Something happens to kids when they’re about 9 years old. Before then, they’re voracious little bookworms, with most of them saying they read for fun at least five days a week. After their ninth birthday, only 35 percent still do. 

Experts call this phenomenon “the decline by 9,” and they spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to stop it. They talk up and cherish the books that break through: the Harry Potters and the Percy Jacksons, which got so many kids to keep reading through those danger years and which sold so well through millennial and Gen Z childhoods. Publishers keep looking for new books compelling enough to keep kids away from their screens and glued to the page. 

But for the past 10 years, books for kids ages 8 to 12 (known as middle grade) have been selling less and less. 

“It had been happening for maybe a decade, very very slowly,” said Joanne O’Sullivan, a children’s book author and reporter for Publishers Weekly. What had been a gradual slope got dramatically worse in 2020. And in the years since the pandemic, publishers have shut down multiple middle-grade imprints, culminating in it happening twice this year. 

No one in publishing is entirely sure why kids books stopped selling, but there are two major theories. One says that children are no longer reading as much as they used to, because they are worse readers than previous generations were. The age group that used to happily devour Harry Potter is now distracted by iPads and YouTube shorts, so they never developed the ability to sit down and focus on a printed page. Their reading scores, which started falling in 2014, tell the tale.

The other theory says that the kids aren’t the ones who changed — publishers are. Starting in the 2000s, middle-grade books began getting long, with the average going from 174.5 pages in 2006 to 290 in 2016. According to this narrative, publishers flooded the market with books too difficult for their target audience. Kids responded by tuning out. 

Whichever theory is true, the fact remains that all those ravenous 8-year-old bookworms depend on middle-grade publishers to keep on reading after they turn 9. The publishers who sell these books have built massive businesses on their ability to supply kids with exciting, addictive stories. If they’re failing, what will kids turn to for entertainment instead?

Why did tweens lose interest in books?

Reading decline happens during the big transition all middle-grade readers go through: moving from short illustrated chapter books to fully fledged novels. It’s a pain point. 

“They’ve been doing short chapter books; they’ve been doing those leveled readers in the classroom; and, then, all of a sudden, what’s available to them is a lot chunkier, more challenging,” O’Sullivan said. She described the transition as “abrupt,” adding, “that’s not necessarily just for kids who are struggling with reading. That’s also for kids who like reading and are capable.” 

“If you have a kid who’s not a very confident reader, a long book is very intimidating,” Kelly Dickinson, a middle school librarian in Bethesda, Maryland, told Vox. “They just stall out before they can even pick one, because they look at it and they think, ‘I can’t read that.’” 

The shadow of Harry Potter, with its doorstopper volumes approaching a thousand pages, looms large here. Before Harry, a standard middle-grade novel might look like The Baby-Sitters Club volume The Truth About Stacey, which clocks in around 35,000 words. In a Substack post in April, Vicky Weber, an author, literary agent, and author coach for middle-grade books, pointed out that Sorcerer’s Stone was 76,944 words long, already pushing the limits of a middle-grade reader’s attention. After the books became phenomenons, they got much longer; Order of the Phoenix was 257,045 words, which is heftier than most adult novels. As publishers raced to catch up, their books began to expand, as well.  

“When something becomes really popular, other publishers try to replicate that success,” Weber told Vox. “I think one of the things we didn’t take into account is how many Harry Potter readers were adults.” 

While middle-grade books really did get longer, everyone I spoke to also acknowledges that kids’ reading scores really did drop, too. Kids have lost a lot of their unstructured play time to the grind of organized sports and music lessons, which means the empty childhood hours that are such perfect reading opportunities have vanished. “That time to just sit down and read is so truncated for a lot of kids, probably a lot of the kids who would have chosen to read a 400-page book if they had the time,” O’Sullivan said. 

Then, there was the trauma of Covid, which smashed right into kids’ reading habits. “There were factors like schools and libraries closing, not much time with peers, and plenty of screen time during the pandemic,” said Kristen McLean, who runs the thought leadership collective Circana Entertainment Knowledge Group. All these bad effects, McLean said, that essentially “broke the discovery chain” for middle-grade fiction, in what she describes as “a perfect storm for lower literacy.”

The graphic novel pivot

The good news is that kids didn’t stop reading entirely during the pandemic. A few categories spiked: illustrated books, graphic novels, and manga. Jackie De Leo, now the chief merchant and publisher at Scholastic, was a vice president at Barnes & Noble during the pandemic, and she describes seeing kids with an unquenchable thirst for manga all through 2020. 

“If you sat in a store and watched the manga section, you’d see little kids at lunch; you’d see them through the day; and, then, it would move into being adults,” De Leo said. “The only real constraint was actual inventory.” 

Now, O’Sullivan says she keeps hearing middle-grade publishers say, “Let’s meet them where they are.” In practice, that appears to mean they’re focusing on books like the wildly popular Dog Man, a graphic novel series featuring a hero with the head of a dog and the body of a police officer. 

“Dog Man is full color — so immersive,” De Leo said. “There’s these fun parts about the physical book, too, where you actually have to flap the pages and it makes an animation reel.” More importantly, she said, the books are funny. “Kids like things that are funny, and we were giving them some pretty serious things for a while — books for adults packaged as middle-grade books.”

The new ideal middle-grade book is short, punchy, and comedic and comes with a hefty dose of graphics. “Maybe it’s comics, maybe it’s illustrated novels,” O’Sullivan said. “Maybe, instead of just running text, they’ll have a panel with some text messages in it or something, just to break up the text to make the entire experience of reading less intimidating.” 

This focus on breaking up the text means that publishing isn’t going back to what middle-grade books looked like before Harry Potter: short, simple chapter books à la The Baby-Sitters Club and Encyclopedia Brown. Those series weren’t hefty or overly serious, but they were massive bestsellers on the strength of their words, not their images. (It’s also worth noting that Scholastic adapted a few of the BSC books into graphic novels in 2006 and, then, perhaps seeing the writing on the wall, picked up the project again in 2021.)

I asked De Leo if she thought the industry’s shift to including more illustrations suggests that kids have lost an ability to handle pure text, even when it is short and sweet.

But De Leo said that reading graphic novels represents a “different type of literacy” from that required to read Encyclopedia Brown mysteries, not a lesser one. She said that when she reads a graphic novel, she has trouble forcing herself to look at the images, not just the words. When she sees kids focusing on the pictures with ease, she takes it as evidence of “a real visual literacy that they have that I am jealous of.”

Dickinson, the librarian, said she wishes that publishers would put out comedic fiction in more formats. “A lot of kids want funny books, and a lot of the funny books are the illustrated hybrid stuff,” she said. “There’s not enough other funny books, in my opinion.” 

Reenvisioning middle grade books

Experts are hopeful that publishers’ new direction will be enough to get kids reading again — and to get their parents to buy books. “This is probably the first year where I’ve heard people being optimistic and feeling excited about the new ideas that are coming,” O’Sullivan said. “People are beginning to be able to re-envision middle grade.” 

The publishing shutdowns reflect the industry’s new direction. One of the three people to survive the March closure of Dial Books for Young Readers was an editor specializing in picture books and graphic novels. Macmillan is replacing the now-defunct Roaring Brook Press imprint, which also closed in March, with a new imprint specializing in nonfiction and illustrated books for kids, although it’s not yet clear what age group the new imprint will cater to.

In the meantime, kids’ reading test scores have started to rebound. In 2025, 9-year-olds’ average reading scores went up four points from 2022 — back to where they were before the pandemic. 

With kids becoming stronger readers and books getting shorter, the hope is that they’ll meet in the middle. 

“Kids in the middle-grade age are extremely self-centered and view everything through how it impacts them. Developmentally, that’s very normal,” Dickinson said. “But also, they’re incredibly empathetic at this age.” Reading fiction, which allows us to imagine how other people’s minds work, can be deeply impactful for this malleable age if kids can hold onto their love of reading long enough to reap the benefits. 

“This is a time when reading habits and interest in reading can really die,” Dickinson said. “The hope is to help kids discover what kinds of books or what formats they like — and to show that there are ways in.”

A full three decades ago, as Bill Clinton turned 50 in the midst of his successful 1996 reelection campaign, he was sounding even then in an autumnal mood.

“I have more yesterdays than tomorrows” he used to say often that year, a wistfulness that caused those of us who covered him to puzzle. What’s with this misty nostalgia? It was literally true, unless he expected to live 100, that he probably had more yesterdays than tomorrows. But fifty is typically the point when people realize they are no longer exactly young. It is hardly an age that merits a self-conception as old. Clinton’s perspective, however, doubtless left him with an appreciation of the fragility of life. He never met his biological father — a traveling salesman who married five times and died at age 28 in a car accident, three months before the future president was born.

Yet Clinton himself has proved reasonably durable, especially for a man who had serious heart surgery at age 58. The 42nd president turns 80 today — at last at an age that amply justifies a more searching look back on life.

Rest assured that no one in 1996 was contemplating the possibility that the president 30 years later would be a man who is actually two months older than Clinton — much less that this man would be President Donald Trump, who at that time had already been famous as a real estate magnate and professional self-promoter for 15 years or so.

Above all, I think few people then were imagining that the country in 2026 would itself be feeling so old — or, at a minimum, so surly and so bereft of a unifying vision of the future. The very essence of the most powerful and divisive political movement since former President Ronald Reagan’s is expressly backward-looking — Make America Great Again.

Many of the habits that today infuse American politics — the ones that make it so remorseless and infused with indignation and disdain — were present in nascent form in Clinton’s presidency. At the time, those developments seemed exotic — there was scant notion that they represented a shabby new norm.

In the early days, this brand of contempt-driven politics often revolved around arguments about Bill Clinton’s public and private character. This was a theme of his 1992 election against George H.W. Bush, his 1996 election against Bob Dole, and it even shadowed the 2004 dedication of his presidential library in Little Rock, Ark.

I am hardly a Clinton intimate. I haven’t been in his company in a decade. At one time, however, I probably knew as much about his presidency — its animating ideas, its decisive moments, its distinctive personalities — as anyone who had not actually served in it. This came from six years covering his White House for the Washington Post, and another two working on a book that aimed to synthesize his years in office and take a preliminary cut at assessing their historical weight. In both journalistic and historical terms, much of this time was devoted to thinking about competing appraisals of Clinton’s character.

It is an argument without end in part because the positive and negative elements of Clinton’s character, the light and the shadows, seemingly flow from the same source: an intense need to win, to matter, to seduce, to prove himself in the world. Imagine if people around Bill Clinton in 1974, the year he ran unsuccessfully for Congress — Hillary Rodham, then a girlfriend but not yet a spouse, showed up in Arkansas to help — had been given a crystal ball to peer into the future. These people would not be surprised to learn that a future president was in their midst; His talent, ambition, and idealism were that obvious. Nor would they be surprised to learn how his campaigns and presidency would at various turns be nearly derailed. As early biographer David Maraniss documented, even then Clinton had a reputation for sexual vagrancy, and the patterns of heedlessness, deception, and hypocrisy such a lifestyle inevitably requires.

He’s been out of political office for more than a quarter-century — as long as he was ever in it, beginning with his first victory as Arkansas attorney general in 1976. By my lights, the years since he yielded the Oval Office to George W. Bush (who turned 80 last month) in January 2001 have abundantly ratified the proposition that the country could do worse — at key junctures plainly has done worse–than Clinton’s character or his record, the strengths and infirmities alike.

As he turns 80, and the country contemplates a post-Trump future two years from now, it seems to me there are at least four ways in which Clinton has prevailed in the great character argument woven throughout his life.

Responsibility

This is a place where my views have not changed much from what I thought at the time and what I think now. A paradox of Clinton’s presidency is that, however reckless he was in his personal life — culminating in the Monica S. Lewinsky scandal and Republicans’ unsuccessful attempt to evict him from office through impeachment — he was supremely responsible in his use of power and his willingness to take sober risks for what he thought was right. Yes, he would over-agonize on hard choices — on issues from trade to welfare to war in the Balkans. But at the end of the day — sometimes it could be a very long day — on big subjects there was rarely much variance between what Clinton genuinely thought was the right decision and what he did.

A good many of his policies are out of favor now within his own party. But the political and policy landscape he was navigating was much different than today. Clinton was a thoroughly political creature, but he was not an unduly cynical one — he was willing frequently to risk his political self-interest on behalf of what he conceived of as the public interest.

Persuasion

One reason Bill Clinton and his brand of centrist politics can seem antiquated is that the past generation has been defined by a whole different emphasis: the politics of mobilization. Under this later school of politics, elections are won principally by sharpening divisions and elevating the moral stakes. The aim is not to win over skeptics through the power of reasoned argument. It is to convince your own side that the other side is so repugnant in its character and aims that they should rally behind you and turn out in the biggest possible numbers.

Clinton would in most of his campaigns give a nod to trying to explain what the other side believed, and why he believed his approach is better. “I think one of the ways you win elections is by talking straight with people and giving them permission to vote against you,” Clinton said a few years ago on a podcast. What he meant was that effective arguments don’t hector audiences or assert moral superiority, or the other side’s moral iniquity. They invite or even inspire people to think about an issue differently.

In short, the politics of mobilization harnesses the power of contempt; the politics of persuasion employs the language of respect. Mobilization politics tends to deal in ideological and cultural abstractions like free markets versus socialism, or “traditional values” versus sexual freedom — the kind of debates that are especially potent at pushing people to decide “which side are you on?” Persuasion politics is more likely to center on the concrete human dimensions of policy choices — here’s what an expansion of childcare tax credits might mean for you.

You could argue which brand of politics is more effective, and for the most part advocates of mobilization politics in recent years on left and right have been prevailing. But it’s hard to see how the politics of persuasion is not a more inspiring expression of American character, and also more likely to resolve serious long-term debates.

The fight for power

When Clinton opened his presidential library in Little Rock in 2004, the late Peter Jennings of ABC News in an interview baited Clinton about a recent survey of historians that rated his presidency reasonably well overall, but second to last (ahead only of Richard Nixon) in “moral authority.” Clinton said curtly that the historians were wrong, adding, “I don’t really care what they think.” Jennings replied: “Excuse me, Mr. President. I can feel it across the room. You care very deeply.”

Clinton then snapped: “You don’t want to go here, Peter. You don’t want to go here. Not after what you people did. And the way you — your network — what you did with [Whitewater prosecutor] Kenneth Starr. The way your people repeated every little sleazy thing he leaked. No one has any idea of what that’s like.”

The new library had an alcove about Clinton’s 1998 impeachment and subsequent acquittal called, “The Fight for Power.” The scandal, the exhibit argued, was simply the Republicans’ effort to overturn an election they lost.

At the time, I believed this was mostly Clinton’s tortured rationalization for his own mistakes. Events since then, however, have swung the historical argument irrefutably in his favor. In the 1990s we spent months and even years covering such inane issues as whether the newly elected Clinton acted properly to fire long-term employees of the office that booked White House charter flights and hotels for the media. Now, Trump asserts the right to eliminate cabinet departments and agencies without congressional approval — and the stories often get lost in the rush of other news. There is not a credible argument that says Bill and Hillary Clinton’s Whitewater land investments in the 1970s were a worthy subject for ethics inquiries and criminal probes but the Trump family’s crypto investments and overseas deals while the company founder is in the Oval Office are no big deal.

Clinton was right that the attacks on his character were often simply not on the level—but a proxy for other agendas.

Perseverance

In 2000, as Bill Clinton’s presidency was winding down and Hillary Clinton was waging a successful campaign for New York Senate, there was a political skull session at the White House involving a trusted roster of aides and strategists. As one of them described it to me later, Bill Clinton brought up the elephant in the room. Female voters in particular, he noted, wanted to understand why Hillary had stayed with Bill during the sex scandal. The mood was briefly awkward until Hillary Clinton said good-naturedly that she wanted to know the answer too.

“Because you’re a sticker!” the president replied, jabbing the air for emphasis.

Actually, it seems to me, both Clintons are. Across many decades, they have stayed married, and stayed in the fight over the issues they care about—amid plenty of victories and setbacks alike. That is a kind of character, too.

These days, Bill Clinton’s public appearances are fewer. At times he looks frail. His skeptics include many people in his own party. Yet, on his 80th birthday, the main question seems to be less about his character than the country’s: Is there a pathway to a destination in which more people believed with him that politics can illuminate the best and most generous and inspiring parts of national identity? Clinton may be getting old, but that idea should be made young again.

Visit our bookshop.org page to purchase this week’s new books and support your local bookstore. And us!

 

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Ampersand, Erin: Time to Play (Tor 978-1250470171, $18.99, 368pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

SF LitRPG novel, the first book in the Apocalypse Parenting series. A mom has to teach their kids how to fight after Earth is transported to an intergalactic game show, and everyone is given supernatural powers.

 

 

Andersen, Kurt: The Breakup (Penguin Random House/Random House 978-1984801371, $30.00, 576pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Near-future satirical/dystopian political SF novel. In 2045, a couple with a failing marriage is brought together to tour colleges with their seventeen-year-old. They road trip through a broken America that’s been reshaped by a civil war.

 

 

Anonymous: Dreams Divine (Flame Tree Collections UK 978-1835627952, $30.00, 416pp, formats: hardcover, 08/18/2026)

Fantasy romance anthology. Features stories from Benjamin Adams, Aishatu Ado, Dee Alberts, Danielle Marie Cahill, Bella Chacha, Victor W. Clubb, Irene W. Collins, K.S. Dearsley, H.L. Docherty, Philip Brian Hall, and many more.

 

 

Anonymous: Of Swords & Roses (Flame Tree Collections UK 978-1835627969, $30.00, 416pp, formats: hardcover, 08/18/2026)

Fantasy romance anthology. Features stories from Erica Barnes, Keyan Bowes, Kim Chance, Deborah L. Davitt, Sarina Dorie, Umenyi Chisomaga Evelyn, Jonathan Ficke, Jess L. Freed, M.A. Gardner, and many more.

 

 

Blackwood, Lauren: The Queen’s Bodyguard (Penguin Random House/Delacorte 979-8217092413, $32.00, 307pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Fantasy romance novel. Queen Theora selects Argos to be her bodyguard during negotiations, and while they’re technically married, she has no plan to have their souls bound together, but over time she begins to change her mind.

 

 

Blake, Olivie: Dreamland (Tor 978-1250368935, $29.99, 368pp, formats: hardcover, paperback, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Fantasy novel. Anya is invited to work for the de Witt family, one of the most important film dynasties in LA. It’s there where she finds herself oddly attracted to Jude, and discovers a family curse that lives within the walls of their villa. Simultaneous with the Tor UK edition.

 

 

Cantor, Jillian: The Season of Light and Darkness (Simon Pulse 979-8347107285, $21.99, 352pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/04/2026)

Young-adult dystopian SF novel. Ellie and her family decide to freeze themselves cryogenically in order to escape a dictatorship. When the government finds the lab, Ellie is the only one who gets unfrozen, and she must become “initiated.”

 

 

Cavendish, Catherine: The Ghosts of Chanterlands (Flame Tree Collections UK 978-1787589919, $26.95, 272pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 08/18/2026)

Horror novel. In the year 1940, Pamela Courtney is evacuated to Chanterlands, where her aunts live, but secrets are stirring in the house, and greater danger is awaiting Pamela as the safety her mother hoped for is not gaurunteed.

 

 

Cesare, Adam: Clown in a Cornfield 4: Lights! Camera! Frendo! (Harper 978-0063325081, $19.99, 400pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Young-adult slasher horror novel, fourth in the Clown in a Cornfield series. Sabrina Alvarez is cast as the final girl in a horror movie, but things feel off as this movie based on real events begins to feel like it might repeat itself.

 

 

Cornell, P.A.: The Astronaut Among the Flowers and Other Stories (Stars and Sabers 978-1967550005, $30.00, 218pp, formats: hardcover, paperback, 08/18/2026)

Collection of 21 stories that look into human connections to each other, to technology, to the world, and to themselves. Includes stories such as “Once Upon a Time at The Oakmont,” and “Split.”

 

 

Fletcher, C.A.: The Two of Us at the End of the World (Orbit US 978-0316538695, $19.99, 400pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Post-apocalyptic SF novel. As the world is falling apart, a couple is falling in love, and when they realize they’re some of the only people in the world who can still have kids, the government does too. Simultaneous with the Orbit UK edition.

 

 

Gilman, Carolyn Ives: Testament of Leaves (Fairwood Press 978-1958880302, $16.99, 120pp, formats: paperback, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

SF novella. On a faraway planet, inscrutinator Shameesh Kulkarni must find out why a linguist has died, but no one wants to help her besides a digital copy of the victim, and an octopod.

 

 

Hallow, S.M.: The Halls of the Dead (Harper Voyager US 978-0063446984, $30.00, 352pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Gothic fantasy novel. Irene Haley has been practicing necromancy her entire life, and when her love, Agnes, is hanged, she decides to perform a resurrection, something that hasn’t been done successfully in two thousand years. A first novel.

 

 

Jae-Jones, S.: Guardians of Dawn: Suhwa (St. Martin’s/Wednesday Books 978-1250191519, $22.00, 368pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 08/18/2026)

Young-adult fantasy novel, fourth in the Guardians of Dawn series. When Min Suhwa leaves her convent for the first time in her life, she finds herself having to flee from a Huntsman who’s trying to take her life. Simultaneous with the Titan Books UK edition.

 

 

Lemming, Kimberly: I Punched an Alien and Now We’re in Couples Therapy (Penguin Random House/Berkley Romance 978-0593818657, $20.00, 352pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

SF romance novel. Blair is captured by aliens, and taken to their planet where she is to be put into a breeding program with the arrogant king Osid. Together, they must complete increasingly difficult, and dangerous challenges

 

 

Monét, Noelle: Bound by Fury (Simon & Schuster/McElderry 978-1665979870, $21.99, 496pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Young-adult fantasy novel. Harper goes to Black Mountain Academy to discover more about her new powers, but as she digs deeper, she realizes that the academy has sinister secrets beneath the surface. A first novel.

 

 

Moronova, K.M.: Once Written in Gilded Blood (Sourcebooks/Bloom Books 978-1464279041, $29.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Fantasy romance novel, second in the Cruel Fates duet. Alira married the Blood Knight in order to end the war, and prove that peace between demons and demigods is possible, but the gods are restless and people keep fighting. Simultaneous with the Penguin Random House UK edition.

 

 

Pacton, Jamie & Podos, Rebecca: Homeward for a Spell (Penguin Random House/Del Rey 978-0593873670, $18.99, 368pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Cozy romantic fantasy novel, second in a series. Sage and Araphi go on a life-changing adventure together with a team of ragtag explorers. As time goes on, Sage and Araphi begin to develop great chemistry together. Simultaneous with the Penguin Random House UK edition.

 

 

Pedersen, Kailee: The Minimalist (St. Martin’s 978-1250328274, $18.99, 272pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Horror novel. Mia Voss must finish the unfinished manuscript of her late teacher, Ryder Wakefield. Mia abandons her girlfriend to work in Ryder’s home, where she begins to unpack with the complicated bond she had with him.

 

 

Pratt, Tim: The Jewel and the Comet (Angry Robot UK 978-1836730224, $18.99, 400pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

SF novel, the second in the Nigh-Space multiverse. Glenn is pulled out of his normal life to navigate through the multiverse, while his girlfriend, Vivy, is called on a scouting trip to stop a comet.

 

 

Pulley, Natasha: The Salt King (Bloomsbury USA 978-1639737291, $29.99, 464pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

SF novel. Former Jesuit priest Avelyn Brocken teams up with Jericho, a doctor, to protect the world from salt light, a dangerous substance that’s been turning people into salt. Simultaneous with the Orion UK edition.

 

 

Sandeen, Del: These Walls Remember (Penguin Random House/Berkley 978-0593955666, $30.00, 352pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Horror novel. Strange things begin happening to sisters Mickie and Delilah after learn ingmore about the history of the house they inherited. Mickie must save her sister before they’re both changed forever by the house.

 

 

Schwab, Kathleen: Queenswood (Blackstone Publishing 979-8228465084, $29.99, 346pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Historical fantasy novel set in 12th-century Ireland. Angus, the Crown Prince of Faerie, must travel to the human world in order to find a maiden who can become the next Queen of Faerie, despite how much he doesn’t want to.
A first novel.

 

 

Sharabianlou, Lexie: The Blue Moon Café and 24-Hour Occult Emporium (Penguin Random House/Dell 979-8217094684, $20.00, 448pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Paranormal romance novel. Talula Smith runs the worst coffee shop in town, but that’s the point. The true purpose of the café is to protect and provide new identities for magical beings that are at risk. A first novel.

 

 

Singh, Amal: Slow Burn (Flame Tree Press UK 978-1787589889, $26.95, 224pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 08/18/2026)

Fantasy novel. Failed actor Rishi Tripathi is sent to an inverted version of Mumbai. In this world, he’s a superstar, but when the actions of his doppelganger start having consequences, he’s forced to make a hard decision.

 

 

Snow, Eli: The Divine Gardener’s Handbook (St. Martin’s/Saturday Books 978-1250395184, $31.00, 368pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

New adult SF novel. Cyprin cheats her way into getting a job in the divine gardens, and starts working with her rival, Purcell. They begin to form a bond that might ruin Cyprin’s life. A first novel.

 

 

Young, E.G.: A (Dead) Thing Like Me (Holiday House 978-0823461066, $19.99, 352pp, formats: hardcover, paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Young-adult ghost novel. A ghost named Hot Dog is summoned by Logan, an artist grieving the death of her best friend. Hot Dog hopes this will make her feel alive again, but she’ll need to confront the reason behind her death. A first novel.

 

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The post New Book Releases: Aug 18, 2026 appeared first on Locus.

My incurable optimist friend, Kevin Kelly, co-founder of Wired and my partner at Cool Tools and the Recomendo newsletter, has been posting essays on Substack mainly about the future, artificial intelligence, and what it means for humanity. I am loving these essays. — Read the rest

The post Kevin Kelly: AI will be a microscope we point at our own minds appeared first on Boing Boing.

The first thing I noticed when I gave up American technology was the silence.

My phone usually starts up before I get out of bed, buzzing every few minutes throughout the day with calls, messages, headlines, calendar reminders and social media alerts. It’s a constant pulse that averages nearly 200 iPhone notifications on weekends and twice as many Monday-to-Friday.

But on this warm mid-summer Sunday, my life was on an unlikely version of mute. After years of reporting on Europe’s push to wean itself off U.S. tech giants and cultivate homegrown alternatives, I had decided to test my own daily habit by cutting myself off from using any American technology for 72 hours.

No iPhone. No Mac. No Slack or Teams. No Google Search or Maps. No ChatGPT. No WhatsApp or Signal. No Facebook or Instagram feeds. No credit card payments.

I wondered if I would turn into a digital monk.

For three days, I set out to live and work in Brussels as if U.S. tech had suddenly become unavailable to me overnight. It was a purposefully fictional scenario rooted in a very real European anxiety: what happens if Washington weaponizes our continent’s Silicon Valley dependence and reaches for the tech “kill switch?”

Limited versions of that scenario have already surfaced. When U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration cut off French-born International Criminal Court judge Nicolas Guillou from U.S.-linked financial and technology services, he called it a form of “civil death.”

Meanwhile, U.S. export controls in June forced Anthropic to block foreign nationals from accessing two of its most advanced AI models, offering a glimpse of what government bans on access to cutting-edge technology can look like.

Such episodes feed into mounting fears that the Trump administration could use Europe’s overreliance on U.S. tech as leverage in trade fights or disputes over EU regulations. A Proton survey released earlier this month found that 74 percent of European business leaders worry such a cutoff could disrupt their operations.

In my own little experiment, the stakes were much lower. Yet I was about to find out that replacing American tools with those built here in Europe was going to make almost everything harder — and lonelier.

Trying to live without U.S. tech, I would find out, essentially amounts to trying to live without tech at all. That was partly because, like virtually all of my fellow Europeans, I had locked myself into those consumer choices.

Dumbphones and FOMO

The early symptoms of going cold turkey looked suspiciously like withdrawal.

On that first morning, with my iPhone shut off, I reached for a Nokia brick from Finland. The so-called dumbphone is the type of device now enjoying a second life among people detoxing from screen time and is also a favorite of drug dealers seeking to avoid getting busted by any tracking and data collection.

Several hours in, I realized there were no notifications on the Nokia. Nobody calls or texts anymore. Then came the shameful part: a sense of helplessness, followed by FOMO-fueled restlessness. The world had surely kept spinning at full speed, and I was missing it. For the next few days, I would still catch myself checking the phone compulsively like an addict.

“The phone aged you instantly,” my best friend joked later that day as we traded our now-standard FaceTime video calls for a regular one. It was unclear whether he meant the muffled audio or me struggling with a new-but-actually-old device, or both.

I did notice that I was pacing up and down my flat because my usually overstimulated brain apparently couldn’t handle focusing on a voice-only call.

One instant benefit from my dumbphone: no doomscrolling in bed.

It all took me back to my first cellphone at 13, when texting meant tapping the same tiny key several times for a single letter, every SMS cost money and abbreviations and emojis were not just stylistic choices but ways to squeeze more into a message.

I knew my social media life would be at risk in my experiment. European alternatives such as Mastodon have gained traction since Elon Musk turned Twitter into X. But who joins a social network when none of their friends are there?

That was fine. I was actually eager to disappear for a while, well aware of the anxiety social media induces in me and the insecurities created by constantly watching other people’s supposedly perfect lives.

Online shopping was out — but so too was paying by card in stores and restaurants. The payment networks I rely on are American: Visa and Mastercard dominate card payments across Europe, meaning that even a purchase made with a European bank card often still runs over U.S.-controlled rails.

It meant I had to buy everything using cash, which I hadn’t done regularly in ages. Fortunately, unlike in some other European countries, Belgian legislation requires merchants to accept banknotes. The hard part was finding some of those stores without the help of Google Maps, which I’d come to rely on almost as much as my credit cards.

The invisible grip

Swearing off Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+ and YouTube was also part of the deal — already eliminating a sizable chunk of my leisure time. But it turned out I could barely watch anything at all, or even properly test European streaming platforms, because my television and tablet both ran on Google software.

Thankfully, an offline Nintendo Switch from Japan, good old books and the legendary Snake game kept me company.

These invisible dependencies run deep. Beyond the products we use every day, U.S. systems often serve as gateways to European companies trying to take on Big Tech.

Take Sweden’s Spotify or the Estonia-based rival to Uber, Bolt. Both still heavily rely on U.S.-controlled app stores, operating systems, payment networks and other digital infrastructure.

And then there is the cloud: the data centers and servers that host websites, process data and route traffic. The vast majority of that market is dominated by Amazon, Microsoft and Google, whose infrastructure supports large parts of Europe’s digital economy.

Many corners of Europe would go dark if those services were shut down, with its economy, public administration and communications infrastructure struggling to function normally.

Working outside the stack

On Monday morning, I walked into the office with the slightly misplaced confidence that I had prepared for everything. My efficiency at work, admittedly during a very quiet summer week, took less of a hit than I expected.

I was still working from the office. I used an open-source, Linux-powered computer. I communicated by email through a Switzerland-based Proton address, browsed the web using the Norwegian browser Vivaldi and French search engine Qwant, wrote everything in LibreOffice and even tried Mistral’s generative AI assistant. And there was always a good old notebook.

I felt productive. But the workflow around me was not. The tools themselves worked perfectly well once I accepted that breaking years of habits would take time. The disruption ultimately came from stunted collaboration: meetings, messages, shared documents and the constant stream of small exchanges that keep a newsroom moving.

“It was like you disappeared,” one colleague would tell me later.

European alternatives do exist in that space. The problem is, just like for social media, they only work properly when everyone else uses them too or when competing systems are interoperable — something the EU has long tried to legislate and enforce, often against resistance from large technology platforms.

For this little while, despite technically being able to continue working, I became an outsider within my own team. I had to skip our routine video meetings on Slack and Teams, while missing messages sent over WhatsApp and Signal.

In a trade, a city and an era built around instant messaging, sending a good old SMS felt almost prehistoric — a reminder of the longstanding complaints from the European telecom industry about losing messaging and calling revenues to U.S. tech firms.

Ultimately, this underscored one of the major pinch points in Europe’s push for greater tech independence: digital sovereignty is not an individual project. It only works if people, companies and institutions move together.

On their own, individual efforts are more likely to leave people feeling digitally isolated rather than digitally sovereign.

Relax and relapse

And yet, there was something blissful about these three days.

The initial anxiety slowly gave way to a kind of peace. Of course, that feeling may only reflect that the experiment was temporary and my digital life had not been erased.

The experience nevertheless highlighted how much I had taken these tools for granted. I have placed all my eggs in the same digital basket: my communication channels, the tools I use to authenticate myself and access the digital world, my polished digital self and years of accumulated knowledge, all stored inside one sprawling digital safe.

The concern is no longer simply whether that safe could be broken into from the outside. It is also whether somebody could lock it — or empty it — from within.

Now, as you might wonder how I’ll act on what I’ve learned, I am strangely reminded of Covid.

Many of us emerged from that temporary era of lockdowns and involuntary limits full of healthy new habits and grand ideas about how our lifestyles should change, only to return remarkably quickly to our old routines.

Sadly, the same thing happened here. My iPhone came straight back into my pocket. Messages began flowing through again. My bank card returned to its usual place. Within hours, I had fallen comfortably back into the U.S. technology stack.

As I switched my smartphone back on, my screen lit up with incoming texts inquiring whether my little experiment was over. After 72 hours of old-school SMS exchanges, two different friends were both clearly eager to return to reality, sending me the same final text: “Back to WhatsApp?”

Having finished The Tainted Cup, I immediately dove into the next Ana and Din novel by Robert Jackson Bennett. I also finished the third in the series. Now I must wait.

This series fantasy worldbuilding inside of a detective novel is really a lot of fun. — Read the rest

The post Unfortunately, there are only three Ana and Din mysteries appeared first on Boing Boing.

What a nineteenth-century uproar reveals about our zeal for public shaming—and the truths that get trampled along the way.

“The Yahoo Boys,” “Unsayable,” “Sunrise,” and “Skin Contact.”

Today's links

• Jennifer Jenkins' 'Music Copyright, Creativity, and Culture': The definitive textbook (with comics!).
• Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
• Object permanence: Hair-gel bombers v bras; Hair-gel bombers v chemistry; AOL digs for spammer's platinum; Stross on infosec in 2061; In-game Ponzi; Snowden on Shadow Brokers hack; Life v understanding advanced math; "Greatest of Marlys!"; Housing and precarity; LLMs as slot-machines for coders; Hypercard's backstory; Pirate Party; Fanbois' mental health v critics; Krugman calls for alien invasion; Trump x Serbian genocidaires; The last Sandman Slim; Muphry’s Law; NSA created the Shadow Brokers; DOJ kills private prisons; Walmart externalizes crime; "Sgt Augmento"; Zuckermuskian solipsism.
• Upcoming appearances: Sydney, Melbourne, Brighton, London, South Bend.
• Recent appearances: Where I've been.
• Latest books: You keep readin' em, I'll keep writin' 'em.
• Upcoming books: Like I said, I'll keep writin' 'em.
• Colophon: All the rest.

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Jennifer Jenkins' 'Music Copyright, Creativity, and Culture' (permalink)

Nobody explains copyright like Jennifer Jenkins, the director of the Duke Center for the Public Domain, in which capacity she is responsible for the annual New Year's roundups of all the materials entering the public domain (a series that started in the decades during which the public domain was frozen by the Sonny Bono Copyright Act):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/20/em-oh-you-ess-ee/#sexytimes

Jenkins has a gift for making one of the most complicated, worst understood, most consequential areas of law not only comprehensible, but also fascinating. Her late 2023 explanation of what "Mickey Mouse's copyright is expiring" actually meant was the single best explainer on the subject, in a crowded field:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/15/mouse-liberation-front/#free-mickey

Small wonder that she's the go-to copyright and trademark expert for so many media outlets. Perhaps you heard her Planet Money segments on which superheroes are in the public domain:

https://www.npr.org/transcripts/969512231

Jenkins' flair for legal communications carries over to her scholarly work, of course, which is why her Open Copyright Casebook is a standard text for American law schools:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/30/open-and-shut-casebook/#stop-confusing-the-issue-with-relevant-facts

Jenkins co-wrote the Casebook with her husband, the equally erudite and expert James Boyle. It's just one of their many fruitful collaborations; they are also the writing team behind THEFT! A History of Music, the greatest graphic novel ever created about the history of music, music law, music censorship, and the music industry:

https://web.law.duke.edu/musiccomic/

Last year, Jenkins published Music Copyright, Creativity, and Culture, an Oxford University Press title that fuses her scholarly and popular work in a generalist textbook on the legal framework for music that will forever change how you think about music. Now, a second edition, with a lengthy section on new music litigation, AI copyright fights, and the issue of uncompensated labor is available as an open access download:

https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/musiccopyright/

Music Copyright weaves together the economic, cultural, political and artistic history of music, pulling on historic threads ranging from antiquity to medieval Europe to the age of mechanical reproduction to describe changing views of musicians, their audiences, and religious and political leaders on what constituted music, who was allowed to make music, and what music was for. In so doing, she firmly establishes the extremely contingent nature of our present-day norms around music, showing that the "natural" present-day assumptions about who gets paid, who pays, and when payment (or permission) is required are anything but, and are always in flux.

For obvious reasons, much of Jenkins' text describes these changes in the context of the record, the radio, satellite transmission, P2P file-sharing, and digital sampling (along with a chapter on AI). These examples are liberally illustrated with links to musical excerpts that bring the subject to life (these are presented as hotlinks in the ebook; if you're reading the print edition, you can use the book's companion website:)

https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/musiccopyright/

Interspersed with these histories and analysis are lengthy, extremely on-point excerpts from THEFT!, her graphic novel history of music. These enliven the text as much as the music samples, making this textbook as entertaining as it is informative.

Of especial interest – and importance – are the long sections on the courtroom battles of Ed Sheeran, Katy Perry, and Pharrell Williams over similar "grooves" and "vibes" to other songs, some of them well-known and some quite obscure:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/04/08/oh-why/#two-notes-and-running

These cases highlight the fundamental incoherence of music copyright, a system composed of improvised responses to new technologies, each layered atop the last in a messy pile that virtually no one understands.

Jenkins understands it, though. I've been reading, writing, and debating about this stuff since the late 1990s, and I learned something new on every page of this delightful book. This should be required reading for anyone who makes music, loves music, or cares about musicians and the arts more generally. It's a towering accomplishment and a brilliant read.

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Hey look at this (permalink)

• The CEO who fired 900 people on Zoom just before Christmas wants his job back https://edition.cnn.com/2026/08/14/business/vishal-garg-better-ceo

• Who Crapped on Johnny Depp's Bed? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGt7-WnWdhE

• No-One Makes You Shop at Amazon https://www.programmablemutter.com/p/no-one-makes-you-shop-at-amazon

• Paramount’s Merger Strategy: Empty Promises and Empty Threats https://prospect.org/2026/08/14/paramounts-merger-strategy-empty-promises-threats-justice-department-antitrust/

• they_live_adblocker https://github.com/davmlaw/they_live_adblocker

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Object permanence (permalink)

#25yrsago RIP, The Industry Standard, Palm buys BeOS https://web.archive.org/web/20010927192339/http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,46113,00.html

#25yrsago Smart dust sensors https://web.archive.org/web/20011112010004/http://www.smalltimes.com/document_display.cfm?document_id=1935

#25yrsago Pentagon patents onion-routing https://web.archive.org/web/20010912222427/http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,46126,00.html

#25yrsago Coltan: the conflict mineral in our gadgets https://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/12/magazine/the-dirt-in-the-new-machine.html

#25yrsago Danny Goodman Talks About HyperCard https://web.archive.org/web/20011214114614/http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/mac/2001/08/17/goodman.html

#25yrsago Report an insecure website, win a visit from the FBI https://web.archive.org/web/20010820110330/http://www.linuxfreak.org/post.php/08/17/2001/134.html

#20yrsago Copyright wars: film-makers eats themselves https://web.archive.org/web/20070318010544/https://www.laweekly.com/film+tv/film/freedom-of-information/14244/

#20yrsago RyanAir to UK govt: ease off on security or we sue https://www.theguardian.com/business/2006/aug/18/theairlineindustry.terrorism

#20yrsago Federal court bans Bush’s warrantless spying on Americans https://edition.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/08/17/domesticspying.lawsuit/index.html

#20yrsago Western millionaires plotted Equatorial Guinea coup as a game https://web.archive.org/web/20071114211448/https://www.salon.com/books/review/2006/08/17/roberts/index_np.html

#20yrsago Sweden’s Pirate Party – political arm of the pro-piracy groundswell https://web.archive.org/web/20060820093355/https://www.wired.com/news/technology/1,71544-0.html

#20yrsago Hair-Gel Bombers win war on bras https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/us-authorities-leave-gel_n_27402

#20yrsago Would a hair-gel bomb actually work? https://seclists.org/interesting-people/2006/Aug/86

#20yrsago The Pirate Bay’s backstory https://web.archive.org/web/20060901180116/https://www.wired.com/news/technology/1,71543-0.html

#20yrsago AOL will dig for buried platinum and gold in spammer’s Mom’s yard https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna14365934

#15yrsago Charlie Stross on network security in 2061 https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2011/08/usenix-2011-keynote-network-se.html

#15yrsago Damning 2007 letter asserts that phone hacking was an open practice at News of the World https://www.theguardian.com/media/2011/aug/16/phone-hacking-now-reporter-letter

#15yrsago In-game Ponzi nets US$50K https://web.archive.org/web/20110921052125/http://gamergaia.com/pc/1724-eve-online-space-heist-one-trillion-isk.html

#15yrsago Copyright troll handed ass (again), tries saddest trick ever to get out of paying its victim’s legal bills https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/08/righthaven-rocked-owes-34000-after-fair-use-loss/

#15yrsago English cops arrest man for planning water-fight via Blackberry Messenger https://www.theguardian.com/media/2011/aug/15/essex-water-fight-blackberry-messenger

#15yrsago Woman who recorded Massachusetts police beating charged with illegal wiretapping https://www.masslive.com/news/2011/08/videographer_of_alleged_melvin.html

#15yrsago Criticism of a brand lowers the self-esteem of its adherents https://arstechnica.com/science/2011/08/users-treat-criticism-of-favorite-brands-as-threat-to-self-image/

#15yrsago Homeopathy multinational sues blogger over statements that its mythological curative had “no active ingredient” https://web.archive.org/web/20110930131033/http://www.blogzero.it/contatti/prova/

#15yrsago Edinburgh Fringe show asks audience to shred banknotes https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2011/aug/16/crunch-edinburgh-festival-shred-cash

#15yrsago CCTV deterrence and the London uprising https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/aug/17/why-cctv-does-not-deter-crime

#15yrsago Paul Krugman: save the economy by staging an alien invasion hoax https://comicsalliance.com/watchmen-paul-krugman-alien-invasion/

#15yrsago Minecraft creator challenges trademark belligerents to winner-take-all Quake deathmatch https://web.archive.org/web/20110817205045/http://notch.tumblr.com/post/9038258448/hey-bethesda-lets-settle-this

#15yrsago Muphry’s Law: the inevitability of typos in discussions of typos https://web.archive.org/web/20101227141449/https://www.editorscanberra.org/muphrys-law/

#15yrsago Copyright complaint as phishing email https://memex.craphound.com/2011/08/18/copyright-complaint-as-phishing-email/

#15yrsago Rep Allen West pens “dumbest thing ever written on congressional stationery” https://web.archive.org/web/20110914030034/https://thinkprogress.org/security/2011/08/17/297619/allen-west-nuts/

#10yrsago The NSA’s program of tech sabotage created the Shadow Brokers https://web.archive.org/web/20160818132904/https://www.wired.com/2016/08/shadow-brokers-mess-happens-nsa-hoards-zero-days/

#10yrsago Walmarts are high-crime zones thanks to staff cuts, but America gets the bill https://web.archive.org/web/20160818000539/https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-walmart-crime/

#10yrsago DoJ says it will end private federal prisons https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/08/department-justice-plans-end-private-prison/

#10yrsago Fiction: Sgt. Augmento, Bruce Sterling’s robots-take-our-jobs story https://web.archive.org/web/20160818161624/https://motherboard.vice.com/read/sgt-augmento

#10yrsago Las Vegas: high unionization rates mean smaller wage-gaps for women, especially older women https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/17/opinion/how-unions-help-cocktail-servers.html

#10yrsago The incredible true story of the Epcot Horizons superfans who ruled the ride https://web.archive.org/web/20160822031741/https://dangerousminds.net/comments/the_true_story_of_the_unauthorized_daredevil_documentation_of_the_horizons_/

#10yrsago Predictive policing predicts police harassment, not crime https://web.archive.org/web/20160821093834/https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11292-016-9272-0

#10yrsago UC Davis Chancellor spent $400K+ to scrub her online reputation after pepper-spray incident https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article94733812.html

#10yrsago Reputation systems work because people are mostly good https://timharford.com/2016/08/the-meaning-of-trust-in-the-age-of-airbnb/

#10yrsago The guy who started Serbia’s ethnic cleansing led a pro-Trump rally in Belgrade https://web.archive.org/web/20160817022133/https://theintercept.com/2016/08/16/serb-inspired-ethnic-cleansing-bosnia-leads-vote-trump-rally-belgrade/

#10yrsago Europe’s banks want to store billions in cash to fight back against negative interest https://web.archive.org/web/20160817152157/https://www.cnbc.com/2016/08/16/banks-look-for-cheap-way-to-store-cash-piles-as-rates-go-negative.html

#10yrsago Kill Rock Stars president explains why the radio plays the same songs over and over https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThrXkYwTBP8

#10yrsago Snowden explains the Shadow Brokers/Equation Group/NSA hack https://www.techdirt.com/2016/08/16/ed-snowden-explains-why-hackers-published-nsas-hacking-tools/

#10yrsago Hackers claim to have stolen NSA cyberweapons, auctioning them to highest bidder https://web.archive.org/web/20160816035711/https://motherboard.vice.com/read/hackers-hack-nsa-linked-equation-group

#10yrsago What life is like when you really understand advanced mathematics https://www.quora.com/What-is-it-like-to-understand-advanced-mathematics-Does-it-feel-analogous-to-having-mastery-of-another-language-like-in-programming-or-linguistics

#10yrsago Parents who can’t pay the bill for kids’ incarceration can still go bankrupt, a US court rules https://archive.thinkprogress.org/everything-wrong-with-how-our-justice-system-treats-poor-people-in-one-awful-case-bfd91a6fa114/

#10yrsago UK Intellectual Property Office grants trademark on “should’ve” https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-37092366

#10yrsago The Greatest of Marlys! is the Lynda Barry book we’ve been waiting for https://memex.craphound.com/2016/08/16/the-greatest-of-marlys-is-the-lynda-barry-book-weve-been-waiting-for/

#5yrsago Housing, money laundry, speculation and precarity https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/16/die-miete-ist-zu-hoch/#assets-v-human-rights

#5yrsago Big Oil caught lying about methane https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/17/king-bullet/#methanescan

#5yrsago Sandman Slim's final adventure https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/17/king-bullet/#sticking-the-dismount

#5yrsago The Sacklers threaten us all with a good time https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/18/lets-make-a-deal/#art-of-the-deal

#1yrago Zuckermuskian solipsism https://pluralistic.net/2025/08/18/seeing-like-a-billionaire/#npcs

#1yrago LLMs are slot-machines https://pluralistic.net/2025/08/16/jackpot/#salience-bias

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Upcoming appearances (permalink)

• Edinburgh International Book Festival with Jimmy Wales, Aug 17
  https://www.edbookfest.co.uk/events/the-front-list-cory-doctorow-and-jimmy-wales

• Sydney: The Festival of Dangerous Ideas, Aug 23-24
  https://festivalofdangerousideas.com/program/

• Melbourne: Enshittification at the Wheeler Centre, Aug 25
  https://www.wheelercentre.com/events-tickets/season-2026/cory-doctorow-enshittification

• Brighton: The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI with Carole Cadwalladr (Brighton Dome), Sep 8
  https://brightondome.org/whats-on/LSC-cory-doctorow-the-reverse-centaurs-guide-to-life-after-ai/

• London: The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI with Riley Quinn (Foyle's Picadilly), Sep 9
  https://www.foyles.co.uk/events/enshittification-cory-doctorow-riley-quinn

• Manchester: Take Back Big Tech with Jovan Owusu-Nepaul (House of Books and Friends), Sep 11
  https://ma.to/event/cory-doctorow-house-of-books-and-friends-11-sep-2026

• South Bend: An Evening With Cory Doctorow (Notre Dame), Oct 6
  https://franco.nd.edu/events/2026/10/06/an-evening-with-cory-doctorow/

• Victoria: Munro's Books (Oct 20)
  https://www.munrobooks.com/events/6113620261020

• Vancouver: BC Policy Solutions Gala, Nov 12
  https://bcpolicy.ca/gala/

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Recent appearances (permalink)

• Technofeudal Enshittification (Fucking Cancelled)
  https://www.fuckingcancelled.com/p/technofeudal-enshittification-with

• Who The Machine Serves (EFF)
  https://archive.org/details/effecting-change-who-the-machine-serves

• Speculative Fiction for Social Change II (Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff)
  https://pocketcasts.com/podcast/cool-people-who-did-cool-stuff/08cbb840-a6ae-013a-d8aa-0acc26574db2/part-two-cory-doctorow-on-speculative-fiction-for-social-change/937e8800-9404-45a6-b5e3-90ebee2cfaea

• Speculative Fiction for Social Change I (Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff)
  https://pocketcasts.com/podcast/cool-people-who-did-cool-stuff/08cbb840-a6ae-013a-d8aa-0acc26574db2/part-one-cory-doctorow-on-speculative-fiction-for-social-change/15ad467c-0832-44c9-91ea-59defd783dba

• AI, automation and enshittification (Telecoms.com)
  https://www.telecoms.com/ai/the-telecoms-com-podcast-ai-automation-and-enshittification

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Latest books (permalink)

• "The Reverse-Centaur's Guide to AI," a short book about being a better AI critic, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, June 2026
  https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374621568/thereversecentaursguidetolifeafterai/

• "Canny Valley": A limited edition collection of the collages I create for Pluralistic, self-published, September 2025 https://pluralistic.net/2025/09/04/illustrious/#chairman-bruce

• "Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It," Farrar, Straus, Giroux, October 7 2025
  https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374619329/enshittification/

• "Picks and Shovels": a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2025 (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels).

• "The Bezzle": a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2024 (thebezzle.org).

• "The Lost Cause:" a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org).

• "The Internet Con": A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245).

• "Red Team Blues": "A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before." Tor Books http://redteamblues.com.

• "Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin", on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com

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Upcoming books (permalink)

• "The Post-American Internet," a geopolitical sequel of sorts to Enshittification, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2027

• "Unauthorized Bread": a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, April 20, 2027

• "Enshittification, Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It" (the graphic novel), Firstsecond, 2027

• "The Memex Method," Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2027

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Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources:

Currently writing:

• “Once Is Enemy Action,” a science fiction novel about the origins of modern technofascism. Friday's words: 564 (6039 total).

• "The Post-American Internet," a sequel to "Enshittification," about the better world the rest of us get to have now that Trump has torched America. Fourth draft completed. Submitted to editor.

• A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING

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"When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla" -Joey "Accordion Guy" DeVilla

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ISSN: 3066-764X

“The Yahoo Boys,” “Unsayable,” “Sunrise,” and “Skin Contact.”

Pompous scholars were a standard joke on the Italian stage through the 16th century. Arnoud Visser writes in The Public Domain Review that Francesco Belo, a playwright from Rome, published the first play to put one at the center. In El pedante, from the 1520s, the schoolmaster Prudenzio "talks in a mangled mix of Latin and vernacular." — Read the rest

The post A 1582 comedy translates "pedant" as "worthless idiot, donkey head" appeared first on Boing Boing.

Jonathan Weber has written a history of San Francisco's rise as a global technology capital and the crises that came with it. City on the Edge: Technology, Politics, and the Fight for the Soul of San Francisco opens in the early 1990s, when San Francisco had not recovered from the AIDS epidemic and the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. — Read the rest

The post How San Francisco became a tech capital, then nearly lost itself appeared first on Boing Boing.

Louis Pope Gratacap was the curator of mineralogy at the American Museum of Natural History from 1880 until his death in 1917. He usually read during his three-hour round trip to the museum from Staten Island. He also wrote novels, and one of them, The New Northland (1915), may be the earliest novel to feature a Tyrannosaurus rex. — Read the rest

The post A museum curator wrote the first T. rex novel on his daily commute appeared first on Boing Boing.

Visit our bookshop.org page to purchase this week’s new books and support your local bookstore. And us!

 

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Afifi, Nadia: A Fugitive’s History of the Known Universe (Flame Tree Press UK 978-1787589483, $26.95, 288pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 08/11/2026)

SF novel. Azad is being hunted across the galaxies by the Vitruvian Authorities because he exposed the dark past of his world. Azad and his team need to team up with a space pirate to start a revolution.

 

 

Anonymous: Critical Role: The Mighty Nein: Stories Untold (Penguin Random House/Random House Worlds 979-8217298488, $30.00, 320pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Tie-in anthology of Critical Role, stories based on the livestreamed roleplaying game. Nine different tales of some of the most memorable characters, including: Essek Thelyss, Isharni, and Pumat Sol. Simultaneous with the Penguin Random House UK edition.

 

 

Ayinde, M.H.: A Dance of Burning Blades (Simon & Schuster/Saga Press 978-1668086858, $22.00, 688pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Epic fantasy novel, the second in the A Song of Legends Lost series. Tension is growing everywhere across the nine lands. The people hope to find out the secrets the king has been keeping from them.

 

 

Bennett, Robert Jackson: A Trade of Blood (Penguin Random House/Del Rey 978-0593723852, $32.00, 400pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Fantasy mystery novel, third in the Shadow of the Leviathan series. Ana Dolabra must prove the innocence of the heir of one of the Empire’s most powerful families, and if she doesn’t, the Empire will fall apart. Simultaneous with the Hodder & Stoughton UK edition.

 

 

Kim, Bo-Young & Bowman, Sophie: A Plagued Sea (Tor/Nightfire 978-1250380753, $24.99, 102pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Horror novel. An earthquake on the coast of Haewon, a small seaside village, released a plague that turns its victims into fish monsters. Mu-young has been doing everything she can to survive here for the past three years.

 

 

Chapman, Clay McLeod: Devil Inside (Harlequin/Mira 978-0778306214, $18.99, 384pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Horror romance novel. After an accident that nearly cost his life, Jordan’s grip on reality seems to be slipping. After getting ghosted by a woman named Lilith, things start to get even weirder. Simultaneous with the Titan Books UK edition.

 

 

Dade, Olivia: World’s Okayest Oracle (Reluctantly) Seeks Demon (Penguin Random House/Berkley Romance 978-0593818220, $20.00, 458pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Supernatural romantic comedy novel, the second in the Supernatural Entanglements series. Gwen Wexloff can see the future, but not when it matters, until one day, she experiences a world-changing vision, and she needs to find help.

 

 

Doty, Max: The House that Eats the Dead (Macmillan/Tor Nightfire UK 979-8217092239, $20.00, 336pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/18/2026)

Horror novel. Claire discovers that her family’s new house eats anything that used to be alive. When she exploits this power, she forms a bond with the house, but its hunger starts to grow.

 

 

El-Arifi, Saara: Earthbound (Penguin Random House/Del Rey 978-0593723067, $29.99, 384pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Fantasy novel. Alder returns to the cave he was born in to discover more about his past, and the truth has him shaken. In the fae court, Yeeran is trying to create a peace treaty with the elven army.

 

 

Goodman, A.B.: House of Atreus: Orestes’ Return (Planetary Books 979-8188214753, $19.99, 144pp, formats: hardcover, paperback, ebook, 07/20/2026)

SF novel, third in the House of Atreus series. Agamemnon’s exiled son, Orestes, has finally come of age, and must prove himself to Apollo, as he returns home to the kingdom.

 

 

Hanrahan, Gareth: The Dungeon Book (Orbit US 978-0316595421, $19.99, 352pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Fantasy novel. After Bait is captured by a dragon, and left for dead in a dungeon, she’s taken in by a family of goblins, and is given the chance to decide where she belongs. Simultaneous with the Orbit UK edition.

 

 

Jafari, Sara: Heavensent & Hellbent (Penguin Random House/Delacorte 979-8217028634, $20.99, 416pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Young-adult fantasy romance novel. After seeing Zain kill a man, Roxana realizes that demons (and also angels) exist, but she can’t help her attraction towards him.

 

 

Johnston, E.K.: The Third Period Comeback (Penguin Random House/Dutton 979-8217110421, $17.99, 176pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Upper middle-grade “magic-tinged” novel. Hayley Rilko is cursed to ruin any hockey team she plays for, but it doesn’t go into effect until she’s no longer a kid, so she becomes determined to break the curse.

 

 

Kelly, James Patrick: The Book of Bots (Fairwood Press 978-1958880418, $19.99, 302pp, formats: paperback, ebook, 08/14/2026)

Collection of 12 stories about robots and AI that come in all different forms. Some are in the shape of a car, some are from the far future, and some only exist in cyberspace.

 

 

Keslowitz, Steven: Traveling the Yellow Brick Road: What We Learn from The Wizard of Oz and Wicked (McFarland 978-1476699646, $39.95, 236pp, formats: paperback, ebook, 08/13/2026)

Critical non-fiction focusing on the films, looking at the world of Oz as a reflection of American society, exploring how beliefs about heroism, villainy, ethics, and truth change between the classic film and the recent Wicked films.

 

 

Maberry, Jonathan: Bewilderness (WordFire Press 978-1680577969, $23.99, 514pp, formats: hardcover, paperback, ebook, 08/11/2026)

SF horror novel. A doorway to a parallel dimension malfunctions and causes infinite parallel Earth’s to collide with our’s. Abby Corman is the only one who knows how to stop this, but an alien hunter is determined to stop her.

 

 

Okungbowa, Suyi Davies: Season of the Serpent (Orbit US ‎978-0316428996, $19.99, 368pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Epic fantasy novel, the third book in the Nameless Republic trilogy. The Nameless Republic and Kangalaland are on the verge of war, and everyone must pick a side. Lilong lost her power, and is doing everything she can to get it back.

 

 

Penelope, Leslye: The Inevitable Undoing of Zahara Douglass (Orbit US/Redhook 978-0316594691, $19.99, 496pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Contemporary fantasy novel. After the disappearance of Zahara’s sister, no one remembered she even existed in the first place, besides her. Four years later she finds evidence of her existence, and hires a private investigator to look into her past.

 

 

Ribay, Randy: Nest of Tongues (Penguin Random House/Random House 979-8217024346, $19.99, 384pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Young-adult paranormal horror novel inspired by Filipino mythology. Lily and her brother Caleb are vampires, but choose to keep it a secret, until one day when a monster hunter kills another vampire.

 

 

Smith, Jasmine: Death Card (Penguin Random House/Putnam 978-0593858295, $13.99, 304pp, formats: paperback, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Young-adult contemporary fantasy novel. Mikaela Broussard has a vision of a customer stabbing her in the heart. She decides to spend time with the customer, Joelle, in order to gather more information, but starts to find her irresistible. A first novel.

 

 

Spotts, Isabelle: Saint Delilah (Penguin Random House/Berkley 979-8217189816, $30.00, 311pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Horror novel. Delilah, a ghost, is trying to clear her unfinished business, and she needs to start with finding who her killer is, so she teams up with the owner of a strip club she used to dance at, and a stranger who can hear and touch her. A first novel.

 

 

Tchaikovsky, Adrian: Preaching to the Choir (Rebellion/Solaris UK 978-1837867301, $32.99, 176pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/13/2026)

SF novel, second in the Terrible Worlds: Transformations series. Ross asked Elena to come with her to a mysterious family gathering for moral support, despite the fact that spouses aren’t invited, and they uncover dark secrets.

 

 

Tooley, Adrienne: There Are Ghosts Here (Penguin Random House/Delacorte 979-8217027897, $19.99, 272pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Young-adult speculative horror novel. Willa Childs forgets the details of the accident that sent her to the Dorsey House, and the others stuck there, Caroline and Ivy, are intending to keep it from her.

 

 

Walter, Heather: The Witch Queen (Penguin Random House/Del Rey 978-0593598399, $30.00, 560pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audiobook, 08/11/2026)

Fantasy novel, second in the Crimson Crown duology. Queen Ayleth knows that having the kingdom under her rule isn’t perfect, and she’s consumed by fears that the witches will come to remove her, or that people will find out her secret. Simultaneous with the Penguin Random House UK edition.

 

 

Whitten, Hannah: Reliquary (Orbit US/Run For It 978-0316579537, $30.00, 320pp, formats: hardcover, paperback, ebook, 08/11/2026)

Horror novel. The estranged family of Claire’s late fiancé, Elias, reaches out after his death, and invites her to a three day stay at Harrow Point. While she’s there, she uncovers the reason behind her traumatic connection to the ocean.

 

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The post New Book Releases: Aug 11, 2026 appeared first on Locus.

A French manuscript from about 1485 shows a woman spinning wool in her doorway while her child plays beside her. The doorway is the mouth of a giant snail shell. She lives there.
Robert Testard painted it for Charles d'Angoulême, a count in southwestern France, as one of 56 miniatures in Les secretz de l'histoire naturelle.  — Read the rest

The post In this 1485 manuscript, people live inside giant snail shells appeared first on Boing Boing.

Robert Jackson Bennett's The Tainted Cup delivers everything I want from a fantasy detective story. Wonderful characters, fantastic world-building, and a mystery worth solving.

Bennett tells the story from the point of view of Din Kol, an altered human whose misshapen talents left him useless to most regular sources of employment for altered humans in the Empire. — Read the rest

The post The Tainted Cup gets the fantasy detective novel exactly right appeared first on Boing Boing.

Doi Toshitsura was a feudal lord in Edo-period Japan who studied snow for about twenty years. His 1832 book of woodblock prints, Sekka Zusetsu, has eighty-six drawings of what he called "snow flowers" (sekka), plus a dozen more copied from a 1779 Dutch natural history book. — Read the rest

The post A Japanese lord spent 20 years drawing snowflakes under a microscope appeared first on Boing Boing.

Luke Howard was an industrial chemist in London. He studied clouds as a hobby in the early 1800s. In his Essay on the Modification of Clouds, he gave the standard cloud formations the names we still use today. Cirrus is the Latin word for a wisp of hair, cumulus for "convex or conical heaps," stratus for a "horizontal sheet." — Read the rest

The post One hobbyist named cirrus, cumulus, and stratus back in 1803 appeared first on Boing Boing.

The writer’s political ideal—citizens appearing before one another as equals, engaging in dialogue and debate—had a counterpart in her spirited gatherings on the Upper West Side.

Cold War policymakers pushed for a unified Continent. Their MAGA successors are trying to undo all that.