World Book Day

• World Book Day in Bogotá is just the beginning of a 13-day book fair that showcases over 500 national and international events and exhibits, with Japan as the guest of honor.
• In addition to this, 5,000 books will be left in the city's parks, shopping centers, restuarants, transportation sites, elevators, building entrances, movie theatres, and even in some public restrooms. Instructions are left in each book as to what the finder can do: read the book, write notes in it, and leave it somewhere else--or email the organizers with the reader's thoughts. The twenty titles include works by Jorge Franco, Mario Benedetti, Antonio Muñoz Molina, Elfriede Jelinek, Juan Gossaín, Oscar Collazos, Elliot Perlman, Gustavo Piero, and Matthew Pearl. There's even a list of the most likely places to find these books.
• I'm very excited that Open Letter is finally up and running. The catalogue is brilliant and I look forward to reading them. Dubravka Ugrešić's Nobody's Home (reviewed at The Literary Saloon) will be the first to become available.