Tenth of December – George Saunders
Saunders’s fiction leaves the discernible impression its representation of human folly is at least partly meant to suggest we should (and could) stop doing and believing the things that make it possible.
How Literature Saved My Life – David Shields
The title of the book, tongue-in-cheek but still on the cheesy side, fits the showing-all-my-cards-right-up-front ethos of the project.
See Now Then – Jamaica Kincaid
Whether Mrs. Sweet’s or Jamaica Kincaid’s, this failure of imagination is the novel’s gravest flaw.
An Enlarged Heart – Cynthia Zarin
(The above may preclude the reviewer’s objectivity.)
To Kramer’s credit, and to the reader’s dignity, there is no life because life itself is comprised of death, of disease, of a boy’s rotten teeth and a lover’s disintegrating body.
The Aylesford Skull – James P. Blaylock
THE AYLESFORD SKULL is a fairly straightforward adventure story, but Blaylock’s attempts to situate his novel in a historical moment backfire.
Both Flesh and Not – David Foster Wallace
Suddenly anything the author wrote, even lists of words he wanted to use but never got around to using, are fair game so long as the publisher makes a buck.
As alive as the West’s wide skies and wildflowers, this is a story to see us through the struggle to tell those we love that we love them.
Operation Sweet Tooth is about the creation of art, in particular fiction.
Will Oldham on Bonnie “Prince” Billy – Will Oldham and Alan Licht
As an antidote to the self-serving, grandiose, and often grotesque nature of many “rock memoirs” Will Oldham on Bonnie “Prince” Billy is a refreshing kind of book.