Greetings NBCC Friends,
Hope you’re enjoying the summer. Here’s the latest roundup of reviews, interviews, and news from our prolific freelancers.
Please note that next week’s newsletter will come out on Tuesday, July 5, due to the holiday. We wish you a Happy Fourth of July in advance!!
Enjoy, stay safe, and thanks for reading!!!
Member Reviews/Essays
NBCC Emerging Critic Kathy Chow reviewed Elaine Hsieh Chou’s Disorientation for Hyphen Magazine.
NBCC board member May-lee Chai wrote about the legacy of Vincent Chin’s murder, which occurred forty years ago this month, for “The Emancipator” of The Boston Globe.
NBCC VP/Membership+Tech Chelsea Leu reviewed Thuận’s novel Chinatown, translated from the Vietnamese by Nguyễn An Lý, for Astra.
NBCC board member Joanna Scutts reviewed The Baby on the Fire Escape: Creativity, Motherhood, and the Mind-Baby Problem by Julie Phillips for The New Republic.
Former NBCC board member Marion Winik wrote about attending her stepdaughter’s wedding in Hawaii in her “Bohemian Rhapsody” column for the Baltimore Fishbowl. She also reviewed The Foundling by Ann Leary for The Washington Post and compiled a preview of summer books for Newsday.
Former NBCC board member Stephanie Burt wrote about Imogen Binnie’s Nevada in a piece entitled “The Invention of the Trans Novel” in the New Yorker.
Former NBCC Emerging Critic Rishi Reddi reviewed Madhushree Ghosh’s Khabaar: An Immigrant Journey of Food, Memory, and Family for the Los Angeles Review of Books.
Barbara J. King reviewed An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us by Ed Yong for NPR.
Kate Knibbs reviewed Jordan Castro’s The Novelist for Wired.
Ron Slate commented on Aurelia, Aurélia by Kathryn Davis; Son of Svea byLena Andersson; and The Night Albums by Kate Palmer Albers in his “Book Notes” column for On the Seawall.
Jeremy Lybarger reviewed The Letters of Thom Gunn, edited by August Kleinzahler, Michael Nott, and Clive Wilmer, for The New Republic.
Dara Yen Elerath reviewed Sean Singer’s Today in the Taxi for Lit Pub.
Kristen Martin reviewed Alexandra Lange’s Meet Me by the Fountain for The Atlantic.
Charles Green reviewed Lafayette Place by Jefferson Flanders for Blueink Review.
Julia M. Klein reviewed Lisa Brahin’s Tears Over Russia for the Forward.
Diane Josefowicz reviewed Snow Crow, the sixth annual anthology of prize-winning flash fiction published by Ad Hoc Fiction, for Necessary Fiction.
Frank Freeman reviewed Ghost of the Hardy Boys: The Writer Behind the World’s Most Famous Boy Detectives by Leslie McFarlane for the Dublin Review of Books.
Linda Hitchcock reviewed Jenny Colgan’s An Island Wedding for BookTrib. She also reviewed Hilary Mantel’s Learning to Talk for the same outlet.
Cory Oldweiler reviewed Georgi Gospodinov’s Time Shelter, translated from the Bulgarian by Angela Rodel, for the Los Angeles Review of Books. He also reviewed Jess Walter’s The Angel of Rome for the Minneapolis Star Tribune.
Clea Simon reviewed Hilary Mantel’s Learning to Talkfor The Boston Globe.
Member Interviews
NBCC board member Lori Feathers and co-host Sam Jordison talked to author Patrick McCabe about his ghost-rich novel in free-verse, Poguemahone, for their “Across the Pond” podcast.
NBCC VP/Events Jane Ciabattari spoke with Kirstin Chen, author of Counterfeit, about how her novel shatters the myth of the model minority for Lit Hub.
NBCC board member Mandana Chaffa interviewed Taylor Brorby about his memoir, Boys and Oil: Growing Up Gay in a Fractured Land, for the Chicago Review of Books.
Former NBCC board member Marion Winik interviewed Emily Henry, author of Book Lovers, for Kirkus Reviews. She also recently did a live Q&A with John Waters at the bookstore Politics & Prose, a transcript of which appeared in the Washington Blade.
Member News
Former NBCC board member Marion Winik’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” column for the Baltimore Fishbowl recentlywas awarded second prize in the “Local Column: Humor or Feature” category at the MD/DC Press Awards. Read her piece, entitled “The Cicadas and the Sun,” here.
Jenny Shank’s short story collection, Mixed Company (Texas Review Press), won the Colorado Book Award in the General Fiction category.
“Goleta, CA” photo by NBCC member Paul Zakrzewski. Used with permission.
SEND US YOUR STUFF: To have your work featured in the weekly Critical Notes, please join the NBCC (or renew your membership). Thanks!!