Genre: Not Genre-Specific

The author sued earlier this month by J. D. Salinger for usurping rights to The Catcher in the Rye has come forward with a defense of what Salinger called a "rip-off, pure and simple" of his classic novel.

David Grant, president and CEO of the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, announced this week that he will step down by June 2010. Grant has helmed the New Jersey-based philanthropic organization—best known as the sponsor of the Dodge Poetry Festival—since 1998.

Two American journalists who were arrested on March 17, presumably at the border between North Korea and China, have been tried and sentenced to twelve years hard labor, North Korea’s official news agency, KCNA, recently announced. The state agency accused the women, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, of “illegal border crossing” and described their punishment as “reform through labor.”

McSweeney’s founder Dave Eggers says his quarterly’s next issue intends to prove the viability of print by adopting a newspaper format. Eggers made the announcement at an Authors Guild gathering in New York City last month, where he was being feted for his charity work with the nonprofit 826 National.