The New York Times interviews Paul Yamazaki, the chief buyer for City Lights Booksellers in San Francisco. “At City Lights we see a growing enthusiasm, particularly among younger readers (from my perspective, anyone under 40), for printed matter.”

PBS offers a report from inside “Seattle’s burgeoning community of literary translators.” 

Interview magazine features a conversation between author Chelsea Hodson and Ashleah Gonzales, multimedia star Kendall Jenner’s modeling agent. Gonzales this week published a book of poetry, Fake Piñata and Other Poems, with Hodson’s indie press, Rose Books. Gonzales is also apparently responsible for Jenner’s emergence as a “literary it-girl,” curating the Kardashian kin member’s library: “In the summer of 2019, every other paparazzi shot of the supermodel featured a hot alt-lit title as accessory.”

In the New Yorker Anthony Lane considers Blinkest, an app that compresses full-length books into “micro-synopses” for those who value “knowledge management” over the pleasures of leisurely reading.

A tale in Stephen King’s latest story collection—You Like It Darker, published this week—took the horror master forty-five years to complete. “What happens with me is I will write stories and they don’t always get done," King tells NPR. “And the ones that don’t get done go in a drawer and I forget all about them.”

The New Yorker considers a new podcast series called Not All Propaganda Is Art, which unpacks how the “CIA turned writers into operatives” during the Cold War.

PEN America has published remarks by its president, author Jenny Finney Boylan, at the free speech organization’s annual fundraising gala last week. Boylan addressed the ongoing controversy over PEN America’s response to the war in Gaza, which led PEN to cancel its annual literary festival and awards ceremony. “To our critics I want to say that we hear you, and we want to move forward with you, together. We are determined to amplify the voices of all writers at risk—from Israel to Ukraine, from Palestine to Russia, from Florida to Texas.” The gala reportedly raised more than $2 million.

A report on AI’s “transformative effects” on media finds that AI has already affected or will likely affect three aspects of the book industry: content creation, editing, and sales and marketing, reports Publishers Weekly. “Publishers including Hachette, HarperCollins, and Macmillan Education are partnering with such technology providers as OpenAI, Jasper, and Google.”

An open letter with more than one hundred signatories is calling for the resignation of the Board of Trustees of Kundiman, a nonprofit that supports the Asian American literary community, over the organization’s response to the war in Gaza, reports Literary Hub. “The letter goes on to detail a number of grievances and demands, all dating back to an October 11th incident in which the Kundiman co-founders and board ‘took to Kundiman’s social media accounts to delete a staff-posted statement of solidarity with Palestinians and replaced it with one that conflated Jewish lives with Israel while also erasing Gazans entirely.’”

The Donnelly Public Library in Idaho will prohibit unchaperoned readers under the age of eighteen in order to comply with a “library porn” law. The legislation requires public and private libraries to “relocate a book to an adults-only section within 60 days of receiving a written complaint,” writes Boise State Public Radio. “Our size prohibits us from separating our ‘grown up’ books to be out of the accessible range of children,” the library’s management reportedly wrote in a statement.

The New York Times has a report on the “shake up” at Knopf Doubleday, a division of Penguin Random House, that led to the departure of Alfred A. Knopf publisher Reagan Arthur and Pantheon and Schocken publisher Lisa Lucas, which “likely came as a surprise to many in the company.”

An ongoing rivalry between hip-hop artists Drake and Kendrick Lamar got Erica Ezeifedi thinking about feuds in the book world. On Book Riot Ezeifedi recalls “literary beefs” between Richard Wright and Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison and journalist Bill Moyers, Salman Rushdie and John Updike, and others.

Nonprofit Quarterly considers how the LGBTQ community and its allies are working to support the right to read as conservative activists across the country are increasing efforts to ban books with queer themes from school and public libraries. “Many LGBTQ+ advocates and groups believe that these book bans are attempts to remove the very identities of LGBTQ+ people—but they are refusing to let that happen.”

Washington Post book critic Michael Dirda offers tips for deepening your reading experience.

In an announced “restructure” for Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (KDPG), Alfred A. Knopf publisher Reagan Arthur and Pantheon Schocken publisher Lisa Lucas will both leave their positions, reports Publishers Weekly. “Jordan Pavlin has been promoted to executive VP and publisher at Knopf, in addition to her role as editor-in-chief, newly reporting to [KDPG president and publisher Maya] Mavjee and managing both the Knopf and Schocken editorial departments. Pantheon editorial now reports to VP and editorial director Denise Oswald, who will newly report to Doubleday EVP, publisher, and editor-in-chief Bill Thomas. The search for a new editorial director at Shocken continues, and the role’s eventual occupant will report to Pavlin.”

Lucas Wittmann is the new executive director of the Unterberg Poetry Center at 92NY, writes Publishers Weekly. The announcement follows months of controversy for the Center after it cancelled an October 2023 event featuring Viet Thanh Nguyen because of the author’s public criticism of Israel in the wake of the Hamas attack on the country; the Center then put an indefinite hold on literary events. Wittmann will be coming from Time magazine, where he was the editorial director of the ideas and opinion sections; he previously worked at W. W. Norton, Regan Arts, and as literary editor of the Daily Beast and Newsweek. 

Washington Square Press, an imprint of Atria Books—which is a division of Simon & Schuster—is getting a rebrand. Next spring it will begin publishing hardcover literary fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, reports Publishers Weekly. “The reimagined imprint, which for many years has been the home of many of Atria’s trade paperback reprints, will be helmed by Atria v-p and editorial director Lindsay Sagnette.”

The Los Angeles Times reports on The Libros Lincoln Heights, an L.A. bookstore opened late last year by an electrical engineer. “In the months since opening, the Libros has become a neighborhood hub, spotlighting books and authors that can’t always be found on the shelves of other bookstores. Collections of self-published poetry and family histories of Lincoln Heights sit alongside multi-award-winning books by Viet Thanh Nguyen and Kelly Lytle Hernández (also L.A. residents).”

British Queen Camilla is a literary “podcast queen,” writes the Daily Mail. The second season of the Queen’s Reading Room, which is hosted by Vicki Perrin with prerecorded segments by the Queen, is set to feature authors Neil Gaiman, Peter James, and Kate Mosse, among other writers. 

The New York Times considers the “literary empire” actress Reese Witherspoon has built with Reese’s Book Club. “In 2023, print sales for the club’s selections outpaced those of Oprah’s Book Club and Read With Jenna, according to Circana Bookscan, adding up to 2.3 million copies sold.”