Marquez's "Until August," DFW's "Pale King," and what to do with unfinished novels by the greats| www.writingaboutreading.com
"Underworld" is more urban pastiche than cohesive novel, but damn it radiates. Isolated scenes and set pieces will stay with me forever.| www.writingaboutreading.com
Dune 2, Barbenheimer, American Fiction, Poor Things. Geeking out about a great slew of movies in time for the 2024 Oscars.| www.writingaboutreading.com
If you're not enjoying a book, quit it. But that's often much easier said than done...| www.writingaboutreading.com
Gus Moreno combines old curses with new tech and pulls it off—including an evil smart speaker.| www.writingaboutreading.com
Thinking about movie theaters, cultural moments, and book-to-screen adaptations.| www.writingaboutreading.com
Scratching my head at the latest Pulitzer-winning critical smash hit. But literary awards don't typically signal readability these days.| www.writingaboutreading.com
My Cormac McCarthy kick started in Texas in 2020, ending with his crazy and excellent novel The Passenger, a major departure from the rest.| www.writingaboutreading.com
Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash" is an all-time classic and coined the term "metaverse." But does it still feel relevant today? Does that matter?| www.writingaboutreading.com
How memory, metonymy, and repetition make Thomas Cromwell real in Hilary Mantel’s incredible Wolf Hall trilogy.| www.writingaboutreading.com
A tribute to audiobooks—and to consuming books while hiking, running, doing dishes, folding laundry, and even while showering—from someone who had never listened to an audiobook prior to the pandemic.| www.writingaboutreading.com
The incredible Dune series gets much wilder, and much funnier, after the first book. And it's all about Duncan Idaho.| www.writingaboutreading.com
The Three-Body Problem makes me feel the same way that movies like Contact and Arrival do—a feeling of cosmic smallness that is both scary and satisfying.| www.writingaboutreading.com
Sally Rooney was hailed as the voice of her generation—then came the backlash. Why do writers dismiss other writers for being commercially successful?| www.writingaboutreading.com
Michel Houellebecq's 2015 novel about France electing an Islamic fundamentalist reads as a prescient commentary on Trump, even if accidentally.| www.writingaboutreading.com
On slowing down my reading. Plus: Discovering audiobooks from the library. Also: Where to find book recs. And: My favorite reads of 2020.| www.writingaboutreading.com
I get asked this a lot. Here's my ultimate recommendation guide. Plus: my favorite reads of 2023.| www.writingaboutreading.com