We’re in a bit of shock after reading a very sincere and rave review of something on Gawker. What was it for, you ask? Why, none other than wundervato Junot Diaz and his new tome, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (which by the way, we totally started this weekend and a report is coming soon, we proms.) From one Emily Gould, Gawker editor extraordinaire:

Junot Diaz, whose long-awaited first novel The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao is the best book we’ve read in a long-ass time, was probably the most entertaining speaker at any of the butt-numbing events of the New Yorker Festival.

People of color do have that magical ability to shake a book festival up, no? Well perhaps not everyone in the audience thought so, but Emily remains optimistic:

Actually the audience was sort of generally unresponsive, or maybe reverent? Maybe a lot of them were there to see Annie Proulx, who read a long story about, literally, sagebrush. The only rise Junot got out of the crowd was when he introduced a story about cheating on one’s girlfriend like so: “As long as you all keep cheating on each other, I’ll keep writing this shit!” (Cue little “he-said-shit!” gasps all around.)

That Junot is forever keeping it real. Real slutty, that is.

Heroes: Junot Diaz On Truth, Memoir, Fiction and How James Frey Cheated [Gawker]
Earlier: Junot Díaz Graces Us With the Geekiest Latino Anti-Hero This Side Of Fez