For The Book Obsessed
[ad_1] Ruins are scars. Some are in the process of healing, succumbing to gravity, dirt, and time, covered in roots and soon to be buried. Others still hurt, poking at the sky, or, more pointedly, at the transformation and defacing of a people’s dignity. No matter their state of decay, the remnants of buildings, monuments, … Read more
[ad_1] When World War II comes to an end in Siegfried Lenz’s The German Lesson, our young narrator, Siggi, is looking through a microscope at some fish eggs. His biology teacher has forced his class to learn about fish reproduction, even as anti-aircraft guns fire just off the North Sea coast. Siggi is disappointed in … Read more
[ad_1] Edward Carey’s latest book, The Swallowed Man, is a retelling of the classic Pinocchio fairy tale from Gepetto’s perspective. Gepetto is left alone for much of Carlo Collodi’s original story, so Carey saw an opportunity to both write his version of events and create a visual art exhibition of the weird and wild creations … Read more
[ad_1] Alchemy may no longer be considered a reputable or factual science, but it still shapes our current understanding of chemistry, physics, and biology. In her new book, The Experimental Fire: Inventing English Alchemy, 1300-1700, scholar and historian Jennifer Rampling shows that this influence is worth chronicling, not only for marking how attitudes towards science … Read more
[ad_1] We have all, at some point in our lives, awoken to find that something we used to believe is a lie. The world used to look one way, but now you can see right through it, the cracks and the fissures. A part of you is fractured, your self is changed, disconnected, and it … Read more
[ad_1] When I finished Shane McCrae’s newest book of poetry, Sometimes I Never Suffered, I immediately missed his two main characters: the Hastily Assembled Angel and Jim Limber. The former is a detached but sincere fictional guide through a reimagined and repurposed Old Testament. The latter, the adopted Black son of Jefferson Davis, asks the … Read more
[ad_1] Lindsay Ellis’s new book, Axiom’s End, is an ambitious work of science fiction. Not content to take the route of alternate history, or tell an action-packed “First Contact” tale, Ellis centers her story on the human and inhuman. The driving question of the novel is how we make sense of what we don’t understand. … Read more