Author Archive

Bad People and Bad Dreams in A Door Behind a Door

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Yelena Moskovich’s novel is loose, dreamy, and symbol-packed. Characters morph and become nightmarish versions of themselves, and it is unclear if the transformation is real or only a bad dream.

The Hare by Melanie Finn

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Finn gives us an important, comprehensive picture of the stages of a woman’s learning, suggesting that, over time, teachers will be rejected, new ones sought, and the student might herself become a teacher.

Many People Die Like You by Lina Wolff

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Lina Wolff’s new story collection, translated by Saskia Vogel, addresses death with morbid humor and oddity—flings, murders, and a DIY porn channel—and leaves us to stave off death with morbid hopefulness.

Ha Seong-nan’s Bluebeard’s First Wife

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Ha is invested not in the myth itself but in what it helps us see. In her hands, the fairy-tale works as a photo filter, bringing into clearer relief her actual subject: the horrors of daily contemporary life.