Largehearted Boy

Contest - Win Michael Moss's Book Salt Sugar Fat and a $100 Threadless Gift Certificate

This weekend, Brooklyn's Prospect Park hosts its second annual GoogaMooga food festival, and I am interviewing Michael Moss there tomorrow about his fascinating book, Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us.

For a chance at winning this book and a $100 Threadless gift certificate, share your favorite guilty pleasure food in a comment. Cheese is easily my foodstuff kryptonite, in any and all forms.

One winner, chosen randomly from the commenters, will receive the following prizes:

Michael Moss's book Salt Sugar Fat

A $100 Threadless gift certificate to buy book-related t-shirts like Storytellers, The Best Channels Since 1465, Fahrenheit 451, Brainy Rainbow, or Word!, and music-related t-shirts like Death Note, Funkalicious, Music Snob, or anything else that catches your fancy.

If you have already have this book or it doesn't interest you, I am happy to substitute a second $100 Threadless gift certificate.

The winner will be chosen randomly at midnight ET Friday evening (May 24th).

also at Largehearted Boy:

previous and ongoing contests at Largehearted Boy

100 Online Sources for Free and Legal Music Downloads
Atomic Books Comics Preview (highlights of the week's new comics)
Book Notes (authors create playlists for their book)
Daily Downloads (daily free and legal music downloads)
Largehearted Word (highlights of the week's book releases)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
Shorties (daily links from the worlds of music, literature, and pop culture)

Shorties (The New Daft Punk Album, The Top 25 Horror Novels for Young Adults, and more)

Spotify is now streaming the new Daft Punk album, Random Access Memories (out May 21st).

The Guardian reviews the album.

Urban Titan lists the top 25 horror novels for young adults.

At the New Yorker, authors weigh in on the importance of likeability of characters in fiction.

Two writers debate whether the Smiths were the best or worst band in the past 30 years at the Telegraph.

Flavorwire lists 10 of the greatest Cold war spy novels.

Rolling Stone asks, "What is the best summer song?"

Hilary Mantel shares her reading habits with the New York Times.

Yo la Tengo frontman Ira Kaplan talks to the Denver Post about the band's approach to recording.

Author Elliott Holt lists her six favorite books about expatriates at NPR Books.

Indie band ANAMANAGUCHI fielded questions from the Reddit community.

Zola Books interviews James Renner about his novel The Man from Primrose Lane.

Norman Lock discusses his favorite short story at Flavorwire.

Katie Shelly talks to The Salt about her forthcoming illustrated cookbook, Picture Cook: See. Make. Eat..

The Thermals visit The Current studio for an interview and live performance.

Weekend Edition interviews Colin Broderick about his new memoir, That's That.

"When I started writing That's That, I thought it was just a story about my childhood. And two years in, I realized — and I thought it was only going to take me two years — but two years in I realized it's not just my story that I'm telling. And I think the book itself, it's about personal narrative, it's the story of a family, it's the story of a son and a mother, but it's also a story of Northern Ireland."

Read an excerpt from the book.

Morning Edition profiles singer-songwriter Sam Amidon.

Shape-note singing is a communal form of music that began in New England 200 years ago, mostly from townsfolk without any musical training. It's music that surrounded folk singer during his childhood in Vermont.

Five English scholars weigh in on the latest film adaptation of The Great Gatsby at The Millions.

Amazon MP3 offers 100 albums on sale for $5 each.
Amazon MP3 offers over 1,400 albums on sale for $3.99.
Amazon MP3 offers over 600 albums for sale for $2.99.
Amazon MP3 offers over 400 jazz albums on sale for $1.78.
Amazon MP3 offers over 56,000 free and legal mp3s.

Follow me on Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, Google+, Facebook, and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.

also at Largehearted Boy:

previous Shorties posts (daily news and links from the worlds of music, books, and pop culture)

100 Online Sources for Free and Legal Music Downloads
Atomic Books Comics Preview (the week's best new comics & graphic novels)
Book Notes (authors create playlists for their book)
daily mp3 downloads
Largehearted Word (the week's best new books)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from this week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists

Daily Downloads (Robyn Hitchcock, Sharon Van Etten, and more)

Every day, Daily Downloads offers 10 free and legal mp3 downloads, plus free and legal live sets from around the internet.

Today's free and legal mp3 downloads:

The Antlers: 2009-01-22, New York [mp3,ogg,flac]
The Antlers: "Harvest Moon (Neil Young cover)" [mp3]

Caitlin Rose: 2013-03-01, Manchester [mp3,ogg,flac]
Caitlin Rose: "Dallas" [mp3]

The Deep Dark Woods: 2013-04-17, Hamburg [mp3,ogg,flac]
The Deep Dark Woods: "Rosa Lee McFall" [mp3]

Futurebirds: 2013-05-13, Columbia [mp3,ogg,flac]
Futurebirds: "Virginia Slims" [mp3]

Low: 2013-05-09, Amsterdam [mp3,ogg,flac]
Low: "Dragonfly" [mp3]

Meat Puppets: 2007-10-17, New York [mp3,ogg,flac]
Meat Puppets: "Look at the Rain" [mp3]

Mekons: 1985-06-08 [mp3,ogg,flac]
Mekons: "This Sporting Life" [mp3]

Robyn Hitchcock: 2013-04-25, New York [mp3,ogg,flac]
Robyn Hitchcock: "She Said She Said (Beatles cover)" [mp3]

Sharon Van Etten: 2008-06-06, New York [mp3,ogg,flac]
Sharon Van Etten: "I Fold" [mp3]

The Soundtrack of Our Lives: 2012-12-15, Gothenburg [mp3,ogg,flac]
The Soundtrack of Our Lives: "Throw It to the Universe" [mp3]

Free and legal live performances at other websites:

Literature: Key Studio session [mp3]

search for more free and legal music downloads at Largehearted Boy

also at Largehearted Boy:

other daily free and legal mp3 downloads
covers collections
100 Online Sources for Free and Legal Music Downloads

Book Notes (authors create playlists for their book)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
Shorties (daily music, books, and pop culture news and links)
Soundtracked (composers and directors discuss their film's soundtrack)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from the week's CD releases)

Book Notes - Virginia Pye "River of Dust"

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.

Previous contributors include Bret Easton Ellis, Kate Christensen, Kevin Brockmeier, George Pelecanos, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Myla Goldberg, Heidi Julavits, Hari Kunzru, and many others.

Set in China of the early 1900s, Virginia Pye's River of Dust is a haunting and vivid debut novel filled with fascinating, flawed characters.

Robert Olen Butler wrote of the book:

"Virginia Pye's River of Dust is a remarkable novel in the ways that delight me the most: It has a compelling narrative voice, a dynamic story and a deep resonance into the universal human condition, all of which is inextricably bound together. This is a major work by a splendid writer."

Stream a Spotify playlist of these tunes. If you don't have Spotify yet, sign up for the free service.

In her own words, here is Virginia Pye's Book Notes music playlist for her debut novel, River of Dust:

I wrote much of my novel River of Dust in a twenty-three day surge. I did all the usual things when not at my desk—ate, talked to friends, walked the dog, fed the kids—but with only part of my brain. My mind was off in China in 1910, the setting for the book. I had worked on a previous novel about the same characters, but hadn’t been able to sell it, and in the end decided to take two small parts from the beginning and the end and created River of Dust. The main characters had been with me so long, they were like a song you can’t get out of your head, and this allowed me to complete the new book in a burst of creativity.

I don't listen to music when I write, but music does work its way into the novel—slyly and through memory, like so much else in the story. On the playlist I offer, there are no Chinese tunes, no music from the nineteen-teens. Instead, the songs here are metaphors for the feelings, actions, and mood of the novel. The setting of River of Dust is a faraway place in the distant past. I hope it will stick to the reader like the dust swirling on the wind from the Gobi Desert that figures so largely in its pages.

The novel’s four main characters are the American missionaries I call The Reverend; Grace, his wife; Ahcho, the "house boy;" and Mai Lin, Grace’s maid and mid-wife. Drought and famine sweep over the land and desperate, violent actions occur. In the opening scene, Mongolian bandits kidnap The Reverend and Grace's young son. The wind picks up, loss fills the air, and the most fragile of the characters—Grace—reaches deep within herself to find the strength to survive. Another baby is born, innocents die, a beheading occurs and elephants fly--or not. All this spins out on the desert plains with the hallucinatory purple mountains in the distance and opium within easy reach.

The music I hear in my mind as I transport myself to that distant time and place are often songs of longing. Some still contain joy, while others reflect the desperation of a starving and lost people. Here’s how I break it down as the story unfolds:

River of Dust is set in Shansi Province, China and while that’s quite a distance from Salinas, California, the song that comes to mind is "Me and Bobby McGee" as sung by Janis Joplin. The upright Reverend and his wife have their son torn from their arms by the Mongolian bandits and nothing captures loss better than her line, sung in that throaty plangent voice: "I let him slip away…."

When the Reverend goes out in search of his son across the rough terrain, he encounters more trouble, in fact, double trouble, but he is a man of remarkable luck. Little Feat’s "Trouble" captures God’s "good-humored grace" which saves our hero from not one, but two disasters.

As Ahcho, the converted Christian, tries to find a rational solution to their dire situation, Hem’s "Burying Song" plays. In this reflective section, the reader has a chance to catch their breath and wonder whose version of the story is trustworthy.

When Grace accompanies the Reverend to chapel, she tries to keep her straying husband’s attention. Grace could sing a line from Joplin’s "Try (Just a Little Bit Harder)": "I waited so long for someone so fine." The music rises in a frenzy as the Reverend’s sermon stirs both the church and his anxious wife.

Later, in a sorrowful haze, Grace watches her children return to her—their ghosts floating in with the hordes of Chinese peasants. It’s all quite pleasant, until she realizes she’s still alone. In "Tiger Mountain Peasant Song," Fleet Foxes sing, "I don’t know what I have done. I am turning myself to a demon." The song softly fades in the same way that Grace quietly folds in on herself.

As Grace and Mai Lin break free of the mission compound and stroll into the marketplace, Joni Mitchell’s "All I Want" came to mind. "I am on a lonely road and I am traveling/ Looking for the key to set me free." Grace feels freer than she has in some time. "I want to feel strong, I want to belong…" But of course, the moment of escape can’t last.

Meanwhile, the Reverend is out on the tundra at a Mongolian circus. This scene reminds me of a song by a young fiddle duo from New Orleans, Jubal’s Kin. In their tune, "Raleigh and Spencer," they wail about a town where the liquor has gone dry and all is lost. The ballad ends with the mournful promise that the singer has no choice but to lie down and die.

Grace waits by the window for her husband to return and Sufjan Stevens’s "For the Widows in Paradise" captures her longing. "If there's anything to say/ If there's anything to do/ I there's any other way/ I'd do anything for you." Grace would do anything for the Reverend, including risk her life.

Later, The Reverend, Grace, Ahcho and Mai Lin travel through the desert on donkey back. As they enter the misty foothills at dusk, Grace feels great love for her husband. Dylan’s "Girl From the North Country" is a perfect melding of setting, romantic love and longing, especially when Dylan sings it with Johnny Cash.

Back at the mission compound, Mai Lin watches over everything. She is a wise woman of strong opinions who does not suffer fools gladly. Like the old woman in Bonnie Raitt’s rendition of "Angel from Montgomery," Mai Lin has seen it all.

As Grace grows weaker physically, her spirit gains strength. The repeating syllables of Regina Spektor’s "Eet" mirrors Grace’s confused thoughts: "It's like forgetting the words to your favorite song./ You can't believe it; you were always singing along./ It was so easy and the words so sweet./You can't remember; you try to move your feet." Grace has forgotten a great deal, but something vital nonetheless grows inside her. Fleet Foxes’ song "Your Protector" starts slowly, the way Grace walks slowly on camel back into the desert, but then gains urgency. She knows now that she "runs with the devil."

Among other things, River of Dust is about religion and a loss of faith, but I’ve saved any overt Christian songs for late in the story when Ahcho finally speaks his mind. He holds fast to his beliefs and loves his Jesus; Neutral Milk Hotel in "King Carrot Flowers, Part Two," may or may not, but they sure wail about him just the same.

Into the desert Grace rides, her body filled with longing, determination and loss. No one sings pain like Patti Smith, especially in "Walking Blind." In a flashback to the Reverend’s night of terror and frenzy in a bleak hamlet, I hear the echoes of Neil Young’s "Four Dead in Ohio." This song remains a war cry through the years, reverberating as a warning all the way to this day. There are consequences to violence that cannot be escaped, even with time. The end of River of Dust finally rises up and Eric Clapton’s sweet voice singing "Tears in Heaven" are the best accompaniment I can imagine.

Virginia Pye and River of Dust links:

the author's website
excerpt from the book
video trailer for the book

River City Reading review
Style Weekly review

CarolineLeavittville interview with the author
Elizabeth Huergo interview with the author
Huffington Post interview with the author
James River Writers interview with the authors
The Quivering Pen interview with the author
Richmond Magazine interview with the author

also at Largehearted Boy:

Book Notes (2012 - ) (authors create music playlists for their book)
Book Notes (2005 - 2011) (authors create music playlists for their book)
my 11 favorite Book Notes playlist essays

100 Online Sources for Free and Legal Music Downloads
52 Books, 52 Weeks (weekly book reviews)
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (weekly comics highlights)
Daily Downloads (free and legal daily mp3 downloads)
guest book reviews
Largehearted Word (weekly new book highlights)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
Shorties (daily music, literature, and pop culture links)
Soundtracked (composers and directors discuss their film's soundtracks)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from the week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists

Book Notes - Various Authors "The Cassoulet Saved Our Marriage"

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.

Previous contributors include Bret Easton Ellis, Kate Christensen, Kevin Brockmeier, George Pelecanos, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Myla Goldberg, Heidi Julavits, Hari Kunzru, and many others.

The Cassoulet Saved Our Marriage: True Tales of Food, Family, and How We Learn to Eat is an impressive essay collection that explores how food helps forge some of our closest relationships, with our families.

Serious Eats wrote of the book:

"The stories are touching and at times brutally honest. Anyone who's ever argued and celebrated with family over a kitchen table can relate to these stories."

Stream a Spotify playlist of these tunes. If you don't have Spotify yet, sign up for the free service.

In their own words, here is the authors' collaborative Book Notes music playlist for their essay collection, The Cassoulet Saved Our Marriage: True Tales of Food, Family, and How We Learn to Eat:

"Still Life on the Half Shell," by K.G. Schneider

Lucinda Williams’ song from her album of the same name, "West." True confessions: I played this song almost every day for my first couple of years in Tallahassee....sometimes several times back to back. My computer desktop image was a photo I took of California at sunset, taken just after we crossed the border into Arizona the day we began our move to Florida. While Williams sang about love and longing, I would dream of driving back toward that sunset, Sandy by my side. As life got easier in Florida, I played it less, but when we were miraculously able to return to our beloved California in 2009, it returned to my playlist, this time with gratitude.

"An American Omelette in Brooklyn," by Sarah Shey

In December, my niece from Iowa cooked supper for me one night. I put on Brandi Carlile for her. When I came back from an errand, I returned to a striking picture: the fragrance of caramelized onion; the buoyant country song "100"; my niece commandeering the stove; and my son oblivious to everything but his book, which he gripped on the sofa. I was given the rare chance to see something I don’t often get to: I have managed to create a home. Bonus track: Carlile’s "Hard Way Home."

"A Case for Soul Food," by Deesha Philyaw

"September," by Earth, Wind, & Fire, is a great song to dance and cook to. It takes me back to my childhood, to house parties with family and friends that went on way past my bedtime. Incidentally, the song also appears on soundtrack for the movie, "Soul Food."

"Red Sauce Days," by Chris Malcomb
Enrico Caruso singing "O Sole Mio"

My mother says that she and her dad used to play opera records together when she was young, and that this is the song that always makes her think of the sauce. "You have to love the sauce while you are stirring it," she says, so "O Sole Mio," the traditional Neapolitan song, is the first tune that she thinks of when she thinks of singing and cooking in the kitchen. So here is Italian tenor Enrico Caruso's version from 1916; we both love how the crackling of the phonograph recalls antiquity, transporting us back to the "old world" and evoking the history of the sauce. I can picture myself in the kitchen, with this playing, the lights dim, a glass of red wine, making the sauce!

"Recipe," by Phyllis Grant
"Kandi" by One EskimO

Be careful. This is an escapist song. It also happens to play a part in my essay. It makes me pause, takes me to the floor, causes me to dream of flying off on a motorcycle, arms wrapped around a body, ear glued to the back of a heart. Dangerous stuff.

"Rachael Ray Saved My Life," by Melissa Clark

For my song, I'm choosing "My Doorbell" by the White Stripes.

Tonally, I feel it captures the essence of Rachael Ray--fun, frantic, silly, and yet it all comes together as a perfect pop song.

I feel like it's the perfect song to crank right before your guests arrive for the fabulous dinner party you're hosting. The food is cooked, the table is set and you've got a rush of nervous pre-party energy which you can dance off to this song. "I've been thinking about my doorbell when ya gonna ring it, when ya gonna ring it?" And at this point, your doorbell will probably ring.

 "Pie-Eyed," by Lisa McNamara

I would recommend "Home Cookin" by Lambert, Hendricks & Ross to go with my essay. The line "I just found a woman/She ain’t nuthin’ for looks/But out in the kitchen, she tends to business and cooks" pretty much captures the essence of my essay; I turned pies into my "weapons of mass seduction" in the absence of the gift of classical physical beauty. But even if you’ve been blessed with natural looks, this jazzy little number by Lambert, Hendricks & Ross is perfect music to bake (or cook) by!

"The Cassoulet Saved Our Marriage," by Deborah Copaken Kogan and Paul Kogan

Paul and I choose this Serge Gainsbourg song:

When we host our cassoulet day, we always have Gainsbourg on the iPod, as it is one of the first CD's we bought when we moved in together back in 1990. His voice transports us back to that era, back to that place we fell in love, and this song in particular ("The Recipe for Crazy Love") speaks specifically of the importance of setting and wine for love, with the relationship itself portrayed as a recipe.

"May It Never Be the Last Brisket," by Stacie Stukin
"Que Sera, Sera" by Sly and the Family Stone

"Talk with Your Mouth Full," by Catherine Newman
Talking Heads, "This Must Be the Place."

Because of the line: "Home is where I want to be / but I guess I'm already there." Also because of the word talking!

"A White Food Disorder," by Dani Klein Modisett

I chose "With a Little Bit of Luck" from the musical My Fair Lady. Moss Hart directed the original Broadway production of this Lerner and Loewe American Musical classic in 1956. With a little bit of luck and the right amount of cheese butter, perhaps my children will some day eat a green vegetable.

 "One Bite At a Time," by Elrena Evans

I had a surprisingly difficult time selecting a song for this essay. Unlike other pieces that I've written, where a song connection is easily apparent, I went round and round and round on this one and couldn't seem to think of anything. Finally I decided to ask my daughter (now eight) what her current favorite song is -- turns out it's "Strut" by People Train. For an essay about bodies and body issues, I can't think of a better pairing than this jubilant, body-positive, celebration of self that is this song. And what a way to celebrate how far we've both come -- good job, kid.

"Vegging Out," by Gregory Dicum

"It's a Zoo," a song that

1) i often listen to while cooking
2) is great
3) could certainly use the exposure
4) sort of captures the feel of my piece, I think

"Lunch Lady," by Caroline Grant

Adam Sandler’s goofy "Lunch Lady" is the song I think of when I tug on my latex gloves to volunteer in my sons’ school lunch room. Happily, I’m not scooping up gluey chop suey and sloppy joes like the hair-netted, orthopedic-shoe-wearing woman in his song; for a growing number of kids -- mine included -- that strict old school lunch lady is becoming as much of a relic as the mystery meat she is dishing out.

"Why Won’t My Kid Eat Foie Gras?" by Jeff Gordinier
"Le Temps de L'Amour," by Françoise Hardy

I can't say for certain whether I heard this reverie on a car radio while heading toward Monte Carlo with my parents on a summer afternoon in the early '80s, but I feel as though I should have. And even if I didn't, it's a song that captures the way I felt back then, in those early adolescent years when I was waking up to the beauty of Mediterranean food and Françoise Hardy herself. So you think an adolescent kid with a jones for grilled octopus and a crush on Françoise Hardy sounds like a character out of a Wes Anderson movie? Then maybe it makes sense that this ode to a time of "friends and adventure" appeared in a pivotal moment in "Moonrise Kingdom" — the scene where the two young runaways take out their plastic turntable and shimmy on the beach.

"Out of the Box," by Lisa Catherine Harper
"California Dreamin’" by the Mamas and the Papas

My essay is about the disorientation I have about two facts: 1) I live in California and 2) My kids are Californian. We eat like Californians. My kids are old enough now that, even if we were to leave the Golden State, California—with its sun, its food, its intangible sense of opportunity--will always be in their blood. Even as a kid in New Jersey, this song embodied the sunny mystery of an impossibly faraway place. It’s groovy, and my kids are groovy, in a way I never ever was, and never will be. Still, a girl can dream.

"Bad and Plenty: Parental Anxiety in the Age of Food Abundance," by Edward Lewine
"Little Martha" by the Allman Brothers

Perfect for cooking a hippy banana bread! 

The Cassoulet Saved Our Marriage links:

the editors' blog
the editor's website

Examiner review
San Jose Mercury News review
Serious Eats review
Tablehopper review

Jungle Red guest post by the editor
SFoodie profile of the editors

also at Largehearted Boy:

Book Notes (2012 - ) (authors create music playlists for their book)
Book Notes (2005 - 2011) (authors create music playlists for their book)
my 11 favorite Book Notes playlist essays

Shorties (Naomi Alderman on Historical Fiction, Kelley Deal on The Breeders' Last Splash Album, and more)

Author Caroline Leavitt interviews herself at The Nervous Breakdown.

Read an excerpt from her new novel, Is This Tomorrow.

PopMatters lists four remarkable 2013 black metal albums.

The Rumpus profiles cartoonist Ariel Schrag.

SPIN shares a glossary of terms used in Vampire Weekend songs.

The Barnes and Noble Review interviews Naomi Alderman about her new novel, The Liars' Gospel.

MN: Are you drawn to many historical novels or novels that reimagine history or myth?

NA: I have read quite a bit of historical fiction, everything from Ellis Peters to Umberto Eco, Hilary Mantel to Rosemary Sutcliffe. I am impressed by all those four -- what I'm unimpressed by is writers who fail to imagine how minds were different in different eras. I think one sees it more in film than novels -- in novels you have to put yourself inside the mind of the characters, perhaps in movies you can get away without doing it. So you get horrors like the moment in Gladiator (which is in general a very good, very Roman-feeling movie) where Commodus berates Marcus Aurelius for not having loved him as a boy. What nonsense. No Roman man would have asked for this from his father, nor would a Roman father have apologized for it. A Roman man might have been justly condemned for not teaching his son the manly virtues, but love...? Irrelevant. One has to understand that people really did think differently in the past.

Bust interviews Kelley Deal about the Breeders reunion and Last Splash tour and reissue.

Flavorwire lists 20 books you should definitely not read in your 20s.

Stereogum lists the 15 best LCD Soundsystem songs.

WKNO profiles independent bookstore Square Books of Oxford, Mississippi.

Bookselling Editor for Publishers Weekly Judith Rosen said Square Books "represents the best of what a rural bookstore can be," and that's the reason the publication named it this year's best bookstore.

The members of Daft Punk talk to All Things Considered about their new album, Random Access Memories.

Author Adam Wilson talks video games with the Gameological Society.

Boing Boing is streaming the soundtrack to The Source Family.

Thought Catalog lists 25 things you didn't know about The Great Gatsby.

Billy Butcher portrays indie rockers as comic book superheroes.

Author Lindsay Hunter discusses her favorite short story at Flavorwire.

Win new novels by Jennifer Gilmore and Monica Drake plus a $100 Threadless gift certificate in this week's contest at Largehearted Boy.

Follow me on Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, Google+, Facebook, and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.

also at Largehearted Boy:

previous Shorties posts (daily news and links from the worlds of music, books, and pop culture)

Daily Downloads (The 2013 Saddle Creek Spring Sampler Album, pacificUV, and more)

Every day, Daily Downloads offers 10 free and legal mp3 downloads, plus free and legal live sets from around the internet.

Today's free and legal mp3 downloads:

The Goodly Beggars: free and legal Chew the Pages EP [mp3]

Great Divide: free and legal Great Divide album [mp3]

Hijo Del Rio: free and legal National Parks album [mp3]

Last Good Tooth: "Problems Leave Out of Mouth" [mp3] from Not Without Work and Rest (out June 28th)

Liz Wood: free and legal Into My Own EP [mp3]

pacificUV: free and legal pacificUV - After the Dream You Are Awake album [mp3]

Ruth Acuff: free and legal This Is the Dream album [mp3]

Various Artists: free and legal Summer 2012 Saddle Creek Sampler album [mp3]

Washa: free and legal Roots EP [mp3]

We Are the City: free and legal Sound Samples, Song Examples album [mp3]

Free and legal live performances at other websites:

Rathborne: 2016-05-14, Brooklyn [mp3]

search for more free and legal music downloads at Largehearted Boy

also at Largehearted Boy:

other daily free and legal mp3 downloads
covers collections
100 Online Sources for Free and Legal Music Downloads

Book Notes - Norah Labiner "Let the Dark Flower Blossom"

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.

Previous contributors include Bret Easton Ellis, Kate Christensen, Kevin Brockmeier, George Pelecanos, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Myla Goldberg, Heidi Julavits, Hari Kunzru, and many others.

Norah Labiner's new novel Let the Dark Flower Blossom is intriguing and clever. Labiner proves herself yet again a master of metafiction in this haunting and challenging book.

Publishers Weekly wrote of the book:

"Labiner, narrating in several distinct and haunting voices, proves herself a metafictional adept. She succeeds in crafting an ambitious, poignant and sharp-tongued novel filled with secrets and ghosts, jealousy and love."

Stream a Spotify playlist of these tunes. If you don't have Spotify yet, sign up for the free service.

In her own words, here is Norah Labiner's Book Notes music playlist for her novel, Let the Dark Flower Blossom:

Let the Dark Flower Blossom is a book about writers who do monstrous things. It's a book, sure, but metaphorically speaking: it's a box of chocolates and a long-stemmed rose to the long-suffering reader. Admit it: you've put up with a lot lately. Everyone is so damned sincere these days! How much pitch-perfect prose must you suffer? How many stark portrayals of the dystopian post-apocalyptic rapture-ready world must you endure? How many precocious child narrators are you to bear? Just how much tragedy can you take? Take a break! Close the door, cut the lights. Don't be afraid. What is there to fear? The past is an ink pen. The future is an abstraction. If the vampires do not get you, then you know the werewolves will. Let's do what we want. Let's talk about actresses we like. Let's talk about Poe, Hawthorne, and Sir Graves Ghastly. This book is my love letter to the plot twist. It's a tip of the top hat to god with a small g and to Hollywood with a capital h; it's a crie de coeur to villagers with pitchforks; a valentine to girls in white nightdresses and the boys who kill them. It's an I'll-grind-your-bones-to-make-my-bread kind of book. It isn't real. It is art! No girls were harmed in the writing of it. No gods were smashed. A few lines were stolen. Not too many graves were robbed. And all the dogs run free. It is a story about characters who like to tell stories. Any resemblance to real monsters is accidental. Any accidents are intentional. Let's talk about what we like. Let's run out the clock on history while the zombies bang at the door. We can talk about songs and movies. Let's read our fortune in the cards. We can talk about what it was like way back when we were kids. Let's ride bikes and imagine that there is a place called the future. This book has all of the things you like and none of the things you don't like. All the girls are beautiful. All the hatchets are very sharp. It takes place in an old house during a snowstorm. There is a radio playing in a dark room. If there is a late night-station taking requests and sending out dedications to characters in novels; if there were such a thing—I'd like to send these songs out to my monsters.

"Ever" - Flipper

For Pru, who lies.

"The End of the World" - Skeeter Davis

For Eloise, who tells the truth.

"Tusk" - Fleetwood Mac

For Louis, who suspects.

"California Dreamin'" - The Mamas & the Papas

For Zigouiller, who loves Eloise.

"You're the Top" - Ethel Merman
For Zola, who loves Zigouiller.
"Be My Baby" - The Ronettes

For Beatrice, who says that she is happy.

"Oh Bondage Up Yours!" - X-Ray Spex

For Inj, who dreams of being murdered.

"Losing My Edge" - LCD Soundsystem

For Ben, who knows all that there is to know.

"Underground Babylon" - Catholic Discipline

For Roman, who never finds out which one of you wrote with the greasy lipstick, "Babylon must fall," on the bathroom mirror.

"When I Paint My Masterpiece" - Bob Dylan

For Sheldon, who tells the story.

"Your Future Our Clutter" - The Fall

For Susu, who does not.

Norah Labiner and Let the Dark Flower Blossom links:

Kirkus Reviews review
Minneapolis Star Tribune review

Largehearted Boy Book Notes essay by the author for German for Travelers

also at Largehearted Boy:

Book Notes (2012 - ) (authors create music playlists for their book)
Book Notes (2005 - 2011) (authors create music playlists for their book)
my 11 favorite Book Notes playlist essays

Book Notes - Cecil Castellucci "Odd Duck"

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.

Previous contributors include Bret Easton Ellis, Kate Christensen, Kevin Brockmeier, George Pelecanos, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Myla Goldberg, Heidi Julavits, Hari Kunzru, and many others.

Odd Duck, the new children's book written by Cecil Castellucci and illustrated by Sara Varon, is an instant classic that celebrates friendship, individuality, and the oddness in all of us.

Booklist wrote of the book:

"Varon's gentle art and Castellucci's nuanced writing combine in a sweet, quiet tale that celebrates the joys of being unique."

Stream a Spotify playlist of these tunes. If you don't have Spotify yet, sign up for the free service.

In her own words, here is Cecil Castellucci's Book Notes music playlist for her children's book, Odd Duck:

illustration by Sara Varon

My new book is for the birds. Or more precisely it's for you odd ducks. It's a hybrid picture book /graphic novel for kids but really it is also for adults. It is illustrated by the wonderful Sara Varon (Go pick up her book Robot Dreams if you haven't read it yet. It's brilliant.) The story is simple tale from the pond. Theodora, a duck who lives by herself and has her own way of doing things – not flying, (not even south for winter), swimming with a teacup on her head, reading space duck mysteries, space books and romances, and eating mango salsa on her duck pellets - has her life disrupted when a new duck, Chad moves into the empty house next door. Chad has dyed his unkempt feathers strange colors, he dances like a wild thing and he makes large art sculptures which he proudly displays in his front yard. From the get go you can tell that these two ducks are most likely not going to get along. But as in any odd couple story, with a little time and understanding, these duck hearts just might open up. So here for you are Odd Duck's Theodora and Chad's "Songs for the Birds."

Theodora: "There are a lot of songs I like called 'Little Bird.' But Chad, are you sure some the songs you've picked are actually music and not just random noise?"

Thea likes things to be a little mellow. A little bit dreamy. She likes something to listen to while she gazes up at the night stars. Something lyrical that she can sip rose hip tea to. And most of all Theadora likes music that you can sway and swoon to.

"Little Bird" by The Weepies from Hideaway
"I'm Like a Bird" by Nelly Furtado from Whoa, Nelly!
"Tiny Birds" by Yo La Tengo from Summer Sun
"Little Bird" by Imogen Heap from Ellipse
"Talking Bird" by Death Cab for Cutie from Narrow Stairs
"Morning Bird" by Sade from Soldier of Love
"Singing To The Birds" by Lisa Germano from Excerpts From A Love Circus
"Lady Bird" by Fats Navarro from Lady Bird

Chad: "Oh! I like all the songs on your list, Thea. I like a great 'Lady Bird' song. I've got one you might like!"

Chad likes his music to be bold and upfront. He wants to be able to shake a feather or two, but he also wants something that can to inspire him when he's outside working on his art. Chad's tastes are wide and eclectic. He's not afraid of classic rock and he's bold enough to appreciate a good girl ripper. He can also dial it down and get a little soft.

"Lady Bird" by Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood from Nancy & Lee
"Free Bird" by Lynyrd Skynyrd
"Little Bird" by Annie Lennox from Diva
"Bird Song" by Florence + The Machine from Lungs
"Three Little Birds" by Bob Marley from Exodus
"Night Bird Flying" by Jimi Hendrix
"Pretty Bird" by Jenny Lewis from Acid Tongue
"Surfin' Bird" by The Trashmen from Tube City - The Best of The Trashmen

Cecil Castellucci and Odd Duck links:

the author's website
the illustrator's website
the author's Wikipedia entry
excerpt from the book
order a signed copy of the book

100 Scope Notes review
Kirkus Reviews review
Publishers Weekly review

Comic Book resources interview with the author
Hero Complex interview with the author
Largehearted Boy Book Notes essay by the author for Year of the Beasts

also at Largehearted Boy:

Book Notes (2012 - ) (authors create music playlists for their book)
Book Notes (2005 - 2011) (authors create music playlists for their book)
my 11 favorite Book Notes playlist essays

Shorties (An Oral History of The Breeders' Last Splash Album, Neil Gaiman on Writing for Money, and more)

SPIN shares an oral history of the Breeders' 1993 Last Splash album.

Talk of the Nation interviews Neil Gaiman about his new book, Make Good Art.

On money as a motivator

"Whenever I did something where the only reason for doing it was money — and this was a lesson that I learned beginning with being a 23-year-old author hired to write a book about Duran Duran — that whenever I did something and the only reason for doing it was the money, normally something would go terribly wrong. And I normally wouldn't get the money and then I wouldn't have anything. Whereas, whenever I did anything where what prompted my doing it was being interested, being excited, caring, thinking this is going to be fun, even if things went wrong and I didn't get the money, I had something I was proud of. ...

Flavorwire shares 25 Brian Eno quotes.

Bookworm interviews Aleksandar Hemon about his new memoir The Book of My Lives.

PopMatters profiles Matthew Cooper, the man behind the band Eluvium.

Now, with Nightmare Ending—a voluminous, 83-minute double album—Cooper has brought Eluvium to its creative peak. Things are no longer about a single, unique experiment or sonic idea; instead, Nightmare Ending collects every single facet of Eluvium into a gorgeous, unforgettable whole that’s undoubtedly the defining record in Cooper's body of work. From the ambient pop epic "Don’t Get Any Closer" to the near claustrophobic piano plinking of "Entendre", Nightmare Ending spans the intimate and the epic, the quiet and the explosive. It’s not, however, an album of oppositional traits; rather, it’s about synthesis and integration.

Rutu Modan talks to the Jewish Journal about her new graphic novel The Property.

LA Music Blog lists the top five up and coming electronic music acts.

Author S.E. Hinton discusses her love for the television series Supernatural with Flavorwire.

The Mountain Goats are reissuing a remastered edition of their album All Hail West Texas, which will include bonus tracks and an essay by John Darnielle on his songwriting process.

Bookish lists its favorite short stories.

Unleashed! lists cover song posts at Largehearted Boy.

Bryton Taylor is a food and literature blog that finds convergence between these two wonderful things.

All Things Considered examines Googles new music streaming service.

Flavorwire recommends 10 "fantastical" novels you should read immediately.

Win new novels by Jennifer Gilmore and Monica Drake plus a $100 Threadless gift certificate in this week's contest at Largehearted Boy.

Follow me on Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, Google+, Facebook, and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.

also at Largehearted Boy:

previous Shorties posts (daily news and links from the worlds of music, books, and pop culture)

Daily Downloads (Camera Obscure, Sea Wolf, and more)

Every day, Daily Downloads offers 10 free and legal mp3 downloads, plus free and legal live sets from around the internet.

Today's free and legal mp3 downloads:

Beach: "Ibuprofen" [mp3]

Camera Obscura: "Fifth in LIne to the Throne" [mp3] from Desire Lines (out June 4th)

Dead Stars: "Fractured" [mp3] from High Gain EP (out June 4th)

Hani Zahra: "Cannibal Crime (Wait Wait Wait)" [mp3]

Howth: "Superfreak" [mp3]

Kyle Andrews: "The Way to Wonder" [mp3] from Brighter Than The Sun (out July 23rd)

The Racer: "Settle" [mp3] from Passengers

Saltland: "Treehouse Schemes" [mp3] from I Thought It Was Us But It Was All Of Us

Sea Wolf: free and legal Old World Romance: Selects and Outtakes EP [mp3]

Various Artists: eight free and legal album compilations from Deep Elm Records [mp3]

Free and legal live performances at other websites:

Aspiga: Switchboard session [mp3]

search for more free and legal music downloads at Largehearted Boy

also at Largehearted Boy:

other daily free and legal mp3 downloads
covers collections
100 Online Sources for Free and Legal Music Downloads

Book Notes - Norman Lock "Love Among the Particles"

In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.

Previous contributors include Bret Easton Ellis, Kate Christensen, Kevin Brockmeier, George Pelecanos, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Myla Goldberg, Heidi Julavits, Hari Kunzru, and many others.

Norman Lock once again proves himself a master storyteller in his new collection, Love Among the Particles. These stories are brilliantly imaginative and wonderfully unsettling.

Kirkus Reviews wrote of the book:

"[Lock’s stories] are gems, rich in imagination and language. Readers will happily suspend disbelief, perhaps even finding particles of humor . . . And beyond the entertainment lie 21st-century conundrums: What really exists? Are we each, ultimately, alone and lonely? Where is technology taking humankind? For all their convolutions of space and time, these stories are remarkably easy to follow and savor."

Stream a Spotify playlist of these tunes. If you don't have Spotify yet, sign up for the free service.

In his own words, here is Norman Lock's Book Notes music playlist for his short story collection, Love Among the Particles:

I do not listen to music when writing – fascinated as I am by the sound of my own voice, as it dictates lines whose music is sufficient. I am incapable, as well, of giving my attention to two things simultaneously, and no doubt the rhythms enlivening my prose would be overwhelmed by music's more forceful character. I do not believe that music is in any way central to my writing, as it may be to some others and as painting certainly is for me. But music is and has been always a pleasure, and for the purpose of this playlist, I shall give it its due. I will say this, however: John Adams's "The Chairman Dances," from Nixon in China, which I heard for the first time in 1985, determined, in no small way, the course of my mature work. That sardonic and sensuous foxtrot confirmed for me what Doctorow's Ragtime had first brought to my attention in the 70s: that one could bring into one's fictions – a dreaming on paper – persons who had had actual lives, as opposed to persons with equally plausible and often more satisfying imagined ones. (That being said, one can hardly deny that an aspect of real life, in any guise, is always at least partially imagined.) And so, the dancing Chairman Mao, a charming conceit, drew me after him into realms of story-telling that led, first, to A History of the Imagination (FC2, 2004), then Land of the Snow Men (Calamari Press, 2005, in which Captain Scott and his doomed Antarctic explorers waltz on the Ross Ice Shelf), and now – thanks to the good offices of Erika Goldman and the excellent Bellevue Literary Press – Love Among the Particles (May, 2013). In each of these chronicles of the marvelous, which is the incursion of the fantastic into the "real" (is it an affectation to insist always on enclosing that word in quotation marks?), someone is "dancing." I mean by this, that I delight in the improbable, chance convergence of persons from the world as it is truly composed: by an exterior and an interior – and when once you allow the latter, you are helpless not to accept the supremacy of the purely imaginary.

Now to play David Gutowski's delightful game (for me, play is an essential aspect of my fiction), I'll associate pieces of music for the stories in my Love Among the Particles:

(1) "The Monster in Winter." Since the monster happens to be Hyde, who has survived his tormentor Jekyll by a quarter-century's confinement in Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum, I think it appropriate that we listen to Arvo Pärt's Mirror in the Mirror while Hyde regards himself helplessly in his other self. We might also, if you like, hear Elgar's Enigma Variations.

(2) "The Captain Is Sleeping." Before it, too, vanishes into a world of ice and silence, The Light Orchestra Society regales the strange assortment of passengers aboard the labyrinthine ship The Minos (after the Minotaur). While the central character (who, as in so much of my other fiction, happens to be me) descends into the interior of the ship, like Orpheus in search of his ravished Eurydice, let us have Offenbach's "Infernal Gallop" from Orpheus in the Underworld.

(3) "The Mummy's Bitter and Melancholy Exile." There does seem to be ample music being made inside my stories. In this, a mummy, at large in New York City in 1934, shares a cigarette and a piano bench on New Year's Eve with Noël Coward, while he plays Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. Earlier, the Mummy was a guest, with Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy, of The Chase and Sanborn Hour, when Benny Goodman may have sat in to play his theme "Let's Dance," in which he swings Carl Maria von Weber's Invitation to the Dance.

(4) "A Theory of Time." We can't be sure whether the solitary train traveling with uncertain purpose through the earth's most desolate regions terminates – in the far distance – in a circus wagon or something more sinister. But let's listen to Stravinsky's wry Circus Polka, or, if you wish, Villa-Lobos's toccata Little Train of Caipira as it sambas noisily through Brazil. Or, if you want to experience a more hectic time signature, Honneger's Pacific 231.

(5) "The Gaiety of Henry James." Having abandoned his art and Edith Wharton (whose straw hat was despoiled of its cherries by an orangutan in the Central Park Zoo) for la belle époque, Henry James will fly "into the clear blue Parisian air – upheld by waves of desire, transmitted by M. Eiffel's magic tower like a radio program of boleros." And though we are by now sick to death of it, we may listen to Ravel's Bolero – or, less familiar and more mysterious, Debussy's bolero from La soirée dans Grenade.

(6) "Ideas of Space." How does one accompany, musically, my bewildered Umberto da Silva across the Adriatic coastal plain and through successive meanings imposed imperialistically upon it by an eighteenth-century painter, militarist, surveyor, historian, businessman, and prototypical industrialist? Perhaps with something far in the van of Modernism such as Elliott Carter's Symphony of Three Orchestras. Now, I do not pretend to an ear for musical subtlety or intricate structure, but the notion of three orchestras imposing their separate ideas on a single space fascinates me.

(7) "The Sleep Institute." Once again a character in my own fiction (in this, in fact, a fiction-making character whose well of invention has run dry), I have checked myself into a sleep institute to acquire a new mental imagery. To cultivate a sympathetic entrancement, you might listen to Copland's Quiet City or else Philip Glass's Music in 12 Parts – or, if you feel yourself in the least danger of falling asleep over my story, his Akhnaten. (For those of you who have already fallen asleep, I suggest Varèse's Ionisation.

(8) "Love in the Steam Age." In this, my epithalamium to steam and its nineteenth-century contrivances, the narrator (me, again) and his disingenuous lover attend a concert of the Empire Steam Calliope. Its "burbles, chirps, and hisses, accompanied by the clanging of cast-iron radiators" might remind you of Morton Subotnick's lovely, otherworldly Silver Apples of the Moon, or an example of musique concrète. But maybe something from a 70s album of Bach played on a Moog would be nearer the mark (which is to say, nearer the noise).

(9) "Ravished by Death." My retelling of Alberto Casella's play Death Takes a Holiday (you may know the Fredric March 1934 film better) ought to have a musical score characterized by a majestic slowness (my ambition was to write something quite Robert Wilson-like in its glacial unfolding). You can listen to a Phillip Glass composition, again; but I propose, instead, Vaughan Williams's Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis (for its wrenching and pensive melancholy) or Puccini's "Largo Religioso Sostenuto Molto" from Tosca. Or else Rószsa's movie music for Lost Weekend (with a Dies Irae thrown in for good measure).

(10) "The Love of Stanley Marvel & Claire Moon." I wrote this story thirty-five years ago to see whether gravely important themes of love, betrayal, war, and death could be handled with the colors and casual structure of a comic book. We might listen to some of Satie's eccentric miniatures – say, Sports et divertissements, written near the time in which my story takes place: before, during, and immediately after World War I. Or for its brightness, a Scott Joplin rag or a jazz tune from 1917 – say, W.C. Handy's "Joe Turner's Blues." (In my story, someone plays "Where the Mountains Meet the Moon" on a ukulele, a piece I once heard on an ancient record in my grandparents' house.)

(11) "To Each According to His Sentence." Determined to disappear for good inside another's literary text (what better sanctuary for a misanthropic author?), I (no point in dissembling) enter the depths of Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera, where the Phantom holds sway and plays Bach's Passacaglia and Fugue. Other music figures in the text, notably Gounod's The Funeral March of a Marionette and Saint-Saëns Danse Macabre.

(12) "Tango in Amsterdam." Any tango will do to accompany this story of insouciant authorial intrusion in the lives of Peter and Karin, a Dutch married couple, and their talking dog Maus. (Maus speaks a low Dutch, of course.) We might hear a tango by Satie or by Stravinsky or by Ástor Piazzolla – or even Milton Babbitt's It Takes 12 to Tango, which I have never heard. The story is light, a confection that plays with a few postmodernist themes. In all candor, I must tell you that no tango is ever heard in my story, although I do resist – ostentatiously – the temptation to have Peter tango with the heroic yachtsman who saves his Karin and Maus from drowning. An occasion as splendidly improbable as Chairman Mao's sudden swerve out of character in John Adams's "The Chairman Dances."

(13) "The Brothers Ascend." A meeting in the time of legend of certain persons who figured largely in the early twentieth-century imagination: Freud, H.G. Wells and his Time Traveler, Huck Finn and Jim disembarked from their raft, Freud, and the brothers Wilbur and Orville Wright, who, at story's end, vanish – "dissolved into higher mathematics, or Paradise, wearing raiment of light...." You might hear in that final ascent into myth Vaughan Williams's The Lark Ascending – or, perhaps, a John Cage construction for wood or metal as the wind might play it in the struts of the brothers' mythic aeroplane.

(14) "Love Among the Particles." In this the first story of the book's concluding trilogy, I am reduced by celestial accident to a swarm of intelligent subatomic particles and, having visited places of interest such as the New York Public Library, Tahiti, Seville, a Magellanic Cloud, and Darwin's Gálapagos Islands, compose my thoughts on time and space and loneliness, in a word processor. (I am data after all!) The accompaniment to this absurd picaresque (possessing serious themes!) most certainly is electronic. Music by Brian Eno, Stockhausen, Milton Babbitt, or Wuorinen (especially his Time's Encomium) will do.

Norman Lock and Love Among the Particles links:

the author's website

Akashic Books' review
Kirkus Reviews review

also at Largehearted Boy:

Book Notes (2012 - ) (authors create music playlists for their book)
Book Notes (2005 - 2011) (authors create music playlists for their book)
my 11 favorite Book Notes playlist essays

Atomic Books Comics Preview - May 15, 2013

In the weekly Atomic Books Comics Preview, Benn Ray highlights notable new comics and graphic novels.

Benn Ray is the owner of Atomic Books, an independent bookstore in Baltimore. The Mobtown Shank is his blog, and his comic Said What? is syndicated weekly in the Baltimore Sun's B-Paper.

Atomic Books has been named one of Bizarre Magazine's 51 geekiest places on the planet, as well as one of Flavorwire's 10 greatest comic and graphic novel stores in America.

Adult Babysitting Volume 1
MarYanna Hoggatt

Adult Babysitting Volume 2
MarYanna Hoggatt

MarYanna spent years slinging booze in a tiny neighborhood pub in Portland and all she has to show for it is this excellent comics series that collects her anecdotes and drink recipes. Easily one of my favorite new mini comics.

Adventure Time: Marceline And The Scream Queens Volume 1
by various

Adventure Time: Playing With Fire Volume 1
by various

Whether you love Marceline and Princess Bubblegum or Fire Princess, this week offers up 2 Adventure Time treats. Marceline & The Scream Queens collects the mini-series where Princess Bubblegum joins Marceline's rock band for a tour across Ooo. Playing With Fire is an original black & white (slightly manga-style) graphic novel that focuses on the Flame Princess and her own adventure, romance with Finn and wrestling with the call of evil.

The Authority Volume 1
by Warren Ellis / Mark Millar / Bryan Hitch / Frank Quitely

Warren Ellis's hit superhero series is back in print with a deluxe hardcover edition. The Authority isn't your average superhero pablum - it's sort of like quality superhero comics extra plus.

Coffin Cuties #1 / Playnerd #1
by Tuffnerd / Mike Hearse

While this adult pin-up magazine isn't an actual comic, it certainly has a comic spirit. It's a flip mag, with one side featuring horror-based pin-ups (Coffin Cuties) and the other featuring sci-fi-based pin-ups (Playnerd). Playful, sexy, naughty, fun.

Dungeon Family
by Matt Furie

Furie is best-known for the hit humor comic series, Boy's Club. Dungeon Family is a snappy, full-color collection of his groteques - trippy monster drawings.

Wicked Vibes #1
by Dillon Hallen / various

Wicked Vibes is a punk, underground type of modern Tales From The Crypt. An array of creepy and/or gross stories, all written by Dillon Hallen with a diversity of artists.

Questions, concerns, comments or gripes – e-mail benn@atomicbooks.com. If there’s a comic I should know about, send it my way at Atomic, c/o Atomic Books 3620 Falls Rd., Baltimore, MD 21211.

Atomic Books & Benn Ray links:

Atomic Books website
Atomic Books on Twitter
Atomic Books on Facebook
Benn Ray's blog (The Mobtown Shank)
Benn Ray's comic, Said What?

also at Largehearted Boy:

other Atomic Books Comics Preview lists (weekly new comics & graphic novel highlights)

52 Books, 52 Weeks
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Book Notes (authors create music playlists for their book)
guest book reviews
Largehearted Word (weekly new book highlights)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)

Largehearted WORD Books of the Week - May 15, 2013

In the Largehearted Word series, the staff of Brooklyn's WORD bookstore highlights several new books released this week.

WORD is an independent neighborhood bookstore in Greenpoint, the northernmost neighborhood of Brooklyn, that recently celebrated its sixth anniversary. Our primary goal is to be whatever our community needs us to be, which currently means carrying a lot of paperback fiction (especially classics), cookbooks, board books, and absurdly cute cards and stationery. In addition, we're fiends for a good event, from the classic author reading and Q&A to potlucks and a basketball league (and anything set in a bar). We're a small operation, just 1000 square feet and four people, but we read too much, so it all works out. If a weekly dose of WORD here isn't enough for you, follow us on Twitter: @wordbrooklyn.

WORD also hosts the monthly Largehearted Lit reading series, featuring authors who participated in this blog's Book Notes series and musical guests.

Make Good Art
by Neil Gaiman

The commencement speech Gaiman gave in 2012 at Philadelphia's University of the Arts gets a lovely gift book treatment from designer Chip Kidd.

Astronaut Academy: Re-Entry
by Dave Roman

This follow-up to Astronaut Academy: Zero Gravity is just as action-packed and space-tastic as the first. Your ten-year-old (and inner ten-year-old) want this immediately.

Beautiful Ruins
by Jess Walter

Walter's highly praised, transcontinental, decade-spanning novel is now in paperback.

River Cottage Veg
by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

The latest addition to the River Cottage subsection of your cookbook shelf is a hefty and mouthwatering tome with more than 200 recipes.

WORD Brooklyn links:

WORD website
WORD Tumblr
WORD on Twitter
WORD's Facebook page
WORD's Flickr photos

also at Largehearted Boy:

other Largehearted Word Books of the Week (weekly new book highlights)

Online "Best Books of 2012" Lists

52 Books, 52 Weeks (my yearly reading project)
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (weekly comics & graphic novel highlights)
Book Notes (authors create music playlists for their book)
guest book reviews
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)

Shorties (Daft Punk, Translating Haruki Murakami, and more)

The Asahi Shimbun explores the process of publishing Haruki Murakami's new novel in English.

Gabriel said Murakami approached him late last year about translating the work.

He plans to complete the translation by the year-end, with publication expected in 2014.

"It is a very realistic book, like 'Norwegian Wood'," Gabriel said in an e-mail interview. "To me, it seems more serious, even somber, compared to some of his other novels, but one ultimately that is hopeful."

Evolver.fm examines Daft Punk's decision to stream its new album at iTunes.

...these links, which are seriously on just about any music, tech, or culture blog right now, will remain intact long after iTunes stops this free stream, which could happen at any time (probably the moment the album goes on sale next Tuesday, or Monday in the UK). They will live on for years, drawing curious listeners of the future to — where else — the iTunes purchase page for the record, which will then have only short samples of the songs, and of course the “buy” button.

The New York Times interviews the album's producer.

The Huffington Post shares trivia about the band.

Pitchfork profiles the band.

Author Benjamin Percy discusses his favorite literary passage at the Atlantic.

The most terrifying moment in any horror story is when a noise is heard—a noise behind a closet door; a noise heard in an attic, or the basement; a noise heard in a thicket of bushes; a noise heard deep in a cave—and a person pursues the sound. We always want to yell out: Don't go there. It's that moment of suspense, the second before the bogeyman is revealed, that is the most gripping. After the door opens, after we shine a flashlight on whatever awaits, the audience might laugh or scream but ultimately they feel relief. Because whatever is provided by the author or filmmaker is never as bad as what we imagine ourselves.

Cover Me shares a collection of covers of David Byrne songs.

SPIN is streaming the new Japanther album, Eat Like Lisa Act Like Bart.

The Guardian examines the literary legacy of WG Sebald.

Rocks Off lists the most disappointing goth albums.

Fresh Air interviews Robert Caro about his series of Lyndon Johnson biographies.

Elle profiles singer-songwriter Pete Yorn's new band, The Olms.

George Saunders discusses his favorite short story at Flavorwire.

All Things Considered interviews Vampire Weekend frontman Ezra Koenig about the band's new album, Modern Vampires of the City.

Pop Candy lists its 25 favorite books from the past 25 years.

Flavorwire lists underrated Britpop songs.

Biographile lists recently published biographies of obscure inventors.

The A.V. Club wonders if oral histories are the best way to write about music eras and genres.

Bret Easton Ellis was interviewed by the Reddit community.

Win new novels by Jennifer Gilmore and Monica Drake plus a $100 Threadless gift certificate in this week's contest at Largehearted Boy.

Follow me on Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, Google+, Facebook, and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.

also at Largehearted Boy:

previous Shorties posts (daily news and links from the worlds of music, books, and pop culture)