Michael Pugliese

Soon, it will be winter. You’ll look out over brown fields and at empty branches, and though you understand that life remains, this knowledge cannot ameliorate the scene’s barrenness. A similar conclusion can be drawn about Robert Morais’ new novel, Buddhaland Brooklyn. Much of the responsibility for this lies with Morais’ choice of narrator, the […]

Somewhere, the spirit of Douglas Adams is crying foul over Sam Leith’s new novel The Coincidence Engine. Lifting from the Hitchhiker books Adams’ infinite improbability drive is a far more venial sin than abandoning the promising screwball comedy of the novel’s first half for a much deeper, darker, and incongruous exploration of the characters that […]

A female acquaintance of mine once complained about baseball that “All it is, is a bunch of guys standing around grabbing themselves and spitting for an hour, moving for maybe two seconds, then standing around grabbing themselves and spitting for another hour.” While this characteristic of baseball cannot be denied, there’s a lot more to […]

Two books take place simultaneously within the slim confines of Stewart O’Nan’s new novel The Odds. One tells the story of a failed marriage, its two unhappy principals not filled with hate for each other, but worn down by their own and their partner’s mistakes and weaknesses. The other explores how desperation can drive people […]

There’s an iron fist inside the velvet glove that is Amy Franklin-Willis’ new novel, The Lost Saints of Tennessee, a story that, though it strays into sentimentality now and again, nevertheless depicts the small everyday challenges, successes and failures that define most lives with both empathy and unblinking realism. Ezekiel Cooper, 40, divorced, owner of […]

Boredom, identical in effect, is the offspring of a million causes. I can happily watch the moon rise over the beach, changing colors as it climbs higher into the sky, while another person would consider walking into the water and never walking out again a much more pleasant alternative activity. I thought about this as […]

I don’t make New Year’s resolutions, because I despise the inevitable disappointment I feel when I break them slightly more than I enjoy the wicked thrill of violating even self-imposed laws. This doesn’t mean, however, that I don’t indulge myself, at least vicariously, by suggesting resolutions that would better both those who ought to make […]