“When, like Alice Munro, you feel your way forward, sniffing and digging and groping toward a truth virtually beyond words, it takes a long time. And the structures, organic to that process, are as miraculous and indicative and expressive of that truth—one of the deeper truths of human life—that fiction is all about.” Elizabeth Poliner explains how mapping Alice Munro’s stories made her a better writer. Never read Munro? Check out our beginner’s guide to her stories.
Learning from Munro
That’s Not Leather
In horrifying book news, the binding of one of Harvard College Library's books has been confirmed to be human skin.
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The Chance of a Lifetime
It’s famously easy to get scammed on OkCupid. Sarah Hepola (of Salon) knew as much when she joined. But when someone who claimed to be Joseph Gordon-Levitt sent her a flirty message, she figured... what could she do?
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Refuge in Reading
It's World Refugee Day and Book Riot has 100 (yes, 100!) reading recommendations. Meanwhile, earlier this year, Ted Gioia proposed, Kanye-style, that Vladimir Nabokov's Pnin was actually the greatest refugee novel of all time.
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Pynchon Possessed by the Spirit of a Teenaged Girl
“Though female authors write experimental novels about women—like Renata Adler’s Speedboat or Sheila Heti’s How Should a Person Be?—the avant-garde has long been associated with male authors and stories. That association made Alexandra Kleeman’s You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine seem doubly unusual.” On Kleeman’s debut novel and blatantly feminine themes in the avant-garde.
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