A surreal hero

Of growing up in Wingham, Ont., Alice Munro has said, “The worst thing you could do was ‘call attention to yourself.’” Some 80 years later, we...;

Our bookshelves, our selves

Technology has made it possible to store an entire collection of books on a device the size of a shoe, but many of us still dream of building a physical...;

Details of the war

War is, in most respects, the opposite of love, but these two subjects share one conspicuous trait: No matter how many novels are written about war or...;

Black and white and read all over

1. “This image is from a six-page visual essay I did for Print this fall. The magazine simply gave me a theme: International. I knew I was going to...;

Darkly twisted Brit novelist Edward St. Aubyn is the best lit discovery of 2012

Reading a gifted first-time novelist can be a heady thrill, but it’s nothing compared to the joy of coming across an unfamiliar talent with a deep catalogue...;

The Night Shift: A Glad Day’s night

Last Sunday, I found myself at a book launch in a third-floor loft space on a stretch of Yonge Street just outside the Village, overlooking the adult...;

Come to Papa: Minimal tolerance for maximalist prose

I felt a range of emotions recently while reading D.T. Max’s new book, Every Love Story Is a Ghost Story: A Life of David Foster Wallace. The most immediate...;

What do you say, Junot Diaz?

Junot Diaz leaves very little of the human condition unexamined in his latest work: The nine linked stories that make up This Is How You Lose Her sweep...;

Faceoff: LMFAO vs. IFOA

Until recently, the International Festival of Authors—colloquially known as the IFOA—was the most influential acronym in cultural circles. But when...;

Inside the cluttered mind of Michael Chabon

Having set his last three novels in comics-saturated 1940s Brooklyn (The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay), an alternative-universe Alaska (The...;