A densely-packed and wonderfully readable new biography of Isherwood, surely the book destined to be the definitive life of the man (and the men in hiA densely-packed and wonderfully readable new biography of Isherwood, surely the book destined to be the definitive life of the man (and the men in his life). My full review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/c......more
A breathless, cliched, and often ridiculous look at the final years of King George VI. The author has done some research, but he when he got to his wrA breathless, cliched, and often ridiculous look at the final years of King George VI. The author has done some research, but he when he got to his writing table, he ended up preferring gossip, salacious footnotes, and bombastic nonsense over any kind of sober analysis. Readers who want a Royals biography to love the queen and dish the dirt will eat this up - but there's not much more here. My review: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/p......more
This Shakespeare book - big, generous, quite readable - examines the effects Lady Elizabeth Russell may or may not have had on the world of ShakespearThis Shakespeare book - big, generous, quite readable - examines the effects Lady Elizabeth Russell may or may not have had on the world of Shakespeare's theater, and it's very good on both the lady and the theater parts of the story, even Shakespeare himself, as always, continues to be elusive. My review here: https://www.stevedonoghue.com/review-......more
Reading the poems of the great Marianne Moore, or her letters, or just bumping into snippets of her antics and the odd, larger-than-life persona she tReading the poems of the great Marianne Moore, or her letters, or just bumping into snippets of her antics and the odd, larger-than-life persona she took on in her later years will most almost any readers wish there were a big, definitive biography -- and there is, this one! My full review here: https://www.stevedonoghue.com/review-......more
It's always frustrating when first-rate prose-crafting skills are enlisted to unworthy ends, and even worse when the raw material of a good novel is eIt's always frustrating when first-rate prose-crafting skills are enlisted to unworthy ends, and even worse when the raw material of a good novel is emblobbed all over with the posturings and gimmicks of arid postmodern game-playing, and that certainly happens here. My full review: https://www.stevedonoghue.com/review-......more
Former Microsoft wonk Dennis Yi Tenen here whips up an entry for the "Norton Shorts" series about all the things artificial intelligence likes to do iFormer Microsoft wonk Dennis Yi Tenen here whips up an entry for the "Norton Shorts" series about all the things artificial intelligence likes to do in its spare time, the things it dreams about, the kinds of stuff it likes to read - all the kinds of exaggerations, wild overstatements, and low-rent science fiction that responsible tech-specialists spend lots of time correcting or tamping down. It certainly makes for entertaining reading. My review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/l......more
A doubtless unfair but probably inevitable litmus test for any biography of pioneering choreographer Martha Graham is fairly simple: can the biographeA doubtless unfair but probably inevitable litmus test for any biography of pioneering choreographer Martha Graham is fairly simple: can the biographer make Graham's world very specific art form comprehensible and interesting to the uninitiated? When it comes to modern dance, I'm about as uninitiated as it's possible to be, and thanks to the writing skills of Deborah Jowitt, I not only found this biography fascinating but I felt warmly, intelligently instructed in what exactly made Graham a great figure in the history of dance. My full review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/e... ...more
In 1500, artist Jacopo de' Barbari produced a massive woodcut print of the city of Venice - not the over-generalized and detail-free like most city-prIn 1500, artist Jacopo de' Barbari produced a massive woodcut print of the city of Venice - not the over-generalized and detail-free like most city-prints were in the era, but remarkably detailed right down to little side canals and recognizable buildings. It was a big, expensive luxury item at the time but also an invaluable historical resource now, and this volume from Duke University Press opens with large fold-out map of the View itself and follows that up with a dozen scholarly papers on all aspects of the print and the Venice it represents. Such a treat for fans of both history and Venice! My review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/a......more
Dan Jones continues the Hundred Years War adventures of his core group of grizzled warriors, the Essex Dogs, as they hack and slash and slosh and steaDan Jones continues the Hundred Years War adventures of his core group of grizzled warriors, the Essex Dogs, as they hack and slash and slosh and steal and slur their way across the French countryside, moving from the carnage of Crécy to the siege of Calais. The only possible drawback to this sequel will also be its greatest strength to most of its readers: its character-drawing, action, pacing, tone, anachronisms, and color are absolutely identical to everything found in its preceding volume. This in itself is a feat, as is the rabid readability of the whole thing. Any fears of the dreaded "dull middle volume" are completely dispelled before the first chapter is over. My full review here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/w......more
Avery's novel imagines a fantasy world in which human guides step through a mystical mirror to the realm of the gods and escort back to the world eachAvery's novel imagines a fantasy world in which human guides step through a mystical mirror to the realm of the gods and escort back to the world each of the successive calendar seasons. Tirne, the young escort of the beautiful god Autumn, has no sooner brought him through to the human realm he'll rule for the next few months than the portal between worlds shatters behind them, stranding Autumn and subjecting the world to the "longest autumn" of the book's title. Avery does a very assured job of rendering her story and adds a terrific twist: the longer Autumn stays in the mortal world, the more human he becomes - and the more he's attracted to Tirne. My full review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/t......more
The latest entry in Princeton's terrific "Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers" series presents new translations of some of writings of the ancient physiThe latest entry in Princeton's terrific "Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers" series presents new translations of some of writings of the ancient physician Galen (doctor to Marcus Aurelius) and asking the question: Does Galen have anything useful or beneficial to tell 21st-century readers about health or wellness? Despite the fact that the most advanced doctors of his time knew less about biology than the average high school student does today? The answer, of course, is no - but what self-respecting book series would let a silly detail like that get in the way? Fortunately, translator Katherine Van Schaik does such a fantastic job judiciously selecting from Galen's body of work that that the volume is fascinating anyway. My review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/h...
This book is full of equations, but it's also full of odd, dorky passion. It's the author's spirited defense of all the complicated math that goes intThis book is full of equations, but it's also full of odd, dorky passion. It's the author's spirited defense of all the complicated math that goes into the technology behind the humble FM/AM radio, and from that description, you'd hardly think it had any chance of keeping you reading. But it kept me reading, and my understanding of math is exactly equal to that of an 8-year-old beagle. And it goes without saying that this book will be required reading for actual radio enthusiasts. My full review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/t......more
The main character in Marie-Helene Bertino's oddly touching novel feels a cultural alienation that will be very familiar to most people currently enduThe main character in Marie-Helene Bertino's oddly touching novel feels a cultural alienation that will be very familiar to most people currently enduring the appalling 21st century, but Adina takes it further: she's convinced that she's in contact with alien beings, regularly giving them carefully-faxed field reports about all the puzzling human behaviors she observes. But she nevertheless lives in the real world, and human experiences, good and bad, are her inevitable fate. It's a fairly obvious conceit, but Bertino handles it all so wonderfully and intelligently that readers will be completely pulled in. My full review here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/b......more
Any new hardcover release that's 70 pages and nearly $30 was bound to be a disappointment on a couple of levels no matter what, but this little slip oAny new hardcover release that's 70 pages and nearly $30 was bound to be a disappointment on a couple of levels no matter what, but this little slip of a thing adds a few insults to that injury. It's the story of a group of scientists who've been successful in genetically repopulating a herd of mammoths on the Russian steppes. Their experiments with mammoth DNA have been successful, but they realize this doesn't really speak to the behavioral aspects of actually BEING a mammoth in the wild. For that, inexplicably, they decide they need to download the computerized consciousness of a passionate elephant conservationist into the body of a mammoth matriarch, so she can teach the whole herd what it's like to be a mammoth (despite the fact that absolutely no human could ever possibly even begin to know that). Plot ensues - but not much plot, and no satisfying elaborations in this wee handful of pages. My review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/t......more
For decades, William Maxwell quietly and courteously shaped and guided the fiction appearing in the New Yorker, calming down egomaniacs and filling waFor decades, William Maxwell quietly and courteously shaped and guided the fiction appearing in the New Yorker, calming down egomaniacs and filling wallflowers with the courage to find their own talent. And along the way, he had a long and active writing career of his own. In this slim volume, Alec Wilkinson assembles some of that writing. My full review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/t......more
Thanks to the proliferation of both social media and AI, the issues surrounding the idea of copyright have never been more pressing -- or more widesprThanks to the proliferation of both social media and AI, the issues surrounding the idea of copyright have never been more pressing -- or more widespread. Which makes this new book that most deadly of adjectives: relevant. Fortunately, it's also really good, full of lively prose and all the history and interpretation the 21st century needs on the subject. My full review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/w......more
Mariah Fredericks follows up her very popular "The Lindbergh Nanny" with this terrific novel in which Edith Wharton - no longer young, years after herMariah Fredericks follows up her very popular "The Lindbergh Nanny" with this terrific novel in which Edith Wharton - no longer young, years after her previous hit novel, generally dissatisfied - meets and instantly dislikes a brash New York novelist who gets under her skin ... and very shortly afterward is shot dead outside New York City's Gramercy Park. Mrs. Wharton can't help herself: she begins inquiring into who might have wanted that novelist dead. Fredericks makes it all work just wonderfully. My full review here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/t......more
The strange witchy-woman who lives on M'Sauga Island outside small-town Michigan in Bonnie Jo Campbell's newest (and very much best) novel distrusts tThe strange witchy-woman who lives on M'Sauga Island outside small-town Michigan in Bonnie Jo Campbell's newest (and very much best) novel distrusts the outside world of men and their violence and their soulless medicine, even though all of her equally eccentric daughters are deeply and ambivalently involved in that world. In this weird, beautiful story, all the family's old secrets (and a couple of blockbuster new ones, one very effectively saved for the end of the book) are gradually dredged from the muck. This kind of heavily-written hick-lit is ordinarily guaranteed to annoy me, but this book completely swept me away. My full review here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/t......more
In this English-language translation of the Japanese bestseller, the author paints a picture in which all of humanity has a common enemy and a common In this English-language translation of the Japanese bestseller, the author paints a picture in which all of humanity has a common enemy and a common cause: catastrophic climate change, the acceleration of which will devastate economies and render swaths of human civilization untenable. The problem, as he sees it, is rampaging capitalism, which has fenced in all the "commons" of human life and strangled all but a few vestiges of human happiness. Here he calls for 'degrowth communism' to reverse these inequalities and give the species a chance to survive its own prosperity. As with all calls for any kind of communism, he's strategically unclear on who would be in charge of the degrowing (hint: they're the ones with summer dachas), but even so, there are some genuinely urgent points here, some undeniable truths. My full review is here: https://openlettersreview.com/posts/s......more
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