The New Yorker: Awake
by Tobias Wolff
I was highly impressed with Awake by Tobias Wolff all the way through the read. It catches you initially by reminding you of the days when you too had to struggle through the Odyssey. The fumbling while reading through chapters and the flash when the light bulb finally goes [...]

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Mississippi Review: Ski-Doo
by Pia Z. Ehrhardt
Pia Z. Ehrhardt’s short story Ski-Doo leaves much to be desired. How often does a father marry and bear children with his daughter’s best friend and no one has a problem with that?
Don’t get me wrong the story is interesting mid-way through, but from the beginning it seems a bit [...]

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The New Yorker: The Dinner Party
by Joshua Ferris
“I can predict everything that will happen from the moment they arrive to the little kiss on the cheek goodbye and I just can’t goddam do it.”
We’ve all been here before. The Dinner Party by Joshua Ferris summarizes these awkward and well, boring moments we all endure for [...]

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The New Yorker: Wakefield
by E. L. Doctorow
“People will say that I left my wife…”
A completely engaging first sentence, but I found it hard to continue reading. Maybe I was simply distracted the day I tried to read it or maybe not. Finding myself half way through the story on the following day, I started to [...]

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The New Yorker: The King of Sentences
by Jonathan Lethem
The main characters are young New Yorkers who work in a bookstore together and live together as well. Their world revolves around the written language, specifically sentences. They worship the sentences within books as well as a man they call “The King of Sentences”. They stalk this [...]

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