Critical Notes

Road Trips with Andrew Sean Greer and Better Times for Women in Hollywood

By David Varno

NBCC board member and Best Translated Book Award judge Lori Feathers writes about why My Heart Hemmed In by Marie NDiaye should win this year's BTBA fiction prize.

Julia M. Klein shows how Hollywood used to be better for women, with her review of Nell Scovell's “Just the Funny Parts” and J.E. Smyth's “Nobody's Girl Friday” for the Forward. She also reviewed Scott W. Stern's “The Trials of Nina McCall” for the Boston Globe.

“The real stuff is how Tom Wolfe best used his write stuff,” writes Colette Bancroft for the Tampa Bay Times.

Laura Spence-Ash reviewed The Boatbuilder by Daniel Gumbiner for the Ploughshares blog.

“For summer vacation, the best audiobooks are about long, strange trips,” says Katherine A. Powers, in her recommendation of books by Charles Portis, Andrew Sean Greer, Bill Bryson, Candice Millard, and Paulette Jiles for the Washington Post.

Rebecca Kightlinger reviewed Víctor del Árbol's A Million Drops for Historical Novels Review

Ellen Akins's review of the 40th Anniversary Edition of Joy Williams's The Changeling for the Minneapolis Star Tribune was excerpted in The Week and mentioned in Jane Ciabattari's “5 Books Making News This Week” column for Lit Hub.

Grace Schulman reviewed Blue Rose, a new poetry collection by Carol Muske-Dukes, for the New York Journal of Books.

Harvey Freedenberg reviewed of Dan Harris and Jeff Warren's Meditation for Fidgety Skeptics for Harrisburg Magazine.

S. Kirk Walsh reviewed William Trevor's Last Stories for the San Francisco Chronicle.

Michael Magras reviewed A View of the Empire at Sunset by Caryl Phillips for BookPage.

For Jewish Journal, Erika Dreifus previewed seven titles to keep on your summer-reading radar.

Shoba Viswanathan interviewed Meena Alexander for Bloom.

Hamilton Cain reviewed Chasing New Horizons for the New York Journal of Books, and Jamel Brinkley’s A Lucky Man, William Trevor’s Last Stories, and Rachel Cusk’s Kudos for the Ten Titles to Pick Up Now, June issue of O, the Oprah Magazine.