Fiction critic at the Wall Street Journal (https://www.wsj.com/news/author/sam-sacks); editor at Open Letters Review, formerly Open Letters Monthly (https://openlettersreview.com/) sam_sacks [at] hotmailhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.socialhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mlogntnqbc2v'“I don’t really have any vices,” he declared, before adding, as I looked at him quizzically but gently, “Except for sex. And food. But you have to eat.”' Another urging to read Adrian Nathan West's beautiful, intensely heartfelt in memoriam to Edmund White https://www.metropolitanreview.org/p/melancholy-is-a-duty-we-ignore12 May 2026 18:37 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mlogntnqbc2vhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mlodpf66us2q"Poetry has been, faute de mieux, one of the metaphors most frequently used for Atget’s bittersweet gaze. There’s something Dickinsonian about his empty spaces, his often quite literal slant." Excellent Max Norman piece on the stark, angular genius of Eugène Atget. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2026/05/28/quoting-the-world-max-norman/12 May 2026 17:44 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mlodpf66us2qhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mlgshmjafk2v"All his life, he has been taught to yearn for eternity. Yet here is this singular brilliance, consigned to a small span of years." In this weekend's WSJ, a commendation for Stephanie Sy-Quia's debut 'A Private Man,' about a priest who falls in love with a laywoman. https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/books/fiction-a-private-man-by-stephanie-sy-quia-2a80945d?st=68rMxQ&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink09 May 2026 17:47 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mlgshmjafk2vhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mllrqc2pg22cUpon winning the Nobel Prize, Camus recorded his “strange feeling of overwhelming weight and melancholy.” Benjamin Shull on Ryan Bloom's translation of Camus' Notebooks. https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/books/the-complete-notebooks-review-camus-confidential-91c6dee8?st=LRGFxJ&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink11 May 2026 17:17 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mllrqc2pg22chttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mllrkduuds2c"She was a bag of doorknobs, but the movie camera found the gazelle inside the unicorn and captured the joy she radiated." The great Jeanine Basinger has a piece on the authorized Audrey Hepburn biography for WSJ Books. Gift link: https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/books/intimate-audrey-review-all-about-his-mother-179a0d20?st=7Hk6gN&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink11 May 2026 17:14 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mllrkduuds2chttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mlgshmjafk2v"All his life, he has been taught to yearn for eternity. Yet here is this singular brilliance, consigned to a small span of years." In this weekend's WSJ, a commendation for Stephanie Sy-Quia's debut 'A Private Man,' about a priest who falls in love with a laywoman. https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/books/fiction-a-private-man-by-stephanie-sy-quia-2a80945d?st=68rMxQ&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink09 May 2026 17:47 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mlgshmjafk2vhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3ml6snzpkg22u"Grasset’s authors rarely agreed on much, but as the letter of protest we signed said, we have had — and still have — a common enemy: authoritarianism." Olivier Guez, one of 200 writers to leave Grasset, writes on the destruction of an eminent publisher. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/06/opinion/french-publishing-grasset-olivier-nora.html06 May 2026 13:29 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3ml6snzpkg22uhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mkzqck6ob22q'Casual traders “have no chance. Systematically,” said Michael Boss, a former professional poker player and a statistician by training. On Kalshi, Boss places 60 trades a minute and modifies his bids and asks 30 times a second.' On the prediction market grift (gift link): https://www.wsj.com/finance/investing/polymarket-kalshi-betting-profits-prediction-markets-eb23ac11?st=rvYoo7&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink04 May 2026 13:04 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mkzqck6ob22qhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mksssgwhcs2k“Islands within islands, within islands, within islands,” says a character in 'John of John,' Douglas Stuart's novel of extreme emotional repression in the Outer Hebrides. Gift link to my review of it and Elizabeth Strout's parable-like latest for this weekend's WSJ: https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/books/fiction-john-of-john-by-douglas-stuart-734d7c5a?st=vQKEHP&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink01 May 2026 19:00 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mksssgwhcs2khttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mks5ous4mc2w'Updike’s self-described “battered and vestigial but unsurrendered Christianity” feels, in his writing, like a kind of lacquer applied to give a surface shine.' Thoughtful Anthony Giardina piece on religion in John Updike's fiction and correspondence. https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/updike-letters-fiction-giardina-anthony-review01 May 2026 12:42 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mks5ous4mc2whttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mks3ut4nq22e"The US is spending hundreds of millions of dollars [to] give federal agents easy access to the home and workplace addresses of American citizens, their social-media accounts, vehicle information, flight history, law-enforcement records and other personal information" https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/immigration-ice-arrests-surveillance-6f1cef64?st=eXpeHn&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink01 May 2026 12:09 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mks3ut4nq22ehttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mko3hxxfxk2mVery happy that Housing Works Bookstore is getting back to hosting concerts. Some of the best shows I've seen in my life were here. These are fair prices to see Suzanne Vega in a small, book-filled space! And it's for charity. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/an-evening-with-suzanne-vega-tickets-1985712324015?aff=Klaviyo&utm_source=Klaviyo&utm_medium=campaign&utm_campaign=BKS%204-29%20Suzanne%20Vega&utm_id=01KQD7TGYR8T3S5KW3VPF7XYDT&utm_term=01GF43K1EER99VST26PN6CNJWS&_kx=q2guM7W2X-75wwib1buAs0NRO8e7Xwc6rbYkkzz7Pt4.XUKpQq29 Apr 2026 21:52 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mko3hxxfxk2mhttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mknchwbwn22wI love Andy Cush's Bookforum piece on Larry McMurtry, especially the shout-out to 'Moving On,' a book "full of layabout grad students and fast-talking rodeo cowboys, cheeseburgers and six-packs of Lone Star—like a Linklater film in the form of an 800-page novel" https://www.bookforum.com/print/3204/infinite-west-6273029 Apr 2026 14:24 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mknchwbwn22whttps://bsky.app/profile/ssacks.bsky.social/post/3mkkxppynks2l'What are “nonchalant Balliol voices”? What’s a “three pip emma”? Why is “General ffolliott” not a misprint? What does “napoo finny” mean, and is it even English?' Always a delight to find writing by Stephen Akey, here on the strange argot of High Modernism https://hedgehogreview.com/issues/humanism-in-a-posthumanist-age/articles/lost-allusions28 Apr 2026 16:06 +0000at://did:plc:i2mhsuqwk4pitsibrffigdpv/app.bsky.feed.post/3mkkxppynks2l