Meet a Favorite Author from Northern Ireland: Ian Sansom

I spend a great deal of time reading crime novels, detective fiction and police procedurals.  They’re visceral, engaging on both the intellectual and emotional fronts, the loose ends tie up neatly, and there’s justice for most.  Or at least for some.   While bingeing on some great Irish detective fiction, I stumbled onto the work of Ian Sansom.  I love his books. Ian Sansom contributes a weekly column to The Guardian, writing book reviews, and essays on contemporary as well as historical cultural figures.  I wish…

Feb.1: David Ulin and Peter Guber on The Lost Art of Reading

This is a special, almost defining program for Writers Bloc, a program that explores the purpose of reading literature.  David Ulin’s book, The Lost Art of Reading: Why Books Matter in a Distracted Time, is an intimate and personal exploration of reading novels (and for discussion’s sake, we’ll include the occasional nonfiction work) for the sake of enjoyment, enrichment, stimulation and intellectual engagement.  David examines why reading matters, how thinking about ideas presented in literature can actually help us move forward as a civilization.  At…