Buy Conlon’s Blue Blood at Amazon
Ah, Wilderness!, All God’s Chillun Got Wings, and Long Day’s Journey Into Night by Eugene O’Neill. O’Neill was my high school literary hero. I’m still in awe of how he could take a rough and often wretched past and remake it as a nostalgic comedy in Ah, Wilderness!; a brutal naturalistic work like Journey; and, in the most stunning leap, to reimagine his parents’ marriage as “mixed” in All God’s Chillun. There was something terrible and wonderful in each transformation: It meant you could make any kind of story from any experience.
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Buy All God’s Chillun Got Wings at Amazon
Buy Long Day’s Journey Into Night at Amazon
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (Penguin, $16). When I read Anna Karenina, I broke it down into the basic architecture and engineering, to understand how you made something on this scale. It’s more like building a city than telling a story—though as a story, Tolstoy’s novel is incredibly alive and deeply felt.
Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable by Samuel Beckett (Grove, $14). I wrote my college thesis on this trilogy of novels as a kind of reverse commedia, a nihilistic one. Its purity of vision, beauty of line, and heartbreaking humor are extraordinary.
The Untouchable by John Banville (Vintage, $13). As a stylist, Banville is nearly as fluent as Nabokov, and many of his books seem to aspire to simply be precious, useless objects, like Fabergé eggs. With The Untouchable, however, which tells the story of Cambridge spy Anthony Blount, that mandarin style gains great force through its match with the character. Blount’s was not merely a double life, but a sextuple one, at least: communist and courtier, bisexual husband and father, actor and critic.
The Great Gatsby
New York City Police Department Patrol Guide Manual
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October 13 editorial cartoonsCartoons Monday's political cartoons include Donald Trump's consolation prize, government workers during shutdown, and more
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Can Gaza momentum help end the war in Ukraine?Today's Big Question Zelenskyy’s request for long-range Tomahawk missiles hints at ‘warming relations’ between Ukraine and US
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The Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners being releasedThe Explainer Triumphant Donald Trump addresses the Israeli parliament as families on both sides of the Gaza war reunite with their loved ones
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Marisa Silver’s 6 favorite books that capture a lifetimeFeature The author recommends works by John Williams, Ian McEwan, and more
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Lou Berney’s 6 favorite books with powerful storytellingFeature The award-winning author recommends works by Dorothy B. Hughes, James McBride, and more
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Elizabeth Gilbert’s favorite books about women overcoming difficultiesFeature The author recommends works by Tove Jansson, Lauren Groff, and more
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Fannie Flagg’s 6 favorite books that sparked her imaginationFeature The author recommends works by Johanna Spyri, John Steinbeck, and more
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Jessica Francis Kane's 6 favorite books that prove less is moreFeature The author recommends works by Penelope Fitzgerald, Marie-Helene Bertino, and more
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Keith McNally's 6 favorite books that have ambitious charactersFeature The London-born restaurateur recommends works by Leo Tolstoy, John le Carré, and more
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Garrett Graff's 6 favorite books that shine new light on World War IIFeature The author recommends works by James D. Hornfischer, Craig L. Symonds, and more
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Helen Schulman's 6 favorite collections of short storiesFeature The award-winning author recommends works by Raymond Carver, James Baldwin, and more
