POETRY MONTH: poetry reviews from the vaults
before a month of all new all poetry reviews, check out a selection from the TotN vaults!
before a month of all new all poetry reviews, check out a selection from the TotN vaults!
an excellent novel; in footnotes my concluding thoughts on the TV series The Affair
i cannot read myself happy
if u see a dead racoon at the side of the road
my year was deathly dull, which in 2020 counts as a good year
the building i live in got on fire in lockdown
some inevitably biased hagiography
a lovely fucking novel
an enjoyable but intellectually presumptive novella
Reviewed by Karina Bush
Review by L. Tumbleweed Parker. CW: ableist language
mainstream literary fiction that I very nearly love
very very good Argentine poems
new article & award attention elsewhere
Fantastic Mr Fox is an ode to adventure capitalism. My life is an ode to wine.
Can I write about writing about race without discussing race? No.
In America alone, 281 pounds of pig shit is produced for every one person per year. I don’t know if that’s a lot as I don’t know what a pound is.
Have you ever had a dream? Have you ever dreamt a day, a week, a month, a year? Have youContinue Reading
I don’t know where this book came from. I know I bought it, I’m pretty certain I went out ofContinue Reading
A lot of people don’t read poetry. A lot of people who read a lot of books, don’t read poetry. AContinue Reading
This is my first blog post in a while, and even then it’s still happening a little earlier than expected.Continue Reading
Long before James Frey was breaking Oprah Winfrey’s fragile heart by fictionalising his time in addiction therapy and the behaviourContinue Reading
I’ve accidentally grown a goatee and as a result of this I now look like a sex pervert*. This wasContinue Reading
Well, as some of you may be aware, I’m off having adventures. Yes, again. After an 18 month stint inContinue Reading
When I read the first volume of Elena Ferrante’s lauded Neapolitan Novels series, many of the conversations being had about itContinue Reading
I’m an abyss filling up with regret and alcohol at equal measure, like a really wet martini.
My new puppy hasn’t been very well. I’ve spent the day taking him to the vets and watching him sleep,Continue Reading
I’m on a flight, heading eastwards for 36 hours in Bucharest[1]. Flying out of Luton at 10pm on a MondayContinue Reading
fuck So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past. fuck fuck fuck fuck fuckContinue Reading
Flaubert in Egypt is ostensibly (though it isn’t) a book written by Gustave Flaubert about his hedonistic travels through EgyptContinue Reading
I’ve been reading a massive book* since I got back from my holiday last month, and have only just reached its end.Continue Reading
midlands novel and a road trip into childhood
A couple of weeks ago, I got a strange email from a small publishing house, Zoilus Press. They said thatContinue Reading
Big books. I have an odd relationship with ’em. The idea of big books, to be honest, I have aContinue Reading
I like Biblical novels. So much so that I wrote one*, and so much so that after reading about ten/twenty,Continue Reading
For the past four years, the big literary release (for me) has been the continuing publication of Karl Ove Knausgaard’sContinue Reading
I’m going to be honest, I did not get what the point of Molloy was. Oooh, it was Beckettian; itContinue Reading
Obnoxiously (the manner in which I do most things), I read Tarjei Vesaas’ The Birds because Karl Ove Knausgaard refersContinue Reading
Joe Sacco’s wordless, 8 metre long panorama of the first day of the Battle of the Somme is a harrowingContinue Reading
Both the blurb and the author biography of my 1980s edition of Jacob’s Room by Virginia Woolf state that thisContinue Reading
I’ve said it before and I will say it again: Isabel Allende is brilliant, an under-rated writer of supreme skill,Continue Reading
Fuck it, I’m going to discuss the plot. MONKEYS. It’s about MONKEYS. Or, to be technical, chimps. Chimpanzees (which aren’tContinue Reading
Child of God was Cormac McCarthy’s third novel, and is the first book of his I’ve read for a while.Continue Reading
I intended to read Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams for a while, but held off doing so forContinue Reading
I sourced this 1971 collection of short stories for one simple reason: ‘For Bolocks Please Read Blocks Throughout’, a B.Continue Reading
Last Summer, whilst twatpacking* around the Mediterranean, Tunisair lost my backpack between Casablanca and Tunis. Though it contained nothing ofContinue Reading
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World is, I must begrudgingly admit, a great Haruki Murakami novel. One ofContinue Reading
Ali Smith’s latest novel – How to be both – has been shortlisted for this year’s Man Booker PrizeContinue Reading