For The Book Obsessed
[ad_1] In Wine People, Michelle Wildgen dives into the rich and ruthless business of wine via the dueling perspectives of two young women working for a Manhattan importer. While steely, pragmatic Wren learns the nuances of wine buying from her quixotic mentor, Sonoma-bred Thessaly prides herself on delivering top sales numbers alongside an eclectic cast … Read more
[ad_1] Mostly set around Atlanta, with excursions to Louisiana, Stephen Kearse’s Liquid Snakes is a psychotropic crime thriller, a revenge story, and a bitter invective against environmental racism. It’s also an immensely engaging read—clever and nimble in its narration, pointed in its critiques—with a chorus of interesting voices and arresting images. Although the novel is … Read more
[ad_1] The Translator’s Voice is a new monthly column from Ian J. Battaglia here at the Chicago Review of Books, dedicated to global literature and the translators who work tirelessly and too often thanklessly to bring these books to the English-reading audience. Subscribe to his newsletter to get notified of new editions as well as … Read more
[ad_1] It’s easy to trust the enchanting people we encounter who make us feel like the most important thing in the world. Especially when we’re young and are always looking for new sources of joy and self-esteem. But as Catherine Chidgey reminds us in her latest novel, Pet, the most charming role models often warrant … Read more
[ad_1] One morning, you receive a call and are told to board a flight. Your bags are already packed, a car has been sent to pick you up. When you’re hungry, you find food has been packed for you as well. It tastes like nothing. Perhaps someone is dead. This is how the narrator of … Read more
[ad_1] There’s something distinctly aspirational about the titles of Lydia Kiesling’s two novels thus far. If judging on that alone, you’d be forgiven for missing their satirical bent. First was The Golden State in 2018, which bears the nickname of its California setting, but whose story of a young mother searching for a haven for … Read more
[ad_1] The work of Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Steven Millhauser demands to be read seriously since, at its often disarming core, it is about serious matters: time, memory, seeing the world as it is (reminiscent of Wallace Stevens’s “One must have a mind of winter to regard / the frost…”), the painful, inevitable divisions between human … Read more
[ad_1] The Translator’s Voice is a new monthly column from Ian J. Battaglia here at the Chicago Review of Books, dedicated to global literature and the translators who work tirelessly and too often thanklessly to bring these books to the English-reading audience. Subscribe to his newsletter to get notified of new editions as well as … Read more
[ad_1] Much has been said in recent years about “witness literature,” writing that can feel like a blend of reporting and lyrical prose, bringing poetic attention to headline news topics that are often painful, tragic, and complex. By extension, witness literature can provide healing to the writer and the reader. It may even potentially create … Read more
[ad_1] Kyle Dillon Hertz’s The Lookback Window starts in paradise. Or rather, it starts in a clothing-optional resort in South Florida. I found it apt to open the book here, a space of artificial beauty and peacefulness built directly on a foundation of unspoken terrors, all of which are fated to be erased by the … Read more