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Browse our essays and reviews on fiction.
Chantal Johnson’s debut novel, Post-Traumatic, makes the case that we can—by moving away from representations of individual suffering.
Reflecting on three monumental works of modernism a hundred years on.
László Krasznahorkai’s latest novel reflects on the power of the surveillance state through the perspective of a librarian who wishes to lock up all books.
The celebrated novelist treated the past seriously, depicting its psychological complexity and drawing out its present-day political implications.
In her new book, Danish poet Olga Ravn writes with open love, pity, and compassion for her strange yet familiar creations.
Amidst a boys’ club of ’70s-era comics, Shary Flenniken’s Trots and Bonnie was unique for its feminist depiction of the political and sexual awakening of young women.
Newly translated into English, Minae Mizumura’s An I-Novel is a vivid portrait of immigrant displacement and the ironies of our global cultural ecosystem.
The Greens are on track to become Germany’s second strongest party. For many, this is proof that abandoning radicalism was the right choice, but a new novel offers valuable insights into why it should be recovered.
The French Algerian writer steadfastly defended democracy and humanity against dogmatic ideologies of all stripes. We need to read and reread him today.
In ‘Vineland’, his underappreciated 1990 novel, the author of ‘Gravity’s Rainbow’ anticipated a United States in which security would become the greatest good.
Rereleased this year in a single volume, Kim Stanley Robinson’s trilogy Three Californias imagines three possible futures for the world writ large through the lens of Orange County, California.
Michel Houellebecq’s Islamophobia and chauvinism have made him a favorite intellectual of right extremists. So why does he appeal to so many on the left as well?
Alternate histories like Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America—newly adapted by HBO—force us to imagine a different America.
Garth Greenwell’s Cleanness movingly depicts the vulnerabilities of queer desire, but it also continues a long tradition of exoticizing Eastern European sexuality.
The artist exploded the idea of what a book can be. For him, it was not a thing, but an instrument—something to do something with.
A timely new documentary celebrates Morrison’s novels, but downplays the enduring power of her work as an editor and essayist.
Science fiction author Ted Chiang wrote the story for the Academy Award–winning film Arrival. Now his new collection of short stories gives us further glimpses of possible futures.
Hwang Sok-yong’s novel Familiar Things sounds a warning about the pitfalls of Korean reunification.
Neel Mukherjee is part of a new generation of Indian writers dissecting postcolonialism’s failed promise of a classless society.
A science fiction writer remembers his early correspondences with Ursula Le Guin.
We live in Philip K. Dick’s future, not George Orwell’s or Aldous Huxley’s.
“However you find your society . . . you do not have to embrace its lies, or become complicitors in its cruelties,” wrote E. L. Doctorow, whose novels offer a map for navigating the Trump era.
From invading Afghanistan to dismantling Confederate monuments, George Orwell has been pressed into the service of all sorts of causes. But the real Orwell remains unknown.
A new generation of young Polish novelists has turned to dystopia to express Poland's cultural and economic contradictions.
Celebrated dystopian novelist Paul Kingsnorth talks surviving the collapse of civilization as we know it.
Emile Habiby's absurd fictions offer a map for surviving impossible political conditions.
Our democracy may depend on government workers, and indeed all of us, saying "I would prefer not to."
Yuri Herrera's first two novels explore Mexican border identity.
Paul Park’s fantasy troubles the line between fiction and reality.
Spain struggles to honor the legacy of Cervantes.
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That’s what sociologist Alondra Nelson says of Boston Review. Independent and nonprofit, we believe in the power of collective reasoning and imagination to create a more just world.
That’s why there are no paywalls on our website, but we can’t do it without the support of our readers. Please make a tax-deductible donation to help us create a more inclusive and egalitarian public sphere—open to everyone, regardless of ability to pay.
That’s what sociologist Alondra Nelson says of Boston Review. Independent and nonprofit, we believe in the power of collective reasoning and imagination to create a more just world.
That’s why there are no paywalls on our website, but we can’t do it without the support of our readers. Please make a tax-deductible donation to help us create a more inclusive and egalitarian public sphere—open to everyone, regardless of ability to pay.