Penguin Books commissioned illustrator Michael Gillette to create fourteen covers for its upcoming reissue of Ian Fleming’s James Bond books.

Book cover illustrations by Michael Gillette

At The Penguin Blog, Penguin Books Senior Copywriter Colin Brush writes:

The centenary of Fleming’s birth was clearly a good time to revisit the Bonds and cover them in a package that says, yes these are fun, but also makes it implicit that there’s no reason not to take them seriously. Most importantly, they should look like books worth owning.

Poster-sized prints of these covers would also be worth owning. The colors, the different Bond women, the almost psychedelic typography meets pop art quality — reminds me a bit of the old Wes Wilson posters of the psychedelic sixties.

Book cover illustrations by Michael Gillette

In an interview at the James Bond fansite MI6, Gillette talks about his inspiration for this project.

I’ve always been inspired by pop art and pop culture. This was a job where I could indulge that to the hilt. I was trying to distill all the things I’d enjoyed about Bond and impress those times in to the various women and the typography - psychedelic posters, Saul Bass, Milton Glaser, films, pop music, it’s all in there.

Each of these illustrations is unique and titillating. These new editions are worthwhile for both the classic stories and the soon-to-be-classic covers. See them all at The Penguin Blog.

I recently read Keith Gessen’s debut novel All The Sad Young Literary Men and loved it. This passage from the first chapter — “Keith: The Vice President’s Daughter” — takes place in November of 2000:

The night of the election Jillian and I stayed home and watched the results come in, and ate fancy pizza, and blogged away. When they called the election for Lauren’s father, I asked Jillian to marry me — it was corny, it was psychologically obtuse, but I couldn’t think of a better way — and she said, “Yes.” She put on the ring I had bought her and added to her acceptance: “Especially now that we’ll have an environmental President who’ll assure a future for our children.” I kissed her.

When they called the election back, we sat there together in disbelief. The diamond dangled on her finger like a fake.

If you’re so inclined, read the novel’s Prologue on Gessen’s n+1 website. Good stuff. And that’s only the beginning.

Another stimulating thing about this book is the cover: a minimal design and intuitive illustration from the wildly creative minds at The Heads of State. Check it:

Because you love good writing, read Gessen’s book. Because you love good design, visit The Heads of State portfolio. You won’t go wrong with either one.

Photo by Kelly Campbell

Joshua Ferris’ debut novel Then We Came To The End is a funny and deliciously detailed story about a group of coworkers at an ad agency in Chicago.

It’s a fun read, especially for those of us who work in and with ad agencies.

One of my favorite parts of the book is when one of the agency employees Jim Jackers — struggling to come up with concepts for a particularly difficult campaign — calls his ornery old Uncle Max (who has graced Jim with ideas in the past) seeking new ideas and inspiration.

Max gives him a good idea and Jim tells him “he’d missed his calling.”

“You should have been a creative,” [Jim] said.

“A creative?” said Max.

Jim explained that in the advertising industry, art directors and copywriters alike were called creatives.

“That’s the stupidest use of an English word I ever encountered,” said Max.

Jim also told him that the advertising product, whether it was a TV commercial, a print ad, a billboard, or a radio spot, was called the creative.

Then,

Sometime later in the afternoon, Max Jackers surprised Jim by calling him back. “You folks over there,” said Max, “you say you call yourselves creatives, is that what you’re telling me? And the work you do, you call that the creative, is that what you said?” Jim said that was correct. “And I suppose you think of yourselves as pretty creative over there, I bet.”

“I suppose so,” said Jim, wondering what Max was driving at.

“And the work you do, you probably think that’s pretty creative work.”

“What are you asking me, Uncle Max?”

“Well, if all that’s true,” said the old man, “that would make you creative creatives creating creative creative.” There was silence as Max allowed Jim to take this in. “And that right there,” he concluded, “is why I didn’t miss my calling. That’s a use of the English language just too absurd to even contemplate.”

With that, Max hung up.

[Excerpt Copyright 2007 by Joshua Ferris]

I recently read Brian Morton’s novel Starting Out In The Evening and was struck by this passage on “the glory of choosing your own life, even when it takes ruthlessness to do it.”

You seize your freedom in a spirit of rebelliousness, exuberance, defiant joy. But to live that choice — over the weeks and months and years to come — requires different qualities. It requires that you turn hard, turn rigid. Because it isn’t a choice that the world encourages, you have to wear a suit of armor to defend it.

Photographer unknown/Courtesy Neil LaBute

I just read Neil LaBute’s play The Distance from Here. His work always knocks me on my ass or leaves me staggering, whispering “oh my god” over and over to myself. The Distance from Here was no different.

I won’t go into the action of the play since I wouldn’t want to spoil it for you. I also believe that LaBute’s work, this play in particular, is not for everyone. I know for a fact that my wife wouldn’t like it at all. So forgive my being so vague about the story itself.

This quote from the back of the Tusk/Overlook paperback edition piqued my interest when I was browsing the shelves at the library:

No American playwright has written more compellingly about the subtle ways in which people inflict pain on each other than Neil LaBute.

I’m fascinated by the stories LaBute creates. I can’t look away for the sheer audacity I see or read before me.

LaBute writes about the idea for The Distance from Here in the book’s preface.

When I was in high school in Washington State, there was a myth that ran through our hallways; our own little urban myth, in fact, about a boy and a girl who had dated since junior high.

That story stayed with me for a long time, right up until I wove it into the dramatic fiber of this play. I hope it has finally left me now, a part of this world and no longer a frightening image from my teen years. I think that is often why writers write and painters paint and musicians play their instruments. It’s not just because they have a gift, but also to create something slightly more beautiful or coherent or illuminating than the frenzied, scrambled memories of their own pasts.

Our lives up to this point are made up of stories and experiences and influences we carry with us whether we like them or not. I don’t think LaBute will ever shake the story from his high school days. We may not or try not to think about them anymore, but we don’t shake them.

However, I’m intrigued by the idea of looking to those stories and experiences and influences, no matter how extraordinary or awful they may be, for inspiration or a source to create new work.