past editions

With Vol. 4, No. 1 (Issue #13, Winter 1999), RAIN TAXI launched its online edition with all original material.

On this page, you can browse to the table of contents of all online editions.

FALL 2003

Brenda Hillman, Joseph McElroy, Craig Watson, and more...

INTERVIEWS

Our Very Greatest Human Thing Is Wild: An Interview with Brenda Hillman
Interviewed by Sarah Rosenthal
Brenda Hillman discusses the unique position she holds as a poet, straddling lyric and postmodern aesthetics in an increasingly antipodean poetic community.

"Failure. Building. Embrace": An Interview with Joseph McElroy
Interviewed by Trey Strecker
One of contemporary fiction's most inventive wordsmiths, Joseph McElroy discourses on the aesthetics of his novels in his inimitable style.

Architectures of Absence: An Interview with Craig Watson
Interviewed by Chris McCreary
Unaffiliated with any poetic school, Craig Watson discusses the recurring dynamics in his work.

FEATURES

Collecting Speculative Fiction
Essay by Alan DeNiro
Two new anthologies of speculative fiction from small independent publishers tackle the permeability of genre.

REVIEWS: FICTION

Platform
Michel Houellebecq
If the pure product of America is insanity, what have we gotten from the French--le petit mort and the bitter rant? Houellebecq has again combined the two in Platform. Reviewed by Joel Turnipseed

The Fortress of Solitude
Jonathan Lethem
Meet the next contender for the Great American Novel--Jonathan Lethem's sprawling epic in which the lives of two child superheroes careen toward dark adult fates. Reviewed by Eric Lorberer

Wolf Dreams
Yasmina Khadra
Khadra offers an intensely stark and provocative portrait of the culture of violence in contemporary Algeria in the person of Walid, an aspiring actor who gets swallowed up in the military-religious fervor of the Islamic Salvation Front. Reviewed by Kevin Carollo

Waiting for an Angel
Helon Habila
Confronting the legacy of political imprisonment in Africa, Habila follows the life of an aspiring Nigerian writer who becomes a journalist and is subsequently imprisoned. Reviewed by Christopher J. Lee

Ten Little Indians
Sherman Alexie
In this collection of nine stories, Alexie challenges many stereotypes people have about American Indians, including those held by Indians themselves. Reviewed by Anne Bergen-Aurand and Brian Bergen-Aurand

One More For The Road
Ray Bradbury
One of the best short-story writers ever, Bradbury offers a new collection of twenty-five wondrous stories of the fantastic and the macabre. Reviewed by Ryder Miller

REVIEWS: NONFICTION

Surrealism and Painting
André Breton
Celebrate the republication of this out-of-print gem from Surrealism's most outspoken proponent. Reviewed by Jay Besemer

To Have and To Hold
Phillip Blom
Blom illustrates the ideological differences in collecting thorough, colorful biographies of collectors who were lurid, weird, daring, polymathic, and dark, and considers them from every angle in the context of social change. Reviewed by Allison Slavick

The Middle Mind: Why Americans Don't Think for Themselves
Curtis White
Destined to become the pop-intellectual scandal of the season, White's latest collection of essays attempts to awaken America to a more socially-engaged imagination. Reviewed by Steve Healey

The Constructivist Moment: From Material Text to Cultural Poetics
Barrett Watten
Much less a book for Russian scholars than for those interested in literary theory, contemporary poetry, and American cultural studies, The Constructivist Moment collects Watten's essays from the last ten years. Reviewed by Brent Cunningham

Fire in a Canebrake: The Last Mass Lynching in America
Laura Wexler
Wexler explores the true story but still unsolved mystery of the last mass lynching in America. Reviewed by Jack Gilden

REVIEWS: POETRY

The New Directions Anthology of Chinese Poetry
edited by Eliot Weinberger
Just as a translator must compromise between fidelity to the original text and creating a well-written and moving poem in English, Weinberger's anthology presents both the range of classical Chinese poetry and a catalogue of translations to compare and contrast. Reviewed by Lucas Klein

Sand
Dennis Phillips
In his ninth collection of poems, Phillips's beautifully sedate work places pressure on syntax in order to yield an opening away from familiarity. Reviewed by Deborah Meadows

All Around What Empties Out
Linh Dinh
Dinh addresses the lessons of architectural structure in the form of poetry, creating new ways to break into a poem like a thief may break into a "house with no doors." Reviewed by Chris Pusateri

Rattlesnake Plantain
Heidi Greco
The pairing of a poisonous snake and a wild plant in the title may give you a hint of the otherworldly landscape of these poems. Reviewed by Nathan G. Thompson

Ode Ode
Michael Farrell
Channeling Frank O'Hara, Farrell performs feats of daring elisions and jarring enjambments with lots of fast-talking whimsy. Reviewed by Aaron McCollough

The Good Kiss
George Bilgere
Bitterness. Nostalgia. Anger. Love. Humor. Wonder. Bilgere can do it all in a single poem. Reviewed by Nicole Trokey

Rain Taxi Online Edition, Fall 2003 | © Rain Taxi, Inc. 2003

SPRING 2002

John Bennett, Rosalind Belben, New York poetry, and more...

INTERVIEWS

John Bennett
Interviewed by Mark Terrill
Meet the founder of Vagabond Press and the author of over twenty-one books of prose, poetry and "shards."

FEATURES

The Work of Rosalind Belben
Essay by M. J. Fitzgerald
These novels by one of Britain's lesser known writers are worth hauling around the world.

From Black Mountain College to St. Mark's Church: The Cityscape Poetics of Blackburn, di Prima, and Oppenheimer
Essay by Burt Kimmelman
New York City is refracted in the multiple poetic voices presented in this essay.

REVIEWS: POETRY

Harrow
& House Made of Silver
Elizabeth Robinson
Intense meditations on fundamental forms, these two new books tread the edges between the structure of faith and the experience of it. Reviewed by Ken Rumble

Lip Service
Bruce Andrews
Both ironic and erotic, Lip Service implicates the reader in his or her own sexual politics as it revels in the linguistic possibilities of sexual vocabulary. Reviewed by Joel Bettridge

Disobedience
Alice Notley
A feisty, irreverent volume that gives the finger to many of the received ideas and unexamined assumptions inscribed in dominant culture. Reviewed by Dawn Michelle Baude

The Gauguin Answer Sheet
Dennis Finnell
From a painting by Gauguin, Finnell gleans a fractal poetic that considers origins, identities, and the interlocution of time and space, painting and history. Reviewed by Daniel Sumrall

Zirconia
Chelsey Minnis
In her first book, Minnis offers a unique prose poetry that stresses individual words and phrases. Reviewed by John Erhardt

My Sister Life
Joseph Lease
A poet of lyric grace and specific, evocative images, Lease engages in associative jumps while also offering narrative's edifying vitality. Reviewed by Thomas Fink

Overtime
Joseph Millar
Before academia, there was blue-collar work. Millar gives voice to these average Americans just trying to deal with their everyday problems. Reviewed by Julie Drake

Useless Virtues
T. R. Hummer
Hummer closely examines the tools for transcendence and redemption in this powerful book of poems. Reviewed by Justin B. Lacour

REVIEWS: FICTION

Lydia Cassatt Reading the Morning Paper
Harriet Scott Chessman
& La Tour Dreams of the Wolf Girl
David Huddle
These two new novels have painters as their subjects, but how does the cover art help or hinder their project? Reviewed by Carrie Mercer

Wild Turkey
Michael Hemmingson
This new novel by one of the "high priests of transgressive fiction" takes the form of a contemporary noir thriller. Reviewed by Tim Brown

L.C.
Susan Daitch
First published in 1986, Susan Daitch's challenging debut novel centers on a fictional diary translated from the French. Reviewed by Jason Picone

Tarzan's Tonsilitis
Alfredo Bryce Echenique
In his latest novel, Latin American writer Echenique passes between the old and the new world through the letters of two lovers caught between the continents. Reviewed by Jay Miskowiec

Hotel World
Ali Smith
Try this: judge a book by how many times the words on the page send your face up and out and your breath quickly inwards, in excitement, astonishment, joy, wonder. Reviewed by Jessica Hoffmann

Phone Calls from the Dead
Wendy Brenner
In her second collection of short stories, Brenner breathes life into a group of eccentrics whose hilarious predicaments are depicted with compassion. Reviewed by Ann Veronica Simon

Soliloquy
Kenneth Goldsmith
From the king of experience comes a new release, which consists of every word Kenneth Goldsmith said in one week. Reviewed by Doug Nufer

REVIEWS: NONFICTION

Before & After: Stories from New York
edited by Thomas Beller
A stirring and impressive catalog of voices, Before & After collects short personal essays by New Yorkers on both sides of the demarcating chasm of 9/11. Reviewed by Thomas Haley

War of the Words
edited by Joy Press
Once upon a time, the Voice Literary Supplement was capable of busting balls and warping minds, as these forty pieces culled from the supplement's twenty years of existence demonstrate. Reviewed by Laird Hunt

Dance of Days: Two Decades of Punk Rock in the Nation's Capital
Mark Andersen and Mark Jenkins
Dance of Days shows how the development of an artistic style—the earnest, propulsive post-punk of most Dischord bands—interacts with everything else in the artists' lives. Reviewed by Steve Burt

Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Buddhism
Gary Gach
Buddhism, of all religions, embraces irony and paradox, so don't blanch at this do-it-yourself manual on its history, teachings, practices and applications. Reviewed by Charisse Gendron

Star Trek: The Human Frontier
Michèle Barrett & Duncan Barrett
A literary and cultural theory specialist and her teen-aged son find thematic connections and intriguing continuities in Star Trek's treatment of humanity. Reviewed by Rudi Dornemann

Eldorado: Adventures in the Path of Empire
Bayard Taylor
A classic of travel writing, Eldorado collects the experiences of Bayard Taylor in Central and Northern California in 1849 during the gold rush. Reviewed by Mark Terrill

Amped: Notes from a Go-Nowhere Punk Band
Jon Resh
Amped is as much about the unsung people who seek out the unheard music as it is about Spoke's years in the punk underground. Reviewed by Kevin Carollo

Looking for a Fight
Lynn Snowden Picket
When Picket took up boxing, she punched people real hard. Her new book explores the violence and pleasure she experienced inside the ring and out. Reviewed by Tricia Cornell

The City in Mind: Notes on the Urban Condition
James Howard Kunstler
Kunstler deftly relates how Louis-Napoleon and his architect transformed a medieval shanty town with no working sewers or clean water into the enduring glory that millions of tourists still seek out. Reviewed by N. N. Hooker

Rain Taxi Online Edition, Spring 2002 | © Rain Taxi, Inc. 2002

WINTER 2001/2002

J. T. Leroy, Paul Auster, Dana Gioia, and more...

INTERVIEWS

J. T. Leroy
Interviewed by Kevin Sampsell
Despite having a reputation for being painfully shy and never being seen at his readings, J.T. Leroy has been described as a typical 21st-century kid, gladly answering e-mails all day long but without social skills in public.

REVIEWS: FICTION

My Name is Red
Orhan Pamuk
Art and the Islamic culture of 16th-century Istanbul flavor this unique novel, a sort of murder mystery told in a variety of voices. Reviewed by Eric J. Iannelli

Argall
William T. Vollman
Through the voice of William the Blind, Vollman gives an imaginative account of the relationship between Jahn Smith and Pocahantas in this new addition to his Seven Dreams series. Reviewed by Jason Picone

Scorch
A. D. Nauman
A "reductio ad absurdum critique of free-for-all capitalism," Scorch scorches both utopian ideals of capitalism and its counter-mate, Marxism. Reviewed by Justin Maxwell

The Woman Chaser
& The Machine in Ward Eleven
Charles Willeford
Noir or not, these beefy testosterone-filled tales will have you tipping back shots and railing against the status quo in no time. Reviewed by Kris Lawson

REVIEWS: POETRY

The Mercy Seat: Collected & New Poems 1967-2001
Norman Dubie
Offering more than thirty years of poetry, The Mercy Seat revels in surreal allegory and archetypes. Reviewed by Joel Weishaus

Plot
Claudia Rankine
Beyond the ur-plot of this book-length poem of man and woman having baby lies a deft language of exploration. Reviewed by Bonnie Blader

Interrogations at Noon
Dana Gioia
Will formalism save poetry? Take a gander, dear reader. Reviewed by Michael McIrvin

With the First Dream of Fire They Hunt the Cold
Trevor Joyce
This too-little-known Irish poet explores language as a "broken bird on stunned wings." Reviewed by Harriet Zinnes

The Angelus Bell
Ed Foster
Poems of intimate communion and sound resonate beyond their telling. Reviewed by John Olson

REVIEWS: NONFICTION

I Thought My Father Was God
edited by Paul Auster
The National Story Project sees print in this engaging and magical collection of unbelievably true stories by average Americans. Reviewed by Sarah Fox

Free Flight
James Fallows
& Air Rage
Anonymous and Andrew R. Thomas
To fly or not to fly? Two books explore the possible best and definite worst of airline travel. Reviewed by Peter Ritter

Canaries in the Mineshaft: Essays on Politics and Media
Renata Adler
Adler doesn't hold back in theis work that takes on journalistic integrity and political prejudice. Reviewed by Rumaan Alam

Courting Justice: Gay Men and Lesbians v. the Supreme Court
Joyce Murdoch and Deb Price
The authors explore numerous Supreme Court cases that have defined how homosexuals are treated in an often hostile justice system. Reviewed by Jane S. Van Ingen

Strange Good Fortune: Essays on Contemporary Poetry
David Wojahn
Drawn to writers afflicted by mental illness, scandal, and bad luck, Wojahn unflinchingly delves into poets' lives in this new collection of essays. Reviewed by Susan Smith Nash

The Body and the Book: Writing from a Mennonite Life
Julia Kasdorf
A poet juggles her Mennonite heritage with her writing life. Reviewed by Sarah Fox

REVIEWS: ART & PHOTOGRAPHY

One Hundred Paintings
Federico Zeri
The late art historian and critic gives voice to a selection of dazzling paintings in this new series of art books. Reviewed by Kelly Eveding

Havana
Robert Polidori
Reviewed by David Taylor

Rain Taxi Online Edition, Winter 2001/2002 | © Rain Taxi, Inc. 2001/2002