Lit Hub Weekly: October 19 – 23, 2026

Read More TODAY: In 1903, Mark Twain moves to Florence, Italy.

• Meet the authors shortlisted for the 2026 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. | Lit Hub In Conversation
• Was Cormac McCarthy that guy in your MFA? | Lit Hub Craft
• We promise: you really don’t need a smartphone. | Lit Hub Technology
• On Irish legend’s dangerously seductive fairies, the beguiling aes sidhe. | Lit Hub History
• “Plath described and wrote herself into the violence of her own century. She is now part of the record of the violence of our own.” Kristin Grogan considers new collections of Sylvia Plath’s writing. | Boston Review
• What really makes a bad literary adaptation bad? | The Walrus
• Sarah Stankorb considers the tradwives who are deconstructing: “They are a sign that gender-based authoritarianism is unsustainable, even among the biggest advocates for women’s submission.” | Slate
• Sarah Clegg digs into the surprisingly deep roots of romantasy. | The Guardian
• Arundhati Roy explores AI as capitalism’s final form: “The oligarchs do seem to believe in their extinction narrative – at least enough to have built themselves bunkers at the far ends of the Earth stocked with water, food and ammunition. But extinction is not what they are selling the rest of us.” | Equator
• How journalists—including those at Wired—were fooled by Elizabeth Holmes. | Wired
• Hannah Goldfield digs into Louise Glück’s passion for restaurants. | The New Yorker
• One of the spookiest (and most famous) writing competitions in history gave us both Frankenstein and The Vampyre. | JSTOR Daily
• “She was reaching women I would never know. This, I thought, was how social change really occurred.” Vivian Gornick remembers Gloria Steinem. | The Baffler
• “You pay attention to his attention.” A.O. Scott on John Berger’s antidote to the infinite scroll. | The New York Times Magazine
• “But how do you change minds? Tsai, Chang, and Chiang all responded the way one would expect bookstore owners to: the transformative power of reading.” Kelly Kong reports on Taiwan’s “bookstore revolution.” | The Nation
• Willis Jenkins remembers Wendell Berry, “the farmer-prophet of rural Kentucky.” | The Hedgehog Review
• Izabella Scott traces the literary history of dildos. | The Paris Review
• “In several descriptions of these amateur events, including some of his own, Hemingway sounds less like a matador than a rodeo clown.” On Hemingway’s beef with bullfighting author Barnaby Conrad. | The New Yorker
• What happened to Scientific American? Emmet Fraizer investigates the uncertain future (and messy recent past) of the beloved science publication. | The Nation

Also on Lit Hub:

When you think of the Brontës, think of botany • Essential reading on Chinese American history • Why are nameless narrators nameless? • How Joseph Luzzi found inspiration in his mother’s storytelling • On the growing role of memoir in the academy • Why the Confederacy was a fake nation • Writing about Syria’s Uyghur community as a Chinese-American • Step aboard the Hindenburg before disaster struck • Navigating the American health insurance system as a writer • The real-life inspiration for Sherlock Holmes • The significance of John Berryman’s Shakespeare lectures • The bookselling boom that developed Britain’s modern literary culture • American classrooms are segregated, and AI is only makes it worse • Nina Chayka searches for the rarest Nabokov paperbacks in America • How two sisters built a movie theater for the children of Gaza • Channeling the violence of white supremacy into art • How the Communist Party of China became the most successful political party in the world • Read “Elevation,” a poem by Lindsay Turner • There will never be another Wikipedia • Tanaïs takes the Lit Hub Questionnaire • Are you the asshole if you think books are over? • Three new books that examine Joe Biden’s support for Israel • 5 book reviews you need to read this week • This week’s Independent Press Top 40 Bestsellers for fiction and nonfiction • Why are we so uneasy about pubic hair? • The Puritans’ legacy and the contradictions of American power • What broiler chickens reveal about the Anthropocene • How writing fiction about Palestinian lives allows stories to live on • Why your writing soundtrack matters • The best reviewed books of the week • It’s 1961, and you’re seeing Nina Simone live at the Village Gate • Otherness, the darkness of the past, and drawing inspiration from The House of Seven Gables • Read “At the Dinner Table at Night,” a poem by Allen Guy Wilcox