Minnesota Reads

It starts with a young James Wolcott riding a ref from Norman Mailer to the grunts of the Village Voice offices. One of those “I like how you write, if you’re ever in NYC, stop by X and ask for Y and he’ll hook you up” scenarios Wolcott took seriously enough to drop out of [...]

I remember the moment Jeanette Winterson entered my life. It was the summer of 1995, upstairs in a dusty used-bookstore called The Book Peddler in downtown Eau Claire, Wisconsin. I was lost somewhere in the philosophy stacks when my friend Anderla came over holding a paperback reverently in her hands. “You have to read this,” [...]

You know who Anne Lamott is, she’s that great great aunt who had a tiny but bright blip in your life and she opened some windows, taught you a few things, and made you look at dreadlocks differently. But here it is, almost Christmas, and you know it’s time to make that annual drive to [...]

There are very few books that I am scared to read when I first pick them up (I’m reading one right now that scares the crap out of me). That being said, Agorafabulous! *Dispatches From My Bedroom didn’t scare me too much at first. The cover was bright red, cheery, and there were polka-dots. Polka-dots [...]

I’m a big believer in that adage about not meeting your heroes because they’ll just disappoint you. The same can probably be said about reading memoirs by your heroes. Ignorance really is bliss, people. What we need here is a word for being compelled to do something you know is going to break your heart. [...]

Harold Pinter was one of my favorite playwrights. We studied his play “Betrayal” and I wondered what kind of person could write such realistic dialogue with strong, almost mighty, subtext. Actors loved his plays because the subtext allowed them to create a situation that could be completely opposite the dialogue. My theory on Pinter is [...]

One time someone told me in a really convincing and authoritative voice that as an English major, it is really bad form that I claimed no interest in history. “All literature is history,” or maybe “All history is literature,” this person said and I shrugged and imagined maps and capitols and dates that wars ended [...]

“This is a story about madness.” So begins the delightful insanity of The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson. Ronson, a self-proclaimed sufferer of severe anxiety, admits that he is an odd choice for a renegade psychopath hunter, but his sense of humor and occasionally bizarre behavior make him perfect for the job of writing about [...]

The last time you saw Heather Donahue she had a camera pointed up her nostrils, flared and leaking, and she was delivering her “Goodbye cruel world!” speech in one of the final scenes of “The Blair Witch Project.” In the decade plus since that movie she has had a few roles here and there — [...]

I bawled my eyes out for the entirety of the “Friday Night Lights” television series finale (and, to be honest, several preceding episodes), so I had been looking forward to reading the book by the same name. Written by H.G. Bissinger, it inspired the movie, which in turn prompted a television series. I’m generally a [...]

At first I didn’t like Miranda July. She seemed too precious. Her first book of short stories, contrived quirkiness. Like watching Zooey Deschanel shop for leg warmers at Goodwill. But I didn’t like Miranda July in that way that meant I’d be peeking out from behind the curtains to watch her walk down the street. [...]

When the people in Joan Didion’s life die, it’s the kind of thing that makes the news. Niece, before the release of the biggest movie she will live to make, “Poltergeist,” strangled by an ex-boyfriend. Husband dies of a heart attack, and Didion’s account of it wins a National Book Award. Her brother-in-law, bladder cancer, [...]

I haven't found a book that I love in months. It has been a dark time and all I did was scour the library looking for a book I could love. I walked through life crossing my fingers hoping I would find the perfect book that I would read in a matter of days and [...]

The young costumed actor at Epcot Center greeted us with a British accent. We must have been in a zone dedicated to all things charming and UK. It was the mid-1980s and my brother and I were too old to be Disney World's target audience, but my parents had decided that if we went any [...]

Dear Shevaun, You left a self-addressed envelope, the size of a note card, in the Duluth Public Library’s copy of The White Album, a collection of essays by Joan Didion. Your name as both the sender and receiver. Both address labels indicate an association with the University of Florida. One is decorated with a UF, [...]