AltWeeklies Wire
New Scott Pilgrim!! Squee!!new
Everybody loves Scott Pilgrim—and if they don't, it's only because they haven't met him yet.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
02-05-2009 |
Fiction
David Sedaris Cranks Out an Airplane Readnew
When You Are Engulfed in Flames does feature flashes of that off-kilter Sedaris wit, but more often the stories here are quickly read and more quickly forgotten: entertaining enough, but easy to put away when the wheels hit the tarmac.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
07-03-2008 |
Fiction
Willy Vlautin's 'Northline' Really has Its Own Soundtracknew
The slow-strummed ballads that accompany Northline provide a lush companion to Vlautin's starkly descriptive prose, and wisely, they're wordless, so you can listen and read at the same time.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
05-01-2008 |
Fiction
'Animal's People' Takes on Corporate Responsiblitynew
The fictional town of Khaufpur is based on Bhopal, India, where a 1984 gas leak at a Union Carbide chemical plant caused thousands of deaths and countless more injuries.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
04-03-2008 |
Fiction
It's Easy to Read Because It's Badnew
Even the most distracted bus rider won't fail to notice that The English American isn't easy to read because it's frivolous; it's easy to read because it's bad. Larkin's sentences unfold with such hackneyed predictability that reading each one in its entirety hardly seems necessary.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
03-27-2008 |
Fiction
Hipsters Add John Brandon to Your Reading Listnew
His first book, Arkansas, has just been released by the McSweeney's Rectangulars imprint.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
03-13-2008 |
Fiction
Peter Carey Examines the Democratic National Convention of 1968new
But Carey's book is less about the events of the period than about its immediate consequences; about what happens when rich kids go revolutionary; about those who create tidal changes, and those who, through naivete or weakness, are swept up in them.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
02-21-2008 |
Fiction
Yes, It's a Werewolf Booknew
In Toby Barlow's surprising first novel, contemporary Los Angeles is secretly inhabited by packs of men who can, at will, transform themselves into dogs.
The Portland Mercury |
Alison Hallett |
02-14-2008 |
Fiction