The Mookse and the Gripes

• Giller Prize

• Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award

• International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award

• National Book Award

• National Book Critics Circle Award"

• Nobel Prize in Literature

• Orange Prize

• PEN/Faulkner Award

• Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

• The Man Booker Prize

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Click here to see what's happening in the fiction of each issue of The New Yorker.

Last Five Issues:

• Téa Obreht: "Blue Water Djinn"

• Karen Russell: "The Dredgeman's Revelation"

• Dinaw Mengestu: "An Honest Exit"

• Sarah Shun-lien Bynum: "The Erlking"

• Nicole Krauss: "The Young Painters"

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At the FSG blog, Ryan Chapman has a discussion on the state of book jacket design with three of the best designers out there: Susan Mitchell, Charlotte Strick, and Henry Sene Yee.

At Reading Matters, Kim has featured my blog on her Triple Choice Tuesday. My choices? The Ghost Writer, So Long, See You Tomorrow, and Butcher's Crossing. Pop on over and see my fresh, brief write-up of each title.

For Independence Day, the Huffington Post has a slide show of fifteen great independent publishers, featuring a few of my favorites -- Open Letter, Archipelago -- and a few I didn't know about. New Directions is a model of perfection, and I agree. I have stacks and stacks of books from these three presses, and I'm anxious to see what the others have to offer.

This year's Berkshire Wordfest will be held at the beautiful Edith Wharton estate, The Mount, on July 23 - 25. I will be going north that weekend, but I will be stopping at Tarrytown, New York, for some other fun. Still, a trip to the Berkshires is always pleasant, and a literary festival at Edith Wharton's house is a must if you're available.

Michiko Kakutani's review of Jacob de Zoet is surprising in its lack of substance. It's mostly just a plot rehash (which I think gives away a bit too much). It's boring to read and insightless, where I usually enjoy her reviews even if I disagree (as I do here). I'm not saying my reviews are better, surely, but this is pretty poor for The New York Times daily and from a Pulitzer-winning critic.

The PEN American Center has started its first online book club (click here for their page). Their first book is Clarice Lispector's The Hour of the Star, published by the great New Directions.

In the new issue of The New Yorker, James Wood takes a look at The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet: "This is to argue not that David Mitchell should be more like Tolstoy or Conrad or Beckett but, curiously, that he might be more Mitchellian—that the reader wants a kind of moral or metaphysical pressure that is absent, and that has ceded all the ground to pure storytelling."

KevinfromCanada features a guest post from Kathleen Winter, author of Anabel, which KFC also just reviewed.

The Paris Review blog has a Q&A with Jennifer Egan, author of The Goon Squad, a piece of which was published in The New Yorker and discussed here.

Click here for the Never Let Me Go trailer. I didn't like the book as much as I hoped I would, but the trailer makes the film look good. ____________________________

• National Book Critics Circle Award
  • Winner: Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall

• PEN/Faulkner Award
  • Winner: Sherman Alexie's War Dances

• Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award
  • Winner: Brigid Pasulka's A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True

• Pulitzer Prize
  • Winner: Paul Harding's Tinkers

• Orange Prize
  • Winner: Barbara Kingsolver's The Lacuna

• Man Booker Prize
  • Late July
  • Early September
  • Winner: October 12

• Nobel Prize in Literature
  • Winner: October

• Giller Prize
  • Longlist: September 20
  • Shortlist: October 5
  • Winner: November 9

• National Book Award
  • Finalists: October 13
  • Winner: November

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• National Book Critics Circle Award
  • Winner: Roberto Bolano's 2666

• Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award
  • Winner: Michael Dahlie's A Gentleman's Guide to Graceful Living

• Pulitzer Prize
  • Winner: Elizabeth Strout: Olive Kitteridge

• PEN/Faulkner Award
  • Winner: Joseph O'Neill's Netherland

• Orange Prize
  • Winner: Marilynne Robinson's Home

• Man Booker Prize
  • Winner: Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall

• Nobel Prize in Literature
  • Winner: Herta Müller

• Giller Prize
  • Winner: Linden MacIntyre's The Bishop's Man

• National Book Award
  • Winner: Colum McCann's Let the Great World Spin

If the book reviewed was sent to me for free by the publisher, I have indicated as much in a caption under the book's cover image.

For a detailed explanation of my review policy, click here.

Email me at mookseandgripes [at] gmail [dot] com

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