fiction and creative non-fiction from Brennan Quenneville
I don’t believe in God, so, as an academic pursuit, the fallibility of man has always been vastly more interesting to me than the proposed infallibility of God. As a result, I have a soft spot for songs that grapple with crises of faith—As Cities Burn has had their fair share of entries on that [...]
In a few short hours, I was going to board a plane that would take me first to New York and then to Senegal, where I would live for six weeks, but all I could do was keep refreshing Myspace. It was early in the summer of 2007 and technically I was a student majoring [...]
One day, someone explained the idea of happiness to me and I thought, Sure, I know what that feels like. The same can be said for sadness, anger, and, if I’m being honest, schadenfreude. But there are some emotions that entered my life as definitions first and experiences later and that feels so weird because, now [...]
We need to take a few steps to get caught up to the present. In 1976, Kiss released Rock and Roll All Over which featured “Calling Dr. Love,” a song about a “doctor” who suggests that he can cure his patients with the magical healing powers of his penis. Fascinated by the absurdity of this (excessively creepy) premise, alternative/temporarily-ska [...]
Marcus Sedgwick's Midwinterblood is one of those books that defies review because if you discuss any element of its plot, you start chipping away at the mystery and suspense that make it such a gripping read. Here's the most I'm comfortable relating: For its first few pages, Midwinterblood seems like it might be a romance [...]
Four months ago I launched a newsletter, for which you can sign up---for free!---right here. Today, I'm posting a few of my favorite entries across the newsletter's initial run: We'll discuss Rilo Kiley, Coheed and Cambria, and Lisa Loeb. Let's get to it. Rilo Kiley -- "The Good That Won't Come Out" The Execution of [...]
Meaghan O'Connell's slim memoir, And Now We Have Everything: On Motherhood Before I Was Ready should probably be required reading for every millennial considering having children and for most who already do. O'Connell's unpretentious prose demystifies and de-romanticizes the pop culture vision of pregnancy: This is not a book about feeling glowing and radiant or [...]
Part of what I love about Hamilton is that it's a show about everything---well, maybe not everything but the show's characters certainly experience a lot of what makes being a person such a wild experience. All the big ticket themes that you'd expect make appearances: Hamilton and his friends must fight a war before figuring [...]
I never need a reason to think about The Juliana Theory but their recent reemergence, including a pair of new singles and an upcoming album of 'reimagined' classics, provides a perfect excuse to talk about them here. More specifically, to talk about the best tracks from a band that was somehow both deeply beloved and [...]
For several minutes I sat on my couch thinking about the story I had just experienced, letting Jeff Russo's gorgeous, looping soundtrack envelop me. I had spent the last two hours playing through the entirety of What Remains of Edith Finch, the highly decorated 2017 release from developer Giant Sparrow, and all I wanted was [...]
