Strand Books in 1938

Flannery O’Connor’s Typewriter

Letters from The Habit of Being: Letters of Flannery O’Connor

To Elizabeth Bishop

2 August 1959

I have at last got my novel out of the house and on the train and haven’t yet self-employed myself back on anything serious. After you have worked on a thing seven years, it is too close for you to see it with precision. I see my stories much more clearly because they haven’t exhausted me by the time I finish them. My book is about a boy who has been raised up in the backwoods by his great uncle to be a prophet. The book is about his struggle not to be a prophet - which he loses. I am resigned to the fact that I am going to be the book’s greatest admirer.

Yesterday I sold a pair of peacocks, the first time I have sold any. These people showed up in a long white car, the woman in short shorts. They obviously had plenty of money that they weren’t used to. She flew a Piper Cub, kept two coons, and what she called a “Weimeraw” dog. He was going to start in on pheasants, peafowl an dbullfrogs. They came in and admired the house and she said, “We was in Macon looking for some French provincial furniture. I want me a love seat.” The man was a structural engineer. He said he had a friend who was a writer in Mississippi and I said who was that. He said, “His name is Bill Faulkner. I don’t know if he’s any good or not but he’s a mighty nice fellow.” I told him he was right good.

Her Interactive has launched a Nancy Drew inspired game for the iPad and iPhone.

The Nancy Drew Mobile Mysteries Series, for the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, takes the story-based gamebook category to new heights with players choosing their own paths and solving mysteries and puzzles both big and small. Shadow Ranch is an interactive mystery for mobile devices that brings the book to life. As you navigate the mysterious events at Shadow Ranch, you will soon find yourself in a world of long lost treasure, phantom horses, rough and tumble cowboys, and fearsome creatures of the wild desert.

Nancy is off to lend a hand at Shadow Ranch with her two best-friends, Bess and George. But when she arrives, she quickly discovers that Shadow Ranch hides a darker past. A recent rash of ghost sightings and a series of horrible accidents, have been driving customers away from Shadow Ranch in droves, and with business at a standstill, it’s only a matter of time before it closes the doors for good. It’ll be up to you, as Nancy Drew to piece together the mysterious events at Shadow Ranch, before it’s owners are forced to ride off into the sunset. Play the Story!

Artist Julia Fields creates these amazing works of art from old books. Click through the link for her Etsy shop.

Move over, Jonathan Safran Foer.