A Cult of Translation: Jennifer Croft’s The Extinction of Irena Rey
Readers preferring more straightforward narratives won’t find one here.
Features & Reviews
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“Obsession is the Secret Ingredient to Being a Creative Person”: A Conversation with Marie Mutsuki Mockett
That's a concern that one might have in the middle of one’s life: “How much time do I have left? What did I not do? What do I still need to do?”
The First Book: Armen Davoudian
I was attracted to those aspects of poetry where you can be in two places at once but also lost between them: rhyme, the pun, and “binary” forms like the sonnet.
“All of Humanity Probably Won’t Enjoy My Book:” A Conversation with Debbie Urbanski
If you are reading the story of the last human on Earth, then you should expect to have to do some work.
A Manifested Destiny: Vinson Cunningham’s Great Expectations
There is the power of money and its capacity to corrupt—money that flows often from the pockets of wealthy white men but sheds some green onto any hand it touches.
The Weaponization of Identity Politics: A Conversation with Andrew Boryga
I want to see a novel with POC characters but that’s the least interesting part of the book. . . . Just write a great book that happens to inhabit this world.
A Palestinian Voice in Gaza: Mosab Abu Toha’s Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear
Here, the will to survive outlasts destruction. Here, Palestinians in Gaza coalesce with the land and its resilient growth and beauty.
Writing about Grief is Making Sense of It: A Conversation with Kyoko Mori
When entering a narrative that has great emotion, it’s important to commit to capturing the emotion and portraying it. But also knowing when to stop.
Genius or Madness: Patrick Langley’s The Variations
Like a piece of music or genetic code, the gift changes over time and according to who is experiencing it. Langley’s novel traces the shifts.
The Other Home I Found is in the Art Itself: A Conversation with Richard Blanco
. . . it’s the poet or artist’s job to open up a new dialogue, to ask questions that aren’t being asked
Sustaining Forces When Splintering: A Conversation with Leslie Jamison
All of life is simultaneity for everyone. We’re all inside of many different tracks of experience at once.
Punctuating pseudo-realities: Daniel Lefferts’s Ways and Means
This is a world in which the “ways and means” of the novel’s title are no sure thing, in which the relationship of the protagonists to the money they have (or don’t have) easily exceeds tangible causality.