Books
Hemingway’s masterpiece on Spain’s bull runs turns 100 years old with its allure intact
PAMPLONA, Spain | Bill Hillmann has been gored three times while running with the bulls in Spain, but he wouldn’t miss this year’s San Fermin festival for anything. It marks the 100th anniversary of the publication of Ernest Hemingway ‘s book “The Sun Also Rises” that launched the future Nobel Laureate to literary fame and […]
Anissa Helou’s new book of recipes from Lebanon spotlights villages scarred by war
BALLOUNEH, Lebanon | Before becoming one of the Middle East’s most acclaimed cooks and food writers, Anissa Helou had no intention of either path. She entered the world of cooking and writing almost by accident when she was in her late 30s. Now 74, Helou has a wide following in the region and elsewhere and […]
Hollywood gets into the microdrama race as mobile-first storytelling draws stars and major studios
LOS ANGELES | While much of Hollywood was consumed by the streaming wars, Issa Rae was studying a different mode of entertainment thousands of miles away: microdramas. No stranger to creating a successful online series, the Emmy-nominated actor and producer became intrigued by China’s booming market for the short, mobile-first soap operas, seeing its potential […]
A new Ishiguro novel heads to 1930s England, with spies, music and wit
NEW YORK | Nobel laureate Kazuo Ishiguro’s next novel is set in a time and place familiar to fans of his classic “The Remains of the Day”: England in the 1930s. Alfred A. Knopf announced Tuesday that “Miss Lambert Steps Aboard Danger” will be published March 9. The novel is built around an encounter between […]
Independent bookstores are multiplying, although many people still think they’re dying out
NEW YORK | Allison Hill, CEO of the American Booksellers Association, is used to strangers expressing sympathy when they learn what she does for a living. “It’s all so funny,” she says. “When I tell them I run the trade association for independent stores, they’ll say, ‘It’s just so sad that they’re disappearing.’ I don’t […]
Bam! Pow! Krakoom! The everlasting allure of the American comic book
BARCELONA, Spain | Pick one up. Be seduced by its glossy cover. Gaze upon the impossibly muscular body clad in a skin-tight suit. Our hero or heroine will surely be soaring, shouting, blasting a villain into next week. They are ridiculous. They are addictively great. Comic books, of the superhero variety, are 100% American. Compare […]
Researchers stunned by a forgotten medieval book in Rome hiding the oldest English poem
ROME | The researchers in Ireland looked at their computer screen, marveling at a medieval book tracked down in a Roman library. They flipped through its digitized pages and found their sought-after treasure: the oldest surviving English poem. “We were extremely surprised. We were speechless. We couldn’t believe our eyes when we first saw that,” […]
Corleone crime family returns in a new ‘Godfather’ novel for 2027 release by Random House
NEW YORK | Decades after the last “Godfather” movie and more than 10 years since the last “Godfather” novel, the story of the Corleone crime family has a new chapter, presented for the first time from a woman’s point of view. Random House told The Associated Press that it had acquired a “Godfather” novel authorized […]