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New
Fiction Forum
Boston
Review created the New Fiction Forum as
a space for wide-ranging dialogue about contemporary fiction, a
dialogue founded on a simple premise: that despite the intense commercialism
of current publishing, there are original, vital novels published
every season and readers to whom such narratives are of the profoundest
importance. Alongside evaluative reviews, the Forum features essays
that explore the complete works of individual writers; discuss emerging
trends and innovativions in fiction (creative and commercial); and
probe the shifting meaning of genres as writers stretch and bend
them. Moreover, in an effort to provoke debate about the very nature
of reviewing and its role in the fate of a novel, we invite authors
to respond to reviewers. Throughout, the Forum approaches fiction
as what we strongly believe it to be—an essential part of our
individual and collective lives—and in so doing, reasserts
why it so deeply matters.
—Neil
Gordon
See
below for a list of New Fiction Forums, or choose a review by
title from the following list.
December 2003/January 2004
Essay:
Conrad’s List
M.G. Stephens remembers a Greenwich Village bookstore.
Review:
Marketplace Multiculturalism
M.K. Chakrabarti on Monica Ali’s Brick Lane.
New Novel:
A Mostly Irish Farce Roger
Boylan on writing The Great Pint-Pulling Olympiad.
October/November 2003
Essay:
Buona Sera, Social Clubs?
Alane Salierno Mason on Italian American fiction anthologies.
New Novelist:
Another Country Sue
Halpern on writing The Book of Hard Things.
Summer 2003
Essay:
Adam Thorpe’s
One-Man Show James Hynes on the British novelist’s
impressive oeuvre.
New Novelist:
An Indian Realist
in a World of Fiction Aniruddha Bahal on writing
Bunker 13.
April/May 2003
Reviews:
New Pioneers
of the American Short Story Tom Bissell on Elizabeth
Crane’s When the Messenger Is Hot and Marshall Boswell’s
Trouble with Girls.
Situationist
Noir Jennifer Howard on Jean-Patrick Manchette’s
Three to Kill and The Prone Gunman.
Essay:
A Dutchman
with Very Dark Eyes and Hair You Could Call Raven-black Margriet
de Moor on writing Duke of Egypt.
February/March 2003
Review:
Maxwell’s
Lives James Campbell
The New Yorker editor who became
his own best charge.
Essay:
Skirting
the Issue Patrick Erouart-Siad
French literature out of touch with social realities.
December 2002/January 2003
Review:
Noir Voyager
Roger Boylan
Alan Furst’s glamorous, doomed world.
New Novelist:
Homecoming
Natasha Radojcic-Kane
Writing the madness of war.
October/November 2002
Essay:
Feminist Icons
in Love Vivian Gornick
Why Colette, deBeauvoir, and Duras don’t age well.
Review:
Making History
Richard A. Kaye
Paul LaFarge’s Haussmann, or the Distinction
and Susan Daitch’s L.C.
Summer 2002
Reviews:
Gitta Honegger:
Thomas Bernhard: The Making of an Austrian
Thomas Bernhard: Gathering Evidence; Correction; Gargoyles
James M. Baskin
Lucius Shepard:
Valentine
David Gilmour: Sparrow Nights Richard Burgin
Nora Eisennberg:
The War at Home Jill Eisenstadt
Hans Koning:
Zeeland, or Elective Concurrences Roger Boylan
Under the Influence
Rick Moody
The intoxicating power of Kate Braverman’s first
novel.
April/ May 2002
Essay:
High Art
in the Age of Oprah James Campbell
The case of Oprah v. Franzen.
Reviews:
Howard
Norman: The Northern Lights; The Bird Artist; The Museum Guard;
The Haunting of L. Drake Bennett
February/ March 2002
Essay:
Writing in
Exile Roger Boylan
James Hamilton-Paterson explores his inner life and our human
nature.
Snakes and
Ladders Jennifer Howard
Eric Amblers spy thrillers confront a century of political
treachery.
Reviews:
The Spirit
Returns Ethan Paquin
December 2001/ January 2002
Essay:
The Territory
of Trauma Joyce Hackett
Writing in the shadow of the Holocaust
Reviews:
Paula Fox:
Poor George; Desperate Characters; The Widow’s Children
Randall Curb
October/November 2001
Essay:
Alfred
Nobel and His Prizes James Campbell
The troubled history of literature’s "gold standard."
Reviews:
Patricia
Highsmith: The Selected Stories of Patricia Highsmith
James Sallis
Robert Clark:
Love Among the Ruins; Tom Bissell
Summer 2001
Essay:
Secret Histories
Santiago Gamboa
On the creation of a Colombian national identity through crime
fiction.
Reviews:
Abdulrazak
Gurnah: By the Sea Patrick Erouart-Siad
Brad Leithauser:
A Few Corrections; Barry
Unsworth: The Partnership James Sallis
André
Brink: The Rights of Desire Roger Boylan
April/May
2001
Essay:
The Kingdom
of Moravia Bill Marx
Alberto Moravia’s kinky, subversive realism is back in print
The Last
Gentleman James Crumley
A friend and student remembers Richard Yates
Reviews:
Allegra
Goodman: Paradise Park Joyce Hackett
Laura Glen
Louis: Talking in the Dark Randall Curb
Clare Boylan:
Beloved Stranger Jennifer Howard
Hugh Nissenson:
The Song of the Earth Roger Boylan
February/March
2001
Essay:
A Comedy of
Animals Alane Salierno Mason
Ernest Hemingway, Jane Kendall Mason, and "Francis Macomber."
Reviews:
James Hynes:
The Lecturer’s Tale Eliza Nichols
Alan Furst:
Kingdom of Shadows Lev Raphael
Chris Adrian:
Gob’s Grief Drake P. Bennett
Interview:
No Happy Endings
John F. Baker and Paco Taibo discuss mysteries, Mexico, and
Manhattan Paco Ignacio Taibo II
December
2000/January 2001
Essay:
Genre Trouble
James Hynes
What stands between John Crowley and a serious literary reputation?
Reviews:
Gloria Emerson’s
Loving Graham Greene and G.
K. Wuori’s An American Outrage Jennifer Howard
Paul Watkins:
The Forger John Marks
John Fante:
The Big Hunger Rob Spillman
October/November
2000
Essay:
The
Wound and the Dream Patrick Erouart-Siad
In Haiti, a militant, prophetic literature thrives alongside
political disaster.
Reviews:
Brian McGrory’s
The Incumbent and Toby
Olsen’s Write Letter to Billy Roger Boylan
Richard
Powers: Plowing the Dark Tom Bissell
Lucinda
Rosenfeld: What She Saw . . . Jill Eisenstadt
Simone Zelitch:
Louisa Leora Bersohn
Anne Enright:
What Are You Like? Robert Karron
Emily Carter:
Glory Goes and Gets Some Don Hymans
Summer
2000
Essay:
Restless Souls
Ross Feld
The novels of Israeli writer A. B. Yehoshua create their own
diaspora.
Reviews:
Tom Drury’s
Hunts in Dreams and Stephen
Dobyns’ Eating Naked Roger Boylan
H. Lee Barnes’
Gunning for Ho and John
Mort’s Soldier in Paradise Jerome Gold
W.G. Sebald:
Vertigo (translated by Michael Hulse) Joyce Hackett
George Saunders:
Pastoralia Stewart O’Nan
Joan Silber:
In My Other Life: Stories Jennifer Howard
Robert Cabot:
That Sweetest Wine Bill Marx
April/May 2000
Essay:
Unflowered
Aloes Tom Bissell
Why literary success is a product of chance, not destiny.
Reviews:
Peter Gadol’s
Light at Dusk and
Robert C.S. Downs’ The Fifth Season Randall
Curb
Joyce
Carol Oates: Blonde Jill Eisenstadt
Larry Brown:
Fay Roger Boylan
Francine
Prose: Blue Angel Lucinda Rosenfeld
February/March
2000
Essay:
The Mysterious
Romance of Murder David Lehman
The enduring highbrow fascination with detective stories.
Opinion:
Embracing
Defeat Neal Gabler How the publishing
industry is failing readers--and how it could do better.
Reviews:
Alice Elliott
Dark’s In the Gloaming and Tracy
Chevalier’s Girl with a Pearl Earring Felicia
Ackerman
Lucia Berlin’s
Where I Live Now and Liza
Weiland’s You Can Sleep While I Drive Susan
Daitch
Andrew Huebner:
American By Blood Stewart O’Nan
Carl Hiaasen:
Sick Puppy James Hynes
Peter Ho Davies:
Equal Love Randall Curb
December
1999/ January 2000
Essay:
American
Faith, American Violence Michael Greenberg
Robert Stone’s fiction explores the delusions that shape our
lives.
Reviews:
Kent Haruf’s
Plainsong, The Tie That Binds, Where You Once Belonged Laura
Hendrie
Leslie Epstein’s
Ice Fire Water and Judy
Budnitz’s If I Told You Once Bob Chase
Judith Grossman:
How Aliens Think Susan Daitch
Kathryn Davis:
The Walking Tour Edwin Frank
Walter
Mosley: Walkin’ the Dog Peter McCarthy
October/November
1999
Essay:
The Lost World
of Richard Yates Stewart O’Nan
How the great writer of the Age of Anxiety disappeared from
print.
Exchange:
The
Human and the Monstrous Melvin Jules Bukiet and
Ron Hansen
An author and his reviewer debate the literary representation
of Hitler.
Archive:
Behind
the Beat James Campbell
Remembering "Neurotica," the short-lived journal of the Beats.
Reviews:
Pia Pera’s
Lo’s Secret Diary and Sena
Jeter Naslund’s Ahab’s Wife Michael Greenberg
Miranda Seymour’s
The Summer of ’39 and Laura
Hendrie’s Remember Me Donna Seaman
Ross Feld:
Zwilling’s Dream James Hynes
Frederick
G. Dillen: Fool Paul Gediman
Ronan Bennett:
The Catastrophist Jennifer Howard |
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