The New Kings of Nonfiction

How can you go wrong when you include in an anthology of recent nonfiction the work of such greats as Susan Orlean and Malcolm Gladwell and David Foster Wallace? And a great editor like NPR's Ira Glass? Call it creative nonfiction. Call it personal memoir. Call it narrative nonfiction. Whatever you call it, it's some of the best writing out there. A bit dated (copyright of 2007), but well worth a read.

So many awesome examples of my very favorite genre of writing (“literary nonfiction,” a label that Ira Glass shuns in his introduction)! I was kind of expecting this to be “This American Life: The Book” but actually I don't think any of the pieces here were on TAL, which was great–new authors, hooray!

Some of the stories in this collection were incredibly well-written, entertaining, and thought-provoking, once I got over the super-stylish cover art and Ira Glass branding.