Maureen Corrigan
Stories
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Arts & Life
What if a 'Blood Test' predicted you'd commit murder?
In Charles Baxter's new novel, a small-town insurance salesman buys a blood test that can predict romantic entanglements, promotions — and more. It's a screwball satire of all-American zaniness.
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Arts & Life
Need a break from politics? Marvel at the 'Vanishing Treasures' of the natural world
With 23 short essays on creatures ranging from the wombat to the spider, Katherine Rundell's new book is essential reading for anyone whose wonder could use a jumpstart.
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Arts & Life
Two books delivered beauty, inspiration and humor — just when I needed them most
Sometimes, the right book shows up just at the right time. Our book critic encountered two such books this week: Water, Water, by Billy Collins, and The Dog Who Followed the Moon, by James Norbury.
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Arts & Life
'Time of the Child' is a marvelous blend of despair and redemption
Set in a small Irish village in the weeks leading up to Christmas 1962, Niall Williams' latest novel avoids cliché by investing specificity and life into characters and places.
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Arts & Life
Maureen Corrigan picks her favorite books from an 'unprecedented' 2024
This year, our Fresh Air book critic highlights alternative history, suspense, satire — and some of the most extraordinary letters ever written. Here are Maureen Corrigan's 10 best books of 2024.
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Arts & Life
Secrets feed on time in the masterful novel 'Mothers and Sons'
Adam Haslett's compelling novel focuses on the strained relationship between an asylum lawyer and his mother. It's a beautiful appreciation of the all-too-human mess of life.
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Arts & Life
'Coming to New York' stories are alive and well in these two new books
Kay Sohini's graphic memoir, This Beautiful, Ridiculous City, tells a story of migration and redefinition. Gay Talese gathers many of his great pieces about the city in A Town Without Time.
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Arts & Life
Tony Horwitz's widow Geraldine Brooks writes a beautiful memoir of grief
Horwitz died suddenly in 2019 while on a book tour. In Memorial Days, Geraldine Brooks grieves her husband — and also reflects on the life she might have lived had they not met.
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Arts & Life
'Last Seen': After slavery, family members placed ads looking for loved ones
Formerly enslaved people would placed ads in newspapers hoping to find lost children, parents, spouses and siblings. Historian Judith Giesberg tells the stories of some of those families in a new book.
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Arts & Life
Karen Russell's 'The Antidote' is an American epic — and well worth the wait
Russell has published excellent short story collections since her 2011 debut novel Swamplandia!, but this is her first novel in nearly 15 years. It follows a "Prairie Witch" in Dust Bowl-era Nebraska.
