Why I Was LateCharlie PetchBrick Books, 2021 Review by Stella Cali Charlie Petch’s debut collection of poetry, Why I Was Late, opens with a love letter to C-3PO. “I always thought you were gay,” says the speaker. “I imagined...
Norma Jeane Baker of TroyAnne CarsonNew Directions Publishing, 2020 Review by Natalie Podaima Anne Carson’s Norma Jeane Baker of Troy, first staged at the Shed Theatre in New York City, is a poetic performance piece that retells Euripides’ Helen,...
Interview by Uche Umezurike Questions of displacement and diaspora haunt Brandon Wint’s poetry. In Divine Animal (Write Bloody North, 2020), Wint traverses the watery routes of memory to unearth the various ways that the spectres of history haunt modernity....
Recovery CommunityConor Mc DonnellMansfield Press, 2020 Review by Robert Colman A lot has been written about life in lockdown over the past year and a half—so much so that even new literary journals, including The Quarantine Review, have been...
Brighten the Corner Where You AreCarol BruneauNimbus Publishing, 2020 One Madder WomanDede CraneFreehand Books, 2020 Review by Marcie McCauley The cover of Dede Crane’s 2020 novel reveals the French Impressionist painter Berthe Morisot’s painting Peonies partially, as though a...
Interview by Uche Umezurike Yejide Kilanko’s new novel A Good Name (Guernica Editions, 2021) explores the complexities of relationships, traditions, and masculinities. Uche Umezurike sits down with the author to discuss the process behind her work. Uche Umezurike: A...
Interview by Kufre Usanga Uche Umezurike’s new collection Double Wahala, Double Trouble (Griots Lounge Publishing, 2021) touches on human relationships, the complexities of life, ecological degradation, police brutality, banditry and militancy, and masculinities. Umezurike illuminates various shades of troubles...
Beautiful World, Where Are YouSally RooneyPenguin Random House, 2021 Review by Alexandra Trnka Are the politics of Sally Rooney’s fiction empty or realistic? Such is the question around which critics pivot with the release of each of Rooney’s books....
Interview by Vivian (Xiao Wen) Li This year’s 2021 Jacob Zilber Prize winners‘ stories, chosen by contest judge Téa Mutonji, explore themes of sexuality, identity, branding, desire, and connection. Their words are luminous—reflecting and challenging society’s profit off time,...