Longtime contributor Pravesh Bhardwaj read and shared 276 short stories on the #longreads Twitter hashtag in 2021. Here are his favorites.
fiction
Posted inEditor's Pick
John Updike, His Stories, and Me
“But now I’ve been a writer for 30 years, I can understand the impulses that I and he and probably every other writer have: to go after a subject we’re compelled by.”
Posted inBooks, Crime, Current Events, Highlight, Nonfiction, Quotes, Writing
‘Can You Imagine How That Felt?’: Blake Bailey’s Predations, As Told By His Students
The inside story of author Blake Bailey’s grooming of middle-school girls.
Posted inBooks, Fiction, Story
‘I’m a Big Fan of Writing To Find Out What You Don’t Know.’
Mark Haber discusses “Reinhardt’s Garden” and its protagonist’s quest for a true understanding of melancholy: “not a feeling but a mood, not a color but a shade, not depression but not happiness either…”
Posted inStory
‘I Was Interested in the People Who Are Stuck With These Memories.’
Steph Cha discusses her new novel “Your House Will Pay,” the LA Riots, the Korean American Angeleno community, her 3,600 Yelp reviews, and pushing back against gatekeepers in publishing.
Posted inStory
“We’re All Still Cooking…Still Raw at the Core”: An Interview with Jacqueline Woodson
“When I look at that dress and how much intention went into the making of it…it’s like we want to have something that can’t be destroyed, because so much of the past has been destroyed…”
Posted inNonfiction
‘To Be Polite By Ignoring the Obvious’: Jess Row on Unpacking Whiteness in Literature
“I was looking for texts that seem to go the extra mile in hiding something — texts that almost seem to be begging to be interpreted in terms of what’s not being said.”
Posted inStory
The Migrant in the Mirror
In recent novels, Ocean Vuong and Nicole Dennis-Benn tell stories in which young queer characters affected by migration and displacement are worthy of seeing themselves reflected in others.
Posted inBooks, Fiction, History, Profiles & Interviews, Story
‘Nobody in This Book Is Going to Catch a Break’: Téa Obreht on “Inland”
‘The history of the West is a deeply turbulent one… that kept the living population in a constant state of unrest. I thought this constant state of unrest must be true for the dead as well.’
