Four novels featuring cultural institutions & crime

Molly Odintz is the managing editor for CrimeReads and the editor of Austin Noir. She grew up in Austin and worked as a bookseller before becoming a Very Professional Internet Person. She lives in central Texas with her cat, Fritz Lang.

At CrimeReads Odintz tagged "four excellent recent and upcoming novels featuring cultural institutions and plenty of crimes." One title on the list:

Maha Khan Phillips, The Museum Detective

This book is so cool! As The Museum Detective begins, an archaeologist gets a call from the police to identify a body—specifically, a mummy preserved in a highly unusual sarcophagus that just about everyone would like to get their hands on, for profit or for politics.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Nev March's "The Silversmith’s Puzzle"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Silversmith's Puzzle: A Mystery (Captain Jim and Lady Diana Mysteries, 4) by Nev March.

About the book, from the publisher:

Captain Jim Agnihotri and Lady Diana Framji return to India as they investigate a murder amidst colonial Bombay's complex hierarchy in March's fourth mystery.

In 1894 colonial India, Lady Diana's family has lost their fortune in a global financial slump, but even worse, her brother Adi is accused of murder. Desperate to save him from the gallows, Captain Jim and Lady Diana rush back to Bombay. However, the traditional Parsi community finds Jim and Diana's marriage taboo and shuns them.

The dying words of Adi’s business partner, a silversmith, are perplexing. As Captain Jim peels back the curtains on this man's life he finds a trail of unpaid bills, broken promises, lies and secrets. Why was the silversmith so frantic for gold, and where is it? What awful truth does it represent?

Set in lush, late-Victorian India, Captain Jim and Diana struggle with the complexities of caste, tradition, and loyalty. Their success and their own lives may depend on Diana, who sacrificed her inheritance for love. Someone within their circle has the key to this puzzle. Can she find a way to reconnect with the tight community that threw them aside?

Visit Nev March's website.

Q&A with Nev March.

The Page 69 Test: Murder in Old Bombay.

My Book, The Movie: Murder in Old Bombay.

Writers Read: Nev March (October 2022).

The Page 69 Test: The Silversmith's Puzzle.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the best legal thrillers

Sally Smith is a barrister and KC who has spent all her working life in the Inner Temple. After writing a biography of Sir Edward Marshall Hall KC, a renowned Edwardian barrister she retired from the bar to write fulltime. A Case of Mice and Murder, her first novel, was inspired by the historic surroundings in which she lives and works and by the centuries of rich history in Inner Temple Archives and Library. This is the first in a series introducing the amateur and unwilling sleuth Sir Gabriel Ward KC.

At the Waterstones blog Smith tagged five favotite legal thrillers ("sticking to what have become classics"). One title on the list:

A Certain Justice by P. D. James

A criminal barrister who is an expert on murder becomes the victim when she is found dead in her chambers wearing her blood-stained wig. Unlikeable and fiercely ambitious with a very colourful domestic life, there are plenty of candidates for murderer. Complex, extremely chilling and seriously good with a gut wrenching conclusion. And I really like the ambivalence of the title; what kind of certain is the justice in the book? Justice up to a point kind of ‘certain’, as the author suggests? Or absolutely ‘certain’ justice?

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Pancho McFarland's "Food Autonomy in Chicago"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Food Autonomy in Chicago by Pancho McFarland.

About the book, from the publisher:

Through eighteen years of field research, dialogues with colleagues, deep involvement in the food movement community in Chicago, and introspection, Pancho McFarland asks: Is the loosely connected network of Black and Indigenous land stewards and food warriors in Chicago an anticolonial force for the liberation of all our relations?

This examination of a sector of the food autonomy movement in Chicago provides important new ways of understanding race relations, gender, sexuality, spirituality, pedagogy, identity, and their importance to the dynamics of social movements. Additionally, the book explores how revolutionary culture, principles, and organization of American Indigenous, diasporan Africans, anarchist Mexicans and others have been adopted, adapted, or rejected in our food movement.

In this autoethnography of the food movement, McFarland argues that at our best we work to establish a new society like that theorized and enacted by Indigenous and Black anarchists. However, the forces of Wetiko (colonialism, capitalism, heteropatriarchy, and white supremacy) make the work of BIPOC food warriors difficult. Wetiko’s conceptual categories―including race, gender, sexuality, and citizenship―influence our worldviews and affect our behaviors. These limitations and our responses to them are captured in the dialogues and chapters of Food Autonomy in Chicago.

Learn more about Food Autonomy in Chicago at the University of Georgia Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Food Autonomy in Chicago.

--Marshal Zeringue

Nine books that center asexuality

Debbie Urbanski is the author of the novel After World (2023)—which was named a best book of the year by the San Francisco Chronicle, Engadget, the Los Angeles Times tech, Booklist, and Strange Horizons—and Portalmania (2025). Her writing focuses on the intersections of horror, fantasy, science fiction, asexuality, memoir, and/or the planet. Over the past two decades, she's published widely in such places as The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, The Best American Experimental Writing, The Sun, Granta, Orion, and Junior Great Books.

At Electric Lit Urbanski tagged nine "narratives [that] push against the traditional definitions of love that confine all of us." One title on the list:

All Systems Red by Martha Wells

The narrator of All Systems Red (who calls itself Murderbot) is a wry, socially awkward, agendered, self-hacked security cyborg who enjoys watching soap operas (though it fast-forwards through the sex scenes due to boredom). Murderbot’s current assignment is to watch over a group of researchers on an unnamed planet. Soon some anomalies are noticed on the planetary maps, and Murderbot has to figure out what’s going on while trying to protect the team of scientists it has grown to care for. In less confident hands, the robot-as-asexual trope may have come off as irritating or wrong. But Murderbot is one of my favorite narrators ever. Funny, shy, self-aware, and occasionally snarky, it connects with people only in its own way, forming some moving and unique relationships. All Systems Red leans a little toward “hard” science fiction— think drones, implants, hubs, transports, hatches—but I still believe typical literary readers who don’t often read sci-fi can deeply enjoy this one.

Read about another entry on the list.

All Systems Red also appears among Lorna Wallace's ten best novels about Artificial Intelligence, Deana Whitney's five amusing AI characters who should all definitely hang out, Andrew Skinner's five top stories about the lives of artificial objects, Annalee Newitz's list of seven books about remaking the world, Tansy Rayner Roberts and Rivqa Rafael's five top books that give voice to artificial intelligence, T.W. O'Brien's five recent books that explore the secret lives of robots, Sam Reader's top six science fiction novels for fans of Westworld, and Nicole Hill's six robots too smart for their own good.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Eva Gates's "Shot Through the Book"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Shot Through the Book by Eva Gates.

About the book, from the publisher:

In the twelfth installment of the Lighthouse Library mysteries, Lucy McNeil is back on the case, but this time she’s on the case alone.

The upcoming YA book festival at the Bodie Island Lighthouse Library is bringing in renowned authors from all over the world. When best selling author Todd Harrison unexpectedly visits librarian Lucy McNeil at her Outer Banks beach house after a meeting, she is puzzled by his presence, since they’re virtually strangers. After she steps inside to get him a drink, she’s shocked to discover that he’s been murdered on her deck in the few minutes she left him alone.

Not knowing why he wanted to meet with her in private, or how someone managed to kill him in the time it takes to make lemonade, Lucy is determined to help with the investigation and figure out what happened. WhenHeather Harrison, Todd’s widow, shows up in town, her motivations aren’t inspired by grief. She’s intending to use her husband’s tragic death to launch her candidacy for state senator and her first order of business is to go after the local police force–and Lucy herself.

Caught between an intrusive fan club mourning Todd, squabbling authors fighting for prominence in his absence, and a politically ruthless widow, Lucy must roll up her sleeves and and catch the killer before the chapter closes on justice.

Follow Eva Gates on Facebook, and visit Vicki Delany's website.

The Page 69 Test: Death By Beach Read.

Writers Read: Eva Gates (June 2022).

The Page 69 Test: Death Knells and Wedding Bells.

Writers Read: Eva Gates (June 2023).

Writers Read: Eva Gates (May 2024).

The Page 69 Test: The Stranger in the Library.

The Page 69 Test: Shot Through the Book.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Jesse Browner reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Jesse Browner, author of Sing to Me: A Novel.

His entry begins:

You Dreamed of Empires, by Álvaro Enrigue. This is already my second read. My hands-down favorite book of 2024. It reinvents the story of Hernán Cortés’ first week in Tenochtitlan and his meeting with the Aztec emperor Moctezuma – probably one of the most fateful encounters in world history, as the future of the entire New World hung on its outcome. Yet Enrigue treats it with irreverence, irony, broad (almost slapstick) humor and compassion for all its protagonists. For me, You Dreamed of Empires is the ideal model of the historical novel, adhering to...[read on]

About Sing to Me, from the publisher:

After the fall of Troy, an eleven-year-old boy sets off for the razed city when his father and sister vanish into the war zone; this "gorgeously drawn" novel offers an intimate vision of the most storied war in history, as seen through the eyes of a child. (Laird Hunt)

His family farm and the surrounding community now emptied by war, young Hani embarks on an epic quest – assisted by a brooding yet brilliant donkey – to find his lost sister in the ruins of Troy. Some war stories transcend time and circumstance, and so it is with the resourceful and heartbroken Hani, who must employ every bit of intelligence, every scrap of ingenuity, and ultimately every ounce of his spirit and humor to withstand the forces of civilization’s collapse.

Hani is no ordinary boy, however, and a character unlike any you’ve ever met. His interior world is one of startling depth and complexity. His insights into life, lives, and history are breathtakingly fresh. And his hope for survival—not a given, and in fact, less than likely—will propel you to the startling conclusion of this brief, elegiac, and singular work.

Writers Read: Jesse Browner (January 2012).

Writers Read: Jesse Browner.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top books for fans of "Sinners"

Brittany K. Allen is a writer and actor living in Brooklyn.

At Lit Hub she tagged ten books for fans of Sinners, the 2025 American musical horror film produced, written, and directed by Ryan Coogler. One title on the list:

Victor LaValle’s The Ballad of Black Tom

LaValle is one of our strongest literary horror writers. The way he braids genres and subverts and honors magical tropes is consistently surprising. This disquieting Jazz Age tale follows a hustling musician who awakens a beast when he “delivers an occult tome to a reclusive sorceress in the heart of Queens.” Expect Black magic.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Ballad of Black Tom is among Chase Dearinger's seven horror titles where the setting is a monster and Colleen Kinder's ten titles about chance encounters with strangers.

--Marshal Zeringue

Nose in a book: Amy Shearn

Who: Amy Shearn

What: Animal Instint by Amy Shearn

When: May 2025

Where: Politics and Prose, Washington DC

Photo credit: Diana Friedman

Visit Amy Shearn's website.

The Page 99 Test: How Far Is the Ocean from Here.

Writers Read: Amy Shearn (March 2013).

Q&A with Amy Shearn.

My Book, The Movie: Dear Edna Sloane.

The Page 69 Test: Dear Edna Sloane.

The Page 69 Test: Animal Instinct.

Writers Read: Amy Shearn.

My Book, The Movie: Animal Instinct.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Steve Gowler's "Thoughts that Burned"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Thoughts That Burned: William Goodell, Human Rights, and the Abolition of American Slavery by Steve Gowler.

About the book, from the publisher:

In Thoughts That Burned, Steve Gowler showcases the life of William Goodell, one of the most significant leaders of the antebellum antislavery movement. Between 1826 and 1864, Goodell edited more than a dozen reform newspapers and played a leading role in the formation of several organizations, including the American Anti-slavery Society, the Liberty Party, the American Missionary Association, and the Radical Abolition Party. His 1852 book Slavery and Anti-slavery was the first comprehensive history of the antislavery movement written by an American.

Convinced that the logic of slavery needed to be investigated and laid bare, Goodell explored the institution's deep structures. Whereas many abolitionists based their arguments on the inhumane consequences of enslavement, Goodell analyzed the legal and psychological relations constituting the slave system. At the heart of this analysis was his close reading of Southern slave codes and of the United States Constitution. He argued that the Constitution, properly understood, is incompatible with slavery and should be used as an instrument of emancipation. Among those influenced by his constitutional hermeneutic was Frederick Douglass, who described Goodell as the man "to whom the cause of liberty in America is as much indebted as to any other one American citizen." Thoughts That Burned is the first comprehensive biography of this extraordinary thinker, whose powerful political and theological arguments grounded abolition within the concept of human rights.

Visit Steve Gowler's website.

The Page 99 Test: Thoughts That Burned.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six great puzzle novels

K. A. Merson is a vaguely reclusive writer who lives in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains, along with a patient spouse, a malevolent boxer dog, and an Airstream trailer.

The author's new novel is The Language of the Birds.

At CrimeReads Merson tagged six favorite puzzle novels, including:

The Raw Shark Texts by Stephen Hall

Several years ago, I was taking a creative writing course and working on The Language of the Birds, when one of the instructors said that my work reminded them of The Raw Shark Texts. Clearly, I had to read it. And I loved it. Few books can tackle hefty topics such as memory, identity, and grief while doing so with such a unique storyline. A cat-and-mouse hunting expedition for a voracious memory-eating predator, this funny, emotional, page-turning thriller is equal parts Stephen King, Michael Crichton, and Franz Kafka. Conceptually brilliant, The Raw Shark Texts was Steven Hall’s first novel and won the Borders Original Voices Award, the Somerset Maugham Award and was shortlisted for the Arthur C. Clarke Award.

Read about another puzzle novel on the list.

The Raw Shark Texts is among Jim Bob's top ten illustrated books for adults.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Jessica Guerrieri

From my Q&A with Jessica Guerrieri, author of Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea sets the tone before the first page. The cover’s striking image—water as both refuge and threat—mirrors the novel’s emotional stakes. The title speaks to being trapped between two impossible choices, something my protagonist, Leah, knows all too well. On the surface, she has it all: a handsome husband, three daughters, and a fresh start in a sleepy coastal town. But beneath that facade, she’s quietly unraveling—gripping tightly to the illusion of control, one drink at a time.

The "devil" can be read as addiction, guilt, or the crushing expectations of motherhood. The “deep blue sea” is both literal and symbolic: the beach town where Leah lives and surfs, and the murky depths of her own emotional landscape. It also hints at the secret she’s keeping from the O’Connor family—one that...[read on]

Visit Jessica Guerrieri's website.

Q&A with Jessica Guerrieri.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Catherine Ryan Hyde's "Michael Without Apology"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Michael Without Apology: A Novel by Catherine Ryan Hyde.

About the book, from the publisher:

A film student struggling with self-acceptance finally stops looking away from his traumatic past in a powerful novel by New York Times bestselling author Catherine Ryan Hyde.

Michael Woodbine was seven years old when a near-fatal fireworks accident scarred him and led to his placement in foster care. Now a college freshman, he is still trying to hide the effects of his trauma from his classmates, his adoptive family, and himself.

When Michael signs up for a film class, he meets Robert Dunning, a teacher who wears his own scars unapologetically. Robert encourages Michael to make a documentary that explores body image and self-perception. Michael places an ad seeking people who feel unattractive and rejected by society―and is surprised to learn that this is essentially everyone. Although some participants are recovering from injuries or surgeries, others are dealing with more everyday factors like aging or the changes to a body from giving birth.

As he collects these stories―and finally tells his own―Michael feels more connected to the world than he ever has before. But he knows his journey of self-acceptance has one more obstacle: his crushing doubts about why his birth parents wouldn’t fight to keep him.

Visit Catherine Ryan Hyde's website.

Q&A with Catherine Ryan Hyde.

The Page 69 Test: Brave Girl, Quiet Girl.

The Page 69 Test: My Name is Anton.

The Page 69 Test: Seven Perfect Things.

The Page 69 Test: Boy Underground.

The Page 69 Test: Dreaming of Flight.

The Page 69 Test: So Long, Chester Wheeler.

The Page 69 Test: A Different Kind of Gone.

The Page 69 Test: Life, Loss, and Puffins.

The Page 69 Test: Rolling Toward Clear Skies.

The Page 69 Test: Michael Without Apology.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight titles exploring complicated feelings about ambition

Emma Pattee is a climate journalist and fiction writer. Her work has been published in The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, and elsewhere.

Her debut novel, Tilt, is available now.

At Electric Lit Pattee tagged eight "contemporary novels that explore ambition in complicated, nuanced, and exciting ways." One title on the list:

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

Written in the form of a letter, The White Tiger tells the story of a Indian man who was born into incredible poverty and is now a self-made entrepreneur, and murderer. Aravind Adiga is one of my favorite writers, and this book is no exception. At turns a social critique of modern-day India, a meticulous satire of greed and striving, and an examination of ambition that comes from desperation but truly eats you alive. I read a review that called it an “anguishing howl of rage” about poverty and class inequity. I’d say that pretty much nails it.

Read about another novel on the list.

The White Tiger is on Nathan Go's list of eight novels with narrators who defy our expectations, Saskia Lacey's list of fifty incredible literary works destined to become classics, Louise Doughty's six best books list, Amy Wilkinson's list of seven top books with "white" in the title, Julia Stuart's list of five of the best stories about domestic servants, Stephen Kelman's top ten list of outsiders' stories, and is one of The Freakonomics guys' six best books.

The Page 69 Test: The White Tiger.

--Marshal Zeringue

Paul Vidich's "The Poet’s Game," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Paul Vidich's The Poet's Game.

The entry begins:

The English director, John Madden, would be a good fit to make The Poet’s Game a movie. Madden directed Operation Mincemeat and much earlier in his career, he director the multiple- Oscar winner, Shakespeare in Love with a screenplay by Tom Stoppard. Both movies had ensembles casts and the story lines blended personal lives into an historical moment. The Poet’s Game shares those qualities: the tense political conflict between Moscow and Washington in 2018 provides the backdrop for a love story. Madden has the light touch of a director who can bring people’s stories alive and still sustain the suspense of a thrilling plot.

My main character, Alex Matthews, could be played by the chameleon-like Damian Lewis, whose remarkable range makes him a good candidate for the role. Lewis is a smart actor and has the right amount of devious sophistication to play a spy moving...[read on]

Visit Paul Vidich's website.

Q&A with Paul Vidich.

My Book, The Movie: The Mercenary.

The Page 69 Test: The Mercenary.

Writers Read: Paul Vidich (January 2022).

The Page 69 Test: The Matchmaker: A Spy in Berlin.

Writers Read: Paul Vidich (October 2023).

My Book, The Movie: Beirut Station.

The Page 69 Test: Beirut Station.

Writers Read: Paul Vidich.

My Book, The Movie: The Poet's Game.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight page-turning revenge thrillers

At Book Riot Addison Rizer tagged eight "satisfying revenge thrillers where the bad guys finally get their due." One title on the list:

Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden

After the death of his sister, Virgil Wounded Horse takes guardianship of his nephew, Nathan. To get the money to send him to college, Virgil works as an enforcer in their community, doling out justice when the system fails.

When he’s offered a large sum to handle a drug issue on the reservation, he takes it. That is, until Nathan is caught in the drug scene too. Now, with a personal stake in the issue, Virgil is determined to find the source and put a stop to it.

Read about another thriller on the list.

Winter Countsis among Robert Justice's five best crime titles set in Denver, Brittany Bunzey's ten best Indigenous suspense novels, Tracy Clark's top ten crime books by writers of color, Erin E. Adams's seven novels that use mystery to examine race, S.F. Kosa's top ten psychological thrillers, Stephen Miller's favorite crime fiction of 2020, Molly Odintz's six favorite titles from the "new wave of thrillers where the oppressed get some well-earned revenge," and Jennifer Baker's top twelve mystery novels featuring BIPOC protagonists.

The Page 69 Test: Winter Counts.

My Book, The Movie: Winter Counts.

Q&A with David Heska Wanbli Weiden.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Lindsay O'Neill's "The Two Princes of Mpfumo"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Two Princes of Mpfumo: An Early Eighteenth-Century Journey into and out of Slavery by Lindsay O'Neill.

About the book, from the publisher:

A fascinating account of two eighteenth-century princes from East Africa, their travels, and their encounters with the British Empire and slavery

In 1716 two princes from Mpfumo—what is today Maputo, the capital of Mozambique—boarded a ship licensed by the East India Company bound for England. Instead, their perfidious captain sold them into slavery in Jamaica. After two years of pleading their case, the princes—known in the historical record as Prince James and Prince John—convinced a lawyer to purchase them, free them, and travel with them to London. The lawyer perished when a hurricane wrecked their ship, but the princes survived and arrived in England in 1720. Even though the East India Company had initially thought that the princes might assist in their aspirations to develop a trade for gold in East Africa and for enslaved labor in Madagascar, its interest waned. The princes would need to look elsewhere to return home. It was at this point that members of the Royal African Company and the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge took up their cause, in the hope that profit and perhaps Christian souls would follow. John would make it home, but tragically, James would end his own life just before the ship sailed for Africa.

In The Two Princes of Mpfumo, Lindsay O’Neill brings to life individuals caught up in the eighteenth-century slave trade. O’Neill also shows how the princes’ experiences reflect the fragmented, chaotic, and often deadly realities of the early British empire. A fascinating and deeply researched historical narrative, The Two Princes of Mpfumo blurs the boundaries between the Atlantic and Indian ocean worlds; reveals the intertwined networks, powerful individuals, and unstable knowledge that guided British attempts at imperial expansion; and illuminates the power of African polities, which decided who lived and who died on their coasts.

Learn more about The Two Princes of Mpfumo at the University of Pennsylvania Press website.

The Page 99 Test: The Two Princes of Mpfumo.

--Marshal Zeringue

Three of the best--and three of the worst--mothers in literature

BBC.com Culture tagged three of the best--and three of the worst--mothers in literature. One of the good ones:

Marilla Cuthbert, Anne of Green Gables

Outwardly steely, the adoptive mother of red-haired orphan Anne reveals herself as a softie through the course of the 1908 novel: so much so that Margaret Attwood has claimed that Marilla is the true central character: “Only Marilla unfolds into something unimaginable to us at the beginning of the book. Her growing love for Anne, and her growing ability to express that love – not Anne's duckling-to-swan act – is the real magic transformation. Anne is the catalyst who allows the crisp, rigid Marilla to finally express her long-buried softer human emotions.”

Read about another mother on the list.

Anne of Green Gables is among the Observer's ten best fictional mothers, Bea Davenport's top ten books about hair and the Observer's ten best fictional mothers.

Marilla's raspberry cordial in Anne of Green Gables is one of Jane Brocket's top ten food scenes in children's literature.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Paul Vidich reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Paul Vidich, author of The Poet's Game.

His entry begins:

I am fascinated by the different paths that espionage fiction has taken in the England, where is began with Erskine Childers and Eric Ambler in the early 20 th century, and its American expression, which didn’t emerge until the 1960’s with Robert Ludlum and Charles McCarry. There are interesting differences between English and American spy fiction and to understand the differences, I recently began to reread early American spy fiction classics, Charles McCarry’s The Tears of Autumn and Robert Littell’s The Amateur.

McCarry, a CIA intelligence officer before he turned to writing novels, reimagines the assassination of JFK as an act of revenge for America’s killing of South Vietnam’s president Diem in 1963. McCarry’s protagonist, Paul Christopher, is a weary anti-Bond figure who pursues his theory against the advice of agency’s higher-ups, and finds himself out in the cold. It’s a fine novel with an interesting premise, and what makes it stand out is...[read on]

About The Poet's Game, from the publisher:

A hall of mirrors with no exits, The Poet's Game is a sophisticated portrait of a spy working to uncover layers of deceit behind a Russian plot on the American president.

Alex Matthews thought he had left it all behind: his CIA career, the viper's den of bureaucracy at headquarters, the deceits of the cat-and-mouse game of double agents, and the sudden trips to Russia, which poisoned his marriage and made him an absentee husband and father, with tragic results.

But then the Director came asking for a favor. Something that only Alex could do because it involved the asset Byron—a Russian agent whom Alex had recruited. Byron had something of great interest to the CIA; the Director said it was a matter of grave national security that implicated the White House, and that Byron would hand over the kompromat once he was extricated from Russia.

But Alex is a different man than when he had run Moscow station: he has pieced his life back together after a tragic accident killed his wife and daughter—but the scars remain. He left the agency; started a financial firm that made him wealthy; and met a new woman, Anna, who works as an interpreter in the CIA. Anna is beautiful and supportive and helps him find love again after years of drowning in grief alongside his son. Throughout the last years, Alex has remained, in his mind, a patriot, and so he begrudgingly accepts the Director's request.

Something, though, doesn’t feel right about the whole operation from the start. The Russians seem one step ahead and the CIA suspects there is a traitor in the agency, passing along secrets to the Russians. Alex realizes that, by getting back into the game, he has risked everything he has worked for: his marriage, his family’s safety, and the trust of his closest colleagues—one of whom is betraying him. As the noose tightens around Alex, and the FSB closes in on Byron, the operation becomes a hall of mirrors with no exits. To find redemption, Alex must uncover Byron’s secrets or risk losing everything.

The Poet’s Game is a remarkably sophisticated and emotionally resonant portrait of a spy from a renowned master of the genre.

Visit Paul Vidich's website.

Q&A with Paul Vidich.

My Book, The Movie: The Mercenary.

The Page 69 Test: The Mercenary.

Writers Read: Paul Vidich (January 2022).

The Page 69 Test: The Matchmaker: A Spy in Berlin.

Writers Read: Paul Vidich (October 2023).

My Book, The Movie: Beirut Station.

The Page 69 Test: Beirut Station.

Writers Read: Paul Vidich.

--Marshal Zeringue

Nine top books about women without children

Nicole Louie is a writer and translator based in Ireland. Her essays have appeared in Oh Reader Magazine, The Walrus, and The Guardian and her curated collections of books, movies and podcasts about women who are not mothers by choice, circumstance or ambivalence can be found on Instagram: @bynicolelouie.

Others Like Me: The Lives of Women Without Children is her first book.

At Electric Lit Louie tagged nine favorite books "by women who placed writing, not babies, at the center of their lives and flourished outside of motherhood." One title on the list:

Manifesto: On Never Giving Up by Bernardine Evaristo

Manifesto: On Never Giving Up walks us through how Bernardine Evaristo came to be the first Black woman and Black British person to win the Booker Prize, receive over 80 awards, nominations, fellowships, and honours, and have her books named the Book of the Year over sixty times.

Delving into her English, Nigerian, Irish, German and Brazilian heritage, romantic relationships, personal development and activism, Evaristo outlines her trajectory over six decades. Her ninth book also offers glimpses of her decision not to have children. “Instead of becoming a mother, I became an aunt and godmother, roles I’ve loved. I also describe myself as child-free, as opposed to childless, which implies a failure to fulfil my role as a woman rather than an active choice not to have them.”

Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue