Los Angeles Review of Books

The Los Angeles Review of Books (LARB) is a literary review journal covering the national and international book scenes. A preview version launched on Tumblr in April 2011, and the official website followed one year later in April 2012. Founded by Tom Lutz, Chair of the Creative Writing Department at the University of California, Riverside, the Review seeks to redress the decline in Sunday book supplements by creating an online “encyclopedia of contemporary literary discussion.”[1]

The LARB features reviews of new fiction, poetry, and nonfiction; original reviews of classic texts; essays on contemporary art, politics, and culture; and literary news from abroad, including Mexico City, London, and St. Petersburg.[2]

The site also proposes looking seriously at detective fiction, thrillers, comics, graphic novels, and other writing “often dismissed as genre fiction,” and printing reviews of books published by university presses. Of these plans Lutz has said, “What's considered worthy of study in the literary world has shifted radically over the past 50 years, and it reflects the natural evolution of academic thought, which is constantly raising questions about what matters.”[3]

The site also features input from over 200 contributing editors, including T.C. Boyle, Antonio Damasio, Jonathan Kirsch, Jonathan Lethem, Jeffrey Eugenides, Mike Davis, Jane Smiley, David Shields, Carolyn See, Barbara Ehrenreich, Greil Marcus, Jaron Lanier and Jerry Stahl.

In addition to Lutz, the current editorial staff includes Kate Wolf, Mike Goetzman, Sarah Mesle, Laurie Winer, and Jonathan Hahn. Section editors include Cecil Castellucci (Young Adult Fiction), Gabrielle Calvocoressi and Claudia Rankine (Poetry), Arne De Boever (Philosophy & Theory), Costica Bradatan (Religion & Comparative Studies), Rob Latham (SF), Michele Pridmore-Brown and Ross Andersen (Science), Jeffrey Wasserstrom and Megan Shank (Asia), Ben Schwartz (Comics), Franklin Bruno (Music), and Boris Dralyuk (Noir).

A print edition premiered in May 2013 [4]

References

  1. ↑ Ayoub, Nina (20 July 2010). "'The Los Angeles Review of Books' to Launch This Fall". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved 15 August 2010.
  2. ↑ Werris, Wendy (19 July 2010). "'Los Angeles Review of Books' to Launch This Fall". Publishers Weekly. Retrieved 15 August 2010.
  3. ↑ McKenna, Kristine (20 May 2010). "'Lutz: Keeper of the Printed Word'". LA Weekly. Retrieved 22 August 2010.
  4. ↑ Werris, Wendy (23 May 2013). "'Los Angeles Review of Books' Debuts Print Edition". Publishers Weekly. Retrieved 8 May 2014.

External links