Articles

Water for Elephants (Alonquin Books, 2006) is absolutely superb. Author Sara Gruen apparently loves animals--her fist novel Riding Lessons is, as the title suggests, about horses. Water for Elephants goes beyond good writing--the entire concept is ingenious and intriguing.

A critic called Stuart: A Life Backwards (Delacorte Press 2006) by Alexander Masters "important." That is the best word to describe this book. Stuart is a gruff thirty-three year old , who has suffered some incredibly unfortunate events. Born with muscular dystrophy. Stuart was teased relentlessly through much of his childhood. His pain, sadly, did not end there.

"The sky was a donkey's swollen paunch, hanging threateningly low overhead."

Diary by Chuck Palahniuk is a force to be reckoned with. It's a little bit horror, a little bit psychoctic and little bit comedic.

Karen: I was thinking about the fact that good, emotionally-resonant experimental narrative is more rare to find than the heady or detached kind. I've been meaning to ask you, who were your prose influences when you started learning to write like you do now?

Tao Lin’s new book of poetry is Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy from Melville House Publishing. My review of the book is here. I asked Tao a few questions via email about the composition of the book and other methods.

William Walsh is the author of the novel Without Wax, A Documentary Novel. Without Wax is the fictional tale of Wax Williams, an adult film star. Available from Casperian Books.