Wednesday Linkstorm

We're only three days out from Richard Ford's birthday, and you've done nothing, nothing, to prepare. I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed. The least you could do would be to read this.Sam Lipsyte on sex for The New Republic is a delight. Among many other great lines: "Today, I shall pen a mighty portrait of coitus!"From the Ploughshares blog, the best essay about underrated horror flick Black Christmas you'll read all day.Here is an piece on the use of post-structuralist theory in fiction, including Jennifer Egan's A Visit From the Goon Squad, Ben Lerner's Leaving the Atocha Station, and Smug Mercutio's The Marriage Plot. (Sorry, but that vest.)There's a new book out that might shed some light on why the pope quit. Kidding, that's obviously a link to The Da Vinci Code. Here is the real book, which is called The Vatican Diaries: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Power, Personalities and Politics at the Heart of the Roman Catholic Church. "The title? Yeah I love the title. Could you think of more words to add, actually?"U.K. covers vs. U.S. covers in a blood-drenched rumble to the death. Whoever wins, we lose.In what sounds like the plot of a Bolano novel, they're exhuming Pablo Neruda's body to determine his actual cause of death during the Pinochet regime.New Donna Tartt coming out in October! How delicious is The Secret History on a scale of one to eight delicious points?