Category Archives: Reviews – Backlog
Pocket Review: Atmospheric Disturbances by Rivka Galchen
Atmospheric Disturbances Rivka Galchen Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2008 This first novel starts out irresistibly: Last December a woman entered my apartment who looked exactly like my wife. This woman casually closed the door behind her. In an oversized pale blue purse—Rema’s purse—she was carrying a russet puppy. I did not know the puppy. And [...]
Pocket Review: A Short History of Women by Kate Walbert
A Short History of Women Kate Walbert Scribner, 2009 Kate Walbert’s A Short History of Women was one of the ten best books of 2009, according to the New York Times. It’s easy to see how this story of women, all dealing with quintessential “women’s issues” through five generations of the same family, might impress [...]
The Language of Flowers 2012: “Hot Summer” Limited Edition
Wandering lonely as a cloud through London’s dusty bookshops back in the spring of ’88, I came across a lovely edition with a rose-strewn cover, full of cross-references to flowers and feelings, with verses to boot. Topics included Energy in Adversity, Immortality, and Secret Love. A keeper! For the Romantic that stubbornly persists in me, [...]
The Short Shelf: Wolves
Wolves haunt those woods Mr. Frost, whether they’re those in the mind’s recesses, or the canine predators roaming the nearest wilderness. Even though they have largely been erased throughout the world where people live, packs of wolves populate our individual and collective memories. And which of us doesn’t wonder how far removed is that canine [...]
Summer Reading at Open Letters Monthly
The Fourth of July falls square in midweek this year, which means people either get more time off than usual or less, depending on who’s doing the giving. Either way, it’s a good idea to have some good reading material lined up—whether you’re kicking back while you’re waiting for the grill to be ready or [...]
Lynne Barrett’s (Bad) Girls
When I’m ready for a break from Emerson and Thoreau—currently the only titles beyond a guide to Greek mythology loaded on a gifted Kindle—I gravitate toward points on the literary number line that aren’t controlled by fampires and other figures of the character undead. (And yes, I hope I just coined a word; may famous [...]
Able-Bodied Praise
OK, so what’s the opposite of faint praise? We’ve all read the reviews that are stretching for something—anything—positive to say about a book: it’s un-put-downability, how faithful the translation is, how nice the binding, how sumptuous the cover stock. But what about the really meaty compliment, the one that sends a reader immediately clicking, or [...]
Pocket Shorts Review: Scary Stories from Alfred Hitchcock, Part V
“Men Without Bones,” by Gerald Kersh, 1954 This one has my favorite windup and pitch so far, I think. In this case the story’s told to a nameless worker loading a banana boat in Puerto Pobre, Peru—interesting how so many of these narrators remain nameless, the better to grab you by the collar and make [...]
Pocket Shorts Review: Scary Stories from Alfred Hitchcock, Part IV
“Two Spinsters,” by E. Phillips Oppenheim, 1926 OK, so this collection has thus far managed to insult African Americans, Jews, and now Unmarried Women of a Certain Age who Have Been Jilted and Thus Driven Criminally Insane. I think that about covers this one, although Oppenheim does an especially gorgeous job of the lonely, wet [...]
Pocket Shorts Review: Scary Stories from Alfred Hitchcock, Part II
Today’s picks involve some creepy justice and a blue-faced, yellow-eyed troll. Read on… “Camera Obscura,” by Basil Copper, 1965 The trouble with scary morality tales is that you pretty much know how they’re going to end: The unrepentant miscreant is consigned to some form of horrible hell, the only real variables being the type of [...]
