Erika! I was reading an old Elle (not that old -- a couple of months old) from a stash a friend gave me and I saw a little blurb of a book I thought you'd find interesting: Blue Blood by Edward Conlon. It's a history of the NYPD told by a cop who comes from a cop family. It was published by Riverhead Books.

(BTW, the Elle is from April of this year and has Mischa Barton on the cover -- did everyone EXCEPT me remember that she played Jessie's girlfriend Katie on Once and Again? )

Cool...although I'm thinking I might have to change my tag to "Cop Groupie" if I keep cultivating this reputation.

The New Yorker eviscerates Eats Shoots and Leaves and talks about the writer's voice.

(edited because I can spell)

Man, I'm in the middle of that book right now, and I'm loving it! I want to marry it. I'm curious to see what has the New Yorker so up in arms.

The article made my eyes glaze over -- I'm not sure it ever got past the raftload of punctuation errors they found in the book.

Was the article supposed to make me recoil in horror from the book? As in "Oh, dear god! She misuses commas! Hypocrite! HYPOCRITE!"

Because I'm thinking that even Alton Brown fucks up a recipe once in a while.

And the second half of the article, about "voice," was pointless. If it was meant to be an oblique jab at the author of the book, it didn't work. Not once in the part about voice does the article's author even mention Eats, Shoots & Leaves. If that was deliberate, it didn't work. If it wasn't deliberate, it was sloppy and unnecessary.

I think I'd quite like to be able to agree with the New Yorker-- I too have read Eats, Shoots, and Leaves (with however many commas that should have in it-- either all or none, I disremember)-- and, while I do like to see good puncuation, felt she was carrying the whole thing a bit too far; good heavens, the woman's never ventured very far into the depths of the internet; she'd have had a fit and died the first time she read omg teh baturds liek eval!!!~11!! wtf?!?!, if what she says about her reaction to misuse is true-- but it's not a very good article, and I can't actually bring myself to defend it.

Of course crime junkie me sees it as eats, shoots, and leaves. Naturally.

Of course crime junkie me sees it as eats, shoots, and leaves. Naturally.

You know, I feel it's creepier if he shoots, eats, and leaves.

Mobsters do it. Business is business, cannoli is cannoli.ETA: both Homeresque "Mmm, cannoli..." and insent, Deb.