Wes Phillips

Nick Hornby gets an unusual request.

According to an AP poll, one out of every four Americans hasn't read a single book in the last year. Okay, maybe I can believe that, but whenever I read articles like this, they inevitably include some guy (and yes, it is always a guy) who says something like, "I just don't have time for fiction, when I read I want to learn something."

Or, in my case, doesn't. Gary Lynch thinks he has the answer.

Alexander Zakharov posts, well, a Soviet poster every day. Best of all, he provides a lot of useful historical and artistic context for them. I've always been fascinated by the visual bravura of these posters, now I get to discover the "hidden" meaning to them, which, of course, weren't hidden to the proletariat .

Florence Foster Jenkins was many things. A teacher, a philanthropist, and a kind and generous friend, by many accounts. What she was not, was a gifted vocal artist, despite her unshakable belief to the contrary.

B. R. Myers is fightin' mad about high-faluting writin'.

Admit it—the lad simply smolders.