Solex reviews her own Pandora station, Aimee Bender, Tom Bissell, Spalding Gray

I’ve been working as managing editor at The Fanzine and  wanted to pass along some links to some interesting pieces that are up at The Fanzine right now.

I am a longtime fan of Dutch cut’n’paste pop-star Solex, a.k.a. Elisabeth Esselink. Here she reviews the Solex Pandora station. It’s interesting to read a musician’s opinion of the Pandora playlist that typifies their style.

Also, Matthew Simmons did a great interview with Tom Bissell about his recent book, Extra Lives, which sets out to apply something a bit like literary criticism to video games. Also, an interview with Aimee Bender about food, fiction and her recent novel, The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake.

Also, a review of the new Steven Soderbergh’s recent documentary on actor and monologist Spalding Gray, who committed suicide in January 2004. The review is written by Theresa Smalec, who was the last person to interview Gray before his death.

Louis Chude-Sokei delivers a fascinating review of Alain Mabanckou’s Broken Glass delving into the importance of self-loathing as an authorial tool and the ways it’s traditionally been off limits for black writers.

Great fiction from Jimmy Chen of HTMLGiant and Andrew Leland.

Kaya Oakes brings a thoughtful piece on the radical anarcho-socialism of Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Workers. Oakes presents a real different vision of the possibilities for Catholicism, after the ongoing bad news about priest abuse scandals.

Finally, here’s a blog I wrote about fiber optics and the difficulty of visualizing internet infrastructure.