New England Review of Books

boston, mass. // launched 2016 // the diction is harsh, the rhymes uncertain
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Contributors

These authors have contributed original reviews, essays, articles, interviews and features for publication in The New England Review of Books. Readers who would like to contact one of our authors are invited to connect via the social media links provided, or to send a message to the editors that will then be passed on to the recipient.

Biographical information and links are current to the time of the author's most recent publication in NERObooks.

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Raquel BALBONI (@monkeyflesh) is the author of a collection, XXX Poems, to be published by Art & Letters in February 2020. Her poems have appeared in The Brooklyn Rail, and are forthcoming in the anthology Boston (Dostoevsky Wannabe, 2020). She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Bylines: break slow (poem, 28 x 2019).
Russell BENNETTS (@russellbennetts) is editor of the online magazine Berfrois, and co-founder of Queen Mob's Teahouse. He is a contributor to venues including Guardian Review, Morning Star, BBC Radio 4, and Al Jazeera English. Bylines: My Clover Order Is Ready in 4 mins (poem, 28 xi 2017).
Henry BERRY (@henryberry) is a researcher and cataloguer of historical and archival materials for university libraries, institutions, dealers, collectors, and auctions. With degrees in English and philosophy, he has been in business for more than twenty years. Bylines: In Honor of Richard J. Cox: a review of Defining a Discipline (23 iv 2020).
Paul BLUMER (@sirstirsalot) studied English at the University of Michigan, and writing at California College of the Arts. He is currently living in Virginia, and has been head bartender at The Rogue Gentlemen in Richmond. Bylines: Showers of Stars from the Universal Feminine: a review of Naomi Wolf's Vagina (22 vi 2016); Legends of Gods and Ghosts: a review of Springs Toledo's The Gods of War (11 viii 2016); Messages in the Bottles: a review of Olivia Laing's The Trip to Echo Spring (12 iii 2018).
Keith BOTSFORD (1928-2018) was an American/European writer, professor emeritus at Boston University and co-founder and editor of News from the Republic of Letters. Bylines: The Botsford Guide to Kulchur (essay, 21 viii 2018)
Fabiana CABRAL hails from Caracas, Venezuela, and has been living in Boston since 2006. A Master's graduate in English literature, she is currently the editor of the My Theatre (Boston) and My Books branches of My Entertainment World. Her writing has appeared in HowlRound and American Theatre. She writes about culture at www.educatedprocrastinator.com. Bylines: Peeking Behind the Curtain: a review of Timothy R. White's Blue-Collar Broadway (20 vii 2016)
Sean CAMPBELL (@seancampb) has written for venues including Boston Review, The Battersea Review, The Critical Flame, and Clarion. He holds an MFA from Emerson College. He currently resides in Somerville, Massachusetts, and works for Pearson Education. Bylines: Botanical Prose: a review of Melissa Green's The Linen Way (17 viii 2016)
Mila CASON was born in Boston, and grew up in an orphanage. Following an autodidact's education, she earned degrees in art history and library science. She has traveled extensively; worked for some time in the European countries of Germany and Norway; and has three times fallen in love. She presently resides in Weston, Mass., and has been spending time re-reading the ten volumes of Romain Rolland's Jean-Christophe. Bylines: Bessay: A Defense of Dalila (6 xi 2020)
Rob CHALFEN's poems have appeared in The Battersea Review, Fulcrum, The Ocean State Review, and Literati Quarterly. He is at work on a first full-length collection, and lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts where he directs the gallery and arts venue Outpost 186. Bylines: Train (poem, 6 xi 2017)
Elizabeth DIDYKALO studied art history and European history at Boston University. She has been editor-in-chief of The Journal of the Core Curriculum and Back Bay Review, and an editorial assistant on Cultures of the West. Bylines: Emperor and Lexington Avenue (poems, 9 viii 2018)
Catherine DOSSETT (@aboutadaughter) is an illustrator based in Boston. Her work has appeared in Queen Mob's Tea House, Clarion, Burn, and The Charles River Journal.
Abigail Adams ELIAS (Wordpress) was born in Virginia and raised in Philadelphia. After student years in St. Louis and London, with gap years in Savannah and West Cork, she vagabonded to the South Shore of Massachusetts, where she's been for the past decade. Her current projects include: raising a son alone, an epic fantasy novel series starring social justice, and setting her poetry to musical landscapes.
Gwendolyn GARCIA is a graduate of the University of Virginia's Area Program in Poetry Writing. She lives and works in Boston.
Meia GEDDES (@meiageddes) was born in Hefei, China, adopted and raised in Sacramento, CA, and now lives in Boston, MA. She is an alumna of the Fulbright program, and receipient of a Spectrum Scholarship at Simmons College, where she is a student in the graduate program in library and information sciences. Connect with her online at meiageddes.com.
George GENOVESE has published four volumes of poetry: Heartlines (1998); Time Steals Softer (2007); The Essential Space of Play (2012); and Love Letters to the World (2016). He has collaborated extensively with the composers Lawrence Whiffin and Mario Genovese on projects setting lyrics and poetry to their music and lives in Melbourne, Australia.
Nadia GERASSIMENKO is the founding editor of Moonchild Magazine, managing editor at Luna Luna Magazine, and proofreader at Red Raven Book Design. She is a freelancer in editorial services by trade, a poet and writer by choice, a moonchild and nightdreamer by spirit.  
Frederick GRANT was born in Brooklyn, attended George Washington University and the Graduate Faculty of the New School, and has lived in Central Square, Cambridge for many years.
Uttaran Das GUPTA (@uttarandasgupta) was born in Calcutta, India, in 1986, and read English at Jadavpur University. His writing has appeared or is forthcoming in CITY (Karachi), Fulcrum, Magnapoets (Toronto), Indian Literature, The Dhauli Review, The Bombay Review, The Bangalore Review, Muse India, and Raiot, The Unsettled Winter, The Sangam House Reader, The Charles River Journal, The Mongrel Book of Voices, and Modern Indian Poetry in Greek. His poetry was shortlisted for the Raedleaf Poetry Competition 2016 and his short stories have been shortlisted for the Juggernaut Short Story Prize and Open Road Review Short Story Contest. He is the author of the collection Visceral Metropolis and the novel Ritual.
Jonathan HAN (@jonhan_theman) was born in Tennessee and raised in Hong Kong. He is still young, so forgive him, if you should ever find fault.
Jack HANSON is a graduate student in philosophy of religions at the University of Chicago. Some of his writing can be found in The Hopkins Review, Open Letters Monthly, and PN Review.
William “BT” HATHAWAY lives in Fairhaven, MA, and is a fourth-generation funeral director. His writing has appeared in publications including Her Heart Poetry Annual, Resistance Is Fertile, Bitchin’ Kitsch and the GNB Writers Block. He also serves as a .
Michael HEALY (@michaelhealy) is a doctoral candidate in comparative literature at The Graduate Center, CUNY, working primarily in the literature of the Americas in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He can be reached by email.
Léann HERLIHY is a performance artist based in Ireland. Learn more about her work at www.leannherlihy.com.
Corey HOWARD (@brkntthprss) is a poet, musician, and chef living in Brighton, Mass. He is Senior Editor of the literary journal Hollow. His poems have been published in The Finger, Paradise in Limbo, New Bourgeois, I Want You to See This Before I Leave, and The South Jersey Review.
Daniel HUDON (@daniel_hudon) is a collegiate lecturer in astronomy and math. He is the author of a popular astronomy book, The Bluffer's Guide to the Cosmos (Oval Books); a chapbook of prose and poetry, Evidence for Rainfall (Pen & Anvil); and a collection of short texts about the biodiversity crisis, Brief Eulogies for Lost Animals (Pen & Anvil). He lives, writes and dances Argentine tango in Boston, MA.
Sandra HUGHES is the president of the Nathaniel Hawthorne Society and an associate professor of English at Western Kentucky University.

Chukwuebuka IBEH was born in Nigeria in 2000. A student of history at the Federal University in Otuoke, he has had pieces published in PenEgg, Clarion, Woke Africa, the website of Short Story Day Africa, and elsewhere. He lives in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, and is a columnist with Bella Naija.

Natalie JANES (@janesnat) is an aspiring writer - slash - funny person, and a senior at Bard College.
Cassandra A. JONES (@CassAnnJones) completed her degree in English at Boston University. She is editor of the twin specfic zines SPACEPUB and Unfamiliar Forces, and host of the monthly SciFi Study Hall in Boston.
Diana KEARNEY (LinkedIn) is the Telford Taylor Fellow and Visiting Instructor in the Benjamin B. Ferencz Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention Clinic at Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University.
Abhijit KHANDKAR is a doctor by profession, currently residing in Delhi. He writes poetry to heal himself. He is a co-founder of a poetry group, The Rhyme Republic. On Instagram as @abhijitkhandkar.
Alexandra KULIK lives in a house overcrowded with books, musical instruments, and dog fur in suburban Illinois. She loves nature but forgets to wear her eyeglasses.
Meghan LAMB is from Chicago. She holds an MFA from Washington University in St. Louis. She is the author of All of Your Most Private Places (Spork Press), Silk Flowers (Birds of Lace), and Sacramento (Solar Luxuriance). Her short stories and essays have appeared in Redivider, Passages North, The Collagist, DIAGRAM, Necessary Fiction, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. Online at meghanlamb.com.
Susan LANDRY writes short-form prose has been published in Brevity, Pindeldyboz, Word Riot, and Mr. Beller's Neighborhood. Her poetry has appeared in Little Star and Cape Cod Poetry Review. She founded and edited the online journal about memoir, Run to the Roundhouse, Nellie, and was co-founder and managing editor of the print literary magazine, Lifeboat: A Journal of Memoir. Both journals have crossed the threshold into the literary afterlife. Born and raised in Massachusetts, she lived most of her adult life in New York City, and now enjoys quiet contemplation in Maine. She continues to work as a freelance copy editor; feel free to contact her about editing services.
Gregory LAWLESS is the author of Far Away (Red Mountain Books, 2015), Dreamburgh, Pennsylvania (Dreamhorse Press, forthcoming), and I Thought I Was New Here (BlazeVOX Books, 2009)
Paul LEWIS is the president of the Poe Studies Association, a professor of English at Boston College, and the editor of The Citizen Poets of Boston: A Collection of Forgotten Poems, 1789–1820.
Colson LIN (@colsonlin) studied philosophy and political science at the University of Chicago, and is now a graduate student at Yale University.
Jon MANISCALCO is a contributing editor to Clarion magazine. He is presently based in Japan, teaching English. Connect with him on LinkedIn.
Ben MAZER was born in New York City in 1964. His published books include the collections New Poems (Pen & Anvil), The Glass Piano (MadHat) and White Cities (Barbara Matteau Editions), and editions of the Selected Poems of Frederick Goddard Tuckerman (Harvard University Press) and the Collected Poems of John Crowe Ransom (Un-Gyve Press).
Robert MORRIS (@theseusinboston) is a multimedia writer and designer working out of Boston, MA. His work has previously appeared in Stillwater, Clarion and various outdoor Green Line stops. He graduated from Ithaca College.
Chris NELLES is influenced by the Russian and Latin writers including Mandelstam, Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Merini, Corca, and Vallejo. In his native tongue he is influenced by Hart Crane, Dylan Thomas, and T. S. Eliot. The landscape and seascape of the Pacific Northwest inform his lyric, lend authenticity and immediacy to the ambient moods it is his intention to create.
Chad NORMAN lives by the high tides of Cobequid Bay, Nova Scotia. Each July he hosts the poetry and music festival RiverWords to showcase both younger and established NS talent. His latest collection is Selected & New Poems.
A. J. ODASSO's poetry has strange and wonderful publications including Sybil's Garage, Mythic Delirium, Jabberwocky, Cabinet des Fées, MidnightEcho, Not One of Us, Dreams & Nightmares, Goblin Fruit, Strange Horizons, Stone Telling, Farrago's Wainscot, Through the Gate, Liminality, inkscrawl, The Battersea Review, and SWAMP Writing (just to name a few). Her début collection, Lost Books (Flipped Eye Publishing, 2010), was nominated for the 2010 London New Poetry Award and for the 2011 Forward Prize, and was also a finalist for the 2011 People's Book Prize. Her second collection with Flipped Eye, The Dishonesty of Dreams, was released in 2014. She holds degrees from Wellesley College (B.A. in English), University of York (M.A. in Medieval Studies), and Boston University (MFA in Creative Writing). She serves as Senior Poetry Editor at Strange Horizons magazine.
Nick PANTELI is a young Brit of Cypriot heritage. He studied English at the University of London, and was a long-time contributor to London Student. Online at nickpanwriter.com.
Georgia PARK (Instagram) is the author of Quit Your Job and Become a Poet (Out of Spite) and Softly Glowing Exit Signs, an autobiography written in poetry. After dropping out of high school in 2004, she earned her MA with an emphasis on creative writing in 2017. She has since featured in literary magazines including Offbeat and Soundings East. She has written for a literary collective, Sudden Denouement, and created another, Whisper and the Roar. She began her teaching career in South Korea and continues to teach ESL and English at the college level. Bylines: Hot Pink Iron Lung (fiction, 17 iv 2020).
Raj ROHAN is a founder of The Booknerds, and an organizer of the Valley of Words International Literature and Arts Festival.
Maya RAMAKRISHNAN (@maya_ramak) lives and writes in Somerville, MA. She is the 2014 recipient of the Katherine Rogers Murphy Prize for Original Poetry at Colby College.
Sara Daniele RIVERA (@sdr_arts) is a Cuban/Peruvian writer, artist, and educator from Albuquerque, NM. She is the recipient of a 2017 St. Botolph's Emerging Artist Award in Literature. In Boston, she works as a teaching and collaborating artist at GrubStreet and the Urbano Project. Sara is currently working on a fantasy novel, a poetry collection, and translations of Peruvian poet Blanca Varela.
María Antonieta RONDÓN (@antorondon), studies philosophy and international relations at Boston University, and is a passionate advocate for human rights and democracy. Her favorite arepa is arepa con queso guayanés.
Paul ROWE (@paulsrowe) holds a degree in English from Suffolk University. He lectures at Suffolk and at Merrimack College. He lectures at Suffolk and Merrimack College, and is co-editor of The Charles River Journal.
Jayce RUSSELL is a graduate of the MFA poetry program at UNH. When he isn't dancing for his dinner at a community college local to his home of Reidsville, NC, he works as poetry editor and warlock for Outlook Springs.
Zoë SATHER studies in Flagstaff, Arizona at Mount Elden Middle School. She is bilingual in Spanish and English, a blue belt in taekwondo, a piano player, and a voracious reader.
Vlad SAVICH was born in the USSR, where he was educated, married and fathered his daughter. As soon as the chance appeared to leave, he did. At present he lives in Montreal, where he writes, directs for the theatre and breathes the air of freedom. (He prefers Vlad to Vladimir, so as not to be associated with the disreputable activity of a certain barnardine Russian leader.) His short story collection A Russian Disease is published by Pen & Anvil. Contact him via his website.
Jessica SEQUEIRA (@jess_sequeira) is a writer and translator from California, currently living in Santiago de Chile. Her works include the collection of stories Rhombus and Oval (What Books), the collection of essays Other Paradises: Poetic Approaches to Thinking in a Technological Age (Zero) and the novel A Furious Oyster (Dostoyevsky Wannabe).
Anis SHIVANI is a poet, fiction writer, and critic in Houston, Texas. His books include Anatolia and Other Stories (Black Lawrence Press, 2009), Against the Workshop: Provocations, Polemics, Controversies (Texas Review Press, 2011), and The Fifth Lash and Other Stories (C&R Press, 2012). A Pushcart Prize winner, he studied economics at Harvard College. Contact him through his website.
Daniel SIMONDS has a recent review on the stories of Peter Caputo at berfois.com and is studying nonfiction at the University of New Hampshire.
Chris SINAGRA is an aspiring literary critic whose name used to be Herschel, until his parents got a better idea. Ever since, his only recourse has been books, especially those by one of his favorite superheroes—Whitman. He enjoys the essay, but feels the best criticism is done within ten words.
Chris SITEMAN (@chrissiteman) lives in Brookline, MA. He holds an MFA from Emerson College, a JD from Suffolk University Law School, and teaches English at Suffolk University and Bridgewater State University. In his spare time he teaches writing workshops for veterans with PTSD and TBI isssues through the Writer's Guild Institute. His poetry has or is soon appearing in publications including Ellipsis, Drafthorse, Boxcar Poetry Review, Stoneboat, Poetry Ireland Review, Hayden's Ferry Review, Salamander, The Carolina Quarterly, Consequence Magazine and The Worcester Review.
Onna SOLOMON (@onnaPLAY) is a social worker and training director of The PLAY Project, an autism early intervention training program. A graduate of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, she studied creative writing in the graduate program at Boston University.
James STOTTS is a poet and translator living in Boston. His work has appeared in journals including Little Star, Berfrois, The Charles River Journal, AGNI, The Atlantic, Action Yes, and Failbetter. His first book, Since, was reissued in 2016 by Pen & Anvil; his second, Elgin Pelicans, is forthcoming.
Sassan TABATABAI teaches at Boston University and Boston College. He is the editor of Pusteblume journal of translation, and author of the books Uzunburun and Rudaki: Father of Persian Verse.
David TACIUM teaches English, German and Italian in a francophone college in Montreal. His articles, stories and poems have appeared in various magazines in Canada, France, Switzerland. His PhD dissertation in comparative literature from the Université de Montréal concerned the crisis in masculine identity in the late 19th century.
Christopher TORMEY has twenty years of experience teaching English as a Second Language in the United States and South Korea. His articles about his experiences as an American teacher abroad as well as other essays have appeared in newspapers and magazine publications. He has worked as an English language instructor for the past seven years at at a large technical high school in Massachusetts.
Meg TYLER was the 2016 Fulbright Professor of Anglophone Irish Writing at Queen's University in Belfast. She teaches Humanities at Boston University where she also directs a poetry series and chairs the Institute for the Study of Irish Culture. Her book on Seamus Heaney, A Singing Contest, was published by Routledge in their series, Major Literary Authors. Her poetry chapbook Poor Earth came out from Finishing Line Press in 2014. Her poems and prose have appeared in Agni, Literary Imagination, Kenyon Review, Harvard Review, Irish Review and other journals. A chapter on Heaney's last two volumes recently appeared in "The Soul Exceeds Its Circumstances": The Later Poetry of Seamus Heaney, edited by Eugene O'Brien (Notre Dame University Press, 2016).
Joanna C. VALENTE (@joannasaid) is a human who lives in Brooklyn, NY, and the author of Sirs & Madams (Aldrich Press, 2014), The Gods Are Dead (Deadly Chaps, 2015), Marys of the Sea (The Operating System, 2017), Xenos (Agape Editions, 2016) and the editor of A Shadow Map: An Anthology by Survivors of Sexual Assault (CCM, 2017). Joanna earned her MFA at Sarah Lawrence College, and is also the founder of Yes, Poetry; a managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine and CCM; and an instructor at Brooklyn Poets. Some of their writing has appeared, or is forthcoming, in Brooklyn Magazine, Prelude, Apogee, Spork, The Feminist Wire, BUST, and elsewhere. Instagram: @joannacvalente.
Eric VALOR (@surfiving) is the author of the poetry collection Hamachi Eyes, and a writer, researcher and advocate focused on the ALS community.
Erick VERRAN lives in Boston. His poetry is forthcoming in Little Star and Gargoyle Magazine.
Sam WRIGHT FAIRBANKS (@thesamwf) was born in Massachusetts and raised on the Internet. He writes short stories, poetry, miscellany and holds an MFA in Fiction Writing from Columbia University. He is constructing his first collection of writings, tentatively titled Gay Bread.
Samuel WRONOSKI was born in Boston. He currently resides in Portland, Oregon, attending Reed College where he is finishing his undergraduate degree in mathematics.

ABOUT THIS SITE. The New England Review of Books was launched on the summer solstice in 2016. Posts listed under each of our three content categories (REVIEWS AND CRITICISM, EXCERPTS, FEATURES AND INTERVIEWS, and NEW BOOKS AND LITERARY NEWS) may link to content created by and hosted by this website, or to content residing on the sites of other publications. We draw upon sources current and historical. We cannot anticipate when outlinked material may cease to be available at its original location; let us know if you discover any links that have become obsolete so that we can update our archives. The oak tree device used as our logo is taken from a silver shilling made ca. 1667–ca. 1682 by John Hull (1624–1683) and Robert Sanderson Sr. (ca. 1608–1693), mint masters of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The coin now resides in the permanent collection of the MMOA. The design and editorial scheme for this homepage (like that of our sister site, Secular Age) are inspired by those of Arts & Letters Daily, an invaluable site founded by Denis Dutton in 1998 and now published by The Chronicle of Higher Education. Our motto changes monthly, in reflection of the reality that nothing gold can stay. Click here to see a list of our month-by-month motto selection, from our launch to the present time. Although our update schedule varies, we try to post new content every weekday. If you’d like to recommend a book review, literary interview, essay, or news item to our attention, or if you’d like to pitch a piece, let us know: editors@nerobooks.org. Publishers interested in sending review copies of new or forthcoming titles may mail them c/o Pen & Anvil, 139 Mt. Vernon Street, Fitchburg Mass. 01420. NERObooks is edited by Zachary Bos, with the ongoing assistance of Contributing Editors Jenna Bos, Cat Dossett, Jonathan Han, Cassandra Jones and Paul Rowe. Contributions from others are credited whenever possible. Special thanks should be paid to the writers and editors of those journals and organizations we are in most frequent contact with, including the Boston Poetry Union, Clarion, and the Fellows and BookLab of Bonfire Press. We are not affiliated with New England Review, though we do celebrate their work.

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