Meander, Spiral, Explode – Jane Alison
Why would the exploration of the formal possibilities (in all their complexity) not be just as crucial to the integrity of fiction as evoking emotion in the reader?
Max Havelaar or, The Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company – Multatuli
No anti-colonial tract more effectively debunked the, by then, three-century-old system which—tweaked and window-dressed to pacify the progressives of each generation—had enriched Europe while shredding colonized societies everywhere.
Binstead’s Safari – Rachel Ingalls
In many novels, the survival of a marriage symbolizes a return to normalcy, but Ingalls twists that convention by rendering marriage as a stricture on each individual’s autonomy.
Juliet the Maniac – Juliet Escoria
JULIET THE MANIAC displaces survival from its preferred position of totality i.e. restitution, and reframes recovery as a messy and unpredictable process of fragmentary retrieval.
I’ve come to read the book as an alternate proximity to conflict: the paradox of Luisa’s sense of self collapsing and rebuilding without an obvious enemy to focus on amidst the uncertainty of incipient adulthood.
In every trip to get punk t-shirts on Melrose or listen to Pink Floyd at Griffith Observatory she is not merely coming of age; she is coming of culture, of heritage, of community.
A Primer for Forgetting: Getting Past the Past – Lewis Hyde
Pledging allegiance to memory makes you feel part of something bigger; that’s the lie, at least.
Buddhism for Western Children – Kirstin Allio
There’s something odd, on the face of it, about a novel sending its protagonist into a therapist’s office.
The Skin is the Elastic Covering that Encases the Entire Body – Bjørn Rasmussen
Rasmussen has managed to stretch the soul in the way a butcher might stretch flesh, asking us to consider the roots of our desires and the depths of our longings.
O! The Scarcity of Gore – Evan Isoline
O! THE SCARCITY OF GORE is cinematic because it acts as if it is already a film. Language is repurposed for new solutions.