Allen Morris Jones’s "Sweeney on the Rocks" is a quick-witted, dark-humored crime novel whose clever plot twists and morbid sarcasm never let up. Its characters,... Read More

The first step of deprogramming is education, informing the person you are trying to free just how indoctrination works to hamstring a mind. But information alone will not free... Read More

One thing is for sure, Mickey Hess has done his homework for "A Guest in the House of Hip-Hop", in which he records trying to be a good ambassador as he amplifies black voices... Read More

This dystopian novel is poetic even in its austerity. Andrew Valencia’s dystopian "Lord of California" is set in rural, isolated California a few decades after it disbands... Read More

"Empire of Glass" is a study in contrasts and a provocative labyrinth. "Empire of Glass" is the visceral tale of an American exchange student, Lao K, who is entrusted with her... Read More

An Arctic exploration becomes an exploration of the self as a man seeks a new understanding of connection with loved ones. The North Pole reveals itself to be not what... Read More

Depth of internal struggle, powerful themes, and setting as character—Rachel Weaver has achieved greatness with her debut. In Rachel Weaver’s "Point of Direction", Alaska is... Read More

It is a Tuesday morning in November, and Diana Wagman’s fourth novel could take place only in Los Angeles. Winnie Parker, a thirty-eight-year-old single mom, has been waiting... Read More

Sometimes it seems as though America was founded upon the idea of consumption. With capitalism as the form of economic distribution, buying things is what Americans seem to do... Read More

The novel opens with Swain, a one-armed juggler, watching from the wings of a theater as Jonson and his boy dance atop wooden barrels. They are all performers in a small-town... Read More

Post-apocalyptic fiction, once solely the purview of science fiction and best exemplified by novels such as Earth Abides, A Canticle for Leibowitz, and Alas, Babylon, began... Read More

A significant part of the United States counter-culture movement of the 1960s and 70s included thousands of adventuresome hippies engaged in spiritual pilgrimages to eastern... Read More