SOURCE: Pinsker, Sanford. “Essayists, Obsessions, and Hardcovers.” Georgia Review 51, no. 3 (fall 1997): 549-61.

In the following review, Pinsker asserts that Hamilton's Walking Possession is witty, enjoyable, and thought-provoking.

In much the same way that good novelists explore the arc of their obsessions in book after book, the essayists who most matter follow the threads of an individual essay only to discover that it leads to yet another sustained rumination—and in due course to a collection lodged between stately hardcovers. No doubt there are as many versions of this ur-tale as there are essayists, but one central fact remains: while a clear, individual voice surely counts, an obsessive subject probably matters more.

Many essays begin with a thesis that will be proven as its pages systematically unroll, but for all the well-meaning advice about outlines that teachers pass along to their students, essays that surprise, and then convince, are...