Magic Hours, Tom Bissell
Magic Hours, Tom Bissell
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Magic Hours

Author: Tom Bissell

Narrator: Tom Bissell

Unabridged: 9 hr 48 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 03/20/2018

Synopsis

Award-winning essayist Tom Bissell explores the highs and lows of the creative process. He takes us from the set of The Big Bang Theory to the first novel of Ernest Hemingway to the final work of David Foster Wallace; from the films of Werner Herzog to the film of Tommy Wiseau to the editorial meeting in which Paula Fox's work was relaunched into the world. Originally published in magazines such as The Believer, The New Yorker, and Harper's, these essays represent ten years of Bissell's best writing on every aspect of creation—be it Iraq War documentaries or video-game character voices—and will provoke as much thought as they do laughter.

What are sitcoms for exactly? Can art be both bad and genius? Why do some books survive and others vanish? Bissell's exploration of these questions make for gripping, unforgettable listen.

About The Author

Tom Bissell is a journalist, critic, and fiction writer. He has been awarded the Rome Prize and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He writes frequently for Harper’s Magazine and The New Yorker. 

Reviews

Goodreads review by MJ on November 27, 2014

Bissell is a decent essayist with an eclectic outlook. ‘Unflowered Aloes’ is an intelligent discussion of literary immortality and the afterlife of books (I believe no book should fall out of print, unless espousing hateful ideologies), ‘Grief and the Outsider’ explores the dark hinterland of the un......more

Goodreads review by Kressel on July 13, 2012

Anyone who knows me for more than five years, whether online or off, can tell you that I used to be absolutely obsessed with becoming a professional writer. I even had some modest success; nine of my short stories were published and I spent four years as a copywriter for Rabbi Wein’s Destiny Foundat......more

Goodreads review by Nicholas on October 28, 2014

It's a difficult thing for me to evaluate this- Scratch that. It's a difficult thing for me to evaluate ANY book, not just this. Even bad books, ones I carry deep, dark hatreds for, require a vigorous and focused back and forth. I will always be awed by the spirit it takes for a person to create. I......more

Goodreads review by Tuck on May 29, 2012

a new imprint of mcsweeney's, believer books (2 gripes, the font is terrible, and there is no index, come on, we need an index mcsweeneys), has this collection from bissell, collecting about 12 years of essays taken mostly from mainstream mags (harpers, new yorker, new york times book review, believ......more

Quotes

"[Tom Bissell] writes these essays with a storyteller’s eye for detail." —New York Times Book Review

"Bissell writes astutely, smartly, and with acerbic candor." —The Boston Globe

"A highly gratifying literary experience." —Los Angeles Review of Books

"Sharply observed, lushly descriptive and often extremely funny." —Salon

"Elating." —Guernica

“Tom Bissell is at his best in this terrific collection.” —Geoff Dyer

"Every one of Bissell's pieces is like some great, transfixing documentary you stumble on while channel-surfing late at night—something you feel, in that moment, a kind of gratitude toward for redeeming your sleeplessness. Considered alongside his fiction, this new collection makes clear that Tom Bissell is one of our most interesting and ambitious writers." —John Jeremiah Sullivan, author of Pulphead

"Bissell (Extra Lives) peels back the layers of what it means to create and the toll creation often takes on its practitioners.... Never pedantic or self-congratulatory, Bissell says that he never set out to write nonfiction, and perhaps it’s this backdoor approach that makes his observations on craft and the many avenues that lead to the written word all the more powerful." —Publisher's Weekly (Starred Review)

"A whip-smart, occasionally pugnacious collection of essays on culture from a wide-ranging critic....Bissell can tear into his subjects with a ferocity and brutal wit that recalls Dwight Macdonald...Stellar cultural writing—Bissell has the knowledge and wit to earn his provocations." —Kirkus (Starred Review)

"Bissell’s essays are brutally honest, thoughtful and entertaining to the nth degree." —Portland Book Review

"Entertaining, informative and exquisitely readable." —Shelf Awareness

"Full of beauty." —The Cleveland Plain Dealer

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