About Book Marks
Recent Reviews
Aminatta Forna
Positive The Kenyon Review \"I’ll state flat-out that I don’t think this novel means to create a revolution ... Forna allows similar ripples in the scrim between worlds (in moments like the above and also in longer, italicized chapters set in different eras and locales) providing surprises of a poetic and uncanny nature ... As Attila and Jean subtly flirt, I found myself thinking, \'Uh, hello people, the missing kid?\' The novel might have benefited from the mother’s point of view, which would have provided a sense of immediacy and panic ... Happiness’s globalist worldview will reassure its readership—its heroes are the American expat, the doctor without borders, a plucky group of runaway-finding immigrants, and a skulk of scrappy, charmingly-named foxes using strategies of assimilation and camouflage to make a life for themselves in a world they never made ... With their creaturely assistance, Forna writes into the space between human / nature, a space where the novel shudders out of convention to reveal something wild.\
Marcy Dermansky
Positive The Rumpus Dermansky writes refreshingly about the way we think, choose, and act in real life ... With honesty and humor, The Red Car leads us to ask if we aren’t all just a little un-cherry.
Masande Ntshanga
Positive The Rumpus I sometimes found myself wishing the masked man amounted to more than he does, and that the book had a bit more narrative snap, the relief of suspense that comes with a flash of violence, a narrow escape, maybe some moral brinksmanship. But there are other pleasures to be had here, as Ntshanga weaves a diaphanous fabric out of narrative devices—like point of view, the novel’s sense of time, and intermingling with African folklore. The primary satisfaction of the novel is in experiencing Cape Town through Lindanthi ... The author has a sympathetic ear for the particular rhythms of young friendship, the banter, the petty arguments, the sticky and fleeting fun. The scenes that find Lindanathi, Cissie and Ruan doing nothing more than hanging out together are delightful and hilarious.