The author, most recently, of “Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights” says that more or less everything by Christopher Hitchens makes him laugh: “The laughter is what I miss most about the Hitch.”

What books are currently on your night stand?

“Between the World and Me,” by Ta-Nehisi Coates, which I just finished and which impressed me; “Genghis Khan,” by Jack Weatherford, which is next up; “The White Album,” by Joan Didion, which is great to rediscover, and as good as I remembered it being; “The Heart of a Goof,” by P. G. Wodehouse, which can actually make me care about the game of golf, at least while reading it; and “Humboldt’s Gift,” by Saul Bellow, which seems to be on the night stand more or less permanently.

Who is your favorite novelist of all time?

“Of all time” is a long time. There are days when it’s Kafka, in whose world we all live; others when it’s Dickens, for the sheer fecundity of his imagination and the beauty of his prose. But it’s probably Joyce on more days than anyone else.

What genres do you especially enjoy reading? And which do you avoid?

I don’t really catalog my reading. I usually just read the books that grab my attention for whatever reason. But there is one genre I’m diving into right now, for work reasons. I’m reading a lot of “nonfiction novels” because I’m going to teach them at N.Y.U. So, Mailer’s “Armies of the Night,” Keneally’s “Schindler’s List,” Capote’s “In Cold Blood,” and so on.