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Our Week in Reviews: 2/14/26

The Typewriter and the Guillotine: An American Journalist, a German Serial Killer, and Paris on the Eve of WWII by Mark Braude (Grand Central Publishing). Reviewed by Bob Duffy. “Flanner is covering the spectacle onsite, following up on the assignment she’s had for at least part of Weidmann’s trial. In…

The Reviews Are In

Unleash your potential in our immersive review-writing workshop! Both emerging and experienced critics will be inspired to write stunning and impactful reviews of books, videogames, and visual art. Panelists include Marion Winik (books), Todd Harper (videogames), Randon Billings Noble (art/hybrid), and Holly Smith (books). Poet and professor Steven Leyva will…

A Self-Publishing Success Story

When I set out to release Stray: Breaking Free, Falling Hard, and Growing Stronger, my self-published memoir tracing travels across five continents, I knew that the journey didn’t end with the last page. The launch itself would be a careful choreography, a blend of strategy, patience, and outreach. Months before…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Samuel Ashworth

A creative-writing professor at George Washington University and a regular contributor to the Atlantic, the Washington Post, Longreads, and other outlets, Samuel Ashworth is also the author of the debut novel The Death and Life of August Sweeney, which was longlisted for the Dzanc Prize for fiction. Hear what Ashworth…

An Interview with Kurt Luchs

In an age of hackneyed AI, when authenticity itself feels suspect, Kurt Luchs’ new poetry collection, Tributaries, is a breath of fresh air. His prose is lucid, frank, and tender, enlivened by much-needed comic relief. He lays a proverbial wreath at the feet of these “dead poet” poems, offering them…

Meet David Guterson

Join us for a conversation with David Guterson, author of the new book, Evelyn in Transit. The writer, best known for the novel, Snow Falling on Cedars, will be talking about his latest and also about the work of the Tibetan Nuns Project (TNP). Guterson's new book and the mission…

Father Knew Best

Great readers aren’t born, they’re made. As an adoptee, I often wonder if I would’ve become a writer if I’d been raised by other parents. But before I was a writer, I was a reader, encouraged by both my parents. Here, I would like to eulogize in books my father,…

Our Week in Reviews: 2/7/26

One Aladdin Two Lamps by Jeanette Winterson (Grove Press). Reviewed by Nicole Schrag. “Yet to say One Aladdin Two Lamps is about the power of storytelling risks underselling it. Winterson offers a beautiful, book-length reading of the Nights that delights in the absurd tales, recounting them in her own hilarious…

Romance Roundup: February 2026

It’s February, but winter has made it very clear it’s not finished with us yet. It’s been bitterly cold in Virginia, and the snow and ice (mostly ice) have kept me firmly indoors. The silver lining is that I’ve had plenty of new books to keep me company. As we…

Asha Futterman in Conversation with Jonny Teklit

Song of Gray approaches Black experience by clarifying the concrete worlds that exist between humanity and objecthood. Asha Futterman renders this in-between space as it reveals itself in performance: in a contemporary performance workshop, at an audition, in a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and in the dailiness of…

Literature Lives in Lightness

Like many of you, I grew up with the Washington Post in my house every single day. It was a fixture; its delivery got the morning started. Some of my earliest memories are of my mother at our kitchen table as she read it stem to stern each day. The…

Our 7 Most Favorable Reviews in January 2026

Fit Into Me: A Novel: A Memoir by Molly Gaudry (Rose Metal Press). Reviewed by Marcie Geffner. “When writers’ lives inspire their fiction and their imaginations color their memoirs, where can a line be drawn between the two — or does no such line exist? Astute readers may point to…

Podcast: Philip Taubman

A former longtime journalist at the New York Times and now an affiliate of Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation, Philip Taubman is also the author of several books, including Secret Empire: Eisenhower, the CIA, and the Hidden Story of America’s Space Espionage and The Partnership: Five Cold…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Marisa Kashino

A former journalist who spent the bulk of her career at Washingtonian magazine, Marisa Kashino is also the author of the debut novel (and Good Morning America Book Club pick) Best Offer Wins, now in development as a TV series for Hulu. Find out what advice Kashino has for crafting…

Meet Kwame Alexander

We are excited to welcome bestselling author Kwame Alexander to Frederick! Kwame will be speaking about his latest children’s chapter book, The Mighty Macy, at C. Burr Artz Library from 6-7 p.m. (doors open at 5:30 p.m.). Please note: Kwame will sign but not personalize copies of his newest book…

Our 5 Most Popular Posts: January 2026

John P. Loonam’s review of What We Can Know: A Novel by Ian McEwan (Knopf). “Absent the actual poem, Tom relies on reading or rereading every note, text, email, journal entry, interview, or article about the Blundys and the six others who attended the birthday dinner where the great verse…

An Anniversary Gift for the Ages

It was in February 2011 that a scrappy group of authors in the DC region — many of whom had met through the now-disbanded Washington Independent Writers — joined together to form the Washington Independent Review of Books. Witnessing an alarming drop in the number of quality book reviews offered…

We Contain Multitudes

The Wall, a dystopian novel by Marlen Haushofer, was published in Austria in 1960 but only translated into English in 1990. I read it last month, around the same time I read David Szalay’s Booker Prize-winning novel, Flesh. In Flesh, a hollow man works his way from rags to riches…

Our Week in Reviews: 1/31/26

Strikingly Similar: Plagiarism and Appropriation from Chaucer to Chatbots by Roger Kreuz (Cambridge University Press). Reviewed by William Rice. “It’s only with the regimentation of copyright protection over the past two centuries or so that our current conception of plagiarism has taken hold. Now that we all at least pay…

Meet Malcolm Kempt

About the book: After a botched high-profile murder investigation as a cop in Alberta, Corporal Eldrick Cole is exiled to the remote, rugged landscape of Nunavut, Canada, a vast territory in the Arctic Circle known for its untamed beauty, frigid temperatures, and perpetual darkness. Amid these harsh elements, the indomitable…

Authors on Audio: Marion Orr

A political scientist and the inaugural Frederick Lippitt Professor of Public Policy at Brown University, Marion Orr is also the author of several books, including Black Social Capital: The Politics of School Reform in Baltimore and The Color of School Reform: Race, Politics, and the Challenge of Urban Education. His…

An Interview with Katie Yee

Katie Yee’s work has appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, No Tokens, the Believer, the Washington Square Review, and Triangle House, among other outlets. Maggie; Or, a Man and a Woman Walk into a Bar, her debut novel, was named a New York Times Notable Book and a…

Appraising Information in the Cybersphere, Pt. II

In my work with college students, I teach critical reading. I think of it as both a praxis and a skillset that have, at their root, a disciplined form of questioning. For some, critical reading is solely the analytic work of active reading. For many of us, though, it includes…

Our Week in Reviews: 1/24/26

Departure(s): A Novel by Julian Barnes (Knopf). Reviewed by John P. Loonam. “However, even here, this seemingly significant thread only occasionally takes center stage. Instead, Barnes writes about his own health, the passing of old friends Martin Amis and Christopher Hitchens, the fact that Jimmy doesn’t know he’s a dog,…

Tramaine Suubi in Conversation with Michele Evans

Join us for light refreshments and a fantastic author reading and conversation! There will be a brief audience Q&A as well as book signing after the author talk. Please note: Loyalty has a zero-tolerance policy for harassment of staff, authors, or fellow patrons at our events. ABOUT THE BOOK Critically…

Don’t Trust — Just Verify

As much as I enjoy creating historical narrative nonfiction, I find searching for new topics somewhat vexing. On the lookout for a fresh subject, I turned to artificial intelligence for inspiration. I would never allow AI do any actual writing for me; all my words are always my own. But…

Sweet Home Alabama

I haven’t taken up too many Goodreads challenges, but one that I did tackle was to find and read a detective story set in each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia. (The latter was easy since George Pelecanos sets his novels in DC.) I didn’t get too…

Authors on Audio: Eliana Ramage

A citizen of the Cherokee Nation, Eliana Ramage is also the author of the debut novel To the Moon and Back, a Reese’s Book Club pick. “Ramage stuffs the book to the brim with big ideas and digressions, from indigenous history to family identity,” says NPR, “but it is the…

An Interview with Jane Borden

When it comes to falling for cults, the Land of the Free’s track record isn’t the kind of American exceptionalism we should flaunt. In fact, while cults aren’t uniquely American, the U.S. has taken them to unmistakably cruel and dire new levels. In Cults Like Us: Why Doomsday Thinking Drives…

My Year of Rest and Relaxation

I know what you’re thinking: Is this person insane? Or has she been living under a rock? What with the United States government denying the citizenship of a Maryland woman, kidnapping foreign heads of state, and murdering people in broad daylight, this hardly seems the time to let our guard…

Jennette McCurdy in Conversation with Kelsey McKinney

From Jennette McCurdy — the #1 New York Times bestselling author of I’m Glad My Mom Died — comes Half His Age, a sad, funny, thrilling novel about sex, consumerism, class, desire, loneliness, the internet, rage, intimacy, power, and the lengths we’ll go to in order to get what we…

Our Week in Reviews: 1/17/26

Being Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History by Andrew Burstein (Bloomsbury Publishing). Reviewed by Peter Cozzens. “Burstein’s work is balanced; his three decades of study of Jefferson have not blinded him to the Virginian’s shortcomings or to the profound contradictions in his character. Indeed, it is his interpretation of these contradictions…

Eyes on the Prize(s)

Have a poem or tiny tale that punches above its weight? The nonprofit Next Generation Short Story Awards is now accepting entries for its 2026 poetry and fiction contests! Sponsored by the Next Generation Indie Book Awards and the Independent Book Publishing Professionals Group, the NG Short Story Awards “aim…

On Poetry: January 2026

Welsh Argentine poet Lynette Roberts, born in Buenos Aires in 1909, has largely been forgotten, and her work is difficult to categorize because of its range. She could write lyrically and colloquially of Welsh village life as well as of the Argentine pampa and Patagonia. But her most ambitious work…

Biden’s Bookmobiles

Although a constant personal correspondent by email and snail, I rarely write letters to the editor. I do read several papers every day, both hard copy and online. But now, I often only scan and skim, flinching at the news. A recent low-voltage headline in the New York Times caught…

Elizabeth MacBride and Seth Levine in Conversation with Lori Montgomery

Business overtook government. Now what? The future of capitalism isn’t left or right — it’s forward. In Capital Evolution: The New American Economy, Seth Levine and Elizabeth MacBride deliver a bold and timely reassessment of capitalism in America. Drawing on decades of experience in finance, journalism, and policy, Levine and…

Authors on Audio: Todd Goddard

An associate professor of literary studies at Utah Valley University and the former editor-in-chief of the Connecticut Journal of International Law, Todd Goddard is also the author of the only biography of the late Jim Harrison, Devouring Time: Jim Harrison, a Writer’s Life. Carl Hiaasen calls the work “raw and…

An Interview with Lacey N. Dunham

Lacey N. Dunham’s debut novel, The Belles, casts a light on the chilling underbelly of adolescence. Set in early 1950s Virginia, the story follows 17-year-old outsider Deena Williams as she enters her first year at genteel Bellerton College. Concealing her lower-class background in order to fit in, Deena clings to…

Children’s Book Roundup: January 2026

Monkey’s Sweet Surprise: A Lunar New Year Mix Up by Patricia Tanumihardja (author) and Bonnie Lui (illustrator) (Picnic Heist Publishing). “Today is Lunar New Year’s Eve. All the zodiac animals are excited about tonight’s reunion banquet…everyone except Monkey. He’s still embarrassed about what happened last year.” What did happen? Let’s…

Our Week in Reviews: 1/10/26

A Day in “The Hole”: Risk, Loss, and Excess in Downtown Lima by Daniella Gandolfo (University of Chicago Press). Reviewed by Cara Tallo. “The tower that was built now houses the country’s Superior Court, ironic given these offices overlook the footprint of the planned second tower, where vendors at El…

Emily Austin in Conversation with Emma Sarappo

The Atlantic’s Emma Sarappo will be in conversation with Emily Austin about her new book, Is This a Cry for Help? Copies will be available for purchase and signing courtesy of East City Bookshop. About the Book Darcy’s life turned out better than she could have ever imagined. She is…

Romance Roundup: January 2026

Happy New Year! I’m not a big fan of sweeping resolutions, but every year, I vow to spend more time reading than doomscrolling. In 2025, I read 80 books, and nearly half of them fell somewhere in the romance genre, offering entertainment and comfort when the world felt loud and…

Bedtime Stories: January 2026

Jayne Ann Krentz: I lean gothic. I love to read the genre and I pull on it when I write. Yes, my books are labeled romantic suspense — my new release, The Shop on Hidden Lane, is an example — but if you look under the hood, you’ll see what…

Marion Winik with Laura Lippman

When Marion Winik’s First Comes Love came out in 1997, it reshaped the landscape of memoir with its bold, heartbreaking and hilarious telling of the trajectory of a marriage. Now, 30 years later, it’s being reissued in a special anniversary edition — with an audiobook! — and we are throwing…

Our 7 Most Favorable Reviews in December 2025

Metamorphosis: A Natural and Human History by Oren Harman (Basic Books). Reviewed by Julie Dunlap. “Metamorphosis is steeped in wonderment, equal parts history of science, collective biography, and ‘meditation of a father-to-be.’ It is also hauntingly timely; today, the work of empiricists like Maria Sibylla Merian is again threatened by…

An Interview with Peter R. Henriques

A professor emeritus of history at George Mason University and frequent lecturer on the Founding Era, Peter R. Henriques has written several books and articles about George Washington. His most recent work, George Washington: His Quest for Honor and Fame, published by the University of Virginia Press, was developed from…

Our 5 Most Popular Posts: December 2025

“Our 51 Favorite Books of 2025.” “Gaze down from on high and declare certain books ‘the best’? Never! Instead, here are the titles that especially stuck with us this year. We hope you enjoy them as much as we did!” William Rice’s review of Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse…

Pain Is Not the Opposite of Pleasure

In the wake of a recent and excruciating shoulder injury, I sought succor in Small Rain, Garth Greenwell’s latest wonder of a novel. I’d read it once before, shortly after it came out, and so I knew the subjects at its heart — illness, isolation, and the perennial question of…

Meet Julian Hattem

An urgent wake-up call about the coming large-scale human displacement caused by climate change, from one of the world’s leading experts. Mere decades from now, millions of people all over the world will be forced to move because of climate change. Entire islands will disappear into the sea. Once-in-a-century hurricanes…

Our Week in Reviews: 1/3/26

Road to Nowhere: How a Highway Map Wrecked Baltimore by Emily Lieb (University of Chicago Press). Reviewed by Patricia Schultheis. “Lieb’s impressive research reaches back to when the vast estates of Baltimore’s gentry were converted into neighborhoods like Rosemont, communities of neat rowhouses for white working people. But by 1950…

Meet Frank Van Riper and Judith Goodman

The Green Heart of Italy provides an intimate portrait of the lush and verdant region of Umbria, known as “Tuscany without tourists.” The pandemic halted international travel and access to most areas of Europe, creating lasting impacts on these regions which benefit greatly from outside visitors. Now, in the post-covid…

The Old Man and the New Year

At my age, I don’t buy green bananas (old joke, I know). But, since it’s Jan. 1, 2026, here are my New Year’s resolutions. (If only I could remember them in a week or two. Oh, well. I’d probably break them, anyway.) One thing I do remember are PBS documentaries,…

Our Super-Early Bird Rate Ends Tonight

Don’t miss your last chance to attend the 2026 Washington Writers Conference at the Super-Early Bird Rate of $389! This entitles you to: In-person pitches with FOUR (not three) agents. A Friday reception and “How to Pitch an Agent” tutorial. Saturday panels and workshops featuring dozens of publishing pros. An…

An Interview with Judith Enck

In 1980, college intern Judith Enck was “thrown into the deep end” lobbying the New York Legislature to adopt a “bottle bill.” The political-science/history major succeeded — on her third try — when her home state passed one of the first beverage-container-deposit laws in 1982. Enck’s green fervor later landed…

A Middle-Aged Eucatastrophe

Sometimes, the old ways are best. In a time of #NoKings protests, the aftermath of our longest government shutdown, and unprecedented attacks on undocumented individuals, I wonder if any hobby — nerdy or otherwise — matters beyond the self-soothing it provides. I recently returned (via audiobook) to one of my…

“The Best Book I Read in 2025”

Naturally, our contributors are a bookish bunch, but their tastes are all over the map. If you’re not sure what we mean by that, take a gander at the smart, surprising list below. May you find something on it to add to your own New Year’s TBR stack! Baldwin: A…

Noon Year’s Eve Party

Ring in 2026 with a special kids’ celebration to welcome the New Year (and maybe find your next favorite read while you’re at it)! Hosted by the Myersville Community Library, 8 Harp Place, Myersville, MD. Learn more here. Want more people at your event? Advertise in the Independent!

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Our Week in Reviews: 12/27/25

Family of Spies: A World War II Story of Nazi Espionage, Betrayal, and the Secret History Behind Pearl Harbor by Christine Kuehn (Celadon Books). Reviewed by David A. Taylor. “In Family of Spies, Kuehn patiently uncovers the tale that her aunt tried to scare her away from pursuing. The author…

All I Wanted for Christmas…

Santa let you down again? (What is it with that guy?) No worries! Get yourself what you really wanted for Christmas: admission to the 2026 Washington Writers Conference! Register at the Super-Early Bird Rate by New Year’s Eve, and you’ll enjoy: Four (not the usual three) face-to-face pitches with literary…

7 Sweet Stories for Christmas Eve

Ah, the gifts are wrapped and the kids are (finally) in bed! Before the chaos of Christmas morning, take some time tonight to enjoy a fun, maybe-things-really-will-be-okay read. Here are several titles that should be especially welcome on this long winter night. A Fine Line Between Stupid and Clever: The…

4th Saturday SLAM!

Join us for our 4th Saturday SLAM! at Busboys and Poets! The 4th Saturday Slam provides an opportunity for poetry lovers to enjoy the competitive art of late-night performance poetry! Enjoy several rounds of competitive poetry by amateurs and professionals, with the audience choosing a winner. The event’s host is…

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Mailboxes are filling up with holiday cards, and thank-you notes will soon be joining them, both of which show the enduring power of a physical letter. During their break from school, encourage your kids to write another meaningful letter: one to their favorite author praising the books they love. I’ve…

Further than Far

As I Lay Dying (1930) by William Faulkner is not a long book. With 59 brief chapters and punching in at just under 60,000 words, the novel, my AI overview tells me, can be read by the average person in less than four hours. Which goes to show the limits…

Our Week in Reviews: 12/20/25

Canticle: A Novel by Janet Rich Edwards (Spiegel & Grau). Reviewed by Terri Lewis. “Canticle revels in language, both in its prose and as part of the storyline. In early chapters, Aleys struggles to learn Latin, a subject forbidden to lay people and especially to women. She first awakens to…

Read to a Dog

Build confidence and read one-on-one with a therapy dog! For kids ages 5-10 who have some ability to read aloud on their own. In-person registration is required the day of the program. We have a limited number of available time slots. Readers can sign up for a time slot starting…

On Poetry: December 2025

Thin Glass by Christine Degenaars is a collection with verve and sincerity, one that uses poems to gently smudge the translucent barriers that separate one human maturation point from another. If “good fences make good neighbors,” as Frost’s “Mending Wall” reminds, then Degenaars’ poems seem to ask, “What of windows?”…

Looking for a Last-Minute Holiday Gift?

Not sure what to get that impossible-to-shop-for aspiring scribe in your life? Sign them up for the 2026 Washington Writers Conference! Register at the Super-Early Bird Rate by Dec. 31st, and they’ll get: Four (not the usual three) face-to-face pitches with literary agents. Insider advice from authors, editors, and other…

An Interview with Emily Mitchell

A full-time professor at the University of Maryland and editor at the New England Review, Emily Mitchell has written for Ploughshares, the Sun, the New York Times, Guernica, and many other outlets. Here, she explains her writing process, what inspired the stories in her new collection, The Church of Divine…

Children’s Book Roundup: December 2025

Interrupting Chicken Saves the Nutcracker by David Ezra Stein (Candlewick). Okay, so the tiny red chick did promise Papa she’d stay in her seat for the whole show. In her defense, however, it’s awfully hard not to jump onstage and intervene when Clara, Fritz, the soldiers, and all the others…

A Tale for Our Time Being

I’m writing from the 42nd parallel south latitude in Tasmania at the beginning of summer. The Port of Hobart teems with sailboats and fishing vessels. From the balcony of my son’s home in Sandy Bay, we see cruise ships gliding up the Derwent River and ice-breakers heading for Antarctica. Gusts…

Poetry Book Club with Sidney

We will be reading poetry collections from diverse voices and publishers! The fun/naughty thing about this book club is you DON’T have to read the whole book before our meeting (just make sure you read enough of the collection to have an idea of what poems you would like to…

Our Week in Reviews: 12/13/25

The Great Contradiction: The Tragic Side of the American Founding by Joseph J. Ellis (Knopf). Reviewed by David O. Stewart. “Given the course of public discussion in recent years, I wondered if the book would mark a concession to contemporary denunciations of Revolution Era leaders who piously proclaimed that ‘all…

9 Notable Kids’ Books for Chanukah

The Book of Candles: Eight Poems for Hanukkah by Laurel Snyder (author) and Leanne Hatch (illustrator) (Clarion Books). “Oh! Look! There’s another one now/a second flame to follow the first/as the room holds its breath/just a moment before breaking/into song, ‘Baruch atah adonai…’” The youngest member of the family may…

The Whiting Foundation Announces Its 2025 Nonfiction Grant Recipients

The nonprofit Whiting Foundation just announced the winners of its 2025 Nonfiction Grant for Works-in-Progress. The $40,000 prizes are given “to writers in the process of completing a book of deeply researched and imaginatively composed nonfiction.” In addition, recipients will receive guidance on marketing their books from Press Shop PR’s…

Peter Mountford in Conversation with Karin Tanabe

Sensorily rich and narratively captivating, the stories in Detonator are utterly addictive. Author Peter Mountford invites readers with a balance of humor, sensuality, and compassion while spanning continents, offering intimate portraits of flawed characters caught in the crosshairs of personal and political upheavals. Mountford is the author of the novels…

Authors on Audio: Richard Carwardine

The former president of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, Richard Carwardine is also the author of multiple books on Abraham Lincoln, including Lincoln’s Sense of Humor and Lincoln: A Life of Purpose and Power. His latest work is Righteous Strife: How Warring Religious Nationalists Forged Lincoln’s Union, which Jon Meacham says,…

Become a Washington Writers Conference Sponsor

Do you run a literary entity or small business geared toward authors, poets, or other bookish types? Become a sponsor of the 2026 Washington Writers Conference at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center in Rockville, MD! Sponsorships include a table at our conference all day Saturday, May 2nd,…

An Interview with Larry Magid

Larry Magid’s reputation in Philadelphia music circles stands higher than the William Penn statue atop city hall. Co-founder of the legendary performance venue Electric Factory and the Electric Factory Concerts promotion company, co-producer of Live Aid and Live 8, and founder of the Philadelphia Music Alliance, Magid is well known…

Sneak Preview: Winter 2025-2026

Thousands of books are published each month. And much as we’d like to, we can’t read (or review) them all. But what we can do is point out a few we think you might enjoy. In that spirit, here’s a rundown of forthcoming titles that caught our eye and may…

Tuesday Night Open-Mic

Charity Blackwell is an award-winning spoken-word artist, poet, and educator known for her dynamic performances and captivating storytelling. With a passion for using her voice to inspire change, Charity creates thought-provoking and powerful works that resonate deeply with audiences across diverse backgrounds. She is a Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI)…

Our Week in Reviews: 12/6/25

Restitution by Tamar Shapiro (Regal House Publishing). Reviewed by D.A. Spruzen. “Shapiro deftly weaves past and present as she reveals the secrets and betrayals that plague an Eastern Bloc society where every neighbor is a potential informer and any hint of dissent brings swift and harsh retribution. Secrets and betrayals…

Romance Roundup: December 2025

As I write this, I’m surrounded by half-wrapped gifts, a stack of unwritten holiday cards, and the creeping awareness that winter break and a family trip are coming up very soon and I’m not at all ready. This time of year always seems to run on fast-forward, which is exactly…

Read All About It. (Please.)

The Tracker series by Jeffery Deaver has been made into the TV show “Tracker” — starring Justin Hartley as protagonist Colter Shaw — and it’s something my wife and I watch (although I’m probably a bigger fan than she is). Recently, I started reading the books, too. Deaver and I…

A Friendship Like No Other

Tom Stoppard and André Previn were an odd couple and also collaborators and best friends. Playwright Stoppard, who passed away last week, was the first to admit he knew nothing about music, couldn’t even read a note. André, the musical polymath — conductor, classical composer, jazz pianist, scorer of 50+…

Our 7 Most Favorable Reviews in November 2025

Unabridged: The Thrill of (and Threat to) the Modern Dictionary by Stefan Fatsis (Atlantic Monthly Press). Reviewed by Randy Cepuch. “But then the internet came along, making it possible for online editions to be updated much more quickly. The big books with tiny type disappeared from nearly every desk when…

Introducing 1455 books

I’ve been immersed in the art world both as a writer and advocate — as well as a teacher, critic, and mostly ardent fan — for the last several decades. I’ve seen a lot of things unfold in real time and, as such, have opinions. Everything, of course, is evolving…

Yep, It’s Giving Tuesday

The world feels awfully inhospitable to books these days (and to everything else, honestly), but the Independent will continue advocating for them in all their glorious diversity. As you know, we want folks to read what they like — widely, deeply, and fearlessly. As you also know, there are lots…

An Interview with Jessica Francis Kane

At the center of Jessica Francis Kane’s fifth book, Fonseca, is a trip that Penelope Fitzgerald never discussed taking. In 1952, she traveled to Mexico, leaving her husband and young daughter at home for three months, while she and her 6-year-old son went in search of a much-needed inheritance from…

Edmund Ghareeb in Conversation with Greg Thomas

Join author Edmund Ghareeb in conversation with Greg Thomas as they discuss Enemy of the Sun, a powerful collection that brings to light the poetry and resilience of Palestinian voices. RSVPhere. Hosted by Sankofa Video, Books & Cafe, 2714 Georgia Ave., NW, Washington, DC. Learn more here. Want more people…

Keep on Keeping on

Maybe it’s just that I sat down to start this column on the day we switched back to Standard Time, but it’s been difficult to come up with much good about the year that’s coming to a close. (The metaphor of impending darkness works on multiple levels.) Living in the…

Our 5 Most Popular Posts: November 2025

“Our 51 Favorite Books of 2025.” “Gaze down from on high and declare certain books ‘the best’? Never! Instead, here are the titles that especially stuck with us this year. We hope you enjoy them as much as we did!” Samantha Neugebauer’s review of The Mind Reels: A Novel by…

Be Intentional This Cyber Monday

Celebrating Cyber Monday from your couch? You’re our people! But as you do your online shopping today, skip the Big A and buy books from Bookshop.org instead. Not only does each purchase support us, it also helps the hundreds of indie bookstores out there fighting the good fight for the…

Our Week in Reviews: 11/29/25

The Stolen Crown: Treachery, Deceit, and the Death of the Tudor Dynasty by Tracy Borman (Atlantic Monthly Press). Reviewed by Bob Duffy. “This is an old and timeworn tale, but under Borman’s industrious scholarship, it takes on fresh urgency, at least for students of the period. She tells it in…

Thanksgiving: A Love Story

Thanksgiving. Among tangible souvenirs of past holidays are handprint turkeys our kids made in kindergarten. The teacher (the only one the three had in common over the years) drew an outline of each student’s hand. The palm became the turkey’s body, the thumb its head, the fingers the feathers. Same…

Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore in Conversation with Jennifer Natalya Fink

From iconic author and activist Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore comes a breathless search for intimacy and connection, ranging from club culture to the art world, from the AIDS crisis to covid-19. Terry Dactyl has lived many lives. Raised by boisterous lesbian mothers in Seattle, she comes of age as a trans…

Podcast: Susan Glasser and Peter Baker

Longtime journalists Susan Glasser (a staff writer for the New Yorker) and Peter Baker (chief White House correspondent for the New York Times) first collaborated as co-authors on Kremlin Rising: Vladimir Putin’s Russia and the End of Revolution, and later on The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times…

An Interview with Tiffany Hopkins

When I first got a copy of Beyond: A Living Person’s Guide to the Dead, I didn’t know what to think. Talking to dead people? Communicating with living pets from miles away? But I was drawn into this how-to book because of Tiffany Hopkins’ personal story and the words of…

Our 51 Favorite Books of 2025

We Lived on the Horizon: A Novel by Erika Swyler (Atria Books). Reviewed by Mariko Hewer. “The seemingly disparate events that tie the three women and the AI Nix together will eventually require them to make decisions fraught with pain, love, fear, and desire. Through it all, Swyler’s slow burn…

Tuesday Night Open-Mic (Poetry & Music)

Glo Shines is a poet, emcee, host, and supplier of vibes. A hip-hopper since a toddler, Glo composed her first raps at the age of 4. Poetry and spoken-word came many years later. She has performed for and worked with the public school systems of Norfolk, Hampton, and Newport News,…

Our Week in Reviews: 11/22/25

Charlatans: How Grifters, Swindlers, and Hucksters Bamboozle the Media, the Markets, and the Masses by Moisés Naím and Quico Toro (Basic Books). Reviewed by William Rice. “It all starts in our head, insist Moisés Naím and Quico Toro. Charlatans, say the authors, know how to exploit a collection of mental…

On Poetry: November 2025

More than 80 languages are spoken on the campus of George Mason University. So, what better place for a Day of Translation? It’s an annual event sponsored by the Alan Cheuse International Writers Center, which is named for the late NPR book critic, author, professor, and, back more than 25…

Podcast: A Conversation with Bret Baier

Fox News anchor Bret Baier is also the author of multiple bestselling books, including Three Days in Moscow: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of the Soviet Empire and To Rescue the Constitution: George Washington and the Fragile American Experiment. His newest work, written with Catherine Whitney, is To Rescue the…

Our BIPOC Scholarships Return in 2026

We’re committed to elevating diverse voices in the DMV writing community. That’s why we’re pleased to offer five full BIPOC Scholarships to the 2026 Washington Writers Conference in May! Scholars will have access to every aspect of the event, including agent-pitch sessions, panels, keynotes, lunch, and networking opportunities. (Note: Scholarships…

Mike Maggio in Conversation with Antonella Mangaelli

Join performance artist, author, and poet Mike Maggio at the Italian American Museum in Washington, DC, for a discussion, Q&A, and reading from his new book of poetry, A Brief Gazelle. Presented by Art4Us and hosted by IAM-DC, the afternoon discussion, led by Antonella Mangaelli, will be filled with Maggio’s…

An Interview with Miriam Gershow

A recipient of writing fellowships in Wisconsin and Oregon, Miriam Gershow also organizes the annual 100 Notable Small Press Books list. Her works include the story collection Survival Tips, the novel The Local News, and, most recently, another novel, Closer. Gershow holds an MFA from the University of Oregon, where…

A Faithful Beginning

I’ve known Therese Doucet for a long time as part of a writer’s group that has met monthly for over a dozen years. In that time, we’ve discussed at length our manuscripts and our daughters but almost never the independent press she launched in 2011, the DC-based micro-publisher Strange Violin…

Children’s Book Roundup: November 2025

How to Find a Yeti by Matt Hunt (Nosy Crow). “I have borrowed all 27 yeti books from the library. I have a pair of yeti slippers (not made from real yeti). I also have a 1:16 scale cardboard cutout of a yeti in my bedroom.” The little boy just…

Sharon Cornelissen in Conversation with Jonathan Tarleton

Gentrification is not inevitable, reveals Sharon Cornelissen, in this surprising, close look at the Detroit neighborhood of Brightmoor and the harsh reality of depopulation and urban decline. In the minds of many, Detroit is undergoing a renaissance thanks to gentrifying urbanites who’ve been drawn to the city with the promise…

Our Week in Reviews: 11/15/25

The First Eight: A Personal History of the Pioneering Black Congressmen Who Shaped a Nation by Jim Clyburn (Little, Brown and Company). Reviewed by Kitty Kelley. “While this appears to be a staff-written book, it’s been read and annotated by Clyburn, whose 2014 memoir was entitled Blessed Experiences: Genuinely Southern,…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Aran and Margot Lee Shetterly

We’re thrilled to announce that husband-and-wife authors Aran Shetterly and Margot Lee Shetterly will be the keynote speakers at our 2026 Washington Writers Conference! Aran, a journalist and narrative historian, most recently wrote Morningside: The 1979 Greensboro Massacre and the Struggle for an American City’s Soul. And Margot, founder of…

Meet Matt Tavares

Join us for a meet-and-greet with New York Times bestselling author Matt Tavares as he promotes his new book, Dasher and the Polar Bear. Matt will be at the Iguana till 4:30 p.m. to meet fans and sign books; a personalized book will make a great holiday gift! This event…

Good Books about Bad Men

As a former journalist and current novelist, two things have always intrigued me: Ponzi schemes and Nazis. I can’t get enough of either, in books or on the screen. The Nazis are the gift that keeps on giving for fiction and nonfiction writers, even 75 or so years after Germany…

Authors on Audio: Marcus J. Moore

A journalist, cultural critic, and professor whose work has appeared in Pitchfork, TIME, Entertainment Weekly, Rolling Stone, the Atlantic, and elsewhere, Marcus J. Moore is also the author of The Butterfly Effect: How Kendrick Lamar Ignited the Soul of Black America and, more recently, High and Rising: A Book About…

An Interview with Melanie D.G. Kaplan

In July 2013, DC-based journalist Melanie D.G. Kaplan adopted a shy, velvet-eared beagle formerly known as CAICWZ, the identifier tattooed inside one of those velvet ears. Before Kaplan brought him home with her, the only other one he’d known was a locked cage. For four years, the beagle, renamed Hammy…

Our River Runs Through It

In June 2016, I moved to Washington, DC. It was the first time I’d ever lived in a city. I spent that summer on my feet, walking from my sublet at the corner of Quincy and 14th into Columbia Heights and Rock Creek Park, Mount Pleasant, and U Street. One…

Our Week in Reviews: 11/8/25

Unabridged: The Thrill of (and Threat to) the Modern Dictionary by Stefan Fatsis (Atlantic Monthly Press). Reviewed by Randy Cepuch. “His lifelong love of dictionaries led him to do a story for Slate about how rapidly things were changing in lexicography (noun: ‘the process of writing, editing, or compiling a…

Meet Ben Passmore

Join us as we welcome comic author Ben Passmore to CCB! We'll be talking about Black Arms to Hold You Up: A History of Black Resistance in a riveting Q&A followed by a meet and greet with Ben himself, as well as an opportunity to get your books signed in…

Romance Roundup: November 2025

After a wildly busy September and October, I know November is going to fly by, but I’ll enjoy it just the same. As we inch closer to the holiday whirlwind, I’m savoring the quiet when I can — and the comfort of good books with characters who quickly feel like…

Authors on Audio: Bryan Burrough

Longtime journalist Bryan Burrough is the author of multiple bestselling books, including Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco and Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth. His new book is The Gunfighters: How Texas Made the West Wild, which Library Journal calls “a…

Our 7 Most Favorable Reviews in October 2025

Archipelago by Natalie Bakopoulos (Tin House Books). Reviewed by Wendy Besel Hahn. “Complexity defines the protagonist/narrator from the start: her Greek and Ukrainian lineage connecting her to places far beyond the Detroit neighborhood where she was raised; her ambiguous status as neither native nor tourist in the region; her familiarity…

An Interview with Margaret Hutton

Margaret Hutton’s debut novel, If You Leave, moves between the years 1944 and 1973, two eras marked by volatility. The power of the narrative is how it fills out the twilight-zone period in between, when choices are made in secrecy that will resurface decades later. Touching on themes of abandonment,…

Emily Mitchell in Conversation with Tania James

Delightfully blending literary fiction with speculative genres, the stories in The Church of Divine Electricity somehow manage to feel as though they could take place today. In Emily Mitchell’s created worlds, as in our own, technology bewitches, especially with its ability to heighten both connections and isolation. Whether being held…

Our 5 Most Popular Posts: October 2025

John P. Loonam’s review of What We Can Know: A Novel by Ian McEwan (Knopf). “Eager to reach the novel’s conclusion, I flipped the pages so quickly that my own questions about language’s shifting nature and its effect on our understanding of literature, history, and the world around us will…

Authentically Authored

November is National Adoption Awareness Month. Launched in 1988 as National Adoption Month, the initiative has been rebranded by adoptees to center our voices and to counter the self-serving narratives of private adoption agencies, religious groups, and adoptive parents. The adoptee perspective is too often ignored, our authentic stories too…

Meet Nikki Payne and Diana Quincy

East City Bookshop welcomes back Nikki Payne and Diana Quincy to discuss Ladies in Waiting. Celebrate Jane Austen’s classic novels with this short-story anthology starring forgotten characters as they experience their own happy endings! Note on Format: This hybrid event will have both an in-person component with limited seating as…

Our Week in Reviews: 11/1/25

I Am Not Your Enemy: A Memoir by Reality Winner (Spiegel & Grau). Reviewed by Gretchen Lida. “In the end, even if her motives were a bit fuzzy and her actions impulsive, she proves herself to be the kind of person we very much need to prevent fascism: a troublemaker.…

9 Nail-Biting Narratives for Halloween

We know: Nothing is more terrifying right now than the day’s headlines. But still. If you’d rather tuck into some fictional frights this Halloween, here’s a handful to get you started! Motherthing: A Novel by Ainslie Hogarth (Vintage). Reviewed by K.E. Flann. “To crack open a horror novel is to…

I’m Your Biggest Fan(bot)

More than a decade ago, I co-wrote a Chinese cookbook. It was an unusual work: The Cultural Revolution Cookbook presented recipes from the Chinese countryside that urban youth learned from the peasants when they were “sent down” by Mao during that tumultuous era in modern Chinese history. The volume has…

Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde in Conversation with Robert P. Jones

Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde is no stranger to bravery in the face of bullies. In this adaptation of her New York Times bestselling How We Learn to Be Brave: Decisive Moments in Life and Faith, Bishop Budde and acclaimed novelist Bryan Bliss share lessons in how to be brave in…

Announcing the 2026 Washington Writers Conference

You know those pages you’ve been toiling over for months (or forever)? Well, it’s time to DO something with them! Attend the 2026 Washington Writers Conference (May 1-2) at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center in Rockville, MD, and pitch your book to literary agents! Registration opens this…

An Interview with Holly Mason Badra

The associate director of Women and Gender Studies at George Mason University, as well as an educator and award-winning poet, Holly Mason Badra is also the editor of Sleeping in the Courtyard: Contemporary Kurdish Writers in Diaspora. Here, Badra — herself of Kurdish descent — explains how the anthology of…

Meet Amy Erdman Farrell

More than cookies and badges When 8-year-old Amy Erdman Farrell moved with her family to Akron, Ohio, in 1972, she found herself adrift in a sea of taunting boys and mean girls. Shy by nature, she dreaded her long, unhappy days at school. But a few years later, Farrell found…

The Madness of the Moment

One night, back during the pandemic, I had a vivid dream. In it, a shadow crossed the sky while we were having lunch underneath the pergola. We looked up and saw a flying tortoise. He was about to crash when my son, Alex, darted across the grass and caught him…

Our Week in Reviews: 10/25/25

Born Equal: Remaking America’s Constitution, 1840-1920 by Akhil Reed Amar (Basic Books). Reviewed by Jonathan Sallet. “Which leads to a pressing question in today’s constitutional moment: Does Professor Amar’s Lincolnian originalism differ from the prevailing conservative approach? In an op-ed, he expressed the view that Dobbs was correct in overruling…

Autumn Festival at the Ivy

Fall is sweet at the Ivy Bookshop! Join us on the back patio for books, pumpkin painting, fall activities, face painting, local art, and more! Featuring a special fall nature craft with the Waldorf School of Baltimore. Drop by any time from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. in your coziest…

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