For instance, while working as a correspondent during World War II, he managed to be accused of contravening the Geneva Convention when he took up arms with a small group of resistance fighters in the village of Rambouillet.  As WWII historian Paul Fussell once put it: “Hemingway got into considerable trouble playing infantry captain to a group of Resistance people that he gathered, because a correspondent is not supposed to lead troops, even if he does it well.” Hemingway eventually beat the charges by claiming that he did not actually lead the group but merely offered advice when asked.

A similar type of situation has come to light just recently.  The Guardian reports that within the pages of a new Yale University Press book entitled Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America, Hemingway is included on a list of known KGB agents in America.  The list was dredged up by the book’s co-author Alexander Vassiliev who, as a former KGB officer, was given access to Stalin-era intelligence files in the 1990s.

Now, before we label Hemingway as a traitor, it should be noted that while he “repeatedly expressed his desire and willingness to help [the USSR]” he also “[failed to] give us any political information” and “[was never] verified in practical work.”

So perhaps Hemingway was playing the part of James Wormold for the Soviets (Their Man in Havana, as it were), or perhaps he was just really bad at being a spy.  I suppose we will never know.

They range in scope from the broad-themed Biblio in Williamsburg, which is simply a book-themed eatery, to more specific culinary-cum-literary adventure spots such as Club Verne, a wonderfully weird-looking Jules Verne-themed restaurant found in Budapest, Hungary. Or if you’re feeling like you need a change (get it? change? metamorphosis?), check out Cafe Kafka, found in Barcelona, Spain. I’d love to make it a bucket-list goal to visit as many of these places as possible.

I think my favorite may be Alice in Magic World, found in Tokyo Japan. Sometimes, one craves a little taste of the surreal. I can only imagine the food and beverage menus are headed with “Eat me” and “Drink me”.

Via Flavorwire.

The Desolation of Smaug opens in North American theaters on December 13th.

Next up is this strange but nice story about an elementary school in California which is offering its students books in exchange for their toy guns as part of a safety day. Anything to put more books in small hands is fine by me.

And finally, Ireland is issuing a new literary stamp. Despite what you are thinking, it isn’t a James Joyce headshot. It’s a 224-word short story, written by one of the country’s young aspiring authors.

Very sad literary news today – just two months after making a public statement about his illness, Iain Banks passed away today at age 59. The Scottish author had been suffering from cancer of the gall bladder. Banks was best known for his novel The Wasp Factory, though he was quite prolific and wrote many others pieces of fiction and science fiction. As a result of his illness, the publication of his final novel, The Quarry, was rushed forward at his request, and is to be published on June 25th. Sadly, that was still just a little bit too late. He leaves family, friends and countless readers and peers mourning his him as a person and a truly excellent writer.

More from the BBC News.

One of the suggestions that my colleague Richard made was for Terry Deary’s Horrible Histories series . Featuring titles such as The Vile Victorians, Ruthless Romans and Awful Egyptians, the series attempts to put the often dry, boring and stodgy subject of history into terms a child will be enthralled by. In short, the series is often gory, bloodthirsty, and blunt, and chock full of toilet humor. But it sneaks in plenty of education when the kid isn’t looking – kind of like hiding spinach in a delicious smoothie.

This excellent video from Horrible Histories is an absolute delight. It’s a short biography of Charles Dickens, plenty peppy enough to amuse kids and make them laugh. But there’s a ton here for an adult to enjoy, too – like the fact that the video and song are clearly a tongue-in-cheek take-off on Morrissey and the Smiths (and sounds very much like a hybrid of “This Charming Man” and “Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now”. The lyrics are genius and cracked me up:

“Little Dorrit is a tale about my dad in debtor’s jail, while Hard Times tells my life, ’bout when I tried to leave my wife…”

Enjoy!

Famously sharp-witted satire novelist Tom Sharpe has died. Sharpe was revered throughout England and beyond as one of the funniest writers going, despite some of his more delicate readers being turned off by his vulgarity and refusal to shy away from hilarious and dirty sex scenes.

Sharpe was best-known for his five part Wilt series, about a literature teacher named Henry Wilt who has been quite beaten down by life. Wilt teaches at a Community College and his efforts are largely ignored by his disinterested students. The series was so popular for its heart and stinging wit that it was picked up and adapted into a 1989 film. After the initial novel Wilt, four more were subsequently published: The Wilt Alternative, Wilt on High, Wilt In Nowhere and The Wilt Inheritance. There is also a Wilt Omnibus. He was not a prolific signer, and autographed Tom Sharpe books are relatively scarce.

Wilt also made #5 on our Top 10 Funniest Books According to the British.

Sharpe will also be remembered for his Porterhouse Blue series, adapted for BBC television, and his other novels – over 15 in all – and for his short stories. He died of complications from diabetes. He was 85.

Our most expensive book sales in May tell a fascinating story. The British Empire still stretched around the world during the Edwardian era. The British traveled and imposed their colonial ways, but a few were also taking photographs.

John Claude White was part of a military expedition to Tibet in 1904 and his pioneering photographs detailed the culture and landscapes of the Himalayas. Last month, a book of his photography sold for $28,000 on AbeBooks and topped our most expensive sales.

By now, if you are someone who finds themselves mired in internet from time to time, you may well have already experienced the joyous phenomenon that is Prancercise.

If you are yet unfamiliar, let me help you – Prancercise is much what the name implies – a fitness program that combines prancing, sashaying, cantering, trotting and more into one weirdly wonderful regime that most of us would likely be too chicken (horse?) to perform in public. The routine was inspired by horses (neigh, you say!) and pioneered by a woman named Joanna Rohrback in 1989. Prancercise never caught on back then, but a recent dusting off of the program via Youtube (and, if you ask me, a recent resurgence in the fetishization of irony) has helped sendind the video viral.

But what you may not know is that there is a Prancercise book, too, published in 2012 by Rohrback herself (who, I think it’s safe to say, has been prancing in anticipation these past 20+ years).

I actually love it and find it quite mesmerizing. I’m not sure I would ever be able to summon enough chutzpah to publicly prancercise myself, but I love her calming presence and how earnest and sincere she is in her love of prancing. They say the key to sticking to an exercise regime is to find something you really enjoy – seems like Rohrback has done just that, and is sharing with everyone else too. Why walk when you can prance?

From the campy cartoon style creatures and ridiculous buxom babes of space opera, to the darkly stylized futuristic cities in dystopian futures, Penguin embraces all that is good (and comically bad) with science fiction in this series. There is a spectacular array to explore.

Click through to enjoy all 26 covers.