CityLit Press – Baltimore Magazine

Best Books of 2015

Gabriella Souza — Thu, 24 Dec 2015 12:05:00 +0000

Our list of Baltimore’s best books in 2015 run the gamut of genres— memoir, fiction, poetry, history. Two explored the issues of race and equality we face as a country, while others provided a literary escape or made us pause to consider our lives. And while the literary world provides endless options each year, we feel sure that these extraordinary books will stand the test of time.

Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates

It’s no wonder this tour de force has made critics’ best of 2015 lists and, earlier this year, won the National Book Award. Between the World and Me is a wake-up call, a mind-altering analysis of why our country has failed to provide equality for everyone, regardless of color. Coates carries us from his boyhood in West Baltimore through his time at Howard University and adulthood as he reflects in a letter to his 15-year-old son, Samori—who is learning what it means to be black in America. Coates enlightens us all.

A Spool of Blue Thread, Anne Tyler

Every book this Charm City resident writes demonstrates depth and feeling, but A Spool of Blue Thread is truly remarkable. The book chronicles four generations of the Whitshank family of Roland Park, a regular, middle-class brood. Yes, you will feel as if you know them, but Tyler elevates this story’s ordinary setting into something profound. You’ll be left musing on the roles each of us play in our own families, and what it means to go home.

The Beast Side, D. Watkins

If you were to pick a quintessential Baltimore writer right now, you’d be hard pressed not to choose D. Watkins. With his sharp eye for detail and unsentimental prose, he highlights the characters in his beloved East Baltimore, the economic, social, and racial divides in the city, his own drug-dealing past—and just how badly social change is needed here. Watkins’ book has garnered national attention, with good reason, and people across the country are joining Charm City in contemplating his message.

Get a Grip, Kathy Flann

Flann is a master at developing her characters and creating plots that have you gripping, so to speak, on every word. With nearly all of these short stories set in Baltimore, Flann, a Goucher College creative writing professor, explores different facets of the city—from an Estonian teenager living in West Baltimore to a 40-year-old woman devouring her own birthday cake in Catonsville. But the best part are Flann’s unresolved endings. With each, she takes you to the edge, and leaves it up to you to decide which way life will turn.

It Shouldn’t Have Been Beautiful, Lia Purpura

Each of Purpura’s poems in this collection read like spontaneous gems, as if she was struck by a moment of inspiration and paused to scribble down her thoughts. But don’t think that makes them any less profound. Purpura—writer in residence at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, whose work has appeared in The New Yorker and The Paris Review—provides poignant insight into our existence and all its mysteries. The collection is an absolute wonder.

Intimacy Idiot, Isaac Oliver

Baltimore native Oliver moved to New York City a decade ago and started chronicling his sexual misadventures in hilarious, cringe-worthy detail—from his liaison with an Italian guy who was into spanking to encounters with a hockey player with aggression issues. This memoir is funny and touching in a style reminiscent of David Sedaris. And trust us—your awkward hook-ups won’t seem that bad ever again.

Clash by Night, edited by Gerry LaFemina and Gregg Wilhelm

Emotions run strong in this poetry anthology published by Baltimore’s own CityLit Press—outrage, despair, infatuation, longing, to name a few. But how could they not? Each poem is based on The Clash’s 1979 album London Calling, a post-punk masterpiece of raw energy and intense creativity. The poems describe the longing of youth, social or political displacement, or simply how the authors felt upon those first formative listens to punk-rock classics such as “Train in Vain” and “Spanish Bombs.” You can almost hear the buzz of the needle on the vinyl and feel the vibration of the speakers.

Showdown, Wil Haygood

Thurgood Marshall was one of Charm City’s greatest native sons—his long list of achievements include being the attorney behind the legendary Brown vs. Board of Education case and becoming the first black Supreme Court justice. But little was written about the confirmation hearings that led to his Supreme Court appointment until Haygood, a Washington, D.C, based writer, came along. And he found ample drama to showcase—weaving narrative from the proceedings with background details about those influencing them—that will make you realize just how important Marshall was to our country’s history, and how relevant his story still is today.

One Child for Another, Nancy Murray

In her debut book, Murray, a graduate of the University of Baltimore’s MFA program, creates a poignant example of what memoirs can achieve. She relates the story of how she became pregnant as a teenager in the 1970s and her decision to give up her child for adoption with remarkable detail and candor. Her story is one of surviving abuse, sacrifice, and ultimately, resilience, told with such honesty that you’ll feel as if you are living it with her.

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Book Reviews: May 2015

Jess Mayhugh — Fri, 29 May 2015 11:29:32 +0000

Baltimore’s Little Italy
Suzanna Rosa Molino (The History Press)

Decades ago, the blocks of row houses nestled between Eastern and Pratt streets felt like slices of the old country. Little Italy was home to generations of families, whose children’s voices bounced off the cobblestones. It was a place where organ grinders and nuns in long, black habits weren’t surprising sights. Molino chronicles the history of this enclave, settled in the 1800s by immigrants from Naples and Genoa. The Baltimore native, who is also the director of a promotion center for the neighborhood (and wife of former Oriole Ken Singleton), remembers visiting her aunt and uncle there, and harbors much love for the community. Her book is full of delights, from old photographs of neighborhood groceries to recipes for tiramisu and St. Leo the Great Roman Catholic Church’s famous ravioli. It will make you long for an era when grandmas chitchatted on stoops, guys had nicknames like “Mugs” and “Fookey,” and you didn’t have to go far to find someone who would invite you to dinner.

Clash by Night
Edited by Gerry LaFemina and Gregg Wilhelm (CityLit Press)

Emotions run strong in this poetry anthology—outrage, despair, infatuation, longing, to name a few. But how could they not? Each poem is based on The Clash’s 1979 album London Calling, a post-punk masterpiece of raw energy and intense creativity. You’ll remember its infamous cover, which shows bassist Paul Simonon slamming his Fender Precision bass on stage. Co-edited by Baltimore’s own Wilhelm, who founded CityLit Press, and poet, writer, and punk rocker, Gerry LaFemina, the anthology debuts May 2 at the 12th Annual CityLit Festival. Both Wilhem and LaFemina hope it will be the first of many such anthologies to pair poems and iconic albums. Some of the poems are literal, others abstract. While some focus on the album as a whole, most home in on one specific track, mimicking its cadence or lyrical structure or focusing on one detail or character. The poems describe the longing of youth, social or political displacement, or simply how the authors felt upon those first formative listens to punk-rock classics such as “Train in Vain” and “Spanish Bombs.” You can almost hear the buzz of the needle on the vinyl and feel the vibration of the speakers.

See our Q&A with writer Gregg Wilhelm.

Touch: The Science of Hand, Heart, and Mind
David J. Linden (Viking)

If asked to name the senses, we’re quick to tick off “sight” and “smell.” But oddly, Linden writes, “touch” isn’t the first one to come to most minds, though it has such an intrinsic connection to our emotions. And, he points out, it has quite a presence in everyday language. Think of phrases like, “He rubs me the wrong way,” or, “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.” Linden, professor of neuroscience at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, sets out to explain how touch is critical to us as humans and how it impacts our lives, becoming, as he puts it, “a crucial form of social glue.” The book can get a little science-heavy as Linden analyzes the nervous system, the brain, and the skin as organisms. But he weaves the lecture-type material with attention-grabbing anecdotes—including one from his time as a juror on a rape case and another about a funny, if freaky, sexual encounter—that help connect the anatomical stuff to our day-to-day experiences.

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Book Reviews: March 2015

Jess Mayhugh — Thu, 26 Mar 2015 08:30:00 +0000

The Oldest Living Things in the World
Rachel Sussman (The University of Chicago Press)

This is my favorite photography book of the past year—in part, because it’s so well written. As the title suggests, Sussman, a Baltimore native, found and photographed the oldest continuously living things on the planet, all of them at least 2,000 years old. From underground forests in South Africa to map lichens in Greenland, she produces fascinating images. Bonus: Sussman’s narrative of her travels is equally compelling.

Geo-Poe
Various Contributors (CityLit Project/Eight Stone Press)

Geo-Poe originated as a geo-caching scavenger hunt in which 14 Poe-inspired stories were hidden in canisters around the city. Clues were given via social media, and Poe fans went looking, but some canisters proved hard to find, while others were stolen. This publication remedies the original project’s shortcomings by gathering all the stories into an easily findable zine format. I especially enjoyed Dean Bartoli Smith’s unexpected foray into local sports history.

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Book Reviews: November 2014

Jess Mayhugh — Wed, 26 Nov 2014 08:30:00 +0000

The Great Grisby
Mikita Brottman (Harper)

This is a love story. Brottman, who teaches in MICA’s Humanistic Studies department, loved her dog, Grisby, who passed away just months after she finished the book. The bulldog accompanied her everywhere, from the classroom—he’s pictured with Brottman on her MICA bio page—to the bathtub. If that seems a bit extreme, this spirited book provides context, both historical and personal. Over the course of 26 chapters (from A to Z, each one takes the name of a dog owned by an artistic or historical figure), Brottman examines the human-canine connection with a historian’s eye for lasting significance and a diarist’s fondness for everyday detail. She mixes stories and anecdotes about Picasso’s dachshund (Lump) and Freud’s chow (Yofi) with candid and intimate appraisals of life with Grisby. Brottman also injects a fair amount of psychology into the book and comes off as completely crazy—crazy about Grisby.

See our Q&A with author Mikita Brottman.

Ripple Meets the Deep
Jason Tinney (CityLit Press)

Harry Crews blurbed fellow Southern writer Larry Brown’s debut book by succinctly stating, “Talent has struck.” This book of short stories by Jason Tinney, a Frederick resident and occasional contributor to Baltimore, brings Crews’s quote to mind. Tinney, like the aforementioned writers, crafts bold and sensual stories that ripple with nuance below the surface. His self-conscious characters might bleed and bruise, but it’s the seemingly offhanded comment that hangs in the air or the sense of unspoken longing that nudges them toward profundity. They grapple with aging and mortality and a sense that the open road, once so inviting, might lead nowhere good. They also sense that the salvation they’re seeking might be found closer to home, in things like the hushed beauty of a snowfall or the warmth of a pre-dawn embrace. But the restlessness stirs, bringing tension and an aching humanity to Tinney’s prose.

Design and Content
Abbott Miller (Princeton Architectural Press)

Abbott Miller and Ellen Lupton, Baltimore’s graphic-design power couple, have both published new books recently. Lupton’s Type on Screen, a follow-up to her influential Thinking with Type, is basically a textbook on screen-based typography, the perfect gift for the hotshot web geek in your life. Miller’s book, a monograph surveying his career to date, has much broader appeal and includes his print work (the Matthew Barney 2003 Guggenheim catalog is stunning), exhibition design (check out 2002’s traveling Harley-Davidson exhibition), and collaborations with the likes of Yoko Ono and Philip Glass. I especially like the generous selection of spreads from 2wice, the arts magazine Miller founded in 1997. The writing isn’t bad either, especially an insightful essay by Lupton, who recalls the days when they would “work side by side as friends, no benefits, pursuing a journey that still defines us.” I should note that the book is well-designed—by Miller, of course.

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