Schlumping toward Altenburg

Schlumping toward Altenburg

Schlump by Hans Herbert Grimm. NYRB Classics, 2016. Paperback, 288 pages, $16.95. Reviewed by Michael Shindler There are the great German books of the First World War that everyone knows: Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front, Ernst Jünger’s Storm of...
Rocket Age Drama

Rocket Age Drama

V2: A Novel of World War II by Robert Harris. Random House, 2020. Hardcover, 320 pages, $29. Reviewed by Robert Huddleston The unconditional surrender of all German forces in early May 1945 triggered a mad dash by the Allies to exploit the defeated enemy’s military...
Marriage Can Change Everything

Marriage Can Change Everything

Jack: A Novel by Marilynne Robinson. Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2020. Hardcover, 320 pages, $27. Reviewed by J. L. Wall Why, I ask students who are reading Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead, does John Ames never directly give us his wife’s name? It’s only learned late in the...
Retail Heaven

Retail Heaven

Convenience Store Woman: A Novel by Sayaka Murata. Grove Press, 2019. Paperback, 176 pages, $15. Reviewed by Eve Tushnet Keiko just wanted to do the right thing. Eager and goal-oriented to a fault, little Keiko Furukura found the world around her baffling, full of...
The Curse of Knowledge

The Curse of Knowledge

A Golden Fury by Samantha Cohoe. Wednesday Books, 2020. Hardcover, 352 pages. $19. Reviewed by Christine Norvell Curses are too common, particularly in fairy tales. Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, Puss-in-Boots. Thanks to the collections of the...