Gilbert Cruz
👤 PersonAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
I'm Gilbert Cruz, and this is the interview from The New York Times.
I'm Gilbert Cruz, and this is the interview from The New York Times.
Sure. So a bunch of editors and critics over the course of the year, really, are meeting monthly. And at every one of those meetings, we're discussing books that we think are great. And these are books that sort of go through the ringer. We're really debating them over the course of the whole year. At the end of October, which is when this process ends, we take a vote.
Sure. So a bunch of editors and critics over the course of the year, really, are meeting monthly. And at every one of those meetings, we're discussing books that we think are great. And these are books that sort of go through the ringer. We're really debating them over the course of the whole year. At the end of October, which is when this process ends, we take a vote.
And these 10 books are the result of that vote.
And these 10 books are the result of that vote.
Um, the five fiction books, some of them might be familiar to you. All Fours by Miranda July, Good Material by Dolly Alderton, James by Percival Everett, Martyr by Kaveh Akbar, and You Dreamed of Empires by Alvaro Enrique.
Um, the five fiction books, some of them might be familiar to you. All Fours by Miranda July, Good Material by Dolly Alderton, James by Percival Everett, Martyr by Kaveh Akbar, and You Dreamed of Empires by Alvaro Enrique.
I do. And I think it's the smallest book on this list, actually. It is You Dream of Empires by the Mexican writer Alvaro Enrique. And it essentially imagines the first meeting between Hernan Cortes and Moctezuma, the Aztec emperor, in what is now Mexico City in 1519. It is an imaginative sort of psychedelic look at what that encounter might have been like. It's very funny.
I do. And I think it's the smallest book on this list, actually. It is You Dream of Empires by the Mexican writer Alvaro Enrique. And it essentially imagines the first meeting between Hernan Cortes and Moctezuma, the Aztec emperor, in what is now Mexico City in 1519. It is an imaginative sort of psychedelic look at what that encounter might have been like. It's very funny.
It's very sort of descriptively written, like there are smells and sights that pop off the page. And again, it's slim. And that's important when you're reading a lot of books over the course of a year.
It's very sort of descriptively written, like there are smells and sights that pop off the page. And again, it's slim. And that's important when you're reading a lot of books over the course of a year.
Sure. So nonfiction is a mix of biography, history. We have stuff like Reagan by Max Boot. It's about Ronald Reagan. Everyone Who's Gone is Here by Jonathan Blitzer. The Wide, Wide Sea by Hampton Sides, which I will talk about in a minute because I really loved it. I Heard Her Call My Name by Lucy Sant. And then Cold Crematorium by Yosef Debrezeni.
Sure. So nonfiction is a mix of biography, history. We have stuff like Reagan by Max Boot. It's about Ronald Reagan. Everyone Who's Gone is Here by Jonathan Blitzer. The Wide, Wide Sea by Hampton Sides, which I will talk about in a minute because I really loved it. I Heard Her Call My Name by Lucy Sant. And then Cold Crematorium by Yosef Debrezeni.
The Wide, Wide Sea. So The Wide, Wide Sea is about Captain Cook, Captain James Cook. It's about his third and final voyage. He was sent in the year 1776, a year that we're all very familiar with, to the South Pacific to return a Polynesian man to his home island in the South Pacific. He was also sent to try to find... the Northwest Passage, which is something that many explorers were looking for.
The Wide, Wide Sea. So The Wide, Wide Sea is about Captain Cook, Captain James Cook. It's about his third and final voyage. He was sent in the year 1776, a year that we're all very familiar with, to the South Pacific to return a Polynesian man to his home island in the South Pacific. He was also sent to try to find... the Northwest Passage, which is something that many explorers were looking for.
It was not accessible at the time. And then something bad happened to him. He died. That is bad. That is bad. And I love this book so much because I just love tail set on the high seas. I love books about what it's like to be on a, you know, a big boat with big sails, drinking grog, possibly getting scurvy and not knowing what you're going to encounter the next day.
It was not accessible at the time. And then something bad happened to him. He died. That is bad. That is bad. And I love this book so much because I just love tail set on the high seas. I love books about what it's like to be on a, you know, a big boat with big sails, drinking grog, possibly getting scurvy and not knowing what you're going to encounter the next day.