Good Literature Should Fit in Your Pocket

For a few months, arts media has been reporting that the mass-market paperback has finally gone extinct. It’s been a long time coming. Even at the end of my bookselling career in 2008, publishers were phasing out the form factor and shoppers simply didn’t seem to care one way or the other. On the one hand, […]

A Conspiracy of Dunces

2026 has been a great year for conspiracy nuts. The latest Epstein Files dump proved every paranoid stoner to be correct. Yes, Epstein was involved in a plot to turn global politics sharply to the right. Yes, he helped create cryptocurrency, which made political corruption much more prevalent. He tried to get involved with the Gawker lawsuit, which eventually undid […]

Make Cops Look Dorky Again

Hi! Everything I said in the last issue is still true: The emotionally scarred people in the White House are deeply frightened, and they’re acting out of fear. They don’t know what to do, but they understand that what they’re doing isn’t working. Now that ICE is executing people in the streets, the only sensible political response […]

Where the Fear Has Gone There Will Be Nothing

Hi! The news is all bad. This year started off badly and it quickly got much worse. I expect there’s more awfulness to come. I don’t have much to say about any of this except one thing: It’s important to remember that the Trump administration isn’t doing all of this—the kidnapping of other nations’ leaders, […]

The Art I’m Taking with Me from 2025

Hi! Like many people, I like to reflect on the art and culture that most made an impact on me over the year. Because I take in so much art in the course of an average year, I don’t think in terms of “favorites.” (One of my crankiest opinions is that nobody over the age […]

You Have Nothing in Common with Elon Musk

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about polarization and the us-versus-them mindset that started developing during President Obama’s first term and really ran wild under the iPhone and algorithmic social media. It worked out very well for the very rich people who pay to develop those algorithms that we have been forcefully divided along party […]

AI Is Coming Home for the Holidays

Hi! Right before Halloween, I was at a family member’s house and children were getting their faces painted for some festivity or another. I noticed that the picture on the packaging for the face paints was not a real photograph of a real human. Instead, the model was clearly created by AI. She had the […]

Green Shoots in Autumn

Hi! It’s already been a roller coaster of a month, with the election turning decisively toward the Democrats followed almost immediately by eight centrist Democrats blowing that capital and folding on the shutdown with basically nothing to show for it. But generally, I’m still feeling pretty good about the results of the election. Any off-year […]

The Longest Little Vacation

In which I share my thoughts on Bellingham, the movie Halloween, and two of November’s hottest tickets. Hi! Since the last newsletter, I’ve been out of commission with a pretty bad cold that might have been the flu. If you haven’t gotten your flu or Covid shot yet, please consider making an appointment to do […]

One Organizational Challenge After Another

Hi! Thanks so much to all the folks who wrote back with opinions about the cadence of this newsletter. Two of you wrote to say you prefer one big edition at the end of the month, the vast majority of you said you would be happy with two editions per month, and a couple of […]