Features & Reviews
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Travel As A Political Act
Rick Steves’s recent book, Travel As A Political Act tells us how we can travel more thoughtfully. “Growing up in the U.S., I was told over and over how smart, generous, and free we were. Travel has taught me that…
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Junot Diaz’s Favorite New Yorker
At Red Hill Books we keep having to order more Junot Diaz books. It’s really extraordinary. They keep flying off the shelves on a daily basis.
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Discovering Georges Simenon
Maybe because I’m one-quarter Belgian, or so my parents claim, I tend to go out of my way to discover famous Belgians. I’m half-kidding about that but I do admit there was a brief, embarrassing period when I claimed to…
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The Daily Grind Of Writing
I laughed out loud, like a lot of writers probably did this week, when I read J. Robert Lennon’s confession in the L.A. Times, The Truth About Writers. The truth, it turns out is that “writers don’t spend much time…
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The Rumpus Book Blog Roundup
Greetings! Your humble guest-editor Michael is back in the saddle for another round of negotiating the highly-addictive world of the book blogs. I had an interesting week, where I had time to contemplate my imminent move to Bernal Heights and…
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The Rumpus Sunday Book Review Supplement
The sun blazes in a clear blue sky and is visible well until 9 o’clock at night. It’s Gay Pride weekend in San Francisco, the streets bejewelled with parades, both joyous and bittersweet. The coffee shop is full of people…
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The Rumpus Interview with Joe Meno
Two authors, one dinner table. Joshua Mohr talks to Joe Meno about The Great Perhaps, fundamentalism, and why George W. Bush’s sentences are so short.
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Mexico City’s “Bukowski”
Just one last quote here from First Stop in the New World, and then I promise to stop exhorting you to read the book. This passage concerns an author I hadn’t heard of, Guillermo Fadanelli, “whose novels and stories have…
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Extreme Storytelling and Literary Mayhem
Mike Edison has been promoting the paperback edition of his book I Have Fun Everywhere I Go: Savage Tales of Pot, Porn, Punk Rock, Pro Wrestling, Talking Apes, Evil Bosses, Dirty Blues, American Heroes, and the Most Notorious Magazines in…
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The Tao of Keith
A collection of wisdom, witticisms, hypothetical scenarios, and recipes (really!) lays out the principles of “Keithism”
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Work Befitting A Free Man
“I feel like I’ve been sort of … anointed this voice in the culture by people who, if they’d seen me two years ago when I was just fixing motorcycles would have said, ‘What are you doing with your life?’”…
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Kevin Hobson: The Last Book I Loved, Disgrace
The last book I loved was Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee. Maybe “loved” isn’t the right word. “Loved” implies affection, fealty, romance and adoration. Coetzee’s Booker-Prize winning masterpiece affected me profoundly, but I did not feel any of those “lovely” types…