MetroPulse Stories: Books

Jamie Quatro’s Stories of Infidelity, Faith, and Family Herald the Arrival of a Bright New Talent

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 15:13:00 -0000

I Want to Show You More marks the emergence of a new Southern talent. Jamie Quatro doesn’t just dissect the modern marriage and the modern family, but the modern evangelical church. It’s a book to both devour and chew over.

Michael Moss Takes on the Processed Food Industry in 'Salt Sugar Fat'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 15:54:00 -0000

For a country that loves to eat as much crap as we do, we sure love to read about how terrible it is for us.

Like a Weak Cocktail, 'Drinking With Men' Is Best Left Aside

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 19:15:00 -0000

There has been a lot of discussion in certain circles lately over the memoir: Is it inherently narcissistic? Can it ever be journalism? Is anyone’s personal life ever actually interesting to anyone else?

Sebastian Faulks Examines the Meaning of Self in 'A Possible Life'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 02 Jan 2013 15:09:00 -0000

A Possible Life is a series of five disparate novellas that jump back and forth in time from the 19th century to the near future. But wait, you say, isn’t that just what David Mitchell did in Cloud Atlas, way back in 2004? And yes, you are right. There is more than one similarity between the two novels. However, were I to recommend but one of the two, it would be A Possible Life—and it wouldn’t be a hard decision to make.

The Best Books of 2012

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 26 Dec 2012 22:00:00 -0000

Is the year really over? Has the wealth of riches that has been the literary scene in 2012 really come to a close? I mean, the year had its down points—can we please stop talking about 50 Shades of Grey already?—but good god, if this wasn’t one of the best years for books in recent memory, then I don’t know what is.

Jon Ronson Takes Clever Reporting to the Ends of the Earth in 'Lost at Sea'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 15:20:00 -0000

Jon Ronson has a curious mind. More specifically, it’s a mind captivated by extreme people and situations.

Is Michael Chabon's 'Telegraph Avenue' an Elegy for Vinyl or a Tribute to Fatherhood?

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 14:52:00 -0000

What really sends Telegraph Avenue over the edge from realism to fantasy is that it’s a book about a record store in a mostly black neighborhood focused mostly on black music that neglects any mention at all of hip-hop culture until more than 200 pages have passed.

SEC Hijinks in Inman Majors’ Comic 'Love’s Winning Plays'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 05 Sep 2012 14:13:00 -0000

It’s a given that the nephew of one of college football’s most storied coaches might know a little something about the sport, especially if his father also played college ball and his grandfather coached for decades over at Sewanee. So it’s no surprise that Inman Majors’ new novel, Love’s Winning Plays (Norton), is a knowing satire of SEC football culture.

Femme Noir: The Best Hard-Boiled Novels of the Summer Are All Written by Women

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 15:21:00 -0000

While it’s likely the summer of 2012 will be best remembered in the publishing world for the utter domination of 50 Shades of Grey, the erotic trilogy hasn’t been the only best-selling surprise this year.

Summer Reading: '50 Shades of Grey' vs. 'Game of Thrones'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 19:26:00 -0000

'50 Shades of Grey' vs. 'Game of Thrones'—a review in comic-strip format.

Sheila Heti Asks 'How Should a Person Be?' in Her New "Novel From Life"

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 16:38:00 -0000

How Should a Person Be? is described as “a novel from life,” although it could equally be called a fictionalized memoir. The book’s protagonist is a Toronto writer named Sheila Heti whose best friend is a painter named Margaux Williamson (who is, in real life, a painter and one of the author Heti’s best friends).

'The Secret History' Meets 'Gossip Girl' in Jennifer Miller's 'Year of the Gadfly'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 15:03:00 -0000

Do we really need The Year of the Gadfly, a new novel by Jennifer Miller about a possibly villainous secret society at a small New England prep school? Probably not. However, if you’re a fan of the genre, The Year of the Gadfly is a mostly delightful addition to the canon and a better-than-average summer read.

Alan Greenberg Pays Tribute to Werner Herzog

everettm@metropulse.com (Matthew Everett) — Wed, 23 May 2012 18:30:00 -0000

This new, revised version of Alan Greenberg’s 1976 book collects fragmentary, dream-like scenes from the period—starting with his first meeting with Herzog at the Cannes Film Festival in 1975 and concluding with the final shoot for the film, in Ireland—plus Herzog’s screenplay and Greenberg’s photos from the production.

Hilary Mantel's 'Bring Up the Bodies' Mixes Political Terror and More Private Conspiracies

Wed, 09 May 2012 15:37:00 -0000

Bring Up the Bodies (Henry Holt), Hilary Mantel’s sequel to Booker Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award winner Wolf Hall (2009), arrives on the heels of the latest flare-up about women in literary publishing, kicked off by Meg Wolitzer’s New York Times essay “The Second Shelf.”

Be Prepared: Girl Scouts, Trailer Parks, and Growing Up in 'girlchild'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 14:59:00 -0000

Tupelo Hassman’s girlchild is a tough read. It’s not because the book is dense and impenetrable, although Hassman does stray from a conventional narrative structure. No, girlchild is a tough read because the string of events that happen to the novel’s protagonist, Rory Dawn Hendrix, are so harrowing.

Sarah Manguso Mourns a Friend in 'The Guardians'

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 15:15:00 -0000

“My friend died—that isn’t a story,” Sarah Manguso writes near the beginning of The Guardians: An Elegy. But, of course, it is. We all have friends, and we love them, and we lose them.

Two New Books Wonder How Much Work a Marriage Should Take

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 16:17:00 -0000

Maybe you’ve said it, maybe someone has said it to you, maybe you learned it from Friday Night Lights, but most Americans know: Marriage takes work.

'Running the Rift' Hurdles Olympic Training and the Rwandan Genocide

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 16:25:00 -0000

Running the Rift is a much better novel than The Help, but it suffers from the same problematic issue—can an American white woman write authentically and realistically about the issues faced by blacks? Can someone who lives a life of comparable privilege really get at the heart of something so horrible, so unimaginable as genocide?

Best of 2011: Books

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 17:00:00 -0000

I wish I could say I liked more books than I did in 2011. I really do. There were so many books I was excited to read, and so few of those lived up to my expectations.

Holiday Book-Giving Guide: Books for (Most) Everyone on Your List

gervinc@metropulse.com (Cari Wade Gervin) — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 15:52:00 -0000

Christmas shopping season is upon is, but there’s no need to stress. Who doesn’t like books? The problem is finding the right one for everyone—books for the nonreader, books for the picky reader, books for the precocious young adult. We can’t help you pick out a book for everyone, but this gift-giving guide should help narrow down your list. (We suggest going to an actual physical bookstore for assistance.)