How a Chapter 16 writer’s great-grandmother befriended—and betrayed—J.D. Salinger
December 8, 2011 Who owns the story of a friendship? A Chapter 16 writer considers her great-grandmother’s decision to sell the letters J.D. Salinger had written during their twenty years of friendship—and the great, reclusive writer’s final letter in response.
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Madison Smartt Bell’s The Color of Night provoked and enthralled the critics
December 7, 2011 With his novels about both the Haitian Revolution and the Confederate anti-hero Nathan Bedford Forrest, Madison Smartt Bell made an art of writing about violence. His latest novel, The Color of Night, takes that art to a new level with its depiction of a solitary, unrepentant killer who happens to be a woman. The book provoked controversy for its subject matter and for Bell’s unusual creative process. Today Chapter 16 offers a roundup of the discussion, including Bell’s own thoughts about his work.
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Chapter 16 tallies the critical accolades falling to Holly Tucker’s Blood Work
December 6, 2011 The 1660s saw an intense scientific race between England and France, a rivalry every bit as heated and fervently nationalistic as the race to the moon that occurred between the United States and the Soviet Union three centuries later. This first scientific contest was to demonstrate an understanding of the nature of blood by performing the first successful transfusion involving a human being. The often gruesome experimentation conducted by the eccentric geniuses at the center of this quest is the subject of Blood Work: A Tale of Medicine and Murder in the Scientific Revolution by Holly Tucker. Soon after publication in March, the book was named a Scientific American Book of the Month, a History Book Club pick, and a Book of the Month Club pick—all fitting choices, as the book offers something to satisfy scientists, historians, and general readers alike. Chapter 16 takes a tour of the book’s critical reception.
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Chapter 16 surveys the critical rhapsodies for Kevin Wilson’s The Family Fang
December 2, 2011 The story of two performance artists, Camille and Caleb Fang, and their adult-but-dysfunctional children, Annie and Buster, Kevin Wilson’s The Family Fang is at once a family drama, a series of laugh-out-loud set pieces that parody the self-involvement of artists, a scathing indictment of the culture of celebrity, and a deeply moving examination of the ways in which our families shape (and warp) us. Critics quickly lined up behind the book, which promptly became a New York Times bestseller and ended up in the movie-making hands of Nicole Kidman. No wonder The Guardian called it “an experience, rather than a mere read.” Today Chapter 16 sums up the critical response to Kevin Wilson’s smash hit.
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Chapter 16 surveys the critical rhapsodies for Kevin Wilson’s The Family Fang
December 2, 2011 The story of two performance artists, Camille and Caleb Fang, and their adult-but-dysfunctional children, Annie and Buster, Kevin Wilson’s The Family Fang is at once a family drama, a series of laugh-out-loud set pieces that parody the self-involvement of artists, a scathing indictment of the culture of celebrity, and a deeply moving examination of the ways in which our families shape (and warp) us. Critics quickly lined up behind the book, which promptly became a New York Times bestseller and ended up in the movie-making hands of Nicole Kidman. No wonder The Guardian called it “an experience, rather than a mere read.” Today Chapter 16 sums up the critical response to Kevin Wilson’s smash hit.
Read moreOn this Indonesian slum tour, an American novelist discovers more than he expected
December 1, 2011 The pigeon races are going to be a scene in the novel I’ve come to Jakarta to research. Thematic resonance is what I’ve told Ronny. It took me half an hour to explain. His English isn’t perfect, but I don’t think that was really the problem. It was more that he just didn’t see the point.
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