Kate Wolf
Draw it with your eyes closed: the art of the assignment, a book edited by the arts journal Paper Monument, is an informal investigation into the ambiguous task of teaching art in the wake of postmodernism. In it, the editors ask contributors to answer one or both of two seemingly straightforward questions: to write about the best or most memorable assignment they have ever received or about one they have given. Sam Munson’s debut, The November Criminals, hinges on the distinct, adolescent voice of its narrator. In the tradition of Huck (“You don’t know about me”) and Holden (“If you really want to hear about it”), Munson’s Addison Schacht starts with “You’ve asked me to explain what my best and worst qualities are.” This particular you is the admissions board of the University of Chicago, and the novel’s clever conceit is an extended response to a generic essay question. In a spirited mea culpa, Addison recounts the unsolved murder of one of his classmates at John F. Kennedy Senior High School