F. Scott Fitzgerald’s second novel, The Beautiful and Damned*,* has frequently been dismissed as an outlier and curiosity in his oeuvre, a transitional work from the coming-of-age plot of This Side of Paradise to the masterful critique of American aspiration in The Great Gatsby*.*The Beautiful and Damned belongs to a genre that is widely misunderstood, the “bright young things” novel in which spoiled and wealthy characters succumb to decay becaus...

"No other work has focused so sharply and revealed so clearly the vitality of Hemingway's time in Key West. Key West Hemingway shows that even as his Papa persona grew during the 1930s, Hemingway continued to generate a significant body of nuanced and complex (if also misunderstood) experimental prose. With keen scrutiny and brilliance, these fresh and readable essays rediscover and give us Hemingway's multifaceted American literary voices."--Linda Patterson Miller, editor of ...

A “delightful” (Vanity Fair) collection from the longest-running, most influential book review in America, featuring its best, funniest, strangest, and most memorable coverage over the past 125 years.Since its first issue on October 10, 1896, The New York Times Book Review has brought the world of ideas to the reading public. It is the publication where authors have been made, and where readers first encountered t...

“Make [your] characters want something right away—even if it’s only a glass of water. Characters paralyzed by the meaninglessness of modern life still have to drink water from time to time.” —Kurt Vonnegut“‘The cat sat on the mat’ is not the beginning of a story, but ‘the cat sat on the dog’s mat’ is.” —John Le CarréNothing is more inspiring for a beginning writer than listening to masters of the craft talk about the writing life. But if yo...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Anna Quindlen presents a “swift and compelling paean to the joys of books” (Booklist).“Like the columns she used to write for the New York Times, [How Reading Changed My Life] is tart, smart, full of quirky insights, lapidary, and a pleasure to read.”—Publishers Weekly“Reading has always been my home, my sustenance, my great invincible companion. . . . Yet of all the many things in w...

The first full biography of Ernest Hemingway in more than fifteen years; the first to draw upon a wide array of never-before-used material; the first written by a woman, from the widely acclaimed biographer of Norman Mailer, Peggy Guggenheim, Henry Miller, and Louise Bryant.A revelatory look into the life and work of Ernest Hemingway, considered in his time to be the greatest living American novelist and short-story writer, winner of the 1953 Pulitzer Prize for Fic...

"Churchwell... has written an excellent book... she’s earned the right to play on [Fitzgerald's] court. Prodigious research and fierce affection illumine every remarkable page.”—Kirkus (STARRED review)The autumn of 1922 found F. Scott Fitzgerald at the height of his fame, days from turning twenty-six years old, and returning to New York for the publication of his fourth book, Tales of the Jazz Age. A spokesman for America’s carefree younger genera...

**National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist • National Bestseller • A brilliantly conceived and illuminating reconsideration of a key period in the life of Ernest Hemingway that will forever change the way he is perceived and understood."Hendrickson’s two strongest gifts—that compassion and his research and reporting prowess—combine to masterly effect.” —Arthur Phillips, The New York Times Book Review**Focusing on the years 1934 to 1961—from Hemingway’s pinnacle ...

A "deeply researched and uncommonly engrossing" book profiling ten trailblazing literary women, including Dorothy Parker and Joan Didion ( Paris Review).In Sharp, Michelle Dean explores the lives of ten women of vastly different backgrounds and points of view who all made a significant contribution to the cultural and intellectual history of America. These women—Dorothy Parker, Rebecca West, Hannah Arendt, Mary McCarthy, Susan Sontag, Pauline Kael,...

The acclaimed author examines the importance of a writer's voice—including interviews with Susan Orlean, Michel Chabon, Junot Díaz and others.In writing, style matters. Our favorite writers often entertain, move, and inspire us less by what they say than by how they say it. In The Sound on the Page, acclaimed author, teacher, and critic Ben Yagoda offers practical and incisive help for writers on developing and discovering their own style and voice.

**Winner of the 2021 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for BiographyA Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2020 in NonfictionA resonant biography of America’s most celebrated novelist of the Great Depression.**The first full-length biography of the Nobel laureate to appear in a quarter century, Mad at the World illuminates what has made the work of John Steinbeck an enduring part of the literary canon: his capacity for empathy. Pulitzer Prize finalist...

More than 1000 outrageously irreverent quotations, anecdotes, and interviews on a vast array of subjects, from an illustrious list of world-class curmudgeons