SHIFT, a Japan-based international online magazine that features creative culture, has announced the continuation of their short films and calendar competition for 2011-2012. (Last year’s results were quite impressive.) The details for submission have been included below.

DOTMOV Festival

While some might equate writing with pulling teeth, Yu Hua (余华), who started his professional life as a dentist at the age of 18, finds it fun. Despite the grim subject matter of his books, he revels in the absurdity …

Jimmy Liao makes some great adult picture books. He combines serious writing with playful illustrations in a way that’s reminiscent of Maurice Sendak’s works (you know, the Where the Wild Things Are guy). They differ in that Liao’s writing style …

What if you can enter a book?

Imagine reading a book, in which the second half takes place in just one house. The story progresses within the same house, with the same people, again and again. When you finish the …

Last week, when I was on page 200 of The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet and was so entranced I was able to completely ignore the extremely large and somewhat smelly man sitting beside me on the BART, a …

Before I bought the Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2007), my friend told me, “You should buy it. It’s good, just don’t read into all the hype surrounding it.” Though I was not hooked into literary circles enough to …

I first heard about Haruki Murakami from one my Asian writer friends, who mentioned the author in hushed tones of love. Since then I’ve met both bankers in New York and civil servants in Spain who treasure Haruki Murakami as …