Booklist Online: More than 130,000 book reviews for librarians, book groups, and book lovers - from the trusted experts at the American Library Association

Alex Ross won The Guardian‘s First Book Award for The Rest is Noise. Ross’ subject, twentieth century music, had some critics tossing out the word “inaccessible”: The chair of the judging panel, Guardian literary editor Claire Armitstead, said: “In some quarters this book has been seen as not having a popular appeal. Our prize – [...]

Though I try to keep an eye on the poetry beat, my efforts are woefully inadequate. Today I’ll do better. In Donna Seaman’s review of Kevin Coval’s Everyday People in the December 1 issue of Booklist, it caught my eye when Donna noted that the white, Jewish, suburban-raised hip-hop poet’s works contain “beef jerky and sandalwood incense.” And if [...]

I’m not the only one who noticed that the New York Times Book Review’s 10 Best Books of 2008 is a little Knopf-heavy: Fiction Dangerous Laughter, by Steven Millhauser (Knopf) A Mercy, by Toni Morrison (Knopf) Netherland, by Joseph O’Neill (Pantheon) 2666, by Roberto Bolano (FSG) Unaccustomed Earth, by Jhumpa Lahiri (Knopf) Nonfiction The Dark [...]

Dan Kraus just reminded me to take a look at the Book Design Review‘s Favorite Book Covers of 2008. I love this stuff. Seeing books that are physically beautiful is a great reminder that, no matter how handy a Kindle can be, e-books will never be as satisfying as a book made of paper–just as an [...]

Talk about a business of extremes. [1] One could imagine the book, venerable as it is, just vanishing into the ether. [2] Nevertheless, publishers continue to produce books, while countless numbers of people read them and — a word that crops up frequently in relation to books — love them. [3] 1. “Publishing Displays Its [...]

There’s an interesting profile of M. T. Anderson (The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, volumes 1 and 2) in the Washington Post (“Tomes for Teens,” by Bob Thompson): M. T. Anderson is defending the intelligence of teenagers, and he’s getting quite worked up about it. “It’s insulting to believe that teens should have a different [...]

The Cervantes winner was announced over the holiday weekend. The prize (worth over $150,000), went to Juan Marse, an author far more popular in Spanish-speaking parts of the world. Marse’s English translator, Nick Caistor, had this to say:  “He was fashionable in the 70s when he was translated quite a bit … but then he [...]