The Thing In The Snow (William Morrow) is set in a remote location “where the snow never melts.” Given my fiery hatred of Iowa winters, this was already enough to catapult me into a headspace of inexplicable tension that kept […]
What’s Left (Finishing Line Press) builds its atmosphere immediately — the cover and epigraph synching an ambiance by opening with a formally stylized Nirvana quote followed by a transcription of a sparse voice message from the author’s father (the cover […]
While contemplating Tending Iowa’s Land, a poignant story returned to mind. A good friend of mine and his wife, several years ago, lived very near the Iowa River. During a hot, dry spell, he decided to put a pump into […]
Early in DK Nnuro’s debut novel, a Ghanaian father presiding over his son’s divorce ritual is introduced by his well-read brother to the concept of schadenfreude. “Delighting in [someone else’s] misery,” it’s defined. Again and again, the characters in What […]
Born in 1936 in Istanbul (and approaching his 87th birthday on Feb. 24), Ferit Edgü has been writing beloved and award-winning work in his native Turkish since 1959. He’s published novels, stories, essays, poetry and even a children’s book. He’s […]
In the 1864 novella Notes From the Underground, Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky proposes the proto-existentialist notion of “perverse freedom.” There are never no choices in life, because one can always, at any time, choose to act against one’s own self-interest […]
Things not to do: read Mark Levine’s Sound Fury while battling a nasty rhinovirus. Here’s why: Levine (deftly) uses so many literary devices simultaneously that one really needs the full use of their faculties to experience Sound Fury (University of […]
What to say about Robin Hemley’s Oblivion? The University of Iowa Writers Workshop alum’s 16th book was released this year on Gold Wake Press. And although it’s short in pages, the novel is not short on big ideas. Oblivion follows […]
I won’t lie to you. I wasn’t going to read Love and Potato Salad until I read the press quotes on the back of the book. Riddled with jokes but also, quite possibly, real exclamations from shocked readers (“‘Your novel […]
“I am a Holocaust survivor, and every survival story is unique. What makes mine unique is that I was fortunate enough to be on ‘Schindler’s List.’” These are the words of Celina Karp Biniaz, one of youngest to be included […]
Searching for Petco (Forklift Books, 2022) opens like someone suddenly turned on a speaker. I felt accosted by author Skylar Alexander’s opening poems: clearly meant to be spoken, clearly friends with slam poetry. Extra-sensory and openly branded “millennial.” Alexander brazenly […]
Little Village comic contributor Lauren Haldeman’s fourth book, Team Photograph (out Nov. 8 from Sarabande Books) is a poignant exploration of how we’re shaped by the places where we grow up. This graphic novel combines Haldeman’s iconic wolf-headed style with […]
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