The collection may give a sense of contemporary U.S. writing, but the marked unevenness is surprising given the magazine’s...
A collection of recent work from this venerable publication includes a dozen short stories that range as widely in style as they do in quality.
The term “unprofessionals” aims to distinguish the writers here from those who “write long and network hard” in search of commercial success, Paris Review editor Stein says in his introduction. That’s somewhat disingenuous: the author bios note 16 published or imminent novels, a senior editor at the New York Review of Books, and the New Yorker’s poetry editor. Never mind. Along with 5 essays and 14 poems, the fiction here represents what Stein calls “the intensity and perfection found only in small things.” “Intensity” certainly applies to some. Ottessa Moshfegh writes of a man’s weekend flight from his pregnant wife to an unplanned tryst with his brother’s lover. Angela Flournoy seems to capture a lifetime in a few hours of a gambling addict’s life as it moves from eviction to the roulette wins and then broke again. An S&M session between two men gets out of hand in Garth Greenwell’s painfully clinical prose. Atticus Lish carries the torch for Raymond Carver in his laconic tale of a blue-collar worker in and out of prison. Several pieces have the callow ring of MFA exercises. "Perfection” came to mind only with Zadie Smith’s angry, tense, hilarious story of a black transvestite shopping for a corset in prose that manages to suggest both Lou Reed and Flannery O’Connor. Special mention goes to John Jeremiah Sullivan’s evocative essay on the time he spent with 92-year-old Southern literary critic Andrew Lytle, an atmospheric portrait that some of these unprofessional fiction writers would do well to study.
The collection may give a sense of contemporary U.S. writing, but the marked unevenness is surprising given the magazine’s illustrious history.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-14-312847-2
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: Sept. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
There are unforgettable beauties in this very sexy story.
Passion, friendship, heartbreak, and forgiveness ring true in Lovering's debut, the tale of a young woman's obsession with a man who's "good at being charming."
Long Island native Lucy Albright, starts her freshman year at Baird College in Southern California, intending to study English and journalism and become a travel writer. Stephen DeMarco, an upperclassman, is a political science major who plans to become a lawyer. Soon after they meet, Lucy tells Stephen an intensely personal story about the Unforgivable Thing, a betrayal that turned Lucy against her mother. Stephen pretends to listen to Lucy's painful disclosure, but all his thoughts are about her exposed black bra strap and her nipples pressing against her thin cotton T-shirt. It doesn't take Lucy long to realize Stephen's a "manipulative jerk" and she is "beyond pathetic" in her desire for him, but their lives are now intertwined. Their story takes seven years to unfold, but it's a fast-paced ride through hookups, breakups, and infidelities fueled by alcohol and cocaine and with oodles of sizzling sexual tension. "Lucy was an itch, a song stuck in your head or a movie you need to rewatch or a food you suddenly crave," Stephen says in one of his point-of-view chapters, which alternate with Lucy's. The ending is perfect, as Lucy figures out the dark secret Stephen has kept hidden and learns the difference between lustful addiction and mature love.
There are unforgettable beauties in this very sexy story.Pub Date: June 12, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-6964-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
