I am now going to demonstrate how small and magical and awesome the world can be, and I am going to use the intro to Peter Bognanni’s 6 questions to do it. Sorry, Peter. If you want to get to good stuff, skip this beginning and jump right to his answers. I’ve never met Peter, but I did stand behind [...]

My list is not that original, you may find many of these books on other best of lists for 2009, but hopefully that’s because they are good books. I’m behind the times with two of these titles – The Road and Push – but they both left lasting impressions on me this year. Here you go: 1. 2666 by Roberto [...]

In no specific order: In the Miso Soup by Ryu Murakami: Kenji is a young guide who takes tourists through Tokyo’s seedy underground. It’s an illegal job that brings him into contact with the seemingly plastic-faced and socially awkward Frank, whom Kenji suspects is a murderer. This book is absolutely chilling. In my favorite scene, blood spills from a slit [...]

I feel bad making this list on December 27th when I’m in the midst of two books that are really quite good (A Friend of the Family by Lauren Grodstein and What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us by Laura van den Berg) what if they turn out to be mind-blowingly awesome? Then what? WHAT? [...]

To celebrate our first anniversary, we’re giving you the chance to win one of our favorite books by Minnesota authors. Below, you’ll see five of our favorites, and a little bit about why we liked them so much. To win, all you need to do is leave a comment and tell us which book you want. We’ll draw a winner [...]

I’ve noticed lately a slew of Best of 2009 (so far) music lists (all of which I found on Largeheartedboy). I thought, you know maybe people want to know what the best books (that I’ve read) of 2009 thus far. Ominvoracious has a list of the best book so far, but I haven’t read any of them yet (though I’m [...]

I deserve a big, fat, chocolate-covered “I told you so.” Arthur Phillips’ Prague is, interesting-wise, the exact inverse of his most-recent novel The Song is You, interesting-wise. Damn if I didn’t fall hard in the early chapters, which find a handful of 20-something ex-pats in Budapest in 1990: John, the laid back, lovelorn accidental journalist has followed his brother Scott, [...]

Wow. I just gotta say sometimes fortune shines down on me when I least expect it. As I was pondering what to write here in this intro of David de Young of How Was the Show, I stumbled on Jim Walsh’s excellent, informative piece on de Young for Minn Post. You should go read that, if only to find out [...]

Before I even get started, you should know that Arthur Phillips is going to be reading tonight (May 21st) at 7 p.m. (doors at 6:15) at the Central Library, 300 Nicollet Mall Minneapolis, 55401. He’ll be joined by Chan Poling (The Suburbs, New Standards) and Steve Seel (from 89.3 The Current). And me. Well, I’ll be in the audience. If [...]

And there I was, minding my own business on a Sunday afternoon, when suddenly I could not put down The Song Is You by Arthur Phillips. It was like I got hit over the head with a love mallet. It had to be, because for the first third of the book I was trudging through Phillips’ metaphor mud, wondering why [...]