Sara McCraw Crow

Canterbury, New Hampshire

Reader, writer, author of THE WRONG KIND OF WOMAN (Mira/HarperCollins). Rep'd by @sharongracepjs 📚Paperback, newsletter info: https://t.co/uJun18hwNV

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Articles

Book review of The Möbius Book by Catherine Lacey

1 week ago | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

In her new hybrid work, The Möbius Book, Catherine Lacey sets a novella-length piece of fiction next to a memoir, calling them “Book A” and “Book B.” Book A, the fiction piece, follows longtime friends Marie and Edie through a long night as they try to comfort each other, both having suffered a bad breakup, while a pool of blood spreads from the neighboring apartment into the shared hallway. Edie has returned from traveling after leaving an abusive relationship.
Things in Nature Merely Grow

1 month ago | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

“There is no good way to say this,” Yiyun Li writes in the opening line of Things in Nature Merely Grow. It’s the same thing a police officer says before delivering the worst possible news: that Li’s son James, a college freshman, has taken his own life. James has followed his brother, Vincent, who died by suicide in 2017, at 16.
Book review of Twist by Colum McCann

Mar 24, 2025 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

Colum McCann ranges widely in his fiction, from multitimeline historical novels like TransAtlantic to the National Book Award-winning Let the Great World Spin, which followed New York City characters through one day in 1974. With Twist, McCann focuses on the present day and a timely issue: the surprising fragility of the internet, whose traffic is carried in fiber-optic cables across ocean floors, and the unseen labor it takes to keep us all connected.
Book review of Show Don’t Tell by Curtis Sittenfeld

Feb 24, 2025 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

In her second story collection, Show Don’t Tell, novelist Curtis Sittenfeld (Prep, Romantic Comedy) mines midlife—the cringey moments and also the unexpected shifts in perspective.
How to be imperfect

Jan 6, 2025 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

In How to Be Enough: Self-Acceptance for Self-Critics and Perfectionists, clinical psychologist Ellen Hendriksen tackles an issue that many might not consider a problem at all: perfectionism. In fact, Hendriksen concludes, the overly high standards, harsh inner voices, fear of judgment and other factors behind perfectionism interfere with our well-being and happiness, leaving us burned out and lonely.
Interview with Adam Haslett, author of Mothers and Sons

Jan 6, 2025 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

In Mothers and Sons, Adam Haslett offers a family story, though it’s a fraught one. Peter Fischer, a gay immigration lawyer, is haunted by a secret he carries from his teen years. His mother, Ann, left behind her life as an Episcopal priest to build a women’s retreat center in Vermont. Their struggle to reconnect after years of estrangement unfolds as a closely observed character study.
Interview with Weike Wang, author of Rental House

Dec 1, 2024 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

In her third novel, Weike Wang follows married couple Keru and Nate on two vacations: the first on Cape Cod, the second five years later, in the Catskills. Keru, a Chinese American woman, and Nate, a white man who grew up in Appalachia, grapple not only with the usual challenges of marriage and careers, but also with two very different sets of parental expectations and hopes. Wang shares her thoughts on parents and in-laws, bringing humor to the heavy stuff and coming of age in midlife.
Book review of The Wildes by Louis Bayard

Sep 15, 2024 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) is known for his comedic plays (The Importance of Being Earnest), fiction (The Picture of Dorian Gray) and for his trial and imprisonment for his homosexuality. Less well known is that he had a family: his wife Constance, who advocated for more practical dress for women, and their sons Cyril and Vyvyan. In The Wildes, novelist Louis Bayard focuses on Constance, Cyril and Vyvyan. Like a play, The Wildes is structured in five acts.
The Volcano Daughters

Aug 18, 2024 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

Gina Maria Balibrera’s debut novel, The Volcano Daughters, offers the epic early 20th-century tale of sisters Graciela and Consuelo, born into poverty and servitude on a coffee finca (plantation) on the side of a volcano in El Salvador. In 1923, Graciela and her mother, Socorrito, are summoned to San Salvador for the funeral of the father that Graciela never knew: a peasant who rose to become the advisor to El Gran Pendejo, the strongman ruling El Salvador.
Take Back Your Brain

May 20, 2024 | bookpage.com | Sara McCraw Crow

Before creating her popular podcast Unf*ck Your Brain, Kara Loewentheil was already ambitious and accomplished: Her accolades include a degree from Harvard Law School, a clerkship for a federal judge and a job as a litigator for the Center for Reproductive Rights. “I had it all,” she writes, but “the problem was that my brain did not seem to share this understanding. . . .