What We’re Reading

2 Minutes Read Time

Heather Hamilton: I’m currently rereading Paula Bohince’s Incident at the Edge of Bayonet Woods, a poetry collection that doubles as a murder mystery, though to file it under any one term would be reductive. In fact, Incident is a complex and breathtaking book, pulling double duty on multiple fronts: at once rooted in a specific terror and speaking eloquently to the larger human condition, gleaning the best qualities from both narrative and lyric and melding them into a graceful whole, and forever tossing that strange coin whose faces are violence on the one side and beauty on the other. This is a book that not only withstands but deserves multiple readings.

Katherine Zlabek: Salvatore Scibona’s The End, nominated for the National Book Award in 2008, is a novel of ideas. It urges the reader onward, always deeper, saying, “There is a thing, wrapped in its name. Go on, catch it.” I love it for its density, and for its audacity in taking on supernatural elements—occasionally with surprising nonchalance on the part of the characters. It is a book with the structure of a lightbulb: narrow in plot, achieving fullness in the characters’ backstories—their failures and strengths, their faith and the denunciation of that faith. And the language is gorgeous, innovative and lyrical.

Lisa Ampleman: Right now, I’m reading Gallowglass, by Susan Tichy, which I picked up at the Ahsahta Press table at AWP after hearing Tichy read the title poem.  “Gallowglass” is an Anglicization of a Gaelic word meaning “foreign soldier or mercenary,” and while the collection addresses the wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, the book also explores the personal grief of a wife whose husband has died, among many other concerns.  The poems are mostly in long-lined, ghazal-like couplets, which allows for the juxtaposition of the horrific and the mundane.  “One, Two” is particularly wrenching.

Michael Griffith: During the term, most of my non-school reading consists of starting many books late at night, wistfully; investing fifteen minutes in them; then setting them down and stockpiling them for spring break. The ones I can’t wait to get to right now are Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad, Barbara Hamby’s Lester Higata’s Twentieth Century, John Brandon’s Citrus County, Karen Russell’s Swamplandia!, and Tom Rachman’s The Imperfectionists.

Sun icon Moon icon Search icon Menu icon User profile icon User profile icon Bookmark icon Play icon Share icon Email icon Facebook icon Twitter icon Instagram icon Bluesky icon CR Logo Footer CR Logo Topnav Caret Right icon Caret Left icon Close icon

You don't have credit card details available. You will be redirected to update payment method page. Click OK to continue.