eronica Bond of the Gapers Block Book Club reviews Granta’s newest issue, which focuses on Chicago and Chicago writers. The issue will be available September 22nd.

“What this issue of Granta shows is that Chicago is a city rife with contradictions. It is a land made beautiful by the lake and towering skyscrapers and less so by crumbling homes and crime-stricken neighborhoods. It a place that opens its arms to immigrants the world over, yet cannot promise to keep safe those who call its limits home. It is a city that can inspire monumental aspirations and crush dreams. But, as George Saunders intones here, this is our city. For better or for worse, it contains everything we could ever desire and Granta superbly does everything to make that known.”

For the rest of Bond’s review, head to Gapers Block.

A Bump in the Road is an easy and entertaining read. It follows Clare Finnegan, who works at an event planning firm in Chicago, and also has her own blog, in which she keeps her readers updated on the everyday happenings in her life as she unexpectedly finds out she is pregnant. This forces Clare and her husband to completely change their newlywed partying lifestyle for a more child friendly one, which takes just about nine whole months for them to do. The book progresses via a timeline as opposed to chapters, where the time is not just kept track of by days, but hour by hour as well. This seems to give the reader a more personal connection to Clare’s character, and makes it easier to relate to her. For example, we all have that night where we know we shouldn’t go out because we’ll end up spending an unnecessarily large amount of money on drinks and cab rides, in addition to looking and feeling like crap the next morning when we actually have important things to do, but we end up going out anyway against our better judgment, which is something Clare is quite accustomed to:

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