10182 results were found.

An Interview with Polly Rosenwaike

Polly Rosenwaike's debut story collection, Look How Happy I’m Making You, should be required reading for all women of childbearing age (and for mothers potential, new, or, like me, seven years in). It's a book I wish I’d had during my days of should I or shouldn't I, one that…

Poets in Protest Reading Series: LGBTQ+ Pride

As our next installment of the Poets In Protest Reading Series at Loyalty Books, in honor of Pride Month, 5 queer and/or trans poets based in the DMV area will read a piece of their own and a piece written by a queer/trans literary predecessor to acknowledge our diversity, lineage,…

Love Stories?

Two bits of fun over the last week led me to think about the idea of books we love — think about it both warmly and critically. The first was a Facebook challenge: Post photos of seven books you love, one each day for seven days, no explanation needed, and…

Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer in Conversation with Jon Ward

East City Bookshop presents Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer in conversation about their book, The Hill to Die on: The Battle for Congress and the Future of Trump's America, with Jon Ward, senior political correspondent for Yahoo News. This event is free and open to the public. The startling inside…

Romance Roundup: June 2019

Summer has arrived! This is the time of year when I have more time to read, which means I’m usually reading more than one book at once! These were my favorites this month — great for the beach, by the pool, or just a late night when the house is…

Be Yourself!

“Be yourself. Everyone else is taken.” I think I got this quote from Oscar Wilde right. It should be every writer’s mantra — up to a point. “Genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.” A quote usually attributed to Thomas Edison. I’d like to substitute the word “writing”…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Nathan Englander

Pulitzer Prize finalist Nathan Englander — author of, among other works, the story collections For the Relief of Unbearable Urges and What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank — is out with a new novel, kaddish.com, a funny but poignant tale of a secular man’s uneasy return…

Meet Chris Taylor and Paul Arguin

Join Kramerbooks and bakers Chris Taylor and Paul Arguin for a tasting of their delicious desserts and signing of their book The New Pie! Create 75 beautiful and unique pies using traditional techniques and modern tools from a couple who has baked their way to the top! Get ready for…

An Interview with Chanel Cleeton

Chanel Cleeton’s second historical novel, When We Left Cuba, returns to the dynamic Perez family she explored in her bestselling Next Year in Havana. Now, uprooted from Cuba and adrift in Florida’s not entirely welcoming social scene, the beautiful and firebrand oldest daughter of the family, Beatriz Perez, determines that…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in May 2019

A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II by Sonia Purnell (Viking). Reviewed by Bob Duffy. “Purnell deserves much credit for her meticulous research, mining Hall’s surviving correspondence, the memories of comrades-in-arms, and the declassified files of three governments for…

5 Most Popular Posts: May 2019

Y.S. Fing’s review of Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society by Nicholas A. Christakis (Little, Brown Spark). “Unable to ignore the festering society he is surrounded by, Christakis acknowledges the challenges to our hopes, that it may very well be that our civilizations will collapse. Still, he sees…

Into the Wilds

“There should be a place where only the things you want to happen, happen.” – Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are Have you ever sat at a bar, swirling a bourbon or watching your tea bag steep, and felt like there is no place more perfect than the one…

Meet Elizabeth Acevedo, Robin Benway, and Meg Medina

Award-winning authors Elizabeth Acevedo, Robin Benway, and Meg Medina come together for an exciting panel event. These powerful storytellers give voice to new generations of under-represented young people and examine what it means to come of age in America today. In this conversation, they’ll discuss their writing processes and the…

Tony Horwitz: An Appreciation

In acknowledgements for his bestselling book Midnight Rising, published in 2011, author Tony Horwitz wrote, “The story of the black raiders at Harpers Ferry also remains to be fully told.” It would be nice to say that Horwitz’s comment inspired my own book, Five for Freedom: The African American Soldiers…

Lend Me Your Dog Ears

Dear Independent readers, Over the past few years in my tenure as a columnist for this site, I’ve done my best to write honest essays, express truthful opinions, and relay personal experiences regardless of my worries about your response. And that honesty, this contract with you, is why I begin…

Meet Claire Handscombe

No one is a bigger fan of actor Thomas Cassidy than Libby. No one. That's why she's totally going to marry him. She is going to write a novel, name the main character after Thom, and find a way to get it to him. Intrigued and flattered, he will read…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Tim Johnston

Author of the short-story collection Irish Girl, the YA novel Never So Green, and the indie breakout Descent, Tim Johnston tackles suspicion, past tragedies, and an icy river in his new novel, The Current. Johnston spoke recently with FM89.3 WYPL’s Stephen Usery about his latest release. This podcast comes courtesy…

An Interview with Charlie Jane Anders

Fresh off a Nebula win for her novel All the Birds in the Sky, Charlie Jane Anders’ follow-up, The City in the Middle of the Night, is a change of pace. Where All the Birds was bright and full of humor and ignored the line between fantasy and hard science…

The Unlikable Novel

Not everyone likes my novel, Famous Adopted People. And, frankly, I’m thrilled about that. I wrote the book to challenge the popular narrative on adoption, one that I unwittingly helped to frame when I was a toddler in 1968. In that era, adoption was regarded with some ambivalence by society,…

Shalini Shankar in Conversation with Stefan Fatsis

At first glance, Generation Z (youth born after 1997) seems to be made up of anxious overachievers, hounded by Tiger Moms and constantly tracked on social media. One would think that competitors in the National Spelling Bee — the most popular brain sport in America — would be the worst…

Tesla

Tesla

Patriotic Picks: May 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: Jennie Gerhardt by Theodore Dreiser. Class inequality, lost love, and personal sacrifice collide in this early-20th-century tale of a young lady’s…

Sailing with the Greats

“[Charles Dickens] will teach any writer how to plot and can turn a sentence into an incantation…” – Donna Leon, crime writer Funny, isn’t it, the way a book affects you depending on how old you are when you read it? Just like people: If only I had met her…

Meet Kat Gardiner and Singer/Songwriter Bartees Strange

Please join us for a reading and signing of Kat Gardiner’s intimate, intricate work of microfiction Little Wonder. The reading will also feature live acoustic musical performances by local singer/songwriter Bartees Strange Click here for tickets! Born in Oklahoma, raised in the Pacific Northwest, and based in Detroit, Kat Gardiner…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Mary Laura Philpott

The editor of Musing, Parnassus Books’ “laid-back literary journal,” Nashville resident Mary Laura Philpott is also a longtime essayist whose work has appeared everywhere from the New York Times and the Washington Post to the Paris Review and McSweeney’s. Her new collection of essays is I Miss You When I…

Josh Levin in Conversation with Gene Demby

Part social history, part true-crime investigation, Slate editor Josh Levin's mesmerizing new book, The Queen, the product of six years of reporting and research, is a fascinating account of American racism, and an expose of the “welfare queen” myth, one that fueled political debates that reverberate to this day. The…

An Interview with Patrick J. Crocker

After 37 years of working in emergency medicine (EM) in Austin, Texas, as both a provider and administrator, Dr. Patrick J. Crocker has now written a book on the role of the emergency-medicine physician in the lives of people seeking immediate care. Letters from the Pit: Stories of a Physician's…

Theater of the Abjured

Sometime in the fall of 1982, I put the needle down on the spinning vinyl record. The theme from “2001: A Space Odyssey” rose: “I don’t know how you came by this record, but you are now embarked upon a journey that must certainly lead you to change your life…

A Conversation with Duvalier Malone

Please join us in the Pearl Bailey Room for “Our Seat at the Table,” a conversation with author and activist Duvalier Malone. This program highlights Malone’s new book, Those Who Give a Damn: A Manual for Making a Difference. Change is always discussed and planned during an election year. Right…

The 10th-Annual Gaithersburg Book Festival

Since its inception, the festival has become one of the nation’s top literary events, attracting hundreds of award-winning and best-selling authors, poets and songwriters from across the country to its quaint, park-like setting in the heart of Olde Towne Gaithersburg. The event was conceived and introduced by Gaithersburg Mayor (then…

Community Trifecta

Unmatched in their ability to attract all sorts of personalities, the comic-book shop, the barbershop, and the writing workshop can be the vanguard of unwarranted advice, unmitigated trash talk, and unexamined gatekeeping. But they’re also safe havens for misfits and modest geniuses — or the unacknowledged scholars, as the film…

May 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri

American Samizdat by Jehanne Dubrow. Diode Editions. 63 pages. Even Then by Michael Wurster. University of Pittsburgh Press. 76 pages. The Tiny Journalist by Naomi Shihab Nye. BOA Editions. 128 pages. Against Translation by Alan Shapiro. University of Chicago Press. 96 pages. Small Sillion by Joshua McKinney. Parlor Press. 100…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with John Grisham

Adults know New York Times bestselling author John Grisham for his thrillers — including The Firm, The Rooster Bar, and A Time to Kill — but to middle-grade readers, he’s the mastermind behind the popular Theodore Boone series, featuring an intrepid teenage crime-solver. Grisham recently spoke with author/attorney Talmage Boston…

Ted Chiang and Karen Russell in Conversation with Everdeen Mason

Chiang, author of Stories of Your Life and Others, the basis for the Academy Award-nominated film Arrival, is nearly legendary in the science fiction community. His accolades include four Hugo Awards, four Nebula Awards, four Locus Awards, the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and many others. He’s…

An Interview with Hanna Jameson

In The Last, Hanna Jameson proposes a scenario that’s beyond terrifying: the world as we know it ends while the novel’s protagonist is far from home and his loved ones. The early chapters are short and abrupt, reading almost like telegrams. “I’m not sure anybody is coming,” historian Jon Keller,…

Laying Tracks

My mom is a voracious reader of mystery, sci-fi/fantasy, and the occasional romance. Yet, as much as she loves to read a good tale, she doesn’t have the slightest urge to write one. We’ve talked about this many times, since I can’t imagine going too long without writing. I get…

Meet Sarah Solomon

Navigating the landscape of young adulthood is fraught with challenges big, small, and existential that leave even the best of us screaming internally. Guac Is Extra But So Am I: The Reluctant Adult’s Handbook explains the realities of life people expect you to know, but aren’t usually spelled out through…

Literally Literate

Copyediting has never been a glamorous field in journalism. The largely thankless task of dotting I’s and crossing T’s, meticulous work done on deadline without a byline, has nonetheless been a hallmark of quality publications. Of course, it is often more than minor tweaks. A skilled copyeditor can take out…

7th Annual Washington Writers Conference

Agents. Authors. Publishing pros, and keynote speaker Jeffery Deaver. The centerpiece of the Washington Writers Conference is one-on-one pitch sessions (six minutes apiece) with literary agents from New York, Boston, and the DC area. Our conference, now in its 7th year, will be bigger than ever! For the first time,…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with David McCullough

Throughout his illustrious career, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David McCullough has chronicled everything from natural disasters (The Johnstown Flood) to singular American figures (John Adams; The Wright Brothers; Truman). In his new book, The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West, he trains his eye…

An Interview with E.A. Aymar

E.A. Aymar’s third novel, The Unrepentant, grabbed me by the throat from its first page and didn’t let up. It wasn’t always an easy read — there were a few brutal scenes that I had to get through with one eye closed — but it was memorable and tense. A…

4 Sunny Springtime Reads

When it’s sunny one minute and we’ve got tornado warnings the next, you know spring has officially arrived. This season can also be marked by the number of daylilies and tulips the deer have snarfed out in my yard, or by the uneven grass on our lawn, signaling that my…

Chris Pavone in Conversation with Karen Cleveland

In his fourth suspense novel, Pavone revisits some of the characters that made his literary debut, 2012’s The Expats — winner of both the Edgar and Anthony Awards for best first novel — so memorable. Kate Moore is living with her family in Paris, tending to ordinary events like dinner…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in April 2019

Finder by Suzanne Palmer (DAW). Reviewed by Andrea M. Pawley. “In short order, Mother Vahn acquaints Fergus with the scope of tragedy possible in Cernekan: cracked sunshields, punctured human habitats, messy sewage bots, non-healing suit breaches, and the corrosive effects of the light substitute she smears onto Fergus' hands in…

Romance Roundup: May 2019

April showers brought May flowers — and a bevy of new romances to read! From rom-coms to erotic romance, I’ve read some terrific novels this month. ***** For foodies who love romance (or romance fans who love food), Stephanie Evanovich delivers a delicious treat with Under the Table (William Morrow).…

The Next Step

On December 31, 2018, my best friend since first grade retired from her job as a professional photographer for the federal government. Over the course of 31 years, Susanne has flown in fighter jets and gone behind the scenes at the space-shuttle program with NASA, photographed high-speed ballistics tests for…

5 Most Popular Posts: April 2019

Talmage Boston’s review of The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life by David Brooks (Random House). “In his new book, Brooks elevates this assemblage/distillation process to new heights as he gleans the most important thoughts from some of history’s leading philosophers and theologians, and combines them with lessons…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Susan Coll

As the author of five novels — The Stager, Beach Week, Acceptance, Rockville Pike, and karlmarx.com — Susan Coll knows a thing or two about succeeding as an author. If you’re attending this year’s sold-out Washington Writers Conference on May 11th in North Bethesda, MD, you’ll get to hear her…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with David Brooks

David Brooks, a New York Times columnist and frequent contributor to “PBS NewsHour” and “Meet the Press,” is also the author of several bestselling books, including The Road to Character and The Social Animal. In his new work, The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life, he explores what…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Greg Iles

Bestselling novelist Greg Iles — whose wide-ranging works include Black Cross, True Evil, Third Degree, and the acclaimed Natchez Burning trilogy — recently penned Cemetery Road, which Publishers Weekly called “a compulsively readable thriller.” Iles spoke in April with FM89.3 WYPL’s Stephen Usery about his latest release. Listen to it…

OutWrite Presents: The Future Is Still Very Queer

East City Bookshop and OutWrite present speculative readings from Rashid Darden, Lara Elena Donnelly, and Nibedita Sen. Moderated by Marianne Kirby. Rashid Darden (he/his) is an award-winning novelist who uses the written word as a vehicle for the advancement of justice and social action. His influences are wide and varied,…

An Interview with Thurston Clarke

Thurston Clarke is a seasoned author known for the variety of his subjects. His newest book, Honorable Exit (Doubleday), tells of Americans still in Vietnam as it fell to the North Vietnamese and their struggle to rescue the South Vietnamese threatened by the conquering northerners. I escaped under fire when…

First Readers Pave the Way

Every year, tens of thousands of writers across the world snip off little pieces of their soul and send them to the literary magazines they hope will give those stories, essays, or poems a bit of time in the printed (or digital) spotlight. Literary magazines are vibrant canvases for the…

Malaka Gharib in Conversation with Shaheen Qureshi

One part Mari Andrew, one part Marjane Satrapi, I Was Their American Dream: A Graphic Memoir is a triumphant tale of self-discovery, a celebration of a family’s rich heritage, and a love letter to American immigrant freedom. Malaka Gharib’s illustrations come alive with teenage antics and earnest questions about identity…

Kensington Day of the Book

Our 14th-annual FREE street festival celebrating the International Day of the Book. Over 100 authors, poets, and other participants line Howard Ave. in Old Town Kensington, MD. Live music, children's program, author readings, food trucks, and more! Along Howard Avenue in Old Town Kensington, MD. Click here for a complete…

Patriotic Picks: Apr. 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane. After being driven by fear from a Civil War battlefield, a young Union…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Meg Eden

Along with penning pieces for publications like Prairie Schooner, RHINO, and CV2, poet Meg Eden is also author of the YA novel Post-High School Reality Quest. She’ll offer insight to aspiring scribes on publishing quests at this year’s Washington Writers Conference on May 11th in North Bethesda, MD! If you…

An Action Figure as Strong as Steel

The only thing that can top a bigger-than-life hero is a bigger-than-life heroine. And we have her in Caitlin Strong. Strong As Steel by Jon Land is the 10th novel in the Caitlin Strong Texas Ranger series. And, this time, the mission is personal. Fifth-generation Texas Ranger Strong didn’t expect…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Douglas Brinkley

A professor, CNN presidential historian, and contributing editor at Vanity Fair, Douglas Brinkley is also the bestselling author of numerous nonfiction works, including Cronkite, Rightful Heritage, and The Great Deluge. In his new book, American Moonshot, he looks at President John F. Kennedy’s — and the nation’s — quest to…

DC Author Festival

The DC Author Festival, in partnership with the Library of Congress, is a gathering for local writers to participate in workshops, discussions, social activities, and professional development. Our signature speaker is Michael Twitty, the James Beard Award-winning author of The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African-American Culinary Traditions in the…

An Interview with David A. Taylor

Author David A. Taylor has somehow turned the material plugging our wine bottles and padding our Birkenstocks into an epic saga spanning generations and stretching across continents. In Cork Wars: Intrigue and Industry in World War II, this seemingly humble material plays a leading role in a story that reads…

Short Stories Are Out of Style

“If your tastes skew more toward fiction, consider short stories. While there aren’t many modern writers who do more than dabble with the form, lots of the greats of the last century wrote a ridiculous number.” ~ Harry Guinness, the New York Times Oh, how I wish I lived in…

Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi in Conversation with Alicia Adams

Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi published her award-winning debut novel Kintu to wide acclaim, and returns with Let’s Tell This Story Properly, a collection of stories of race, class, and the Ugandan immigrant experience in Britain. About Kintu: “A soaring and sublime epic. One of those great stories that was just waiting…

Nerds! Trivia Night

Join us for a night of D.C. trivia! How many rings were forged by Sauron in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth? Excluding monuments, what is the tallest building in D.C.? Sign-up starts at 7 p.m. in The Den. Then grab a drink special, put on your thinking cap, and join us…

Subscribe to My Email List!

As all self-publishers know and lament, marketing takes up much of their time. One tool that most, if not all, self-publishers use is, of course, email. Most nascent authors start off by emailing friends and family, many of whom will doubtlessly feel obliged to buy a book. That’s what I…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Melissa Scholes Young

Melissa Scholes Young, author of the novel Flood and editor of the anthology Grace in Darkness, has been published in the Atlantic, the Washington Post, Narrative, and other places. What might she say about getting your work published all over the place? Find out at the Washington Writers Conference on…

Bedtime Stories: April 2019

Sandra Newman: I've been in a phase where I keep starting books and then getting blasted out of them by a work tsunami and then, somehow, when I wash up on dry ground again, I'm reading some other book. I mean, I used to just read one book faithfully from…

An Interview with Thomas Christopher Greene

In his new novel, The Perfect Liar, Thomas Christopher Greene proves once again that there’s nothing more enthralling than an unreliable narrator. But in his novels, we’re never really certain if the narrator is the only one whose words we shouldn’t trust. The Perfect Liar tells the story of young…

Social Justice Book Club

Join us on the third Wednesday of every month at Kramerbooks (upstairs meeting room) to discuss books related to social justice and activism. Our book selections will cover topics like race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, ability, religion/spirituality, nationality, immigration, socioeconomic status, and current events. Our April meetup, we'll be…

Perils and Boundaries

Tell me, what is the source of your self-regard? I have been exploring answers to this question for weeks — ever since I began reading Toni Morrison’s new pink and gold book of essays, The Source of Self-Regard. Morrison has taken me down a path of fundamental enquiry. Thus, I…

Meet Reed Hundt

Hundt was a member of the transition teams for the Clinton and Obama presidencies, and in his provocative new book he argues that Obama determined the fate of his presidency before he even took office. Closely examining the domestic policy decisions the president-elect made between September 2008 and his inauguration,…

Public Servant No. 1

The Land of Lincoln has produced giant oaks in the political forest, none more majestic than Abraham himself. But other impressive Illinois timbers have continued to flourish throughout the years: Governor and U.N. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson; Senator Paul Douglas; Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg, also secretary of labor and U.N.…

April 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri

Playlist by David Lehman. University of Pittsburgh Press. 64 pages. Missing Madonnas by Gil Fagiani. Bordighera Press. 142 pages. The Tradition by Jericho Brown. Copper Canyon Press. 110 pages. When the Pipirite Sings by Jean Métellus, translated by Haun Saussy. Northwestern University Press. 104 pages. Native Species by Todd Davis.…

What the Gaithersburg Book Festival Means to Writers

There was no reason for me to be at the free Gaithersburg Book Festival back in 2014. My first book had come out earlier that year from a rather small (but kind) publisher to absolutely no acclaim. I had no idea how to do marketing. I barely knew any other…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Shanon Lee

Shanon Lee is a sought-after speaker, social commentator, and writer with bylines in popular publications from Cosmopolitan and ELLE to Marie Claire, Woman’s Day, and Prevention. Find out what she can tell you about getting your byline out there at this year’s Washington Writers Conference on May 11th in North…

Finder

Finder

Meet Miriam Toews

In her stunning new novel Toews, the award-winning author of books including All My Puny Sorrows and A Complicated Kindness, transforms the chilling events that unfolded in a Bolivian Mennonite community between 2005 and 2009 into the unforgettable and empowering story of the fictional Molotschna Colony. The colony’s women are…

An Interview with Juli Berwald

Dr. Juli Berwald, author of Spineless: The Science of Jellyfish and the Art of Growing a Backbone, is a science writer with the ability to explain biology to people who enjoy biology but don’t want the science to interrupt the story. Her background as a textbook writer and training as…

Authors on Audio: A Conversation with Evan Thomas

Award-winning journalist/historian Evan Thomas has penned numerous bestselling works, including Ike's Bluff: President Eisenhower's Secret Battle to Save the World, Being Nixon: A Man Divided, and John Paul Jones: Sailor, Hero, Father of the American Navy. In his newest book, First: Sandra Day O'Connor, he chronicles the life of the…

The Knight of the Pained Countenance

Having just been brutalized by the Yanguesans, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza lie on the ground, contemplating their agony. The famed knight errant bears his injuries with dignity, even finding the energy to lecture his squire on “the courage to take offensive and defensive measures in every emergency,” only to…

MOONLIT: The World in a Flash: Intro to Flash Fiction

How do you fit the world into 1,000 words or less? In this course, you'll explore the genre of flash fiction and create your own compact masterpiece. Topics include the elements of fiction, fundamentals of storytelling within the constraints of flash, and opportunities for further reading and potential publication. Join…

Springtime in DC: Writing Nature, Romance, and Sci-Fi

Join the DC Regional Authors Guild Chapter for a discussion of genre writing and publishing — from traditional and academic to self-publication — and learn about the Authors Guild, too! Featuring Bruce Beehler (North on the Wing, Smithsonian Books), Tracee Lydia Garner (Fatal Opposition), and Tara Campbell (Midnight at the…

Submit Your Entries for the 2019 Grateful American™ Book Prize!

Historically accurate books of fiction and nonfiction for adolescent readers published between July 1, 2018. and July 31, 2019, are now being considered for the $13,000 Grateful American™ Book Prize! Submissions will be accepted until July 31, 2019. There are no fees. The award — which includes a medallion created…

Romance Roundup: April 2019

Spring has sprung, and romance is in the air! These are my favorite romance novels this month. ***** Helena Hunting’s Meet Cute (Forever) is as charming as its title, but it’s also so much more. When Kailyn Flowers runs into her teenage celebrity crush on her first day of law…

Merwin & Marquez in Manhattan

“Cuz we was all ridin' …right on the subway train…” – The New York Dolls Last month, the weekend of St. Patrick’s Day, I traveled to New York to see “Nylon,” a new play by my daughter, Sofia Alvarez. I arrived on Saturday, March 16, 2019. The day before, the…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in March 2019

Antisemitism: Here and Now by Deborah E. Lipstadt (Schocken). Reviewed by Helene Meyers. “Antisemitism was written after Charlottesville and before Pittsburgh. Since its release, a spate of less-publicized but no less terrorizing attacks against Jews in Brooklyn has occurred, and a member of Congress has trafficked in antisemitism and apologized…

5 Most Popular Posts: March 2019

The 2019 Washington Writers Conference. From the agent listings and schedule of events to everything in between, readers were all over our conference pages this past month. They must suspect what we already know: Space is filling up fast. (Click here to register while there’s still time!) Talmage Boston’s review…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Pintip Dunn

Pintip Dunn is the New York Times bestselling author of such YA novels as Forget Tomorrow, The Darkest Lie, and Girl on the Verge. Are you on the verge of becoming an author yourself? Then you’ll want to hear her insights firsthand at the Washington Writers Conference on May 11th…

An Interview with Carrie Callaghan

Carrie Callaghan’s debut novel, A Light of Her Own, is a portrait of Judith Leyster, the first woman admitted to the Haarlem painters guild in the 17th-century Netherlands. Callaghan and I recently corresponded about the experience of getting her book published. The difficulties of pulling a reader into an unfamiliar…

10 Storied Bookshops

Mental Floss recently published its list of the “Best Bookstores in All Fifty States,” according well-deserved recognition to some outstanding DC-region shops while failing to recognize that the District of Columbia is not only part of the United States, but also has some bitching bookstores. What are we, chopped liver?…

Don’t Feed the Troll

A few years ago, I came into contact, through Facebook, with a mid-distant cousin whom I’d known of but never met. I’d been somewhat enthralled by the way she reports her life, and I feel we’re sympatico. We’d be friends in real life, too, if we could arrange it. But…

Socrates Now: Free Speech & the Role of the Citizen

Live from Solid State Books comes the acclaimed “Socrates Now,” a solo play that looks to the past to bring to the present new questions of corruption, justice and civic duty, challenging you to think, question and change. Yannis Simonides' “Socrates Now” is an engaging solo performance that captures the…

Michelle Obama’s Riveting Read

A few months ago, Michelle Obama zoomed to the top of the bestseller list with Becoming, and set the gold standard for writing a masterful memoir. As wife of the nation’s first African-American president, she has an extraordinary story to tell, and she tells it with sublime grace, substance, and…

Scrabble Mania for Literacy

Join us for our 4th Annual SCRABBLE® Mania for Literacy event! Come play a lively game of Scrabble with a team of four players for the benefit of the Literacy Council of Frederick County. Also visit our Silent Auction and enjoy heavy hors d’oeuvres, a complimentary glass of wine, and…

5 Nerdy Revision Exercises

At the University of Baltimore, where I am a professor in the Creative Writing & Publishing Arts MFA program, my colleagues and I are always encouraging students to combine their sense of work and their sense of play. My own experience as a poet and a teacher has continually affirmed…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Tyrese L. Coleman

Tyrese L. Coleman is a wife, mother, attorney, and author of the debut collection How to Sit: A Memoir in Stories and Essays. Find out what she can tell you about how to write at this year’s Washington Writers Conference on May 11th in North Bethesda, MD!

An Interview with Christine Otten

You wrote The Last Poets — a novelized account of the lives and work of the legendary African-American poets of the Black Power era — more than a decade ago, in Dutch, in what were very different political times than the times we find ourselves in now, as the first…

Damon Young in Conversation with Panama Jackson

Co-founder and editor-in-chief of VerySmartBrothas, senior editor at the Root, columnist for GQ, and one of EBONY’s Power 100, Young is one of the most influential writers on race, class, and gender working today. His memoir is a scathing and painfully funny account of growing up Black in America. In…

Anti-Social Media?

Hi, I’m Meg and I’m a Facebook junkie. I have a problem, I admit. I have to closely monitor how much time I’m on social media or I will spend countless hours doing pretty much nothing. I’m not a huge fan of Twitter, though I have an account. Instagram, not…

Census

Census

Meet Brad Parks

Struggling stage actor Tommy Jump knows he has to stop chasing applause and start chasing greenbacks. But then he’s offered the role of a life-time: $150,000 for a six-month acting gig. With a newly pregnant fiancée depending on him, it’s an opportunity he can’t refuse, even though the offer comes…

Patriotic Picks: Mar. 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: My Name Is Asher Lev by Chaim Potok. In postwar Brooklyn, a young Hasidic Jew grapples with honoring his faith while…

The Anarchy that Never Comes

In many ways, Robert D. Kaplan is a writer after my own heart. A prolific analyst now affiliated with the Eurasia Group, the former foreign correspondent and policy strategist has produced a steady stream of books and articles on how geography and history impact events. Kaplan enlivens his books with…

Elizabeth McCracken in Conversation with Matthew Klam

From the moment Bertha Truitt materializes in a Salford, Massachusetts, cemetery to the time she dies in a freak accident, she’s the town’s most charming—and enigmatic—character. She mystifies the community with her unexplained stash of gold and her decision to marry the doctor who found her, but keeps everyone entertained…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Stephanie Dray

Stephanie Dray is a New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today bestselling author of historical novels. Find out what she can tell you about novel writing — historical or otherwise — at this year’s Washington Writers Conference on May 11th in North Bethesda, MD!

An Interview with Steve Luxenberg

Steve Luxenberg is a longtime journalist and editor at the Washington Post. His new book, the deeply researched Separate – The Story of Plessy v. Ferguson, and America's Journey from Slavery to Segregation, chronicles the legacy of one of the country’s most pernicious Supreme Court decisions. We spoke earlier this…

Romantic Inspiration and Corn Chips

As your friendly local romance writer, it may surprise you to learn that, for once, this column will be about…wait for it: romance! Maybe the recent celebration of Valentine’s Day has me thinking about romantic things, or maybe it’s just a hazard of my particular career choice. There is one…

Writers LIVE: Jessie Morgan-Owens

Girl in Black and White: The Story of Mary Mildred Williams and the Abolition Movement restores Mary Mildred Williams to her rightful place in history and uncovers a dramatic narrative of travels along the Underground Railroad, relationships tested by oppression, and the struggles of life after emancipation. The result is…

Blood Sports

As a little girl, Elizabeth Anne Holmes was asked what she wanted to be when she grew up: “I want to be a billionaire,” she said. “Wouldn’t you rather be President?” “No,” she said. “The President will marry me because I have a billion dollars.” This youngster knew what she…

Meet Marc Boutavant

His name is Dumpster Dog. He sleeps outside, walks himself, and eats whatever he wants, whenever he wants. But freedom isn't everything — Dumpster Dog needs a friend. Dumpster Dog dreams of treats, balls, and leashes. He wants someone to play with, someone who will take him on long walks,…

Book Juggling

As a voracious reader — judgy people might cough into their hand that it’s called “addiction” — I always have something to read, and I do what I can to maximize my reading time. As I’ve mentioned before, I have, on more than one occasion, finished one book and started…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Jane Leavy and Christine Brennan

Award-winning writer Jane Leavy (auhor of Squeeze Play, The Big Fella, Sandy Koufax: A Lefty's Legacy, and more) knows a thing or two about performing at the top of her game. Hear what she has to say about doing just that when she’s “in conversation with” fellow star sportswriter Christine…

March 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri

The White Card: A Play by Claudia Rankine. Graywolf Press. 80 pages. Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky. Graywolf Press. 80 pages. A Cry in the Snow by Stella Vinitchi Radulescu, translated by Luke Hankins. Seagull Books. 120 pages. Nouns & Verbs by Campbell McGrath. Ecco. 288 pages. Still Life with…

An Interview with Molly Tanzer

Set in Prohibition-era Long Island (Amityville, no less), Molly Tanzer’s Creatures of Want & Ruin is an intriguing hybrid: part historical novel, part pulpy supernatural adventure. Bootlegger Ellie West is delivering hooch during a powerful storm when she comes across a crashed boat and its weirdly unhinged, violent operator, a…

Meet Edward Tenner

Algorithms, multitasking, the sharing economy, life hacks: our culture can't get enough of efficiency. One of the great promises of the Internet and big data revolutions is the idea that we can improve the processes and routines of our work and personal lives to get more done in less time…

Four Degrees of a Queen (of Romance)

A 72-year-old woman with shorn blue hair sits bereft in Beirut. She has lost everything — her only love and, most recently, the 37 translation manuscripts she has devoted her life to creating. Then, to her surprise, the three neighbors she calls “the witches” show up. “I feel nostalgic for…

Meet Robert M. Kaplan

While the U.S. outspends most nations on health care, American life expectancy and quality of life fall behind those of many other countries. Looking closer at that paradox, Kaplan, one of our top experts on public health, found that our focus on medical treatment causes us to neglect the social…

Not Your Mama’s Superhero

We all love Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel. But haven’t you ever wished for a more human superhero? One without a cape or magical weaponry? Meet Thea Paris. She is an anomaly, one of only a few international hostage negotiators — a freedom broker — and, rarer still, a woman.…

The Washington Writers Conference Presents Jeffery Deaver

Bestselling novelist Jeffery Deaver — author of, among many others, the mega-popular Lincoln Rhyme thrillers, including The Bone Collector and The Cutting Edge — will deliver the keynote address at our 2019 Washington Writers Conference on May 11th in North Bethesda, MD! What key insights will you take away from…

7 Best-Reviewed Books in February 2019

Black Leopard, Red Wolf: A Novel by Marlon James (Riverhead Books). Reviewed by Josh Denslow. “Black Leopard, Red Wolf is as dark and pulsing as blood from a fresh wound, nearly bursting with tragically flawed characters and some of the most truly musical dialogue in any book, fantasy or otherwise.…

An Interview with David Alan Johnson

David Alan Johnson has dealt with many charlatans in his role as senior vice president of the Federation of State Medical Boards, where he oversees assessment. A former high-school history teacher who loved using stories to teach, Johnson found a great one on med-school malfeasance while researching a different topic.…

Marital Malice

This year started out particularly well in terms of my writing — and not only because of having a few of my stories accepted for magazines and anthologies. But as it turns out, every silver lining has its clouds. One cold morning in late January, crossing the parking lot at…

5 Most Popular Posts: February 2019

“February 2019 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri.” As always, this perennial favorite (penned by Maryland’s newly minted poet laureate!) drew huge numbers of verse-loving readers. Kenneth Jost’s review of The Company They Keep: How Partisan Divisions Came to the Supreme Court by Neal Devins and Lawrence Baum (Oxford University…

Alyssa Mastromonaco in Conversation with Symone Sanders

So Here’s the Thing…: Notes on Growing Up, Getting Older, and Trusting Your Gut is a no-nonsense and no-holds-barred 21st-century girl’s guide to life by Alyssa Mastromonaco, the former White House deputy chief of staff under President Obama, New York Times bestselling author of Who Thought This Was a Good…

Busboys Books Presents: Charneice Fox

Join us at our Brookland location for a reading and book signing with Charneice Fox, the author of The Bread Monster. Copies of the book will be for sale in our bookstore. Every Saturday, Nigel makes bread with his mother, but today is different. Today, Nigel wants to go on…

Romance Roundup: March 2019

If March is here, can spring be far behind? I’m more than happy to put the frigid weather behind me, even if I’m not quite ready to give up my lazy weekends reading by the fire! In the past few weeks, I’ve read a few outstanding novels in three subgenres…

“Hi. I’m Larry, and I’m a Writer”

Many writers of fiction, if they are honest with themselves, are pathologically insecure. They are doubters, second-guessers, Monday-morning quarterbacks, and pessimists. It doesn’t matter if they are successful or not. Their literary glass is always half empty. To survive, novelists must develop a thick skin. They take criticism badly, mostly…

Irshad Manji in Conversation with Latoya Peterson

A unique conversation about diversity, bigotry, and our common humanity, by the NYT bestselling author, Oprah “Chutzpah” award-winner, and founder of the Moral Courage Project When she was 14, Irshad Manji was expelled from her religious school for asking too many questions. Now, as one of the foremost voices of…

An Interview with Diane Kiesel

Who was Dorothy Ferebee, and what made you want to write She Can Bring Us Home: Dr. Dorothy Boulding Ferebee, Civil Rights Pioneer, which came out in 2015 and is now being reissued in paperback? Dr. Dorothy Celeste Boulding Ferebee (1898-1980) was famous in her day and largely forgotten in…

Breaking Free

In Tishani Doshi’s book Girls Are Coming out of the Woods, she remembers her friend Monika Ghurde, who was murdered in her home in Goa. She remembers girls like Jyoti Singh, fatally assaulted on a Delhi bus in 2012. Doshi’s title poem is an anthem for our time. “Girls are…

Meet Kyle Bryant

Shifting Into High Gear: One Man’s Grave Diagnosis and the Epic Bike Ride That Taught Him What Matters charts the course of Kyle Bryant's transformation as he journeys on a recumbent tricycle across the United States in the throes of Friedreich's ataxia, a life-shortening and disabling disease. Full of humor…

Patriotic Picks: Feb. 2019

Whether it’s via their tone, topic, or tenor, certain works just say “America.” Here are three such titles, suggested by David Bruce Smith, founder of the Grateful American™ Foundation: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. Humor, sentimentality, and the irrepressibility of the human spirit combine and shine in…

Meet Andrew G. McCabe

McCabe started working at the FBI in 1996 and served in many capacities, from street agent on the Eurasian Organized Crime Task Force to leading the Counterterrorism Division, the National Security Branch, and the Washington Field Office as well as serving as the first director of the High-Value Detainee Interrogation…

The Little Shop of Yours

Over at the Thrill Begins, the website I run on behalf of the International Thriller Writers, we were inspired by Carrie Callaghan’s recent run of Independent columns dedicated to the positive aspects of the writing community…and then we were inspired by Dan Mallory to shamelessly steal her idea. The result…

Bedtime Stories: Feb. 2019

Randon Billings Noble: I’m an essayist, so I read a lot of essay collections. I love to dip into other essayists’ minds, their lives, their different ways of thinking. But I often find it hard to read a collection straight through. It’s almost too much — too overwhelming — to…

An Interview with Kim Hooper

Kim Hooper’s novels don’t deal in easy topics. Her debut, People Who Knew Me, told the story of a woman who escapes New York City in the aftermath of 9/11 and assumes a new identity in California, leaving behind her husband, her mother, and the man she was having an…

Meet Dave Cullen

After writing the definitive account of the then deadliest school shooting in history, the award-winning Columbine, Cullen suffered secondary bouts of PTSD and swore off reporting on subsequent mass killings. But when he saw how courageously the students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School responded to the deaths of seventeen…

The Reviewer Gets Reviewed

I got my start in writing as a book reviewer. I’d published some things before, but book reviewing was my first regular gig, right here at the Washington Independent Review of Books. My first book review appeared in August 2011, not long after the debut of the Independent. It was…

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