The title of Krasikov’s stunning debut collection, One More Year, suggests both despondency and hope, both reluctance and anticipation—wonderfully fitting for a book about immigrants from the former Soviet Union.
This fascinating Atlantic article by psych professor Paul Bloom explores the idea that each of us has multiple selves vying for control of the body and mind they inhabit. It’s also a rational (yet somewhat radical) take on creativity; see p. 2 for related ruminations on fiction.
I teach in Connecticut on Wednesdays, so it’s the perfect excuse to shirk blogging duties and link to two of the best stories I’ve read this year: 1. “Nine” by Aryn Kyle, from the Atlantic‘s 2008 Fiction Issue. If it strikes your fancy, read Kyle’s debut novel, The God of Animals, now available in paperback and reviewed here on FWR. 2. “Face” by Alice Munro, from the September 8 New Yorker. What a fresh story! Who can “make it new” after more than a dozen collections? Alice Munro, that’s who.
