Books
March 2, 2021
How Hank the Cowdog Made John R. Erickson the King of the Canine Canon
He wanted to become a serious literary novelist, like Faulkner or Hemingway. Fortunately for millions of Hank the Cowdog fans, he failed.
Books
Reviews, profiles, and interviews that capture the diverse voices adding to Texas’s rich literary tradition
Books
March 2, 2021
Meet the Comedian Whose New Poetry Book Is as Discomfiting as Her Cabaret Act
Houston-raised actor and stand-up star Catherine Cohen confronts anxiety and narcissism in a self-deprecating collection of poems.
Books
January 28, 2021
Why Is the Death Penalty on the Decline in Texas?
Maurice Chammah’s “Let the Lord Sort Them” is a searing history of the rise and fall of capital punishment.
Books
January 20, 2021
Texas’s Most Famous Historian Looks Back at His Own, Legendary Life
Walter Prescott Webb’s previously unpublished memoir recounts the experiences that shaped his best-known—and most controversial—works.
Books
December 26, 2020
Ten Texas Books We Loved in 2020
Looking for a great read over the holidays? From fiction to memoir, cooking to comics, Texas Monthly writers recommend a few favorites.
Books
December 16, 2020
From the Editor: Books Are Back
We signed a deal to produce four books over the next four years. The first volume will go on sale next fall.
Books
December 16, 2020
The Best Things in Texas 2021: Matthew McConaughey’s ‘Greenlights’
In one of the year's best memoirs, truth is often stranger than fiction.
Books
December 14, 2020
Remembering Karl Kilian, Founder of Houston’s Brazos Bookstore
He helped make the city the literary powerhouse it is today.
Books
December 12, 2020
We Need to Talk About Secession
With chatter about Texas leaving the union on the rise, two new books remind us what it was like the last time we tried to go it alone.
Books
November 28, 2020
In Her Tender Poetry Collection, Lucy Griffith Commemorates a West Texas Figure
The San Antonio native's debut book, about a woman known for riding her burro along remote roads, recently won two major poetry awards.
Books
November 20, 2020
The Thrills of Houston’s 1970s-Era Friday Night Wrestling Come Alive in a Stunning Photo Book
Nearly fifty years ago, photographer Geoff Winningham spent months documenting wrestlers, and the fans who cheered them on, for his book ‘Friday Night in the Coliseum.’
Books
November 13, 2020
A Riveting New Photo Book Shares Vulnerable Portraits of the Football Team That Inspired ‘Friday Night Lights’
Thirty years after Buzz Bissinger’s bestseller chronicled the Permian Panthers’ 1988 season, these black and white photos are as compelling as ever.
Books
November 10, 2020
Emmanuel Acho on His New Book, ‘Uncomfortable Conversations With a Black Man’
"My advice for allies is to just let people know, first and foremost, that you care," says the Dallas native.
Books
October 30, 2020
Texas Monthly Recommends: A Soothing Japanese Bookstore in Houston, Austin, and North Texas
Plus, a psychedelic music festival, Fat Tony's new album, and a book that casts a critical eye on the true-crime genre.
Film & TV
October 30, 2020
How to Scare Yourself Like a Texan
A selection of Texas-bred horror films, books, and TV episodes to indulge in during the spooky times.
Books
October 28, 2020
Matthew McConaughey’s Memoir Doesn’t Dispel His Own Mythology—But Does Challenge It
In his recently released memoir, the Texan actor spins tall tales that just so happen to be true.
Books
October 28, 2020
This Lawyer Works to Free Incarcerated Victims of the War on Drugs. It All Started With Her Mom’s Arrest.
In a blistering memoir, attorney Brittany K. Barnett explores the traumatic aftermath of the war on drugs.
Books
October 26, 2020
Texas Book Festival 2020
The Austin-based celebration of literary culture begins October 31.
Film & TV
October 16, 2020
Selena Gomez Could Be Your Next Scream Queen
Plus, Demi Lovato releases an anti-Trump song, Sandra Bullock gets back into rom-coms, and the Legendary Stardust Cowboy gets the documentary treatment.
Books
October 14, 2020
Six Good Texas Book Festival Reads
This year’s festival is all-virtual, but its lineup is still all-star, as demonstrated by this trio of recent books from Texas authors.
Film & TV
October 9, 2020
Hollywood, Texas: ‘Dazed and Confused’ Cast to Reunite Online, Online, Online
Plus, Kacey Musgraves meets Scooby Doo, Borat meets Sid Miller, and Austin meets ‘Walker, Texas Ranger.’
Books
October 8, 2020
MacArthur Fellow Cristina Rivera Garza Believes That Writing Is an Act of Hope
The Houston author, who blurs boundaries of genre, language, and culture, says she writes in part to imagine a better world.
Film & TV
October 7, 2020
‘News of the World,’ Tom Hanks’s First Western, Is the Perfect Role for ‘America’s Dad’
The film adaptation of Utopia author Paulette Jiles’s acclaimed novel finds Hanks shepherding a young girl across 1870s Texas.
Books
September 28, 2020
‘Loving Sports When They Don’t Love You Back’ Is an Ethical Guide for Fans
Authors Jessica Luther and Kavitha A. Davidson say it's time for sports fans to grapple with the industry's systemic injustices.
Books
September 20, 2020
Remembering Jan Reid, Distinctive Voice in Texas Letters
The longtime Texas Monthly contributor introduced the Austin music scene to the rest of the world.
Books
September 17, 2020
A North Texas Teacher Wanted a Superhero His Latino Students Could Relate to, so He Created One
Hector Rodriguez’s hit comic book series, El Peso Hero, is now set to become a film.
Books
September 16, 2020
The Late, Great Bud Shrake’s Last, Great Novel
The funny and brutal ‘Hollywood Mad Dogs’ was inspired by the Texas writer's experience working in Hollywood with the legendary—and very demanding—Steve McQueen.
Books
August 21, 2020
Texas Monthly Recommends: UT’s Summer Reading List
Plus: a free fridge project in Austin, novels by Jennifer duBois, and Garden Marcus’s soothing TikToks.
Books
August 19, 2020
Vivian Stephens Helped Turn Romance Writing Into a Billion-Dollar Industry. Then She Got Pushed Out.
Now, as the Romance Writers of America reckons with its history of racism, will she finally get her due?
The National Podcast of Texas
August 14, 2020
Paul Begala Wrote the Book on Defeating Donald Trump
On The National Podcast of Texas, the legendary Democratic strategist on whether Texas is swingable and what it’ll take for Joe Biden to win.
Books
July 31, 2020
Hollywood, Texas: Matthew McConaughey All Writes, All Writes, All Writes a Book
Plus, William Jackson Harper of “The Good Place” gets an Emmy nod, Joe Rogan is moving to Texas, and Miranda Lambert is number one again.
Books
July 24, 2020
Texas Monthly Recommends: Larry McMurtry’s ‘Texasville’
Plus, a podcast hosted by a UT alum and native North Texan, a restaurant with the best banh mi in Dallas, and a show about Austin’s roller derby scene.
Texas History
July 22, 2020
Meet the Unruly Clan That Once Ruled the Hill Country
Living hard and free, cedar choppers clashed with respectable townsfolk in the mid-20th century.
Books
July 21, 2020
With Her New Book, a Texas Author Wants You to Take Boy Bands Seriously
Music journalist Maria Sherman discusses why she wrote 'Larger Than Life,' her exhaustive guide to an enduring cultural phenomenon.
Books
July 2, 2020
A Guide to Living Decadently Without Alcohol
In their new book, ‘The Sober Lush,' Austin writers Amanda Eyre Ward and Jardine Libaire offer a booze-free road map to a rich, full lifestyle.
Books
June 23, 2020
In Her Poetry, Mónica Teresa Ortiz Immortalizes the Act of Remembering
The queer Texan writer's verses speak to the idea that because there is violence and injustice there is also beauty, love, and living to be done.
Books
June 18, 2020
Will Dystopian Times Inspire Utopian Art?
Texas science fiction authors Nicky Drayden and Christopher Brown contemplate the future of writing about the future.
Books
June 16, 2020
Is Houston a Prophetic City? Or a Pathetic City?
Rice sociologist Stephen Klineberg’s portrait of Houston focuses on the busts, not the booms—and still remains optimistic.
Books
May 20, 2020
What to Read Now
Stuck at home? Run out of shows to binge-watch? We have a few suggestions.
Books
May 20, 2020
‘Valentine’ Writer Elizabeth Wetmore’s Texas Roots
The best-selling debut author remembers the Permian Basin home she fled as soon as she could.
Books
May 20, 2020
The Secret History of the Texas Rangers
‘Cult of Glory' upends decades of mythmaking.
Books
May 20, 2020
How ‘Passage’ Author Justin Cronin Became a Lifelong Catastrophist
Decades of reading about the apocalypse led to the creation of his own series of pandemic novels. Lately, he's been wishing real life didn’t track fiction so closely.
Books
May 20, 2020
Go-Go’s Bassist Kathy Valentine Remembers the Sounds of 1970s Austin
The Texas native's new memoir offers plenty to listen to.
Books
May 1, 2020
Lawrence Wright on the Politics of the Pandemic
The Austin author says he wrote his new pandemic thriller as a "cry of warning," but he never expected it to be released during an eerily similar crisis.
Books
April 23, 2020
Texas Monthly Bedtime Stories
Stressed? Can’t sleep? Curl up at home and let our writers help you escape into a great story.
Film & TV
April 15, 2020
How to Hunker Down Like a Texan
A guide to catching up on great culture from around the state while you’re holed up in isolation.
Books
April 14, 2020
I Love Paulette Jiles’s Novels. So Why Won’t She Talk to Me?
My up and down encounters with the brilliant, beloved, and very grouchy western novelist.
Books
April 7, 2020
A Bookstore That Closed During the Pandemic Started a Literature Hotline. Now People Are Calling in for Life Advice.
Deep Vellum Books’s help line is about literature—but also life advice, horoscopes, and tough conversations.
Books
April 3, 2020
Texas Monthly Recommends: E-books From Your Public Library
Plus, a debut album by Texas duo Broken Revival, the television show ’Kidding,’ and to-go margaritas.
Books
March 24, 2020
The Seminal Novel About the 1918 Flu Pandemic Was Written by a Texan
Katherine Anne Porter’s ‘Pale Horse, Pale Rider’ tells the tale of a pandemic she barely survived.