Hello everyone. I finished two freelance pieces and now I'm rewarding myself with an afternoon escape -- reading about Paris. My latest book about my favorite city is called "The Secret Life of the Seine" by Mort Rosenblum, former Editor in Chief of the International Herald Tribune. Rosenblum lived for a time on a 54-foot boat made of Burmese teak and brass, tied up alongside the barges near the Pont Alexandre II in the center of Paris.
This is what I call escape reading. Without it, life would be so dreary.
What's your favorite escape book?
(Photo by Miu37)
One of my favorite stories from the weekend papers: A Wall Street Journal Magazine profile of novelists Martin Amis and Isabel Fonseca. The two discuss the pleasures of reading, writing and their marriage.
"Being married to one of Britain's most celebrated authors could be a disappearing act for some women," writes author Ariel Leve. "But the American Fonseca, 49, is an impressive writer herself. Amis, 61, married both a muse and an equal, and they are mutually supportive...."
I love this quote from Amis on Fonseca: "I rely tremendously on her beauty. She looks very nice when she's asleep and she wakes with a smile. It's an extraordinary thing. It's very unfair, as all things to do with beauty are, but it's a fact. I rely on it for joie de vivre. It's proof of her equilibrium as well. Your happiness determines your demeanor in the world."
See the full story here.
And a list of Amis' books and Fonseca's.
(Photo above by Simon Upton for the WSJ.)
Happy Monday everyone!
Hello everyone! I'm so sorry my posting has been so light. But, I have very good news: I've been asked to participate in Unique LA's H.D. Buttercup boutique and I'm working like mad on my jewelry designs through my little firm, Crown and Badge Salvage Co. I'm so excited to be involved with Unique LA -- a group that runs one of Los Angeles' largest and most prestigious craft and art shows. And it's doubly sweet because H.D. Buttercup is sort of like the west coast version of ABC Carpet in NYC. I've been making jewelry for a long time, but this is the first time I've seriously set out to design a line. So this is heaven for me.
If you're in Los Angeles, there will be a reception for the new boutique from 6 to 8 pm on Friday at H.D. Buttercup.
Meanwhile, will see you back here soon. xoxo
Tina
(Illustration, above, from the Keep Calm store on etsy.)
It's awards season for the books industry, and today the National Book Foundation announced its twenty finalists for the National Book Awards. Among those included in the non-fiction category is Patti Smith's autobiography "Just Kids," covering her years as muse to photographer Robert Mapplethorpe.
Reviewer Tom Nissley sums up "Just Kids" so beautifully:
"Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe weren't always famous, but they always thought they would be. They found each other, adrift but determined, on the streets of New York City in the late '60s and made a pact to keep each other afloat until they found their voices--or the world was ready to hear them.
"Mapplethorpe was quicker to find his metier, with a Polaroid and then a Hasselblad, but Smith was the first to fame, transformed, to her friend's delight, from a poet into a rock star. "
What is it about Patti Smith that makes her so compelling, like a young Mick Jagger?
(The National Book Award winners will be announced on Nov 17 in NYC.)
Hello all!
Here's new book of note: Farrar, Straus and Giroux today released Fragments, a collection of “poems, intimate notes, and letters” by Marilyn Monroe. The glossy tome is packed with pictures and references to the many books in Monroe’s life. (She loved to read and was often spotted with a book during breaks on film sets.)
Here's a snippet from the publisher: "These bits of text—jotted in notebooks, typed on paper, or written on hotel letterhead—reveal a woman who loved deeply and strove to perfect her craft. They show a Marilyn Monroe unsparing in her analysis of her own life, but also playful, funny, and impossibly charming. The easy grace and deceptive lightness that made her performances so memorable emerge on the page, as does the simmering tragedy that made her last appearances so heartbreaking."
PS: Howard Jacobson won the Booker Prize for the Finkler Question!
