Seven great novels depicting an environmental apocalypse

At io9 Maddie Stone tagged seven great novels that show the real terrifying prospect of climate change, including:

Odds Against Tomorrow by Nathaniel Rich (Macmillan)

In a not-too-distant future Manhattan, mathematician Mitchell Zukor is hired by financial consulting firm FutureWorld to crank out worst-case predictions for the future, which are sold to corporations at a profit. Just as Zukor’s scenarios are reaching apocalypse proportions, a disastrous hurricane floods New York City. A fast-paced literary thriller, Odds Against Tomorrow reveals a world where humanity’s worst fears about the future are being realized in the present. Eerily enough, Rich finished the novel right before Superstorm Sandy struck New York—so maybe there’s a touch of prophecy in here, as well.

Read about another book on the list.

Also see: six top sci-fi books about the changing climate and ten top climate change fiction books for young readers.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Graeme Gill's "Building an Authoritarian Polity"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Building an Authoritarian Polity: Russia in Post-Soviet Times by Graeme Gill.

About the book, from the publisher:

Graeme Gill shows why post-Soviet Russia has failed to achieve the democratic outcome widely expected at the time of the fall of the Soviet Union, instead emerging as an authoritarian polity. He argues that the decisions of dominant elites have been central to the construction of an authoritarian polity, and explains how this occurred in four areas of regime-building: the relationship with the populace, the manipulation of the electoral system, the internal structure of the regime itself, and the way the political elite has been stabilised. Instead of the common 'Yeltsin is a democrat, Putin an autocrat' paradigm, this book shows how Putin built upon the foundations that Yeltsin had laid. It offers a new framework for the study of an authoritarian political system, and is therefore relevant not just to Russia but to many other authoritarian polities.

Graeme Gill is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Government and International Relations at the University of Sydney.

Learn more about Building an Authoritarian Polity at the Cambridge University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Building an Authoritarian Polity.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Michael A. McDonnell reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Michael A. McDonnell, author of Masters of Empire: Great Lakes Indians and the Making of America.

His entry begins:

Funny enough, I’ve just been reading the work of two great Australian historians - who happen to be married to each other. One of the wonderful things about teaching here in Australia is that it forces you to read widely and think comparatively, if only to keep up with the varied interests of amazing colleagues.

Recently, we took a trip up to Magnetic Island, just off the east coast of Australia and within the Great Barrier Reef. I took along a copy of Iain McCalman’s The Reef: A Passionate History, that relates the human history of the Reef in a series of brilliantly told biographies from Captain Cook to Charlie Veron – an environmental activist trying to document the shocking effects of climate change on the Reef today. I don’t normally read non-fiction while trying to relax, but Iain’s book was a compelling and delightful read. He brings to life in vivid detail Cook’s claustrophobic and near- deadly encounter with this uncharted wonder, different Aboriginal communities’ relationship to its nurturing grasp, and the science (and scandals) surrounding the study of corals and reefs. Now heading up...[read on]

About Masters of Empire, from the publisher:

In Masters of Empire, the historian Michael A. McDonnell reveals the pivotal role played by the native peoples of the Great Lakes in the history of North America. Though less well known than the Iroquois or Sioux, the Anishinaabeg, who lived across Lakes Michigan and Huron, were equally influential. Masters of Empire charts the story of one group, the Odawa, who settled at the straits between those two lakes, a hub for trade and diplomacy throughout the vast country west of Montreal known as the pays d’en haut.

Highlighting the long-standing rivalries and relationships among the great Indian nations of North America, McDonnell shows how Europeans often played only a minor role in this history, and reminds us that it was native peoples who possessed intricate and far-reaching networks of commerce and kinship, of which the French and British knew little. As empire encroached upon their domain, the Anishinaabeg were often the ones doing the exploiting. By dictating terms at trading posts and frontier forts, they played a crucial part in the making of early America.

Through vivid depictions—all from a native perspective—of early skirmishes, the French and Indian War, and the American Revolution, Masters of Empire overturns our assumptions about colonial America. By calling attention to the Great Lakes as a crucible of culture and conflict, McDonnell reimagines the landscape of American history.

Visit Michael A. McDonnell's website, blog, and Twitter perch.

Writers Read: Michael A. McDonnell.

--Marshal Zeringue

Emily Ross's "Half in Love with Death," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Half In Love With Death by Emily Ross.

The entry begins:

I’ve often fantasized about a movie of Half in Love with Death, my YA novel about a teen’s search for her missing sister. The Arizona desert setting provides a cinematic backdrop for my psychological thriller, set in Tucson in 1965. I’d love to see suburban neighborhoods encroaching on the desert and disaffected teens looking for anything to alleviate their boredom coming to life on the big screen.

I’d choose Kiernan Shipka (Sally Draper from Mad Men) as Caroline, my 15-year-old protagonist. Like Sally, Caroline comes of age in the ‘60s. As Shipka literally grew from a child into a teenager on screen, I often thought of my young protagonist. Like Caroline, Shipka has a quiet loveliness and changes from child to sophisticate in an instant. Both Sally and Caroline are able to strike the rocky balance between innocence, intelligence, and...[read on]

Visit the official Emily Ross website.

The Page 69 Test: Half In Love With Death.

Writers Read: Emily Ross.

My Book, The Movie: Half In Love With Death.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Mette Ivie Harrison's "His Right Hand"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: His Right Hand by Mette Ivie Harrison.

About the book, from the publisher:

In the follow-up to the controversial and critically acclaimed mystery, The Bishop’s Wife, Mormon housewife Linda Wallheim finds herself once again ruffling feathers in Draper, Utah, as she assists a murder investigation that is being derailed by transphobia within the LDS community.

In Draper, Utah, a tight-knit Mormon community is thrown into upheaval when their ward’s second counselor—one of the bishop’s right-hand men—is found dead in an elaborately staged murder on church property. Carl Ashby was known as a devout Mormon, a pillar of the community, and a loving husband and father. Who would want him dead?

Linda Wallheim, the wife of the ward’s bishop, can’t rest as long as the ward is suffering. She is particularly worried about Carl’s grieving family. But the entire case is turned upside down by the autopsy report, which reveals Carl Ashby was a biological female. In the Mormon church, where gender is considered part of a person’s soul, some people regard transgenderism as one of the worst possible transgressions of faith. Church officials seem to be more upset by Carl’s gender than by his murder, and more concerned with hushing up the story than solving the crime.

Linda realizes that if the police are to catch the killer, they are going to need an ally on the inside—and she is the only one who can help. Carl was living a life of secrecy for twenty years. What else was he hiding—and can Linda ferret out the key to his death before the rumors tear her community apart?

Visit Mette Ivie Harrison's website.

Writers Read: Mette Ivie Harrison (January 2015).

The Page 69 Test: His Right Hand.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Alastair Bellany & Thomas Cogswell's "The Murder of King James I"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Murder of King James I by Alastair Bellany and Thomas Cogswell.

About the book, from the publisher:

A year after the death of James I in 1625, a sensational pamphlet accused the Duke of Buckingham of murdering the king. It was an allegation that would haunt English politics for nearly forty years. In this exhaustively researched new book, two leading scholars of the era, Alastair Bellany and Thomas Cogswell, uncover the untold story of how a secret history of courtly poisoning shaped and reflected the political conflicts that would eventually plunge the British Isles into civil war and revolution. Illuminating many hitherto obscure aspects of early modern political culture, this eagerly anticipated work is both a fascinating story of political intrigue and a major exploration of the forces that destroyed the Stuart monarchy.

Learn more about The Murder of King James I at the Yale University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: The Murder of King James I.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top books about justice and redemption

Jeffrey Lent's novel A Slant of Light is a Washington Post Notable Book of 2015. One of the author's top ten books about justice and redemption, as shared at the Guardian:

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

There’s no escaping it: this is perhaps the greatest novel ever written. As such, it’s brimful of wordly justice and almost utterly lacking in redemption. Tolstoy, being Tolstoy, was not content to write a novel only about a “fallen” woman, but inserts us into the political life, the feudal system and the overarching military thrust of imperial Russia. The result is tactile, satisfying and immensely disturbing.

Read about another book on the list.

Anna Karenina also appears on Bethan Roberts's top ten list of novels about childbirth, Hannah Jane Parkinson's list of the ten worst couples in literature, Hanna McGrath's top fifteen list of epigraphs, Amelia Schonbek's list of three classic novels that pass the Bechdel test, Rachel Thompson's top ten list of the greatest deaths in fiction, Melissa Albert's recommended reading list for eight villains, Alison MacLeod's top ten list of stories about infidelity, David Denby's six favorite books list, Howard Jacobson's list of his five favorite literary heroines, Eleanor Birne's top ten list of books on motherhood, Esther Freud's top ten list of love stories, Chika Unigwe's six favorite books list, Elizabeth Kostova's list of favorite books, James Gray's list of best books, Marie Arana's list of the best books about love, Ha Jin's most important books list, Tom Perrotta's ten favorite books list, Claire Messud's list of her five most important books, Alexander McCall Smith's list of his five most important books, Mohsin Hamid's list of his ten favorite books, Louis Begley's list of favorite novels about cheating lovers, and among the top ten works of literature according to Peter Carey and Norman Mailer. John Mullan put it on his lists of ten of the best erotic dreams in literature, ten of the best coups de foudre in literature, ten of the best births in literature, ten of the best ice-skating episodes in literature, and ten of the best balls in literature.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Paullina Simons reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Paullina Simons, author of Lone Star.

Her entry begins:

“There’s a panther stalks me down. One day I’ll have my death of him.” So writes poetess extraordinaire Sylvia Plath, the day after meeting England’s future poet laureate and her future husband Ted Hughes in February 1956. They fell in love and three months later married. Seven years later, in another frozen February, her premonition came true. She was thirty years old when she kneeled in front of the gaslit oven, while her two small children slept nearby, and put her head inside.

Lately I’ve been consumed by all things Plath/Hughes. Who was this man who drove his passionate heartbroken wife to suicide? And why did tragedy continue to follow him down the road of life? Many years later his only son also committed suicide. I re-read Ariel, the book of poems Plath wrote in the six months before her death. Ted Hughes was the love of her life, but he had fallen for another woman. He left Sylvia Plath, abandoned her and his children to travel joyfully abroad with his new lover, a childless yet married Assia Wevill (rhymes with devil not evil).

While they gamboled, Plath nursed her wounds and her babies and wrote Ariel, arguably one of the best poem collections of the twentieth century. And after she was done writing, she glanced around and Ted wasn’t back. She was still alone, and his new lover was pregnant. Plath may have known this. Or the winter of 1963 may have been too cold and too long for her, the burdens too heavy, the future too bleak. Who knows. Not even Ted Hughes knows. This, according to the books I read.

I read Sylvia Plath: Letters Home, followed by Her Husband by Diane Middlebrook, and...[read on]

About Lone Star, from the publisher:

From the bestselling, acclaimed author of Tully and The Bronze Horseman comes the unforgettable love story between a college-bound young woman and a traveling troubadour on his way to war—a moving, compelling novel of love lost and found set against the stunning backdrop of Eastern Europe.

Chloe is just weeks away from heading off to college and starting a new life far from her home in Maine when she embarks on a great European adventure with her boyfriend and two best friends. Their destination is Barcelona, but first they must detour through the historic cities of Eastern Europe to keep an old family promise.

Here, in this fledgling post-Communist world, Chloe meets a charming American vagabond named Johnny, who carries a guitar, an easy smile—and a lifetime of secrets. From Treblinka to Trieste, from Karnikava to Krakow, from Vilnius to Venice, the unlikely band of friends and lovers traverse the old world on a train trip that becomes a treacherous journey into Europe’s and Johnny’s darkest past—a journey that jeopardizes Chloe’s plans for the future and all she ever thought she wanted.

But the lifelong bonds Chloe and her friends share are about to be put to the ultimate test—and whether or not they reach Barcelona, they can only be certain that their lives will never be the same again.

A sweeping, beautiful tale that mesmerizes and enchants, Lone Star will linger long in the memory once the final page is turned.

Visit Paullina Simons's website.

The Page 69 Test: Lone Star.

Writers Read: Paullina Simons.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five sci-fi books with an Australian sensibility

Jackie Hatton is the author of Flesh and Wires, a post-apocalyptic, post-alien novel that imagines women as the agents of their own destiny. One of five sci-fi books with an Australian perspective she tagged at Tor.com:

John Marsden—Tomorrow, When the War Began

Five kids “go bush, go feral,” for a few days during the holidays. They’re allowed to do this because Australian kids are not mollycoddled. As predicted, the worst thing that happens is that they find a snake in one of their sleeping bags. However…when they get home to their rural farm houses they find their parents missing, their animals dead, something seriously wrong with their world. So begins what is possibly Australia’s most popular speculative fiction novel of all time (with over three million sales to prove it and the #1 ranking on the Better Reads 2013 Top 100 Favourite Homegrown Reads List). As it says in the blurb for my yellowed old copy, “the first of a trilogy, When the War Began is truly an insomniac’s nightmare.” I list it here because kids who don’t read anything will lose sleep to finish this series. Adults with genre boundaries suddenly don’t care that it’s young adult or speculative. An addictive adventure/mystery story set in a future Australia that is pretty scary for kids, invaded by people (we never know exactly who) who plan to either enslave or kill the existing inhabitants, this book echoes the brutal colonial history of Australia and reflects upon the impact of WWII upon the Australian character, as well as offering insight into contemporary life as a young Australian growing up in a rural town.

Although the premise is quite brutal and the realities of life as bush fugitives are never denied, this is also a story that appeals to many Australians’ (young and old) fantasy of living life off the land, or at the very least somehow learning to negotiate its treacherous and beautiful nature.

Marsden’s perspective: This was my country; I felt like I had grown from its soil like the silent trees around me, like the springy, tiny-leaved plants that lined the track.

Read about another entry on the list.

Tomorrow, When the War Began is among Janet Manley's six great Australian YA lit classics.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Robert Pollin's "Greening the Global Economy"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Greening the Global Economy by Robert Pollin.

About the book, from the publisher:

In order to control climate change, the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates that greenhouse gas emissions will need to fall by about forty percent by 2030.

Achieving the target goals will be highly challenging. Yet in Greening the Global Economy, economist Robert Pollin shows that they are attainable through steady, large-scale investments—totaling about 1.5 percent of global GDP on an annual basis—in both energy efficiency and clean renewable energy sources. Not only that: Pollin argues that with the right investments, these efforts will expand employment and drive economic growth.

Drawing on years of research, Pollin explores all aspects of the problem: how much energy will be needed in a range of industrialized and developing economies; what efficiency targets should be; and what kinds of industrial policy will maximize investment and support private and public partnerships in green growth so that a clean energy transformation can unfold without broad subsidies.

All too frequently, inaction on climate change is blamed on its potential harm to the economy. Pollin shows greening the economy is not only possible but necessary: global economic growth depends on it.

Learn more about Greening the Global Economy at the MIT Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Greening the Global Economy.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Paullina Simons's "Lone Star"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Lone Star by Paullina Simons.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the bestselling, acclaimed author of Tully and The Bronze Horseman comes the unforgettable love story between a college-bound young woman and a traveling troubadour on his way to war—a moving, compelling novel of love lost and found set against the stunning backdrop of Eastern Europe.

Chloe is just weeks away from heading off to college and starting a new life far from her home in Maine when she embarks on a great European adventure with her boyfriend and two best friends. Their destination is Barcelona, but first they must detour through the historic cities of Eastern Europe to keep an old family promise.

Here, in this fledgling post-Communist world, Chloe meets a charming American vagabond named Johnny, who carries a guitar, an easy smile—and a lifetime of secrets. From Treblinka to Trieste, from Karnikava to Krakow, from Vilnius to Venice, the unlikely band of friends and lovers traverse the old world on a train trip that becomes a treacherous journey into Europe’s and Johnny’s darkest past—a journey that jeopardizes Chloe’s plans for the future and all she ever thought she wanted.

But the lifelong bonds Chloe and her friends share are about to be put to the ultimate test—and whether or not they reach Barcelona, they can only be certain that their lives will never be the same again.

A sweeping, beautiful tale that mesmerizes and enchants, Lone Star will linger long in the memory once the final page is turned.

Visit Paullina Simons's website.

The Page 69 Test: Lone Star.

--Marshal Zeringue

Adam Christopher's "Made to Kill," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Made to Kill by Adam Christopher.

The entry begins:

The characters in Made to Kill can be divided into two groups – the speaking parts, and the extras. Set in Hollywood, 1965, the book drops the names of a lot of stars, but most of them appear silently at the periphery of scenes, looking moody and evil and possessed by… well, that’s a spoiler.

The two main characters pose an interesting problem. Raymond Electromatic is a robot, six feet ten of bronzed steel with a face that looks human, but is immobile. While he is a Philip Marlowe-type, I’d actually like to see—or perhaps, hear—Andre Braugher behind the metal mask.

Ada is even harder to cast, as she’s just a voice—a little older, smoky, husky. Kathleen Turner or Christine Baranski would do nicely. She’s actually based, rather loosely, on Anne...[read on]

Visit Adam Christopher's website, blog, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

The Page 69 Test: Made to Kill.

My Book, The Movie: Made to Kill.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top 10 fiction books of 2015: TIME Magazine

One of Time magazine's top ten fiction books of 2015:

Fates & Furies, Lauren Groff

On the face of it, Lauren Groff’s novel doesn’t seem revolutionary: it’s the story of a marriage told in two halves, one for each spouse. But Fates and Furies is less “he said, she said” than “he said, she said, and whoa, he had no f—ing idea.” The cataclysmic unknown unknowns that separate Lotto and Mathilde, a golden couple who marry young and flourish through Lotto’s success as a playwright, simultaneously explode and reinforce the notion of soul mates—to hide so much for so long, to such striking effect, takes a peculiar kind of dedication. If the plot occasionally strains credibility (couples’ counseling might have done wonders), that doesn’t detract from Groff’s searing exploration of how far a person will go for love, loyalty and revenge.

Learn about another book on the list.

Fates & Furies is among Jeff Somers's five top novels about marriage.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Emily Ross reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Emily Ross, author of Half In Love With Death.

Her entry begins:

I recently read the science fiction novel, The Man Who Fell to Earth, by Walter Tevis. I was a huge fan of the 1976 movie version. Directed by Nicolas Roeg, it featured David Bowie in his film debut, playing Thomas Jerome Newton, an alien who travels to Earth to save his dying planet. This movie has an unforgettable mythic quality, and I’ve always been curious to see if the book measured up – and it really did!

Newton is not your typical green-skinned, bug-eyed alien. Tall, slender, and frail, he easily disguises himself as a human, and only in the privacy of his own home does he remove the lenses concealing his golden, cat-like eyes.

On a desperate mission to find food and water for his war-ravaged planet, Newton comes to Earth with plans for technical inventions that ultimately turn him into a billionaire and the CEO of a giant corporation. But earthly success brings him no happiness. Lonely for the world he left behind, he meets Betty Jo, an alcoholic who introduces him to gin. An uneasy friendship develops into an unlikely love story as the well-meaning Betty Jo...[read on]

About Half In Love With Death, from the publisher:

It’s the era of peace and love in the 1960s, but nothing is peaceful in Caroline’s life. Since her beautiful older sister disappeared, fifteen-year-old Caroline might as well have disappeared too. She’s invisible to her parents, who can’t stop blaming each other. The police keep following up on leads even Caroline knows are foolish. The only one who seems to care about her is Tony, her sister’s older boyfriend, who soothes Caroline’s desperate heart every time he turns his magical blue eyes on her. Tony is convinced that the answer to Jess’s disappearance is in California, the land of endless summer, among the runaways and flower children. Come with me, Tony says to Caroline, and we’ll find her together. Tony is so loving, and all he cares about is bringing Jess home. And so Caroline follows, and closes a door behind her that may never open again, in a heartfelt thriller that never lets up.

Visit the official Emily Ross website.

The Page 69 Test: Half In Love With Death.

Writers Read: Emily Ross.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six notable books that almost never saw the light of day

Lindsey Lewis Smithson has her MFA from UC Riverside’s Palm Desert Low Residency MFA. She has served as the Poetry Editor and the Managing Editor for The Coachella Review, in addition to having read for The Pacific Review and The Whistling Fire. At B&N Reads she tagged six essential books that were almost never published, including:

Animal Farm, by George Orwell

When T.S. Eliot was the editing director of Faber & Faber, he rejected Animal Farm because he “did not want to upset the Soviets in those fraught years of World War II.” There was no mention of a problem with Orwell’s writing, and he was already a household name with five other books in print. In this case, in contrast to other rejected writers, politics—not style—almost stopped this required reading staple from ever hitting bookshelves.

Read about another entry on the list.

Animal Farm is among Alex Clark's ten best quotable novels, Piers Torday's top ten books with animal villains, Robson Green's six best books, Heather Brooke's five books on holding power to account, Chuck Klosterman's most important books; it appears on John Mullan's list of ten of the best pigs in literature and Charlie Jane Anders and Michael Ann Dobbs's list of well-known and beloved science fiction and fantasy novels that were rejected over and over.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: David Lough's "No More Champagne: Churchill and His Money"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: No More Champagne: Churchill and His Money by David Lough.

About the book, from the publisher:

The fascinating story of Winston Churchill's lifetime of tangled personal finances

Meticulously researched by a senior private banker now turned historian, No More Champagne reveals for the first time the full extent of the iconic British war leader's private struggle to maintain a way of life instilled by his upbringing and expected of his public position.

Lough uses Churchill's own most private records, many never researched before, to chronicle his family's chronic shortage of money, his own extravagance, and his recurring losses from gambling or trading in shares and currencies. Churchill tried to keep himself afloat by borrowing to the hilt, putting off bills, and writing "all over the place"; when all else failed, he had to ask family or friends to come to the rescue. Yet within five years of the war, he had taken advantage of his worldwide celebrity to transform his private fortunes with the same ruthlessness as he waged war, reaching 1945 with today's equivalent of £3 million in the bank. His lucrative war memoirs were still to come.

Throughout the story, Lough highlights the threads of risk, energy, persuasion, and sheer willpower to survive that link Churchill's private and public lives. He shows how constant money pressures often tempted him to short-circuit the ethical standards expected of public figures in his day before usually pulling back to put duty first-except where the taxman was involved.

Visit David Lough's website.

The Page 99 Test: No More Champagne.

--Marshal Zeringue

Kim MacQuarrie's "Life and Death in the Andes," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Life and Death in the Andes: On the Trail of Bandits, Heroes, and Revolutionaries by Kim MacQuarrie.

The entry begins:

For Life and Death in the Andes, which is about a 4,300-mile journey along the Andes, looking into characters such as Pablo Escobar, Che Guevara, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, I would expand one of the chapters into a film. One of the lesser-known stories I looked into is a young Charles Darwin in Patagonia on the square-rigger ship, the H.M.S. Beagle. Darwin was only 25, yet was gathering the evidence that would lead to both his theory of evolution and make him question his religion. The ship’s captain, Robert Fitzroy, was extremely religious. He’d been conducting an experiment of “civilizing” three naked Patagonian natives (whom he’d captured on an earlier voyage and had taken to London, where they met the King and Queen, learned English, and were now being returned to Patagonia). Darwin and Fitzroy would later clash, with dire consequences for one of them; the “civilization experiment” would also have unintended consequences. So, a quick casting for a story that takes place at the southern, tempestuous end of the world:

Charles Darwin: Paul Bettany (has played him well before)

Captain Robert Fitzroy: Christian...[read on]

Visit Kim MacQuarrie's website.

The Page 99 Test: Life and Death in the Andes.

My Book, The Movie: Life and Death in the Andes.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight top books about Muslim life for a nation that knows little about Islam

Laila Lalami's most recent book, The Moor’s Account, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. At the Washington Post she tagged eight books about Muslim life for a nation that knows little about Islam, including:

The Reluctant Fundamentalist, by Mohsin Hamid (2007)

Borrowing from Camus’s “The Fall,” Hamid tells this novel in the form of a single dramatic monologue. Changez, a Pakistani immigrant, has a charmed life: He graduated from Princeton, he has a job at a top valuation firm in New York, and he recently started dating a beautiful woman. But this life is abruptly upended by the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and Changez finds his perceptions and allegiances shifting, with potentially disastrous consequences.

Read about another book on the list.

The Reluctant Fundamentalist is among Porochista Khakpour's top ten novels about 9/11, Jimmy So's five best 9/11 novels, and Ahmede Hussain's five top books in recent South Asian literature.

The Page 69 Test: The Reluctant Fundamentalist.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Emily Ross's "Half in Love with Death"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Half In Love With Death by Emily Ross.

About the book, from the publisher:

It’s the era of peace and love in the 1960s, but nothing is peaceful in Caroline’s life. Since her beautiful older sister disappeared, fifteen-year-old Caroline might as well have disappeared too. She’s invisible to her parents, who can’t stop blaming each other. The police keep following up on leads even Caroline knows are foolish. The only one who seems to care about her is Tony, her sister’s older boyfriend, who soothes Caroline’s desperate heart every time he turns his magical blue eyes on her. Tony is convinced that the answer to Jess’s disappearance is in California, the land of endless summer, among the runaways and flower children. Come with me, Tony says to Caroline, and we’ll find her together. Tony is so loving, and all he cares about is bringing Jess home. And so Caroline follows, and closes a door behind her that may never open again, in a heartfelt thriller that never lets up.

Visit the official Emily Ross website.

The Page 69 Test: Half In Love With Death.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is David Drake reading?

Featured at Writers Read: David Drake, author of Air and Darkness.

His entry begins:

I'm reading Our Hearts Were Young and Gay by Cornelia Otis Skinner and Emily Kimbrough, a 1942 memoir (in Skinner's first-person voice) of the European trip the two young ladies took twenty years earlier when they were just out of Bryn Mawr. The decision to read it was a sentimental one for me.

One of my classics teachers at Iowa had done the same thing with a friend at what must have been the same time. I recall with pleasure her stories of being guided through the ruins of Knossos by Sir Arthur Evans, who had discovered the site. For an undergraduate who had never traveled, it was as different a time as Samuel Johnson's London would have been.

In addition to those memories from my youth...[read on]

About Air and Darkness, from the publisher:

Air and Darkness, an intriguing and fantastic adventure, is both an independent novel and the gripping conclusion of the Books of the Elements, a four-volume set of fantasies set in Carce, an analog of ancient Rome by David Drake. Here the stakes are raised from the previous novels in an ultimate conflict between the forces of logic and reason and the forces of magic and the supernatural. During the extraordinary time in which this story is set, the supernatural is dominant. The story is an immensely complex journey of adventure through real and magical places.

Corylus, a soldier, emerges as one of the most compelling heroic figures in contemporary fantasy. Battling magicians, spirits, gods, and forces from supernatural realities, Corylus and his companions from the family of the nobleman Saxa-especially Saxa's impressive wife Hedia, and his friend (and Saxa's son) Varus-must face constant deadly and soul-destroying dangers, climaxing in a final battle not between good and evil but in defense of logic and reality.

Visit David Drake's website.

Writers Read: David Drake.

--Marshal Zeringue

Four books that changed Nicole Trilivas

Nicole Trilivas's new novel is Girls Who Travel. One book that changed the author, as shared at the Sydney Morning Herald:

BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S
Truman Capote

There's a lot this short story taught me, the first of which is the importance of a striking title (I mean, come on, that is a great title). Second, is great character names: Holly Golightly, Mag Wildwood, and Sally Tomato, anyone? And third, is how to turn an unlikely character into a timeless heroine: Capote made it easy to love a fresh-mouthed, down-and-out call girl – and I love him for it.

Read about another book on the list.

Breakfast at Tiffany's is one of Dan Rhodes's top ten short books.

--Marshal Zeringue

Jack McDevitt's "Thunderbird," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Thunderbird by Jack McDevitt.

In Thunderbird, a stargate more than ten thousand years old has been discovered on a Sioux reservation in North Dakota. The race to explore and claim the stargate quickly escalates, dividing those involved into opposing camps who view the teleportation technology either as an unprecedented opportunity for scientific research or a disastrous threat to security. In the middle of the maelstrom stands Sioux chairman James Walker.

McDevitt's choice for the leads and director of an adaptation include:

Johnny Depp as Brad Hollister.

Angela Bassett as April Cannon...[read on]

Learn more about the book and author at Jack McDevitt's website.

The Page 69 Test: Firebird.

The Page 69 Test: Thunderbird.

Writers Read: Jack McDevitt.

My Book, The Movie: Thunderbird.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Kim MacQuarrie's "Life and Death in the Andes"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Life and Death in the Andes: On the Trail of Bandits, Heroes, and Revolutionaries by Kim MacQuarrie.

About the book, from the publisher:

Unique portraits of legendary characters along South America’s mountain spine, from Charles Darwin to the present day, told by a master traveler and observer.

The Andes Mountains are the world’s longest mountain chain, linking most of the countries in South America. Emmy Award–winning filmmaker and author Kim MacQuarrie takes us on a historical journey through this unique region, bringing fresh insight and contemporary connections to such fabled characters as Charles Darwin, Pablo Escobar, Che Guevara, and many others. He describes the floating islands of Lake Titicaca, where people’s lives depend entirely on a reed that grows there. He introduces us to a Patagonian woman who is the last living speaker of her language, as he explores the disappearance and sometimes surprising resiliency of indigenous cultures throughout the Andes. He meets a man whose grandfather witnessed Butch Cassidy’s last days in Bolivia,tracks down the ballet dancer who once hid the leader of the brutal Shining Path in her home, and hears a harrowing story from the school teacher who gave Che Guevara his final meal.

Through the stories he shares, MacQuarrie raises such questions as, where did the people of South America come from? Did they create or import their cultures? What makes South America different from other continents—and what makes the cultures of the Andes different from other cultures in South America? Why did Peru’s Shining Path leader Guzmán nearly succeed in his revolutionary quest while Che Guevara in Bolivia so quickly failed? And what so astounded Charles Darwin in South America that led him to conceive the theory of evolution? Deeply observed and beautifully written, Life and Death in the Andes shows us this land as no one has before.

Visit Kim MacQuarrie's website.

The Page 99 Test: Life and Death in the Andes.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top fantasy books with Jewish themes

Jeff Somers is the author of Lifers, the Avery Cates series from Orbit Books, Chum from Tyrus Books, and We Are Not Good People from Pocket/Gallery. He has published over thirty short stories as well. One of Somers's top five fantasy books with Jewish themes, as shared at the B & N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog:

The Angel of Losses, by Stephanie Feldman

This is the dual-track story of sisters Marjorie and Holly, once close and now estranged by Holly’s religious conversion to a severe orthodox branch of Judaism, and an account of Marjorie’s investigation into four mysterious notebooks left behind by their beloved grandfather, telling a true story of the legendary “White Rabbi” who owes a debt to the titular Angel of Losses. Though set in modern day New York, it explores ancient myths and concepts, finding a powerful thread of truth in everything that occurs. A novel that floats on the simple premise that all religious myths and stories are actually quite true, the emotional impact it delivers as it takes us along on the characters’ journeys is strong stuff, and the magical elements are handled with intelligence and grace.

The Jewish religion and culture is ancient, complex, and filled with ideas both fundamental and transporting. That makes it almost ideal for extrapolation into speculative stories that explore the human condition—in this life and the next.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Angel of Losses also made Nicole Hill's list of five of the best new girl-powered sci-fi and fantasy novels.

The Page 69 Test: The Angel of Losses.

My Book, The Movie: The Angel of Losses.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Triss Stein reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Triss Stein, author of Brooklyn Secrets: An Erica Donato Mystery.

From her entry:

[R]ight now, I am deep in When Books Went to War by Molly Gupthill Manning, the story of the Armed Services Editions books that helped the American troops of World War 11 stay sane before, after, and in-between combat. Sounds boring?

How could any book be boring when it tells me that FDR said, “In this war, books are weapons?” That two of the most popular books in the program, ever, were A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and Forever, Amber? That men read until the “pages of each book were so dirty you can’t see the print?” That they wrote “thanks for everything from Zane Grey to...[read on]

About Brooklyn Secrets, from the publisher:

Erica Donato, Brooklyn girl, urban history grad student, and single mom, is researching the 1930s when Brownsville was the home of the notorious organized criminals the newspapers called Murder Inc. She quickly learns that even in rapidly changing Brooklyn, Brownsville remains much as it was. It is still poor, it is still tough, and it still breeds fighters and gangs.

Doing field research, Erica stops in at the landmark local library and meets Savanna, a young woman who is the pride of her mother and her bosses, and is headed for an elite college and a future. A few days later, she is found beaten and left for dead. Her anguished mother is everywhere, insisting someone knows something. After a massive, angry demonstration, a young girlfriend of Savanna’s is found dead too. Is there a connection? Did perfect Savanna have a few secrets?

Erica is curious. But she’s focused on the 1930s and has located a few women who are happy to share memories. Two are childhood friends who disagree on much, but guard secrets too—ones kept for a lifetime. Never one to resist looking deeper than her research requires, Erica keeps encountering an apparent derelict white man, a vengeful rejected girlfriend, the role of boxing as a way out of poverty, and fading evidence of long-ago crimes.

Visit Triss Stein's website.

The Page 69 Test: Brooklyn Secrets.

My Book, The Movie: Brooklyn Secrets.

Writers Read: Triss Stein.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top ten mysteries of 2015: Wall Street Journal

Three of the Wall Street Journal's top mysteries of the year:

The Marauders
By Tom Cooper

Hard times have come to the Louisiana Gulf Coast town of Jeannette in the wake of the BP oil spill, as chronicled in New Orleans writer Tom Cooper’s surrealistically funny and poignant first novel. A half-dozen Southern Gothic types share the sunlight (and the title rights) in “The Marauders”: Gus, the one-armed shrimper intent on discovering the buried treasure of Jean Lafitte; Reg and Vic, maniac twin overseers of a swamp-island marijuana plantation; Cosgrove and Hanson, low-rent adventurers out to steal a fortune; and Grimes, the unscrupulous manipulator sent to rob oil-spill victims of their rightful recompense. Against all odds, these eccentric folk burrow under your skin and into your reluctant sympathies.

My Book, The Movie: The Marauders.

Writers Read: Tom Cooper.

The Page 69 Test: The Marauders.

Tom & Lucky and George & Cokey Flo
By C. Joseph Greaves

In 1936, Thomas E. Dewey, the ambitious New York prosecutor (and future presidential candidate), had a better-than-even chance of bringing down Manhattan mobster Charles “Lucky” Luciano in a trial that kept Dewey’s name in the headlines for weeks. C. Joseph Greaves, a former trial lawyer, has written a work of fiction based on the real-life events leading up to and extending beyond that trial: It is a swift saga, rich with detail, and also features Luciano’s shrewd defense lawyer (George Morton Levy) and a prostitute known as Cokey Flo. What a grand movie this would have made in the Golden Age of Hollywood.

Writers Read: C. Joseph Greaves.

Recipes for Love and Murder
By Sally Andrew

In a year with several exciting first novels, South African author Sally Andrew pretty much takes the crown with her appealing debut. The middle-aged Tannie (“Auntie”) Maria, a half-Afrikaans, half-English widow writing an advice and cooking column for the rural Klein Karoo Gazette, is the book’s delightful narrator. Tannie regards food as “medicine for the body and heart,” but it can no longer help one of her readers, an abused wife found murdered in her home. With the help of a young reporter colleague, Tannie Maria hunts the ingredients that went into this hometown tragedy. The exotic locale, the lovely patois and the heroine’s unique sensibility make Ms. Andrew’s “Recipes” a blue-ribbon winner.

My Book, The Movie: Recipes for Love and Murder.

The Page 69 Test: Recipes for Love and Murder.

Writers Read: Sally Andrew.

Read about more titles on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Adam Christopher's "Made to Kill"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Made to Kill by Adam Christopher.

About the book, from the publisher:

It was just another Tuesday morning when she walked into the office--young, as I suspected they all might be, another dark brunette with some assistance and enough eye black to match up to Cleopatra. And who am I? I'm Ray, the world's last robot, famed and feared in equal measure, which suits me just fine--after all, the last place you'd expect to find Hollywood's best hit man is in the plain light of day.

Raymond Electromatic is good at his job, as good as he ever was at being a true Private Investigator, the lone employee of the Electromatic Detective Agency--except for Ada, office gal and super-computer, the constant voice in Ray's inner ear. Ray might have taken up a new line of work, but money is money, after all, and he was programmed to make a profit. Besides, with his twenty-four-hour memory-tape limits, he sure can keep a secret.

When a familiar-looking woman arrives at the agency wanting to hire Ray to find a missing movie star, he's inclined to tell her to take a hike. But she had the cold hard cash, a demand for total anonymity, and tendency to vanish on her own.

Plunged into a glittering world of fame, fortune, and secrecy, Ray uncovers a sinister plot that goes much deeper than the silver screen--and this robot is at the wrong place, at the wrong time.

Made to Kill is the thrilling new speculative noir from novelist and comic writer Adam Christopher.

Visit Adam Christopher's website, blog, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

The Page 69 Test: Made to Kill.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top unlikely friendships in children’s books

John Boyne's novels include the bestselling The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas and The Boy at the Top of the Mountain. One of his top ten unlikely friendships in children’s books, as shared at the Guardian:

A Boy And A Bear And A Boat by Dave Shelton (2012)

Shelton’s profound and hugely entertaining tale of a boy and a bear sailing nowhere in particular is full of wonderful jokes and sarcastic asides, not to mention illustrations that you end up staring at for ridiculously long periods of time. We don’t know why the boy is running away, we don’t know why the bear is rowing a boat. And yet it all feels entirely rational and important and that if the boy didn’t have the bear to speak to, then he would have no one. From such simple needs, great friendships are made.

Read about another book on the list.

Also see Alex Hourston’s top ten unlikely friendships in literature and Sarah Salway's top ten books about unlikely friendships.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: David Silverman's "Fighting God"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Fighting God: An Atheist Manifesto for a Religious World by David Silverman.

About the book, from the publisher:

Fighting God is a firebrand manifesto from one of the most recognizable faces of atheism. In his book, Silverman--a walking, talking atheist billboard known for his appearances on Fox News--discusses the effectiveness, ethics and impact of the in-your-face-atheist who refuses to be silent.

Silverman argues that religion is more than just wrong: it is malevolent and does not deserve our respect. It is our duty to be outspoken and do what we can to bring religion down. Examining the mentality, methods and issues facing the firebrand atheist, Silverman presents an overwhelming argument for firebrand atheism and reveals:

- All religion is cafeteria religion and almost all agnostics are atheists.
- American society grants religion a privileged status, despite the intentions of the Founding Fathers.
- Christian politicians have adversely (and un-Constitutionally) affected our society with regard to science, health, women's rights, and gay rights.
- The notion of "atheist Jews" is a lie forced on us by religion.
- It is not "Islamophobia" to observe dangerous teachings and disproportionate violence in Islam.
- Atheists are slowly but surely winning the battle.

Fighting God is a provocative, unapologetic book that takes religion to task and will give inspiration to non-believers and serve as the ultimate answer to apologists.

Learn more about Fighting God at the publisher's website, and follow David Silverman on Facebook and Twitter.

Writers Read: David Silverman.

The Page 99 Test: Fighting God.

--Marshal Zeringue

Holly Messinger's "The Curse of Jacob Tracy," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Curse of Jacob Tracy by Holly Messinger.

The entry begins:

The titular hero of The Curse of Jacob Tracy was partly inspired by and named after country singer Trace Adkins. Years ago when I was constructing the character, a friend showed me Adkin’s music video for “I’m Tryin’,” which is an anthem about the difficulties of blue-collar life. Adkins was about 38 at the time and the poster-boy for roughneck masculinity: tall, lean, craggy, solemn. In the video he looms around the edges of the sets like one of the angels from Wings of Desire—outside of the characters’ lives, but listening and sympathetic. And that was how I saw my character Trace—a big man who cared deeply about the troubles of the world around him but felt constrained from action. And of course his overcoming those constraints is the arc of the book.

Adkins is a little long in the tooth these days to play Jacob Tracy, and I just haven’t seen an actor in the current thirty-something set who has the same combination of manliness, world-weariness, and country-boy charm. Chris Hemsworth is probably the closest option. Chris Evans and Jensen Ackles are also contenders, though they are both prettier than I would like. I figure...[read on]

Visit Holly Messinger's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Curse of Jacob Tracy.

My Book, The Movie: The Curse of Jacob Tracy.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top novels about marriage

Jeff Somers is the author of Lifers, the Avery Cates series from Orbit Books, Chum from Tyrus Books, and We Are Not Good People from Pocket/Gallery. He has published over thirty short stories as well. One of Somers's five fascinating novels about marriage, as shared at B & N Reads:

Fates and Furies, by Lauren Groff

Groff’s remarkable new novel focuses solely on the relationship between Lancelot (nicknamed Lotto) Satterwhite and his wife, Mathilde Yoder. The book is divided into two sections; the first tells the tale of their relationship from Lotto’s bright and superficial point of view, the second from Mathilde’s darker and more manipulative one. Groff deftly depicts the true nature of marriage: a partnership, with each spouse providing something the other lacks, supporting each other in the places they are weak, and often knowing the other person better than they know themselves. With Lotto’s opening section providing the puzzles and Mathilde’s the solutions, Fates and Furies is an engrossing look at an intimate relationship.

Read about another entry on the list.

See Lauren Groff's top six portrayals of marriage in literature.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Jack McDevitt reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Jack McDevitt, author of Thunderbird. 

His entry begins:

I’m scheduled to do a presentation on Mark Twain for the St Simons Island Literary Guild in a few weeks, so I’ve been reading every Mark Twain book I can find, other than novels, most of which I’ve already read. Just finished The Library of America edition of his Collected Tales, Sketches, Speeches,& Essays, 1852-1890. I’ve been discovering that, while he deserves his reputation as America’s Great Humorist, he also has a dark side. It’s evident that he believes life is too painful to be worthwhile, not only for humans, but for everything else on the planet. I’m also...[read on]

About Thunderbird, from the publisher:

The Nebula Award–winning author of the Alex Benedict novels and the Priscilla Hutchins novels returns to the world of Ancient Shores in a startling and majestic epic.

A working stargate dating back more than ten thousand years has been discovered in North Dakota, on a Sioux reservation near Devils Lake. Travel through the gate currently leads to three equally mysterious destinations: (1) an apparently empty garden world, quickly dubbed Eden; (2) a strange maze of underground passageways; or (3) a space station with a view of a galaxy that appears to be the Milky Way.

The race to explore and claim the stargate quickly escalates, and those involved divide into opposing camps who view the teleportation technology either as an unprecedented opportunity for scientific research or a disastrous threat to national—if not planetary—security. In the middle of the maelstrom stands Sioux chairman James Walker. One thing is for certain: Questions about what the stargate means for humanity’s role in the galaxy cannot be ignored.

Especially since travel through the stargate isn’t necessarily only one way…

Learn more about the book and author at Jack McDevitt's website.

The Page 69 Test: Firebird.

The Page 69 Test: Thunderbird.

Writers Read: Jack McDevitt.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: A. M. Dellamonica's "A Daughter of No Nation"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: A Daughter of No Nation by A. M. Dellamonica.

About the book, from the publisher:

As soon as Sophie Hansa returned to our world, she is anxious to once again go back to Stormwrack. Unable to discuss the wondrous sights she has seen, and unable to tell anyone what happened to her in her time away, Sophie is in a holding pattern, focused entirely on her eventual chance to return.

With the sudden arrival of Garland Parrish, Sophie is once again gone. This time, she has been called back to Stormwrack in order to spend time with her father, a Duelist-Adjudicator, who is an unrivaled combatant and fearsome negotiator. But is he driven by his commitment to seeing justice prevail, or is he a sociopath? Soon, she discovers something repellent about him that makes her reject him, and everything he is offering.

Adrift again, she discovers that her time spent with her father is not without advantages, however, for Sophie has discovered there is nothing to stop her from setting up a forensic institute in Stormwrack, investigating cases that have been bogged down in the courts, sometimes for years. Her fresh look into a long-standing case between two of the islands turns up new information that could get her, and her friends, pulled into something bold and daring, which changes the entire way she approaches this strange new world....

Visit A.M. Dellamonica's website.

The Page 69 Test: Child of a Hidden Sea.

My Book, The Movie: Child of a Hidden Sea.

The Page 69 Test: A Daughter of No Nation.

--Marshal Zeringue