Double Vision by George Garrett
George Garrett, Double Vision, a novel: As expected from Garrett, this novel is a witty tour de force, marrying fact and fiction about a gifted generation of American writers. (Alabama)
Review
American Smooth by Rita Dove
Rita Dove, American Smooth, poems: In her eighth superb collection, Dove pays homage to the grit and mother wit that inform our mongrel cultural heritage. (Norton)
The Love Wife by Gish Jen
Gish Jen, The Love Wife, a novel: Jen, in her most exuberant and accomplished book, provides a brilliant portrait of a new "half-half" American family. (Knopf)
This Smoke that Carried Us by René Char
Maxine Kumin recommends This Smoke that Carried Us, poems by René Char, translated by Susanne Dubroff: “This volume of selected poems, with a sensitive and informative introduction by Christopher Merrill, is an essential document of World War II. Many of these poems were written while parachutists were dropping behind enemy lines, but the subject matter,…
rev. of No Planets Strike by Josh Bell
No Planets Strike, poems by Josh Bell (Zoo): The network of motifs in Josh Bell’s debut volume, No Planets Strike, create as intricate a system as the roads, tunnels, and bridges that comprise the transportation systems of major metropolitan cities, allowing the reader to traverse the speaker’s psyche at dizzying, gratifying speeds. This is not…
The Unsubscriber by Bill Knott
Bill Knott, The Unsubscriber, poems: The poems in Knott’s collection, his first in a decade, are surreal yet vernacular, outrageous yet tender—absolutely unique, iconoclastic, and astonishing. (FSG)
Altazor by Vincente Huidrobro
C. D. Wright recommends Altazor, poetry by Vincente Huidrobro, translated by Eliot Weinberger: “A book-length poem from the twenties that continues to set the mind on fire. An exhilarating tribute to the future, which is perhaps the only place it is reasonable to aspire since the present is nonetheless interesting but a deadly spot in…
rev. of What You’ve Been Missing by Janet Desaulniers
What You’ve Been Missing, stories by Janet Desaulniers (Iowa): Janet Desaulniers’s debut collection, which won the John Simmons Short Fiction Award, is surprisingly lovely and thrilling, in that it offers incredible intimacy and honesty in the face of life’s worst calamities. In one story, a mother notes after the death of her young son: "Life,…
Breath by Philip Levine
Philip Levine, Breath, poems: Levine, in these heady, extraordinary new poems, looks back at his life to unearth rites of passage in an America of victories and betrayals. (Knopf)