TODAY: In 1884, Williams Wells Brown dies. Katherine Kelaidis on Sergey Davydov andwhy stories of ordinary life are essential in times of political upheaval: “Hatred and division, the business of political conflict, are not the organizing principles of his inner world. Love is.” | Lit HubCriticismWhy Adam Peterson thinkssci-fi needs more sex. | Lit HubCraft“I feel solace in working with pencil and paper.”Priyanka Kumar on the process of illustrating her own nature writing. | Lit HubArtJudi Dench’sIs It Too Late to Make a Run for It?, Ian Rankin’sThe Heights, Louise Kennedy’sStations, and Simon Garfield’sThe Pen: A Human Historyall feature amongthe best reviewed books of the week. |Book MarksHow advances in neurosciencecan give paralyzed people a voice. | Lit HubScience“When a sparrow scratches at the horizon / Do I search for an idol?”Read “Arabic Music,” a poem by Mahmoud Darwish from Darwish: Poems. | Lit HubPoetry“This is Ada noticing on her tongue the translucence of the wordescriureand the wordnovel·la, to write andnovel, respectively.”Read from Irene Solà’s novel Dams, translated by Mara Faye Lethem. | Lit HubFictionPhilippe Jaenada, the winner of this year’s Prix Goncourt, admitted to using ChatGPT “three times” while writing his novel. | The GuardianSophia Nguyen considers themiddle-grade protagonist gender gap. | The AtlanticCasey McQuiston, author of popular romance novel Red, White, and Royal Blue(which includes a plot about flipping Texas), on the real-life flipping of Texas.| SlateNo one cares about your time capsule, and that’s okay. | LongreadsOn Kyoko Okazaki’sHelter Skelter, The Substance, and women in body horror.| The Comics JournalHow UFOs became the domain of the far right:“People who had grown up certain the CIA wasn’t to be trusted were suddenly retweeting former intelligence officials and lighting candles for the FBI.” | Los Angeles Review of Books