All Stories

PEN America cancels its 2024 literary awards ceremony, originally set for April 29, due to controversy over its stance on the war in Gaza. The LA Times Book Prizes are announced. Yoko Ono is honored with the MacDowell Medal. The 2024 Age Book of the Year Award shortlists are announced. Actor Josh Brolin announces a new memoir, From Under the Truck, which arrives in November. Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, and Ben Kingsley will star in the film adaptation of Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club. Plus, Yaa Gyasi’s Transcendent Kingdom will be adapted for film.

Shavonn Matsuda, head librarian at the University of Hawai‘i Maui College Library, was named a 2023 Library Journal Mover & Shaker for her efforts to incorporate traditional Hawaiian languages and cultures into the academic library and cataloging system to guide Hawaiian scholars and community members more efficiently and robustly. LJ recently followed up with her to learn more about her work.

Funny Story by Emily Henry leads holds this week. Also getting buzz are titles by Sally Hepworth, Elly Griffiths, Douglas Preston, and Nancy Thayer. People’s book of the week is Real Americans by Rachel Khong. Winners of the O. Henry Prize for Short Fiction are announced, as are the CWA Dagger longlists. Kevin Kwan’s Crazy Rich Asians is headed to Broadway as a musical. And philosopher Daniel C. Dennett has died at the age of 82.

Many librarians lauded the development of Open Access (OA) publishing models, which offered, at least initially, to help solve the problem of an unsustainable and inequitable scholarly communications ecosystem while simultaneously addressing a growing interest in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). In the past year, the idea that, with appropriate guardrails, Artificial Intelligence (AI) can also play a role in changing scholarly communications has risen to the fore. But can OA, DEI, and AI ever live up to their promise of an affordable, equitable and sustainable publishing ecosystem?

Fady Joudah, author of the collection […], wins the Jackson Poetry Prize for American poets. Winners of the Tolkien Society Awards are announced. Finalists are also announced for NYPL’s Young Lions Fiction Award and the Jhalak Awards. Nominees for the CrimeFest Awards are out. Actor Viola Davis and her husband are launching a publishing company to champion underrepresented voices. Facing criticism for its response to the war in Gaza, PEN announces plans to review the organization’s work going back a decade.

Winners are announced for the Publishing Triangle Awards for LGBTQIA+ books. Of Cattle and Men by Ana Paula Maia, tr. by Zoë Perry, wins the UK Republic of Consciousness Prize for small press books. The shortlist for the Donner Prize, recognizing the best public policy book by a Canadian, is announced. There’s more reporting on the turmoil surrounding the PEN Awards. Plus new title bestsellers and interviews with Marjane Satrapi and Emily Henry.

Because Project MUSE believes that knowledge has the power to enrich lives and that a sustainable scholarly ecosystem is essential for advancing humanity, we partner with mission-driven publishers and libraries to curate dependable content and fuel interdisciplinary discoveries that benefit everyone.

Real-life courtroom battles are shared by John Grisham and Jim McCloskey as they detail accounts of wrongful conviction; plus a new Malcolm Gladwell book is on the way. 

Rebecca Yarros will publish a stand-alone novel, Variation, in October. Kemi Ashing-Giwa wins the Compton Crook Award for The Splinter in the Sky. Oren Kessler wins the  Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature for Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict. The Commonwealth Short Story Prize shortlist is announced. The May LibraryReads list arrives, featuring top pick The Last Murder at the End of the World by Stuart Turton. LibraryReads and LJ offer read-alikes for A Calamity of Souls by David Baldacci. Mick Herron’s Down Cemetery Road and Don Winslow’s City on Fire are slated for adaptations.