(New York: Catapult Books, 2020) “I ask myself: how to account for the impression of splendor?” de Kretser writes at the outset of her thoughtful tribute to Shirley Hazzard, acknowledging how it is famously difficult to capture the mystical in … Continued
(New York: World Editions, 2019) Full disclosure: if you’re an MFA grad, like me, whose novelist credentials involve the unfortunate words self-published, you have to be demure, especially in certain artsy epicenters — Austin, Brooklyn, San Francisco, Reykjavik — if … Continued
Translated from Hebrew by Sondra Silverston (New York: Other Press, 2019) America’s Got Talent winning sleight-of-hand magician Shin Lim sits across from Ellen and signs a playing card, folds it up, then clenches it between his teeth, as Ellen had … Continued
(Minneapolis, MN: Squares & Rebels, 2018) In the final chapter of Dan Callahan’s intriguing debut novel the narrator, Bobby Quinn, reflects on his transubstantiation into adulthood as he crosses over that auspicious threshold of thirty, which happens to him in … Continued
(Austin, TX: A Strange Object, 2018) Belly Up, the title of Rita Bullwinkel’s debut collection, feels like a wave of the hand, beckoning us to cross the threshold of a serving house, walk over to the bar, and lift a … Continued
Translated by Dominic Thomas (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2017) A fun fact I didn’t know before experiencing the short stories of Emmanuel Dongala: there are two Congos, with the two capital cities, Brazzaville and Kinshasa, directly across the Congo … Continued
(New York, NY: Black Cat, 2017) Toward the end of Euripides’s Medea, Jason (erstwhile Argonaut, theiver of the Golden Fleece) abandons his wife Medea to marry Glauce, the daughter of the king of Corinth. Hard to blame him quite – … Continued
Am I Here Alone? Notes on Living to Read and Reading to Live (New York, NY: Catapult, 2016) In his intriguing new book Am I Alone Here? Peter Orner plays with the difference between reading and writing as therapeutic human … Continued
(Detroit, MI: Willow Books, 2016) My personal sense of racial identity is diffuse – I’m a half Ukrainian-quarter Scottish-quarter English Canadian, making me, I suppose, white – and my children are an even more complicated mix: divide my fractions by … Continued
(Portland, OR: Tin House Books, 2016) Jim Krusoe’s surreal novel The Sleep Garden begins with four profound questions coupled to a whimsical statement of doubt: Where are we? How did we get here? Where are we going? And anyway, … Continued
(Louisville, KY: Sarabande Books, 2015) In his new collection of stories, Fox Tooth Heart, John McManus puts his arm around our shoulder and walks us out to the margin, calmly pointing out all the unfortunate souls who have stepped across … Continued