Nevertheless: The Millions Book Preview, July – December 2020 Edition. (link)

Hope Wabuke on the KKK joke. (link)

Isabel Wilkerson considers the persistent caste system and the old, broken-down house that is America. (link)

The Netflix Babysitters’ Club is the cutest sweetest show of all time and you should watch it immediately, and also you should read Constance Grady on why the books were such an enduring pleasure that you eventually got very sick of. (link)

“A carefully veiled invitation to use dehumanizing rhetoric under the bastion of ‘the free exchange of ideas.'” Gabrielle Bellot is so great in this response to the Harper’s letter. (link)

What’s brought us to the current situation of harassment and toxicity in the comics world? (link)

“What it signals is orthogonal to what it says.” Lili Loofbourow decries the refusal of those who condemn “cancel culture” to admit the realities that shape online interactions. (link)

“What is the value of a debate that considers some human lives mainly as rhetorical quandaries?” Hannah Giorgis is, as ever, brilliant. (link)

What does power look like in the age of social media? Or, how to have healthy parasocial relationships. (link)

If you are wondering why everyone has been making cake jokes this week, Jaya Saxena is here to help. (link)

It is never appropriate to be attracted to a David Tennant character, and yet. (link)

The situation with John Ortberg and Menlo Church has been … I want to say shocking, but the truth is it’s been tiresomely predictable. (link)

Two STEM scholars put together 10 simple rules for building an antiracist lab. (link)

Seriously, though: Am I even a human person if I am not thrilled and elated with the Millions book preview?

Anyway,
Jenny

The post I’m Weirdly Not That Into the Millions Book Preview: A Links Round-Up appeared first on Reading the End.

There is a new little Book David in the fight against the Book Goliath that is Amazon. Yay!

What can 594 translations of Jane Eyre tell us about the (greatest) novel (in the whole world)?

Here’s what’s happening with the Miss America pageant, much diminished from its former glory.

In defense of jargon.

“There’s one other thing a fictional treatment like The Morning Show can do that first-person accounts and journalism can’t: provide a shared text on a potentially borderline situation that gives every member of the public the exact same information.” This is a truly fascinating and thoughtful piece on fiction inspired by #MeToo.

Jane Austen’s fame is not waning in the slightest, but new readings and adaptations of her work must grapple with her books’ whiteness (and possibly imagine new versions of her story).

Redemption narratives in Star Wars lack all accountability, and that’s a failure of storytelling and also go to hell, The Rise of Skywalker.

“How very Capitol of us.” Bethany Morrow on the betrayed promise of Catching Fire.

Women of color experience extraordinary discrimination in the world of academia, while being expected to take on a disproportionate amount of service work.

Why can we never escape the allure of monarchy in fiction? Monarchy is NOT GOOD.

“Creativity has no place on these maps.” Some Swiss mapmakers are outsmarting their colleagues to include hidden pictures on their rigorously fact-checked maps.

Imagine being a mapmaker who successfully hides a marmoset! Imagine achieving that level of triumph and joy! Take that spirit of joy and kindness with you into the weekend, and best of luck to you all.

The post Fiction Is Honestly Kind of a Mixed Bag: A Links Round-Up appeared first on Reading the End.

A personal account from a former teaching assistant to Avital Ronell, the NYU professor accused of harassment.

The brilliant Carol Anderson recommends books about democracy and its challenges.

Okay, maybe — MAYBE — I will consume this Sherlock Holmes property. MAYBE.

Design a spaceship: Some instructions.

Over at the Book Smugglers, Foz Meadows reminds us to critique the critics when we’re talking about problematic elements in media.

Constance Grady goes in on redemption narratives for men in Hollywood, versus women. Guess who gets the benefit of the doubt.

I absolutely love this piece about the jokes comedians regret making. The people who aren’t white dudes generally have more interesting, thoughtful things to say.

Deadspin and Jezebel understand how hard this time is, and they have accordingly switched out their editors. Two Jezebel writers attend a football game, and a Deadspin writer covers a fashion show.

Why the Serena Williams thing was so viscerally upsetting for black women.

I don’t know what this partnership between Sony and the owners of The Ripped Bodice but I am ALL ABOUT IT.

I just adore this piece about how authors dress their characters — with accompanying fashion images!

Want to know how Crazy Rich Asians managed to look so, like, crazy rich? The Wrap has you covered!

How to fart when sharing a bed.

Here’s some measurements and statistics about how stupid and useless the pockets in women’s clothes are WHEN WE EVEN GET TO HAVE THEM.

Women retell myths from classical antiquity: a top ten list.

Is social psychology in a replication crisis? Professionals differ on the answer.

What women really want from Jian Ghomeshi. Also: a conversation with the editor who decided to run the Jian Ghomeshi piece, in which Isaac Chotiner gives no quarter to bullshit, and which I believe led to the editor being fired/resigning. Also: Rebecca Solnit on the tradition that men are objective and women are subjective. Also: Mo Ryan on abusive men rewriting their stories (badly). Megan Garber on the question of (vis-a-vis Kavanaugh) whether sexual assault is Just How Things Are. Jia Tolentino on dudes being not very sorry at all. Also Lili Loofbourow on Kavanaugh because Jesus Christ this fucking week.

Are we in a romcom renaissance? God I hope so.

Willa Paskin reviews (with spoilers) the show Forever, and gets into some of the reasons I find it frustrating when the whole marketing push for a thing is KNOW NOTHING ABOUT THIS THING GOING IN or it will be COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY RUINT.

Everything you know about obesity is wrong.

Have a great weekend! Cuddle up with blankets and gin and good friends, as I will be doing.

The post More Harassment Links than I Would Prefer: A Links Round-Up appeared first on Reading the End.

In thrilling news, Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon IS TOMORROW. Can you tell I’m excited? I am SO excited. I have an aunt coming into town, so I don’t know exactly how many hours I’ll end up being able to do, but I’m excited about whatever it turns out to be.

Molly Ringwald wrote a really fascinating piece about sexual harassment and her films with John Hughes.

Junot Diaz writes with extraordinary power and honesty about being raped as a child. Trigger warning for child sexual abuse, ofc.

After taking the top prize at Sundance yet somehow not being picked up by a distributor, The Miseducation of Cameron Post finally has a distributor and will be available to watch in the summer. Yay!

It’s okay to give up on books you aren’t enjoying. Let the switch flip in your brain, and set yourself free from the prison of books that aren’t a good fit for you. The mindset “Maybe I didn’t give up forever” is the one that has helped me a lot.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is incisive on the subject of NFL cheerleaders and the problem with the NFL setting itself up as the guardian of moral virtue.

How publishing is changing (and not) w/r/t race and gender.

Millicent Simmonds, one of the stars of the new film The Quiet Place, wrote a piece for Teen Vogue about becoming the deaf role model she never had.

Mikki Kendall on the two black men arrested at Starbucks for existing there. Black customers are inherently perceived as threatening, which is what leads to situations like this one. And last but not least, here’s a round table of some of my favorite writers talking about navigating public spaces while black. (If you’re not following all these people you should be! They’re great.)

How grad school applications can become performances of trauma for applicants from marginalized groups.

I can’t assess the accuracy of this piece about how East Asian narrative traditions differs from Western narrative traditions, but it’s a really interesting read. I want to keep this in mind when I’m reading books from China and Japan in the future.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is the best show on TV but it does have a tonal dissonance problem in how it portrays the moral implications of various actions. Irene Yoon and Lili Loofbourow break it down.

On constructing a kinder future (in the stories we create and consume).

Not sure what’s been going on with FanCon? Clarkisha Kent has the depressing scoop. Rosie Knight and Jazmine Joyner have another very detailed breakdown of all the nitty-gritty details, at Women Write about Comics.

Skin care marketing is often just selling whiteness.

The post Starbucks and FanCon: A links round-up appeared first on Reading the End.

This is the story of a woman whose childhood was filled with disruptions and changes that she didn’t understand — until her mother summoned her to a hotel to tell her (finally) the truth.

Alyssa Cole talked to Vulture about writing a black princess heroine in her latest romance novel.

Robot love stories are always stories about consent (says the terrific Emily Asher-Perrin).

Claudia Rankine has written a play! How cool is that? AND WITH ME SO FAR AWAY FROM NEW YORK WHERE IT WILL EVENTUALLY BE ON THE STAGE.

More book designers and how they work! I will never tire of this genre of links, so I’m hoping that you like them too because otherwise you may find my link round-ups repetitive.

The romance diversity stats for 2017 are actually worse than the ones for 2016. People need to do the fork better. And this is before the news arrived that Crimson Romance is shutting its doors.

Rahawa Haile is typically brilliant on the subject of Black Panther, a movie I have now seen so consequently I can finally read all the awesome takes on it that people have been writing.

Octopuses might not even be all that great. That one octopus that escaped from the zoo might not even really have done it.

Why are TV detectives all so sad?

Nicole Chung writes about writing a memoir while grieving one of its central figures. I got choked up, friends.

Sherman Alexie’s flaws and failures were evident long before the sexual harassment claims came out (but white readers declined to see them).

Daniel Mallory Ortberg has come out as trans, and he’s been typically thoughtful and funny on the subject of his transition and his new book. An interview with Nicole Chung. Another interview with Heather Havrilesky.

A South African writer considers the question of whether people like Bari Weiss and Katie Roiphe are being censored. (They are not.) It is the best. THE BEST.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

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