Farrar, Straus and Giroux

In Her Book American Gypsy, Oksana Marafioti Tries to Reclaim Romani Culture From Reality TV

Author Oksana Marafioti's new memoir, American Gypsy (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), is two success stories in one: one of an immigrant making her way in America, the other of a Gypsy. At 15, Marafioti moved from her native Moscow to Los Angeles. In Russia, she'd endured discrimination (including tau ... More >>

LEARNING TO LOVE LITERATURE WITH JEFF GARLIN

How To Cook Like a Movie Star: Marilyn Monroe's Stuffing Recipe

Flickr/srettThanksgiving ​ As the former director of the Michelin Guide infamously noted, people in L.A. care more about movie stars than Michelin stars. Sure we do. (That's presumably why Michelin no longer publishes a guide to Los Angeles. And perhaps one of the reasons why Jean-Luc Naret i ... More >>

The Sausage Stand at the Echo

A music innovator and sound impressionist gets inspired by the life customizers of Echo Park

Hallelujah Junction: A Minimalist Life

A memoir from composer John Adams

Marilynne Robinson's Home: Making Light of Life

Laughter in the dark

Adam Thirlwell's Delighted States of literary criticism

Lost in translation

The Story of a Marriage: Gay Love in the Time of Eisenhower

Andrew Sean Greer's novel is far from real

Loquat: A Short Story

Jellyfish's Etgar Keret: The Wizard of Id

Writer/director shoots from the hip about his low-budget movie and his high-budget life

Best Books of 2007

But don't take our word for it. The National Book Critics Circle launched its inaugural Best Recommended List, compiled by polling its members, former book prize winners and finalists. (The NBCC's excellent blog is here: bookcriticscircle.blogspot.com/ ) Here are the lists they came up with, along ... More >>

The Presence of the Past

Those were the days

William Langewiesche on The Atomic Bazaar and Facing our Worst Fear

The eventualist

Lydia Davis’ Short, Weird Fiction

Curious and curiouser

Eurosuburbia

Rachel Cusk’s Arlington Park sounds vaguely familiar

Staff Recommends

Best of 2006

Bedtime Stories

D.T. Max’s and Jonathan Franzen’s mental disorders

Bedtime Stories

D.T. Max’s and Jonathan Franzen’s mental disorders

New From Our Contributors

A Theory of Idleness

Excerpted from Doing Nothing: A History of Loafers, Loungers, Slackers, and Bums in America

15 Writers Share Their Must-Reads

Divine Invention

Marilynne Robinson on her long-awaited new novel, Gilead

Some Very Excellent Books

15 writers share their must-reads

Restoring Pasolini

Thirty years later, new questions arise about who murdered the Italian cultural giant

Genre Bender

Michael Cunningham’s multidirectional Specimen Days

The Gathering Storm

Judith Regan, the world’s most successful publisher, heads for the coast

Divine Invention

Marilynne Robinson on her long-awaited new novel, Gilead

Divine Invention

Marilynne Robinson on her long-awaited new novel, Gilead

Soul on Ice

In John Haskell’s heady, hypnotic fiction, amnesia is a form of metaphysics

The Red Stuff

The sullied waters of Tom Wolfe’s I Am Charlotte Simmons

In the Bedroom

From Latvia with Love

Stunning stories about the urban Jewish immigrant experience

From Latvia with Love

Stunning stories about the urban Jewish immigrant experience

The Coffee Table

Dames, dice and dope: holiday gift books revisited

Too Much Hurt

David Grossman on Bruno Schulz

The Coffee Table

Super Furry Sound

A year in music

Must Reads

Fourteen writers on their favorite book of the year

Boss Cupid’s Poet

The good life and hard times of Thom Gunn

Dick

(Not the movie)

The Ecstatic Life

Geoff Dyer on happiness, laziness and his new novel, Paris Trance

Ask the Auden Expert

Edward Mendelson on the poet's later years

Genocidal Tendencies

Death and bewilderment in Rwanda — and, by extension, Kosovo