Book Reviews

Immortal Longings in “The Stars Undying” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 18, 2022 by Rebecca Peng

“Give me my robe. Put on my crown. I have / Immortal longings in me,” announces Shakespeare’s Cleopatra, in one of her famous—and final—invocations. In … Read More

Exploring Utopian Possibility in “The Mandorla Letters” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 17, 2022 by Rachel León

While award-winning creative flutist, composer, and bandleader Nicole Mitchell Gantt is no longer based in Chicago, she has certainly left a legacy. She was the … Read More

Where in the (Modern) World is Africa? – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 16, 2022 by Tomi Onabanjo

The old adage begins with a drunkard and a streetlight. Hunched over, he strains his eyes toward the ground; cursing, as he looks for the … Read More

A Satire of Russian Life in Alisa Ganieva’s “Offended Sensibilities” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 16, 2022 by Kat Solomon

Vladimir Sorokin’s Day of the Oprichnik imagines a near-future dystopia in which a wall separates Russia from the rest of the world and the old … Read More

The Line Between the Original and the Imposter in “Case Study” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 11, 2022 by Marcie McCauley

“Who is to say which is the original and which is the imposter?” queries Graeme Macrae Burnet in his 2022 Booker-Prize-nominated novel, Case Study. The … Read More

An Interview with Jamil Jan Kochai – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 10, 2022 by Farooq Chaudhry

Jamil Jan Kochai was sitting with his parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins on the second story of his aunt’s home in Logar, Afghanistan, sipping tea … Read More

Self-Examination in “Novelist as a Vocation” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 10, 2022 by Gianni Washington

If an aspiring storyteller were to pick up Haruki Murakami’s Novelist as a Vocation, translated by Philip Gabriel & Ted Goossen, expecting a step-by-step guide … Read More

The Failed Promise of the American Dream in “Cheap Land Colorado” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 9, 2022 by Ian MacAllen

One version of the American dream is based on the idea of owning a piece of the land. That dream seems harder to achieve every … Read More

Landscapes of Memory in Dorthe Nors’ “A Line in the World” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 8, 2022 by Elizabeth McNeill

Lines suggest beginnings and endings, possibilities and limits, differences and connections. Lines can be made by humans. Hand-drawn borders on maps mark one sovereign’s subjects … Read More

Translating Narrative Tension in “Traces of Boots on Tongue” – Chicago Review of Books

Book ReviewsNovember 8, 2022 by Malavika Praseed

When an occupation has ended, what do we have left? Traces of Boots on Tongue: And Other Stories addresses the question in micro and macro … Read More

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