Author Archives: kara

About kara

We know our letters just fine, and we know our numbers to a certain point, but books were always the realm of four-eyed poindexters with bowler hats and cravats. That’s why it pleases us so that America’s proud illiterates are finally stepping up and pushing back against the crushing tide of education that threatens to swallow us all into its gaping maw of checked facts. Champions of the Ignorantiat will not like it here.

“Palazzos of Human Thought”? Britain’s Super-Libraries Battle it out for Supremacy

Posted on March 9, 2010 by kara

“A palazzo of human thought,” is how Birmingham city council’s leader describes the new Library of Birmingham, currently under construction. The library, designed by fabulous and innovative Delft-based Dutch architects Mecanoo is vying to outdo the other new “Super-Libraries” sweeping … Continue reading →

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National Women’s Day Spotlight: A “Hyena in a Petticoat”

Posted on March 8, 2010 by kara

If you are going to only read one weighty tome this National Women’s Month, try this one, written 218 years ago. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: with Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects written in 1792 by British … Continue reading →

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A Very Important Literary Challenge.

Posted on March 6, 2010 by kara

Are you scholarly enough to read books 56 Nancy Drew mysteries? From The Secret of the Old Clock all the way to The Thirteenth Pearl by December 31st? Then sign up for The Nancy Drew Challenge. I did. I dare … Continue reading →

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Egoist.

Posted on March 5, 2010 by kara

Stellar review for Daniel’s Clowes “Wilson” in The Comic Reporter Daniel Clowe’s new, original graphic novel, “Wilson” is Clause’s first novel not to be originally serialized in his seminal comic book series, “Eightball.” “Wilson” is a modern egoist-outspoken and oblivious … Continue reading →

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Paris Review Names New Editor

Posted on March 5, 2010 by kara

Lorin Stein of Farrar, Straus Giroux will succeed Philip Gourevitch as editor of The Paris Review. Read Dave Itzkoff’s piece in New York Time’s Art Beat. http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/05/paris-review-names-new-editor/ Hopefully this will give Gourevitch time to write more books and New Yorker … Continue reading →

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Ruthless

Posted on March 5, 2010 by kara

Martin Stannard’s long awaited biography of Muriel Spark is due out April 12th. In it, Stannard asserts that Dame Muriel’s infamous “ruthlessness” is what she as a woman artist a male-dominated world needed to have to succeed. Spark was “a … Continue reading →

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From the Shenanigans Files: Literary Hoax Alert!

Posted on March 4, 2010 by kara

Okay. Jean Baptiste Botul is a clearly fictional philosopher created by a French journalist named Frédéric Pagès, who writes for a clearly satirical weekly called the Le Canard Enchaîné. Mr. Botul has a wikipedia page and a fan club that … Continue reading →

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Lola Leroy

Posted on March 3, 2010 by kara

A landmark account of the African American experience during the Civil War and its aftermath First published in 1892, this stirring novel by the great writer and activist Frances Harper tells the story of the young daughter of a wealthy … Continue reading →

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Audio Books That Won’t Embarrass You

Posted on March 3, 2010 by kara

Middlemarch, The Mayor of Casterbridge, Pride and Prejudice, Oliver Twist, Crime and Punishment, Great Expectations, Wuthering Heights, Northanger Abbey, Jane Eyre and Frankenstein. A staggering 43 hours worth of these classic novels read by British theatre greats like Hugh Laurie … Continue reading →

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Happy Days Are Here Again!

Posted on March 1, 2010 by kara

THE BOOKMOBILE IS COMING! Old folks, remember the excitement at hearing those words??? Well The Digital Bookmobile is headed to California! It will be rolling into LA tomorrow. First stop: The Los Angeles Public Library, Central Branch, this Wednesday, March … Continue reading →

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