Mark Sarvas
LightNews LightNews
banner
marksarvas.bsky.social
Mark Sarvas
@marksarvas.bsky.social
3.2K followers 1.2K following 1.9K posts
American Book Award winning author of MEMENTO PARK (FSG) and HARRY, REVISED (Bloomsbury). @UGMAN June 2025 from ITNA Press. Scold-proof.
“ … ceaselessly intelligent” - Joseph O’Neill.
"Chilling, flawlessly executed" - Kirkus Reviews
www.marksarvas.com
Posts Replies Media Videos
marksarvas.bsky.social
Downgrading this take to pretty dopey fare, a C- at very best. Gets worse as it goes on.
marksarvas.bsky.social Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 10d
Down Cemetery Road is a generic good time, elevated by its two leads.
November 28, 2025 at 9:47 PM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
rydog.bsky.social
We are now further away from the theatrical release of Raiders of the Lost Ark (June 12, 1981) than it was from the year it takes place in (1936). We have reached the Indiana Jones event horizon.
November 27, 2025 at 12:49 AM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Fuck turkey. I made a chicken paprikash …
A legit homemade chicken paprikash.
November 27, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
shoe.bsky.social
November 26, 2025 at 9:04 PM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
alyssaharad.bsky.social
Most publishers (there are always exceptions) decide whether or not to buy a second book (or a third etc) based on how the previous book did. So when you pirate a book in most cases it’s less about the money you just stole from both author and publisher it’s about the future book you just killed.
November 25, 2025 at 11:29 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Do Trump next!
theguardian.com The Guardian @theguardian.com · 3d
Jair Bolsonaro ordered to start 27-year prison term for plotting Brazil coup
Jair Bolsonaro ordered to start 27-year prison term for plotting Brazil coup
Ex-president to start serving term in 12 sq metre bedroom in police base in Brasília after time for appeals elapses Brazil’s former president, Jair Bolsonaro, has been ordered to start serving his 27-year sentence in a 12 sq metre bedroom in a police base in the capital, Brasília, after his conviction for plotting a coup. The far-right populist, who governed Latin America’s largest democracy from 2019 until 2022, was handed the punishment in September after the supreme court found him guilty of leading a criminal conspiracy to stop his leftwing rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, taking power. Continue reading...
www.theguardian.com
November 25, 2025 at 6:58 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Gonna make up some business cards that say "Wait, wait, wait" in case I ever meet IC ...
karenho.bsky.social Karen K. Ho @karenho.bsky.social · 4d
A new kind of rapid Chotining. Please appreciate the alt-text.
Isaac Chotiner: "You would have to be brain-dead to read this piece and not immediately wonder who is funding Semafor Gulf." Quote post of Ben Smith saying: "Fascinating @msergie piece on covering a monarchy" about a Semafor article on Saudi Arabia's crown prince Smith responds to Chotiner: "That's a hell of an allegation/implication, Isaac. To figure out the literal answer to your question, you'd either have to look and see who the sponsors are in the email (I haven't checked today!) or read our publicly disclosed list of investors. I believe you're trying to imply that it's the Saudi government? Have you read more of our coverage, or just this tweet? My impression — correct me if I'm wrong — is that you're working on zero information and smearing us in general, and an experienced journalist @msergie whose work I suspect you're totally unfamiliar with in particular." Chotiner responds:"I’m not making any allegation. I’m making a simple point about how an average reader—myself included—might respond after reading this ridiculous piece" Ben Smith: "Just asking questions! Come on. You genuinely know better. Or read Mohammed's long career of work covering the Gulf and the Syrian war before you imply he's some kind of stooge." Noah Kulwin: "The point is not about who funds your reporting/if your colleague is a “stooge”. Isaac’s comment is that the reporting is so bad so as to make a reader wonder who is funding it" Smith: A reader, sure. A journalist who can do very basic homework, kind of lame. Chotiner: "You are right, I’ll do some homework now by perusing Jay Solomon Semafor pieces, and reading Jason Greenblatt Semafor columns. In the meantime, I will formally say that I am making no accusation and was just astonished at how inane the piece was" Chotiner quote-posts with "I see Semafor loves running column after column by this guy (https://semafor.com/author/faisal-j-abbas), who also publishes pro-Saudi conspiracies about the murder of Jamal Khashoggi https://arabnews.com/node/1386291" Ben Smith's post says "I hope I'm not overreacting, but it makes me crazy when people I think of as reporters do this "just asking questions" stuff. Feel free to report it out by googling/asking me/reading our various scoops and reports about the region — these two just now" and links to two Semafor articles Chotiner quote posts Ben Smith: "You might have heard that the UAE is helping destroy Sudan, but at the next Semafor event, all is well." Screenshot says "Held at Abu Dhabi Finance Week, Semafor will spotlight insights from the Global Findex 2025 report and the Global Digital Connectivity Tracker, translating global research into actionable, locally relevant conversations. As the third stop on The Next 3 Billion Tour, this edition explores how the Gulf's growing investments in Africa can accelerate digital connectivity and financial inclusion. With Abu Dhabi's focus on sustainable finance, digital transformation, and cross-border collaboration, it offers a strong platform to examine how technology and capital can work together to expand access and opportunity." Ben Smith's post says "Just asking questions! Come on. You genuinely know better. Or read Mohammed's long career of work covering the Gulf and the Syrian war before you imply he's some kind of stooge."
November 25, 2025 at 4:39 AM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Share a '90s movie you think deserves more love ...
Jon Amiel's criminally overlooked 1990 film, TUNE IN TOMORROW
November 25, 2025 at 4:31 AM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Blood in the water. And please get rid of Gillibrand while you're cleaning house ...

www.nytimes.com/2025/11/24/u...
Chuck Schumer Faces Pushback From a ‘Fight Club’ of Senate Democrats
www.nytimes.com
November 25, 2025 at 1:42 AM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Newest addition to the family.
Yamaha BB1200 like wot Macca used.
November 24, 2025 at 8:10 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
I think Comey is a prig and a martinet ... BUT ... quite pleased to see this, obviously.
talkingpointsmemo.com TPM @talkingpointsmemo.com · 4d
A federal judge has ruled that former insurance lawyer Lindsey Halligan was invalidly appointed as interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia and has dismissed the indictments of former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.
Comey and James Cases Dismissed Over Halligan’s Invalid Appointment
A federal judge has ruled that former insurance lawyer Lindsey Halligan was...
talkingpointsmemo.com
November 24, 2025 at 6:38 PM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
phillipcrymble.bsky.social
Derek Mahon, born on this day in 1941
The Birdlife of Kinsale The gulls are out at the Old Head Where the Lusitania went down, So we make do with rooks instead Among the tiered roofs of the town. The gulls are down among the fish, Raiding the trawlers at the quay; Crows strut among our spilt rubbish, Staring ferociously at the sea.
November 23, 2025 at 9:27 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
The Agency is a much better series than Slow Horses.

Discuss.
November 23, 2025 at 8:15 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
"We believed that a taste for ambiguity can make for a decent feast, and I admired the two-mindedness of my friends, resisting the masks of resolution."
- On Friendship, Andrew O'Hagan (@faberbooks.bsky.social)
November 23, 2025 at 7:48 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
We visited Greenwich in October, where we got to see the progression of Harrison's clocks. The leap from number three to the portable number four was simply staggering to take in.
November 23, 2025 at 6:57 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Saw this in October and loved every moment of it. This profile is the next best thing to being there ...
newyorker.com The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 5d
Although the audiences filling the Noël Coward Theatre for Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” may be lured by Stephen Fry’s celebrity, “they stay for Wilde’s wit, and for Fry’s powers in embodying it,” Rebecca Mead writes. https://newyorkermag.visitlink.me/m50fOK
Stephen Fry Is Wilde at Heart
The polymathic entertainer has had a lifelong bond with the wittiest—and the most tortured—of writers. And now he’s starring in “The Importance of Being Earnest.”
newyorkermag.visitlink.me
November 23, 2025 at 5:04 PM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
rincewind.run
I am not paying Ryan Lizza for that

absolutely the fuck not
November 22, 2025 at 6:46 AM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
marisakabas.bsky.social
ryan lizza is a bad person
November 22, 2025 at 1:24 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
My periodic rant that it's FUCKING CRIMINAL that you cannot seem to stream Jon Amiel's TUNE IN TOMORROW on any service known to humankind.
November 22, 2025 at 5:37 AM
marksarvas.bsky.social
I think I might be the only Beatles fan who prefers Real Love to Free as a Bird ...
November 21, 2025 at 10:31 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Cleared my desk of all obligations today so I can give Anthology 4 the attentive listening it deserves. (In My Life Take 1 is already a highlight ... )
November 21, 2025 at 8:46 PM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
thebaffler.com
Is literature, as Philip Roth once prophesied, now a “cultic” concern? Writers from around the world weigh in.
Brain Rot Without Borders | Baffler Forum
There’s no point in denying it anymore: literature as we know it is well on its way to becoming a lost art.
thebaffler.com
November 20, 2025 at 9:45 PM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Pretty revolting to see Cheney afforded all the honors of a state funeral when he should have finished his days in the Hague. Denouncing Trump hardly wipes the slate clean.
November 20, 2025 at 7:02 PM
Reposted by Mark Sarvas
mastodon.peterjanes.ca
@kathleenbelew.bsky.social Omar El Akkad's "One Day, Everyone Will Have Been Against This" just won the National Book Award for nonfiction. You might appreciate his acceptance speech. (It starts a few minutes from here, which is the intro of the finalists.) […]
Original post on mastodon.peterjanes.ca
mastodon.peterjanes.ca
November 20, 2025 at 2:53 AM
marksarvas.bsky.social
Elated for @rabihalameddine.bsky.social! Many congratulations!
groveatlantic.bsky.social Grove Atlantic @groveatlantic.bsky.social · 8d
We are thrilled that @rabihalameddine.bsky.social's THE TRUE TRUE STORY OF RAJA THE GULLIBLE (AND HIS MOTHER) has been selected as the winner of the 2025 @nationalbook.bsky.social Award for Fiction! Congrats, Rabih 🥳
November 20, 2025 at 3:18 AM