Published by Fourth Estate Things are not going well for Nelson. His girlfriend Ixta has left him, and his acting career is floundering. His older brother has moved to the United States, promising to help Nelson move there, but has made no attempt to start the process. So when Nelson’s hero, the playwright Henry Nuñez, …
Continue reading At Night We Walk in Circles: Daniel Alarcón
“In pure mime, the artist has to depend entirely on his body on an empty stage to create an atmosphere around him, plus the characters he depicts, to tell the story without any dialogues, music, or songs, and without any external aids like props and decorations. He has to fill the stage like a painter …
Published by Ballantine Books This is a gripping story set in 18th century London. Thief-taker[1] Benjamin Weaver is asked by a mysterious man called Cobb to carry out a dangerous assignment. When Weaver declines, Cobb resorts to other means. He threatens three people close to Weaver with destitution unless Weaver agrees to Cobb’s demands. Weaver’s …
Photo: BrooksLaTouche Photography, Barbados. Cherie Jones is a Barbadian author and attorney. Her novel, How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps Her House, was shortlisted for the 2021 Women’s Prize for Fiction. She has also written a book of short stories, The Burning Bush Women & Other Stories. Cherie is currently working on her second novel. Talking …
Continue reading Raising Issues of Domestic Violence: An Interview with Cherie Jones
Published by HarperCollins “Nine months Landsman’s been flopping at the Hotel Zamenhof without any of his fellow residents managing to get themselves murdered. Now somebody has put a bullet in the brain of the occupant of 208...” The year is 1998. When, after World War II, plans to create a homeland for Jews in Palestine …
Continue reading The Yiddish Policemen’s Union: Michael Chabon
Published by Hodder & Stoughton and Random House “Luce’s new stranger children were small and beautiful and violent.” “Nothing changes what already happened. It will always have happened. You either let it break you down or you don't.” Luce is the caretaker of an almost abandoned lodge in a forest by a lake, near the …
Translated from Portuguese by Benjamin MoserPublished by Picador Ricardo Carvalho, a well-to-do executive, gets into his car in a multistoried car park in Rio de Janeiro, smokes a cigarette and then shoots himself. He leaves behind a gun, a briefcase, 20,000 dollars and a note to the police. The note says that Ricardo wants the …
Continue reading The Silence of the Rain: Luiz Alfredo Garcia-Roza
Review by Susan T. LandryPublished by Random House and Penguin Forgive me for starting with a brief digression before I tell you about Worn by Sofi Thanhauser. There is a connection. Last summer, July 2021, I read All That She Carried by Tiya Miles, which was a literal eye-opener. She tells the story of a …
Continue reading Worn—A People’s History of Clothing: Sofi Thanhauser
Published by William Morrow and Harper Collins “Ten little soldiers went out to dine; / One choked his little self and then there were nine.” Ten people are summoned to a weekend on Soldier Island, a rugged piece of rock off the Cornish coast with a single large house. Some have received invitations that purport …
Translated from Spanish by Suzanne Jill Levine and Aviva KanaPublished by And Other Stories “‘But you must know about the taiga syndrome, right?’ he asked...‘It seems,’ he continued, almost whispering, ‘that certain inhabitants of the taiga begin to suffer terrible anxiety attacks and make suicidal attempts to escape.’ He fell silent, though it seemed like …
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