October 21, 2008

Hard-Boiled Sentimentality in the Los Angeles Times

But what if that standard [of the hard-boiled narrative] had less to do with Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe than with Ellen Montgomery, the naive young heroine of Susan Warner’s 1850 bestseller “The Wide, Wide World”? What if the walk...

October 20, 2008

Don Hollenbeck: A Pioneer in Media Criticism

Over the weekend, the New York Times ran an article about Don Hollenbeck and Loren Ghiglione’s new biography, CBS’s Don Hollenbeck: An Honest Reporter in the Age of McCarthyism. The book and the article come on the heels of the...

October 17, 2008

The Authors of Gastropolis Answer Your Questions

As we mentioned earlier this week, Annie Hauck-Lawson and Jonathan Deutsch, authors of Gastropolis: Food and New York City, have been fielding questions from readers of the New York Times City Room blog. Yesterday was the second round and they...

October 16, 2008

Rooting for Serial Killers: The Strange Case of Dexter

The following post is by Leonard Cassuto, professor of English at Fordham University and author of the recently published Hard-Boiled Sentimentality: The Secret History of American Crime Stories: The last chapter of my book, Hard-Boiled Sentimentality: The Secret History of...

October 15, 2008

Reflections on Amazon's Kindle

Carolyn Kellog’s Los Angeles Times‘ blog Jacket Copy features a post about Ted Striphas and his take on Amazon’s Kindle. Striphas is an assistant professor at Indiana University and the author of the forthcoming book The Late Age of Print:...

October 15, 2008

Save on Titles in Paleontology and Evolution Titles

In conjunction with the annual meeting for the Society for Vertebrae Paleontology, which begins today, we are offering a SPECIAL SALE on selected titles in paleontology and evolution. All books will be discounted 20% and free shipping is available for...

October 14, 2008

Gastropolis: Food and New York City

Are you interested in the origins and story behind egg creams, bagels, and the distinctive New York City coffee cup? (Who isn’t!?) If so, head over to the New York Times blog the City Room where Anne Hauck-Lawson and Jonathan...

October 14, 2008

Japan Times Reviews Troubled Apologies

The Japan Times recently reviewed Alexis Dudden’s Troubled Apologies Among Japan, Korea, and the United States. The review begins: Alexis Dudden engagingly explores how the nexus of politics, war memory and apology shapes contemporary trilateral relations between Korea, Japan and...

October 10, 2008

Somalia and Piracy

In a recent post on Comment is Free, part of the Guardian’s excellent Web site, Jeremy Sare discusses the continuing chaos in Somalia. He argues that the recent incidents of piracy off Somalia’s coast is yet another reminder of the...

October 9, 2008

“The Change Paragraph”: A Post by Beth Loffreda

The following is a post by Beth Loffreda, author of Losing Matt Shepard: Life and Politics in the Aftermath of Anti-Gay Murder. You can also read Loffreda’s recent post: The Tenth Anniversary of the Death of Matt Shepard. A few...

October 8, 2008

Obituary for Masuda Sayo

The following is a post from G. G. Rowley, translator of Sayo Masuda’s Autobiography of a Geisha. Masuda Sayo died on 26 June 2008, a few months short of her eighty-third birthday. Her end was blessedly swift: she was admitted...

October 7, 2008

CUP Authors Weigh in on the Economy and Sarah Palin

Like much of the country, Columbia University Press authors are thinking about and writing about the downturn in the U.S. economy and the presidential election. In his article Reversal of Fortune, appearing in the November issue of Vanity Fair, Joseph...