Do dimensions matter? Most literary journals are considerably taller than they are wide, often in the 6 by 9-inch range. The New Orleans Review is a compact 5-3/4 by 6-3/4 inches. For this reader, the size has a focusing effect that magnifies the significance of the words, for better or worse. Also as a result of size there are only seven offerings therein, perhaps a budgetary decision, but in any case one that channels attention towards the text. Two short stories, conventional in structure but not in their degree of excellence, contend with five pieces that variously blur the lines between poetry, prose poems, fiction, and essay. Continue reading “New Orleans Review – 2014”

I’ve always viewed the New Orleans Review as one of the silverbacks of the modern literary journal scene. Despite the obvious setbacks in dealing with Hurricane Katrina’s aftermath, it still surges ahead as one of the leading reviews with a promise of great work by great writers—those well-known, and those not. Some have said it is better than ever. This current issue does not disappoint, especially with Jacob M. Appel’s story “Prisoners of the Multiverse,” winner of the 2011 Walker Percy Fiction Contest. Not wanting to ruin the story for future readers, I will quote Nancy Lemann, judge for this year’s prize, in her introduction to the piece: Appel’s story “preserves the mystery” of a thing of beauty and delivers “what I seek in literature: inspiration, hope, and possibility.” Continue reading “New Orleans Review – 2011”

You may not know her name . . . yet, but Nicky Beer, author of this issue’s poetry feature, has won a fellowship from the NEA, a Ruth Lilly Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, a Bread Loaf scholarship, and the Discovery/Nation Award, so, clearly, somebody’s paying attention. But that’s not why you’ll want to get to know her. You’ll want to take notice because her poem “Mako” begins “Motion took on a form / and stayed.” Because to her “all night long” means “twenty to forty minutes.” Because her poem “Hummingbird, 1:30 AM” asks us to “Consider what a thought would do / if it could abandon the body entirely.” And because she turns sharks and octopi into creatures of poetic intrigue and interest in language that is tense and indulgent, without being showy. Continue reading “New Orleans Review – 2009”

Fiction, verse, prose poems, book reviews, and black-and-white photography burst from the nearly 200 pages of this journal, which has been published since 1968 by Loyola University New Orleans. If by looking at this journal we were to gauge the events in the Big Easy, Hurricane Katarina would have been a whisper. Among the poems are works by David Welch, Haine Easton, and Arielle Greenberg. The editors have pointed to two poetry features that focus on the works of Endi Hartigan and Molly Lou Freeman. In such selections as “Owl,” “Icestorm,” and “Avalanches,” Hardigan considers the intersections of natural forces. Continue reading “New Orleans Review – Number 32, 2006”

“The peculiar virtue of New Orleans…may be that of the Little Way, a talent for everyday life rather than the heroic deed,” Walker Percy wrote in 1968, in an essay first published in Harper’s and reprinted in this issue of the New Orleans Review, which includes work solely by writers with deep connections to New Orleans. Continue reading “New Orleans Review – Number 31, 2006”