New Directions Review by Laura Mullen If “The personal is the political” was a truism and rallying cry of second wave feminism (invoked also by student and civil rights activists),…
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Lesser Ruins by Mark Haber
Coffee House Review by Walter Cummins Just opening a copy of Lesser Ruins at any point and encountering a two-page spread of a single block of type signals a challenge…
The Harder I Fight the More I Love You by Neko Case
Grand Central Review by George Yatchisin Given she’s enchanted by fairy tales, it’s only fitting that Neko Case’s memoir The Harder I Fight the More I Love You leaves its…
The Countryside: Ten Rural Walks Through Britain and Its Hidden History of Empire by Corinne Fowler
Scribner Review by Walter Cummins I’m fortunate to have taken several of Fowler’s ten rural walks in Britain along with a number of similar routes. But my ignorance limited me…
Private Rites by Julia Armfield
Flatiron Review by Walter Cummins The world of this novel is ominously dystopian—constant rain pounding a city of unmoored, vulnerable buildings, displaced people fearful of being flooded out of threatened…
A Case of Matricide by Graeme Macrae Burnet
Biblioasis Review by Walter Cummins I must admit that throughout my initial reading of this novel I fell for Burnet’s ruse, believing I was really engaging with his translation of…
A Few Words in Defense of Our Country: The Biography of Randy Newman by Robert Hilburn
Hachette Review by George Yatchisin A tunesmith with a con, not a song, in his heart, Randy Newman is a quintessential American composer. And like America, what a bill of goods…
Rental House by Weike Wang
Riverhead Review by George Yatchisin You’re a mere five pages into Weike Wang’s masterful novel Rental House when she does this to you, as her married couple main characters, one…
What Nails It by Greil Marcus
Yale Review by George Yatchisin Trying to write a book review about essays in which one of our preeminent social critics, Greil Marcus, explores why he writes criticism…well, I’ve already…