Bookworm

Jonathan Lethem and Steve Erickson discuss science fiction-prophet, writer Philip K Dick.

Can a gay man and a straight man be friends? Edmund White explores the gay-straight axis in Jack Holmes & His Friend.

Ayad Akhtar on coming-of-age as a Muslim in Milwaukee. We discuss the nature of cultural understanding and misunderstanding, sexual and spiritual awakening. 

Most everyone has a skeleton in the closet. Wayne Koestenbaum talks about those gruesome and hideous moments most of us would rather not remember.

Steve Erickson latest novel seeks to find a haven in the midst of our economic despair and our fears of global catastrophe.

Leibovitz's first photo book of objects and landscapes is a triumphant array of iconic images. We talk about her opinions on light, digital imagery and distilling time.

This first novel follows the narrator who just happens to be named Ismet Prcic from Bosnia to America, from a radical theater group to a creative writing program.

Dennis Cooper on the inarticulate emotions that underlie the razzle-dazzle of secret corridors, lush language, brutality and desire.

Autobiographical essays and Jonathan Lethem on his favorite books, spending time with James Brown and the writer's role as public intellectual.

This book of poetry is the product of great grief in Peter Gizzi's life: the death of his mother, his brother and his best friend...

Paul La Farge on his innovation of the novel form. His new novel, though it is published between covers, only represents one third of the book. The other two-thirds...

The true story of the historical detective whose work uncovered the 1000 year-old poem that shook the early Christian world and marked the beginning of the Renaissance...

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jeffrey Eugenides on his new novel, in which he learned to "do" character.

A rebroadcast of an engaging conversation with our great octogenarian laureate, W.S. Merwin .

With little known about Pat Nixon, Ann Beattie decided to write a novel in the form of a writer's manual, she used Mrs. Nixon as a model of how to create a character.

Tony D'Souza reveals the life events that led him to write a novel about a solid, middle-class kid who becomes a drug mule...

The veteran contributor to The New Yorker and McSweeney's distills his knowledge about how to structure the essay—from cultural comedies to political tragedies.

The author of Affliction and The Sweet Hereafter takes breathtaking risks in exploring a morally complex story. The protagonist is a renegade and convicted sex offender...

We visited Harold Bloom to talk about his new book, but when you talk with Bloom, you talk about politics, poetry, teaching, aging, reading and ultimately, respect...

This sequence of short stories, or prose poems, or vignettes (author Justin Torres is open to all three descriptions) adds up to a little novel about an underclass family....

Wilson's goofy, sweet-hearted first novel is about a family of performance artists. The Fang family's siblings are struggling to leave their parents behind in order to lead a normal life...

Araceli Ramirez, the heroine of Héctor Tobar's new novel, is a nanny is accused of kidnapping her charges, when she is, in fact, taking them to their grandfather....

Modern and post-modern art have gone up to a level of transgressive and theoretical border play that leave many viewers bewildered or repelled...

The Bookworm learns about retro culture from a master of rock criticism. Simon Reynolds meditates on the aspects of global music that have led to endless recycling....

An explorer of sensuality and violator of taboos, Rikki Ducornet allows a predatory psychoanalyst to narrate her new novel...