We hope you’re having a great fall so far! Our members have been busy with reviews of books by authors including Arundhati Roy, Francesca Wade, Thomas Mallon, Susan Orlean, Laura Vazquez, and interviews with writers such as Taylor Byas, Laura Restrepo, and Quan Barry. We also have three events coming this week that you won’t want to miss—read on for details!
Upcoming NBCC Events
Friends, register now! Today, Oct. 20 at 4 p.m. Pacific/7 p.m. Eastern, please join us on Zoom for “Criticism 101: Interview Fundamentals,” led by NBCC President Adam Dalva. Adam will share practical approaches to getting your author interviews pitched and accepted, and break down tactical differences among the many forms that interviewing can entail. Cost: $10 for non-members/free for NBCC members (fee can be applied to a new NBCC membership within two weeks of the event). Register here.
And on Tuesday, Oct. 21, from 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Pacific, we’ll be holding a panel, “The Who, What, When & How of Literary Prize,” with LitCamp and media sponsor Publishers Weekly, at the Litquake festival in San Francisco at Page Street Writers (297 Page St.). Join NBCC board members Jane Ciabattari and Iris Jamahl Dunkle; former NBCC board member Oscar Villalon, who also has been a Pulitzer and National Book Award judge; and May-Lee Chai, longtime chair of the NBCC autobiography awards panel. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. This event is free, with a $10–15 suggested donation to support Litquake and the NBCC. RSVP here.
Mark your calendars for a virtual event on Thursday, Oct. 23, at 9 a.m. Pacific/12 noon Eastern! Have you ever found yourself waiting endlessly to be paid for your writing? One advantage of joining the National Writers Union is that if you have an issue with any publisher or outlet you write for and can’t resolve it yourself, a NWU grievance officer will advise you or negotiate the case for you. In this event, sponsored by the NWU and NBCC and moderated by Lily Meyer, join NWU’s David Hill and Daisy Alioto to hear how the grievance process works and learn from their hard-won wisdom about how to handle grievances ranging from copyright violations to editorial malpractice to payments that never arrive. Register here.
Member Reviews/Essays
NBCC Emerging Critics Fellow Diya Isha wrote about Arundhati Roy’s Mother Mary Comes to Me for The Swaddle.
Brian Tanguay reviewed Banished Citizens: A History of the Mexican American Women Who Endured Repatriation by Marla A. Ramirez and The World After Gaza: A History by Pankaj Mishra for the California Review of Books.
Carol Iaciofano Aucoin reviewed two mystery novels, Olivia Blacke’s Death at the Door and Tom Ryan’s We Had a Hunch, for WBUR’s Arts & Culture.
NBCC Co-Vice President/Awards Iris Jamahl Dunkle reviewed Francesca Wade’s Gertrude Stein: An Afterlife for Finding Lost Voices.
Sheila McClear wrote an essay about Thomas Mallon’s The Very Heart of It: New York Diaries, 1983-1994 for The Nation.
Karl Wolff reviewed Grady Chambers’ Great Disastersfor The Driftless Area Review.
Heather Treseler reviewed the young Irish poet Molly Twomey’s collection, Chic To Be Sad, in the recent edition of Plume.
Former NBCC President Laurie Hertzel reviewed Susan Orlean’s Joyride for The Boston Globe and Brian Buckbee’s We Should All Be Birds for The Washington Post.
Kristen Martin reviewed John J. Lennon’s The Tragedy of True Crime for The New Republic.
Rafael C. Castillo wrote about The Autobiography of Malcolm X for the San Antonio Express-News.
Kai Maristed reviewed The Endless Week, written by Laura Vazquez and translated from the French by Alex Niemi, for The Arts Fuse.
Marcie Geffner reviewed Maria Dahvana Headley’s Beowulf: A New Translation for her Substack, Six Forty-Five.
George Yatchisin reviewed Xenobe Purvis’ The Hounding for the California Review of Books.
Member Interviews
Elaine Szewczyk profiled Laura Restrepo for Publishers Weekly.
Sullivan Summer interviewed award-winning poet, features editor at The Rumpus, and former NBCC Emerging Critics Fellow Taylor Byas about her new collection, Resting Bitch Face, for the New Books Network.
Hannah Bonner interviewed Nia DaCosta about her film adaptation Hedda for Literary Hub.
NBCC Co-Vice President/Events Jane Ciabattari’s Literary Hub conversation this week is with award-winning poet/playwright Quan Barry, author of the new novel, The Unveiling.
Member News
Former NBCC President Laurie Hertzel’s second memoir, Ghosts of Fourth Street, will be published on March 31, 2026, by the University of Minnesota Press.
Former NBCC Emerging Critics Fellow Antonio López is the new poet laureate of San Mateo County, California.
Hollay Ghadery’s fourth book and debut novel received its first advance review in The Ottawa Review of Books.
Rafael C. Castillo’s The Language of Sparrows and Other Stories was published on Aug. 8 by Tiltwood Press.
Kai Maristed’s full-length play, Paul and Émile, or the Masterpiece, has just finished a successful fully staged run to standing ovations at the Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater. Kai welcomes inquiries from theaters, producers, and fellow writers.
Jeff Alessandrelli was interviewed on the Otherppl podcast by Brad Listi about the concept of minorness, which he also wrote about on the Substack Zona Motel.
“Book Bus” by Eden, Janine and Jim is licensed under CC BY 4.0.