Welcome to The Faster Times update. In today's edition, we bring you seismic nuke risks, Pam Grier, indie lit, satire, and Adele. Enjoy!

Regular readers are aware of how alarmed we are by the construction of a facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico intended, in large part, to help produce something known as plutonium pits. Before examining the latest development in attempts to halt it, first some background on the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Nuclear Facility (CMRR-NF) from recent posts.

You hear the movie before you see it: Bobby Womack blowing out that lone-note falsetto, long and longing, and then the persistence of those percussions and the chunky wah-wahs. That’s when Pam Grier enters the picture, conveyed on airport tread, the screen still holding on her when Womack launches into his lyric–“Across 110th Street” sung with all the desperate striving contained in its message’s meaning.

Attention indie authors and publishers, current and aspiring: after months of planning, legal work, and anticipation, today—June 1st, 2011—marks the official launch of The Lit Pub, a new publicity company/online bookstore completely devoted to independent literature. One of their most ambitious plans: to create a viable small press, non-Amazon alternative. Others: to replace current, lame distribution models and to hawk a bunch of great books they personally like (36 books a year—more info on that below).

The following piece was adapted from the deeply unsettling, and frankly insane online responses to the Franklin Mata and Kenneth Moreno rape trial before and after the acquittal.

I know a lot about Adele’s ex-boyfriend. Except for who he actually is. Adele talks about her ex in almost every interview that she gives, including her most recent one in Out Magazine’s June issue. She says, “he’s still the love of my life.” She credits him as the inspiration for not only her hit single “Rolling In The Deep,” but also the majority of her two albums, “19” and “21.” She even cried over him at the Brit Awards.