“Putin has attacked Ukraine /
I’m tired because I stayed up late watching sitcoms”

“Military folks the world over will tell you theirs is not a business of violence…That’s a lie.”

A few years ago, I was brought on board by a New York-based publishing house to be a fiction editor. My first assignment was, instead, a book about Trump’s relationship to Russia.

I am very interested in writing about those moments when people judge each other, exploring how people’s judgments of others reflect on their own character and understanding.

She grins to herself, then, since they friended
each other at some point during that night,
she opens messenger and starts to write
a message: “Hi. It’s been a while
but I’d still like to be your friend.”

To further the comparison between the two texts, certain thematic valences notwithstanding, Chapman’s debut is an all but negative image of Gessen’s sophomore effort—disjunctive where Gessen’s narrative is straight ahead; knowing and bawdy and essentially unconcerned with portraying human relationships at any great length.

People complain about the city. There is never not something to complain about. The sidewalks fill with leaves — red and gold — and these critics still complain. Some people complain and never say goodbye but, sometimes, a complainer vacates.

The literary device of eliding proper names of course predates Clarice Lispector (“Interrupted Story” was originally published in 1942).