Real Life by Brandon Taylor
Brandon Taylor’s new novel explores the anxiety of being alive, the exhaustion of being black in America, and the cruelty that is embedded in human interaction.
Blog
The Art of Conversation in Theresa Hak Kyung Cha’s Dictee
Theresa Hak Kyung Cha’s 1982 book confounds expectations at every turn. Specifically, there’s something monumental about the text’s extreme lack of metaphor, its striving toward objective observation, that feels to me—in this moment—absolutely poetic.
Weather by Jenny Offill
Jenny Offill’s new novel is collection of portraits, of individual truths and national anguish, curated by a quietly unravelling woman.
Visibility as Dissent in the Panopticity
As panopticon-like tactics of controlling certain populations become increasingly widespread, Abdel Aziz’s debut novel gives us a peek into the authoritarian future to which such surveillance could lead. Within the tyrannical panopticity, she insists on the power of visibility as double-edged tool of oppression and revolution.
“I’m telling these stories for an audience, but I also want to digest this experience for myself”: An Interview with Poupeh Missaghi
Poupeh Missaghi’s debut novel follows a protagonist obsessed with finding out why Tehran’s statues are disappearing. It’s an experimental hybrid work that combines a traditional novel narrative with quotes from theorists and writers, dossier-style notes on people who have been made to disappear after death, and poetry.
Isaac Babel’s Powerful Humor
Babel witnessed pogroms in his youth, lived through times of disdain for Jews and intellectuals, and died at the hands of Stalin’s secret police. Nonetheless, this master of the short story accomplished much. Now, with antisemitism on the rise worldwide, reading Babel reinforces the power of wit when challenging hatred.
Black Sunday by Tola Rotimi Abraham
In Tola Rotimi Abraham’s debut novel, two young girls see the linkage of sex, money, and religion on the path to power.
How About This Weather?
It can be easy, under certain circumstances, to imagine that catastrophe is worlds away. Just as it is easy, from the comfort of the East Coast, to relish in the warmer-than-usual winter and pretend like there are no fires consuming the wildlife of Australia or endangering the children of California.
Blue Flowers by Carola Saavedra
Obsessive love is a theme as old as the Iliad, but Saavedra’s novel gives it her own enigmatic twist, joining the ranks of Latin American authors who are transforming our literary landscape in vivid, thrilling ways.