carolyn kellogg

I’m back online and here’s a roundup to prove it:

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette talks to Alice Hoffman, who’ll be in town tomorrow for the Drue Heinz Lecture Series. Afraid I’ll be in class; no report from me.

Norman Mailer storms the barricades, winning fans at the NY Times and the San Francisco Chronicle. Decide for yourself: the first chapter of The Castle in the Forest is online.

The LA Times, on the fence about his new book, bizarrely calls Mailer “the most metaphysical of America’s major novelists.” Erm, wha? I don’t recall much metaphysics in The Naked and the Dead, Tough Guys Don’t Dance, or even Harlot’s Ghost. Explanations are welcome.

Support Rain Taxi and shop their ebay auction; it ends tonight. Signed stuff and rarities, all for a good cause.

Matt Cheney says BUY DIRECT! From publishers, that is. Especially those who look to be squeezed by the AMS bankruptcy. His suggested to-get list is tasty.

Another long list of good-looking books is up at Bookdwarf. And she’s got ’em all waiting for her.

I’ve been thinking a lot about Russia this week, so this book is going to the top of my must-read list.

Matthew Tiffany has gone chicken.

Anne meets a deadline and goes for a run. The world is her oyster! Oh wait, maybe it’s not. Still, makes me think hard about taking up running.

My life is a punch line — that is, if you watch Campus Ladies, a hysterical TV show about two grown-up women who go back to school. Today the NY Times gets with the program, now in its second season on the Oxygen network — which has embraced the show, ball-gags, bongs and all. Congrats to co-creator Christen Nelson Sussin, who I remember as a bona-fide undergraduate, back when I was the right age to be in school, too.