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Book Rate: Reviews and Literary News

Lit Blog by Robert Birnbaum and Matt Borondy

Every weekday, we post a noteworthy book review or literary news item in Book Rate. Recent entries have covered Steve Krug's Don't Make Me Think! A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, Edward Hopper, new books by Atul Gawande and Christopher Hitchens, and audio from the recent PEN World Voices festival.

What We're Reading

A Collective Book Blog

Catch up on the latest recommendations from Identity Theory staffers and viewers in the What We're Reading blog, which is updated a handful of times a month (sometimes it's a very small handful).

Notable book Reviews

Free Burning by Bayo Ojikutu

Review by Michael Moreci | 11.9.06

It's not uncommon for a short work of fiction to elicit a reaction that calls for more—that the richness of the story and the characters could very well expand into a novel. Not so often is the inverse true for novels winnowing down to a shorter work, novella or less.

Martian Dawn by Michael Friedman

Review by Jeremiah Tucker | 10.17.06

The plot of poet Michael Friedman's new novel unfurls across Hollywood, a biosphere, a nameless space station, Mars, and the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at the Naropa Institute in Boulder, all places with an absurdity quotient significant enough to render serious, dramatic conflict difficult to sustain.

empress

Empress by Shan Sa

Review by Summer Block | 9.21.06

Shan Sa, the author of the prizewinning The Girl Who Played Go, has reached much further back in time for her latest effort, a fictional biography of Empress Shengshen, China’s only female emperor and one of history’s most legendary wicked women.

The Week You Weren’t Here by Charles Blackstone

Review by Summer Block | 9.14.06

The Week You Weren’t Here is the rambling interior monologue of Hunter Flanagan, a young writer living in Chicago and applying to MFA programs. Most of his mental energy is spent obsessively analyzing a series of past romantic entanglements and agonizing over present and future ones.

A Temple of Texts: Essays by William H. Gass

Review by Stephen Schenkenberg | 4.10.06

For Gass, reading is a form of aerobics. It is a demanding, exertive, physical act, and as such it stretches, tones, and conditions those who are turning the pages.

Jumping for that Elusive Truth

Lit Essay by Christian Bauman | 1.11.06

A look at the triumphs and tribulations of memoirists James Frey and Anthony Swofford and the lure of the publishing industry’s nonfiction fix.

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  • The books section of Identity Theory is currently maintained by Matt Borondy. We are looking for more contributors to our book blogs and a new reviews editor, so contact him if you are interested.

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