All Reviews

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  Life as It Should Be

  Devon Halliday on the lure of reality TV in Stephen Fishbach’s novel ‘Escape!’

  Devon HallidayJan 27

  • Fiction

  • Television

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  Toward a More Creative Vampirism

  Radu Jude’s ‘Dracula’ shines sunlight on the vampirism of cinematic AI and the ways studios have bled the vampire IP dry.

  Ryan BedsaulJan 26

  • Film

  • Cultural Studies

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  Ascetic Ghosts in the Machine

  M. D. Usher on Paul Kingsnorth’s impassioned and flawed new manifesto against the pervasiveness of technology in modern life.

  M. D. UsherJan 24

  • Philosophy & Religion

  • Science & Technology

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  Learn to Love Engineers

  New books by Dan Wang and Hu Anyan depict ‘both the achievements and the costs of China’s technological rise,’ and why Americans should take note.

  Afra WangJan 22

  • Politics

  • Science & Technology

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  We Lived Inside Sadness Itself

  On Brenda Navarro’s novel ‘Eating Ashes,’ newly translated by Megan McDowell.

  Cory OldweilerJan 20

  • Fiction

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  Haunted by Silence

  In Elisa Shua Dusapin’s novel ‘The Old Fire,’ newly translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins, two sisters must find a way to communicate without words.

  Grace LindenJan 20

  • Fiction

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  What Vallejo Do You Want?

  Dean Rader considers César Vallejo’s ‘The Eternal Dice: Selected Poems,’ recently translated by Margaret Jull Costa.

  Dean RaderJan 19

  • Poetry

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  Great Maestros of the Human Heart

  Larry Wolff attends the October 2025 Parma Verdi Festival to write about ‘Macbeth,’ ‘Otello,’ and ‘Falstaff.’

  Larry WolffJan 17

  • Music

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  Daddy Reissues

  Dinah Brooke’s 1971 debut novel ‘Love Life of a Cheltenham Lady,’ newly reissued, explores a young woman’s journey to realizing that ‘we should give up the charade’ of ‘heterosexual relationships and the bourgeois family structure.’

  Sophie PooleJan 17

  • Fiction

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  Not Exactly a Thesis

  Brais Lamela explores fiction, history, and the slipperiness of the nonfiction novel in ‘What Remains,’ newly translated by Jacob Rogers.

  Michael BarronJan 15

  • Literary Criticism

  • Fiction

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  Science on Ice

  Neil Shubin’s stories of polar exploration tell us about the losses ahead.

  Marissa GrunesJan 13

  • Science & Technology

  • Environment

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  A Guide to Living in and with Nature

  What the ancients can teach us about cultivating a sustainable world.

  Kurt CaswellJan 13

  • Philosophy & Religion

  • Environment

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  Toward a Feminism Without Gender

  Monique Wittig’s novels ‘The Lesbian Body’ and ‘Across the Acheron’ have just received new editions that reflect the feminist thinker’s ongoing cultural impact.

  Gabriel Ojeda-SaguéJan 12

  • Fiction

  • Gender & Sexuality

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  Dangerous, Decadent Depths

  John Knych dissects Hiron Ennes’s ‘The Works of Vermin.’

  John KnychJan 12

  • SF

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  Made for Strength

  Irene Katz Connelly argues for a new approach to witch hysteria via two recent novels, Olga Ravn’s ‘The Wax Child’ and Irene Solà’s ‘I Gave You Eyes and You Looked Toward Darkness.’

  Irene Katz ConnellyJan 10

  • SF

  • Politics

  • Gender & Sexuality

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   The Toxic Landscapes of War

  Gregg Mitman looks at the bodily damage that soldiers take home in Joshua Howe and Alexander Lemons’s ‘Warbody: A Marine Sniper and the Hidden Violence of Modern Warfare.’

  Gregg Mitman Jan 8

  • Environment

  • Politics