Shortly after our hairy and smelly ancestors climbed down from the trees, they discovered that long pieces of wood tipped with sharp points not only discouraged saber-tooth tigers, but also put woolly-mammoth meat on the table (where there were more empty seats, since the uncooperative mammoths often stepped on the…
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Pressed for Time: The Acceleration of Life in Digital Capitalism
An Interview with Katy Simpson Smith
Katy Simpson Smith’s debut novel, The Story of Land and Sea, is set in a small coastal town in North Carolina during the American Revolution. It follows three generations of family — fathers and daughters, masters and slaves — through recurring tragedy and their drive for redemption and renewal. Smith…
Over many years in Washington, DC, I worked with congressmen on their memoirs as lawyer/literary agent. Conservative – John Kasich – and liberal – Claude Pepper; Western Democrat – John Culver – and Eastern African American – James Clyburn. They were all interesting to work with, but none more so…
Holiday Gift Guide 2014. Shanna Wilson’s look at some of the year’s most give-worthy books drew lots of readers. We must not be the only last-minute shoppers out there… “Meet Civil Coping Mechanisms.” Michael Landweber’s profile of this quirky small publisher generated tons of traffic. Apparently, publishing’s death has been…
With 2014 fading in the rear-view mirror, it’s time to look back at six books that knocked me out during the year. None of them was actually released during 2014 — I’m way too backed up to read anything that current. (In fact, I’ve recently started building a third stack…
Without You, There Is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea’s Elite
With beautiful prose and short, gripping chapters, Anthony Doerr's All the Light We Cannot See had me turning its pages well into the night and quickly became my favorite read of the year. WWII books are a dime a dozen, but Doerr's main characters, a young German recruit named Werner…
In 2014, I read 2.7 books a month. (This statistic would not hold up under scientific scrutiny, but it's probably not too far from the truth.) Only one of them was awful; the rest ranged from okay (The Beautiful Mystery by Louise Penny; Kinder Than Solitude by Yiyun Li) to…
An Interview with Audrey Magee
Like many before him, protagonist Peter Faber, a German soldier, attempts to ease the horrors of war by taking a wife — albeit one he’s only seen in pictures — along with a coveted 10-day leave for the nuptials. Surprisingly, he and his bride, Katharina Spinell, really do fall for…
Frog Music by Emma Donoghue. Reviewed by Ellen Prentiss Campbell. “Ultimately, enjoyably, Donoghue is more time-traveler than historian. ‘Nineteenth-century reporters often made up details to fill in the blanks in their research,’ she says in the afterword. Donoghue herself reports in that tradition — using historical data, but only as…
6 Barnes & Noble 2014 Bestsellers
The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. This YA smash about two teens living with cancer manages to be more snarky than sappy. But keep the tissues handy anyway. Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand. This recollection of track-star-turned-soldier Louis Zamperini’s fight for survival in WWII would be over-the-top unbelievable if…
Empire of Sin: A Story of Sex, Jazz, Murder, and the Battle for Modern New Orleans
As amazing as it is that print books survive and even flourish in this digital age, it is perhaps more amazing that reading — the ultimate leisure pursuit — endures amid the frenetic multitasking of our times. People text while driving (they really do!), talk on the cellphone while paying…
The Meaty Truth: Why Our Food Is Destroying Our Health and Environment — and Who Is Responsible
An Interview with Alix Christie
Gutenberg’s Apprentice is about the invention of the printing press in 15th-century Mainz (Germany). Johann Gutenberg is not the main character; rather, the story is told by his apprentice, Peter Schoeffer. Why did you choose Schoeffer to narrate? Hardly anyone has heard of Peter Schoeffer, yet he was the world’s…
The Art of Asking: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help
Children’s Holiday Gift Guide 2014
Once a Shepherd By Glenda Millard (author) and Phil Lesnie (illustrator) Candlewick, ages 4-8 Beautiful and haunting in its simplicity, this book chronicles the pain of the Great War and the resilience of the human spirit in just a few short pages. Sam & Dave Dig a Hole By Mac…
An Interview with Keith Donohue
In Keith Donohue’s new novel, The Boy Who Drew Monsters, something is very wrong in the Keenan family. Ten-year-old Jack Peter, a deeply disturbed autistic boy, is certain that monsters lurk in his house. He draws obsessive, creepy pictures which seem to be coming to life. Concerned for Jack Peter,…
I went fishing once and sucked at it. Stupid turtles kept eating the bait off my hook, and when I got angry and tried to grab a turtle, it turned out to be feistier than I figured. Turtles are jerks. I finally caught a fish and tried to do the…
Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms: Journeys into the Disappearing Religions of the Middle East
December Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri
The Last Girl by Rose Solari. Alan Squire Publishing. 63 pages. Station Zed by Tom Sleigh. Graywolf Press. 106 pages. Falta de Ar by E. Ethelbert Miller.Translated into Portuguese by Manual A. Domigos, Medulla Press. 59 pages. Basho In America by Sander Zulauf. Cover photography by Madeline Zulauf. iuniverse press.…
The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan. Winner of the 2014 Man Booker Prize, Australian author Richard Flanagan pays homage to his late father in this epic account of Japan’s construction of the Thai-Burma Death Railway during WWII. The Washington Post calls it “a classic work of…
An Interview with Lauren Oliver
Lauren Oliver’s Rooms is the story of a family coming home to bury their father who has recently died, leaving behind a country house full of belongings, his and others’. The house is large but somehow crowded, with two or possibly three ghosts living within its walls. In Rooms, everyone…
Virginia-based Civil Coping Mechanisms operates under a deceptively simple motto: We are coping. But don’t be fooled by what sounds like a vaguely defeatist tone. Coping is actually a rallying cry for this fiercely independent press that seeks to provide a voice for “bold, daring, and anomalous” literature outside the…
“The best status of all is not to be born.” That was the tenet of Samuel Beckett. And in spite of this, he has transformed theater and dramatic literature for all time. Those who don’t know Beckett probably wouldn’t be reading this, but, in case, a formal bio is better…
Bedtime Stories: December 2014
Davar Ardalan: The Republic of Imagination by Azar Nafisi. I first met Azar Nafisi in April of 1995 when listening back to audio interviews NPR reporter Jacki Lyden recorded in Iran. That was before Nafisi's bestseller, Reading Lolita in Tehran. Listeners heard Nafisi in a university classroom, challenging her students…
John Semley recently wrote an interesting article in the New York Times Magazine entitled “The Death of the Private Eye,” which was not about the demise of a particular gumshoe (think Miles Archer in The Maltese Falcon), but about the entire genre in print and on film. Needless to say,…
Outward appearances to the contrary, the city of New Orleans did not invent sin. But the City That Care Forgot boasts a rich history of producing, or enabling, a wide swath of eager sinners who sometimes treat it like the United States' Freudian id. In Empire of Sin: A Story…
With the recent settlement of the months-long dispute between Amazon and Hachette Publishing over the pricing of e-books, it’s a good moment to take inventory of the impact the bitter struggle has had on the world of publishing. The initial assessments are that Hachette won the protracted standoff by regaining…
An Interview with Rhoda Trooboff
The Year of Magical Thinking, the title of Joan Didion’s 2005 memoir written in response to her husband's death, well describes Rhoda Trooboff’s complex debut novel. Correspondence Course, The Bathsua Project follows a “magical year” that takes Dee Young, a retired English teacher, from paralyzing grief at the death of…
A Christmas Far from Home: An Epic Tale of Courage and Survival During the Korean War
Washington, DC, is already the nation’s most literate city, and now it boasts another indie bookstore where dedicated readers can get their fix. The brand-new Upshur Street Books in Petworth threw open its doors in November, and it’s already becoming a neighborhood gathering spot. “A lot of the people who…
Yes Please by Amy Poehler. More serious than slapstick, the comedian/actress’ debut memoir is full of career insights and lessons learned. (Read the Independent’s review here.) The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown. An inspiring…
A review of Jamie Malanowski’s Commander Will Cushing: Daredevil Hero of the Civil War. Grayson Clary’s punchy critique of this little-known sailor’s biography intrigued hundreds of armchair historians. “Bedtime Stories.” A perennial favorite, November’s installment showcased the titles that bestselling author Chris Bohjalian, radio producer Tayla Burney, and DC-based writer…
Talk about post-Thanksgiving letdown. My older child has returned to college after an all-too-brief visit, my younger has a nasty case of strep, my guts are traumatized from all that crisp turkey skin I couldn't stop hoovering up, and, in about 24 hours, this column needs to be submitted for…
For people who still imagine Miami as it was portrayed in “Miami Vice,” a visit to its annual Miami Book Fair International would be edifying. For eight days in November, 600 authors from around the world came to talk about their books, their ideas, and the publishing world in sessions…
Fay Weldon is the author of 36 novels, numerous screenplays, poetry, and more. She wrote the first script for the popular television series “Upstairs, Downstairs” and still teaches, keeping herself busy and challenged in her ninth decade. Her novels The New Countess (the final book in the Love & Inheritance…
9 Bookish Gifts for the Lit-Lovers on Your List
Your bookish loved ones will need a bag for their traveling library. How about a Moby-Dick-themed version from Gibbs Smith totes? Made of gusset natural cotton, they're the perfect choice. On the off chance that they ever get sick of reading, give your friends and family the opportunity to try…
My literary angels are my colleagues in our critique group. All of us are first-time authors writing nonfiction books, and for “first readers,” I can't imagine a group more conscientious and thoughtful in their manuscript reviews. It's never easy finding a compatible group — for anything! — that's really dedicated,…
As newspapers shrink and editorial departments get cut to the bone, one of the key media — along with blogs, podcasts, apps, etc. — filling the information void is the tried and true standby, the nonfiction book. The same technologies that are crippling print newspapers have made the publishing and…
An Interview with Lynn Chandler Willis
Lynn Chandler Willis’ novel Wink of an Eye won for her the Best First Private Eye Novel Competition, held by Minotaur Books and the Private Eye Writers of America. She is the first woman to win the competition in more than 10 years. While Wink of an Eye is her…
An Interview with Mary Rickert
A coven of witches is the focus of Mary Rickert’s The Memory Garden. But the witches she creates aren’t the spell-casting, nose-wiggling kind, nor are they full of pyrotechnic magic like the Wicked Witch of the West. These witches may have some power, but for the most part, they are…
The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr. Volume VII. To Save the Soul of America. Jan. 1961-Aug. 1962
9 Books with a Strong Sense of Place
Iberia by James Michener. This meandering, long, and utterly delicious account of Michener's love affair with Spain takes us from the crisping heat of Extremadura to the massive, wildlife-rich swamps of Las Marismas. Just try not falling in love, too. The Seamstress by Frances de Pontes Peebles. In the wild…
You’ve obviously come to this column because it’s nearing the end of November and you need to find gifts for your friends, family, co-workers, and mailman (give your mailman a gift, you jerk). I’m here to help. My cohort David Stewart offered sage advice on this matter, imploring you to…
The Sonic Boom: How Sound Transforms the Way We Think, Feel, and Buy
3 Bestselling Titles to Consider
Lila by Marilynne Robinson. This brilliant prequel to the equally wonderful Gilead illuminates the title character’s backstory, including her marriage to widower (and minister) John Ames. The Burning Room by Michael Connelly. Can the LAPD’s Harry Bosch finally solve two cases so cold they’re practically frozen? Leaving Time by Jodi…
An Interview with Richard Ford
Frank Bascombe, the regular-guy hero of The Sportswriter (1986), Pulitzer Prize-winning Independence Day (1995), and The Lay of the Land (2006), is back in Let Me Be Frank With You, a collection of four interconnected novellas that take him, and us, closer to the end of a life both memorable…
November Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri
Medic Against Bomb: A Doctor’s Poetry of War, by Frederick Foote. Grayson Books. 78 pages. Twenty Poems That Could Save America and Other Essays, by Tony Hoagland. Graywolf. 219 pages. Plus A Best Books List for the Month: Poetry, Translation, Criticism Medic Against Bomb: A Doctor’s Poetry of War, by…
An Interview with Larry Matthews
Larry Matthews, author of Detonator, the latest Dave Haggard thriller, talks about being a news reporter in Washington, DC, the people he has known, and using the capital of the United States as a character in fiction. What prompted you to launch the Dave Haggard thriller series? I suppose Dave…
“Probably the most popular section in our store is our Staff Recommendations case,” says Stephanie Schindhelm, marketing & promotions manager at Boulder Book Store in Boulder, CO. “Our booksellers are all readers, and we love to talk to customers about books. We can help you find the perfect book for…
An Interview with René Steinke
Deep in the heart of Texas, a storm pushes up a long-hidden container of chemicals buried on a tract of land that, a decade ago, was known as Rosemont. By now, most people have forgotten the illnesses the toxins caused, but not Lee Knowles. Still haunted by her daughter’s death…
When I’m reading a novel, nothing annoys me more than an author who interjects his or her own prejudices and/or politics into the narrative. Except, of course, if I’m the author. Truth is, I can’t help myself. I have a lot of axes to grind, and where better to grind…
If Not Now, When? by Primo Levi. Based on a real band of partisans, this story of Jewish fighters struggling behind enemy lines is a both uplifting and bleak reminder that World War II's victims were also protagonists. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. No, we're not showing off how…
A Deadly Wandering: A Tale of Tragedy and Redemption in the Age of Attention
5 Books for Your Adventurous Elementary-Schooler
The Princess in Black Shannon Hale & Dean Hale (authors) and LeUyen Pham (illustrator) Recommended for ages 5-9 Looking for a princess book that features a strong female character who doesn’t end up in a wedding dress? This is it. Everyone knows princesses don’t wear black — unless you’re Princess…
Founded in 2013, DC-based Big Lucks Books aims to challenge and engage readers, particularly those looking for contemporary poetry that doesn’t pull any punches. BLB wants its publications to make you feel like “there’s an IV of high fructose corn syrup in your arm and it’s ruining your cardiovascular system.”…
I love book clubs. Full stop. There have been periods of my life when I’ve been involved with four or five each month. Nonfiction, Pulitzer Prize winners, clubs with best friends, clubs with colleagues, clubs with strangers, clubs with four people, clubs with 25. I’ve done them all and often…
Bedtime Stories: November 2014
Chris Bohjalian: The Zone of Interest by Martin Amis. I’m a big fan of Amis, especially such masterpieces as Time’s Arrow and The Information, and I am finding this one jaw-droppingly good — even by the very high bar I set for Amis. His return to Auschwitz is wrenching, a…
Nobody likes rejection. But as an adoptee, whose life essentially began with that first, traumatic rejection, I especially abhor it. Which makes me question my sanity in my quest to be a published novelist. Perhaps only the aspiring actor is more exposed to constant, debilitating, degrading rejection. At least with…
Vixens, Vamps & Vipers: Lost Villainesses of Golden Age Comics
An Interview with Monica Bhide
Monica Bhide has long been a nonfiction food writer — penning everything from columns to cookbooks — and presence on NPR and in other media outlets. Recently, though, the DC-based author published her first collection of short stories, The Devil in Us. While it may seem like a sudden departure…
Literary Half-Lives: Doris Lessing, Clancy Sigal, and Roman à Clef
With the holidays looming menacingly on the horizon, our thoughts turn anxiously to one of the more dangerous activities of the season: selecting gifts for those near and (at least somewhat) dear. In my family, this has often meant giving a book. The idea is so well-intentioned and idealistic. On…
The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism
4 Frightening Books That Really Aren’t
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. This page-turner of a novel is certainly entertaining and disturbing, but “terrifying,” as the cover promises? Not at all. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James. This classic is a compelling read, but there’s no need to check your locks while curled up with…
Sometimes an ax murderer is just an ax murderer. But you wouldn’t know it by reading many of the titles on “scariest books” lists haunting the Internet this time of year. When asked to name the most frightening tales they’ve ever read, cultural critics inevitably feel compelled to go all…
Online and mobile banking have been a godsend to banks because it allows them to service mass customers at a much lower cost. No need for so many tellers, branches, and back-office staff. So banks have been shutting down branches, putting electronic banking kiosks in them, or refurbishing them to…
CLICK HERE FOR THE 2015 BOOKS ALIVE CONFERENCE Held at the Bethesda Marriott in Bethesda, Maryland, the annual event promises lots of great draws, including panels on: How to Pitch an Agent. What are Editors and Publishers Looking For? The Art of Memoir Writing. Writing and Publishing Poetry. Conference-goers will…
An Interview with Laura Auricchio
A dreamer and a doer, the Marquis de Lafayette held a special place in the heart of childless “Father of his Country” George Washington. And if President Obama cranes his neck just right in the White House, he can look out his window and see a reverential sculpture across the…
5 Spooktacular New Kids’ Books
Wickle Woo Has a Halloween Party By Jannie Ho Nosy Crow (ages 0-3) Pull the easy-to-grab tabs on this colorful, chunky board book and watch the cute, costumed critters magically appear at the big celebration! Magical Mix-Ups: Spells and Surprises By Marnie Edwards (author) and Leigh Hodgkinson (illustrator) Nosy Crow…
4 Cookbooks that Read Like “Book” Books
The Paris Cookbook by Patricia Wells. As Francophile foodies have long understood, this seminal work is as much a love letter to the City of Lights as it is a how-to-cook manual. Bread and Chocolate: My Food Life in & around San Francisco by Fran Gage. This book’s 60 recipes…
What If? Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions
I first met Ben Bradlee — the legendary newspaper editor who died Tuesday at the age of 93 — when I applied for a job at the Washington Post. It was in January 1970, and I’d already been through the gauntlet of interviews with other editors and had apparently passed…
Gray Mountain by John Grisham. Writes Patrick Anderson in the Washington Post, “Grisham makes his characters all too real, but the heart of his story is his relentless case against Big Coal. We all know something about the plight of miners, but we are unlikely to have encountered the realities…
Lately my iPod has been happily stuck on L’Orange, a brilliant producer heavily influenced by old movies, hip hop, and Billie Holiday. Listening to his work has sent me digging into my record crates (actually, just scanning my iPad) for Holiday’s music. More than that, L’Orange and Billie Holiday have…
An Interview with Robert Jackson Bennett
“New weird” fiction is, at best, an amorphous genre designation, but consensus says that it mingles elements of fantasy and horror with grittier, non-medieval settings. Popular practitioners of this hard-to-categorize sub-genre include China Mieville and Jeff Vandermeer. Robert Jackson Bennett’s new novel, City of Stairs, fits this template. It’s set…
Vaccine Nation: America’s Changing Relationship with Immunization
The Teacher Wars: A History of America’s Most Embattled Profession
Rebel Yell: The Violence, Passion, and Redemption of Stonewall Jackson
“We are in an historic and beautiful bank building set on the waterfront of a 17th-century town,” says Kathy Harig, owner of Mystery Loves Company in Oxford, MD. Since 1991, the indie bookstore has been delighting locals and tourists alike with its “personalized, curated, eclectic collection of mysteries, general fiction,…
“You can’t judge a book by its cover.” Oh, really? Have you scanned the covers of the romance novels that populate the bestseller lists, particularly those devoted to self-published eBooks on Amazon and other Internet outlets? (Don’t worry, dear reader, this isn’t going to be another pro-Amazon, anti-legacy-publisher screed. This…
An Interview with Stephanie Feldman
In Stephanie Feldman’s debut novel, The Angel of Losses, protagonist Marjorie Burke is working to complete her doctoral degree when her life is turned topsy-turvy by the death of her grandfather and the discovery of his notebooks. These notebooks contain special stories that undermine everything Marjorie knows about her family’s…
An Individual History by Michael Collier. W.W. Norton and Company, now in paperback, 80 pages.The Book of Scented Things, edited by Jehanne Dubrow & Lindsay Lusby. Literary House Press. 144 pages.Saint Friend by Carl Adamshick. McSweeney’s Poetry Series. 58 pages.Blood Lyrics by Katie Ford. Graywolf Press. 62 pages.BACCHAE: A new…
5 Adventurous Tales for Leif Ericson Day
The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard. An absolutely harrowing account of (barely) surviving the disastrous 1911 Scott expedition to the South Pole. Swiss Family Robinson by Johann Wyss. Washed up on a deserted island, shipwrecked parents and their four sons must rely on their wits — and…
He’s baaaack. Inspector Hercule Poirot has risen from the dead. Has he come back to atone for our sins and save humankind? No. He has returned to nourish the pockets of Agatha Christie Ltd., owned by Acorn Media Group and Christie’s descendants. Which would be all well and good, only…
An Interview with Maria Chaudhuri
Your memoir is called Beloved Strangers, and you refer explicitly to your mother as one such beloved stranger. I wondered if there was a double meaning. Are you also a beloved stranger, perhaps, even, to yourself? That is a really great question and one that has not been posed before.…
No worries, Angie Merkel. Big Brother has progressed from eavesdropping on heads of state to hunting musicians. The feds are chasing a classical composer turned amateur scientist in Richard Powers’ Orfeo. In Sean Michaels’ Us Conductors, it’s a conductor/scientist framed by the NKVD. When two novels published within months of…
Whatever Happened to the Metric System? How America Kept Its Feet
James Magruder: On my bedside shelf, moving from bottom to top: D.A. Powell’s prize-winning poetry collection, Useless Landscape — a Guide for Boys. I love his work. Atop the Powell are the two last issues of New England Review, perhaps my favorite literary journal, because Editor Carolyn Kuebler publishes translations,…
The Great Gatsby has sold 25 million copies. It has spent 403 weeks — slightly under eight years — on the bestseller list maintained by USA Today, a newspaper founded 42 years after F. Scott Fitzgerald died. In 2013 alone, it sold 185,000 copies. Every year, thousands of high school…
5 Most Popular September Posts
“13 Must-Read Fall Biographies.” Wonks love books, especially political bios. That would explain the huge response to James McGrath Morris’ list. “5 Reasons to Attend Fall for the Book.” Art Taylor gave a rundown of why you should’ve gone to this excellent George Mason University lit fest. Missed it? Mark…
The Rise and Fall of Great Powers is Tom Rachman’s second book. In it, Tooly Zylberberg, the main character, owns a dilapidated bookstore in the Welsh countryside, inexplicably far from everything she has ever known. Tooly is a ward of the world who has never met her mother and was…
12 of the Best Sharable Stories
October is National Reading Group Month! If your book club isn’t sure what to read next, try one of these best-of-2014 titles suggested by the Women’s National Book Association, the organization behind NRGM. Euphoria by Lily King. “A breathtaking novel about three young anthropologists of the 1930s caught in a…
Amazon, contrary to a recent statement by super-agent Andrew Wylie in the New York Times, is not the end of literary culture. Wylie has become enormously rich peddling bestsellers through the Big Five legacy publishers — Hachette, Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, and MacMillan — who dominate book…
American General: The Life and Times of William Tecumseh Sherman
3 Things to Know about the Black Authors & Readers Rock Weekend
Who should support/attend this event? Authors, publishers, avid readers, book club members — anyone interested in literacy!Why should you support/attend? Reading is becoming a lost art — your support will help strengthen the community’s knowledge of literature written by African-American authors. Where/when will the event be held? At the Comfort…
An Interview with Darin Bradley
Chimpanzee is a short but densely layered novel. The fragmentary prose mimics the emotional and intellectual turmoil that Cade, the main character, goes through as he loses himself. Memories fracture and fade, indicated by gaps in the text itself. Here, author Darin Bradley discusses dystopian fiction, the current political zeitgeist,…
Watergate changed politics and journalism in Washington, DC, certainly — and probably beyond. And John Dean was a key witness in the bringing down of President Richard Nixon, along with the infamous White House tapes that provided the final, fatal wound.Billed as “the authoritative account” of the Watergate scandal by…
I had the honor of participating in a panel at George Mason University’s Fall for the Book festival a couple weeks ago. The panel featured three celebrated mystery writers, and also me, and was moderated by a fourth celebrated writer, Donna Andrews. We talked mysteries and writing and da writing…
14 Underrated Comic-Book Characters
Ambush Bug. Any superhero whose uniform is always clearly visible under his street clothes, and whose primary foes include a sock and a giant koala bear, is all right.Sad Sack. He’s the Marcovaldo of the comic-book world, the weary, sad soldier version of Italo Calvino’s hapless everyman. No matter what…
How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World
7 of Our Favorite Banned Books
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Bradbury must have laughed out loud at the perfect symmetry of people wanting to ban his marvelous book about a dystopian society that burns all of its books.The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie. There’s an excellent scene in this book about the march of exhausted…
Your Club in Lights: The “One More Page Mystery Book Club” in Arlington, VA
Your club’s name: One More Page Mystery Book Club; when I email, I call our group “Mystery Loves Company,” and address them as “mysterians.” Location: One More Page Books in Arlington, VA. How long you’ve been around: The group started soon after the store’s founder, Eileen McGervey, opened One More…
4 Ways to Celebrate Banned Books Week
Sound the alarm. Is your local library or school system being strong-armed into dropping a certain title? Tell the ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom about it. Organize a neighborhood event. Gather like-minded readers at a bookstore, library, or community center and discuss your most beloved banned books. Make your voice…
4 National Book Award Longlisters Covered in the Independent
An Unnecessary Woman by Rabih Alameddine.All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr.Redeployment by Phil Klay.Orfeo by Richard Powers. Click here for a full list of this year’s nominees. Which novel would you like to see win the big award? And what titles should have been nominated, but weren’t?…
5 Great Books about the Constitution
American Epic: Reading the U.S. Constitution by Garrett Epps (Oxford). Taking the Constitution on its own terms, Epps leads a fascinating literary exploration of the 7,500 words of the document itself.The Summer of 1787: The Men Who Invented the Constitution by David O. Stewart (Simon & Schuster). This book offers…
To plot, or not to plot? Aye, there’s the rub, as Shakespeare would say. I wonder if the Bard plotted his works. Did he, say, outline Coriolanus. The mind boggles. I believe Sidney Sheldon once admitted that he didn’t plot his novels, preferring to start with an idea and then…
Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy: Four Women Undercover in the Civil War by Karen Abbott (Harper). One shoots and seduces, another masks her identity as a man, a third beds Northern politicians to gather intelligence for the South, while a fourth, a Southern belle, uses her manners to run an espionage…
September 2014 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews by Grace Cavalieri
Gabriel: A Poem, by Edward Hirsch. Alfred A. Knopf 78 pages.The Girls In The Chartreuse Jackets by Maria Mazziotti Gillan. Cat in the Sun Books.71 pages. Underground: New and Selected Poems by Jim Moore. Graywolf Press. 296 pages. Broken Cup by Margaret Gibson. LSU Press.74 pages. Rome by Dorothea Lasky,…
An Interview with Sophie Hannah
The Monogram Murders is the first Hercule Poirot novel in four decades. It comes courtesy of Sophie Hannah, who was granted permission by the Agatha Christie estate to bring the beloved fictional Belgian detective back to life. In his inaugural mystery of the 21st century, Poirot puts his gray matter…
Bedtime Stories: September 2014
Michelle Brafman: Thanks to the lovely invitation to contribute to “Bedtime Stories,” I had the chance to join my kids in compiling a reading list. Here goes. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. I swear that I started this novel well before I was asked to contribute to “Bedtime Stories,” and…
The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
Your Club in Lights: The “Tuesdays with Tea” Book Club in Frederick, MD
Your club’s name: Tuesdays with Tea Book Club (Voila! — a tea shop next door — provides our hot or cold tea selections each month). Location: The Curious Iguana bookstore in downtown Frederick, MD. How long you’ve been around: Since November 2013. How many members: We have anywhere from six…
An Interview with Tavis Smiley
There’s an unmistakable energy you can hear in a person’s voice when they begin to talk about something or someone they fervently believe in. With Tavis Smiley, it emerges when he’s celebrating the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Ten seconds into a conversation with the noted…
I am trying very hard not to accept Jeff Bezos as my personal antichrist. But he isn’t making it easy for me. First, he almost singlehandedly wiped out most of the country’s bookstores and has put the printed book on the endangered species list while contributing greatly to the decline…
Enduring Courage: Ace Pilot Eddie Rickenbacker and the Dawn of the Age of Speed
What are some of the challenges associated with writing mob-related historical fiction? Accessing the interior lives of characters is always a challenge, but entering imaginatively into the lives of gangsters is all the more difficult if, by chance, the writer has never robbed a bank or gunned down an enemy.…
Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life
6 Things We Learned from Our Day at Politics and Prose
People in Washington, DC, are serious about books and will happily make time to discuss them.People in Washington, DC, are also serious about caffeine, at least judging by the amount of coffee coming out of the café.When there’s a passionate Shakespeare discussion happening one table over, you must speak very…
5 Cool Kids’ Books for Junior Fact-Finders
Tiny Creatures: The World of Microbes Nicola Davies (author) and Emily Sutton (illustrator) Candlewick Press Recommended for ages 6-10 With clear, simple wording and jazzy illustrations, this engaging tale explains the world of “wee beasties” in an entertaining way that even the youngest biologists-to-be can grasp. TIME for Kids Explorers:…
“A Most Wanted Man,” Philip Seymour Hoffman’s last completed film before his untimely death earlier this year, is a testament to the actor and a case study in how a very good book can be turned into a very good film, even though casting and direction shift the emphasis. John…
“5 New Kids’ Books for Kids Who Don’t Like Books.” It seems we’re not the only ones constantly on the hunt for good titles to inspire reluctant readers. An interview with author Okey Ndibe. The Nigerian-born writer’s insights into his new novel, Foreign Gods, Inc., drew big numbers last month.“11…
A Grizzly in the Mail and Other Adventures in American History
Visit the Independent at Politics and Prose this Friday!
Why should you shop at Politics and Prose, one of DC’s finest indie bookstores, this Friday, Sept. 5th? Because 20% of your purchase will go to support the nonprofit Independent! Here’s what you do: Stop by our table downstairs — we’ll be right by the café; you can’t miss us…
5 Books They Should Teach in School
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi. This graphic memoir about childhood in Iran might expand some minds about just what constitutes a good book. But who cares about that? It’s a gripping read.Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey. It’s a quintessential American story of rebellion that resonates with young minds.Hiroshima by…
So I was talking with a friend the other day about Woody Allen movies and, turns out, she despises Woody Allen and every film he’s ever made. As for me, “Manhattan” is my favorite movie. I rank it even higher than “From Dusk Till Dawn,” so it’s obviously in pretty…
An Interview with Mona Simpson
Mona Simpson won the Whiting Prize for her first novel, Anywhere But Here (1986), and her Off Keck Road (2000) was a PEN/Faulkner Award finalist. Put up for adoption as an infant, Simpson didn’t meet her Apple-founding brother, Steve Jobs, until she was 25. Almost immediately, they developed a deep…
5 New Kids’ Books for Kids Who Don’t Like Books
Theseus and the Minotaur Yvan Pommaux Toon Graphics Recommended for ages 8-12 Part graphic novel and part traditional storybook, this version of the Greek classic is easy for kids (and attention-span-challenged adults) to follow. The characters’ occasionally snarky dialogue bubbles are just a bonus. Giant Vehicles Rod Green (author) and…
The Selfie of Dorian GrayA Craisin in the SunMemories of My Melancholy HosGideon’s FlugelhornParadise MisplacedFifty Shades of Greige Have your own title that just doesn’t do it? Share it in the comments section below! Who knows? You may see it in a future installment of Rejected Titles!
An Interview with Jessie Burton
In The Miniaturist, Nella Oortman arrives in Amsterdam in 1686 to begin her life as the wife of wealthy trader Johannes Brandt. She’ll share this life and home with two servants, a sister-in-law, Johannes’ beloved dogs, and a tiny miniature cabinet, a replica of her new home that seems to…
Your Club in Lights: The “All Chekhov All the Time” Club at UCLA
Your club’s name: The Chekhov Club. Location: 95% of the time, in the Humanities building at UCLA. The other 5% is at a cafe or park.How long you’ve been around: Since July 15, 2012; our first meeting took place on the anniversary of Chekhov’s death. How many members: 10 (give…
August 2014 Exemplars: Poetry Reviews
If The Tabloids Are True What Are You by Matthea Harvey. Graywolf Press. 152 pages.This book is a poetry moment. It explodes, “I am. There is nothing before quite like me, and I cannot be imitated.” At the same time, it manages to be unpretentious. Harvey is a bold reformer…
As many readers of this blog know (gee, I hope there are many readers!), I self-publish e-books. I have even gone so far as to enter the fray between “legacy” publishers and Amazon. I won’t go into my position again, since I am tired of checking under the hood of…
Jessica Anya Blau: I’m always reading more than one book at a time. And I keep my e-reader by the bed so if (when!) I wake up in the middle of the night, I can read without turning on a light. I just finished Patti Smith’s autobiography, Just Kids. I…
In Foreign Gods, Inc., protagonist Ike is a highly educated Nigerian driving a cab in New York City. Living up to his own expectations proves difficult, especially with his drinking and gambling. So Ike comes up with an idea: He must travel to Utonki, the African village where he grew…
I have a love-hate relationship with books. I love to read them. I hate to own them.For much of my life, I have led a peripatetic existence, moving residences once, sometimes twice, a year. Some of the moves were down the block, some to different continents. They all required packing…
An Interview with Richard Bausch
Richard Bausch makes it look easy. Moving with seeming ease back and forth between beautifully crafted short fiction and the longer narrative arc of a novel, Bausch’s people and situations feel real. They reflect our hopes and dreams and fears. At his best, he holds up a mirror with his…
An Interview with Jack Livings
Your depiction of China and its people in The Dog is very genuine. Were one to take your name away, the reader might assume the stories were written by a Chinese author, not an American one. How much time did you spend in China and what did you learn there?…
Tales from the Holy LandRafael AlvarezPerpetual Motion Machine Publishing226 pp. The White Rail: StoriesClarinda HarrissHalf Moon Editions88 pp. All writing is a dialogue, as the late Iain Banks put it, but it’s especially fun to imagine authors Rafael Alvarez and Clarinda Harriss meeting for drinks and hashing things out in…
6 Books Worth Reading Again (and Again)
The Man Who Walked Away by Maud Casey. A 19th-century Frenchman flees himself in this profound novel, a delicate work that merits repeat immersion, just like a musical fugue, circling back over itself. The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes by Langston Hughes. This book will seduce you over and over…
11 Books to Read before You Die
2666 by Roberto Bolaño.Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee.Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace.Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe.If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino.Gilead by Marilynne Robinson.Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut.Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin.Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro.Maus by Art Spiegelman.The Left Hand of Darkness by…
An Interview with Lisa O’Donnell
Lisa O’Donnell’s Closed Doors follows 11-year-old Michael Murray as he struggles to learn (and keep) his family’s secrets while living on a small Scottish island in the 1980s. O’Donnell’s first novel, The Death of Bees, won the 2013 Commonwealth Book Prize. The first-person voice of your narrator, an 11-year-old boy,…
At least a million people a year make their way to the National Archives in Washington, DC, to see the Declaration of Independence. One visitor, Professor Danielle Allen, author of Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality, wondered about the original copies of the…
Post-apocalyptic fiction is in. Historical fiction is in. And these two types of fiction, which have moved out of the sphere of strictly genre to mainstream audiences, have a lot in common. What they do is strip away all the distractions of contemporary life — too much information, too much…
“6 Best Books We’ve Read This Year (So Far).” We’d like to think you care deeply about our readerly opinions, but the truth is you’re just suckers for a good list, isn’t it?“Privacy for Writers.” Martha Anne Toll’s thought-provoking essay on scribes’ need for solitude had hundreds of visitors clicking…
Deep: Freediving, Renegade Science, and What the Ocean Tells Us About Ourselves
I attended ThrillerFest, the annual conference for the International Thriller Writers, a couple of weeks ago and want to share what I learned with you — the good and the bad. Because it’s ThrillerFest, this column will be in bullet points. Get it, bullet poi…you probably got it. It’s expensive.…
An Interview with Nadia Hashimi
This is not just another novel set in Afghanistan. In The Pearl that Broke Its Shell, Nadia Hashimi breaks the mold for first-time authors. Her story follows two young women separated by generations, yet tied together by a common thread. As both women put on a male mask, the reader…
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