Thomas Grattan, a New Yorker with German roots, displays an observant eye and a way with dialogue in his first novel.
Drew Hart
Book Review: “Desert Oracle” — Dwelling on the Fringe
Desert Oracle is an omnibus, a kind of hand drawn map, as well as a bit of a crackup — something you will peruse and possibly find the route leading to a deeper dive.
Book Review: Nicole Krauss’ “To Be a Man” — A Virtuoso Performance
Nicole Krauss’ new book of short stories generates a curious, understated, but genuinely transporting spirit, pretty much throughout.
Book Review: “The Silence” — Brusque Prophecy
Many Don DeLillo fans will overlook this novella’s somewhat stilted dialogue and perfunctory erotic scenes for the sake of another taste of his dark and knowing world.
Book Review: “Cuyahoga” — An Old-Fashioned Medicine Show of a Read
Filled with galoots of all kinds, the novel might not have any true reason for existing, nor may it have any reason to end. But heck, it’s a good, old-fashioned, medicine show of a read.
Book Review: “Pew” — Someone Truly Out of This World
In no way a ‘tale told by an idiot, signifying nothing’, Pew is instead a kind of reverie, a wide-eyed spin on the Southern novel.
Book Review: “In the Land of Good Living” — Satisfying Your Gonzo Curiosity
Ah, Florida, “the grease trap under America’s George Foreman Grill”: not just “weird America,” also “impending America.”
Book Review: “Cool For America” — A World of Dazed Impermanence
Hardly a portrait of glory from sea to shining sea, these tales drop in on estranged, lost, and overwhelmed people.
Book Review: “You Will Never Be Forgotten” — Curiouser and Curiouser
Whatever might be dark about these stories may also be — since they’re reliably witty and frequently very funny — a welcome distraction and relief from current events.
Book Review: “Weather” — Despite All the Ruckus
There’s a funny, parabolic quality to the emotional weather in Weather — amidst all the unsettling harbingers, the sensation of being in end times, there is still love.