
In our morning reading: revisiting “A Little Life,” new writing by Matthew Specktor and Gabino Igesias, and more.

In our morning reading: revisiting “A Little Life,” new writing by Matthew Specktor and Gabino Igesias, and more.

In our morning reading: interviews with Scaachi Koul and Dan Bejar, fiction from Nathan Ballingrud, and more.

Tobias Carroll’s fifth book, In the Sight, is a hip dystopian road novel. Farrier is the main character, and we follow his travels through roadside motels, eateries, gas stations, bars, retail locations, and secret reading rooms and societies across a futuristic American landscape. In the Sight was inspired by Destroyer’s 2002 album, This Night, and we trail after Farrier as he dispenses a mind-altering product which can change the trajectory of your life. A revision of life is what the product delivers. At first, I wondered if I was heading into Huxley’s Brave New World territory, or a new age reboot of Kerouac’s On the Road, but in a more nomadic picaresque journey. Rick Moody’s hilarious Hotels of North America even crossed my mind as well, early on, as I tried to figure out where Farrier was going and what he was aiming for in his journey. None of these truly fit what I found in this novel. We learn that Farrier and his friends Edwin Hollister, Lopez, and Erskine, all share a similar discontent about the lives they’re leading in university. Edwin names what they’re after: “Reincarnation…but without the death part.” The group experiments with DIY brain science alterations, which allow the recipient to begin a new life. Edwin partakes, revises himself, and sets off never to be heard from again, by Chapter 5. You wonder how many times Farrier has done the same.

In our afternoon reading: new writing by Janice Lee, an interview with Dan Bejar, and more.

In our morning reading: interviews with John Keene and Dan Bejar, the return of Midori Takada, and more.

In our afternoon reading: thoughts on Sara Lippmann’s new collection, an interview with Dan Bejar, and more.

In our morning reading: interviews with Jeff Jackson and Melissa Febos, looking back at Destroyer’s discography, and more.

In our afternoon reading: talking with Evie Wyld, thoughts on new books by James McBride and Ander Monson, and more.