Q&A with Sonora Reyes

From my Q&A with Sonora Reyes, author of The Golden Boy's Guide to Bipolar:

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

The title for The Golden Boy's Guide to Bipolar came much easier than some of my other works. Since it's a spinoff novel to The Lesbiana's Guide to Catholic School, I already knew the titles would mirror each other in a sense. The word "lesbiana" was so significant in being included in the title of the first book, so I wanted to have a similar punchy title for this one. Since bipolar disorder is so heavily stigmatized, I thought it would be fitting to put it right in the title, so readers know exactly what kind of representation they'll be getting.

What's in a name?

I'll admit that I may have named my characters based off of vibes only, but I think there is a fair amount of subconscious meaning that...[read on]

Visit Sonora Reyes's website.

Writers Read: Sonora Reyes.

Q&A with Sonora Reyes.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Keriann McGoogan's "Sisters of the Jungle"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Sisters of the Jungle: Women Who Shaped the Science of Wild Primates by Keriann McGoogan.

About the book, from the publisher:

Sisters of the Jungle explores the history of primatology, a rare scientific discipline led primarily by women, from pioneers like Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey to author Keriann McGoogan’s own adventurous field studies.

Since the 1970s, the science of primatology has been dominated by women—a unique reversal, as men usually outnumber women in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields.

Today, one of those women is primatologist Keriann McGoogan, who has traveled to the far corners of the earth in search of wild primates. In Sisters of the Jungle, McGoogan combines stories about her own studies of howler monkeys (the loudest living primate) and lemurs (the most endangered group of animals on the planet) with those of the women who paved the way: intrepid scientists like Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, Biruté Galdikas, and Alison Jolly who broke boundaries, made astonishing discoveries and ultimately shaped the trajectory of an entire branch of science.

Visit Keriann McGoogan's website.

The Page 99 Test: Sisters of the Jungle.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten of the best good doctors in literature

For the Guardian, in 2010 John Mullan named ten of the best good doctors in literature.

One doctor on the list:

Henry Perowne

Perowne is a noted neurosurgeon and protagonist of Ian McEwan's Saturday. Only slightly less accomplished than Patrick O'Brian's] Maturin, this squash player and bon vivant has his comfortable world threatened by a criminal psychopath – whose life he saves in a properly doctorly fashion.

Read about another doctor on the list.

Saturday also appears among the twenty best 9/11 books, Chibundu Onuzo's top ten megacities in fiction, Jimmy So's five best 9/11 novels, and on Mullan's list of ten of the best prime ministers in fiction.

Also see Mullan's list of ten of the best fictional bad doctors.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: James R. Benn's "A Bitter Wind"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: A Bitter Wind (A Billy Boyle WWII Mystery) by James R. Benn.

About the book, from the publisher:

To solve a murder at an English airbase, US Army Captain Billy Boyle must immerse himself in the fascinating and secretive world of WWII radio espionage.

Christmas Day 1944: After his last mission put him in the tailspin of the Battle of the Bulge, Captain Billy Boyle travels to southeast England to visit his girlfriend, Diana Seaton, for a brief holiday respite. Diana is engaged in classified work at RAF Hawkinge, including Operation Corona, which recruits German-speaking Women’s Auxiliary Air Force members—many of them Jewish refugees from the Kindertransport rescue—to countermand German orders and direct night fighters away from Allied bombers.

It’s fascinating and critical espionage work, but it’s laced with peril, as Billy finds out. On a scenic Christmas walk along the White Cliffs of Dover, Billy and Diana stumble upon the dead body of a US Air Force officer. In the dead man’s pocket are papers with highly confidential information about radio interception operations. Information worth killing over.

As Billy digs into the secret world of codebreakers and radio jammers stationed at Hawkinge, another body turns up. Now Billy must find out what connects these two men—and who was so hell-bent on silencing them. Enlisting the help of his long-time associates, Billy undertakes another thrilling investigation that brings him to war-torn Yugoslavia, where he must rescue an escaped POW who may be the only person who knows the truth.

Learn more about the Billy Boyle WWII Mystery Series at James R. Benn's website.

The Page 99 Test: The First Wave.

The Page 69 Test: Evil for Evil.

The Page 69 Test: Rag and Bone.

My Book, The Movie: Death's Door.

The Page 69 Test: The White Ghost.

The Page 69 Test: Blue Madonna.

Writers Read: James R. Benn (September 2016).

Q&A with James R. Benn.

The Page 69 Test: Proud Sorrows.

The Page 69 Test: The Phantom Patrol.

Writers Read: James R. Benn (September 2024).

The Page 69 Test: A Bitter Wind.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Juyeon Park's "Families for Mobility"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Families for Mobility: Elite Korean Students Abroad and Their Parents' Reproduction of Privilege by Juyeon Park.

About the book, from the publisher:

Families for Mobility documents elite Korean transnational families, focusing on how they use elite education abroad as a tool for class reproduction. Drawing on over 100 interviews with both parents and children at elite U.S. colleges, the book explores the desires, aspirations, and expectations that shape these education-driven transnational family arrangements. By triangulating the perspectives of children, mothers, and fathers, Families for Mobility argues that gendered transnational parenting—by both mothers and fathers—plays a crucial role in the intergenerational transmission of mobility and cosmopolitan lifestyles. The analysis shows how class and gender shape both parents’ and children’s approaches to their transnational ‘family projects,’ with fathers and sons appearing more resourceful and ambitious than mothers and daughters, reflecting the gender achievement gap even among the elite. The book challenges stereotypes of Asian high achievers and ‘tiger’ parenting, providing a more nuanced understanding of who thrives in the hierarchical realms of global education and business, as well as the familial support systems behind their success.

Visit Juyeon Park's website.

The Page 99 Test: Families for Mobility.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top Kiwi and Australian crime writers

Zoë Rankin grew up in a village in Scotland. She studied international relations and Arabic before going on to qualify as a primary school teacher. She spent many years traveling in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, and eventually settled in New Zealand. She has always been passionate about writing as well as spending time outdoors and exploring by bike, often with her two small children, who are equally adventurous.

Rankin's new novel is The Vanishing Place.

[Q&A with Zoë Rankin]

At CrimeReads the author tagged five favorite Kiwi and Australian crime writers, including:

Michael Robotham (Australia)
My favorite of the author’s books: Good Girl, Bad Girl

Robotham is one of my go-to reads when I want a page-turner. His books are addictive and his characters are spot-on.

Good Girl, Bad Girl is the first book in a phenomenal crime series. The two, equally damaged, main characters, Evie and Cyrus, have the most wonderfully dynamic chemistry, and the plot is dark and wickedly addictive. The characters are three-dimensional in every sense of the word, and I cared about Evie and Cyrus more than is probably normal. This is the type of book that you want to sit down and devour from cover to cover, then head to the shop to get the next one in the series. It is a propulsive series that follows the story of Evie, a young woman with a dark and traumatic past, and her evolving relationship with Cyrus, a forensic psychologist.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Jerome Charyn's "Maria La Divina," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Maria La Divina by Jerome Charyn.

The entry begins:

I’ve had one of my books turned into a movie and it was not a great experience. I handed over my crime novel The Good Policeman to a showrunner and lost all my power. The film played in Europe but not in the United States and frankly, I was at peace with that outcome.

But with my Maria La Divina film I would not make the same mistakes. I want my Maria to sing, to act, to be a strong powerful woman worthy of the name Greatest Diva of All Time.

So, the first star I want my producers to talk to is – The Lady herself, Lady Gaga. I’ve watched every film she’s made and every performance I could get to. Lady Gaga is everything Maria was in her prime – the greatest singer, a talented actress, an exotic beauty and fashion icon, with a genius understanding of her times.

Lady Gaga is the Maria Callas of the 21st Century.

Maria gave it all up for love, for the love of Aristotle Onassis, a strange sort of...[read on]

Visit Jerome Charyn's website.

The Page 69 Test: Under the Eye of God.

My Book, The Movie: Big Red.

Q&A with Jerome Charyn.

The Page 69 Test: Ravage & Son.

Writers Read: Jerome Charyn (August 2023).

My Book, The Movie: Maria La Divina.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven complicated books about complicated family histories

Jeremy B. Jones is the author of the new nonfiction book Cipher: Decoding My Ancestor’s Scandalous Secret Diaries (2025) as well as the memoir Bearwallow: A Personal History of a Mountain Homeland (2014). Bearwallow was named the 2014 Appalachian Book of the Year in nonfiction and was awarded gold in the 2015 Independent Publisher Book (IPPY) Awards in memoir. His essays have been published in Oxford American, Garden and Gun, The Bitter Southerner, and Brevity, among others. He also writes frequently for Our State Magazine. Jones earned his MFA from the University of Iowa and is a professor of English Studies at Western Carolina University, in his native North Carolina. He also serves as the series co-editor for In Place: a literary nonfiction book series from WVU Press.

At Lit Hub the author tagged seven "beautifully complicated books about complicated family histories," including:

Ancestor Trouble: A Reckoning and a Reconciliation, Maud Newton

Newton’s heavily researched journey into her family’s past doesn’t shy away from dark secrets. Like the above books, the stakes are personal. Her obsession (her words) into genealogy starts close, with her estranged father, and she unspools the family past from there, in part to understand what led to the dysfunction of her childhood. She finds plenty in her research to account for the anxieties of today, and in a book that is organized like a patchwork quilt (as the cover prompts us to notice), she continually steps back from her own family to explore larger questions of inheritance and epigenetics and regional identities. The book is a marvel in its intensity, thoroughness, and honesty.

Read about another entry on the list.

Ancestor Trouble is among Juliet Patterson's eight books that tackle the subject of ancestral legacy.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Jeffrey H. Cohen's "Eating Grasshoppers"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Eating Grasshoppers: Chapulines and the Women Who Sell Them by Jeffrey H. Cohen.

About the book, from the publisher:

An approachable ethnography of how grasshoppers are harvested, sold, and consumed in Oaxaca.

Chapulines (toasted grasshoppers) are not a delicacy in Oaxaca. They are just food—good food—and a protein-rich seasonal snack that is the product of a long-standing industry based overwhelmingly on the labor of women. Jeffrey Cohen has interviewed dozens of these chapulineras, who harvest insects from corn and alfalfa fields, prepare them, and sell them in urban and rural marketplaces. An accessible ethnography, Eating Grasshoppers tells their story alongside the broader history of chapulines.

For tourists, chapulines are an experience—a gateway to the “real” Oaxaca. For locals, they are ordinary fare, but also a reminder of Indigenous stability and rural survival. In a sense, eating chapulines is a declaration of independence from a government that has condemned eating insects as backward. Yet, while chapulines are a generations-old favorite, eating them is not an act of preservation. Cohen shows that the business of this traditional food is thoroughly modern and ever evolving, with entrepreneurial chapulineras responding nimbly to complex and dynamic markets. From alfalfa fields to online markets, Eating Grasshoppers takes readers inside one of the world’s most fascinating food cultures.

Visit Jeffrey H. Cohen's website.

The Page 99 Test: Eating Grasshoppers.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Susan Coll's "The Literati"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Literati: A Novel by Susan Coll.

About the book, from the publisher:

An unexpected catastrophe of literary proportions...

Aspirant, bookish, and close to broke, 26-year-old Clemi steps into her dream job at a prestigious literary nonprofit and finds herself in the bull's eye of a financial, legal, and existential calamity. The executive director has disappeared, leaving behind an inscrutable cat to which she is highly allergic. Meanwhile, the bank accounts have been overdrawn, the FBI is asking questions, and she has three days to pull off the annual fundraising gala, a glamorous affair filled with famous writers and local literati.

On the upside, she will get to meet her all-time favorite writer, who has won the award. Clemi has read and reread her novels, pouring over her every word. But her interactions with the author and her eight-year-old son, as well as with the nonprofit's Board Members, leave her wondering whether certain writers are better on the page than in person.

All the while, Clemi is trying to sort out her own life: her current boyfriend is, like every boyfriend before him, a pompous poseur, and the clock is running on her apartment-sitting gig. She finds herself wondering what all the goings-on in this dysfunctional, scandal-plagued nonprofit have to do with literature. And if it's time to let go of her literary aspirations and apply to law school.

In the week in which this madcap story unfolds, USA TODAY bestselling author Susan Coll weaves together a charmingly witty and warm comedy of manners that offers a peek behind the literary curtain--one that anyone who's ever been a little bit uncertain of what the future might hold can relate to.

Visit Susan Coll's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Susan Coll & Zoe.

The Page 69 Test: Acceptance.

The Page 69 Test: Beach Week.

The Page 69 Test: The Stager.

The Page 69 Test: Real Life and Other Fictions.

The Page 69 Test: The Literati.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven books that reckon with larger-than-life mothers

Karleigh Frisbie Brogan is a writer from Sonoma County, California. She is the author of Holding: A Memoir About Mothers, Drugs, and Other Comforts. She was a 2024 Oregon Literary Fellow. Her work has been published in The Atlantic, Washington Post, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Huffington Post, Lit Hub, and forthcoming in Poets & Writers. She lives in Portland, Oregon.

At Electric Lit the author tagged seven

fiction and nonfiction books that engage with the symbolic mother. These works push her away and pull her in, stare into her harsh reflections. They acknowledge the gifts she bears as well as the scars she’s left. They attempt to scale her outsize dimensions, to remember, in the end, that she is human.

One title on the list:

Mother as Ghost

Loved and Missed by Susie Boyt

British writer Susie Boyt’s first American offering is a study of quiet grief, gentle affection, and steady, watchful hope. In gorgeous, somehow autumnal prose, Boyt tells the story of three generations of women. Ruth’s adult daughter, Eleanor, is a semi-estranged heroin addict whose infant daughter, Lily, is not only exposed to the drug and its hazards at home, but was in the womb as well—spending her first weeks in the neonatal unit on a morphine infusion. To keep her granddaughter safe, Ruth assumes custody of Lily and raises her from the preternaturally wise child she is to the sensible, mature, and caring teenager she becomes.

Throughout the novel, Eleanor rebuffs Ruth’s attempts at family. She flakes out, pulls away, recoils at any hint of intimacy. Ruth chastises her own “forced mildness” around her seldom-seen daughter, which she suspects may be the reason for Eleanor’s feral-cat temperament. “I wished she would hand me a script, a set of instructions, what to say what to do what to feel…. Sometimes I thought the more Eleanor evaded and erased me the more I needed her.” For Lily, her mother’s absence—or worse, avoidance—eventually surfaces as tidy, self-aware rage that she allows herself to feel. It is precisely Eleanor’s occasional resurfacing, her near proximity, that are so difficult for both Lily and Ruth. Not a complete severance, Eleanor haunts the edges of her mother’s and daughter’s lives, reminding them that they are not worth her time or effort. Yet despite the bleak acceptance of this, the story is limned in the soft glow of resilience and beauty.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Catherine Chidgey

From my Q&A with Catherine Chidgey, author of The Book of Guilt:

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

I knew from very early on that The Book of Guilt was the right title for the book because of the way it works with the three-part structure. The novel tells the story of thirteen-year-old triplet brothers living in a shadowy boys’ home in the New Forest, England, in a skewed version of 1979. Their three carers – Mother Morning, Mother Afternoon and Mother Night – record the boys’ wrongdoings in a ledger called The Book of Guilt, so the title refers to an actual book within the book. It’s mentioned early in the story, on page 14, and signals to the reader that these are children who are closely monitored. It also speaks to the emotional atmosphere of the novel; almost every character is culpable in some way – or believes that they are, which is possibly more corrosive. The title is also the name of the last of three sections in the novel: The Book of Dreams, The Book of Knowledge, and The Book of Guilt. While all referencing specific texts, these titles also trace the main characters’ journeys from dreamy unawareness, through dawning knowledge, and on into...[read on]

Follow Catherine Chidgey on Facebook and Instagram.

Q&A with Catherine Chidgey.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Heidi R. Lewis's "Make Rappers Rap Again"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Make Rappers Rap Again: Interrogating the Mumble Rap "Crisis" by Heidi R. Lewis.

About the book, from the publisher:

In Make Rappers Rap Again: Interrogating the Mumble Rap “Crisis,” author Heidi R. Lewis interrogates the ways Mumble Rap has been subjugated within real Hip Hop. Many critics claim mumble rappers are ignorant about Hip Hop history, disrespectful toward their Hip Hop elders, too similar, unskilled, prone to rapping about nonsense, and too feminine. In contrast, Lewis argues Mumble Rap is real Hip Hop. To do so, she examines Mumble Rap's congruence with oft forgotten or subjugated Hip Hop cornerstones like illegibility, melody, the DJ, and the subgenre, as well as the ways most mumble rappers practice citational and collaborative politics congruent with real Hip Hop. Following an analysis of the Mumble Rap sound, Lewis explains the subgenre's subjugation by situating it as southern and examining the ways it challenges real Hip Hop masculinity norms.

Visit Heidi R. Lewis's website, and check out the companion site for Make Rappers Rap Again.

The Page 99 Test: Make Rappers Rap Again.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five books that tackle the realities of domestic violence

Stephanie DeCarolis is a USA Today bestselling author of thriller and suspense novels. She is a graduate of Binghamton University and St. John's University School of Law, and currently lives in New York with her husband and their two daughters.

Her new novel is The Wives of Hawthorne Lane.

At CrimeReads DeCarolis tagged five books that take on domestic violence in a realistic and respectful way. One title on the list:

The Drowning Woman, by Robyn Harding

This story centers around two women who seem very different on the outside—one is wealthy and living in a mansion, and the other is unhoused and living in her car—but they soon find that they have more in common then it might appear. They form an unlikely bond, which eventually has them both forced to answer the same question: how far would you go to help a friend? What I found most realistic about the domestic violence depicted in this book was the themes of control and isolation. Both are common experiences for victims of domestic violence, and shows that not all abuse comes in the physical injuries. In addition, Harding takes on the difficult subject matter of suicide and its prevalence in victims of abuse, particularly those who experience social isolation, which can exacerbate feelings of despair or make it more difficult to ask for help.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Sonora Reyes reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Sonora Reyes, author of The Golden Boy's Guide to Bipolar.

Their entry begins:

I've gotten to read a few books from my favorite authors recently! I keep adding new authors to my list of auto-buys, and I'm not mad about it!

I adored Nav's Foolproof Guide to Falling in Love by Jessica Lewis. It was the perfect rom com to get me out of my head in a dark time. Sometimes I just want to forget about my own problems and scream about two fictional characters who couldn't be more clueless about their feelings for each other. I can't wait for the spinoff, Hallie's Rules for a Recovering Romantic, which comes out next year! I will read anything Jessica Lewis writes, from horror to rom coms, she hasn't let me down...[read on]

About The Golden Boy's Guide to Bipolar, from the publisher:

From bestselling author Sonora Reyes comes a poignant and searingly honest companion novel to the multi-award-winning The Lesbiana’s Guide to Catholic School, following beloved character Cesar Flores as he comes to terms with his sexuality, his new bipolar diagnosis, and more mistakes than he can count.

Seventeen-year-old Cesar Flores is finally ready to win back his ex-boyfriend. Since breaking up with Jamal in a last-ditch effort to stay in the closet, he’s come out to Mami, his sister, Yami, and their friends, taken his meds faithfully, and gotten his therapist’s blessing to reunite with Jamal.

Everything would be perfect if it weren’t for The Thoughts—the ones that won’t let all his Catholic guilt and internalizations stay buried where he wants them. The louder they become, the more Cesar is once again convinced that he doesn't deserve someone like Jamal—or anyone really.

Cesar can hide a fair amount of shame behind jokes and his “gifted” reputation, but when a manic episode makes his inner turmoil impossible to hide, he’s faced with a stark choice: burn every bridge he has left or, worse—ask for help. But is the mortifying vulnerability of being loved by the people he’s hurt the most a risk he’s willing to take?

Visit Sonora Reyes's website.

Writers Read: Sonora Reyes.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six top books about books & bookstores

USA Today bestselling author Susan Coll is the author of eight novels, including The Literati, Real Life & Other Fictions, and Bookish People. Her other books include The Stager, Acceptance, Rockville Pike, and Karlmarx.com.

[Coffee with a Canine: Susan Coll & Zoe; The Page 69 Test: Acceptance; The Page 69 Test: Beach Week; The Page 69 Test: The Stager; The Page 69 Test: Real Life and Other Fictions]

At Lit Hub Coll tagged six favorite books about books and bookstores, including:

Jenna Blum, Murder Your Darlings

This fun, twisty thriller about two successful writers who fall in love—or at least what passes for love in the case of one of the protagonists—is not about bookstores, per se, and yet indies feature prominently throughout as we follow these authors on tour. And among the three alternating points of view is one possibly unhinged bookseller.

Beneath the surface of this glossy novel is a heartfelt depiction of the obstacles aspirant writers face in trying to both produce and publish. Also, a lot is said about their all-too-easy-to-exploit vulnerabilities.

Blum—a successful novelist and co-founder of the popular Mighty Blaze podcast, knows of what she writes. In its observations about the pressures of publishing and its inverse—the heartbreak of not publishing—the novel is at times so close to the bone that it makes one wonder why anyone would want to engage in the business of books at any level. But don’t let that dissuade you—this book is not only good fun, but it ends with a homage to the business: “We writers, all of us, need booksellers. And readers! What would we do without you? You save our lives.”

Read about another book on Coll's list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Katherine Fusco's "Hollywood's Others"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Hollywood's Others: Love and Limitation in the Star System by Katherine Fusco.

About the book, from the publisher:

We tend to think about movie stars as either glamorous or relatable. But in the 1920s and 1930s, when the Hollywood star system was taking shape, a number of unusual stars appeared on the silver screen, representing groups from which the American mainstream typically sought to avert its eyes. What did it mean for a white entertainment columnist to empathize with an ambiguously gendered Black child star? Or for boys to idolize Lon Chaney, famous for portraying characters with disabilities?

Hollywood’s Others explores the affective ties between white, non-disabled audiences and the fascinatingly different stars with whom they identified—but only up to a point. Katherine Fusco argues that stardom in this era at once offered ways for viewers to connect across group boundaries while also policing the limits of empathy. Examining fan magazines alongside film performances, she traces the intense audience attachment to atypical celebrities and the ways the film industry sought to manage it. Fusco considers Shirley Temple’s career in light of child labor laws and changing notions of childhood; shows how white viewers responded to Black music in depictions of the antebellum South; and analyzes the gender politics of conspiracy theories around celebrity suicides. Shedding light on marginalized stardoms and the anxieties they provoked, Hollywood’s Others challenges common notions about film’s capacity to build empathy.

Visit Katherine Fusco's website.

The Page 99 Test: Hollywood's Others.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Simon Tolkien's "The Room of Lost Steps"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Room of Lost Steps: A Novel (Theo Sterling, book 2) by Simon Tolkien.

About the book, from the publisher:

An American boy with impossible dreams is thrust into the cauldron of the Spanish Civil War in this arresting and thrilling historical coming-of-age epic and sequel to The Palace at the End of the Sea.

Barcelona 1936. Theo helps the Anarchist workers defeat the army that is trying to overthrow the democratically elected government, and he is reunited with his true love, Maria. But all too soon, his joy turns to terror as the Anarchists turn on him, led by a rival for Maria’s affection.

Lucky to escape with his life, Theo returns to England to study at Oxford. But his heart is in Spain, now torn apart by a bloody civil war, and he is quick to abandon his new life when his old schoolmate Esmond offers him the chance to fight the Fascists. He is unprepared for the nightmare of war that crushes his spirit and his hope until, back in Barcelona, Theo is confronted with a final terrible choice that will define his life forever.

As Theo’s tumultuous coming-of-age journey reaches its end, can his dream to change the world―so far from home―still hold true?

Visit Simon Tolkien's website.

Q&A with Simon Tolkien.

The Page 69 Test: The Room of Lost Steps.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Jessica Bryant Klagmann

From my Q&A with Jessica Bryant Klagmann, author of North of the Sunlit River: A Novel:

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

I hope the title North of the Sunlit River is compelling and original, but also relatable enough that people don’t ask, what the heck could this book possibly be about? I think the word “north” is fitting because it’s not just about a specific place in Alaska, but about the idea and feel of living in the North. “Sunlit” is a reference to the extended daylight hours of summer in Alaska, and it also describes the river as not a specific one, but one that means something to these characters in this story. Every river is sunlit at some point, but this one belongs to them and the particular memories they made there. I also think the themes suggested by the title are present throughout the novel, but they don’t come fully together until the very end, so my hope is the title is a thread that can be followed to...[read on]

Visit Jessica Bryant Klagmann's website.

Writers Read: Jessica Bryant Klagmann.

Q&A with Jessica Bryant Klagmann.

--Marshal Zeringue

Alma Katsu's "Fiend," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Fiend by Alma Katsu.

The entry begins:

In the case of Fiend, this isn’t a hypothetical. We optioned Fiend for a TV series shortly after we buttoned up the final version of the manuscript, literally days after the Los Angeles wildfires. As an aside, when my film agent said we were going to go on submission, I thought she must be crazy but she was right. There was a lot of interest and despite everything going on in Hollywood at the time, we got a great offer.

There are four main characters in the novel. First is Zef, the father and patriarch of the Berisha family, one of the wealthiest and most powerful dynasties in the world. The Berishas are known for being ruthless, but they’re also dogged by rumors that they’ve benefitted from an ancient power that’s somehow been gifted to them. They call it “the family blessing,” a power that sees things fall in their favor and that their enemies are punished. I could see Oscar Isaac as Zef: handsome but hard and ruthless. He’s got the strong facial characteristics needed for this character: the piercing eyes, strong jaw, prominent nose.

Even though there are multiple narrators, Maris is ostensibly the book’s protagonist. She’s the middle of Zef’s three children. She thinks she’s the obvious choice to take over as head of the family and the business empire, but...[read on]

Visit Alma Katsu's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Taker.

My Book, The Movie: The Hunger.

The Page 69 Test: The Hunger.

Writers Read: Alma Katsu (March 2020).

The Page 69 Test: The Deep.

The Page 69 Test: Red Widow.

Q&A with Alma Katsu.

The Page 69 Test: The Fervor.

Writers Read: Alma Katsu (April 2022).

My Book, The Movie: Red London.

The Page 69 Test: Red London.

The Page 69 Test: Fiend.

My Book, The Movie: Fiend.

--Marshal Zeringue