In our morning reading: Kiese Laymon talked with Jesmyn Ward, an inside look at Brooklyn DIY spaces, holiday-themed stories from a host of writers, Mensah Demary interviewed, and more.
We’re taking a brief holiday break; normal posting will resume on Friday.
In our Monday morning reading: new essays from Kiese Laymon and Sarah Gerard, an interview with the director of a film on Soviet hockey, Dmitry Samarov is interviewed, new fiction from Kathleen Winter, and more.
The first time I encountered Kiese Laymon‘s writng was–I believed–via his debut novel Long Division. Long Division is a thrilling, sometimes funny, novel that eludes easy description: there are elements of time travel, metafiction, and commentary on race, America, and the South’s troubled history all woven together. For my money, Laymon’s approach here reminds me of Flann O’Brien: both are willing to elude easy classification in their work and take the reader to unexpected places. When I read Laymon’s essay collection How […]
Hilton Als discusses art and race, a look at Gordon Lish’s legacy as an editor and a writer, Jersey City gets a literary festival, talking with John Waters, and more.
Notes from John Darnielle’s recent reading at Housing Works, Kiese Laymon interviews the director of Freedom Summer, a look at Orbit Books’ cover artwork, and more.
Roxane Gay’s An Untamed State is discussed at Bookforum, a lost Breece D’J Pancake story is found, Mike Watt shares his tour journals, a look at the work of Kiese Laymon and Leigh Stein, and more.
This afternoon: Guernica takes a look at the South in literature and culture, interviews with Christopher Merkner and Jeff VanderMeer, an excerpt of D. Foy’s new novel, and more.
Last year, I read Percival Everett’s Assumption — the first of his books I’d encounter, after reading glowing recommendations from a number of smart readers. It’s still inside my head: it begins like a traditional procedural, and then grows stranger and stranger as Everett keeps revealing that certain things we might have taken for granted are, in fact, not present at all. The whole thing led to a strange, haunting ending (or series of endings) — tightly controlled, and ominous in […]