Engine Empire by Cathy Park Hong
There remain a few shops, labels, and presses in the United States that embody DIY artistic independence in the best way, combining the intensity and existential tenacity of hardcore punk…
Features & Reviews
9301 posts
The Rumpus Interview with Richard Lloyd Parry
Richard Lloyd Parry, Asia Editor and Tokyo Bureau Chief of The London Times, covered the case of Lucie Blackman as it unfolded and now, a decade later, has published an expanded—and fascinating—account in his second book, People Who Eat Darkness: The Fate of Lucie Blackman.
Living in the Memoir Office
The premise of Daniel Nester’s The Memoir Office is simple. Nester sat in a Troy, New York art gallery, wrote and talked to people who inquired about his exhibit, which…
Here Are Some Stories Seth Likes
Here are links to stories I read this week that I liked and I hope you’ll like too. “It’s not that we wouldn’t be able to lay our hands on…
Ring of Bone: Collected Poems by Lew Welch
Lew Welch has been dead now for 40 years, just about as long as his total time on earth. He disappeared on May 23, 1971, walked out of poet and…
We’re Flying, by Peter Stamm
Most of the characters who populate the stories in We’re Flying were once happy. They were ordinary, but hopeful, representatives of Stamm’s native Switzerland: cheerful parents, loving spouses, young professionals.…
Either Way I’m Celebrating by Sommer Browning
Sommer Browning’s Either Way I’m Celebrating shows effervescence, delight in language, and whimsy, even as it hides more introspective and severe undertones. Taking elements of surrealism from the Ashbery branch…
The Rumpus Interview With Joel Stein
At age 27, Joel Stein was hired by Time magazine as a staff writer. In many ways, Stein quickly turned the decades-old publication — revered, traditional, dry — on its…
Parsifal, by Jim Krusoe
Last year, Jim Krusoe completed his Resurrection Trilogy, a threesome of novels (Girl Factory, Erased, and Toward You) concerned with what he called “the spongy turf between life and death,”
Havana Requiem, by Paul Goldstein
Legal eagle Michael Seeley is on his last chance. His Manhattan law firm has warily agreed to take him back but his probation means reining in the waywardness and alcoholism…
Dogs of Brooklyn by Susie DeFord
When poets decide to collect what they consider to be some of their best work into a manuscript, there are seemingly thousands of choices to make. Should all the poems…
Little Century, by Anna Keesey
With her debut novel Little Century, Anna Keesey finds herself among other admirable writers with the hard-won title of late-blooming author.