Author Ethan Mordden serves up plenty of entertaining yarns, sometimes as exaggerated as the genre to which they pay homage.
Books
Book Review: “Bukowski, A Life” — The Poet of Skid Row
Some of the most insightful and moving parts of the biography are Neeli Cherkovski’s personal recounting of his on-again off again relationship with Charles Bukowski.
Book Review: “Time of the Magicians” — The Search for the Language of God
In his book, Wolfram Eilenberger has provided an absorbing view of a period in Western intellectual history that was committed to the new.
Book Review: “To Live and Defy in LA” — Gangsta Rap and the Creative Politics of Dissent
To Live & Defy in LA sees Gangsta Rap as an important way to understand how systemic racism has worked (and works) in America today.
Book Review: Up Close and Personal? — “The Years That Matter Most: How College Makes or Breaks Us”
With journalistic flair, The Years That Matter Most brilliantly shows how, in terms of college opportunities, the scales of justice tilt in favor of the wealthy.
Book Review: “Urban Legends: The South Bronx in Representation and Ruin” — Naked City
Peter L’Official has written an important book that speaks with powerful relevance to the state of Black life in America today — and the demands of Black Lives Matter.
Poetry Review: Henri Cole’s “Blizzard” — Writing as an Act of Revenge
In Henri Cole’s best poems, the outside and the inside interpenetrate and merge.
Book Feature: Children of the Revolution — An Interview with Lawrence Roberts about Mayday 1971
“One lesson is that when a country feels like it’s really gone off on the wrong track, a social movement that finds a way to express that dissent in the streets can really make a difference.”
Book Review: “Beneficence” – A Family, A Farm, An Unshakable Feeling
Beneficence is a novel that lingers, tucking details into its heavy folds.
Book Review: “What Makes the Monkey Dance” — The Mystery of Chuck Prophet
What Makes the Monkey Dance is a comprehensive examination of the life and career of an extraordinary artist that is smart enough to stop short of hagiography.