Critical Notes

Planning out your 2012 reading? The Millions has a hefty list of some of the new year’s biggest titles, and Scott Esposito gathers up some forthcoming 2012 books, with a

Essayist, pundit, critic, and journalist Christopher Hitchens died last Thursday at 62. His 2010 memoir, Hitch-22, was a finalist for the NBCC award for autobiography. Arts & Letters Daily has

Michael Lindgren reviews Meghan O’Rourke’s new poetry collection, Once, for The L Magazine. Michelle Bailat-Jones takes an extended look at the work of controversial French novelist Michel Houellebecq at the

Faulkner: The TV series? Writer-producer David Milch talks with the Los Angeles Times Carolyn Kellogg about his new deal with HBO to bring William Faulkner’s works to the screen. At

The year-end best-of lists have started to appear in earnest: The Atlantic’s Benjamin Schwarz picks his five favorites, the Guardian lists its books of the year, Library Journal lists its

Last Wednesday the winners of the National Book Awards were announced. (Carmela Ciuraru covered the festivities and took plenty of pictures for Electric Literature’s blog, The Outlet.) The fiction winner

Anne Trubek reviews Jonathan Lethem’s essay collection The Ecstasy of Influence for the Cleveland Plain-Dealer. Lizzie Skurnick is writing a mini-column called “That Should Be a Word” for the New

And the lists begin: Publishers Weekly has published its choices for the best books of 2011. Kerri Arsenault is writing a new column for Bookslut called “Locus Pocus,” about books

Standalone book review sections are contracting expanding: Crain’s Chicago Business reports that the Chicago Tribune is looking into launching a premium literary review section. Michael O’Donnell reviews Supreme Court Justice

The Los Angeles Review of Books (see our Q&A with editor Tom Lutz) is launching a series of ebooks collecting some of its essays and interviews. Julia M. Klein reviews