“Overrun by the Kafkaesque”

My review of Tom Bissell‘s Magic Hours appears in this Sunday’s NYTBR.

The theatrical trailer for the film adaptation of 50 Shades of Grey was released this week. If you’re keeping track, that means we’ve now got a film based on fan fiction written about another film adapted from a schlocky romance novel involving vampires. (Come at me, Twilight fans.)

Last month, Austin Bunn published The Brink, his debut collection of short stories. The stories, as Ryan Krull describes them in The Rumpus, hinge on pushing characters to some personal limit of behavior. In an interview, Bunn talks about why that is, as well as his new short film, In the Hollow.

Over at The Rumpus, Caleb Cage interviewed Year in Reading alumnus Phil Klay about wars and human nature.