What a charmer
Wow: those of us who read Phyllis Rose's Parallel Lives already knew that Charles Dickens was a total asshole to his wife Catherine, but a recent discovery indicates that he was even worse than previously supposed...
Not the target audience, I guess
Apparently, the first trailer for the upcoming Hellboy reboot went over so badly they're cutting another one, and comic creator Mike Mignola says it's "so much better". I watched the first trailer, and while it doesn't seem...
Young Men in Spats, by P.G. Wodehouse
The last book I reviewed left me convinced we're all about to die, so this week I wanted something soothing—and soothing, for me, usually means P.G. Wodehouse. I picked up a copy of Young Men in Spats, a collection of Drones Club, Mulliner, and Uncle Fred short stories, and, while definitely not the author's most impressive work, it did its anxiety-reducing job...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Young Men in Spats, by P.G. Wodehouse
After our latest Book Giveaway, I decided to balance things out with little P.G. Wodehouse: our current book on offer is his short story collection Young Men in Spats. A full review will follow shortly, and this giveaway will run through 5/10/19...
Yep. Here they are.
I'm not a Game of Thrones fan, and, even if I was, I'd balk at the $180 price tag, but it is my duty to report that Adidas has released their full line of Game of Thrones-inspired sneakers...
New-old Poirot
NPR recently posted a glowing review of The ABC Murders, a three-part British miniseries that is now available via Amazon Prime...
The Water Will Come, by Jeff Goodell
It has been more than six months since my last review of a gloomy nonfiction book about water, so I'm clearly way overdue. Today's pick is The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World, the latest effort from Rolling Stone contributing editor Jeff Goodell...
Weekly Book Giveaway: The Water Will Come, by Jeff Goodell
If you, like me, are fond of reading deeply unsettling nonfiction accounts of potential disasters, today could be your lucky day: our current Book Giveaway is Jeff Goodell's The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World. It's just as cheery as it sounds...
And just think of their poor livers
In honor of Valentine's Day, The Mary Sue just posted a tribute to Nick and Nora Charles, the married pair at the center of The Thin Man film and its sequels. I've never found the pair quite as endearing as this author does, but...
Roswell 2.0
Huh... I didn't think anyone was crying out for a reboot of the mildly enjoyable Roswell TV series of my teenage years, but apparently they were, and the new version has made several changes...
TEARS
Man, this is a blow: Kate Beaton, creator of my beloved webcomic Hark! A Vagrant, has officially retired the series. She has several very good reasons for moving on, but...
Sleepless: Vol. 1, by Sarah Vaughn
A few months ago, I asked my local comic shop owner for his honest opinion of the new Books of Magic reboot. (I loved the original series as a kid, but I've been burned before by the various attempts at re-starting it, and my comics budget is not limitless.) He hesitated—clearly, a sale's a sale—but...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Sleepless, by Sarah Vaughn
Our current Book Giveaway pick is the first volume (of a two-book series) of Sarah Vaughn's new graphic novel Sleepless, which combines high fantasy, romance, and A+++ artwork. A full review will follow shortly, and this giveaway will run through 5/10/19...
Grim but necessary
In important albeit deeply depressing news, Laurie Halse Anderson recently wrote an essay for Time entitled "I’ve Talked With Teenage Boys About Sexual Assault for 20 Years. This Is What They Still Don’t Know". I'd like to think...
So many questions
Man, this new Nancy Drew movie is really leaning in on the "Nancy Drew = Sammy Keyes" vibe, isn't it? I don't object, exactly, but...
Book-nerd tourism
LitHub recently posted a guide to the many literary hotspots of Yorkshire. There are quite a few I could willingly miss (much as I admire her work, very little about Sylvia Plath's life says "let me visit these spots on vacation"), but...
Whiplash!
Well, this is disappointing: after literally years of waiting for Jenny Crusie's next book, St. Martin's Press has decided that supernaturals are over and declined to publish it...
Devil's Daughter, by Lisa Kleypas
After three mediocre-ranging-to-outright-disappointing installments in her Ravenels series, Lisa Kleypas has made an unexpected return to form. With Devil's Daughter, we are suddenly back to her normal solid work...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Devil's Daughter, by Lisa Kleypas
Our latest Book Giveaway is Devil's Daughter, the most recent installment in Lisa Kleypas's thus-far-disappointing Ravenels series. Without going into spoiler-y details, I'm happy to say that it is a vast improvement over its predecessors...
Right show, wrong network
The New York Times recently took a look at the unexpected success of Netflix's You, based upon Caroline Kepnes's novel of the same name. I keep hearing the show described as a "Netflix Original" (it's right there on the cover!), but...
Just take the L, son.
Vulture just posted a update on the latest controversy involving Jay Asher (author of the popular YA book 13 Reasons Why). The essay is worth reading in full, but here's a very brief summary: in 2017, Asher was accused of several instances of sexual harassment. He had been invited to be a guest speaker at an event sponsored by...
Shady, Netflix
The Verge recently posted an article about Chooseco Publishing (the company behind the Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books) suing Netflix over its interactive Black Mirror episode "Bandersnatch"...
It claims to be the "easiest ever"
This article is a few months old, but it's about one of my favorite subjects: COOKIES. It is based on an excerpt from bestselling author Anne Byrn's recent book American Cookie, and focuses on the invention of blondies...
An Everlasting Meal: Cooking with Economy and Grace, by Tamar Adler
As longtime readers know, while Wordcandy usually sticks to reviewing fiction, I make the occasional exception for nonfiction titles about stuff I consider to be of general interest—usually books about food, money, or the environment. Tamar Adler's An Everlasting Meal is touches on all three of those subjects, so it jumped to the top of my-to-be-read pile...
Weekly Book Giveaway: An Everlasting Meal, by Tamar Adler
Our current Book Giveaway pick is Tamar Adler's An Everlasting Meal, which feels less like a cookbook than an updated version of one of those Victorian books of domestic management. A full review will follow shortly, and this giveaway will run through 5/10/19.
Movies that don't exist yet
The fine people at LitHub have an ongoing series where they mentally cast actors in thus-far-imaginary movie adaptations of books. I haven't read most of the books that they're talking about, but I have read Kindred, and...
No, but thanks!
Well, this is nice: I was just wondering what Michael Buckley was up to, and the internet kindly provided an exciting answer! Apparently, Buckley and his young son Finn have co-written a choose-your-own-adventure book called Lenny the Lobster Can't Stay For Dinner...
At long last
According to The Guardian, a long-overlooked note could solve the mystery of the "Rice Portrait", which descendants of Jane Austen have long argued was a portrait of the author as a young girl. Art experts have disagreed...
By Night, Issues 1-4, by John Allison
My affection for John Allison's comic Bad Machinery is the kind of love that makes all of Alison's other titles (of which there are quite a few) feel like a letdown. They're fine, but they're mostly spin-offs or prequels or also-ran adventures—pale imitations of the story I'd prefer to be reading...