Bourdain, notes editor Witherspoon, “had wanted to be a writer all his life.” His fame as the host of several television travel series, she adds, was accidental: The gigs were someone else’s idea, but as long as he got to write, it was fine. Some of the pieces assembled here are near-transcripts from those shows, …
During the dinner date they’re finally going out on, Chicago area therapist Gwendolyn Lord shares with English professor Cameron Winter a story she’s just heard from forensic psychologist Livy Swain, an old school friend, of an impossible crime. Owen McKay, arrested six months ago for killing his wife and son and crying, “It’s still there! …
When Santa Monica therapist Sarah Newcomb hypnotizes her patients, most of them remember past lives, decades or centuries ago. Not Marigold Chu. The young software engineer is a receptive patient, but under hypnosis, she describes another life that seems to be in the future—or even the present. That leads to two problems. One is information …
Nana no longer knows how to braid challah for Shabbat, and she no longer dances with her grandchild, Sarah, the way they used to. Distressed, Sarah seeks ways to release Nana from the grip of the Memory Thief. With love and compassion, Sarah tries to lift the curtain on the memories stolen from Nana and …
Fervor fuels this impressionistic celebration of basketball’s greatest performers. Serrano, the author of bestsellers about sports and pop culture, sticks with what’s made him successful, peppering this collection of essays about LeBron James, A’ja Wilson, and others with go-for-broke adjectives and references to rappers and action movies. You might not agree that Kobe Bryant’s final …
Opening during the spring of 2020, this book refracts the early days of the pandemic with the acuity of a laser, not unlike Straight’s previous novel, Mecca (2022). But if this is the situation of the narrative, its story is the complexity of love and longing, the edgy insistence of the human heart. Straight begins …
Newman begins her latest with a quote from Nora Ephron: “Death is a sniper. It strikes people you love, people you like, people you know—it’s everywhere. You could be next. But then you turn out not to be. But then again, you could be.” It sets an appropriate tone for a story that is just …
In a gathering of 30 essays and talks from 2016 to early 2025, Smith reflects on arts and politics, aging and craft. Several pieces were informed by dismaying political events: Receiving a literary award from Kenyon College three days after the 2024 American election, Smith talked about the need to protect vulnerable people; in Austria, …
López’s deceptively simple premise unfolds with perfect pacing as a snake suggests that Croco wrap his body around a tree trunk, birds recommend that he flap his (nonexistent) wings, and monkeys encourage him to leap out—all techniques that work brilliantly for the advisers but prove useless for a crocodile. Translated from Spanish by Maude, this …
Joey Carpenter is an insular, gay teenager navigating life in a homophobic town. After a friend’s uncle grooms him, leading him into a creeping relationship that culminates in sexual assault, Joey is eager to escape the explosive aftermath that hangs over him at school and home. As an attendee of the summer getaway Kamp Kromwell, …
