YES!  John Darnielle talks about his novel!  (Via Largehearted Boy)

“I’m working on it really slowly, and at this point, I expect to finish it when I’m 80 or something because I’m being really meticulous about revising it and am really ambitious about it,” he explains. “It’s about a guy who, when he was young, damaged himself very badly and finds himself in a position reflecting on other people who are as young as he once was and are also in the process of damaging themselves. It’s a novel and I’m happy with the individual chapters I have, but I wish it went quicker.”

• Jennifer Egan interviewed at Granta.

• Former British prime minister, Gordon Brown, pens an essay on slain Russian journalist, Anna Politkovskaya.

• They’re reading in France!  They’re reading in Germany!

• One-third of Americans don’t know who the vice president is.

• Mary Timony = Ian MacKaye, Carrie Brownstein = Guy Picciotto, Rebecca Cole = Joe Lally, Janet Weiss = Brendan Canty. Roughly. How Wild Flag is the new Fugazi