WORDS

The law, which will be appealed again, “bans any titles that describe sexual acts from K-12 schools, with the exception of religious texts. The law also limits instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity before seventh grade.” - The New York Times

“Why riddle a puzzle? And yet that’s what the Voynich did, over and over again. The moment you felt you were getting somewhere, it coiled in on itself, retreating from your grasp, into another disguise.” - The Atlantic

"With a mission of publishing 'deep reporting about power and place in North Carolina,' the publication (called The Assembly) has an ambitious vision of curiosity-driven reporting that holds power to account. … (It) takes inspiration from other statewide magazines like California Sunday and Texas Monthly." - Nieman Lab

Starting in the 1830s, the American Bible Society began a campaign to get inexpensive Bibles into homes "in every part of the land," while the American Sunday-School Union, which considered secular books "sweet poison" for young minds, worked to replace them in classrooms with Christian instructional books and evangelical tracts. - Slate (MSN)

Even if you don’t include the music inspired by Shakespeare’s plays, pretty darn far, like countries’ worth of travel. - The New York Times

Good luck keeping A Court of Thorns and Roses out of the hands of teenagers, but also, this is horrifying - and includes Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake, for instance, along with Judy Blume, Rupi Kaur, and (are we surprised?) other women authors. - Salt Lake Tribune

"(She) was working on a sequel to her 1939 novel Moses, Man of the Mountain when she died in 1960. That sequel, The Life of Herod the Great, will be available in January 2025. The manuscript had been in Hurston’s archives at the University of Kansas, accessible only to scholars." - The Guardian

"Nearly 60 journalists — including marquee names such as Adam Serwer, Caitlin Flanagan, Jerusalem Demsas, and George Packer — signed a letter calling on the company to “stop prioritizing its bottom line and champion The Atlantic’s journalism.” The staffers want (their) bosses to include AI protections in the union contract." - The Washington Post (MSN)

"I was accused of insulting Turkishness, even though nobody knew what that meant. And it was quite surreal, because the words of fictional characters were taken out of the novel and used as evidence in the courtroom; ... my Turkish lawyer had to defend my Armenian fictional characters." - The Guardian

"The new 24-volume, 8,100-plus-page Revised Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud has been three decades in the making, with psychoanalyst and neuropsychologist Mark Solms spearheading the once-in-a-generation project." - Publishers Weekly

And the winner of the Inside Prize is Imani Perry, who also won the National Book Award for her South to America. - LitHub

Casey McQuiston explains why romance is literature - if you know how to read it. “Romance holds a mirror to our wants and needs. If we want to study works that sit within a greater literary tradition, romance has one of the richest.” - Time

Then try this 700-page Australian prizewinning novel that “is 'more like an experience’ than a story,” according to its publisher. Then there are the five million feral donkeys. - The Guardian (UK)

Maybe when you’re old enough to appreciate it. “It turns out, being wrong is one of the best things in life.” - The New York Times

The entire Author Events staff resigned in June, after “layoffs loomed internal meetings became contentious.” The resigning staff said they found the work culture “heartbreaking.” - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)