An open letter with more than one hundred signatories is calling for the resignation of the Board of Trustees of Kundiman, a nonprofit that supports the Asian American literary community, over the organization’s response to the war in Gaza, reports Literary Hub. “The letter goes on to detail a number of grievances and demands, all dating back to an October 11th incident in which the Kundiman co-founders and board ‘took to Kundiman’s social media accounts to delete a staff-posted statement of solidarity with Palestinians and replaced it with one that conflated Jewish lives with Israel while also erasing Gazans entirely.’”

The Donnelly Public Library in Idaho will prohibit unchaperoned readers under the age of eighteen in order to comply with a “library porn” law. The legislation requires public and private libraries to “relocate a book to an adults-only section within 60 days of receiving a written complaint,” writes Boise State Public Radio. “Our size prohibits us from separating our ‘grown up’ books to be out of the accessible range of children,” the library’s management reportedly wrote in a statement.

The New York Times has a report on the “shake up” at Knopf Doubleday, a division of Penguin Random House, that led to the departure of Alfred A. Knopf publisher Reagan Arthur and Pantheon and Schocken publisher Lisa Lucas, which “likely came as a surprise to many in the company.”

An ongoing rivalry between hip-hop artists Drake and Kendrick Lamar got Erica Ezeifedi thinking about feuds in the book world. On Book Riot Ezeifedi recalls “literary beefs” between Richard Wright and Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison and journalist Bill Moyers, Salman Rushdie and John Updike, and others.

Nonprofit Quarterly considers how the LGBTQ community and its allies are working to support the right to read as conservative activists across the country are increasing efforts to ban books with queer themes from school and public libraries. “Many LGBTQ+ advocates and groups believe that these book bans are attempts to remove the very identities of LGBTQ+ people—but they are refusing to let that happen.”

Washington Post book critic Michael Dirda offers tips for deepening your reading experience.

In an announced “restructure” for Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (KDPG), Alfred A. Knopf publisher Reagan Arthur and Pantheon Schocken publisher Lisa Lucas will both leave their positions, reports Publishers Weekly. “Jordan Pavlin has been promoted to executive VP and publisher at Knopf, in addition to her role as editor-in-chief, newly reporting to [KDPG president and publisher Maya] Mavjee and managing both the Knopf and Schocken editorial departments. Pantheon editorial now reports to VP and editorial director Denise Oswald, who will newly report to Doubleday EVP, publisher, and editor-in-chief Bill Thomas. The search for a new editorial director at Shocken continues, and the role’s eventual occupant will report to Pavlin.”

Lucas Wittmann is the new executive director of the Unterberg Poetry Center at 92NY, writes Publishers Weekly. The announcement follows months of controversy for the Center after it cancelled an October 2023 event featuring Viet Thanh Nguyen because of the author’s public criticism of Israel in the wake of the Hamas attack on the country; the Center then put an indefinite hold on literary events. Wittmann will be coming from Time magazine, where he was the editorial director of the ideas and opinion sections; he previously worked at W. W. Norton, Regan Arts, and as literary editor of the Daily Beast and Newsweek. 

Washington Square Press, an imprint of Atria Books—which is a division of Simon & Schuster—is getting a rebrand. Next spring it will begin publishing hardcover literary fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, reports Publishers Weekly. “The reimagined imprint, which for many years has been the home of many of Atria's trade paperback reprints, will be helmed by Atria v-p and editorial director Lindsay Sagnette.”

The Los Angeles Times reports on The Libros Lincoln Heights, an L.A. bookstore opened late last year by an electrical engineer. “In the months since opening, the Libros has become a neighborhood hub, spotlighting books and authors that can’t always be found on the shelves of other bookstores. Collections of self-published poetry and family histories of Lincoln Heights sit alongside multi-award-winning books by Viet Thanh Nguyen and Kelly Lytle Hernández (also L.A. residents).”

British Queen Camilla is a literary “podcast queen,” writes the Daily Mail. The second season of the Queen’s Reading Room, which is hosted by Vicki Perrin with prerecorded segments by the Queen, is set to feature authors Neil Gaiman, Peter James, and Kate Mosse, among other writers. 

The New York Times considers the “literary empire” actress Reese Witherspoon has built with Reese’s Book Club. “In 2023, print sales for the club’s selections outpaced those of Oprah’s Book Club and Read With Jenna, according to Circana Bookscan, adding up to 2.3 million copies sold.”

Elastic, a new print magazine of “psychedelic art and literature,” is set to launch next spring, reports Literary Hub. Led by founding editor in chief Hillary Brenhouse, the former editorial director of Bold Type Books and editor in chief of Guernica, Elastic will be “supported in part by grants from UC Berkeley and Harvard as part of their Psychedelics in Society and Culture initiative.”

On the blog of publisher Verso, Miriam Gordis explores what she describes as a labor crisis in book publishing.

Amid criticism of PEN America’s response to the war in Gaza, which led the free speech organization to cancel its 2024 literary festival and awards ceremony, PEN’s annual fundraising gala pulled in more than $2 million last night, reports the Associated Press. But the event was not without controversy: “[A]round 20 protestors stood in front of the museum, calling out names of Palestinian civilians killed and chanting ‘Shame!’ as gala attendees arrived.”

A book containing marginalia by Paradise Lost author John Milton has been discovered in the Burton Barr Central Library in Phoenix, reports the BBC. The handwritten notes were found in a copy of Raphael Holinshed's Chronicles (1587), which is now “one of just three known books to preserve Milton’s handwritten reading notes, and one of just nine books to have survived from his library.”

The Japan Times explores an effort by Iraqi Kurds to digitize “rare and vulnerable” books integral to Kurdish identity; considered the largest stateless ethnic group in the world, the Kurdish people number more than 25 million and live primarily in Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey.

The Hong Kong Free Press considers a new anthology that collects poetry by migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong.

The New York Times offers its take on PEN America—which holds its annual fundraising gala tonight—amid criticism of its response to the war in Gaza that has left the free speech organization in crisis. “What does it mean to defend writers amid a polarizing war? When should a group that promotes free expression for all take sides? And at a time of extreme humanitarian crisis that some see as genocide, is a commitment to big-tent dialogue a necessity, or a dodge?”

The company behind ChatGPT, OpenAI, has an “old-fashioned homage to the written word” in its San Francisco office: a library of physical books. The New York Times offers a peek at its shelves.