I don't know how I missed this until now, but I just found a short note in British Vogue of all places. (I'm driving cross country; you would be reading European fashion magazines too!) I am firmly in the "I detested this book" camp, so the thought that it will be a movie disturbs me on so many levels I don't even know where to begin. (Leila did you know about it?)

A lot has been written about the suicides of Theresa Duncan and Jeremy Blake but I found Laurie Winer's article in California Lifestyle Magazine to be particularly prescient. Unfortunately it's not online but here's the bit that resonated most strongly with me:

USC-affiliated professor of social work John Brekke, who has long worked with the mentally ill, offers a slightly more acute diagnosis (though, of course, one based solely on Duncan's writings). "These were not benign delusions," he posits. "This is an undiagnosed mental illness characterized by non-bizarre paranoid delusions. It's a serious psychosis - a disease in which being bright and creative can actually hurt you." Brekke suspects Duncan's paranoid delusions merged with her real-life disappointments in a way that was unbearable. "Who knows if she had a moment of clarity in which she said, "Oh god, I destroyed myself and this man."

I was a regular reader of Theresa's blog and was shaking my head a lot in the months leading up to her death, wondering what in the world she was doing with some of those posts. (Were they a joke? Did she really believe that stuff?) Winer comes up with a conclusion that is hard to argue with though:

In the end, it seems Duncan was unable to construct a story with which she could live.

The new issue of Eclectica Magazine is up with reviews by me of YA mysteries, YA novels all about family drama, a ton of picture books and Adrienne Martini's intense memoir of motherhood, Hillbilly Gothic.

The new issue of Bookslut is up with my reviews of Jo Walton's Ha'penny, Cherie Priest's Not Flesh Nor Feathers and a column of October Country titles that includes Neil Gaiman's M is for Magic, Margo Lanagan's Red Spikes, Christopher Barzak's One for Sorrow, David Lubar's The Curse of the the Campfire Weinies, TK Welsh's The Unresolved, Vasilis Lolos' graphic novel, The Last Call and the picture book for goth lovers everywere, Circus Carnivore.

After reading her piece in the current issue of Poets & Writers (sadly not online) and now her testimony on Capitol Hill, I am more committed than ever to reading Edwidge Danticant's new memoir, Brother, I'm Dying.