It Might Have Been
/In life there are no second chances, no do-overs. But what if we could keep trying until we got it right? Kate Atkinson explores the possibilities in a novel that just might win her a coveted literary prize or two.
Read MoreSnobs of Extraordinary Ability
/In Andre Aciman's latest novel, a man recalls his time as a graduate student at Harvard, revisiting the early days of a long-estranged friendship.
Read MoreBalkan Zoology
/Tea Obreht's The Tiger's Wife was universally acclaimed by critics, but behind its beautiful writing lie some dangerously unexamined stereotypes about the Balkans. Pedja Jurisic digs beneath the mythology.
Read MoreNo Kaddish For Old Men
/Does love create an unbridgeable distance between two souls? Marco Roth's searching memoir of his microbiologist father alternates between longing and numbness in its search for what, if anything, binds fathers and sons
Read MoreInfinite Reflection
/Born of ancient Buddhist philosophy into the fragments of the modern world, Yoko Ogawa's Revenge asks essential questions about what it means to be human.
Read MoreMaster of the Morbid
/The lurid pathology of Patrick McGrath's fiction - its endless procession of madmen, derelicts, and misguided psychiatrists - can often blind us to the fact that he is first of all a historical novelist - and a great one.
Read MoreOf Mice and Men
/Why, asks James Meek's latest novel, should the rich get smoother, easier lives than their less well-paid fellow men? And what can an innovative novelist do with the oft-visited 'immoral rich versus honorable poor' premise?
Read MoreThe Night Train for Naples: Gorky in Italy
/The great Russian writer Maxim Gorky's heart may always have been in Russia, but for years his intermittent stays in Italy stirred his creativity and fired his passion. "In love you discover everything right away," he wrote - and he loved Italy.
Read MoreFrom the Archives: Embossed Coins
/Elie Wiesel once claimed “a novel about Treblinka is either not a novel or not about Treblinka.” How does Steve Sem-Sandberg grapple with representing the unrepresentable in his sweeping chronicle of the Łódź ghetto, The Emperor of Lies? A review from our archives.
Read MoreExit the Dragons
/Yes, we know Sam Lipsyte's stories are laugh-out-loud funny. But all that low comedy--the pratfalls, the dirty jokes--serves as the ballast for some of the darkest stories in contemporary fiction. Steve Danziger elaborates.
Read MoreTrauma Room
/To make something we must first unmake or take apart something else. Why, then, in a novel preoccupied with acts of destruction and reconstruction, does Pat Barker not offer a corresponding deformation of form? Has her critique of Modernism led her to disavow art altogether?
Read MoreUnhappy In Its Own Way
/Car crashes, suburban swingers' societies, accidental prostitution, Nixon enthusiasts, and a cameo performance by Don DeLillo - in her latest novel, A.M. Homes maintains her equilibrium
Read MorePuce Needle Diggings
/When the Paris Review, long regarded as a literary standard-bearer, publishes a volume on the art of the short story, it flushes a flurry of conversations into the open: what is a short story? What constitutes an anthology-worthy example? What's the audience for this kind of thing? And: can these stories answer such questions?
Read MoreFlowers in the Pit
/“The eye says ‘Here is Anna Karenina,’” wrote Virginia Woolf; “A voluptuous lady in black velvet wearing pearls comes before us. But the brain says ‘that is no more Anna Karenina than it is Queen Victoria.’" Joe Wright's cinematic adaptation of Tolstoy's classic novel avoids the pitfalls of such literalism.
Read MoreA Little Cryptic, A Little Proud, A Little Mad
/In M. John Harrison's lyrical Viriconium trilogy, the high science of quantum physics meets the low art of fighting giant locusts. Justin Hickey finds a quiet spot to watch the chitin fly.
Read MoreAbsent Friends: “Warm, funny, sad, true … It is Perfect”
/"The proper function of a critic is to save a tale from the artist who created it" wrote D. H. Lawrence, but sometimes - most of the time - despite the best efforts of the best critics, both tale and artist disappear. What do we do with the criti-cal darlings of yesteryear, now filling the library bargain sale? And what of the critics, who called them imperishable?
Read MoreHumor: Wayward Authors Nabbed!
/The startling revelations in Anonymous turn out to be only the beginning: literary sleuths have uncovered a slew of other authorial misdemeanors.
Read MoreFiona’s Gambit
/John le Carré is still as popular as he's ever been, but what about Len Deighton? Our correspondent has gone back to Deighton's novels and found their Cold War intrigue and human dramas as rewarding as ever.
Read MoreWe've Been with Lizzie All Along
/A conversation about the enduring appeal of Pride & Prejudice.
Read MoreFrom the Archives: A Map of Faces
/In 2011, Aleksandar Hemon chooses his favorite short fiction from all across Europe. From our archives, Kevin Frazier celebrated these bracing imports.
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