Electric Literature lists its favorite indie bookshops, from Minnesota to Tennessee.

The Hudson Valley Book Trail in New York State has grown from a “doodle on the back of a bookmark” to a major tourist attraction leading literary pilgrims across eight counties and nearly forty bookstores that not only sell books but offer readings, trivia, live music, food, beer, and more, writes the Middletown Times Herald-Record.

Indiana Public Media speaks with a local library director about whether lending physical books will be a priority for public libraries in the future: “[P]ublic library services are increasingly about access to digital resources, whether through computers at the library itself, or online services. It also means the library space is about far more than reading. It’s not just teens who can do more there. It’s a space for public meetings, performances, book clubs, cooking demonstrations, and more.”

Was Shakespeare a writer of fan fiction? “Many of his major works draw their narrative core from classical or popular source material, ranging from Ovid to the Bible to the Decameron,” writes Betsy Golden Kellem at JSTOR Daily.

Two literary organizations are offering financial assistance to small presses affected by the closure of Small Press Distribution (SPD). The Poetry Foundation today announced a bridge fund through which nonprofit poetry presses can apply for grants to help cover costs incurred due to SPD’s closure. The Community of Literary Magazines and Presses (CLMP) announced a separate grant opportunity for nonprofit publishers based in New York that were affected by SPD’s shutdown.

The New York Times profiles Deep Vellum, an independent publisher and bookstore owner that has “put Dallas on the literary map.”

Condé Nast Traveler offers its take on the nine best literary festivals around the world.

A group of thieves has been arrested by European police for the heist of at least 170 rare books written by Russian authors, reports Barron’s. “The suspected thieves posed as researchers at libraries, distracting staff while an accomplice replaced the valuable first editions with a copy of ‘outstanding quality’.”

On Literary Hub Maris Kreizman unpacks the problematics of book preview lists touting most-anticipated titles, “a highly imperfect form of coverage.”

Linda Ewing is the new executive director of Coffee House Press, an independent publisher in Minnesota, reports Publishers Weekly. Ewing had been serving as interim executive director since last year, after the resignation Anitra Budd in 2022 and during “a wave of further resignations,” in which Coffee House lost one-third of its staff. Jeremy M. Davis will become Coffee House’s editor in chief after serving in the role of executive editor since last summer.

Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia, is fighting for the right to send books to people in prison after a county sheriff’s office blocked its delivery of books to the Gwinnett County Jail last year. “Avid is now suing the Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Office for violating the store’s civil rights to free expression, with the University of Georgia School of Law’s First Amendment Clinic and civil rights attorney Zack Greenamyre as counsel. If successful, this case would establish approved vendor policies like Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Office as unconstitutional,” writes the Progressive Magazine.

In the Financial Times Nilanjana Roy contemplates the particular joys and insights to be found in reading the letters of prominent authors.

Literary critic Helen Vender—an influential scholar, thinker, and anthologist of poetry—has died at age ninety.

Public Books interviews novelist Francisco Goldman, who for the past thirty years “has produced a steady stream of ambitious, experimental works that resemble little else that has been published in the Anglophone world.” 

Town & Country offers a guide to the many literary references in Taylor Swift’s new album, The Tortured Poets Department.

On Literary Hub the duo behind Street Books—a bicycle-powered mobile library in Portland, Oregon—reflect on their work supporting unhoused readers by delivering books, eyeglasses, and other supplies needed to engage with literature.

Can book bans be banned themselves? The Associated Press reports that lawmakers in several traditionally Democratic states have proposed laws that do just that. Often referred to as “Freedom to Read” acts, the laws would prohibit or limit the ability of activists to remove from libraries books they claim are inappropriate for children or otherwise problematic.

Vox reports on “garbage e-books” overtaking Amazon: “It’s partly AI, partly a get-rich-quick scheme, and entirely bad for confused consumers”—and legitimate authors and publishers whose books are getting lost in the shuffle.

The New York Times reports on the cancellation of the PEN America Literary Awards after many authors withdrew their books from consideration amid criticism of the free speech organization’s response to the war in Gaza.

Today is World Book and Copyright Day. In 1995 the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designated April 23 as an annual date “to recognize the contributions of books and authors globally,” writes the Business Standard.