SOURCE: Balitas, Vincent D. “New Tricks for Contemporary Fiction.” Book World-The Washington Post (18 July 1999): B7.

In the following positive assessment, Balitas recommends reading Wallace's earlier work before Brief Interviews with Hideous Men.

If David Foster Wallace's new collection of short stories is one's first encounter with this fascinating young writer who has been published in all the right places—Paris Review, the New Yorker and Harper's, to mention just a few—then one is in for many surprises. However, caveat lector: It might be wise to get acquainted with one or more of his previous publications before venturing into waters quite turbulent, always challenging.

Perhaps one might sit down with Mr. Wallace's brilliant collection of nonfiction, A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, a gathering of provocative essays that dig deeply and, most often than not, humorously into American culture. Take, for example, “E Unibus Pluram...