Posts by author
Diksha Basu
-
What I Was Doing While You Were Breeding by Kristin Newman
Diksha Basu reviews What I Was Doing While You Were Breeding by Kristin Newman today in Rumpus Books.
-
I Am an Executioner by Rajesh Parameswaran
Diksha Basu reviews I Am an Executioner by Rajesh Parameswaran today in Rumpus Books.
-
Hell on Earth
Former Poet Laureate Charles Simic grapples with the current global situation in the New York Review of Books. The world is going to hell in a hurry. At my age, I ought to be used to it, but I’m not.…
-
Junot Díaz Plans A Holiday Vacation
Summer isn’t over yet. Read what Junot Díaz, Donald Trump, and others have planned before the weather turns cold. And may we all be as lucky as Junot: Once on a beach in Jamaica, right before an October storm swept…
-
Never Judge a Book by Its Blurb
Book blurbs are the new books covers. And at the Guardian, Nathan Filer says you shouldn’t judge a book by either: Cover blurbs aren’t reviews. They’re advertisements. No space for balanced, nuanced positivity. Nothing can be interesting; it must be…
-
Summer Days Are Here
It’s Friday! And it’s the summer! Are you sitting in your cubicle feeling the same joy Kassia Miller writes about at McSweeney’s? And when it’s summer in the office, I get to break out all my favorite summer clothes: my…
-
Think (and Think Some More) Before You Speak
Notably, there are a few verbal tics that we mistakenly think index insecurity, even though they don’t. These (mostly feminine) quirks—uptalk, vocal fry—are often subtle expressions of power, innovativeness, or upward mobility. In fact, Adam Gopnik recently wrote about how…
-
Critics vs. Copies
Have you actually read Knausgaard or have you only read about Knausgaard? The sales numbers don’t seem to support the phenomenon that this Norwegian writer has become. For the New York Review of Books, Tim Parks tries to understand the correlation…
-
Baijiu on the Rocks
Baijiu is a distilled firewater somewhat like vodka crossed with a non-apple Calvados, with a distinctive nose. Have you tried baijiu, the world’s most consumed liquor? Chances are high that you have not even heard of it. Let novelist and…
-
Nights to Remember
I offer all of this not by way of aimless self-revelation, but as a way of provoking you to remember your stories about similar incidents in your life, stories about the night, and who smoked what and who was doing who…
-
Returning to Poverty
Slate has a haunting photo essay called “Living Below the Poverty Line in Troy, New York.” The photographs are by Brenda Ann Kenneally, who grew up in Troy. She left when she was 17 after a pregnancy and abortion and…
