– Happy Pride month! In honor of this month’s celebrations, here is Bookriot’s roundup of their favorite queer graphic novels and comics of the century to get your monthly TBR going. The list contains one of Sophie and Lilia’s (Monstress) and one of Damla’s (The Tea Dragon Society) favorites too! And if graphic novels are not quite your thing, take a look at their list of underrated new LGBTQ+ releases full of new titles to discover! (Also, please join us in The Hague for Queer Open Mic night on Wednesday 24 June!)(Reservations necessary.)(And keep your eyes peeled for 5 events during Amsterdam Pride next month!)
– Awards! End of May and beginning of June is always exciting as it is (unofficially) literary award season. The biggest item on the docket is the International Booker Prize winner Taiwan Travelogue by Yang Shuang-Zi, which also won the National Book Award for Translated Literature in 2024.
The Women’s Prize for Fiction was also just announced, which Virginia Evans won for The Correspondent, as well as the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction, which went to The Finest Hotel in Kabul: A People’s History of Afghanistan by Lyse Doucet.
In addition, we also have the winners of the Bram Stoker Awards and Edgars for thrill-chasers, the Romantic Novel Association awards for lovers of love, Locus and Nebula Awards for fantasy readers.
– R.I.P Marjane Satrapi, the author of Persepolis, has passed away at 56 years old due to “sadness” according to the statement made by her family, leaving behind a legacy of nostalgia, empowerment, and geopolitical nuance with her remarkable work.
– The publishers’ war against AI continues in full force. This time, five big publishers (namely Hachette, Macmillan, McGraw Hill, Elsevier and Cengage) are suing Meta for copyright infringement, with the claims that their copyrighted works have been illegally used to train the AI program, Llama.
– In addition, the AI controversy in publishing spaces continues to grow as well. A prizewinning short story collection The Serpent In The Grove in the Commonwealth Foundation competition was suspected of being AI-generated. An entry to the Eisner Awards has been withdrawn (despite full disclosure that AI was used in some stories’ creations), and the award committee has released a statement that they will implement a clear AI-policy in their criteria in the future. This, on the heels of Olga Tokarczuk’s interview about her use of AI during her writing process and the Barnes & Noble CEO expressing his support for selling AI-generated books (although he has backtracked a little after some backlash from readers), has stirred the pot even more.
– Trending on Screen! The official trailer for Sunrise on the Reaping has dropped, expected to be released in the theaters in November. And talking of big releases, we also have a new trailer for The Odyssey, one of the most anticipated movies of the summer. In fact, it is so anticipated that ticket sales for its first IMAX screening reached $1,000 on eBay. Also, we CANNOT stock The Deal and the rest of the Off Campus series fast enough! Grab a copy if you see one, the publisher is also having trouble keeping up with demand and who knows when they come in again…
– Despite their variety in genres and topics, a lot of the recent bestsellers that have sparked debates and hot takes online all have one thing in common: “ragebaiting.” With Yesteryear’s tradwife-gone-wrong plotline, Famesick’s controversial allegations, and Strangers’ abundant relationship red-flags, readers have been confronted with plenty of subjects to rant about. Take a look at this take on the phenomena by Harper’s Bazaar.
– Are you more of a reading horse or a library rat? Find out all the cute (and funny) ways other countries call their bookworms.
– Podcast alert! Here’s one for all the Ursula K. Le Guin stans (Sophie can’t be the only one): In Your Spare Time. Notable authors (hello David Mitchell, Omar El Akkad, and adrienne maree brown, to name but three) each read aloud one of Ursula’s 130 blogposts, and reflect on what she has meant to them personally. And thank you to ABC regular and poet Hollis Kurman for shouting out ABC on podcast The Write Stuff, during her episode on building a writing life.
– Summer Reads! Because the official start of summer is less than a week away and slowing down and recharging is in the air everywhere. Publishers Weekly‘s staff picked out their favorite summer books, as did the Guardian reviewers. Both lists are heavy on new titles. LitHub, on the other hand, has picked their 50 of the Greatest Summer Novels of All Time. This list skews to literary fiction. Non-fiction lovers, don’t despair, here’s a great list of new titles for you to dive into this summer, courtesy of bibliolifestyle.com.
– And finally: there might be some kind of sporting World Cup happening right now (go Oranje! And Curaçao!), but a different kind of contest is taking place in ABC The Hague right now, too. Come by and vote for your favorite dinosaur – and don’t say you don’t have one, everyone does! – in the next few weeks. The quarter finals are on as we write, and competition is fierce for the crown of ABC’s Favorite Dinosaur.
