The LA Times had to explain blogs all over again while reviewing a new anthology of the web's best blog-writing, Ultimate Blogs: Masterworks From the Wild Web. "It's clear that, to come up with these gems, [editor Sarah] Boxer must have combed through thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of blogs." Sounds hellish, but Boxer was the NYT's first "web critic," so perhaps she's used to it. The reviewer has a bit of a problem with the format of this book, however. It is a book, not a blog; as such, it does not include links. This proves to be a problem.

Those romance novels are getting naughtier and naughtier! "Explicit sex scenes... can run to six or seven pages, complete with whipped cream, handcuffs and robust, four-letter Anglo-Saxon words." Jane Austen probably wouldn't make the cut for romance-novel writing these days: she'd have to "ramp up the sex a bit." [Reuters]

Award-winning author Zadie Smith frankly scolded the contestants who entered her short-story contest. The problem? Well, none of them were good enough to win, in her overlong and rather wordy explanation. "So, let's try again, yes?" OK, teacher! It's one of those sad moments in life when you really do the best work you can and it's still not good enough. What was wrong with the disappointing entries, exactly?

Oh noes! Michael Stipe, arbiter of coolness and edgy good taste, is supporting Tao Lin's writing career. The REM singer went to the new DUMBO bookstore Melville House and bought Eeeee Eeee Eeee. 24-year-old Tao employs many interns who often email us, and gives his stories titles like "Love is a thing on sale for more money than there exists." Which is the only thing about them that's Carver-esque. He also writes poems, and the one titled "I hate my blog, I hate my interviews" may be one of the most telling statements of our time. [NYP]

Ever since the NEA released its "To Read or Not to Read" study, we've been going through what today's Guardian calls "yet another 'Johnny can't read' mini-panic." It's true: even Steve Jobs jumped into the "people don't read" fray. But the report omits, well, a lot. Screen-based reading, for one. AKA, the entire Internets!

The New York Review of Books, highbrow home of Joan Didion letters and occasional epic literary feuds (or "nerd fights") today undertakes it greatest challenge: explaining "blogs" to its million-year-old readers. The author assigned to the task? Journo (and cartoonist!) Sarah Boxer, who has assembled a little print anthology of blog "writing." Which means that her task is two-fold, actually: explaining blogs to old people and justifying collecting them into a book to herself. How does she fare? Hilariously!

An update on the Boston Globe's "19-0" book (written prior to the Super Bowl) about the New England Patriots' fictional unbeaten season: the paper's spokesman tells us officially today that there will be no reworking, rewriting, or revising of the project, as it "was put aside after the Superbowl victory by the Giants." That's 128 pages of wasted writing by Globe staffers, and one less book on the shelves for Triumph (ha) Publishing. But hey, if you want something along the same lines, you can always search for the Amazon tags that customers put on the book's page before it was taken down:

In a land that time forgot, the New England Patriots defeated the New York Giants to cap the most perfect season in the history of American's Bravest Game, with 19 wins and zero losses. The Boston Globe is trying to live in this world, because it is where their Patriots insta-book was a best seller instead of a pointless waste of energy, so they kept trying to sell it on Amazon despite the onslaught of reality. But they had to take it down because of awful mockery, like in the Amazon comments copied by the Society of News Design and reprinted after the jump.

If you are fortunate enough to have your overlong, overshared essay of thwarted l-u-v chosen for the NYT's Sunday Modern Love column, you might very well land a book deal. That's what Doree Shafrir finds in the Observer this week—no fewer than nine have been signed so far. (Not everybody finds the column an irresistible recruiting opportunity, however: "I read the Styles section religiously, but my eyes glaze over the Modern Love column," said an editor at Random House. "I assume it's going to be a woman getting over her divorce.") But those make the best books! [NY Observer]

Mark Steyn reviewed a book about a Broadway songwriter for the Wall Street Journal, and there was just no way for the National Review contributor to write on that topic without somehow dragging Islamic militants into the whole thing, so he wrote this hackneyed lede about how this one Muslim Brotherhood founder hated on Broadway showtunes in like the 1940s or whatever. To return to the book from the topic of Muslims Hating Our Precious Freedoms, Steyn wrote probably the worst transition in the history of literary criticism, in any language, on any planet, ever. It is, at best, a terrible joke puking its own awfulness all over women, gays, Israelis and anyone who remembers exactly how the Wall Street Journal lost a reporter in Pakistan eight years ago. It reads as follows:

Rapper Kanye West has posted to his website three pages from his forthcoming book, "Thank You And You're Welcome," which apparently will be a collection of "Kanye-isms" — big text, lots of whitespace, few words. But what West's advice lacks in quantity, it makes up for in quality. In fact, it's probably safe to say this is one of the best $10 books by a rapper ever published. After the jump, Kanye drops science on paper.

For his upcoming novel, Bright Shiny Morning, James Frey plans to use smoke and mirrors (plus artist Richard Prince and porn-ish photog Terry Richardson) to distract us from the debacle of his last memoir, according to Page Six. As Oprah taught us, A Million Little Pieces was not really a memoir but more like fiction, and we're sure he knows the difference by now. The book tour, he says, will feature "bands, other authors reading their work." The cover will be designed by artist Richard Prince, whose work is currently on exhibition at the Guggenheim. Interestingly, Prince made his name with "appropriation art": photographing the work of others (the Marlboro Man ads, for example), and exhibiting them. He's an entirely logical choice, then, as Frey is known for appropriating pieces of his memoir out of thin air. Synergy! Click for an example Prince's work.

David Cay Johnston, the New York Times tax reporter most recently heard calling Wesley Snipes a coward, is already upset about something else! Seems that his own paper published a less-than-loving review of his new book, and Johnston is desperate to correct the record. He does not love lawsuits! He does not hate corporations! He's a registered Republican, for chrissakes! Google it, why don't you? To be fair, we haven't read his book, so he may be making perfectly legitimate points. The thing is, Johnston does the "How could you possibly criticize a genius like me?" routine all the time. He got in an identical argument with the National Review over his last book, and then got one of the most hilarious reamings of the past decade from that magazine's media critic, Catherine Seipp, for being a sanctimonious ass. Even Dan Okrent, the NYT's first public editor, basically called Johnston an "asshole" (as commenter Seeräuber Jenny noted). Maybe he should learn to let some things slide. DCJ's full letter after the jump [via Editor & Publisher].

We're all for academics sexin' up their work to sell, but this is a bit much. Lot's Daughters: Sex, Redemption, and Women's Quest for Authority, by Stanford's Robert Polhemus, "uses the 'disreputable Bible story of father-daughter incest' as a lens to understand family and gender relations through the centuries," quoth Publishers Weekly. "He casts a wide net over literature... to argue that the power dynamic between younger women and older men—in which daughters fall in love with their father's lives and older men are tempted by the intoxicating power and promise of youth'—is integral to our society." Oh, is it? Way to justify your Lolita complex, man. Middle-aged men can get away with anything.

"But this is a recognition of your life's work," the reporter argues.

Everybody's on TV these days, or at least web TV. We're looking forward to "Titlepage," an upcoming web show that will feature authors and literary types dorking out over books! Daniel Menaker, former Executive EIC of Random House (and former New Yorker fiction editor), will host. "The idea is to take advantage of the fact that it's much easier to post video online than to get a show on television," says the NYT. Inspiration for the show is French literary show "Apostrophes," and Charlie Rose. The first episode, airing here on March 3rd, will feature It Boy Charles Bock (Beautiful Children), Richard Price (Clockers), and Susan Choi (A Person of Interest). [NYT]

Everybody's trying to figure out in what format we'll read "stories" (also known as "narratives") in the future, since our attention spans are pretty much shot. The short story has already been trumpeted as dead, blogs mostly suck, and cellphone novels are for Asians. What's left? Oh yeah—the novella! Since they "need less of your time," they're the "perfect form for today's lifestyles." [The Guardian]

Charles Bock's latest (and first) novel, Beautiful Children, is about living and being lost in Las Vegas. Called "one of the most-anticipated debut novels in years," it's getting red-carpet treatment at the NYT, including a NYT Magazine profile. The hype for what sounds like an interesting book already has people asking Galleycat who Bock's "damn rabbi" is. We're not sure however, how civilized it is to boast about working so hard on your novel. Even if they are a total bitch to write, everybody wants to think of them as effortless endeavors that spring lightly from your soul. To wit:

Now that they've conquered the market for snarky/bemused strike commentary, hungry screenwriters are finding new ways to pass the time and earn small amounts of money: novel-writing, as the LAT reports! What do we learn? Well, writing a book is different from writing a screenplay, for one. Also, we have projects like this to look forward to: the Rune Warriors, a "Viking saga that's a mix of Harry Potter and 'The Princess Bride' with a little Python thrown in."