HODP in Newsday
Claire Dederer profiles me in the Sunday edition of Newsday. (No login required.)
Claire Dederer profiles me in the Sunday edition of Newsday. (No login required.)
Earlier this month, MoorishGirl turned four years old. In blog years, I suppose that makes me a dinosaur. But, oh, it feels good!
Since it appeared in 2001, MG went from a few dozen readers to nearly 10,000 unique visitors per day. MG readers come from the U.S., Morocco, France, the U.K., Egypt, Spain, Italy, Holland, Israel, Hong Kong, and many other countries around the world. Most readers check the site while at work or at school. A few work in the publishing industry, others in the media, and a handful for government. Marhaba, everyone.
Here is what I have planned for the next few weeks: Guest reviews of several novels, including Yom Sang-Seop’s Three Generations, Naguib Mahfouz’s The Dreams, Dan Olivas’s Devil Talk, and Donna Seaman’s Writers on the Air; book recommendations from Hayan Charara and Rigoberto Gonzalez; giveaways of Wendy Lesser’s A Pagoda in The Garden, Leila Aboulela’s Minaret, the new anthology Waking Up American, and the Memoirs of Ahmed Kathrada; in addition, of course, to literary commentary, rants about various news, and updates from my book tour.
I no longer have a comments box for each post because I grew tired of deleting spam, but I welcome your suggestions. If you want to communicate with me, feel free to email me.
Carolyn See’s review of Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits appears in today’s Washington Post. If you can’t access the article because of a subscription wall, use bugmenot.com for a free login and password. You can also read a brief snippet on my author site.
Casablanca-based Moroccan magazine Tel Quel has a profile of me in its latest issue.
Ursula Lindsey’s review of Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits appears in the latest issue of Cairo Magazine. (No login required.)
Audience: About 30.
Anxiety index: 6 (out of 10).
Books given away: Wickett’s Remedy by Myla Goldberg and South African and leading anti-Apartheid figure Ahmed Kathrada’s Memoirs.
Surprise guest(s): Loggernaut‘s Jesse Lichtenstein.
No. of Moroccans who said hello: 2.
I wrapped up the West Coast leg of my book tour last night at Annie Bloom’s Books, here in Portland. A reader in the front row took copious notes throughout, which I suppose is both flattering and intimidating. It’s not the first time it’s happened at one of my readings, and yet I’m just not used to it.
I also had a great time during the Q&A because the audience was so engaged–lots of interesting questions about the book, the research, immigration, the process of writing, etc. Great crowd.