Books
The Strange Beach Novel That Would Make Mallarmé Proud
Chloe Aridjis’s Sea Monsters doesn’t care much for plot, instead seductively gathering energy through images, repetition, and metaphor.
The Books Briefing: What Stories About Childhood Teach Adults About Themselves
Your weekly guide to the best in books
What It’s Like to Go Back to School After a Shooting
Dave Cullen’s new book about the 2018 massacre in Parkland, Florida, vividly portrays the challenges of starting class again while recovering from trauma.
What Some of the World’s Last Hunter-Gatherers Have to Say
An ancient saying he learned from his subjects, the Lamalerans, showed the journalist Doug Bock Clark how to tell the story of a tribe with no recorded history.
Every Day Is a New Low in Trump's White House
The president steps over bright ethical and moral lines wherever he encounters them. Everyone in America saw it when he fired my boss. But I saw it firsthand time and time again.
Dave Cullen’s New Book on the Parkland Shooting Is Surprisingly Illuminating
With unrivaled access to the student survivors cum activists, the journalist brings new perspective to the massacre, one year later.
The Books Briefing: Beyond ‘Happily Ever After’
Your weekly guide to the best in books
How Aerosmith and Run-DMC Begrudgingly Made a Masterpiece
Initially, neither group was excited about collaborating for “Walk This Way.” The rest is history.
The Hardship of a Very Open Adoption
In Rock Needs River, Vanessa McGrady tells of how she invited her daughter's biological parents into her own home, and everyone had to live with the consequences.
What Medical School Doesn’t Teach About Death
A palliative-care doctor learns the language of suffering and the limits of medical control.
Apocalypse Is Now a Chronic Condition
Art about the endings of things used to be the stuff of tragedy. But today’s creators are finding another way to make sense of ongoing crisis: through comedy.
Books Briefing: What Famous Writers Had to Say About Writing
Your weekly guide to the best in books
John Roberts’s Biggest Test Is Yet to Come
The chief justice writes fiercely conservative opinions, yet champions the Court’s political independence. How will he respond to a constitutional crisis?
The Bitter Origins of the Fight Over Big Government
What the battle between Herbert Hoover and FDR can teach us
The Difficult Genius of Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
A new collection revives the legacy of one of India’s most confounding writers.
Hollywood’s Secret History of Sexuality
David Thomson’s fascinating, and frustrating, tour of gay subversion and female oppression in American movies
Closing the Gulf Between Black and White Christians
In a new book, a black evangelical challenges his white counterparts to take full responsibility for their complicity in racism, and to commit to changing America.
A Bold New Theory Proposes That Humans Tamed Themselves
A leading anthropologist suggests that protohumans became domesticated by killing off violent males.
A Brief Taxonomy of Fictional Academics
The most amusing pleasure of a campus novel is a particular sort of reveal: the topic of a character’s book or dissertation.
Wes Anderson Is Under Edward Gorey’s Spell
He was a writer-artist ahead of his time, but Tim Burton, Lemony Snicket, and American culture have finally caught up.