Celebrating Unlikable Women: Critical Linking, May 7, 2020

Critical Linking is a daily roundup of the most interesting bookish links from around the web sponsored by Flatiron Books, publisher of

“When I first moved to New York, I worked as a nanny for a couple who owned a bookstore, and one day the mother insisted I take home Clarice Lispector’s The Hour of the Star (full disclosure: I never brought it back), which is about a young Brazilian woman overlooked by the world for her dim wits and unremarkable looks. Since then, this idea of books driven by characters you might think have nothing to offer the world or the reader has obsessed me. How do you take a person that most would deem uninteresting, perhaps objectionable—possibly even repugnant— and make the reader care about them?”
Likability is overrated anyway.

“For many of us, life right now feels caught up in the ultimate paradox—it appears that many of us have a lot of free-seeming time to do things, but very little motivation to really do anything, at all. And that’s okay. Should I be working on my doctoral dissertation right now? Leave me alone. (Actually no, please come back.)

But if you do want something to do (maybe even cross something off your list), consider diving into a classic detective series. I’m talking really famous, really clever stories. The heavies. The fun stuff. We’ve rounded up a list of the big ones for you.”
You don’t gotsta, but if you wantsa: the game is afoot.

“Your Taste In Scholastic Books Will Reveal If You’re In Your Early, Mid, Or Late Twenties. Truly, the best day of the school year.”
LOL I got early twenties. Now you take the quiz!