Wednesday Linkstorm

Hey UNH folks, come see me read at Prospective Student Day on Friday, unless you want me to read to an empty room with just a Twix wrapper blowing by like a tumbleweed. Two o'clock, you guys, wherever these events are held. That one room in Ham Smith, probably? With the leather chairs and stuff? Good information, right there. Very good information.You've seen this right? The guy at The Review Review submitted an old New Yorker story to a bunch of journals and it got rejected everywhere, including at the New Yorker. That is somehow heartening and disheartening both! Take the rest of the day off to work out your feelings about it.From NYRB: a pretty charming story about Nabokov as a teacher at Cornell. Excerpt: He then described his requisites for reading the assigned books. He said we did not need to know anything about their historical context, and that we should under no circumstance identify with any of the characters in them, since novels are works of pure invention. The authors, he continued, had one and only one purpose: to enchant the reader. So all we needed to appreciate them, aside from a pocket dictionary and a good memory, was our own spines.Jim Gavin's Middle Men looks good. Why haven't we read it yet? Let's add it to our lists.Frommer's is dead, long live Frommer's. [Jacket Copy]Also, books are dead, long live books. [Salon]Your weird uncle Bret Easton Ellis has tweeted that his new novel is about a high school student/serial killer in 1981 Los Angeles. Which sounds almost like a bit of self-parody, except that would require a sense of humor.I sure hope Foxy Knoxy's recent mind-boggling legal troubles don't delay her hotly anticipated (by me) memoir!Sad news, Chinua Achebe has died. You may remember him as the author of The Only Book You Kind Of Liked In Your 10th Grade World Literature Class (don't get me started about Pearl S. Buck, that's a rant no one needs). Times eulogy here.Have you read this bonkers GQ article about Buzz Bissinger, author of Friday Night Lights, the nonfiction book that inspired the series? Well, guess what? He's a shopaholic addicted to buying designer leather clothing. Go read it right now because it is fascinating. "I even looked him up on faceb to see if there were any more pics of his leather."--my sister.