Blogs about Books and literature

Vincennes Review of Books 2023 is here!Key:* = Excellent, highly recommend~ = Actively bad, do not recommendFirst readsThe Book of Form & Emptiness–Ruth OzekiLove in Idleness–Charlotte Mendelson Straight Man–Richard Russo *The Complete Magazine Stories of …

Whilst Macbeth is the play’s title character, it is the witches who appear on stage first, casting an impression of their malevolent control over the action which follows. In the first scene, Shakespeare presents the …

Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki Read Apr 4, 2022 - Apr 10, 2022 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ This is a lovely book, filled with lovable characters and feeling. It is a novel about food, music, and …

In a May 4, 1889 letter to his friend and editor Alexi Suvorin, Chekhov complains of taking no interest in “reviews, conversations about literature, gossip, successes, failures, high royalties,” and adds: “[I]n short, I’ve become …

Hi everyone! You may have noticed that we’ve slowed down a bit on posting, approving comments, and, well, pretty much our whole end of the deal. We’d like to say we’re just too busy and …

My new poetry pamphlet from Melos Press, The Dictionary Speaks, is now out and can be ordered post-free via this link.From the publisher’s blurb:-NICHOLAS MURRAY’S many books include poetry, two novels, critically acclaimed biographies of …

In addition to Philip Pullman's substantial fantasies, His Dark Materials (three volumes) and The Book of Dust (two volumes published, the third, at present, forthcoming), Pullman has published some short companion volumes to the series. …

With these poems by Tad Tuleja, we continue to highlight original fiction and poetry from writers who either published their first book at 40 or after, who have yet to publish a book, or have …

The system is broken. The celebrity is brighter than the sun. Only she can decide when it is day. There’s a sentiment amongst Swifies that if you wrong Taylor Swift, you will fall. They call …

He’s been called one of the America’s leading humanists, and now he’s taking a step back. Robert Pogue Harrison, Rosina Pierotti Professor in Italian Literature in the Department of French & Italian at Stanford and …

An end of week recap “I suggest that the only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little further down our particular path than we have …

This is my friend’s lovely cat who died recently.

Cover of “Captain” Mayne Reid’s The Headless Horseman With the arrival of spring break, I’ve managed to find time for a little light reading—purely for the sake of entertainment, no edifying strings attached. This is …

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and Sharlene from Real Life Reading that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like …

Remembering Rahul: A tribute by Rohit Chopra Aniruddha Bose, Associate Professor of History at Saint Francis University, passed away on March 31, 2024 from brain cancer. Aniruddha was a remarkable person and brilliant scholar, soft-spoken …

the complex art of dressing in mourning I love it when mourning clothes turn up in books. It was such a huge part of life for so many years, and now has disappeared. Discovering the …

Ridgeline subscribers! Last week I had a new piece for the New York Times go live: “A Japanese Village Wants Tourists to Come for Heat, Soot and Steel”. I took tons of photographs (also, this …

Fool: In Search of Henry VIII’s Closest Manby Peter K. AnderssonPrinceton University Press, 2023 The posthumous image of him has been entangled with the real individual, and no one has really fully tried to disentangle …

In her first novel, art historian Penelope Curtis imagines two episodes from her family’s history. The first part concerns Nora (Penelope’s grandmother, whom she never knew), a painter who tries to articulate what her art …

The Great TabooGrant AllenNew York: Harper & Brothers, 1891271 pagesReviewing Gilbert Parker's The Right of Way a while back, I expressed my opposition to the idea of starting a novel with dialogue. "'Not guilty, your …