PositiveForeword ReviewsRepresenting an erudite palette of influences, the ranging, observational essay collection Prairie, Dresses, Art, Other reveals a mind honed by literature and the arts.
Andrés N. Ordorica
PositiveForeword ReviewsElegiac ... A sensitive story of a first love, How We Named the Stars is a nuanced coming-of-age novel about hiding, heartbreak, and healing.
Cheuk Kwan
RaveForeword Reviews\"Flavorful descriptions of foods mix with adventuresome travel mishaps. Less-remembered history surrounding the Ming dynasty’s venturing into Africa, and how Chinese people fared under apartheid, enrich the book, while sprinklings of film references are hip, atmospheric flourishes. Here, traveling encompasses word-of-mouth scouting for film locations from the Amazon to Norway, but also lessons in ethnography. The stories of women in particular are resounding, encompassing both vulnerability and stalwart resolve. Have You Eaten Yet? is a fascinating, inquisitive global search for Chinese tastes that evoke home in any corner of the world.\
Rupert Thomson
PositiveForeword ReviewsLinked by incisive narrators and chance encounters, Rupert Thomson’s alluring novel Barcelona Dreaming braids three stories into a lush exploration of love and unmet longings ... The book’s dense, multistrand accounts encompass characters’ self-regard, as well as their unwillingness, at times, to see their situations from afar. Jordi’s tale, in particular, stands out. He’s a young man who’s too absorbed with the lives of others, but who alters his own course in time. His story line includes a fascinating story-within-a-story about psychological intimidation ... an astute novel in which adults risk being vulnerable, all while dangerous secrets lead to spontaneous actions.
Jim Lewis
RaveForeword Reviews... wondrous ... encounters among strangers result in unexpected relationships, and a montage that celebrates a city of manifold graces ... Lewis’s observant, gradual stories are linked by recurrent characters and figurative ghosts, which arise in people’s impressions of a city that’s marked by history ... Against this shifting vastness, surprising, intimate situations unfold ... Mixed in length, from a sketch comprised of a list of dead New Yorkers, to an extended, first-person departure set around a man who reminisces about love and loss during his academic years, these stories relish city seasons and backgrounds. They’re unabashed in their extended descriptions of passersby, who often wear striking clothing and make photo-worthy gestures, such that peripheral details accrue into their own spectacle ... The stories omit realistic grit, but nonetheless delve deeper than a romantic paean would: they burrow into their characters’ psyches with delicate, idiosyncratic deliberateness—wearying when it leads to too much introspection, and startling when it hits the right emotional notes ... a subtle, dexterous novel in short stories.
Norman Lock
RaveForeword Reviews... dark, carnivalesque ... The novel takes broad liberties with timelines and beloved figures ... [a] blistering satire of race relations in America ... hammer[s] home how ugly and absurd history is in hindsight, and how little changes ... The fascinating historical novel American Follies features lavish period details and unsettling alternative world building, warping expectations and standing out for its rapier wit.
Rachael Denhollander
RaveForeword Reviews... a mature, resolute Christian memoir that lends vital perspective to abuse and institutional cover-ups ... The long term consequences of Nassar’s betrayal are drawn in a clear-eyed way. Denhollander’s pain balances with a tender portrait of her husband and family. Her intelligent reflections reveal a woman of faith who chose to sacrifice her privacy and to seek justice with love and determination that no child face the same pain. Separating her own future happiness and healing from the outcome of the trial, she presents peace as possible. Hers is a compelling viewpoint that isn’t imposed as a solution for all survivors ... Treating a sensitive topic with unflinching truth, respect, and fair-mindedness, What Is a Girl Worth? fuses biblical notions with legal insights, personal journal entries, and heartbreaking data to make a lucid argument regarding the power of a single voice to inspire a chorus.
Ivelisse Rodriguez
PositiveForeword Reviews...a bold collection that marks the shortfall between romantic illusions and reality ... Here, love involves a challenging negotiation between what Latinx culture fosters and what individuals want to believe. Rodriguez deftly portrays this tension before her characters reach their decisive moments ... In a refreshing twist, despite bitterness or betrayal, believing in love becomes less naïve than singularly hard-won.
Camille Laurens
RaveForeword ReviewsLittle Dancer Aged Fourteen illuminates a slice of art history with ravishing acuity ... a tribute that melds research with quotations, intelligent inquiry, and the underside of the Paris Opera in the nineteenth century. In rhythmic translation, the face behind the sculpture puzzles and beguiles ... the author candidly admits her tendency to imagine. In a distinctly literary third act, the author weighs her own choices in the text, as well as the ineffable Marie who inspires obsession.
Jenny Hval, Trans. by Marjam Idriss
RaveForeword ReviewsMusician Jenny Hval’s Paradise Rot follows a Norwegian biology student and her hypertuned sensitivities. Electric, idiosyncratic, and disturbing observations elucidate Jo’s sexual awakening ... Psychologically dark and at times claustrophobic, this unusual debut portrays raw want as a gradual encroachment. Paradise Rot dances between dream and nightmare, probing the jagged line between exploration and suffocation with unnerving clarity.
Camille Acker
RaveForeword Reviews\"The experiences and disquieting realizations of black women come through Training School for Negro Girls, in which Washington, DC, and its surroundings are treated with tension and tenderness. Spanning girlhood to adulthood, these stories consider aspects of belonging ... A striking cross-section view of the capital’s corners, these stories contain, and sometimes restrain, hope; in fleeting glimpses, they also reveal the beginning of a way out.
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