Seven Books Grappling With What Writers Leave Behind
When an author dies, their legacy can be left entirely in the hands of their estate.
Lucky
A poem for Sunday
Can You Cure Mental Illness? Two Centuries of Trying Says No.
A new book looks at the long and sordid history of psychiatry and its attempt to help those living with mental illness.
There’s Nothing Like a Great Takedown
A negative review can be a beautiful thing: Your weekly guide to the best in books
King of the River
Published in The Atlantic in 1970
The Cult Classic That Captures the Grind of Dead-End Jobs
Pop culture tends to romanticize bookstores as workplaces. Imogen Binnie’s Nevada does the opposite.
Eight Books in Which Ignorance Is the Point
People are always searching for answers, but not knowing can be its own reward.
Books for a Sun-Addled Mind
Popular novels don their summer gear.
Ars Poetica With Mother and Dogs
A poem for Sunday
A Portrait of the Artist Who Never Makes Art
In her latest novel, Nell Zink offers up a classic künstlerroman—the story of an artist’s becoming—but there is a hollowness at its center.
Literature for a Post-Roe World
Fiction and poetry can help us grapple with our fears for the future—and remind us what we stand to lose in the present: Your weekly guide to the best in books
Where to Turn When You Feel ‘at Odds With Being Human’
Two recent books find, in the fluidity and endurance of marine life, respite from a world that expects conformity.
History Is Never Only One Person’s Story
A good group biography details with curiosity the ways, trivial and tremendous, that humans influence one another.
Considering Roe v. Wade, Letters to the Black Body
A poem for Saturday
Without Choice
A poem consisting of many voices
Empathy Isn’t Enough
The perils and limits of writing with a moral message: Your weekly guide to the best in books
What This Is Going to Hurt Leaves Out
And what the AMC black comedy about a British obstetrician illuminates about women’s health
‘I’ve Seen Several Giants Die on My Land’
A new anthology about climate change acknowledges that we are both willing participants in and at the mercy of the systems that are destroying us.
Black Flamingo
A poem for Wednesday
The Most American Form of Architecture Isn’t Going Anywhere
A new book challenges the dominant narrative that malls are dying.