What was the earth like?

My sister asks this every night, leaning back on her pillow. The question is part of our routine, along with brushing our teeth, peeing, pushing our legs into the soft holes of our pajamas.

When he could no longer stand her chatter—in France I made myself a dress of leaves stitched together with stems and I wore it by that river, the big one, the sludge, and that’s how I met many interesting boyfriends from the National Geographic Magazine—he left Nancy on the hotel roof with the chef from Mumbai.

It was with the printing press and Enlightenment science that history first demarcated itself from literature as a field of knowledge founded on scientific principles and archival methods.

From the train I could look out onto the infinite blue of the sea. I was still exhausted, wakeful from the overnight transatlantic flight to Rome, but looking out at the sea, that Mediterranean sea that was so infinite and so blue, made me forget it all, even myself. I don’t know why.

“You poor, quite accurate word… cast aside for being too apt!”

“I pray to God to rid me of God”

CHAPTER ONE: REQUIEM

“Introitus”

“Pray without ceasing.”

—Thessalonians I 5:17

The music we heard on our radios that morning was nothing new to our ears; it was what the soldiers played whenever they make a coup. 

In short fiction and novellas, Littell explores the allure of hell.

Translated from the Spanish by Kimberly Traube

Gregory Lawless and Robb Todd on happiness, Cormac McCarthy, and Todd’s new collection, Steal Me for Your Stories.

In the tenth installment in BOMB’s literary podcast series, listen to Ben Ristow read his short story “Saint Jerome & the Dumpster Girls,” originally published in BOMB 114.

The news arrives: “The Prime Minister is dead.” 

Una vez llamó a su casa, por teléfono, y se contestó él mismo. No pudo creerlo, y colgó.

In the fifth installment in BOMB’s Fiction for Driving Across America series, Frederic Tuten reads his story “The Bar On Tompkins Square Park,” originally published in BOMB 108’s literary supplement, First Proof.

Jesmyn Ward reads an excerpt from her novel Where the Line Bleeds, published in BOMB 105’s literary supplement, First Proof.

This is for when you get here. You have to be prepared. Somebody has to warn you.

Here’s what it’s like to bear up under the burden of so much guilt: everywhere you drag yourself you leave a trail. Late at night, you gaze back and view an upsetting record of where you’ve been.

The white moon acted as cynosure. Angstrom lay awake in his bed, situated directly beneath its transparency.