This weekend we suspend our usual incoherent ramblings in order to present a review of the novel 31 HOURS by Masha Hamilton, brand new from Unbridled Books.

In his great book on 70s American film, A CINEMA OF LONELINESS, Robert Kolker discusses, in the chapter on Scorsese, Roland Barthes' concept of "New York-ness" - that is, the idea or archetype of what NYC 'should' look and feel like in the collective psyche(s). There is no one ideal of New York-ness (compare Scorsese's hellhole with Woody Allen's pleasant Fifth Avenue, for example). Masha Hamilton's new novel works within a comparatively new framework of New York-ness that didn't really exist in generations past - terrorist New York. I dabbled in a little bit of New Historicist type Theory while contemplating this novel, reading it side by side with Christopher Dickey's excellent nonfiction book on terrorism and the NYPD called SECURING THE CITY. This was profitable and rewarding.