Who’s Done More Damage to Fictional Narrative?
Modernists? Or Richard Nixon? A passage from Charles Baxter‘s essay “Dysfunctional Narratives, or: ‘Mistakes Were Made’”: What difference does it make to writers of stories if public figures are denying their responsibility for their own actions? So what if they … Continue reading →
More Sad Literary Young Men
At the New York Review of Books blog, Elaine Blair delivers a kind of update on Katie Roiphe‘s 2010 broadside on the (in Roiphe’s view) insipid boyishness of the generation of male novelists who followed Updike, Mailer, and Roth. Blair … Continue reading →
Two Reviews
Coming off my recent back-and-forth with Jennifer Howard about Henry Adams‘ Democracy, it was fun to think about Thomas Mallon‘s new novel, Watergate, which I reviewed for the Barnes & Noble Review. Mallon has a long view on D.C. political … Continue reading →
Roundup: Debuts by Lysley Tenorio and Keija Parssinen, “Cuckoo’s Nest” at 50, more
Laura Collins-Hughes reviews Lysley Tenorio’s debut story collection, Monstress, for the Boston Globe.
Steve Weinberg reviews Keija Parssinen’s novel The Ruins of Us for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
David Duhr reviews Alan Lightman&...
Roundup: Follow the Reader, Dmitry Samarov, Percival Everett, more
Last Friday Bethanne Patrick discussed the NBCC award nominees with board member Carolyn Kellogg and Balakian awardee Ron Charles for Follow the Reader, a weekly book chat on Twitter. You can catch up on their conversation (and Follow the Reader in...
Democracy: Skepticism Versus Cynicism
This is the third in a series of posts between myself and Jennifer Howard about Henry Adams’ 1880 novel, Democracy. Read her first post. Jennifer, Your point about Madeleine’s transgression is right, and, yes, a little chilling: Her mistake isn’t … Continue reading →
Roundup: NBCC finalists, Aharon Appelfeld, Kjersti Skomsvold, more
Last Saturday the NBCC announced the finalists for its book awards. Here at Critical Mass, you can see the full list of finalists in all six book categories, as well as the awardees of the Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award and the Nona Balaki...
Democracy: A Funny Town for a Woman
This is the first post in a discussion on Jennifer Howard‘s blog and mine about Henry Adams‘ 1880 novel, Democracy. For more background, you can read my introductory post as well as Jennifer’s. Jennifer, So, why did we decide to … Continue reading →
Some Programming Notes
I have a review of George Pelecanos‘ new novel, What It Was, at Washington City Paper. I had the rare luxury of an extended word count, so I tried to riff a little about how the new book (much like … Continue reading →
Roundup: Melissa Pritchard, John Updike, John Lewis Gaddis, and more
A reminder: On Saturday, January 21, the NBCC will announce the finalists for its annual awards. If you're in New York City, you can catch the announcement in person, or follow along on Twitter, where we'll be using the hashtag #nbcc.
Mic...
Links: Gag Rule
Shalom Auslander answers most of the questions in his Q&A with the Rumpus with jokes. Which makes moment when he (more or less) doesn’t, in response to a question about the connection between comedy and morals, interesting: “Humor is anger, … Continue reading →
