World Book Night, Gabriel García Márquez's Final Manuscript, and More

by
Staff
4.23.14

Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—from publishing reports to academic announcements to literary dispatches—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today’s stories:

Tonight is World Book Night, an international celebration of reading and literature created by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, in which half a million free books are given out around the world. To kick off events in London, authors including Philip Pullman will read from the letters of writers such as Kurt Vonnegut and Ted Hughes. (Guardian)

In the wake of Gabriel García Márquez's death last week, the author's family will be faced with the question of whether or not to publish his final unpublished book, a novel tentatively titled En Agosto Nos Vemos or We'll See Each Other in August. (Wire)

A new BBC documentary titled Business Boomers reveals that more than half of today’s online retail sales in the United Kingdom happen through Amazon. (Melville House) 

Actress Alicia Silverstone has released a new book on parenting titled The Kind Mama, in which she advocates a vegan lifestyle for a healthier pregnancy, which the Daily Beast finds less than impressive.

Novelist and short story writer Elizabeth McCracken, whose collection Thunderstruck and Other Stories was released Tuesday, is interviewed at Salon.

Reporter Robert Krulwich of WYNC’s Radiolab examines findings on bird fidelity presented by author Noah Strycker in his new book The Thing With Feathers. (NPR)

The Toast offers advice on determining whether or not your life is a figment of Charles Dickens’s imagination.

The Oxford University Press takes a look at the battles over spelling reform during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.