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THE INSTABILITY OF TRUTH: Brainwashing, Mind Control and Hyper-Persuasion, by Rebecca Lemov BLAZING EYE SEES ALL: Love Has Won, False Prophets and the Fever Dream of the American New Age, by Leah Sottile On the television drama “Severance,” a sleek dystopian mood piece patently designed for Our Times, employees of a nebulous corporation volunteer to … Read more
BAD NATURE, by Ariel Courage For many people, being diagnosed with terminal cancer at the age of 40 might prompt an instant reassessment of priorities. For Hester, the narrator of Ariel Courage’s debut novel, “Bad Nature,” this means immediately quitting her job in Manhattan to drive across the country and murder her father. It’s the … Read more
THE USUAL DESIRE TO KILL, by Camilla Barnes The usual desire to kill your exasperating old parents — that’s the implied full title of Camilla Barnes’s wickedly delightful debut novel. Narrated by their middle-aged daughter Miranda, with various epistolary and dramatically scripted passages interspersed, the book chronicles a few months in the lives of a … Read more
SAD TIGER, by Neige Sinno; translated by Natasha Lehrer In December of last year, a court in Avignon, France, found 51 men guilty of raping 72-year-old Gisèle Pelicot, including her husband of 50 years, who repeatedly drugged and assaulted her, invited other men to join him and filmed their abuse. He was given the maximum … Read more
To this end, and true to its title, there is no shortage of indulgence in “Ecstasy.” The characters in these poems party hard; there is plenty of sex and drinking and drugs. They smoke Sobranies and down bottles of Chablis at Café Charlot in Paris. They are seasoned regulars of New York nightlife, bouncing from … Read more
Given all the press attention and congressional hearings, the recent leak of war plans in strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen may feel like a singular event. And mistakes aside, as the director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, asserted before Congress, the operation itself “was very successful and continues to be very successful.” So why … Read more
No matter how you slice it, Liz Moore has arrived. This month, an adaptation of her blockbuster novel “Long Bright River” started streaming on Peacock. And her next book, “The God of the Woods,” now on the best-seller list for 36 weeks (and counting), will soon hit the million mark in sales — a distinction … Read more
by David Szalay Szalay’s new novel traces the life of a young man in Hungary who eventually makes his way to England, following him from troubled youth to immigrant success to tragic fall. Each chapter provides glimpses of the major stages of adulthood — first love, marriage, parenthood — interwoven with intervals of aimlessness, reinvention … Read more
Linda Williams, a trailblazing scholar whose research was foundational to the field of film studies and to feminist film theory, and who wrote extensively about pornography, died on March 12 at her home in Lafayette, in Northern California. She was 78. Her husband, Paul Fitzgerald, said the cause was complications of a hemorrhagic stroke she … Read more
