Welcome to the Attic

Welcome to Attic Salt: A Literary Blog.

Attic Salt is an Athenian phrase that means elegant and delicate wit, according to the Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. I'm hoping this site will be a place of elegant and witty conversation about books — that and I like the phrase, since it makes me think of a wise old sage, sitting in an attic surrounded by books.

After two years of blogging here about life in D.C., and three years of writing about restaurants and the arts for several publications, it's time to put fingers to keys and write about my first love.

After finishing my M.A. in literature in the spring of 2008, I spent about 9 months unable to read much of anything. I was burnt out (I went straight to grad school after getting my B.A. from Mount Holyoke), and only managed to get through a handful of books in that time. Some were notable (The Elegance of the Hedgehog, The Emperor's Children), but few were memorable. After regaining my ability to tear through books earlier this year, I needed an outlet in which to write or talk about them.

While my interests are primarily contemporary literature (with occasional forays to the 19th century), non-fiction (mostly food memoirs and history) and children's books will appear here as well. Don't expect just reviews — anything literary is fair game, and this means libraries, bookstores, authors' homes, author interviews and reading culture.

Comments and suggestions are always welcome.