Julie Otsuka is one severely  underrated writer. Let's back up a few years - I read The Buddha in the Attic  in spite of my own bett...

Background:   Children's Mate  by Bella Shaier is an Israeli book originally published in 2011 by the New Library. It's comprised of...

I read a collection of Kjell Askildsen's shorts stories (technically novella plus short stories) last year, finding him to be a surpris...

Previous posts in Women in Translation series: Where in the world are women writers? Responses Availability and bias Awards The Ind...

It's been well over a month since I finished Trieste  (Daša Drndić, tr. Ellen Elias-Bursac). Well over two months since I started it. My...

I'm honestly surprised that I'd never heard of Goli Taraghi's  The Pomegranate Lady and Her Sons  (tr. Sara Khalili) before re...

I wanted to write about The Budding Tree  the moment I finished reading it, but I got sidetracked by other books. Now, just over a month aft...

Previous posts in Women in Translation series: Where in the world are women writers? Responses Availability and bias In my previous po...

I saw a lot of glowing reviews for Range of Ghosts  long before I was ever interested in picking it up. After a while, though, the idea of t...

Whatever Viola Di Grado writes next, I will read it. 70% Acrylic 30% Wool  (tr. Michael Reynolds), her first novel, is so utterly bizarre, s...

I don't always fall for poetry collections. Despite loving poetry, despite having a long and personal relationship with the field, I oft...

It's a rare thing to enjoy a short story collection without particularly liking any of its actual components. Judith Hermann's  Summ...

I have a hard time reviewing nonfiction books most of the time because I feel distinctly not qualified. How to Suppress Women's Writing ...

Previous posts in Women in Translation: Where in the world are women writers? Responses One of the things that kept cropping up after...

If ever a book to serve as a transition from solving physics problems to reading literature, Magdalena Tulli's  Dreams and Stones  (tr. ...

I need help. I haven't had much of a proper vacation in a year and a half. Since I started studying in the fall of last year, the stre...

Last night, Greg of the New Dork Review of Books * tweeted an article in which author Jhumpa Lahiri denounces American literature as being ...

There is a trope in fiction that I'm sure you've all come across - the story of the novelist. Whether the novelist is a side charact...

I didn't like Stone in a Landslide . Could that be my entire review? Could I leave it at that, in the hopes of avoiding riling up read...

It's been a very long time since I read a book like The Golem and the Jinni . I'd heard quite a bit of praise for the novel going ar...