The Sinistra Zone – Ádám Bodor
Though the anti-communist critique begins pointedly, after working its way through the book’s vulgar and whimsical digestive tract, it plops out the back end of the novel watered down and amorphous.
The history of science, in Roach’s work, is the history of human curiosity and obsession, and Roach has these in spades.
Crapalachia – Scott McClanahan
Crap-e diem.
It’s unclear at what point you start to feel the depth behind Koster’s acrobatic balance of elegant narration, disgusting violence and acerbic satire. It’s this subtlety that takes the book beyond caricature and into complexity.
Americanah – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
What’s so powerful is the way Adichie thinks through how human faces, flesh, and blood should be honestly portrayed in discussions and representations of the grand and minute violence of everyday life.
We Live in Water – Jess Walter
Even though Walter addresses grim topics like poverty, childhood abandonment, or romantic injustices throughout his narratives, he implements his own sense of humor, which is dark, witty, and hewn with quiet vulgarity.
The weight of ambivalence is greater than any final oath.
Is Emil Cioran an author to be feared?
Linda Perdido is a story about wanderers. Not wanderlusts, and certainly not “lost,” but those who wander for the sake of it.
Odds Against Tomorrow – Nathaniel Rich
He addresses [fear] with poise and the kind of gallows-humor that would make Don DeLillo, Joseph Heller and Gary Shteyngart proud.