Brian Turner is a former infantry team leader from the US Army.  He toured in Iraq in 2003-4, where he wrote his first published collection, Here, Bullet.  That was an extraordinary set of poems, documenting the violence of Iraq’s troubled streets far more intensely than the indifferent reportage of newsrooms.  I discovered it through one

It’s always a pleasure when an artist raises their game.  I really enjoyed The Tallest Man on Earth’s first record, Shallow Grave, which came out in 2008.  But this year’s two offerings, his album The Wild Hunt and subsequent EP Sometimes the Blues Is Just a Passing Bird were a cut above.  Kristian Mattson (for

This is probably the best book I’ve read this century.  If anyone is still hunting for a definitive Great American Novel, they can find it here.  It’s received a great deal of entirely justified acclaim, including the Pulitzer Prize in 2007.  I read it a few months ago after a good friend lent me his