Reviews & Interviews

All in a Day’s Work

by Brian Chappell Fiction
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These types of genres are a narratologist’s dream, because one can spend an inordinate amount of time (even in a 190 page book like this one) teasing out the tiniest components of this unfamiliar world.

Lowell’s Bedlam: John McCullough

by John McCullough Poetry and Poetics
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All acts of observation are partial and reveal as much about the observer as the observed.

Lowell’s Bedlam: M G Stephens

by M G Stephens Poetry and Poetics
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Alfred Corn’s play gives us an inner portrait of Robert Lowell that is not found in either the biography or the poetry itself.

Tom Sleigh, Anthropologist

by Micah Towery Poetry and Poetics
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Formality, in this case, allows Sleigh to achieve a reflexivity and self-awareness without the cloying injections that deliberately remind the reader of the existence of the poet.

Hindu Surrealism: George Kalamaras

by Brooks Lampe Poetry and Poetics
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The two loves of Kalamaras’s life: Surrealism and Hindu mysticism (with a touch of rhetorical theory!).

Caleb’s Passing

by Brian Chappell Fiction
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The climax of the novel is so mawkish that its downright dismissal of the fraught implications of his “achievement” are extremely troubling.

Oyster Perpetual

by Levi Rubeck Poetry and Poetics
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When charm works, the connection established between individuals is palpable.

The Beautiful Pool Is Empty

by Lonely Christopher Poetry and Poetics
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Michael Montlack’s new poem collection Cool Limbo, for starters, looks really cool before it’s even opened.

Ben Fama’s NEW WAVES

by Bianca Stone Poetry and Poetics
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Being “timeless” isn’t about removing the contemporary but about writing a good poem.

Stories Within Stories Within Stories Within…

by Brian Chappell Fiction
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Okay! Fine. Tea Obreht is a veritable prodigy, and The Tiger’s Wife is uncannily good. Most (no, all) reviewers, as well as the likes of Colum McCann, TC Boyle, and Ann Patchett, say no less. But this novel is not just good for a twenty-five year old. Most of us would kill to kill it like she does.

Quiet Anthem

by Genevieve Burger-Weiser Poetry and Poetics
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Cursivism, Will Hubbard’s slim, debut volume of prose poems published by Ugly Duckling Presse, begins with a simple piece of advice that may be one of the most challenging charges facing anyone who is trying to figure out how to live, “just let it happen.”

Will Alexander’s Compression & Purity

by Brooks Lampe Poetry and Poetics
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Certainly postmodern works has blurred generic boundaries, but Alexander seems to be showing, in an almost Pynchon-like way, that even the nuances of specialized language can be conscripted and subsumed into a larger poetic utterance.

David Foster Wallace’s Open-Ended End Game

by Brian Chappell Fiction
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Wallace over the years was most interested in narratives of suffering. Boredom (so closely linked to the problem of addiction, which he addressed in Infinite Jest) is one such type, and it takes center stage in his last book, an unfinished project published under the title The Pale King.

Matthew Rohrer’s Destroyer and Preserver

by Evan Hansen Poetry and Poetics
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If you’d told me that the ultimate line of a wonderful poem could be, simply, “Doctor Wong,” I would’ve looked at you skeptically.

Indie Bookstores: Vancouver

by Brian Chappell Reviews & Interviews
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But how to discern which to visit, on my limited conference schedule and lack of motorized transport? Our decided upon method was a combination of combing the neighborhoods that we already wanted to see, and tossing a net around the area of our hotel.

Indie Bookstores: Kramerbooks

by Brian Chappell Fiction
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I indulge fantasies of ownership, lament the limited capacity of my wallet and shelf space to accommodate all the books I want. But I gird myself and leave with nothing, happy to have looked, touched, but saved myself again.

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