News Around the Net

People, welcome to Twilight World.  Take a look at the top name for boys and girls in 2009.  Shake your head sadly at your discretion.

Here's a fun essay on bad writing.  Does this mean that if I think I'm good, then I'm bad, but if I think I'm bad, then I'm good?  Because I'm fiercely mediocre.  Where does that leave me?

Fellow HFR person Aaron asked me last week whether free books can be considered "bestselling".  A good point.  Amazon does not believe so.

If you thought it couldn't get worse than that time you found Hilary Duff was writing a novel (the wait is down to 151 days! Do I have a paper chain to keep track?  Maybe.), if you thought that was as bad as it could get, then, well, you might want to avert your eyes.  Just skip this one altogether, honestly.  It'll be for the best.

Opinions on the funniest books of all time.  I think they're talking intentional comedy, so maybe not Elixir (151 days!).  I'm behind the guy who said How I Became A Famous Novelist by Steve Hely.  Absolutely hysterical.

Here's a conversation we all need to stop having.  Of course poetry matters!  And where did David Foster Wallace get the nerve to criticize other writers for "forgetting the reader"?  Does anyone know an "average reader" who reads DFW books?  Now I'm all worked up.

Why university presses have become the perfect home for publishing poetry.  This is good.  You should read it.