The other day, in an interview for my new book What He’s Poised to Do, I was asked a question about originality, something to the effect that I am considered an original writer and was that true and how did I feel about it? I gave a bad answer but now I have a good one.

My new book, What He’s Poised to Do, is coming out next week, and here are some posts about related projects. Some of them are connected to the new blog Letters With Character, which invites people to write letters to their favorite fictional characters.

-Guest post at Recommended Reading blog.

-Reflections on reading, at the Laughing Yeti.

-Book Notes at Largehearted Boy.

-The beginning of a project created jointly with Significant Objects and OneStory.

-James Joyce and the Jews, and how they’re coming together for an event with Tablet magazine.

Elian’s controversy is ten years old! I have reposted the musical I wrote at the time.

I took it on myself to save print. Someone had to do it. We’ve heard laments about its imminent demise. It is the case no more. Not with 3*TYPE, which will make everything that’s old new again. Welcome, future. It’s been so long since we saw you.

Two new things:

A piece on Moistworks about Sly Stone and a piece on McSweeneys about Balloon Boy.

The Significant Objects project, which asked writers to imagine origin stories for otherwise unremarkable objects in an attempt to see if that increased their value, now has its own mug, and an explanation of the official mug includes a nice nod to the Smiling Mug I wrote about.

A nice review of the Cassette From My Ex book, to which I contributed an essay.

Everyone knows about Dylan. Most people know about KISS. Some people know about Mark Knopfler and Joey Ramone. How many know about Marc Bolan?

Hop in a time machine and travel through human history.