April 2009 in Open Letters!

April is here, and although it's bitterly, remorselessly freezing in Boston, the skies are clear, the birds are chirping, the crocuses are poking up all along Jamaica Pond, and best of all (well, OK - second best, since nothing really beats the dawn chorus), a new issue of Open Letters is ready for your examination!

It's a big, healthy issue this time around (15 pieces a month is not an unrealistic goal, methinks)(although forever banishing 'methinks' from my vocabulary might well be), so no matter what you're interested in, there'll be something you'll want to read. We've got essays on literary frauds, the Columbine shootings (both fiction and history), and Grand Theft Auto - we've got an item of new poetry and an item of very old poetry. We have no quiz to bedevil you.

And like all the great review periodicals, Open Letters serves a function many habitual readers are reluctant to admit they need: we're your advance scout. The crop of bright young things, new young authors who all have novels out? The novels you've been wondering about, whether or not to sink your time into them? We've got smart, funny, capable reviewers to sort them out for you - American Rust, The Way through Doors, The Song is You ... read about them all here before you attempt them on your own! Likewise that new 800-page doorstop about the Nazis at war: our review will help you decide if you want to invest the time.

Two last things: for April we welcome Bryn Haworth to our merry gang - he's writes from London, so his contributions will be better-pronounced than any others, but they'll drive on the wrong side of the road; and our issue's stunning, evocative photo (if it isn't perfect visual shorthand for the slightly wistful daydreaming April inspires, I don't know what is) was created by Jonas Sacks.

So make yourself comfy on your favorite reading couch, pour yourself a nice warm cup of coffee (or, for all you B&N folk out there, your morning shot of bourbon), and settle in for some wonderful reading! And, as always, feel free to leave copious comments!