Stephen Delaney

“We have been taught to be ashamed of not being 'outgoing.' But a writer's job is ingoing.”

— Ursula K. Le Guin

#writing #quote

Deb Olin Unferth's EARTH 7 cover: on the horizon of a desert, two figures hold hands. Around them is the vastness and beauty of outer space.

Thrilled to announce that in July 2026, we are publishing the magical EARTH 7 by Deb Olin Unferth. A love story set against both a love letter to planet Earth, and a portrait of its slow demise, EARTH 7 is a novel for our times, and for all times dauntbookspublishing.co.uk/book/earth-7/

“Description is hard. Remember that all description is an opinion about the world. Find a place to stand.”

— Anne Enright

#writing #fiction

Love this New Year's poem by Naomi Shihab Nye (recommended on the @matchbooklitmag.bsky.social Substack): www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/48597/...

“Whether we are happy or unhappy leads us to write one way or another. When we are happy our imagination is stronger; when we are unhappy our memory works with greater vitality.”

—Natalia Ginzburg

My favorite books this year:

INTO THE WEEDS - Lydia Davis
THE PELICAN CHILD - Joy Williams
MAN IN THE HOLOCENE - Max Frisch
SHORT: AN INTERNATIONAL ANTHOLOGY
MOON SONGS - Carol Emshwiller
CATASTROPHE - Dino Buzzati

#booksky

3 Ways to Become a Better Reader Always Have a Book With You I read somewhere that authors are voracious readers. I would imagine so. When I read, I also feel the urge to create something of my own. Likewise, I don’t think I’ve ev…

Hwang Bo-Reum recommends little ways to cultivate your reading (and writing) life.

“A story happens when two equally appealing forces, or characters, or ideas try to occupy the same place at the same time, and they’re both right.”

— Amy Hempel

#amwriting #fiction

Happy pub day to The Pelican Child by Joy Williams! To celebrate, we’ve unlocked her Book Post Diary: Hemingway and His Houses.

Read here → books.substack.com/p/diary-joy-...

@aaknopf.bsky.social #EduSky #Books

“The whole language of writing for me is finding out what you don’t want to know, what you don’t want to find out. But something forces you to anyway.”

— James Baldwin

#writing #fiction

Thomas Pynchon Has Been Warning Us About American Fascism the Whole Time Paul Thomas Anderson’s adaptations of Thomas Pynchon’s novels—first Inherent Vice in 2014, and now One Battle After Another in 2025—may be tipping the scales, with more first-time Pynchon readers f…

In @literaryhub.bsky.social, @devintoshea.bsky.social describes how movies are popularizing the classic #Pynchon theme: "The war between the powerful and the powerless."
lithub.com/thomas-pynch...

The Flag of Ahab | Charles Baxter On the literature and politics of charisma.

Read Charles Baxter on the literature and politics of charisma. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/f...

“Always, where there is darkness, there must be a hint of light, and where there is brightness, some shadow play. Without this tonal range of mood orchestration, tension and artistic effect are lost.”

— Aimee Parkison

#writing #fiction

Betwixt or Bewitched? Rethinking the “Middlebrow” with Dino Buzzati Reframed as a “bewitched middlebrow,” Buzzati’s fiction re-enters literary history not as a comforting escape, but as a sharp tool for existential inquiry.

In a new review, Caterina Domeneghini studies a surge in translation to English of the work of Dino Buzzati. “This new translation project doesn’t just revive Buzzati,” she argues, “it reframes him.”

the weight of stillness, the power of white space Photo by Filip Kominik on Unsplash

My free September newsletter...

open.substack.com/pub/artoffla...

This probably can't be bottled, but some books definitely lower blood pressure and help one breathe.

#booksky

Exploring Octavia Butler’s Beginnings as a Sci-Fi Trailblazer It was Octavia Margaret who gave her daughter the spark to even consider a writing career. She saw her quiet, bookish ten-year-old daughter writing, saw the delight on her face as she created, and …

“She became fascinated with how human beings—especially those who didn’t have much power—could empower themselves and others and change the world.” What Octavia Butler’s early writings reveal about her trajectory as a literary icon.

“We sleep in language, if language doesn’t come to wake us with its strangeness.”

— Robert Kelly

#reading #writing

“I hate judgments that only crush and don’t transform.”

— Elias Canetti

#booksky

How to respond to disgruntled readers.

Where to Submit Presses | Chapbooks | Journals + Anthologies | Fellowships + Other Opportunities Last updated July 3, 2025 If you are an editor or publisher and would like your journal, press, or literary organiza…

Heavy Feather Review's Where to Submit resource (updated for July 2025) is invaluable and full of presses, journals, and sites open for submissions.

heavyfeatherreview.org/calls/

“Habitualization devours objects, clothes, furniture, one’s wife, and the fear of war … Art exists to help us recover the sensation of life; it exists to make us feel things, to make the stone stony.”

― Victor Shklovsky

#writing #art

“One of the strangest things about writing well is that it requires two different zones in the brain - rigor and recklessness - simultaneously.”
- Carole Maso

CANONGATE TO PUBLISH URSULA K. LE GUIN’S SELECTED WRITING ON LITERATURE CANONGATE TO PUBLISH URSULA K. LE GUIN’S SELECTED WRITING ON LITERATURE

Thrilled to announce Canongate will be publishing
WORDS ARE MY MATTER by Pulitzer Prize winner by Ursula K. Le Guin. A manual investigating the depth, breadth and importance of contemporary fiction.

canongate.co.uk/news/canonga...

Lydia Davis's INTO THE WEEDS (on how and why she writes) is due out September 16!

#booksky #writing

I like to keep an open book by my sink every morning. (Poetry and flash fiction work best.) It puts me in a better mood and keeps the world at bay.

#booksky

Deb Olin Unferth's "Likeable." Each time I read it it surprises me.

muumuuhouse.com/dou.fiction2...

Sorry I'm slow. Happy Birthday! 😀

“The mysterious does not spell itself out in capital letters, as many writers believe, but is always between, an interstice.”

— Julio Cortázar

#writing #fiction

Kazuo Ishiguro Reflects on Never Let Me Go, 20 Years Later While I’d been busy writing my fourth and fifth novels, my study had mysteriously transformed itself around me into a kind of miniature indoor jungle. Everywhere were dusty mountains of scribbled-o…

After 20 years, Kazuo Ishiguro reflects on the decades-long process behind Never Let Me Go.