Not to get all inside baseball on you, but this review of Shelley Seale's memoir/reportage from her time in India was delayed by an almost tragicomic set of circumstances seemingly destined to keep this book from getting reviewed at all. Throughout it all, Seale was polite but persistent, and after we (finally) had the book in our hands and read it, her dedication to the work came into a wider perspective. Most books have something of import to communicate to the reader, but this true life account of Seale's trips to India in the middle and end of the last decade exposed her to not just tremendous poverty, but to its most helpless and legion victims, children, many of whom are also having their years of innocence wiped away by plagues of disease, forced labor and nothing short of sexual slavery. more ›

What Gods Would Be Theirs is a novel by Colin Shanafelt, a Professor of English and Humanities at ACC, and with that background in mind it's unsurprising that this book explores the impact of his profession on the young, developing mind. A study in the extremes of passion, the novel concentrates on a set of protagonists. The idealistic do-gooder Gavin McBride and the cynical Laird Hardin both struggle with a world that hasn't satisfied their expectations - McBride's Peace Corps stint was a bust, and Hardin chafes under the three-fold responsibilities of fatherhood, marriage, and his career. The way these men handle their challenges and the results of their choices form the crux of this novel. more ›

Trash is the story of three "dumpsite boys" who in the course of their daily foraging through literal mountains of trash, come across a small bag containing keys to a secret that just might change everything around them. The boys are Raphael, Gardo and Rat, and the three live in an unnamed poverty-stricken country rife with political corruption. more ›

In The Cross of Redemption, editor Randall Kenan has brought together fifty-four previously uncollected writings by James Baldwin. These assorted essays, letters, reviews and profiles act as a reminder of the great power language has when used in the service of a talent like Baldwin's. more ›

We put so much pressure on our babies. For nine months we expect them, hoping that they’ll arrive Happy and Healthy, that they’ll grow up to be Smart and Strong. We have secret plans - intentions, if you will - for how they will be received in the world. And then there are the babies of “Babies”, the opening story in Amelia Gray’s new book, Museum of the Weird, who arrive unexpected and overnight - over and over again. more ›

Imagine you are a writer with a secret addiction - an insatiable urge to play video games morning, noon and night, actively ignoring your deadlines, your family, your life. Imagine your mission within these games is to try to convince those around you who expect more than a high score or game completion that what you just did for the last nine hours was actually quite relevant to your work. It would be, if you were Tom Bissell, author of Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter; but since you're not, what's your excuse? more ›

Joe Meno’s breakout 2004 novel, Hairstyles of the Damned, was a punk-rock coming of age story rooted in the Chicago scene. Meno’s strong ear for dialogue still rang with the often-hilarious angst of rebellious adolescence, and his book, published by the indie house Punk Planet, had a whiff of the underground about it. Since then, like your favorite band that no one used to know about, Meno has moved up to the big leagues, publishing with Norton and being honored for his craft alongside established names like Tobias Wolff and Jhumpa Lahiri. Now he releases a new novel, The Great Perhaps, about a halfway-dysfunctional family trying to keep itself together as both parents go through mid-life crises. We couldn’t help but wonder how Meno’s work would hold up to the growing literary reputation and newfound maturity of subject matter. As it turns out, quite well. more ›

Overqualified is ideal for reading in public. Because it's good to laugh and cry in public. Most of us go through a range of emotions when writing cover letters for job applications. We know the doubt, the fear, the frustration, and the possible sliver of hope that comes from contriving the most professional and least complicated versions of ourselves we can present. Overqualified, by A Softer World’s Joey Comeau, dispenses with everything your Career Advisor told you more ›

As Halloween approaches, autumn’s brisk air often provokes our hunger for shivers. While revisiting some of your favorite scary stories this year, consider Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book. His newest endeavor, written for children (children who would no doubt play well with Wednesday Addams), relates the musings and adventures of Nobody Owens, a boy who, orphaned after the murder of his family, grows up in a graveyard, raised by ghosts from a variety of backgrounds and time periods. more ›