Rachel Taylor Brown
Susan Storm’s Ugly Sister and Other Saints and Superheroes
Cutthroat Pop
8/10
Rachel Taylor Brown is a standout, to say the least. Since her debut album in 2001, Brown has cut a swath in the music world with her haunting voice and a blend of dark, avant-garde songwriting and whimsy. With the release of her sixth album Susan Storm’s Ugly Sister and Other Saints and Superheroes, she’s back at it again, exploring the strange world of comic books and Christian martyrs as only she can. The result is …

Since taking the world- or at least Portland, Oregon- by storm with her debut album Do Not Stare eight years ago, Rachel Taylor Brown has inspired plenty of kudos from fans and confusion among critics struggling to define her nonconformist sound. Nearly eight years later, the self-described introvert and comic book geek is back at it again with Susan Storm’s Ugly Sister and Other Saints and Superheroes, a sprawling album depicting the dark, inner lives (and sometimes deaths) of heroes both imaginary and real. I caught up with Brown …

Mohsin Hamid
The Reluctant Fundamentalist
Harcourt, Inc.
8/10
Some of you who have read the interview with Rachel Taylor Brown may have picked up on a reference to one or two major books. The Reluctant Fundamentalist is one of them. Written by a Pakistani émigré living in London, the novel is widely considered to be one of the first post-9/11 novels written from a Muslim point of view. It is also one of the more painfully honest works written since the Twin Towers collapsed (Towelhead by Alicia Erian, is another). …