Bookmarked

plus new albums from Ethel Cain & Ada Lea, an interview with Rax King, an excerpt from Emily Hunt Kivel's debut novel, new music from Joan Shelley & Casey Dienel, & much more

At any given time I am in the middle of at least a dozen books. Waiting for the author to submit a playlist for their forthcoming book to Largehearted Boy, in between chapters of something I am teaching to my 8th grade class, or something tangential to another book I recently finished.

I have to confess, I used to keep my place by dogearing the top edge of the page. Some call this sacrilege, but when there wasn’t a publicity one-pager or bookstore receipt handy, this was my solution. Then about 15 years ago, my mom sent me a box of my old things she found in her house, and among them were a couple of dozen baseball cards. Until about a year ago, Phillies players told me where to pick up.

Last year, McSweeney’s included author cards in the 74th edition of its Quarterly Concern. Since then, Miranda July, James Hannaham, Sheila Heti, Andrew Sean Greer,and others have joined me between the pages to mark my place.

In case you are also looking for the perfect bookmarks, McSweeney’s has released a second series of its author cards.

What do you use for a bookmark?

A Playlist of the Week’s Best New Music (14 albums, 151 songs, 9 hours, and 9 minutes)

This week’s new music includes releases by Ethel Cain, Ada Lea, Field Medic, OSEES, No Joy, Anamanaguchi, Wombo, Charley Crockett, Gordi, Halloween, Teethe, Hayes Carll, T. Hardy Morris, and Bad Suns.

Largehearted Book & Music Links:

1. Read an excerpt from Emily Hunt Kivel's debut novel, Dwelling

2. World Cafe interviewed Perfume Genius’s Mike Hadreas
   Even though the subject feels very campy or 'too much,' I felt a sense of power inside of [those songs]. That's part of it too — I like making stupid or disgusting things feel powerful and beautiful or worthwhile.

3. Leslie Jamison shared an essay on perfectionism at the New Yorker.

4. Black Country, New Road visited KEXP for an interview and in-studio performance

   

5. Nicholas Boggs discussed James Baldwin at Vogue
   Love, as it turned out, was Baldwin’s greatest subject. And when I finally finished my journey with Baldwin, these became my book’s last lines: “It would not be until close to the end of this voyage that I realized what I had actually been researching and trying to write all along was a new James Baldwin biography. But from the very beginning, I always knew it was a love story.”

6. Read Neko Case’s contribution to the Sinead O’Connor anthology Nothing Compares to You

   

7. Rax King talked to Greg Mania about her essay collection Sloppy at Electric Literature
   Good personal writing always feels like the author is exploring some dark corner of herself, trying to shine a light into it so she can map it out properly, but before I show people the fruits of that exploration, I want to make sure the dark corners are safe to investigate!

8. Stream a new song by Joan Shelley

9. Tao Lin shared his college diary at the Paris Review

10. Stream a new song by Casey Dienel

    

11. Literary Agent Kate McKean discussed her new book, Write Through It, on the Debutiful podcast

Last Week’s LHB Feature Posts:

Emily Hunt Kivel’s Book Notes music playlist for her novel Dwelling

Jessica Gross’s Book Notes music playlist for her novel Open Wide

Miranda Mellis’s Book Notes music playlist for her novel Crocosmia