The Guardian asks Ursula K. Le Guin a few questions. She spends much time clarifying opias and isms, and, at one point, even impersonates the French.

A Canadian realtor made the find of a lifetime when she put the late Marian Engel’s house on the market. Hundreds of letters were thrown away in garbage bags, from such heavy-hitters as Robertson Davies, Alice Munro, and Margaret Atwood, many of them of a very private nature. “Dear Marian,” read one. “Robertson keeps speaking in naughty epigrams. Do you know anyone who can drown Robertson in paper and get him to shut up?”

Mark Evanier has a tribute up to the recently departed Julius Schwartz. Schwartz was a tremendous figure in comic book and science fiction circles.

Locus has a recommended reading list up for 2003’s books, along with a tally rundown, essays from Claude Lalumière and Cynthia Ward. One Locus editor has promised science fiction fans that this incredible coverage was intentional, and that “it will be impossible for any of you to keep up.”

Time, of all places, tackles the troubling new territory of dude-lit. Although in Kyle Smith’s case, perhaps monkey lit might be a better term.

Frances Partidge, the last of the Bloomsbury set and a lady who had the decency to avoid Danny Bonaduce, has passed on at 103.

Michiko compares Thoreaux’s new collection to “an embarrassing letter to Penthouse magazine.” But this may have something to do with the unrelated news that men wearing nothing but coats have been buying a lot of extra copies of Old School.

And Padma Lakshimi has been spotted with an engagement ring. Asked if Rushdie, still married to his third wife, plans to marry her, she replied, “I guess so.” However, another journalist was asking Lakshimi about her jeans. So nobody has a definitive answer.