number of sports the 6 year old plays).

Fortunately, I realize that there are experts out there who know how to talk about historical figures to children without getting caught up in attempting to explain what a dream is metaphorically.  Next time I see them, I’m determined to be better prepared.  So I turn to you: does anyone have any favorite nonfiction books for young children?  I’d love to be able to teach them more about not only Dr. King, but other important figures and historical moments.  Any pointers?

January 16, 2015   Rachel   fun, Rachel S., reading  
0

Creature comfort

I’ve been really trying to give myself more time lately for pleasure reading outside of work. It’s surprisingly hard to do when so much of my time is devoted to reading other (just as lovely!) books, manuscripts and queries. However, like pretty much anyone who decides at some point that they’d like to work in publishing, I’ve long nurtured a love of books and reading and I’ve been making a concentrated effort to go back to one of the things I most love. Reading, alone, for no purpose other than to absorb a good story. And I’m doing pretty well, if I do say so myself! Currently halfway through Meg Wolitzer’s THE INTERESTINGS and thoroughly enjoying her insightful and thought-provoking way of describing relationships and the unique ways in which people act, react and observe.

I think you’ll all agree that one of the best things about books is how widely appealing and accessible they are to all walks of life. You don’t need anything much to get absorbed in a book—you can even access entire libraries for free! I’m constantly amazed at how diverse reading culture is.

Seriously.

This kitten, for example:
kitten

Even celebs!
koko

I’ve been there, guy.
dog

Honestly impressed at this little mouse’s tenacity when it comes to getting into a book at any cost.
mouse

This is a bunny learning about history.
bunny

Though I admire this pigeon’s zest for the written word, I’d really rather he choose something else to read. But what canya do?
pigeon

Normally capybaras kind of creep me out, but I could hang out with this one.
capybara

NOW. It’s a long weekend (for us at least), so there’s plenty of time to join the ranks of reading creatures.

January 14, 2015   Miriam   Amazon, e-books, fun, memory, Miriam, reading  
4

Learning to read

Here’s the thing.  I’ve become deeply attached to my Kindle Fire.  I can watch Orange Is the New Black on it while I work out.  I can play the twentysome games of Words With Friends I’ve got going at any given time.  I can read The Washington Post—helpfully delivered free for a trial period by the very thoughtful Jeff Bezos, who now owns the venerable publication.  I can look at the fashion magazines I used to subscribe to physical copies of.  I can find recipes for my weekend cookfests (the chili-polenta dish I tackled last week was delicious).  I can impulse buy (that little clothes steamer is a marvel)….

However, the thing I seem to do the least on my Kindle these days is read the more than 300 books stored in it.  Part of the problem is that, while I am a fan of digital content and really appreciate how much kinder this device is to my perennially aching back—which, of course, got that way from a lifetime of lugging around hardcovers and manuscripts and hunching over thousands of pages (my eyesight is bad too)—I still prefer the heft and feel of the paper product.

As this piece in The Guardian tells us, we actually absorb less information electronically because part of the reading experience involves an array of sensory input that helps us recall the physical space the words appeared in (as well as our own physical space) while immersed in the narrative.  I used to pride myself on my idiot savant ability to find a passage in a paperback I’d read 20 years ago fairly quickly by visualizing where in the book I’d come across it.  You can’t really do that on a Kindle or other e-reader, as these devices flatten the reading experience and turn it oddly two-dimensional.  Also, my Kindle doesn’t smell like anything other than plastic and maybe nail polish remover that I spilled on it while using it as a platform to do my nails.  Real books smell like musty old shops, like winter evenings, like nostalgia, like adventure.

THE DISAPPEARING SPOON

My point is that I need to learn to read better on my digital devices and I need to do more of it.  Because with all of the distractions (see my first paragraph above) these devices allow and foster, it feels like books are an afterthought.   And, I don’t mean to be overly dramatic but when books become an afterthought, civilization as we know it is over.

So, given that e-reading is better for my back, I’m going to make a concerted effort to get more acquainted with the book side of my Kindle.  If nothing else, it should save me money on all the duplicate copies of titles I have lying around my house and hibernating in the Cloud.  What about you guys?  Do you have these problems or is it just me?

 

January 13, 2015   sharon   e-books, marketing/publicity, Oprah, reading, self-publishing, Sharon  
3

Pulling an Oprah

As agents, our number-one job is to look out for the best interest of our clients, from the scope of their writing careers to each individual project. Just as we’ve signed up a number of successful self-published authors and helped them achieve traditional publishing contracts, we also suggest digital self-publishing to our traditionally published clients when that seems to be the best option for them.

But not every author has the time, interest, or know-how to self-publish an e-book. DGLM to the rescue again! Our digital publishing program, run by yours truly, exists to assist them with the details, from lining up freelance editors and cover designers, to building e-book files, to strategizing marketing initiatives. Authors who have taken advantage of this service include those with a sizable backlist, like David Morrell, as well as talented debut writers with projects that just haven’t found a home.

Why am I talking about this today? Because we have a free gift for you! And you! And you!

We’ve put together an e-book sampler that includes excerpts from eight thriller titles self-published by our clients.

Help yourself to our Thriller Almanac!

ALMANAC FINALKindle     Kobo     Google Play      iBooks

We’re curious to see how giving away a free sample could boost sales in this genre, and we’ve asked each of the participating authors to spread the word in their social media circles.

And now we want your input! If you’re an avid e-book reader, please let us know what you think of this sampler.

Are the end points for each excerpt exciting enough to make you want to buy the whole book? How do you discover new e-book authors? What’s the perfect price point to tempt you to take a chance on a series you’ve never heard of?

December 16, 2014   sharon   goals, media, reading, resources, Sharon  
0

Glossy Pages

Recently Mike blogged about his New Year’s Reading Resolutions, and I was inspired. I’m going to make a read-olution of my own, and mine has to do with the pile of magazines next to my bed! I only subscribe to a handful of publications – Elle and Elle Décor, New York Magazine, Vogue, with the latter about to expire – but somehow can’t quite read them as fast as they come! That’s going to change in 2015; I am going to vanquish the stack before it crashes through the floor of my apartment and gives my landlady a concussion. And there are a couple other practical reasons as well…

Magazines are great for commuting. Flip through an article or two if you’ve just got a couple stations to go and don’t want to get lost in a book and miss your spot. And they’re certainly a lot easier to tote around than a book – I’m currently reading the second book in the Outlander series, which clocks in at 743 pages.

And staying up to date with magazines is important to our work as an agency too. Publishing every week or every month, magazines keep you in touch with the latest lifestyle trends, emerging political or economic thought, fascinating little-known stories, scandals waiting to explode – all potential book ideas, whether we pursue the writer of the piece or share a story idea with of our clients or promising At our bimonthly ideas meetings at least one person mentions “Well, I was reading in the New Yorker” or “I saw this thing in The Atlantic…”

So in 2015, I gotta keep up!

Ever seen an article and though that should be a book? Any tips for keeping up with your subscriptions? Or magazines I should check out?

December 12, 2014   Lauren   fun, Lauren, lists, reading  
2

Reading in a Winter Wonderland

snowy water towersEarlier this week, as I watched snow fluttering by my office window, I took a moment to daydream about curling up by a fireplace with some hot cocoa or wine or hot whiskey, reading an appropriately wintery book.  Naturally I then had to think about exactly which books might fit the bill, and the first that came to mind was Little Women, with its general vibe of New England Christmas.   Though on reflection I don’t think it’s true, in my mind every key scene in the book happens in front of a fireplace (where Amy does burn Jo’s manuscript) or frolicking about in the snow.

On the bleaker side of things, I also thought about the Jack London short story “To Build a Fire,” which is definitely not how I’d like my winter to go.

When I polled the office, Sharon reminded me of how much winter plays in to the Laura Ingalls Wilder books:  “I am fully prepared to navigate blizzards with a clothesline or twist hay into braids for the fire among other traumatizing winter survival skills.”  Now I know if we ever set up an apocalypse emergency system here at the office, I should pick Sharon as my buddy.  And bonus points for the venerable LIW, one of them is even called The Long Winter.

Jane voted for our very own David Morrell’s The Spy Who Came for Christmas.  Miriam picked The Cider House Rules and Snow Falling on Cedars, plus Holidays on Ice, while Michael thought of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (which Intern Elie also cited).  Jessica came up with The Corrections and James Joyce’s “The Dead.”  John’s vote was for Russell Banks’s Affliction.  Jim chose The Shipping News, which Stacey seconded, and Frankenstein.  And Intern Jordan made a strong case for Rachel Conn & David Levithan’s Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares that made me want to run to the store after work and pick it up.

There were two votes for Snow—but for two different books by that name.  Jessica went with Orhan Pamuk, while Jim picked Maxence Fermine.  And there were two for Mark Helprin’s Winter’s Tale, including Sharon and Intern Francis, who is reading it right now.  Plus three for the Harry Potter books, from Interns Tatiana, Amy, and Elie.

A few people came up with books that might not be quite winter books, but have a winter feel to them nonetheless, including Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers (Miriam), Hatchet by Gary Paulsen (Mike), The Road by Cormac McCarthy and Into Thin Air by Jon Kraukauer (both Stacey).  On a similar note, Intern May Zhee reads a lot of Russian novels that feel wintery even if they’re not, like Anna Karenina and Doctor Zhivago.

So now that I have such a long list of wintery reading options, all I need is some snow days to curl up and give them a go.   What are your favorite winter reads?

December 09, 2014   mhoogland   chat, dialogue, Mike H, reading, too many books, Twitter  
2

Reading goals for 2015

The New Year is fast approaching—way too quickly if you ask me—and with a new year comes new goals!

I have never before made reading one of my resolutions for the new year. Reading has always been such a huge part of my life that I never really felt it was necessary. It would be like resolving to drink more water or take more showers. But ever since I’ve started taking on clients of my own and representing more and more authors, I’ve found that I’ve had less and less time to read books by authors who aren’t my clients. So for 2015 I will make a very moderate reading goal: I will read one book every two weeks, in addition to the massive amounts of reading that comes with the territory of being a literary agent.

And then, I came across this thoughtful post about resolving to read less on Book Riot via Twitter. (I’m new to Twitter, by the way, so excuse this shameless plug: mike_hoogland.)

Now I’m certainly not at the point of “oversaturation” that Jeremy describes, but he makes a very compelling point. Reading should make you better informed, wiser, and possibly even funnier or more empathetic, so a better-informed, wiser, funnier, more empathetic person-turned-hermit is counterintuitive. I don’t think reading 24 books next year will lead to such a life either, but I’m wondering if there are people out there who have hit this reading tipping point.

Are you one of them? What are your reading goals? I’d like to know. Sound off in the comments.

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