BlogBloghttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010-07-28T14:55:44ZSquarespaceTechnology and melancholia (and the novel)http://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/28/technology-and-melancholia-and-the-novel.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-28T14:46:19Z2010-07-28T14:46:19ZI know which side I'm on: the more books I write, the more convinced I become that what we encounter in a novel is not selves, but networks; that what we hear in poems is (to use the language of communications technology) not signal but noise. The German poet Rilke had a word for it: Geräusch, the crackle of the universe, angels dancing in the static.]]>Real Indianhttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/26/real-indian.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-26T22:00:11Z2010-07-26T22:00:11ZAnupy Singla, whose first book is just a few months from publication, recently shared with the Chicago Sun-Times the story of her family's first trip to India with kids in tow. It's a fascinating glimpse into India's street food culture, and a great tune-up for Anupy's book. And check out this pic of her very cute young daughters, Aria and Neha.

]]>Sex at Dawnhttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/26/sex-at-dawn.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-26T21:27:21Z2010-07-26T21:27:21ZIf you haven't been following the buzz, which is now reaching cicada-like volumes, this is a good place to get up to speed.

]]>Rave review for Racing the Darkhttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/20/rave-review-for-racing-the-dark.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-20T19:51:46Z2010-07-20T19:51:46ZBetter late than never, I guess. But to me, this is the kind of review that the web is perfect for--long, thoughtful, broad-ranging, and untethered by the constraints of release-timeliness and word count limit that make so many print reviews so unsatisfying. You can be sure we'll be sending this reviewer a copy of the new sequel, The Burning City, right away.

 

]]>More on Baked Inhttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/14/more-on-baked-in.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-14T21:14:20Z2010-07-14T21:14:20ZStill finding new fans, like this blogger at Fast Company:

Every now and then you read a book and wish you had about a hundred of them to give away to people who should be exposed to the insight contained within. Baked In is exactly that kind of book.

]]>The future of advertisinghttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/14/the-future-of-advertising.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-14T19:59:52Z2010-07-14T19:59:52ZThey really love our John Winsor at Business Week, as they've given him a ton of room to weigh in on topics like this one over the past year or so. Combined with the blockbuster departure of Alex Bogusky from MDC/Crispin and, it seems, advertising itself, there's no question that our Baked In duo are at the forefront of some major ad industry transformation. Learn Winsor's take here--as for Bogusky's, I guess we'll have to sit tight to see what he has planned for a second act.

]]>What are the healthiest cocktails?http://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/13/what-are-the-healthiest-cocktails.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-13T14:48:24Z2010-07-13T14:48:24ZAnswered at last.

]]>The end of trusthttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/12/the-end-of-trust.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-12T14:20:29Z2010-07-12T14:20:29ZWhat if we had to treat everyone--every friend, every acquaintance, every stranger even--the way we would treat a journalist on assignment? The Observer doesn't paint a pretty picture of the new transparency, which is looking a lot like the new opacity.

 

]]>Would a black person get away with this?http://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/6/would-a-black-person-get-away-with-this.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-06T19:57:22Z2010-07-06T19:57:22ZVery funny, if in a grim sort of way.

]]>Alison Truehttp://blog.agatepublishing.com/blog/2010/7/2/alison-true.html[Your Name Here]2010-07-02T16:01:45Z2010-07-02T16:01:45ZOver at his Chicago Reader blog, Michael Miner is doing the very important and very delicate work of covering--aggressively covering--one of the biggest local media stories of the year: the firing of his own boss, longtime Reader editor Alison True, by her boss, new publisher Alison Draper. Miner paints a pretty devastating picture of how Draper's decision seems motivated largely by Draper's desire to replace True with someone more willing to breach the traditional editorial/sales divide. He does a great job of letting Draper characterize her decision-making process with the kind of flashing-red-light euphemisms any reasonably sophisticated reader should be able to see through pretty quickly. I think we can anticipate seeing a very different Reader before much longer.

I don't know Alison True well, but I have known her a very long time, and I have been a devoted and regular reader of her newspaper for even longer. I admire her very much, not only for her work but also for her commitment to the Reader, and its important (if sometimes maddening) role in Chicago's literary and journalistic culture. My own writing appeared intermittently in the Reader over the past three decades, and I am proud of that. My own career in publishing was in many ways the antithesis of Alison's, and though it's hard for me to imagine the Reader, as an institution, without her, I hope she will flourish out here in Chicago's post-institutional publishing community.

 

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