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Joe Quirk, Author of It’s Not You, It’s Biology: The Science of Love, Sex and Relationships

"Have you ever asked yourself the deepest philosophical question that drives all introspection, which is: Why am I so neurotic and screwed up? Well, stop blaming your mother. It's because you have three brains, and they have never once agreed on anything."

Paul Pope's 100%

100% is a love story, after a fashion. Or, more accurately, three loosely connected love stories, all told without so much as a drop of sentimental syrup.

My Beijing

Grandpa bought the place for cheap back in the sixties, a Communist blessing. Grandpa did good for high-ranking Reds. Black-and-white photographs of him with the Chairman hang where house guests will look.

Spring 2009 Poetry Collection

"For the poet / a tree is the fruit / not the root of poetry. / Origins are unimportant. / Color, shape misleading. / What's lovely is the sound."

The Last Gasp Hotel

Somewhere in the inaccessible reaches of my brain a control panel was lighting up, buttons were flashing, bells were ringing, but my feet were nailed to the floorboards of the Last Gasp Hotel.

Tamim Ansary, Author of Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes

"The story-like essence, that deep narrative structure, is the thing that is most true about a life. Writers who make up additional facts or change the facts in order to make of their memoirs 'a better story' are breaking faith with the proposition that the story-like essence actually exists."

The Sound of Silence: Review of All the Living by C.E. Morgan

The good news about C.E. Morgan’s debut novel is that it is not a big, noisy novel where information and sub-plots sprout like weeds on every page. In fact, rather than suffer from an excess of vitality, it might be argued that All the Living suffers from a vitality deficiency.

Snowshoes and Hunters: An Interview with Midlake

"I guess we got into more of this British folk thing and a 'fair maiden' thing as I call it, but I don't think we really sound like these bands, though there is more than a hint of it on the new album."

Joe Meno, Author of The Great Perhaps

"If you can't enjoy being in front of the computer for a couple of hours and writing something and throwing it out, you’re probably not going to enjoy being a writer."

How I Picked My First Communist In America

Though I am definitely myopic, I’m not naïve. I’ve met Communists in America before today. But not the real ones.

6 Questions: Surviving the Great Recession with Nick Nigro

Author of No Job? No Prob! discusses how to engage in a proactive job search, revamp your resume, and remain optimistic even when the odds are against you.

Interview: Yiyun Li, Author of The Vagrants

"William Trevor influences me more than any other writer, so in reality I write stories to talk to his stories. And a story can talk to another story in many ways--a line, a character, a few details, or sometimes it is the mood of the story, the pacing and the music of the story..."

California Über Alles

After this, you will leave the chocolate factory for a job on the Kölner-Düsseldorfer Linie bringing American tourists to see castles along the banks of the Rhine.

What We're Reading

music and film picks