Jonathan Eig on ‘The Birth of the Pill’
Of all the inventions of the 20th century, the birth control pill arguably had the most profound effect on the everyday lives of human beings. By making widely available a...
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Marilynne Robinson on ‘Lila’
In her Pulitzer Prize-winning novel "Gilead" (2004), Marilynne Robinson introduced readers to the Rev. John Ames, an elderly Congregationalist preacher in a small town in Iowa in the 1950s. Written...
John Lahr on ‘Tennessee Williams’
Thirty-one years after his death and 70 years after his first Broadway hit, "The Glass Menagerie," Tennessee Williams remains something of a mystery. Although his major plays — "Menagerie," "A...
Maureen Corrigan on ‘So We Read On’
Its greatness is right there in the title, not to mention on every page. But "The Great Gatsby," the 1925 masterpiece by F. Scott Fitzgerald, occupies an oddly precarious position...
Eula Biss discusses ‘On Immunity’
In preparation for giving birth to her first child five years ago, Eula Biss began researching the vaccination process. Public health policy strongly recommends that every child should be inoculated...
Lauren Beukes on ‘Broken Monsters’
The South African novelist Lauren Beukes has one twisted imagination. Best known in America for "The Shining Girls," her 2013 novel about a time-traveling serial killer in Chicago, Beukes is...
David Mitchell on ‘The Bone Clocks’
On its surface, David Mitchell's "The Bone Clocks," the sprawling and unclassifiable new novel by the author of the best-selling "Cloud Atlas" (2004), is a page-turning, time-traveling sci-fi yarn designed...
Tavis Smiley on ‘Death of a King’
We know nearly everything there is to know about the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., or so we think. But in his new book, "Death of a King: The Real...
Review: ‘Confessions’ by Kanae Minato
As you're reading what had promised to be a garden-variety crime novel, it's thrilling when it gradually dawns on you that what you're holding in your hands is far deeper...
Richard Bausch on ‘Before, During, After’
With his elegant prose style and keen insights into human nature, Richard Bausch has long been a writer's writer. Over his long career, highlights of which include his short story...