Friends, we hope you’re having a good summer! Our members have been busy with reviews of books by authors including Yiyun Li, Bothayna Al-Essa, Lara Mimosa Montes, Craig Johnson, and Joyce Carol Oates, and interviews with writers like Evanthia Bromiley, Maris Kreizman, and Ayşegül Savaş. Take care, and thanks for reading!
Member Reviews/Essays
Former NBCC Emerging Critics Fellow Jenessa Abrams reviewed Yiyun Li’s Things In Nature Merely Growfor the Los Angeles Review of Books.
In her Girl Writing blog at the Washington Independent Review of Books, Ellen Prentiss Campbell wrote about visiting the Equal Justice Initiative’s Legacy Museum, Freedom Monument Sculpture Park, and Legacy Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama.
Former NBCC board member and recipient of the Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing Steven G. Kellman reviewed Michael Clune’s Pan for Arts Alive San Antonio.
Jake Casella Brookins reviewed Bothayna Al-Essa’s The Book Censor’s Library, translated from the Arabic by Ranya Abdelrahman and Sawad Hussain, for Strange Horizons‘ special issue on small presses impacted by the NEA cuts.
Michael Quinn reviewed Love, Joe: The Selected Letters of Joe Brainard, edited by Daniel Kane, for The Gay & Lesbian Review.
NBCC Vice President/Membership and Technology Rebecca Hussey, with co-hosts NBCC member Frances Evangelista and Dorian Stuber, discussed There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension by Hanif Abdurraqib for the One Bright Book podcast.
Mary Karmelek reviewed Lara Mimosa Montes’ The Time of the Novel for The Brooklyn Rail.
Linda Hitchcock reviewed Amita Murray’s An Unladylike Secret, Adriana Trigiana’s The View From Lake Como, and Craig Johnson’s Return to Sender for BookTrib.
Clea Simon reviewed The Slip by Lucas Schaefer for The Arts Fuse.
Martha Anne Toll wrote a roundup of books that get the world of classical music right for the Washington Independent Review of Books.
Nell Beram reviewed two books for Shelf Awareness: The English Masterpiece by Katherine Reay and Toni at Random: The Iconic Writer’s Legendary Editorship by Dana A. Williams.
Carol Iaciofano Aucoin reviewed Gary Shteyngart’s Vera, or Faith for WBUR’s Arts & Culture.
Ian MacAllen looked at how conservative satire often fails because of a lack of empathy in Scott Johnson’s The Sandersons Fail Manhattan at the Chicago Review of Books.
Robert Allen Papinchak reviewed Joyce Carol Oates’s Fox for Shelf Awareness.
Julia M. Klein reviewed Haley Cohen Gilliland’s A Flower Traveled in My Blood for The Atlantic.
David Starkey reviewed Miracles and Wonder: The Historical Mystery of Jesus by Elaine Pagels for California Review of Books.
Member Interviews
Former NBCC board member Anita Felicelli profiled Evanthia Bromiley and Nishant Batsha for Alta.
Paul Wilner spoke with Victoria Moore about Big Hearts on a Little Island: The Maui Community’s Heroic Response to the 2023 Wildfires for the Nob Hill Gazette.
NBCC Vice President/Barrios Book in Translation Prize and Co-Vice President/Membership Mandana Chaffa interviewed former NBCC board member Maris Kreizman about her debut essay collection, I Want To Burn This Place Down, for Chicago Review of Books and Ayşegül Savaş about her short story collection Long Distance for The Brooklyn Rail.
Adam M. Lowenstein interviewed Hanna E. Morris about her book, Apocalyptic Authoritarianism: Climate Crisis, Media, and Power, for Drilled.
Member News
Parul Kapur won the 2025 Georgia Author of the Year Award for First Novel for her literary debut, Inside the Mirror. The book also won an honorable mention for the Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award in Literary Fiction.
Sean Carlson’s debut work of fiction—a short story titled “Cricklewood”—aired on Irish national radio, RTÉ Radio 1. Listen here as guest host Belinda McKeon highlights her selections around the theme of “Shoes,” including Sean’s contribution, starting at 18:03 via the RTÉ Player.
The Sunday Times ran an excerpt from Hope Reese’s The Women Are Not Fine, published last week by Brazen Books, Hachette UK. Hope’s book was reviewed by Violet Moller in The Telegraph.
Martha Anne Toll was profiled by Margaret Hutton for Broad Street Reviewand interviewed by NBCC board member Tobias Carroll for Vol. 1 Brooklyn.
Terese Svoboda previewed her new book, Hitler and My Mother-In-Law, with an article in Slate, “The Curious Case of My Mother-in-Law’s Polio.”Terese’s book will be published on Oct. 7; please email Cassie Mannes Murray for review copies.