There are stories about war, about those who just don’t fit into society, about the US South, and the dissolution of marriage, of life, its limitations and occasional tender beauty. There are unattractive waitresses, fat men, poseurs, blind men, mothers,…
Interview with Elizabeth Routen
The author of Voices on the Stairs talks about the short story form, the making of her first book, her influences, creating characters, self-publication, her next book, and more. Interview by Magdalena Ball Magdalena: Tell me about the genesis of Voices on the…
A Review of Philip Johnson’s e’cco 2
If you casually flip through this book in a shop, you may well be tempted to leave it alone for fear that the dishes are too fancy and fussy for your tastes. That would be a mistake. This is food…
A review of David Malouf’s Dream Stuff
A missing father, a missing uncle, a missing place. David Malouf’s latest book of short stories, Dream Stuff is about longing and nostalgia. A desire to reach across the bridge of time, back to some place which may have never…
A review of Anita Desai’s Diamond Dust
ndividually, the stories in Diamond Dust traverse a wide geographic terrain, moving from the Himalayas to Manitoba, Toronto, Cornwall, Amherst, Massachusetts, Mexico, and Delhi, but throughout the stories there are similarities in the characters, and in the theme; that of…
A Review of Net Words by Nick Usborne
“Nobody is paying close enough attention to the words on ecommerce sites.” Do you do any kind of online writing? Manage a web site? Run an ecommerce site? Write articles, newsletters, even send action oriented e-mails? If so, you really…
A review of John Grisham’s The Painted House
It is perhaps not fair to review The Painted House from a literary perspective, since the literary and stylistic quality of his prose is not part of his appeal. However, the setting out of critical apparatus for objective book reviewing…
Cooking for Cupid: A Review of Venus in the Kitchen by Pilaff Bey
Cooking for Cupid: A Review of Venus in the Kitchen by Pilaff Bey The recipes in Venus in the Kitchen were apparently collected with the aim of assisting various friends of the author revive their “declining vigour”. According to Bey’s introduction, they…
A review of Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov
There are some wonderful classic novels which are well worth reading and re-reading. Vladimir Nabokov’s Pnin is one of those, and guest reviewer Tom Frenkel, turns his analytical eye on Pnin. Nabokov is most famous for his novel Lolita, but…
The Already Falling-Away Moment: Sarah Stonich’s These Granite Islands
The book reads easily and quickly, but the slow action and gentle nature of Stonich’s prose conceals a powerful message of life, love, and the human condition: how we make meaning from our short lives. Reviewed by Magdalena Ball THESE…