The Latest, Briefly.

* The National. It's turning out to be impossible for me to get enough of this band or to grow tired of them. The lush, hooky arrangements, the lyrics that seem so gentle but cut like the sharpest of knives, and the gorgeous, velvety baritone [belonging to the unexpectedly gorgeous, velvety Matt Berninger -- seriously, Google Image him] are a lethal combination. Dreamy and opiate-like, yet sharp and brainy. Amazing.

* The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer. Embarrassingly, I'm fairly obsessed over this Young Adult trilogy. Just check out the description: a high school girl in love with a vampire? Oy, right? A friend recommended it to me (in hushed, embarrassed tones) and I thought it would be a fun, trashy read. I wasn't expecting the writing to be so excellent, the characters to be so complex, or the storytelling to be so masterful. Yes, I said masterful. There's a movie version (of course) coming out in December. It looks terrible (of course). But I'll be going to see it (duh). Does anyone have a 13-year-old I can borrow?