On Michael Connelly, #1 Bestselling author: “Michael Connelly has the nerve and timing of a whole SWAT team.” Marilyn Stasio,…
Report from the middle of The Recognitions
(First post on The Recognitions) In the middle of this wonderful book, many characters are running around trying to one…
Most Ridiculous Blurbs – 1 of 349, 908, 456, 873
On David Baldacci, #1 Bestselling author: “When Baldacci is on fire, nobody can touch him” Booklist (starred review)
The Absence of Criticism (Guest Post by Ravi Mangla)
The other week a discussion opened up at HTMLGIANT, in response to Justin Taylor’s post, that raised some interesting questions…
Notes on the Cinematographer by Robert Bresson
One of the keys to this book and Bresson himself is the fifth aphorism: “Metteur-en-scène, director. The point is not…
On ‘I’m Still Here’ Guest post by Lawrence Siskind
It’s rare that I see a film that doesn’t bring me pleasure, and that’s not because I’m a sucker for…
The Literary Event of Year
LUTZ, MARCUS, SCHUTT, HASKELL Wednesday Oct. 6th 7pm at the Center for Fiction, 17 East 47th Street, NY, NY Four…
Eight is Enough
NOTE: This was written in the infancy of my knowledge about cinema. Surely, eight is not enough. John Ford, Carl…
Amy Hempel’s ‘Offertory’
I’ve read about half of Hempel’s collected stories but none seem so seminal as this one. It’s one of her…
Jane Unrue’s ‘Life of a Star’
Reading Jane Unrue’s novel Life of a Star (Burning Deck Press) is similar to the experience of entering a quiet…