Heller McAlpin

New York, United States

Freelance Book Critic at NPR

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Articles

'Consider Yourself Kissed' by this rich, relatable story of an overwhelmed mom

1 week ago | nhpr.org | Heller McAlpin

Consider yourself kissed — and hugged and understood — by Jessica Stanley's smart, oh-so-relatable tale of a woman who seems to have assembled all the pieces of a happy life but feels like she's lost herself in the process.
One Steamy Month Charged With Forbidden Longing

1 week ago | flipboard.com | Heller McAlpin

NowEdward St. Aubyn returns with a wide-ranging narrative anchored by a schizophrenic patient. PARALLEL LINES, by Edward St. Aubyn “My funny Guillotine … sweet, comic Guillotine,” he sings. Also: “Pill-cutter, pill-cutter, cut me a pill.” And: “Senator Krupke, I’m down on my knees, because nobody wants …
'The South,' by Tash Aw

1 week ago | nytimes.com | Heller McAlpin

In "The South," a Malaysian man recalls the life-changing period he spent on his family's dilapidated farm when he was a teenager. When you purchase an independently reviewed book through our site, we earn an affiliate commission. THE SOUTH, by Tash AwAs a critic, I often come across international writers, even those who write in English, who are widely celebrated in their own countries while barely known in the United States.
‘The Emperor of Gladness’ walks a tightrope between despair and hope

3 weeks ago | csmonitor.com | Heller McAlpin

In 2019, Ocean Vuong, an award-winning Vietnamese American poet, stunned readers with his first novel. “On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous” was a brutal and tender coming-of-age story about surviving the aftermath of political and domestic trauma, written in the form of a son’s letter to his illiterate mother. In his unremittingly gorgeous second novel, “The Emperor of Gladness,” Vuong again deftly walks a tightrope between despair and hope, heartache and love.
What connects Fredéric Chopin, Marcel Proust and Jim Morrison? A final resting place

1 month ago | boisestatepublicradio.org | Heller McAlpin

The Secret Life of a Cemetery is a paean to the renowned Parisian cemetery, Père Lachaise. This slim volume by Benoît Gallot, its enthusiastic head conservator since 2018, is as crammed with quirky facts as the 110-acre cemetery is crammed with burial plots.
What connects Fredéric Chopin, Marcel Proust and Jim Morrison? A final resting place

1 month ago | kpbs.org | Heller McAlpin

The Secret Life of a Cemetery is a paean to the renowned Parisian cemetery, Père Lachaise. This slim volume by Benoît Gallot, its enthusiastic head conservator since 2018, is as crammed with quirky facts as the 110-acre cemetery is crammed with burial plots.
Joan Didion leaves one more piece of writing to faithful fans

1 month ago | boisestatepublicradio.org | Heller McAlpin

In November 1999, writer Joan Didion started seeing Roger MacKinnon, a New York psychiatrist, on the recommendation of the psychiatrist who was treating her daughter Quintana for borderline personality disorder, depression, and alcoholism. Both doctors felt that the mother-daughter dynamic and powerful co-dependency were central to Quintana's problems.
Brontë family life, as narrated by Emily in 'Fifteen Wild Decembers'

2 months ago | csmonitor.com | Heller McAlpin

British writer Karen Powell’s darkly atmospheric second novel, “Fifteen Wild Decembers,” offers a fresh perspective on the talented Brontë family, whose childhoods on the isolated, rain-lashed West Yorkshire moors nurtured their hearts and fueled their imaginations.
‘The Paris Express’ Review: Ticket to Disaster

2 months ago | wsj.com | Heller McAlpin

In 1895, newspapers around the world carried shocking photographs of a derailed steam engine that had smashed through the parapet of Paris’s Montparnasse Station. In “The Paris Express,” the Irish Canadian writer Emma Donoghue tracks the catastrophe-bound train in that photo on its seven-hour journey on Oct. 22, 1895 from Granville, on the Normandy coast, to Paris.
‘The Café With No Name’ Review: A Refuge in Vienna

Mar 7, 2025 | wsj.com | Heller McAlpin

Robert Seethaler, a writer born in Vienna in 1966, is an exquisite miniaturist whose concise novels depict the quotidian struggles of ordinary, hardworking Austrians in the 20th century. His interest is in how these small-scale lives fit into the larger picture of a country subject to dizzying changes through the decades before and after World War II. Mr. Seethaler’s quietly beguiling eighth novel, “The Café With No Name,” is his most uplifting to date.