As a reader, I have largely ignored the historical fiction genre. The War Begins in Paris (2023), by Theodore Wheeler, shows me that I have been remiss. Through it, I’ve learned that at its best, the genre turns a mirror toward the reader and subtly pushes us to see history repeating itself. And it can […]
Local book reviews
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Book Review: ‘Sundog’ by Melissa Conway
“At the end of January 2018 I sat in a coffee shop sipping a tea I couldn’t afford and reflected on the last month I barely survived. This exercise became a monthly meditation on time passing, what it’s like to live in a body, as a self, something holy, a wrong turn.” This introduction to […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Book Review: ‘Other Minds and Other Stories’ by Bennett Sims
Within Bennett Sims’ Other Minds and Other Stories (Two Dollar Radio) you’ll find several stories about a variety of psychologically interesting narrators. The one thing that brings them together: they’re all quite bizarre. Sims’ writing is at its strongest when a story’s movement and narration flow hand-in-hand seamlessly. A story that embodies this well is […]
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Book Review: ‘Monologues by LGBTQIA+ Writers for LGBTQIA+ Actors’ edited by Alyssa Cokinis
The phrase “representation is important” has become ubiquitous, so commonplace that it’s easy to lose sight of its meaning. On Twitter, or “X,” the phrase is used memetically to accompany pictures of cute, lazy animals, representing a user’s mental state or level of comfort. What does a joke about the importance of reputation obscure? In […]
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Book Review: Carol Roh Spaulding — ‘Waiting for Mr. Kim and Other Stories’
Waiting for Mr. Kim and Other Stories by Drake University professor Carol Roh Spaulding is well-deserving of winning the 2022 Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction, utilizing a masterful short story cycle structure spanning four generations of a Korean American family. Add this to your fall TBR list. I believe you, too, will read the […]
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Book Review: ‘The Demon, the Hero, and the City of Seven’ by A.E. Kincaid
Imagine going to your middle school Scholastic Book Fair, picking up an intriguing fantasy title and thumbing through to find “fuck” sprinkled throughout. If that prospect delights your inner (or outer) 6th-grade persona, then A.E. Kincaid’s The Demon, the Hero, and the City of Seven (2021, Phantom House Press) is for you. This debut novel […]
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Book Review: ‘Inmani: Nova Mundo Blues’ by Cullen McHael
Never before have I come across a book that so thoroughly encapsulates the experience of enjoying a piece of Juicy Fruit gum. Cullen McHael’s debut Inmani: Nova Mundo Blues does just that; the novel provides a world and characters that are satisfying to chew on, but in some ways leaves the reader wanting. Inmani follows […]
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Book Review: ‘I am home.’ by Marianne Maili
Marianne Maili’s second full-length publication, I am home. (Chez Soi, 2023) is a memoir hiding inside other genres. It flits through its own timeline, asking to be considered among modernist texts. This makes sense, Maili is clearly influenced by modernism and themes of which come through in her story: there are moments that seem frivolous […]
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Book Review and Q&A: ‘The Overnight Guest’ by Heather Gudenkauf
I grew up in a small town — population 600 on a good day. Rural Iowans are familiar with the one gas station, one bar kind of town, but it takes a special writer to encapsulate small-town life without turning it trite. Heather Gudenkauf, a New York Times bestselling author based out of Iowa, does […]
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Book Review: ‘The Beckoning World’ by Douglas Bauer
Though the all-star game of July 11 has passed, baseball fans still looking for a summer read might consider Douglas Bauer’s most recent novel: The Beckoning World (University of Iowa Press, 2022). This Iowa-set novel tells the story of Earl Dunham, a protagonist facing a crossroad — to chase the dream of baseball, or to […]
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Book Review: ‘You Have to Be Prepared to Die Before You Can Begin to Live’ by Paul Kix
When Paul Kix set out to write You Have to Be Prepared to Die Before You Can Begin to Live: Ten Weeks in Birmingham that Changed America, one of his goals — in spite of the text’s lengthy title — was to ensure the book moves at a fast pace. By god, does this book […]
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Book Review: ‘Stellaphasia’ by Jason Bradford
Posthumously published from his MFA thesis, Jason Bradford’s Stellaphasia (North American Review, 2023) chronicles life inside a disabled body. It’s unfair to say that this collection is about being disabled or having a disability, though. This is a book of emotional observations, connection and communion. Bradford — a University of Northern Iowa alum — has […]
