Emma Barry's "You, Me, & the Conspiracy," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: You, Me, & the Conspiracy: A Novel by Emma Barry.

The entry begins:

My new book is You, Me, & the Conspiracy, in which two history professors uncover a revolutionary-era secret society and must expose it or risk becoming its latest victims. As you can probably tell from my brief description, I was inspired by adventure romance films such as Indiana Jones (numbers 1 and 3 only), Romancing the Stone, The Mummy, and especially National Treasure. So not only do I have a fan cast for this movie, but I am also feral to see it on screen. It’s meant to be cinema!

First up we have Jessica Wilson, a preppy, rule-following assistant professor whose book was just rejected for publication. Devastated, she dives into the archives, where she discovers a coded message written by a Founding Father that sets the plot in motion. Jess has to be brilliant, warm, and maybe a little bit timid to start, but the tumultuous events in which she finds herself will make her blossom. I would love nothing more than to lure Emma Watson out of retirement and to see her play Jess.

Next is Calloway Morgan, an adjunct history professor with a chip on his shoulder the size of New England. Cal was kicked out of graduate school for...[read on]

Visit Emma Barry's website.

My Book, The Movie: Bad Reputation.

My Book, The Movie: You, Me, & the Conspiracy.

--Marshal Zeringue

Four sweet & satisfying titles to read for Diwali

USA Today bestselling author Sonali Dev writes hilarious and heartwarming stories about families without boundaries. Her novels have been named Best Books of the Year by Library Journal, NPR, The Washington Post, and Kirkus Reviews. She has won the American Library Association’s award for best in genre, the RT Reviewers’ Choice Award, and multiple RT Seals of Excellence. Dev has also earned acclaim as a RITA finalist and has been listed for the Dublin Literary Award. Shelf Awareness calls the author “not only one of the best but one of the bravest romance novelists working today.”

Her new novel, What's Lucky Got to Do with It, arrives in February 2027.

At Book Riot Dev tagged four books "that feel every bit as sweet and satisfying as Diwali goodies." One title on the list:

The Second First Chance by Mona Shroff

Childhood best friends who were almost something more before a tragic fire separated them get a second chance in this deliciously angsty romance. She’s a firefighter now, hiding her profession from her family, and he’s a veterinarian obsessed with healing. If only he could see why she needs to do the work she does.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven books that weigh the choice of motherhood

Alexia Nader is the author of the The Meaning of Daughter. She was a 2023-2024 Steinbeck Fellow. Her work has been published in The Nation, Los Angeles Review of Books, and The New Yorker among other publications. She is from Miami, Florida and currently lives in San Francisco where she teaches creative writing to children and teens.

At Electric Lit Nader tagged seven novels that "have shown me that there are many variations to the questions I grappled with in my novel about what goes into reproductive decisions." One title on the list:

Red at the Bone Jacqueline Woodson

Red at the Bone explores the impacts of an unexpected teen pregnancy, focusing not just on the young father and mother, but their parents too. Through the novel’s first-person rotating point of view, Woodson is able to jump backwards and forwards in time, and we see the teen couple’s parents both as parents—worried about how the pregnancy will affect their children’s futures—and as grandparents, who couldn’t imagine wishing their granddaughter had never been conceived. Through these jumps in time we can also see how the young couple’s respective relationships with their parents affected their desire for intimacy with their daughter once she was born. The novel’s expansive gaze does not shy away from the wounding emotions that can accompany an unexpected pregnancy, as well as the potential for these wounds to change over time.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Mike Jay's "Wireheads"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Wireheads: An Unnatural History of Technology in the Brain by Mike Jay.

About the book, from the publisher:

The story of the mavericks and scientists, crackpots and artistic visionaries who imagined a future where machines fuse with our minds

As humanity and technology become ever more tightly interwoven, Wireheads explores the final and most intimate frontier: the brain, and the electronic devices, magnetic signals, implants, and computer interfaces that promise to merge it with the world of the machine. Will these technologies eventually direct our thoughts and behaviour―or are they doing so already? Will they maintain us in states of artificial bliss, or connect us to higher intelligences, or replace the world of our senses with simulated realities?

Mike Jay, acclaimed author of Psychonauts, now traces the tangled, paranoid history of these real and fantastical brain technologies. From the fictions of H. G. Wells and Philip K. Dick to The Matrix, the CIA’s Cold War experiments and Elon Musk’s Neuralink, scientists and visionaries have long chased the dream of neural enhancement and control, with wildly varying degrees of success.

Encompassing covert military operations and psychedelic art, moral philosophy and cybernetic theory, Jay has assembled a thrilling narrative out of our attempts to understand and rewire the brain―and a brilliant meditation on what it means to be human in a posthuman age.

Visit Mike Jay's website.

The Page 99 Test: Mescaline.

The Page 99 Test: Wireheads.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top non-traditional crime novels

The staff at Publishers Weekly tagged five non-traditional crime novels for fans of James Sallis, who work "often folds the tropes of genre fiction into strange, contemplative tales of self-discovery." One title on the list:

Clete: A Dave Robicheaux Novel by James Lee Burke

In the gonzo latest from Edgar winner Burke (Harbor Lights), detective Dave Robicheaux’s friend, P.I. Clete Purcel, gets caught up in the bizarre pursuit of a bioweapon in late-1990s Louisiana. Clete wakes one Sunday to find three men disassembling his Cadillac in search of contraband. During a brief confrontation, the men knock Clete unconscious, and from there, the story spins out in a dizzying array of directions. One of Clete’s assailants turns out to be a member of an occult neo-Nazi group; the men appeared to be on a mission that also involves slimy millionaire Lauren Bow and his actor wife, Clara. They’re all after a bioweapon called Leprechaun, which may or may not have been in the Cadillac. Clete gets help from Robicheaux, sheriff Helen Soileau, and Joan of Arc, who appears in prophetic visions to steer him from further harm. Readers will delight in Burke’s sterling prose (Louisiana is “an antediluvian place that could have been formed on the first day of Creation, then forgotten, feral and threatening”) and take heart amid the surreal proceedings in Robicheaux’s assertion that “mysteries exist. The denial of them is an absurdity.” This is a winner.

Read about another title on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven Austen-inspired historical romance novels

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 seven Austen-inspired historical romance retellings. One entry on the list:

The Heiress: The Revelations of Anne de Bourgh by Molly Greeley

Another notably overlooked Austen character, Anne de Bourgh, discovers there’s more to life than Rosings in this romance retelling. Reliant on the laudanum she was first given as a fussy baby, Anne lives a quiet half-life within the confines of the great estate she was raised to inherit. But when her father dies and she is spurned by the man she was long told she would marry, Anne decides its time to discover whether its the sickness or the cure preventing her from living as she’s always wanted. With the help of her cousin Colonel John Fitzwilliam, she discovers life has more to offer her than she ever could’ve imagined.

Read about another novel on the list.

The Heiress is among Julia Seales's ten top unexpected Jane Austen homages.

The Page 69 Test: The Heiress.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: M. X. Mitchell's "Unsettling Sovereignty"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Unsettling Sovereignty: International Law, Nuclear Weapons, and US Extraterritorial Power in Postwar Oceania by M. X. Mitchell.

About the book, from the publisher:

Marshall Islanders and their ancestral lands and waters played important roles in reshaping the United States’ offshore power, state sovereignty, and the international politics of decolonization.

In the years following World War II, the United States conducted sixty-seven devastating nuclear blasts in the Marshall Islands―yet the archipelago was never a US territory. Working through the United Nations, US diplomats engineered a new, one-of-a-kind extraterritorial status, called strategic trusteeship, to control the Native lands, waters, and peoples of the Marshall, Caroline, and Northern Mariana Islands. Strategic trusteeship permitted the US to militarize a vast expanse of Western Oceania. This novel and racialized legal form of international dependency was integral to US nuclear weapons detonations and damage in the region.

In Unsettling Sovereignty, M. X. Mitchell recounts this untold legal history, exploring how nuclear weapons changed claims and practices of sovereignty from the 1940s to the present. US nuclear blasting in the Marshall Islands troubled conventional renderings of state sovereignty under international law. The explosions, disastrous for Marshallese communities and their ancestral atolls, also caused hazardous nuclear fallout, which spread around the globe. Islanders and their allies turned to law, using legal wrangling over blasting and fallout to raise new questions about the location, time, and subjects of state violence in a period of decolonization; the intersections between race, Indigeneity, and wide-scale technogenic harm; and the pitfalls and unfulfilled promises of international law. Mitchell shows that the Marshallese people and their lands and waters were, and remain, central to redefining sovereignty in an era of boundless pollution and climate change.

Visit M. X. Mitchell's website.

The Page 99 Test: Unsettling Sovereignty.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight top books about the Romanovs

At Town & Country Lauren Hubbard and Norman Vanamee tagged eight of the best books to explore the history of the Romanov family. One title on the list:

The Romanovs: 1613-1918 by Simon Sebag Montefiore

This is the book to read if you want a sweeping, well-told account of the Romanovs’ entire three-century reign. Montefiore, who has written well-regarded books on Stalin, Catherine the Great’s relationship with Prince Potemkin, and Jerusalem, among others, has a wonderful ability to pinpoint crucial moments and recount them in a way that brings individuals and complex personal and political dynamics to life.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven books that share a comforting charm

At Bustle Grace Wehniainen tagged "seven books as cozy as Gilmore Girls for whatever fall flavor you may be craving." One title on the list:

Not in My Book by Katie Holt

If you loved the romantic and intellectual tension between Jess and Rory, this is a natural addition to your TBR. College classmates Rosie and Aiden have diametrically opposed literary sensibilities, but when they’re forced to team up on a writing assignment, things take a swoony turn.

Read about another entry on the list.

Also see Kristy Woodson Harvey's seven cozy, Gilmore Girls-coded fall novels.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Anna Rasche's "The Cursed Diamond"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Cursed Diamond: A Novel by Anna Rasche.

About the novel, from the publisher:

In New York City a century apart, two women’s fates are bound by the dark legacy of the Midnight Diamond

2010. Jennie is working as a runner in the Diamond District when a friend’s sudden death leaves her with a cryptic note: “Not Safe.” Her search for answers leads her to an antique jewelry box, a clue to a century-old mystery and the legend of the Midnight Diamond—a rare blue gem rumored to bring ruin to all who possess it. As Jennie is pulled deeper into a world of secrets and danger, she realizes she is not just chasing a lost treasure; she is uncovering a story that was meant to stay buried.

1910. On an ocean liner bound for New York, heiress Marcella Porter returns home after being disgraced by scandal in London. Her path collides with a charismatic nobleman and the magnificent Midnight Diamond, which she unknowingly smuggles into the city. Mesmerized by its brilliance, Marcella feels an irresistible pull toward the diamond, and when the glittering façade of her charmed life begins to crack, Marcella must decide whether the Midnight Diamond is her salvation—or her doom.

Can Jennie break the centuries-old curse before it brings more ruin? Inspired by history’s most captivating gemstone, The Cursed Diamond is a thrilling mystery about fate, obsession, and the deadly costs of ambition.

Visit Anna Rasche's website.

Q&A with Anna Rasche.

The Page 69 Test: The Cursed Diamond.

--Marshal Zeringue

Three top paranormal thrillers

Kennedy Cole is a speculative author with a BFA in Creative Writing and a Certificate in Publishing. Born in North Carolina, she lives by the beach with her partner and enjoys playing games, puzzling, sipping matcha, and collecting tattoos. Her creative portfolio includes an array of published fiction, poetry, and nonfiction with Oakland Arts Review, Carolina Muse, Second Story Journal, and others.

There Used to Be People Here is her first novel.

At Book Riot Cole tagged three of her favorite paranormal thrillers. One title on the list:

I read We Used to Live Here by Marcus Kliewer in a single sitting, trapped in a coffee shop booth with no choice but to turn the page. It was utterly captivating, so well written, and God, one of the scariest books I’ve ever read. Following a queer couple who’ve recently purchased a new home and are in the process of moving in, things shift quicker than expected in this terrifying, lightning-paced novel. I highly recommend it for thriller fans looking to dig their way out of a slump.

Read about another novel on the list.

We Used to Live Here is among Victoria Helen Stone's nine icy thrillers to get you through the sweltering summer.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Emily G. Shanahan's "Penelope and Her Maids"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Penelope and Her Maids by Emily G. Shanahan.

About the book, from the publisher:

Penelope and Her Maids reconsiders the Odyssey from Penelope's point of view. Her decisions have long been considered to be the product of a fractured characterization, with no coherent human psychology possibly explaining everything she says and does. Emily Shanahan investigates this characterization, and all of Penelope's decisions, in context, reading each one of her scenes diachronically. In doing so, Penelope and Her Maids reveals how the pervasive threat of gendered violence in homeric society―a rape culture―constrains what Penelope may say and do openly.

The suitors attempt to fill a power vacuum in Odysseus's absence―by either marrying his wife, Penelope, or alternatively, diminishing his honor, geras, which includes the value of his possessions. As Penelope is an asset in his ledger, the only way to stay safe is to lead the suitors to believe she may become theirs at any moment. Penelope ultimately survives the Odyssey's violence. However, twelve young, enslaved girls in her home do not and ultimately demonstrate the inherent danger that men pose to women in Homer's world.

Learn more about Penelope and Her Maids at the Cornell University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Penelope and Her Maids.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five timeless historical fiction books

At Mental Floss Chelsea Thatcher tagged five novels "that paint vivid pictures of history," including:

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

Chinua Achebe was a Nigerian author who worked to unravel the stereotypes of African people. His first novel, Things Fall Apart, is set in 1890 Nigeria as the land and people are colonized by the British. Where most literature on colonialism continued racist tropes about "primitive" tribes, Achebe humanized the Igbo people through Okonkwo's story.

Things Fall Apart has become one of the pivotal works of post-colonial literature, and it gives perspective to parts of history that have long been silenced. It truly makes the reader sit with the heavy emotions Okonkwo feels, adding even more depth to the tragedy.

Read about another book on the list.

Things Fall Apart is among Ore Agbaje-Williams's seven scandalous betrayals in fiction, Claire Fuller's top ten novels set in villages, Jeff Somers's twenty-five books you probably should have read already, Barnaby Phillips' top ten books about Nigeria, Pushpinder Khaneka's three best books on Nigeria, Hallie Ephron's ten best books for a good cry, Helon Habila's three books to help understand Nigeria, and Martin Meredith's ten books to read on Africa.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Mara Williams's "The Other Side of Starting Over"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Other Side of Starting Over: A Novel by Mara Williams.

About the novel, from the publisher:

When her husband’s tragic death uncovers long-buried secrets, a young mother fights to protect her family and heal her heart in an emotionally resonant novel about loss, love, and second chances.

After her husband’s sudden death, Beatrice Bell retreats to her childhood home in California’s Sierra mountains with her rebellious teenage twins in tow. Her plan is to take over her parents’ antique store, ensure it survives another generation, and build a new life from the rubble of the old one.

But Bea didn’t plan on Simon, the gruff store manager with his own ambitions for the business. As they’re forced to work together, animosity gives way to grudging respect and ignites an unexpected spark. Before Bea can find her footing, everything is upended. First by River, a local boy who bears a striking resemblance to her late husband. Then by her estranged mother-in-law, who reveals devastating secrets that will test everything Bea believed about her marriage.

As Bea navigates grief, betrayal, and an unexpected connection with Simon, she finds that it may be possible to begin again, but only if she confronts the truth of her past.

Visit Mara Williams's website.

Q&A with Mara Williams.

The Page 69 Test: The Truth Is in the Detours.

My Book, The Movie: The Truth Is in the Detours.

Writers Read: Mara Williams (August 2025).

My Book, The Movie: The Epicenter of Forever.

Writers Read: Mara Williams (February 2026).

The Page 69 Test: The Epicenter of Forever.

The Page 69 Test: The Other Side of Starting Over.

--Marshal Zeringue

The five best books on the AI industry

The Guardian’s tech reporters shared a list of the best books on the AI industry, including:

Empire of AI – Karen Hao

The most intensively reported book on the AI industry so far, Empire of AI covers the rise of OpenAI, as well as the formation of Anthropic and OpenAI chief Sam Altman’s split with Elon Musk. Parts of the book can feel a bit inside baseball, but the reporting is great and shows how the key American AI companies brought us to this point. Some early reviews of the book in 2025 suggested Hao’s take on the industry was overly negative: she has since been entirely vindicated.

Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Derek A. Ide's "Ghosts of Bandung"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Ghosts of Bandung: Black Power and Palestine in the Global Cold War by Derek A. Ide.

About the book, from the publisher:

Ghosts of Bandung makes the major new argument that the fates of the Black and Palestinian revolutions were bound together through the rise and fall of a larger Third World political project. Drawing on English and Arabic archives, Derek A. Ide shows how Afro-Arab solidarities shaped and were shaped by geopolitics and grand strategy. Through biographical vignettes of forgotten figures and underexplored groups, Ghosts of Bandung interweaves the histories of movement dynamics and those of contending states in the global Cold War. This story binds the United States and the Middle East―Detroit and Damascus, Oakland and Algiers―while spanning the globe. From the Sino-Soviet split to the Beijing-Jakarta Axis, this global retelling of Black Power and the Palestinian Revolution engages China, Cuba, Ghana, Indonesia, Jordan, and others. At the heart of this broader project is the hitherto untold story of CONEFO, Indonesian President Sukarno’s attempt to construct an alternative United Nations–like organization in Jakarta. Centering on 1965 and the collapse of CONEFO, Ide links the fates of Black Power and the Palestinian Revolution to the fall of Third Worldism and the “Bandung Spirit.”

Learn more about Ghosts of Bandung at the University of California Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Ghosts of Bandung.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five great unexpected sequels to crime novels

Janice Hallett is a former magazine editor, award-winning journalist, and government communications writer. She wrote articles and speeches for, among others, the Cabinet Office, Home Office, and Department for International Development. Her enthusiasm for travel has taken her around the world several times, from Madagascar to the Galapagos, Guatemala to Zimbabwe, Japan, Russia, and South Korea. A playwright and screenwriter, she penned the feminist Shakespearean stage comedy NetherBard and cowrote the feature film Retreat. She lives in London and is the author of The Appeal, The Twyford Code, The Christmas Appeal, and The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels.

Hallett's new novel is The Silent Appeal.

At CrimeReads the author tagged five crime novel "sequels no one was expecting, least of all the author themselves." One title on the list:

Tana French, Dublin Murder Squad series

In the Woods, Tana French’s debut novel, featured Detective Rob Ryan and his partner Detective Cassie Maddox. It was such a hit that it inspired the entire Dublin Murder Squad series of six books over ten years. However, interestingly, the focus shifted from Ryan to Maddox, as she proved the more popular and interesting character of the two.

Read about another novel on the list.

The Likeness, the immediate sequel to French's debut, is among Lisa Borders's seven novels featuring women leading double lives, Allison Buccola's seven novels featuring imposters among us, Anna Snoekstra's seven titles built on the weight of a shared secret, Louise Hegarty’s eight Irish novels about the rise & fall of Big Houses, Emily Bain Murphy's seven mystery novels with the best twists, Emily Beyda's seven top doubles in the twisted world of mystery fiction, Sophie Stein's eight books about small-town woman detectives, Alison Wisdom's sven great thrillers featuring communal living, Christopher Louis Romaguera's nine books about mistaken identity, and Simon Lelic's top ten false identities in fiction.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Melissa R. Collings

From my Q&A with Melissa R. Collings, author of The Love Operation: A Novel:

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

Quite a bit, although it took us a while to get there.

My original title was Operating on the Past, which I loved because it worked on two levels. Cordelia is a spine surgeon who approaches problems as things to diagnose and fix, and she’s also operating on information from her past.

But my publisher wanted a title that put the romance more front and center. This led to a lot of back-and-forth.

Eventually, I proposed The Love Operation, which was close to one of the ideas my editor had suggested but still gave me the double meaning I wanted. Cord is essentially performing an operation on her love life, but an “operation” can also be a mission, and she definitely treats it like one.

I think it does a pretty good job of telling readers what they’re getting. Cord approaches her love life much the way she approaches surgery: identify the problem, gather the information, make a plan, fix it. Unfortunately for her, people are significantly less...[read on]

Visit Melissa R. Collings's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Love Operation.

Q&A with Melissa R. Collings.

--Marshal Zeringue

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