[Mind redacted spoilers—highlight to reveal.] A successful book recommendation has one key component. Author familiarity? Genre bias? Language fluency? None of these. (Maybe language.) One and only one question unites all readers regardless of taste and five-star/one-star ratios: “Is this part of a series?” If the answer is Yes and the recommendation is anything beyond […]
Imagine how this opening sentence hits after Emma Cline’s boring mopes: “The morning before the school shooting passed like any other, all my neighbors out at dawn performing oblations to the angels on our roofs.” Pow! Brenda Peynado’s world-building is impressive considering the stories’ fantastic tendencies—her effortlessness is almost Philip K. Dickensian with how the […]
[This is the first of… many?… straight-up book reviews, rated one to five stars.] Emma Cline and/or her publishing company reduces ten stories down to the middle thirds of ten stories. The opening thirds (when unlikable characters might be justified) and the closing thirds (when it’s fair to expect any progress or resolution whatsoever) are […]
Week thirteen The game: Patriots at Chargers The beer: Springdale Brig Mocha Stout The result: Win, 45–0 Week fourteen The game: Patriots at Rams The beer: Maine Post-Ride Snack India Pale Ale The result: Loss, 24–3 The commentary: You see, last week—pre-Rams—was the time to discuss the Chargers game. “Forty-five to zero, you say? As […]
Week sixteen The game: Bills at Patriots The beer: Maine Fall Coffee Stout The result: Win, 24–17 Week seventeen The game: Dolphins at Patriots The beer: Newburyport Overboard India Pale Ale The result: Loss, 27–24 Playoffs, week one The game: Titans at Patriots The beer: Great Marsh London Brown Porter The result: Fuuuuuuck The commentary: […]
Week seven The game: Patriots at Jets The beer: Avery Ellie’s Brown Ale The result: Win, 33–0 Week eight The game: Browns at Patriots The beer: Lord Hobo Dark Lager The result: Win, 27–13 Week nine The game: Patriots at Ravens The beer: Ipswich Chucktoberfest Lager The result: Loss, 37–20 Week ten (bye) The beer: […]
“It’s very gratifying to say that Captain Beefheart’s [Trout Mask Replica] is a total success, a brilliant, stunning enlargement and clarification of his art. Which is not to say that it’s in any sense slick, ‘artistic’ or easy.” – Lester Bangs, Rolling Stone “If one is to enjoy Trout Mask Replica’s twenty-eight songs on a […]
The beer: Great Divide Hibernation English-Style Old Ale The commentary: An excerpt from the—by god—forthcoming “Don’t gimme no affliction: 25 years of ‘Moonlight on Vermont’ and other bush recordings.” During the summer of 1993, which fell between my freshman and sophomore years of college and would prove to be the final extended stretch of time […]
The game: Patriots “at” Raiders (in Mexico City) The beer: Boulevard Tough Kitty Milk Stout The result: Win, 33–8; Steelers win, 40–17; Brandon Kentaro wins, 4–0–0–0 The commentary: The Geeee Mennnn! Hal, Asterisk Jeff, Stephanie, the third and final Tom and the Kansas City Chiefs were no match for the Giants, G. and me at […]
I read a lot. Two hours on the train every day, there’s no excuse not to—I pity those who feel the need to jab at giant laptops in a can’t-leave-work-at-work cry for help. Newspaper Luddites filling up on yesterday’s analysis and the weirdos who stare straight ahead without listening to headphones or looking out the […]
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