Clifford Garstang

Clifford Garstang is the author of two novels, Oliver’s Travels and The Shaman of Turtle Valley, and three collections of short stories, House of the Ancients and Other StoriesIn an Uncharted Country, and What the Zhang Boys Know, which won the Library of Virginia Literary Award for Fiction.

He is also the editor of the three-volume anthology series, Everywhere Stories: Short Fiction from a Small Planet, and the co-founder and former editor of Prime Number magazine.

He holds a BA in Philosophy from Northwestern University, an MA in English, a JD from Indiana University, an MPA from Harvard University, and an MFA in Creative Writing from Queens University of Charlotte.

His work has appeared in numerous literary magazines, including Bellevue Literary Review, Blackbird, The Hopkins Review, Cream City Review, and Whitefish Review. His book reviews have appeared in Virginia Quarterly Review, Shenandoah, Rain Taxi, Washington Independent Review of Books, Southern Review of Books, and elsewhere.

Book Reviews by Clifford Garstang

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Historical fiction that features real people can be problematic.

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“The book could be read as a warning about where we are headed as a society.”

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“Ultimately, Perpetual West is an engaging tapestry of ideas.”

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“It is in death that we become meaningless . . . but the living will continue to seek their destinies.”

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"We take for granted the plants and animals with whom we share our environment, even as we steadily destroy it.

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Life is full of contradictions and paradoxes, and the course on which one sets out almost always leads to an unintended destination, lessons that are on full display in Joshua Henkin’s new novel

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Untold Night and Day is a deliciously complex novel that satisfies at each layer as the reader continues to decipher its codes and hidde

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“Friend offers a fascinating glimpse into the realities of North Korean life.

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The braided narrative is not a new novel form. Authors have long used interwoven but seemingly disparate plotlines to achieve a whole that is greater than its parts.

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“a moving and deeply satisfying tale.”