New York Book Of Reviews Novels & Stories

The night is fucking cold, and the streets are bustling with people walking in and out of stores to buy their last minute Christmas gifts. I’ve always loved this side of New York City. There’s always something going on. The city never sleeps. My eyes dart toward the bookstore across the street, noticing the lights are still on despite the ‘Closed’ sign on the door. I take a puff of my cigarette, my gaze never leaving the woman inside while she moves piles of books from one shelf to another, making sure everything is in the right place.

The first review I read was from a literary publication that described the book as unflinching and specific and written with the particular authority of someone who had lived inside the thing she was describing rather than observing it from outside. The second review used the phrase inside view. Not from the methodology. From the book. From the chapter about the Marlowe's dinner and eating the meal alone and going home with every piece of yourself intact. The third review was not a professional review. It was a message in the Aldrich Press reader feedback system, forwarded to me by Patricia. A woman who identified herself only as M. She said she had bought the book on Tuesday. She said she w