A selection of the interesting literary titbits that have scrolled by this week on the Linklog widget (it's on the right of the books blog, under the most viewed bit), RSS feed and Twitter feed:

• Carson McCullers's dream lunch (it involved champagne, oysters and Marilyn Monroe); first-novel jitters from Susan Sontag's publisher; Paul the Octopus's more highbrow cousins.

• The power of intelligent brevity; the power of editing.

• A scary new book-marketing gimmick involving blood; a boring old one involving "shit".