Eight novels about spending half your life at work

Devon Halliday’s fiction has been awarded a Pushcart Prize and distinguished by Best American Short Stories. Her writing appears in Ploughshares, One Story, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Liberties, and elsewhere. She is the author of To Stay, To Stay, To Stay (McSweeney’s), which was longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize.

At Electric Lit she tagged "eight novels [in which] the daily grind is presented in obsessive, sometimes absurdist detail, turning the familiar into something uncanny and worth studying." One title on the list:

Stoner by John Williams

William Stoner gives himself entirely to the work of loving and teaching literature. In so doing, he alienates students, battles with colleagues, dooms his marriage, and dies unremembered. It is impossible to read the account of the small victories and painful setbacks of Stoner’s life without both rooting for him and resigning oneself to his eventual disappointment. This novel maps out the long and embattled path of academia, from youthful ambition to cutthroat office politics to the fading of relevance. Through it all, Stoner somehow continues to love teaching, and to value the opportunity he has to discuss literature with successive generations of students. Stoner is a compassionate and unsparing view of the life of professors, and shows how even this apparently cushy daily grind has its share of hard and thankless labor.

Read about another entry on the list.

Stoner is among Kate McCusker's five best campus novels, Sally Oliver's five books for the grieving, Kate Weinberg's five top university-based novels, Andrew Hunter Murray's top five books to make you feel less alone, Thomas Maloney's ten best deaths in fiction, Simon Kernick's six best books, The Secret Teacher author's ten top books about teaching, Jamie Fewery's ten best fictional fathers, and Colum McCann's top ten novels featuring poets.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Mariah Fredericks reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Mariah Fredericks, author of Murder on 34th Street: A Novel.

Her entry begins:

Right now, I seem to be reading about awful people. Like a lot of writer/readers, I have a few books going at once and it usually feeds into what I’m working on in some way.

I’m trying to get up the nerve to write something about Dorothy Parker, so I’m deep into a second read of Marion Meade’s 1987 biography, What Fresh Hell is This? It’s a fascinating work because Meade doesn’t pull punches; at times I find myself disliking Parker intensely. Her wit is so fast and so lethal, it puts you mind of Bruce Lee. But she didn’t always pick on people her own size and there are times you think, Oh, shut up. Like many of her era, Parker wasn’t fond of other women. But then she surprises you, showing strength and integrity when under fire from McCarthy, her genuine dedication to civil rights, her empathy for Marilyn Monroe. Her frenemyship with Lillian Hellman at the end of her life is worth an entire book. I can’t say I have Parker figured out yet. But...[read on]

About Murder on 34th Street, from the publisher:

From the author of The Girl in the Green Dress comes a delightful and captivating novel about a fictional murder mystery at the iconic Macy's parade leading up to the holidays in historic New York City.

New York, 1932. Grace Verlander is the secret beating heart of Macy's. She's the "assistant to the assistant to the someone who's in charge", the go-to person for keeping everything running smoothly behind-the-scenes at the famous, bustling store.

It's not every day you get a letter from Santa Claus, but three days before the Macy's annual Thanksgiving Day Parade, Grace arrives at work to find a note from the store Santa Claus in her locker: someone has sent him a death threat. Shocked, Grace promises to look into it and speaks to the store detective about the parade's security, confident that they've found a solution that will keep everyone safe. But on the day of the parade, despite all their precautions, a dead body is found on one of the floats.

Using her wits and deep knowledge of the ways of the place, Grace is determined to find the killer and seek justice-not just for the dead man, but to save the reputation of this iconic store from ruin.

Steeped in glittering glamor and nostalgic wonder, this is a remarkable, unpredictable mystery set in the evocative world of one of New York's most memorable institutions.

Visit Mariah Fredericks's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Girl in the Park.

The Page 69 Test: A Death of No Importance.

My Book, The Movie: Death of an American Beauty.

The Page 69 Test: Death of an American Beauty.

Q&A with Mariah Fredericks.

The Page 69 Test: The Lindbergh Nanny.

My Book, The Movie: The Girl in the Green Dress.

Writers Read: Mariah Fredericks.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight top books about cults

At Huffington Post Tessa Flores tagged eight books that will satisfy your fascination with cults. One title on the list:

The Incendiaries: A Novel by R.O. Kwon

Fans of Donna Tartt’s “The Secret History” will be drawn to R.O. Kwon’s debut novel about the posh Phoebe Lin and the outsider Will Kendall. The two students meet while attending a liberal arts college. Will is drawn to the beautiful and charismatic Phoebe, and Phoebe is drawn to an extremist religious cult. Before attending college, Phoebe’s mother died, and the grief she feels consumes her. In her emotionally vulnerable state, she’s drawn to a carefree and enigmatic barefoot man, John Leal. Phoebe finds purpose through John’s Christian proselytizing, as do others at the college, and he begins to assemble a group of followers. But John’s appeal is not as easily won from Will, who struggles with Phoebe's newfound commitment to what he begins to recognize as a cult. At the book’s climax, Phoebe disappears, leaving Will obsessed with finding her.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Incendiaries is among Lauren Ling Brown's five top dark academia novels by BIPOC authors and Tara Isabella Burton's seven titles with fictional characters in search of utopias.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: danah boyd's "Data Are Made, Not Found"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Data Are Made, Not Found: A Story of Politics, Power, and the Civil Servants Who Saved the US Census by danah boyd.

About the book, from the publisher:

An eye-opening story of the people who make the census, the United States’ largest and most consequential dataset, and the growing threats to their crucial work.

By many measures, the US census is the government’s largest non-wartime operation, and one of the world’s oldest and biggest data-making endeavors. The 2020 census required more than a decade of planning and technical work―not to mention managing nearly a quarter of a million temporary workers simultaneously―to collect data about the American public. That data was then processed to count each of 331,449,281 residents once―and only once―and in the right place. The operation is also one of the country’s most consequential. Census data determine how political power and federal funding are allocated. Census data make politics, and consequently, politics make census data. In this urgent book, danah boyd explores what it took for the Census Bureau to make the 2020 census, amidst a global pandemic and natural disasters, and while navigating political forces that constrained the budget, micro-managed the schedule, and attacked statisticians’ methods.

With rare insider access to the Census Bureau, boyd observed and interviewed hundreds of government civil servants who made the 2020 census. By documenting the perspectives of government workers, Data Are Made, Not Found provides a rare glimpse into what it takes to make democracy’s data. Each chapter reveals a different challenge―ranging from the last-minute fights about a citizenship question to the not-so-helpful help of well-intended stakeholders to avoid undercounts―and shows how civil servants responded to each problem, controversy, and hurdle. Boyd shows how many of the challenges that the Census Bureau faced in 2020 resulted from decades of political operatives, data users, and various stakeholders playing what boyd calls “Jenga politics,” weakening the administrative state for short-term political gains by removing support and adding more requirements.

Civil servants saved the 2020 census, but future censuses―and other data-making efforts related to elections, health, and the economy―are precarious. Boyd’s message is clear and compelling: protecting democracy means protecting the people and institutions that produce this data.

Visit danah boyd's website.

The Page 99 Test: Data Are Made, Not Found.

--Marshal Zeringue

Nine top vampire novels

Lorna Wallace has a PhD in English Literature and is a lover of all things science fiction and horror. She lives in Scotland with her rescue greyhound, Misty.

At Mental Floss Wallace tagged nine "vampire novels with a little less sparkle and a little more bite," including:

The Lesser Dead (2014) // Christopher Buehlman

Christopher Buehlman was inspired to write The Lesser Dead from a single mental image: “a little girl with makeup on riding the subway in the 1970’s.” The story then grew from him “play[ing] around with different explanations of who she was, exactly what kind of vampire, and who it was that was seeing her.” The finished result is set in New York in 1978 and is told from the point of view of 14-year-old Joey Peacock, who was turned into a vampire a few decades earlier. While riding the subway one day, Joey encounters some out-of-control vampire children, and the story takes off from there. The Lesser Dead goes to some dark places, but it’s also absolutely hilarious.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Melissa R. Collings's "The Love Operation"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Love Operation: A Novel by Melissa R. Collings.

About the novel, from the publisher:

A brilliant spine surgeon gains the power to perfectly recall her past—only to discover that some memories are better left undisturbed. A witty, emotional story about the intersection of medicine, memory, and the messy reality of loving imperfectly.

Dr. Cordelia Wren has always been in control—of her surgical career, her emotions, and especially her memories. But when she joins a cutting-edge memory enhancement study at her hospital, she gains an unexpected ability: the power to vividly relive any moment from her past. It seems like the perfect opportunity to analyze her failed relationships and finally understand why every man she’s ever loved has walked away.

There’s just one problem. Actually, three:

1. She may have…borrowed…access to the highly restricted memory study.
2. She’s secretly dating the hospital’s new COO while competing for chief of surgery—a relationship that could destroy both their careers if discovered.
3. Her first love has just reappeared in her life, stirring up feelings she thought she’d buried.

As Cordelia dives deeper into her past, the lines between memory and reality begin to blur. The truth she uncovers forces her to question everything she thought she knew about love, ambition, and what it means to be “in control.”

With her career hanging in the balance and her heart pulled in two directions, Cordelia must decide: Should she trust the memories that have shaped her life, or finally let go of the past to embrace an uncertain future?

Perfect for fans of Emily Henry and Ali Hazelwood, The Love Operation is a witty, emotional story about the intersection of medicine, memory, and the messy reality of loving imperfectly.

Visit Melissa R. Collings's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Love Operation.

--Marshal Zeringue

Three top thrillers about female rage

Janasha Prabhu is a graduate of the University of Illinois with degrees in chemistry and computer science and is a fellow of the 2024 LitUp cycle through Reese’s Book Club.

She has adored horror ever since picking up her first Goosebumps book as a kid and enjoys incorporating her experiences as a queer woman of color, her love for animals, and her interests in cooking into dark and twisted stories.

Prabhu currently lives in Chicago with her partner and their three cats—Grimm, James, and Harpo—and loves catching the latest horror movie, cooking a new recipe, or playing video games when she’s not writing.

Her debut thriller is Monster in the Mirror.

At Book Riot Prabhu tagged "three thrillers about female rage that I hold dear to my heart and am honored to recommend." One title on the list:

They Never Learn, by fellow Chicagoan Layne Fargo, follows Scarlett Clark, an English professor who’s good at her job—and at getting away with murder. As the body count of problematic men on her university’s campus grows larger, the school begins to look more closely into the cases, and Scarlett slips up, putting her secret at risk of discovery.

Read about another entry on the list.

They Never Learn is among Harry Dolan's five great murder mysteries set in college towns, Katherine A. Olson's five top books with righteous female rage, Laura Picklesimer's seven dark and thrilling novels about women who kill, Julia Bartz's five thrillers featuring female psychopaths, Misha Popp's eight recent novels featuring truly fatal femmes fatales, Lesley Kara's six top crime novels about settling old scores, Heather Levy's top eight books on those darkest guilty pleasures we love to devour, Melissa Colasanti's six deliciously duplicitous female characters in thrillers, Amy Gentry's novels of the new Dark Academia canon, and Molly Odintz's six best vigilante thrillers.

My Book, The Movie: They Never Learn.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Adam Plantinga

From my Q&A with Adam Plantinga, author of Dark Country:

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

I’m hoping it does some heavy lifting. This is a road trip book where my main character and a 17-year-old boy he’s protecting push west to escape the reach of some dangerous men who are after the boy. The title Dark Country refers to both the deadly terrain they have to navigate and the fact that they have no idea why the boy is being hunted—they’re operating in the dark.

In a previous Q&A you explained how Kurt Argento, your main character, got his name. For good reason, he's now living under an assumed name. How did you/he come up with the alias?

His alias is...[read on]

Visit Adam Plantinga's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Ascent.

Q&A with Adam Plantinga (April 2025).

Q&A with Adam Plantinga.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top horror novels with creepy settings

Katherine Daniel is a fiction writer based in Atlanta, Georgia, where she loves to explore the dark and twisty parts of what it means to be human through storytelling. She received a bachelor’s degree in English and creative writing from Georgia State University.

Her debut horror novel When the Night Comes Knocking.

At CrimeReads Daniel tagged "five horror novels where the setting feels like a gaping, sharp-toothed mouth waiting to snap shut at any moment." One title on the list:

Stephen Graham Jones, The Buffalo Hunter Hunter

A historical novel with dual timelines in 2012 and 1912, this story follows a modern-day professor, Etsy, as she transcribes the diary of her great-great-great grandfather, a Montana pastor named Arthur. The narrative dives deeper into the past based on the entries of Arthur’s diary, which center around an array of confessions given by a vigilante Pikuni man named Good Stab, who’s been turned into a vampiric creature driven by guilt and a need for justice for the violent wrongs committed against his people.

Utilizing the frigid, snowy Montana frontier, this story vividly explores the horrors of colonization and the generational scars that long-linger.

Read about another novel on the list.

The Buffalo Hunter Hunter is among Erica Ezeifedi's six books to read if you loved the movie Sinners and V.E. Schwab's five top modern vampire novels.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Sarah Marsh's "Novel Constitutions and the Making of Race"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Novel Constitutions and the Making of Race: A Literary and Legal History of Slavery in the Anglophone Atlantic, 1688-1818 by Sarah Marsh.

About the book, from the publisher:

Novel Constitutions and the Making of Race argues that Anglo-American racial slavery emerged from a constitutional crisis in seventeenth-century England between divine-right absolutism of the Stuart kings, and their people's claims to an 'ancient constitution': an immemorial, heritable protection of life, liberty, and property under the common law. As Stuart imperial expansion transported these conflicts overseas, Crown jurists and colonial lawmakers developed new procedures for the absolute mastery of human labour that severed kinship ties, alienated labour, and ultimately converted people of African descent into perpetual, inheritable property, while simultaneously transforming some English subjects into colonial slavocrats. These English slaveholders, like the Stuart kings, asserted absolute power over their human subjects.

Sarah Marsh argues that contemporary racial categories in the United States of America took shape through these legal improvisations, which this study names 'novel constitutions': practices that inserted absolutist power into the very constitutional idioms meant to restrain tyranny, turning an old set of English constitutional safeguards into a rationale for owning human beings, and setting that rationale upon the arbitrary logic of human skin colour.

Early modern literary texts are essential to perceiving this history because, in real time, they recorded this constitutional contest between the rights of the king and the rights of the people. Novels, autobiographies, petitions, and even mathematics disclose the moral drama, political conflict, and spiritual struggle through which modern American conceptions of slavery and antislavery were brought into being--often showing, with unmatched nuance, how race was developed at law, challenged, and ultimately exposed as a legal fiction. Reading these texts alongside statutes, slave codes, charters, and landmark legal decisions, Novel Constitutions reframes slavery and antislavery as competing constitutional impulses that shaped the American founding and continue to inflect its unfinished claims to liberty and equality.

Learn more about Novel Constitutions and the Making of Race at the Oxford University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Novel Constitutions and the Making of Race.

--Marshal Zeringue

Twelve of Theodore Roosevelt’s favorite books

At Mental Floss Matt Hoffman tagged twelve of Theodore Roosevelt’s favorite books, including:

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Roosevelt admitted in his autobiography that as a boy he “worshiped” Little Men, Little Women, and An Old-Fashioned Girl. He read them alongside Our Young Folks, a children’s magazine he called “the very best magazine in the world,” a belief he said he’d kept “to this day unchanged.”

Read about another entry on the list.

Little Women also appears among Annabelle Thorpe's top ten aunts in fiction, Kate Young's top ten fictional feasts for Christmas, Mary Sebag-Montefiore's ten classics every child should read before they are 10, Jeff Somers's five books that are arguably the first in their respective genres, Kate Kellaway's ten best Christmases in literature, Bea Davenport's top ten books about hair, nine notable unsung literary heroines, Sophie McKenzie's top ten mothers in children's books, John Dugdale's ten notable fictional works on winter sports, Melissa Albert's five favorite YA books that might make one cry, Anjelica Huston's seven favorite coming-of-age books, Bidisha's ten top books about women, Katherine Rundell's top ten descriptions of food in fiction, Gwyneth Rees's ten top books about siblings, Maya Angelou's 6 favorite books, Tim Lewis's ten best Christmas lunches in literature, and on the Observer's list of the ten best fictional mothers, Eleanor Birne's top ten list of books on motherhood, Erin Blakemore's list of five gutsy heroines to channel on an off day, Kate Saunders' critic's chart of mothers and daughters in literature, and Zoë Heller's list of five memorable portraits of sisters. It is a book that disappointed Geraldine Brooks on re-reading.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Rosanne Limoncelli reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Rosanne Limoncelli, author of The Spiral: A Thriller (A Nina Esposito Mystery).

Her entry begins:

My reading time for leisure gets thin when I’m working on a project, (or more than one project) but I have found that reading is essential in order to keep my brain nimble for my own writing. I vary between books that inspire me for the particular project I am working on, and something completely different to take me away.

Just finished The Foreign Correspondent’s Wife by Jenna Helwig. I was lucky enough to get an early copy of this book; Set in post-WWII Paris, the wife of an American foreign correspondent stumbles on the body of her murdered classmate at culinary school. If a murder mystery can be part escape, this one is! In addition to the murder mystery, it has...[read on]

About The Spiral, from the publisher:

When Nina finds the dead body of a woman who could easily be her twin, she must divide the men in her life into two groups: the ones she can trust and the ones who might be the killer.

A refreshing new take on the noir-thriller genre, The Spiral is perfect for fans of Tana French and Stieg Larsson.

It’s 1979, and nineteen-year-old Nina Esposito survives gritty Greenwich Village by tending bar with plenty of sarcasm and elbow grease. She can navigate the lewd customers, dirty streets, and danger-after-dark of NYC until a serial killer arrives on the scene targeting women who look exactly like her. Now survival for Nina means finding the killer before he finds her.

She has the constant feeling that she is prey surrounded by predators and every man she meets could be the killer: the guy following her on the subway, her leering acting coach, the restaurant owner pressuring her for a date. But is she really a target, or are the demons of her past clouding her judgment? Detective Frankie Lopez seems to be on her side—but she knows that trusting the wrong person could make her the next victim.

Set in crime-ridden New York City, when the subways were covered in graffiti and the burned-out buildings of the East Village were homes for squatters and punk rock teens, this psychological thriller is a dark murder mystery, one that will keep you guessing until the very end when the final twist is revealed.

Visit Rosanne Limoncelli's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Four Queens of Crime.

The Page 69 Test: The Four Queens of Crime.

Q&A with Rosanne Limoncelli.

Writers Read: Rosanne Limoncelli (July 2026).

My Book, The Movie: The Spiral.

The Page 69 Test: The Spiral.

Writers Read: Rosanne Limoncelli.

--Marshal Zeringue

Twelve top witchy must-reads

Lindsay Merbaum is a queer feminist author, the leader of Pick Your Potions’ Study Coven, and a high priestess of home mixology. A 2021 Foreword Indies Finalist, The Gold Persimmon was her first novel. Her second book, a smutty horror-comedy novella called Vampires at Sea, was also a Foreword Indies Finalist and a LibraryReads Pick. Her queer metaphysical mystery Witches of The Wheel is out now.

Merbaum lives in Michigan with her partner and cats.

At Electric Lit she shared "a curated list of must-reads for witches." One title on the list:

Bunny by Mona Awad

Samatha Mackey is trapped in a top-tier MFA program, a gentrified oasis in a struggling city. Sam’s peers are a clique of squealing, glittery girl-boss white feminists who like to etch poems on glass and call each other “Bunny.” When the Bunnies’ disdain turns into an invitation to join their girl group, Sam finds the pull of their wealth and splendor too much to resist, even as she risks losing Ava, her one true friend. This novel offers a deftly executed exploration of loneliness and aloneness. Also, you’ve never seen witches like this! And there’s a sequel.

Read about another book on the list.

Bunny is among Lindsay Kent's five top novels that read like bad trips, fever dreams, or reality warps, Catriona Silvey's five Gothic novels about cults, Isabelle McConville's six novels for novelists, Chris Wheatley's six top dark academia novels, and Gnesis Villar's seven books about the struggle of being a writer.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Michael B. Cosmopoulos's "Rediscovering Homer"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Rediscovering Homer: The Human Experience in the Odyssey and the Iliad by Michael B. Cosmopoulos.

About the book, from the publisher:

A timeless tale of a heroic character's journey through life, Homer's Odyssey has captured the imagination of readers from antiquity to the present day. Michael Cosmopoulos approaches this epic, together with the Iliad, not as remote works of literature, but as a living record of human experience shaped by war, loss, memory, and survival. He offers a poignant exploration of the aspects and consequences of war as captured in the Odyssey, including trauma, leadership and politics, human relations, religion and fate, and the struggle to return home and rebuild after upheaval. Cosmopoulos also situates both the Iliad and the Odyssey within the social conditions and the material realities of Greek society during the Aegean Bronze Age. Based on decades of archaeological field work and study of classical antiquity, and written in an accessible style, his book powerfully demonstrates how the poetry of ancient Greece preserves collective memory across the generations – and why these poems still speak to modern readers.

Visit Michael B. Cosmopoulos's website.

The Page 99 Test: Rediscovering Homer.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Rosanne Limoncelli's "The Spiral"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Spiral: A Thriller (A Nina Esposito Mystery) by Rosanne Limoncelli.

About the book, from the publisher:

When Nina finds the dead body of a woman who could easily be her twin, she must divide the men in her life into two groups: the ones she can trust and the ones who might be the killer.

A refreshing new take on the noir-thriller genre, The Spiral is perfect for fans of Tana French and Stieg Larsson.

It’s 1979, and nineteen-year-old Nina Esposito survives gritty Greenwich Village by tending bar with plenty of sarcasm and elbow grease. She can navigate the lewd customers, dirty streets, and danger-after-dark of NYC until a serial killer arrives on the scene targeting women who look exactly like her. Now survival for Nina means finding the killer before he finds her.

She has the constant feeling that she is prey surrounded by predators and every man she meets could be the killer: the guy following her on the subway, her leering acting coach, the restaurant owner pressuring her for a date. But is she really a target, or are the demons of her past clouding her judgment? Detective Frankie Lopez seems to be on her side—but she knows that trusting the wrong person could make her the next victim.

Set in crime-ridden New York City, when the subways were covered in graffiti and the burned-out buildings of the East Village were homes for squatters and punk rock teens, this psychological thriller is a dark murder mystery, one that will keep you guessing until the very end when the final twist is revealed.

Visit Rosanne Limoncelli's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Four Queens of Crime.

The Page 69 Test: The Four Queens of Crime.

Q&A with Rosanne Limoncelli.

Writers Read: Rosanne Limoncelli (July 2026).

My Book, The Movie: The Spiral.

The Page 69 Test: The Spiral.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight top genre-blending mystery books

Rachel Brittain is a writer, Day Dreamer, and Amateur Aerialist. Her short fiction has appeared in Luna Station Quarterly, Andromeda Spaceways, and others. She is a contributing editor for Book Riot, where she screams into the void about her love of books. Brittain lives in Northwest Arkansas with a rambunctious rescue pup, a snake, and a houseful of plants (most of which aren’t carnivorous).

At Book Riot she tagged eight top genre-blending mystery titles. One entry on the list:

The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older

This sci-fi take on Sherlock Holmes follows an investigator on the trail of a man gone missing from the human colony on Jupiter. Mossa’s investigation takes her to the planet’s university and her ex, a scholar researching Earth’s pre-collapse ecosystems. Pleiti and researchers like her have dedicated their lives to exploring the possibility of a return to Earth, but Mossa’s new case could undermine any chance of that. Working together could be the difference between a future among the stars or perhaps even one closer to home.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Mimicking of Known Successes is among Book Riot's best science fiction books of the century (so far).

The Page 69 Test: The Mimicking of Known Successes.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Humphrey Hawksley

From my Q&A with Humphrey Hawksley, author of Operation Icebreaker (A Rake Ozenna Thriller, 5):

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

Operation Icebreaker takes readers straight in. No tangents. No nuance. The story does what it says on the cover. Operation imagines secrecy, danger mission. Icebreaker projects extreme cold, exactly the environment familiar for protagonist Rake Ozenna to go into action in Arctic Greenland.

What's in a name?

Rake Ozenna comes from a tiny Alaskan settlement on Little Diomede Island that sits on America’s border with Russia. I shortened...[read on]

Visit Humphrey Hawksley's website.

The Page 69 Test: The History Book.

My Book, The Movie: Security Breach.

My Book, The Movie: Man on Ice.

Writers Read: Humphrey Hawksley (May 2018).

The Page 69 Test: Man on Ice.

The Page 69 Test: Man on Fire.

My Book, The Movie: Operation Icebreaker.

The Page 69 Test: Operation Icebreaker.

Q&A with Humphrey Hawksley.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top thrillers that blend true crime with a gothic ambience

Tara Goedjen loves anything mysterious. Her books include The Breathless (2017) and No Beauties or Monsters.

[My Book, The Movie: The Breathless; Writers Read: Tara Goedjen (December 2017); The Page 69 Test: The Breathless]

Goedjen's new novel, Please Enjoy Your Stay, is her adult debut.

At CrimeReads Goedjen tagged five thrillers that blend true crime elements with a gothic ambience, including:

Jennifer Fawcett, Beneath the Stairs

This one delves into an (sub)urban legend-type crime in a truly terrifying setting. The murder is chilling: decades ago, a man allegedly killed his family in the “Octagon House,” now abandoned in the woods….

Award-winning playwright and author Jennifer Fawcett delivers glimpses of the tragic crime through the perspective of Clare, who went inside the Octagon House as a teenager with her friend as a prank, and who must now trespass again as an adult. Clare needs to find out why her friend recently tried to commit suicide within its walls, and what exactly she remembers when they first went into the haunted Octagon house all those years ago.

Read about another novel on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Bryant Simon's "For Customers Only"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: For Customers Only: Public Bathrooms and the Making of American Inequality by Bryant Simon.

About the book, from the publisher:

Public toilets determine who gets everyday dignity, freedom of movement, and civic belonging―and who doesn’t.

Americans have nowhere to go. Nationwide, countless public spaces lack one crucial thing: bathrooms, never mind ones that are safe and functional. Yet in the past, political leaders celebrated the opening of public bathrooms with boisterous press conferences and showy ribbon-cutting ceremonies.

For Customers Only is the first book to tell the larger history of public bathrooms in the United States, a fascinating story characterized by persistent discrimination, squeamishness about unknown bodies, and disinvestment in public amenities. Acclaimed writer and historian Bryant Simon argues that restrooms aren’t only an architectural feature, but an emblem of control and inequality. In the late nineteenth century, cities vied for the newest and biggest comfort stations to meet the demands of their bustling economies and accommodate a broad and growing public. They built restrooms with gold-domed entrances and ornamented stall doors to inspire cleanliness and order.

But officials soon grew anxious about who might take advantage of this privacy: gay men, the unhoused, and eventually drug users. And as the civil rights movement challenged segregation, officials in the north and south closed public toilets rather than integrate them. By the end of the twentieth century, only people with means could use private bathrooms while out and about―provided they made a purchase at a business. Today, as the fights over trans rights reveal, bathroom access remains a flash point across the country. Meanwhile, some municipalities are again calling for widely available public toilets, but as a tool for economic revitalization, not a public necessity.

The political and cultural history of a squirm-inducing subject, For Customers Only reveals the real and symbolic power of the most ordinary of things. Bathrooms, Simon shows, have always reflected our fragmented national values. Whether these spaces will ever become more accessible and inclusive is ultimately up to us.

Learn more about For Customers Only at the University of Chicago Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Everything But the Coffee.

The Page 99 Test: For Customers Only.

--Marshal Zeringue