Book Reviews Archive
Journey into the Unknown: An Investigation of Metaphysical Poetry
At a poetry workshop recently I heard the word metaphysical used to describe several contemporary American poets of disparate temperaments. At times metaphysical sounded erudite, at times dismissive, and I wasn’t sure I wanted it near poems and poets I loved.
Police Violence & Street Art
It is not often that poetry goes viral on the internet, but that's what happened last month with a poetry project in Boston, Massachusetts. MassPoetry.Org and the City of Boston have teamed up to introduce poetry into the streets of the city via a water-repellant spray that reveals poems.
The Bigness of The World, The Wintry Chill of The Midwest
Lori Ostlund’s “The Bigness of The World,” a short story collection rereleased in trade paperback in February 2016, was recipient of the Flannery O’Connor award for short fiction, and if ever a prize-winning book could be argued to take after the prize’s namesake, then this is that book.
Review: LABOR OF LOVE: THE INVENTION OF DATING by Moira Weigel
Labor of Love: The Invention of Dating Moira Weigel Farrar, Strass and Giroux, 2016 304 pp; $26 Buy: hardcover | eBook Reviewed by Andrew McKernan What are you doing tonight? We should Netflix and chill. Even without receiving that exact text, one knows the purpose, and the posture. Why
Creepy Pasta and Michael Helm’s AFTER JAMES
Part ghost story and part detective novel, After James by Michael Helm is a novel of ideas descended from creepy pasta, or urban legends from the Internet.
The Best Books of Summer
What should you be reading this year at the beach, on the road, and on vacation? Check out our list for this summer's best picks.
Review: THE VERSIONS OF US by Laura Barnett
The Versions of Us Laura Barnett Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, May 2016 416 pp; $26.00 Buy: hardcover | eBook The Versions of Us, Laura Barnett’s tapestry romance, is in many ways Margaret Atwood’s “Happy Endings” fleshed into a full-novel. The novel’s main style device employs just what the title promises:
In Bookstores Near You: THE BLACK MARIA by Arcelis Girmay
I found Aracelis Girmay's the black maria in a month filled with keen grief, the kind that follows a tragedy like Orlando or the loss of a loved one so paramount to your life that afterward people just going about their lives seem like a perverse mystery.
Review: A BESTIARY by Lily Hoang
Not all rat mazes have corridors. For the Morris water navigation task, it is as it reads: a rat must learn to fare in water. It is placed inside a pool and must swim to the other side.
Writ in Water: Yellow Not Mellow
A sight now common across California: the yellow toilet bowl. Conscientiously curated, it’s a light shade of daffodil, lemon, banana; this is early in the lifespan, the visitors before you healthy and drinking plenty of water.