Critical Notes

Claude Peck reviewed Patti Smith’s Year of the Monkey for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Priscilla Gilman reviewed Ann Patchett’s The Dutch House for the Boston Globe. Heller McAlpin reviewed Patchett’s The Dutch House and Leslie Jamison’s Make It Scream, Make It

Where do you read: On the subway? In a park? At a table? At the Washington Post, NBCC board member Mark Athitakis asks, Where do you read? His answer: The mall. 

Margaret Atwood's new novel The Testaments continues to sweep across the literary landscape. Megan Labrise interviewed Atwood about The Testaments for Kirkus Reviews. Former board member Colette Bancroft considers The Testaments in her column

Former board member Barbara Probst Solomon has died. She was 90. Solomon was known for her criticism, her memoir Arriving Where We Started, and her translations from the Spanish. Introducing Afred

Welcome to the latest news from the Nationa Book Critics Circle! We've got reviews and more for your holiday weekend. Elaine Szewczyk talked to humorist John Hodgman for Publishers Weekly

NBCC board president Laurie Hertzel, senior editor for books at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, wrote her weekly column about writers' bookshelves and reviewed the essay collection, Apple, Tree, edited by Lise Funderburg. Board member Mark Athitakis reviewed

Elaine Szewczyk interviewed Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers about his forthcoming memoir, Acid for the Children, for Publisher's Weekly. Martha Anne Toll reviewed The Yellow House by Sarah M. Broom

The first and biggest news of this past week was, of course, the passing of the great Toni Morrison, Nobel Prize winner, writer and mentor to so many. In 2015,

Elaine Szewczyk interviewed Sheila Weller about her forthcoming biography, Carrie Fisher: Life on the Edge, for Publishers Weekly. Joe Peschel reviewed Chuck Klosterman's story collection, Raised In Captivity: Fictional Nonfiction, for

Book critic Michael Lindgren, who has been writing for the Washington Post and other venues for many years, is setting criticism aside to for an equally noble pursuit: plunging deeper into the book business. He'll