When I was conducting my research for my novel A Revolver to Carry at Night, I immersed myself in the correspondence, biographies, and works of Vera and Vladimir Nabokov’s biographies. It was in Nabokov’s poetic memoir, Speak, Memory, that I discovered the story that inspired Lolita, and began to understand Nabokov’s relationship with his novel and its subject matter.
Some scientists believe the universe wasn’t finely tuned to create intelligent life like us at all. Instead, they say, the universe evolved its own insurance policy by creating as many black holes as possible, which is the universe’s method of reproduction. Following this line of thinking, the universe itself may very well be alive—and the fact that we humans exist at all is just a happy side effect.
At the unlikely Chelsea block that’s remained the city’s wholesale flower market for nearly a century, distributors hustling to open up shop arrived on the block around 3 a.m. Then came the delivery trucks from Kennedy Airport, which started to trickle in by 4. What had been a quiet Chelsea block now rumbled with the clinks and clanks of metal carts wheeled between trucks and stores, as runners unloaded boxes of flowers that had passed through customs overnight, freshly cut from the soils of South America, Asia or Europe.
The examination of race and identity can be seen throughout literature, and increasingly today.
In her debut novel, The Library Thief, Kuchenga Shenjé explores these concepts — and the associated expectations that arise when society demands that every group be neatly categorized. Shenjé delves into the past in this work of historical fiction, posing inquiries about Black people's lives in the Victorian era.
While the Corps provides the backdrop, this isn’t a war novel: it’s the story of a young vet desperate to shed the habits of mind and body that were drilled into him. Being tough, impervious to pain and dismissive of weakness may be useful attributes in combat, but civilian life requires a different set of coping skills.
This is a musician’s dream book, but it’s also a must-read story if you’ve never heard of Basie, Ellington or Armstrong. “The Jazzmen” may send you searching your music library, so make note.