Texas Monthly Recommends: A True-Crime Tale of Two Murders
‘Blood and Money’ has it all: new oil money, an equestrian heiress, a handsome plastic surgeon, River Oaks mansions, and gossip-worthy trials.
Books
Reviews, profiles, and interviews that capture the diverse voices adding to Texas’s rich literary tradition
Books
December 13, 2021
Darcie Little Badger’s Engrossing New Novel Blends Lipan Apache Folklore and Oceanography
The San Marcos author draws on her scientific training and tribal storytelling to weave a spellbinding tale in ‘A Snake Falls to Earth.’
Film & TV
December 8, 2021
Skip ‘The Freak Brothers,’ and Read the Original Comics by Its Texan Creator Instead
The new show has a strong premise that’s derailed by cheap laughs. But cartoonist Gilbert Shelton’s counterculture strips are still great.
Books
November 19, 2021
How the Alamo Drafthouse Turned Trash Cinema into a Cultural Institution
A new book tells the sweeping tale of the Alamo’s Weird Wednesday series, the American Genre Film Archive, and Austin’s custodians of cult.
Libations
November 19, 2021
Escape to the Tropics at Austin’s Tiki Tatsu-Ya
Indulge in over-the-top cocktails like the Skeleton Cruise, which comes in a boat with dry ice and activates bar-wide light and sound effects.
Books
November 15, 2021
Five Gripping New Texas Thrillers to Keep You Up at Night
You won't be able to put these down.
Books
November 9, 2021
Announcing Our New Book, ‘Being Texan’
The book for anyone who has ever felt the lure of the Lone Star State, already loves it, or simply wants to make sense of the place.
Books
October 27, 2021
The Tall Tale of the Sabine River Goat Man and the Haunted Cemetery
Things unseen moved along the river bank, slithered or crawled or pranced between the thick growths of trees that ran for miles.
Books
October 21, 2021
Eight Great Texas Book Festival Reads
There’s something for every Texan on this list.
Books
October 21, 2021
What Texas Inherited From Larry McMurtry
A recent tribute in Archer City gave Texans an overdue opportunity to pay their respects to their state’s greatest writer.
Texas History
October 14, 2021
Why We Need Strong Texas Women
Ann Richards, Farrah Fawcett, Beyoncé. An excerpt from TM’s new book, ‘Being Texan,’ explores a strain of toughness in the iconography of the state’s females.
Books
September 15, 2021
Brutally Suppressed in Her Lifetime, Gertrude Beasley Is Finally on Our Bookshelves
A searingly feminist 1925 memoir of life in small-town Texas rises from the dustbin of patriarchy.
Books
September 15, 2021
How a Western Comic Series Made Me the Texan I Am Today
To me, Garth Ennis's ‘Preacher’ is about growing past juvenile, self-destructive notions of masculinity.
Books
September 14, 2021
Sandra Cisneros on Bad First Drafts, Staying Hopeful, and Her New Novella
The former San Antonian started writing the story that became ‘Martita, I Remember You’ thirty years ago.
Style & Design
September 14, 2021
These Texas Homes Designed by Lake Flato Blend Dreamily Into Their Surroundings
A new book explores the recent work and landscape-driven philosophy of the esteemed San Antonio architecture firm.
Books
August 27, 2021
Chef Jesse Griffiths Is Begging You to Eat Wild Hog
The owner of Austin’s Dai Due has crafted a thorough, beautifully photographed new guide to hunting, preparing, and cooking wild hog.
Books
August 26, 2021
An Incendiary History of Civil Rights in Dallas Gets a Timely Reissue
First published in 1987, ‘The Accommodation’ still resonates today.
Books
August 25, 2021
A Joyful New Read Celebrates Galveston’s Bygone Black-Owned Restaurants
Part historical text, part recipe book, ‘Lost Restaurants’ memorializes the self-made entrepreneurs who uplifted the island during its years of segregation.
Books
August 20, 2021
TM Recommends: Read a Dane’s Assessment of Texas Culture
Plus: Some yummy Mexican pastries in Austin and an early collection of Sandra Cisneros poetry.
Libations
August 13, 2021
‘Texas Whiskey’ Is a Fanatic’s Guide to the Good Stuff
Nico Martini's tome is part industry profile, part tasting notebook, and 100 percent—or 200-proof—Texas whiskey boosterism.
Books
August 12, 2021
The Flood That Changed San Antonio, for Better and Worse
One hundred years ago this month, a natural disaster devastated the city's poorest neighborhoods—and then transformed its politics.
Books
August 11, 2021
Are Some People Born Lucky? A UT Psychologist Argues Inequality’s Genetic Roots
Kathryn Paige Harden’s new book says social scientists must acknowledge how DNA shapes our lives. Critics call that dangerous.
Books
August 9, 2021
Reading Selena’s Father’s Memoir Is an Exercise in Empathy
Though uneven and at times lacking in self-awareness, Abraham Quintanilla’s book sheds light on the extreme approach he took to protect his daughter’s legacy.
Books
June 22, 2021
Debut Novelist Kelsey McKinney on Losing Her Religion and Leaving Texas
A conversation with the author of the moving and assured ‘God Spare the Girls.’
Books
June 22, 2021
Texas Monthly Recommends: An Engrossing East Texas Novel
Stacey Swann's ‘Olympus, Texas’ is the read of the summer. Plus: a so-bad-it's-good reality show and Megan Thee Stallion on ‘Legendary.’
Books
June 15, 2021
Set After the Civil War, ‘The Sweetness of Water’ Is Eerily Relevant
Austin author Nathan Harris dazzles in his first novel, which explores racial violence, family, and identity.
Sports
June 8, 2021
New Book Shows Astros Kept Cheating After 2018
In ‘Cheated,’ Andy Martino reports that Houston’s sign-stealing scheme continued through the 2019 MLB playoffs.
Books
June 3, 2021
How Poet and Guggenheim Fellow Roberto Tejada Experiences the World
Video: The University of Houston professor walks us through his process and his award-winning poem "Carbonate of Copper."
Books
May 22, 2021
As the LBJ Library Turns 50, the Man Who Planned Its Dedication Recalls a Few Surprises
Lyndon B. Johnson rehearsed his speech in the bathroom, the new fountain doused the guests, and the booze flowed freely.
Texas History
May 19, 2021
The Next Battle of the Alamo!
Is Phil Collins’s legendary Texana collection everything it’s cracked up to be? An adapted excerpt from ‘Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth.’
Books
May 17, 2021
‘Dumplin’’ Author Julie Murphy on Fat Positivity and Writing Queer Characters
The Fort Worth author’s new book follows a gay teen’s bid for prom queen in a fictional West Texas town.
Books
May 11, 2021
Annette Gordon-Reed Explores the Tangled Meaning of Juneteenth
In her new book ‘On Juneteenth,’ the Pulitzer Prize–winning historian takes on the Texas holiday that has gone national.
Books
May 10, 2021
‘The Hunting Wives’ Is an East Texas Thriller That Takes Women’s Relationships Seriously
May Cobb’s second novel explores how the members of a women-only shooting club love, betray, and protect one another.
Books
May 6, 2021
The Texas Rangers Tried (and Failed) to Capture Pancho Villa. The Conflict Still Shapes the Texas-Mexico Border Today.
Jeff Guinn’s ‘War on the Border’ punctures the myth of the Rangers as frontier heroes.
Books
April 30, 2021
Mary H.K. Choi’s New Novel Is a Witty, Vulnerable Immigrant Coming-of-age Story
The San Antonio–raised author’s new novel, ‘Yolk,’ is about learning to be gentle with yourself—something Choi herself is still working on.
Sports
April 29, 2021
A New Sports History Book Shows How Texas Athletes Have Always Fought for Equality
In ‘The Sports Revolution,’ Frank Guridy revisits the 1960s and ’70s, when Black, Latino, and female athletes pushed for change.
Sports
April 26, 2021
Kim Mulkey Made Texas Fall in Love With Women’s College Hoops
After 21 years in Waco, the coach who led Baylor to three NCAA titles is headed to her home state of Louisiana to take over at LSU.
Books
April 23, 2021
Texas Monthly Recommends: A Lesser-Known Larry McMurtry Book
‘Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen’ offers a glimpse at the author’s life in Archer City. Plus: a boxed wine club and food pop-ups in Houston and Austin.
Books
April 23, 2021
Opening a Small-Town Bookstore During the Pandemic Was the Craziest Thing We Ever Did
But twelve months of renovations and a few burst water pipes later, our dream came true.
Meanwhile in Texas
April 23, 2021
A McAllen Thief Pilfered $400 Worth of Spider-Man Comic Books
He confessed after someone spotted him in surveillance footage.
Books
April 19, 2021
Alone in the City of Light
Former Texas Monthly editor in chief Greg Curtis’s new book explores the years he spent rediscovering Paris after the death of his wife.
Critters
April 15, 2021
Chasing Down Birds of Prey With Ornithologist and Musician Jonathan Meiburg
His new book traces the evolution of caracaras—a strange and beautiful type of falcon.
Books
April 13, 2021
The Rise (and Occasional Dips Into Despair!) of Jenny Lawson
In her best-selling memoirs, her eclectic, taxidermy-filled San Antonio bookstore, and her unvarnished tweets, the author makes light of her darkest times—and helps her readers make light of theirs.
Books
April 13, 2021
In Her Debut, ‘Leaving Isn’t the Hardest Thing,’ Author Lauren Hough Keeps Returning to Texas
In her funny, vulnerable essay collection ‘Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing,’ Hough takes on the cult she grew up in, coming to terms with being a closeted lesbian, and her complex relationship with her home state.
Books
April 9, 2021
When the Political Gets Personal
Veteran Austin journalist Bill Minutaglio’s latest book is a crowd-pleasing account of heated political battles in Texas over the past 150 years. But does it get the big picture right?
Books
April 5, 2021
How the Elephants at the Houston Zoo Helped an Austin Author
S. Kirk Walsh used her time with the animals and their caretakers for her new book, ‘The Elephant of Belfast.’
Books
March 26, 2021
The Larry McMurtry I Knew
I caught my first glimpse of the 'Lonesome Dove' author on the streets of Archer City when I was a teenager. It was an encounter that shaped the rest of my life.
Books
March 22, 2021
My Life With Conan the Barbarian
Growing up in a community not even big enough for a post office, I lost myself in the stories of the warrior who launched the sword and sorcery genre. It would be years before I learned that his creator had also been raised in small-town Texas.
Books
March 22, 2021
Even at a Funeral, LBJ and Lady Bird Couldn’t Make Their Peace With the Kennedys
This exclusive excerpt from a new biography of the late first lady chronicles an emotionally fraught experience in the wake of Robert F. Kennedy’s assassination.
Books
March 19, 2021
New Book Explores the Hidden History of Black Pitmasters
Award-winning food writer Adrian Miller highlights their contributions in ‘Black Smoke.’