Dave Barry is a very funny man. South Floridians have spent years reading and laughing through his columns and published books. And through local appearances and charity events, Barry has earned a ton of goodwill in the Miami community. In fact, he’s probably the only man in the state of…
Representative Allen West. Governor Rick Scott. Real Housewives skin assemblage Elsa Patton. Florida has long had a rough go of things when it comes to being represented to the world. But we’ve always had a fairly rich literary tradition — even if much of it has been tattooed across our…
Yesterday marked the 25th anniversary of Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses being published in England. Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini issued a death sentence on Rushdie as punishment for the supposed blasmphemy in the novel, leading Rushdie and his family going into hiding for nearly a decade, constantly accompanied by an armed…
Salman Rushdie’s life story would make for a cracking read even if he, a man knighted for his services to literature, hadn’t been the one to pen it. This is a life that has included writing some of the English language’s finest novels, dating models, and being sentenced to death…
Get ready for the Illuminati, historical mysteries, and flashbacks to Tom Hanks’ gross long hair. Dan Brown, bestselling author of The Da Vinci Code and The Lost Symbol, is coming to Miami. Brown will launch the 2013 Miami Book Fair International and lead this year’s author lineup with an event…
Last Saturday, a packed house took over Sweat Records for the 20th installment of Pure Imagination, a live performance of storytelling, music, and quantum physics. And as usual, creator Matt Gajewski’s intellectual creativity was on full display. At the record store’s small wooden stage, the Mountain Dew Code Red Terror…
Edwidge Danticat’s cousin was buried alive under his own house. Like so many other Haitian-Americans, the Miami author lost family in the 2010 earthquake that by some estimates killed more than 300,000 people in and around Port-au-Prince. “At some point, his body was moved to the family mausoleum, but his…
Last night’s appearance by two-time National Book Award finalist and MacArthur Genius grant recipient (and Miami’s own) Edwidge Danticat continued more than three decades of Books & Books bringing the world’s most important and entertaining writers to Miami. It was also one of the first to streamed as part of…
Edwidge Danticat’s cousin was buried alive under his own house. Like so many other Haitian-Americans, the Miami author lost family in the 2010 earthquake that by some estimates killed more than 300,000 people in and around Port-au-Prince. “At some point, his body was moved to the family mausoleum, but his…
There are plenty of self-help books on the market, but few tell it to you straight. Who wants to read a story about how some Joe Schmoe turned his life around and went from rags to riches when your success can be guided by simply watching your dog? Yes, your…
The summer of 2013 has been terrible and tragic for fans of one of the best movies ever to be set in Miami, 1995’s Get Shorty. First, James Gandolfini, who had a supporting role as a bearded enforcer before he became known as Tony Soprano, died in June. Last month,…
Fans of the television series Justified, films like Get Shorty and Be Cool, or just damn good crime fiction lost a beloved artist today. Elmore Leonard, author of 45 novels and sometimes Florida resident, died of complications from a stroke on Tuesday. He was 87. An announcement of his death…
Miami-Dade County’s book lovers have been up in arms ever since Mayor Gimenez proposed the closure of 22 libraries in order to save taxpayer money during a budget meeting back in July. Today, the number of libraries marked for closure has been reduced to 13, according to the Save the…
Rows of black plastic chairs filled a small area between walls of bookshelves at Books & Books in the Gables Friday night. On display behind the smart podium sat a row of books with a black and white photo of a beautiful young woman on the cover: Rita Moreno: A…
The life cycle of the outsider who moves to Florida: First, move to the Sunshine State, upbeat about the weather and the ambiance. Next, find yourself on permanent vacation, feeling at peace with your life and yourself. Soon, however, the tropical weather, the unfamiliar locals, the sand in your shoes…
Earlier this month, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez reversed his stance on raising property taxes. Now he wants to close almost half of our public libraries. Many of those libraries are in low-income neighborhoods, and their closure will affect poor adults who rely on the library system for online access,…
As The Dissident, J.J. Colagrande turns his critical eye on Miami culture. This week: Closing 22 libraries in Miami? You’ve gotta be kidding. Closing almost half of the city libraries is wrong on so many levels, and it’s time for a quick call-to-action to ensure that Mayor Carlos Gimenez changes…
You’ve seen them on Kourtney & Kim Take Miami, luring the hapless Scott Disick away from his baby daddy duties in favor of racing expensive cars. You’ve seen them on The Real Housewives of Miami, shmoozing with the plastic faces of Miami’s most notorious women. Or maybe you haven’t seen…
We can all agree that summer is pretty awesome. Even if you’re a “grown up” who doesn’t go to school anymore, summers are always that much sweeter than the rest of the year. And for Miamians, it can sometimes feel like summer all year round. But summertime is also hurricane…
Popular author Neil Gaiman visited Temple Judea in Coral Gables to promote his new book, The Ocean at the End of the Lane. The packed house only served as a reminder of how beloved Gaiman is among readers of all ages, from kids who enjoyed Coraline to young adults and…
“When you hit rock bottom, you have nowhere to go but up.” Those are the wise words of the mother of Justin Bieber. “Beliebers” may know Pattie Mallette solely as the near-religious figure who brought Justin Bieber into this world, but little do they know about her deeper, darker past…
In 2011, while training for a marathon on the University of Massachusetts Lowell’s Riverwalk, Bianca Ramirez was brutally assaulted. The rest of her morning is a hazy memory. “It was so abrupt,” she recalls. “Being attacked came out of nowhere. I literally thought I died, waking up in bushes not…
