NEW YORK — Arthur Frommer, whose “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day” guidebooks revolutionized leisure travel by convincing average Americans to take budget vacations abroad, has died. He was 95. Frommer died from complications of pneumonia, his daughter Pauline Frommer said Monday. “My father opened up the world to so many people,” she said. “He…
WASHINGTON — Yu Miao smiles as he stands among the 10,000 books crowded on rows of bamboo shelves in his newly reopened bookstore. It’s in Washington’s vibrant Dupont Circle neighborhood, far from its last location in Shanghai, where the Chinese government forced him out of business six years ago. “There is no pressure from the…
LONDON — British writer Samantha Harvey won the Booker Prize for fiction on Tuesday with “Orbital,” a short, wonder-filled novel set aboard the International Space Station that ponders the beauty and fragility of Earth. Harvey was awarded the 50,000-pound ($64,000) prize for what she has called a “space pastoral” about six orbiting astronauts, which she…
Is there a better writer of urban American stories than Richard Price? His resume is hart to beat: To episodes of HBO’s “The Wire,” and “The Night Of,” and novels like “Clockers,” “Lush Life,” and “Freedomland,” fans can now add “Lazarus Man.” The story opens with a boom, literally. A five-story tenement in East Harlem…
LONDON — A children’s book written by British celebrity chef Jamie Oliver has been withdrawn from sale after it was criticized for causing offense to Indigenous Australians. The Guardian newspaper reported Saturday that the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education Corporation blasted “Billy And The Epic Escape,” which was published earlier this year, for…
MADRID — It’s the eyes peering from the canvases that get him, their gaze piercing the boundary between art and life. That’s why acclaimed Irish novelist John Banville prefers to visit Spain’s Prado Museum during its opening hours — even though he’s been invited to browse anytime as part of a month-long literary fellowship. Still,…
LONDON — LONDON (AP) — George Smileythe subtle fictional spymaster navigating treacherous Cold War currents, is back. And so, somewhat surprisingly, is his creator, John le Carré. Four years after the spy writer’s death at the age of 89comes a new thriller, “Karla’s Choice.” Billed as “a John le Carré novel,” it was written by…
NEW YORK — This year’s National Book Awards 75th anniversary ceremony won’t only be a tribute to literature. Expect some laughs and some music, too. The National Book Foundation announced Thursday that Kate McKinnon of “Saturday Night Live” fame will host the Nov. 20 event at Cipriani Wall Street in Manhattan, and Oscar- and Grammy-winning…
NEW YORK — Percival Everett’s novel “James,” his acclaimed reworking of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” has won a $50,000 prize that continues Everett’s recent wave of literary honors. On Wednesday night, “James” was awarded the Kirkus Prize for fiction. Everett’s novel, which imagines Mark Twain’s classic from the perspective of the escaped enslaved man…
NEW YORK — Barry Diller has a memoir coming out next spring, covering a life that could fill multiple volumes. simon , Schuster announced Wednesday that Diller’s “Who Knew” will be released May 20, following his rise from the mail room of the William Morris Agency to the heights of wealth and influence. His many…
