As the eminent writer Martin Amis correctly observed, Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice was written as a romantic comedy. Unfortunately, modern readers often find that it falls short, if only because Miss Austen avoided a subject widely recognized as essential in today’s comedic writing. read more

You were on the frontline, risking your life to enforce during the lockdown. I was shielding from this terrifying new plague. Your soldier-like resolve calmed my existential dread. You went out every day and faced it as though it were nothing, while I was scared to use the lift in our building, disinfecting the soles of my shoes before coming indoors. read more

I open a door to an apartment I know well, pretending I don’t know it at all. Her petite frame stands in the middle of the lounge, looking unsure, squeezing a glass of sparkling champagne so hard, she’s at risk of crushing it in her palm. read more

And one early evening, I think it was just the next week, Mr. Sinclair and his wife, pretty petite wife Eva, picked me up in their little British sports car for the three of us to go up to Kiyoshi Kodama’s place, high in the old gold country hills, by a little river or creek they said, for an evening with no clothes on, and whatever else. It was a nice evening. You could be, I imagined, pretty comfortable with no clothes on, or so I hoped. I looked forward to the no clothes on part. Given a choice I’d have worn no clothes all the time. That appealed. read more

The plum stone—clasped between modest gold shoulders—announces its polarity (blue/red, warm/cool, earth/glamor) in a light-eating way… read more

I didn’t hear the water running. You didn’t wash your hands. read more

I passed her as I went inside. We exchanged glances, but again nothing more. Then something strange… read more

The guy next door was honking away, clearing something from deep in his head, blowing out his sinuses in the attempt. “What the hell’s that goddamned noise?! Sounds like somebody’s got a sinus full of pussy!” GayOrg Washington yelled through the phone. “I can hear it from here for Chrissakes!” read more

Almost a full century after the failure of the Demeter system due to its inefficiency – start, stop, start, stop, turn; start, stop, turn – not to mention the literal stumbling blocks, there is a newer system for autonomously harvesting crops:  Saturn, LLC’s self-propelled lateral-move automated harvesting system.  Saturn, for short. read more

I was twenty-five the first time everything fell apart for me. My boyfriend, Dominic, broke up with me after five years together and we cut short the lease on the little flat we were renting in West Hampstead. This meant I had to scrabble around for a room to rent in London, a city that now felt vast and radically unfamiliar, even after four years there. read more