By: Ethan,
on 3/2/2015
Because we continue to go to war, we continue to need war stories, to share some tiny percentage of the experience of the soldier with the people back home they were protecting. This book continues in the tradition of The Things They Carried by bringing readers into the chaos of the lives of soldiers at [...]
By: Dianna Dilworth,
on 11/19/2014
Phil Klay has won the Fiction award for his book Redeployment from The Penguin Press/Penguin Group (USA).
Evan Osnos has won the Nonfiction award for Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Louise Gluck won the Poetry award for Faithful and Virtuous Night from Farrar, Strauss and Giroux.
The Young People’s Literature award went to Jacqueline Woodson for Brown Girl Dreaming from Roaring Brook Press/Macmillan.
The National Book Award winners for 2014 were revealed tonight. If you want to read all the finalists, we’ve collected free samples of the finalists in all the categories below. Who was your favorite this year?
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By: Maryann Yin,
on 11/10/2014
Amazon has revealed their picks for Best Books of 2014, a list led by Celeste Ng, Stephen King, and Liane Moriarty. Follow this link to see the full list of 100 titles.
According to the press release, the editorial team chose the top 10 from a pool of 480 books. We’ve reprinted the top 10 books below.
(more…)
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By: Maryann Yin,
on 10/1/2014
From the Memoirs of a Non-Enemy Combatant author Alex Gilvarry, Faces in the Crowd author Valeria Luiselli, Panic in a Suitcase author Yelena Akhtiorskaya, Redeployment author Phil Klay, and Night at the Fiestas: Stories author Kirstin Valdez Quade have been named this year’s 5 under 35 authors at the National Book Awards.
According to the press release, each honoree will receive a $1,000 cash prize. The National Book Foundation will celebrate these authors at an event at Brooklyn’s powerHouse Arena on November 17, 2014.
Musician and author Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson will play the host. The New Yorker editor Ben Greenman will jump behind the turntables to serve as DJ. Memoir writer Rosie Schaap will handle the drinks and shakers as the guest bartender for the evening. (via BuzzFeed)
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By: [email protected],
on 3/31/2014
What an amazing book! This is a firm candidate for my book of the year already and it is beyond doubt the best collection of short stories I have ever read. I literally could not put this book down but at the same time wanted each story to last as long as possible. I went into total procrastination mode today before reading the final story because I was not prepared for this book to end but resistance was futile.
I first read the title story of this collection in last year’s Fire & Forget. It was one of the standout pieces in a standout collection. I knew at the time reading Fire & Forget that the contributors in the collection were destined for big things. And Phil Klay not only reaffirms that but announces himself in a massive way with his first book.
I have blogged a couple of times here that short stories are not usually my thing. Often there is a story I wish there was more of or a story that leaves me unsatisfied. But absolutely every story in Redeployment was spot on. This was writing as close to perfection as I have ever read and I want to read the book again right now.
I am a big reader of war fiction. They are stories I am drawn to, that seem to resonate with me more than any other fiction. What I loved about Phil Klay’s collection was that each story resonated in a different way. One of the unique aspects to Klay’s collection are the different points of view he conveys in his stories. It is impossible for me to highlight one story and I don’t wish to go through each story one by one because that would spoil the magnificent reading experience.
Klay covers stories about soldiers in action and soldiers coming home. Soldiers wounded in action and soldiers haunted by the fact they saw little or no action. We read about a Marine chaplain, a Marine in Mortuary Affairs, a Foreign Affairs officer sent to Iraq to help rebuild. And through all these stories Klay shows the war in all its messy permutations and consequences, the good and the bad, the humanity and the inhumanity. He even explores the art of telling these stories and the different ways stories can be used and told, hidden and untold.
Every story packs an emotional intensity not only rare in short stories but rare in longer fiction too. Imagine the emotional wallop of The Yellow Birds with the frank and brutal insight of Matterhorn distilled into a short story and you get close to the impact each of these stories makes on their own. Put together as a collection and you have something very special that will be read (and should be read) by many long into the future.
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