Reviews Archive | Los Angeles Review of Books

All Reviews

Small-Town Tragedy, Big-Time Resentments
With subtlety, Susan Henderson attempts to understand, deconstruct, and empathize with small-town America.
Gina FrangelloApr 22, 2018
- Fiction
The Dark Side of Nice
D. Berton Emerson on Carrie Tirado Bramen’s “American Niceness: A Cultural History”
D. Berton EmersonApr 22, 2018
- Cultural Studies
- History
In the Habitations of Specters: On Stephen Graham Jones’s “Mapping the Interior”
Readers can feel confident following Stephen Graham Jones into the dark and obscure landscapes of his fiction.
Billy J. StrattonApr 21, 2018
- SF
How Stan Lee Became the Man Behind Marvel
Chris Yogerst on Bob Batchelor's recent biography of the comic book legend.
Chris YogerstApr 21, 2018
- Biography & Autobiography
- Comics
The Spirit of the Game
Joshua W. Jackson reviews David Wanczyk's "Beep: Inside the Unseen World of Baseball for the Blind."
Joshua W. JacksonApr 20, 2018
- Memoir & Essay
- Sports
Sharp but Narrow
Jacquelyn Ardam reviews Michelle Dean’s “Sharp: The Women Who Made an Art Out of Having an Opinion.”
Jacquelyn ArdamApr 19, 2018
Annotations of Pain: First Love in “The Only Story”
Thomas J. Millay finds Julian Barnes’s “The Only Story” a perplexing, profoundly enjoyable story about the phenomenology of love.
Thomas J. MillayApr 17, 2018
- Around the World
- Fiction
“Living in the Shadows of the Dead”: Cathy Otten’s “With Ash on Their Faces”
Cathy Otten’s new book tells the tragic story of the Yezidi women taken captive by ISIS.
Ryan BoydApr 16, 2018
Laughing in the Dark: On J. R. Pick’s “Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals”
A. M. Bakalar reviews “Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals,” a novella by J. R. Pick, translated from the Czech by Alex Zucker.
A. M. BakalarApr 15, 2018
- Around the World
- Fiction
Beast Mode
Colin Dickey on Peter Sahlins’s “1668: The Year of the Animal in France”
Colin DickeyApr 15, 2018
Free to What?: Reading Zadie Smith at a Best Western in Texas
While traveling in Texas, Aisha Sabatini Sloan takes in the culture and Zadie Smith’s “Feel Free.”
Aisha Sabatini SloanApr 14, 2018
- Memoir & Essay
The Gluttonous Genre Mutations of Rodrigo Fresán
The prose in Rodrigo Fresán’s “The Bottom of the Sky” bristles with energy.
Joey RubinApr 13, 2018
- Around the World
- Fiction
Lamentations of the Woman: Irreverent Feminism in Therese Bohman’s “Eventide”
It’s not your mother’s feminism in Therese Bohman’s “Eventide.”
Randy RosenthalApr 13, 2018
- Around the World
- Fiction
Navigating “The Epic City”
A multifarious portrait of a giant South Asian city.
Gary SinghApr 13, 2018
Papa Césaire’s Long Shadow: On “The Complete Poetry of Aimé Césaire”
André Naffis-Sahely reviews “The Complete Poetry of Aimé Césaire,” edited by Clayton Eshleman and A. J. Arnold.
André Naffis-SahelyApr 12, 2018
- Around the World
- Poetry
Whose Feminism Is It Anyway? Meg Wolitzer’s “The Female Persuasion”
Meg Wolitzer’s “The Female Persuasion” is a work of imagination and intelligence.
Lori FeathersApr 12, 2018
- Fiction