Cormac McCarthy’s 2006 novel The Road is an intensely bleak vision of the apocalypse. The narrative follows two characters only ever referred to as”Man” and “boy” as they limp across a grey and hellish landscape full of cannibals, rotting houses, and precious canned food in aquest to reach the ocean. McCarthy raises very uncomfortable questionsContinue reading “Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and the death of Dialogue Tags”
Tag Archives: book review
Arrival/Story of Your Life: Languages of film and Prose
[This isn’t the first time I’ve written on Arrival, and I doubt it will be the last. you can check out my original view of the film here at The Spectatorial: Arrival – A Case of Déjà vu] Though Ted Chiang’s novella Story of Your Life was originally published in 1998, I did not discover it untilContinue reading “Arrival/Story of Your Life: Languages of film and Prose”
The Simplica Girl Diaries in review
“Limitations so frustrating” (Saunders 126) writes the narrator of George Saunders’ The Semplica Girl Diaries. But the self-imposed limitations and restrictions Saunders impose on his writing make for a more interesting story, building its narrative out of disturbing incompleteness. Set in an unspecified but near future, Saunders communicates everything about his narrative through the sparse,Continue reading “The Simplica Girl Diaries in review”
A Children’s Crusade in Reverse (Slaughterhouse Five in review)
[feeling a little unstuck? that might be because I’ve written on this novel before: God Bless You, Mr. Vonnegut. In some circles, I’m known for talking about Vonnegut a lot, so you can also check out my review of one of the author’s weirdest works Slapstick, which Vonnegut himself graded a D, and my paper on Cat’sContinue reading “A Children’s Crusade in Reverse (Slaughterhouse Five in review)”
Ray Bradbury: There Will Come Soft Rains in Review
Few books have been as formative and influential for me as Ray Bradbury’s 1950 short story fix-up novel The Martian Chronicles. While the book as a whole is far from perfect – there are problematic depictions of gender and race throughout the middle section of the book – There will Come Soft Rains has alwaysContinue reading “Ray Bradbury: There Will Come Soft Rains in Review”
Letters to a Young Poet in review
The ten letters of Rainer Maria Rilke in correspondence with Franz Xavier Kappus that makeup Letters to a Young Poet offer little in the way of technical advice for writing. Rilke does not instruct on form; he does not comment on the use of language, or plot, or dialogue, or verse. However, what takesContinue reading “Letters to a Young Poet in review”
Theory of Adaptation in Review
Note: Over the next two months I will be writing a series of very short reviews of both critical work and fiction for a special project. As there is nothing more I plan to do with these short reviews, I thought it might be appropriate to post them here over the coming weeks, if onlyContinue reading “Theory of Adaptation in Review”
