AltWeeklies Wire
In 'The Big Rewind,' Nathan Rabin Uses His Pop-Saturated Memory as a Window into His Lifenew
Did I mention that most of this book is extremely funny? Rabin is aware that there are plenty of hard-luck stories out there, and he's just as hard on himself as he is on such targets as a video store boss, several girlfriends from hell and a Movie Club co-commentator married to the guy who wrote Soul Plane.
INDY Week |
Zack Smith |
08-28-2009 |
Nonfiction
New Anthology 'Love Is a Four-Letter Word' Examines Relief, Regret and Repentancenew
This anthology of "true stories of breakups, bad relationships and broken hearts" included stories from well-known writers like Junot Diaz, Gary Shteyngart, George Singleton, Lynda Barry and well-linked lit blogger Maud Newton. The book's epigraph, from Oscar Wilde, captures the complexities of the book's tone nicely; the heart, the Irish satirist tells us, was made to be broken.
INDY Week |
Gerry Canavan |
08-21-2009 |
Nonfiction
Suzanne Simons Gives Us a New -- and Timely -- Biography of the Man Behind Blackwaternew
Heroic in Master of War's opening pages, Simons ends her portrait with Erik Prince sputtering in impotent rage against a media he believes has unfairly maligned his company.
INDY Week |
Gerry Canavan |
08-14-2009 |
Nonfiction
New Book Looks at How Billy Graham Shook Up the Solid Southnew
Billy Graham played a key role in shaping the American political landscape of the second half of the 20th century, as confidante to presidents and adviser on domestic issues (particularly civil rights) and foreign policy (Communism and the Cold War).
INDY Week |
John Sinclair |
07-17-2009 |
Nonfiction
'The Book of Dads' Elicits Pungent Prose from Nearly All of its Contributorsnew
It seems appropriate that both The Book of Dads and Father's Day arrive at the onset of summer, when dads and kids head for the shore. A handful of these 20 essays take place on the water, and an aquatic vacation might be the best time to give your favorite father this enlightened, enlightening book.
INDY Week |
Adam Sobsey |
06-18-2009 |
Nonfiction
A Duke Historian Unearths a Motherlode of Forgotten Jazz Recordingsnew
Sam Stephenson has been studying W. Eugene Smith for 12 years. His second book, The Jazz Loft, is a massive oral history of Smith's former home in New York City.
INDY Week |
Jesse Jarnow |
03-26-2009 |
Author Profiles & Interviews
It's Time to Reread Gore Vidal's Enduring Lincolnnew
A reappraisal of Gore Vidal's 1984 novel about the 16th president, in his bicentennial year.
Man and Myth: The Flood of Lincoln Books Goes Onnew
The 11 essays Eric Foner has gathered attempt to wrestle from the mists of history and hagiography a balanced picture of the man who is almost certainly America's most sacred martyr: a sad-eyed, dour man in a stovepipe hat and beard that every schoolchild knows saved the country a long time ago.
INDY Week |
Gerry Canavan |
02-05-2009 |
Nonfiction
Paul Maliszewski Examines Literary Fraudstersnew
Fakers, a collection of essays that comes mostly from Maliszewski's contributions to Bookforum, Harper's, The Paris Review and other publications, examines not just the counterfeiters themselves, but those who publish, promote and read their work.
INDY Week |
Sam Wardle |
01-22-2009 |
Nonfiction
Poet Patrick Herron's Alter Ego Offers Up a Quirky Collectionnew
Whether the poem concerns a puppet longing to get the words right in love letters or a coded numerolanguage, at their core these verses seem to grapple with our very human programming.
Author Justin Catanoso Discovers His Family's Remarkable Legacynew
My Cousin the Saint is a reminder that the word "work" is as crucial as "miracle" in the phrases they share.
INDY Week |
Adam Sobsey |
10-16-2008 |
Nonfiction
Ron Rash's Sensational Appalachian Talenew
In the late 1920s, before George Pemberton's Boston Lumber Company constructed its western North Carolina logging camp—the setting for Ron Rash's haunting fourth novel, Serena—it set aside a portion of its land for a graveyard.
Tags: Ron Rash, Serena: A Novel
A New Southern Strategy in Bob Moser's 'Blue Dixie'new
In Blue Dixie, Moser argues that the Democrats' efforts to win without seriously contesting the South is flawed in tactical terms, profoundly misguided in strategic terms, and indefensible in moral terms.
INDY Week |
Thad Williamson |
09-18-2008 |
Nonfiction
'The World Without Us' Offers the Anti-Apocolypsenew
This was not the first time Alan Weisman had examined nature's resilience in the absence, nor near-absence, of humans.
INDY Week |
Gerry Canavan |
09-11-2008 |
Nonfiction
How Conservatives are Dismantling the Federal Governmentnew
Fresh off listening to Republican presidential nominee John McCain's acceptance speech last week, it was cathartic to visit with Thomas Frank's The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule.
INDY Week |
Bob Geary |
09-11-2008 |
Nonfiction
