A Touch of Stardust, by Kate AlcottRead about the other entries on the list.
Travel back to A Star Is Born’s roots in the golden age of Hollywood. When wide-eyed Julie Crawford loses her job on the Gone With the Wind set, she is named Carole Lombard’s assistant — just as the actress is beginning her tempestuous, tragic affair with Clark Gable. Alcott brings an insider’s knowledge to the glamorous setting: Her late husband was Frank Mankiewicz, whose father wrote Citizen Kane.
Her entry begins:One of the most recent novels I read was The Echo Room by Parker Peevyhouse, which just released a few weeks ago. Claustrophobic and tense, the story kept me guessing for quite a while as to what was going on. The characters wake up and find themselves trapped in a building with no exit, then the time shifts and they wake up again...and repeat. A combination of Groundhog Day and Memento, it was impossible to put down because I found myself...[read on]About The Tomb, from the publisher:
Nothing is as it seems.Visit S.A. Bodeen's website.
These are the first words Kiva's best friend Seth says, after three years of silence.
Kiva thought she was growing up in ancient Alexandria. That's what she and all her classmates had been led to believe by their parents. It turnsout she was living in virtual reality, in a sleep chamber in deep space, and three years ago, Seth woke up. Now it's her turn to join him.
Together, Kiva and Seth must take an escape shuttle to search for the engine part their home ship needs to keep running. But it's been a long time since the Krakatoa has communicated with any of the other three ships harboring human civilization. Kiva and Seth are not sure what they'll find if and when they finally make contact.
Danger, romance and twists you'll never see coming abound in this high-stakes science fiction adventure.
One of Eisenberg's ten favorite books, as shared at Vulture.com:The Leopard, by Giuseppe Tomasi di LampedusaRead about another book on the list.
It’s been some years since I’ve read The Leopard, but I’ve read it a few times and it lives in my mind as a perfect thing, glowing and stately — it’s an incomparable experience of communing with a great and generous intellect. Like Cao’s The Story of the Stone, The Leopard concerns an aristocratic family trembling on the brink of change, and like The Story of the Stone, it was published only posthumously. Although both authors died unrecognized, their books became probably the most popular and beloved books of their respective countries.
About the book, from the publisher:How subtler forms of balance-of-power politics can help states achieve their goals against aggressive powers without wars or arms racesVisit T.V. Paul's website.
At the end of the Cold War, the United States emerged as the world’s most powerful state, and then used that power to initiate wars against smaller countries in the Middle East and South Asia. According to balance-of-power theory—the bedrock of realism in international relations—other states should have joined together militarily to counterbalance the U.S.’s rising power. Yet they did not. Nor have they united to oppose Chinese aggression in the South China Sea or Russian offensives along its Western border.
This does not mean balance-of-power politics is dead, argues renowned international relations scholar T.V. Paul, but that it has taken a different form. Rather than employ familiar strategies such as active military alliances and arms buildups, leading powers have engaged in “soft balancing,” which seeks to restrain threatening powers through the use of international institutions, informal alignments, and economic sanctions. Paul places the evolution of balancing behavior in historical perspective from the post-Napoleonic era to today’s globalized world.
Lou Berney is the author of November Road and three previous novels, Gutshot Straight, Whiplash River, and multiple prize-winning The Long and Faraway Gone.The Passenger, by Lisa LutzRead about another entry on the list.
(Remember: Life on the run is hard)
This terrific contemporary thriller has a simple premise: a woman’s husband dies and she goes on the run. Well, all right, it’s not the simple. The woman didn’t kill her husband, but has lots—and lots—of secrets. She has to go on the run.
One of the things that makes The Passenger so good—in addition to Lutz’s prose, her feel for character, the twisting plot—is the attention to detail, the authenticity, the grit and thegrind. The main character, Tanya, doesn’t have any special skills or connections or resources that will make her escape easier.
In this novel, there’s nothing glamorous about life on the run. Tanya, flees to Nebraska and then to Austin and Wyoming and upstate New York. She’s not, in other words, sipping cocktails and watching the sunset in Venice. She’s dyeing her hair in motel bathrooms and laboring with a razor blade over a fake passport that she hopes will pass muster at a Western Union office.
This, you think as you read The Passenger—the tedium and the dread—is what trying to disappear would really, truly feel like.
People always ask me who I want to play my characters in movies, but I don't see my characters as anything other than the characters I've lived with in my head for a year, so this is always a very difficult question.Visit Matthew Farrell's website.
My sister-in-law suggested Ryan Gosling and...[read on]
Cloudstreet by Tim WintonRead about another entry on the list.
The definitive Australian classic, this is one of my favorite Tim Winton novels: an epic, sprawling and quintessentially antipodean family story.
I’m going to begin this with a caveat: I am a national security analyst by trade, with a PhD in War Studies. So the vast majority of my writing so far has been nonfiction and analytic prose, which is definitely reflected in my reading. Yet in recent years, as the United States and the world have woken up to an era of geostrategic complexity that we’re only at the beginning of wrapping our brains around, I’ve turned to fiction and story to help me understand the world in a different, non-methodologically bound way. That’s one of the big reasons that I wrote The Heart of War: Misadventures in the Pentagon: to better understand and explain the often-wacky way we do national security. In other words, I’m trying to channel both the creative and analytic parts of my mind to figure out where we are as a country, and what we might do about it. And have fun while doing so.About The Heart of War, from the publisher:
To that end, what am I reading now? The proposal to establish a Space Force is pretty hot right now, and I’m trying to understand its historical antecedents. The last major Department of Defense (DoD) reorganization was just over 30 years ago, with the Goldwater-Nichols Act (1986) and the subsequent Nunn-Cohen amendment (1987). I’m once again digging into Victory on the Potomac by Jim Locher to understand why...[read on]
The Devil Wears Prada meets Catch-22; a novel about a young woman’s journey into the heart of Washington’s war machine.Visit Kathleen J. McInnis's website.
Dr. Heather Reilly has been an anti-war activist since her brother died fighting the Taliban. But her crushing student loans drive her to take a job working on a peace plan for Afghanistan, in the last place on Earth she ever thought she'd be employed: the Pentagon. On her first day, however, her position is eliminated and she’s shuffled to a war-fighting office focused on combating Russian aggression. Unfortunately, she knowslittle about Russia and has deep moral reservations about war. Making matters worse, she’s also working for Ariane Fletcher—a woman so terrifying, she eats generals for breakfast. As Heather learns to navigate the Pentagon’s insane bureaucracy and petty power struggles, she finds that her successes come at the expense of her personal life... and that small mistakes can have major consequences in the Department of Defense.
From Washington D.C.'s corridors of power to the dusty streets of Kabul, Kathleen McInnis spins a smart, hilarious, and heartwarming tale that shines a light on the often frustrating but sometimes rewarding experience of a career in the Pentagon. Packed with insider knowledge about one of the least-known—yet most-powerful—organizations in U.S. national security, McInnis' debut novel establishes her as a major new literary voice with a point of view we've never seen before.
Read about another entry on the list.Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward (2011).
Ward is, simply put, a legend in the making. This story haunts me, illustrating how the fierceness of family can be both tender and as destructive as the storm — Hurricane Katrina — that provides the novel's backdrop.
About the book, from the publisher:Joel Higgins has 901 unsent text messages saved on his phone. Ever since the thing that happened, there are certain people he hasn’t been able to talk to in person. Sure, he shows up at school, does his mandatory volunteer hours at the soup kitchen, and spends pretty much every moment thinking about Eli, the most amazing girl in the world. But that doesn’t mean he’s keeping it together, or even that he has any friends. So instead of hanging out with people in real life, he drafts text messages. But he never presses send. As dismal as sophomore year was for Joel, he doesn’t see how junior year will be any better. For starters, Eli doesn’t know how he feels about her, his best friend Andy’s gone, and he basically bombed the SATs. But as Joel spends more time at the soup kitchen with Eli and Benj, the new kid whose mouth seems to be unconnected to his brain, he forms bonds with the people they serve there—including a veteran they call Rooster—and begins to understand that the world is bigger than his own pain. In this dazzling, hilarious, and heartbreaking debut, Joel grapples with the aftermath of a tragic loss as he tries to make sense of the problems he’s sees all around him with the help of banned books, Winnie-the-Pooh, a field of asparagus, and many pairs of socks.Visit K.J. Reilly's website.
April Genevieve Tucholke is the author of Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, Between the Spark and the Burn, and Wink Poppy Midnight.WIZARD IN A FLOPPY HATRead about another entry on the list.
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke
The Lord of the Rings is teeming with Norse myths and Norse beasts, but even the concept of Gandalf’s wide-brimmed hat traces back to the sagas. Odin oftenwandered the land disguised as a traveler, and was described as having a long, white beard, a cloak, a staff, and a floppy hat.
I adore how Susanna Clarke played with this trope in Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. Early on, Jonathan is subtly referred to as the Knight of Wands, which is depicted on the Marseilles Tarot—the deck that the (secret protagonist) Childermass uses in the novel—as a man in a large-brimmed hat, carrying a staff. Jonathan Strange does become a wizard/magician, and a wandering one at that ... though he never grows the beard.
On the 200th anniversary of the publication of Frankenstein, comes a riveting biography of its author, Mary Shelley, whose life reads like a dark gothic novel, filled with scandal, death, drama, and one of the strangest love stories in literary history.Visit Catherine Reef's website.
The story of Frankenstein’s creator is a strange, romantic, and tragic one, as deeply compelling as the novel itself. Mary ran away to Lake Geneva with the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley when she was just sixteen. It was there, during a cold and wet summer, that she first imagined her story about a mad scientist who brought a corpse back to life. Success soon followed for Mary, but also great tragedy and misfortune.
Catherine Reef brings this passionate woman, brilliant writer, and forgotten feminist into crisp focus, detailing a life that was remarkable both before and after the publication of her iconic masterpiece.
blog he tagged ten books "that will make you the darling of hiring managers everywhere." One entry on the list:Presence, by Amy CuddyRead about another entry on the list.
While most of us focus on studying up on the company we are interviewing for so we can answer every question and amaze with our experience and intelligence, there’s a whole other aspect that’s all about how you present yourself—your posture, your clothing, your presence. Harvard professor Cuddy gave a TED Talk about this very subject, then distilled it into this book, which will give you insight into how you can harness your energy and physicality in order to be confident and present in the moment. Although not specific to interviews, there’s little doubt Cuddy’s ideas won’t lead to a better impression in the room.
Her entry begins:In a chapter of Words We Don’s Say, Eli, one of the main characters, stands up in English class and reads a long list of the countries where you could be arrested or put to death for reading the books they are reading in that class—and the list goes on for pages. It’s important for all of us to be reminded that criminalizing freethinking, banning books—and even burning books—isn't just reserved for other countries or the past, or regimes like the Nazis in Germany. Oppressive thinkers can't be geo or time tagged—they’re everywhere. And history repeats itself. Books have not only been banned and burned throughout time; they've been banned and burned all over the world—even in America in the 21st century.About Words We Don't Say, from the publisher:
So since free speech is an important theme in Words We Don't Say, and this week is Banned Books Week – September 23-29th – I’m re-reading as many banned books as I can—from And Tango Makes Three and...[read on]
Joel Higgins has 901 unsent text messages saved on his phone. Ever since the thing that happened, there are certain people he hasn’t been able to talk to in person. Sure, he shows up at school, does his mandatory volunteer hours at the soup kitchen, and spends pretty much every moment thinking about Eli, the most amazing girl in the world. But that doesn’t mean he’s keeping it together, or even that he has any friends. So instead ofVisit K.J. Reilly's website.hanging out with people in real life, he drafts text messages. But he never presses send. As dismal as sophomore year was for Joel, he doesn’t see how junior year will be any better. For starters, Eli doesn’t know how he feels about her, his best friend Andy’s gone, and he basically bombed the SATs. But as Joel spends more time at the soup kitchen with Eli and Benj, the new kid whose mouth seems to be unconnected to his brain, he forms bonds with the people they serve there—including a veteran they call Rooster—and begins to understand that the world is bigger than his own pain. In this dazzling, hilarious, and heartbreaking debut, Joel grapples with the aftermath of a tragic loss as he tries to make sense of the problems he’s sees all around him with the help of banned books, Winnie-the-Pooh, a field of asparagus, and many pairs of socks.
Lost in the City and All Aunt Hagar's Children by Edward P. JonesRead about another entry on the list.
Jones won the Pulitzer for his Antebellum novel, The Known World, but his two short story collections may be his masterworks. In them, D.C. is an intimate setting for his cast of weary and loving mothers, grieving friends, and estranged partners. As a native Washingtonian, Jones places his characters at intersections of real streets and as a deeply gifted writer, Jones beautifully renders those characters when they find themselves at treacherous emotional crossroads.
The Devil Wears Prada meets Catch-22; a novel about a young woman’s journey into the heart of Washington’s war machine.Visit Kathleen J. McInnis's website.
Dr. Heather Reilly has been an anti-war activist since her brother died fighting the Taliban. But her crushing student loans drive her to take a job working on a peace plan for Afghanistan, in the last place on Earth she ever thought she'd be employed: the Pentagon. On her first day, however, her position is eliminated and she’s shuffled to a war-fighting office focused on combating Russian aggression. Unfortunately, she knows little about Russia and has deep moral reservations about war. Making matters worse, she’s also working for Ariane Fletcher—a woman so terrifying, she eats generals for breakfast. As Heather learns to navigate the Pentagon’s insane bureaucracy and petty power struggles, she finds that her successes come at the expense of her personal life... and that small mistakes can have major consequences in the Department of Defense.
From Washington D.C.'s corridors of power to the dusty streets of Kabul, Kathleen McInnis spins a smart, hilarious, and heartwarming tale that shines a light on the often frustrating but sometimes rewarding experience of a career in the Pentagon. Packed with insider knowledge about one of the least-known—yet most-powerful—organizations in U.S. national security, McInnis' debut novel establishes her as a major new literary voice with a point of view we've never seen before.
Claire Legrand's new book, Sawkill Girls, is a queer young adult horror novel.The Boneless Mercies by April Genevieve TucholkeRead about another entry on the list.
Tucholke is one of my favorite young adult authors, her books characterized by immaculately crafted atmosphere and prose so decadent you’re compelled to read it aloud to savor the sensation of the language on your tongue. Her latest, The Boneless Mercies (out October 2), is her best work yet. Inspired by Beowulf, this dark fantasy stars four girls—Frey, Ovie, Juniper, and Runa—who are hired to carry out mercy killings. Butthese girls dream of a better life, so when Frey hears about a terrible monster terrorizing a nearby kingdom, the Mercies see an opportunity: Slay the beast. Reap the rewards. Become legends. Like all Tucholke’s works, The Boneless Mercies is beautifully written and features four bloodthirsty girls who are willing to stop at nothing in their quest to reclaim ownership of their own lives. They are unapologetic in their viciousness, and immersing myself in their story—especially in this fraught era of #MeToo and uncertainty about the future—was cathartic, comforting, and empowering.
From early sitcoms such as I Love Lucy to contemporary prime-time dramas like Scandal and How to Get Away with Murder, African Americans on television have too often been asked to portray tired stereotypes of blacks as villains, vixens, victims, and disposable minorities. In Technicolored black feminist critic Ann duCille combines cultural critique with personal reflections on growing up with the new medium of TV to examine how televisual representations of African Americans have changed over the last sixty years. Whether explaining how watching Shirley Temple led her to question her own self-worth or how televisual representation functions as a form of racial profiling, duCille traces the real-life social and political repercussions of the portrayal and presence of African Americans on television. Neither a conventional memoir nor a traditional media study, Technicolored offers one lifelong television watcher's careful, personal, and timely analysis of how television continues to shape notions of race in the American imagination.Learn more about Technicolored at the Duke University Press website.
I just finished Bree Barton’s Heart of Thorns, which is a beautifully-written, fast-moving YA epic fantasy set in a world where only women have magic. I’m also...[read on]About The Seven Torments of Amy and Craig (a Love Story), from the publisher:
Janesville, Wisconsin (cold in the sense that there is no God)Visit Don Zolidis's website.
1994
“You’re going to find somebody so much better than me.”
“What? No, I’m not! Look at me! Are you insane?”
The worst thing that’s ever happened to Craig is also the best: Amy. Craig and Amy should never have gotten together-Craig is a Dungeons and Dragons master with no life skills andAmy is the beautiful, fiercely intelligent student body president of their high school.
Yet somehow they did until Amy dumped him. Then got back together with him. Seven times to be exact.
Over the course of their senior year, Amy and Craig’s exhilarating, tumultuous relationship is a kaleidoscope of joy and pain as an uncertain future-and adult responsibility-looms on the horizon.
Craig fights for his dream of escaping Janesville and finding his place at a quirky college, while Amy’s quest to uncover her true self sometimes involves being Craig’s girlfriend and sometimes doesn’t.
Seven breakups. Seven makeups. Seven of the highest lows and lowest highs. Told non-sequentially, acclaimed playwright Don Zolidis’s debut novel is a brutally funny, bittersweet taste of the utterly unique and utterly universal experience of first love.
WOLF HALL by Hilary MantelRead about another entry on the list.
I love the character of Thomas Cromwell even though he’s a terrible man.
Mantel makes you obsessed with him and you’re transported right into his world.
She is one of the best at recreating the excitement and dirt of the time.
About the book, from the publisher:What if the empty space was what made you whole?Visit Kendra Fortmeyer's website.
Morgan Stone was born with a hole in her middle: a perfectly smooth, sealed, fist-sized chunk of nothing near her belly button. After seventeen years of hiding behind lumpy sweaters and a smart mouth, she’s fed up with keeping her secret. On the dance floor one night, she decides to bare all.
At first she feels liberated ... until a few online photos snowball into a media frenzy. Now Morgan is desperate to return to her own strange version of normal—when only her doctors, her divorced parents, and her best friend, Caro, knew the truth. But tragically Morgan’s newfound openness and Internet celebrity seem to push those closest to her further and further away.
Then a new doctor appears with a boy who may be both Morgan’s cure and her destiny. What happens when you meet the person who is—literally—your perfect match? Is being whole really all it’s cracked up to be?
The entry begins:I’m very much a visual writer, playing scenes out in my head as if I were seeing them on screen, but, oddly enough, I’ve only ever mentally cast two characters in my novels until now. From the moment she introduced me to him at the end of Bohemian Gospel, Mouse’s dad has always been Robert Downey, Jr. in my head. Sardonic, smart, and suave—though he can become vicious at the turn of a dime.Visit Dana Chamblee Carpenter's website.
And, without giving any spoilers, there’s a character we meet near the end of Book of the Just who came to me emphatically as Tom Hardy (you’ll see why this is especially interesting when you read the book). Playing with that casting actually helped me develop nuances in the character. What a wicked joy it would be to see these guys actually take...[read on]
Peter Stone is a lifelong fan of thrillers on the big screen, small screen, and page. Prior to his career in TV and film marketing, he worked in Washington, DC, first as an intern on Capitol Hill and later as a Spanish tutor for a former Speaker of the House.John Grisham, The Pelican BriefRead about another entry on the list.
Law school student Darby Shaw is the rare female Grisham protagonist, and this time, the author takes his main character beyond his traditional Southern courtroom setting—all the way to the White House. With two Supreme Court justice assassinations and a car bomb in the first few chapters, Shaw’s riveting journey of paranoia is a must-read for those who haven’t met her yet; and worth revisiting for fans who devoured the book long ago. Grisham’s gift for making even research scenes breathless made my own lifelong love of thrillers took root.
Confession: there are lots of books I don’t finish. But George Saunders is an author whose work compels me to continue reading, all the way to the last carefully chosen word. With Lincoln in the Bardo, I’m deep in. It’s fascinating to see how this book unfolds—it feels like a gathering of poignant short stories arranged as a theatrical script. A complicated wafting beauty...[read on]About The Madonna of the Mountains, from the publisher:
An epic, inspiring novel about one woman’s survival in the hardscrabble Italian countryside and her determination to protect her family throughout the Second World War—by any means possibleVisit Elise Valmorbida's website.
Maria Vittoria is twenty-five when her father brings home the man who will become her husband. It is 1923 in the austere Italian mountain village where her family has lived for generations, and the man she sees is tall and handsome and has survived the First World War without any noticeable scars. Taking just the linens she has sewn that make up her dowry and a statue of the Madonna that sits by her bedside, Maria leaves the only life she has ever known to begin a family. But her future will not be what she imagines.
The Madonna of the Mountains follows Maria over the next three decades, as she moves to the town where she and her husband become shopkeepers, through the birth of theirfive children, through the hardships and cruelties of the National Fascist Party Rule and the Second World War. Struggling with the cost of survival at a time when food is scarce and allegiances are questioned, Maria trusts no one and fears everyone—her Fascist cousin, the madwoman from her childhood, her watchful neighbors, the Nazis and the Partisans who show up hungry at her door. As Maria’s children grow up and her marriage endures its own hardships, she must hold her family together with resilience, love, and faith, until she makes a fateful decision that will change the course of all their lives.
A sweeping saga about womanhood, loyalty, war, religion, family, food, motherhood, and marriage, The Madonna of the Mountains is a poignant look at the span of one woman’s life as the rules change and her world becomes unrecognizable. In depicting the great cost of war and the ineluctable power of time on a life, Elise Valmorbida has created an unforgettable portrait of a woman navigating both the unforeseen and the inevitable.
About the book, from the publisher:The postwar United States has experienced many forms of populist politics, none more consequential than that of the blue-collar white ethnics who brought figures like Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump to the White House. Blue-Collar Conservatism traces the rise of this little-understood, easily caricatured variant of populism by presenting a nuanced portrait of the supporters of Philadelphia Mayor Frank Rizzo.Learn more about Blue-Collar Conservatism at the University of Pennsylvania Press website.
In 1971, Frank Rizzo became the first former police commissioner elected mayor of a major American city. Despite serving as a Democrat, Rizzo cultivated his base of support by calling for "law and order" and opposing programs like public housing, school busing, affirmative action, and other policies his supporters deemed unearned advantages for nonwhites. Out of this engagement with the interwoven politics of law enforcement, school desegregation, equal employment, and urban housing, Timothy J. Lombardo argues, blue-collar populism arose.
Based on extensive archival research, and with an emphasis on interrelated changes to urban space and blue-collar culture, Blue-Collar Conservatism challenges the familiar backlash narrative, instead contextualizing blue-collar politics within postwar urban and economic crises. Historian and Philadelphia-native Lombardo demonstrates how blue-collar whites did not immediately abandon welfare liberalism but instead selectively rejected liberal policies based on culturally defined ideas of privilege, disadvantage, identity, and entitlement. While grounding his analysis in the postwar era's familiar racial fissures, Lombardo also emphasizes class identity as an indispensable driver of blue-collar political engagement. Blue-Collar Conservatism ultimately shows how this combination of factors created one of the least understood but most significant political developments in recent American history.
Judy Wajcman is the Anthony Giddens Professor of Sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science. She is the author of several books on technology and culture, such as The Social Shaping of Technology, Feminism Confronts Technology and TechnoFeminism.
Tim Wu’s The Attention Merchants reveals how the campaign to capture and monetise our attention has shaped advertising. There is no precedent for how much time we now spend staring at screens, whether at work, leisure or for everything in between. Wu is right to focus on design: the expertise of the world’s best psychologists is being harnessed to keep us online. No wonder we find these platforms addictive – they are meant to be.Read about another entry on the list.
AN INGENIOUS DEBUT NOVELVisit Scott Von Doviak's website.
INSPIRED BY A REAL UNSOLVED CRIME!
1946: A group of criminals pulls off the heist of the century, stealing a dozen priceless works of art from a Boston museum. Some of the thieves are captured, some are killed—but the loot is never found.
Forty years later, a college student finds himself on the trail of the missing art—and the multi-million-dollar reward.
But three decades after that, the art is still missing, and as his classmates return to Boston’s notorious Charlesgate Hotel for their big 25th reunion, dead bodies keep turning up. Will the stolen masterpieces be discovered at last?
A breathtakingly clever, twist-filled narrative that moves from 1946 to 1986 to 2014 and back again—and is steeped in Boston lore, including three unforgettable seasons of Red Sox baseball—CHARLESGATE CONFIDENTIAL establishes Scott Von Doviak as a storyteller of the first order, and will leave you guessing until the final page.
is Can American Capitalism Survive?: Why Greed Is Not Good, Opportunity Is Not Equal, and Fairness Won't Make Us Poor.Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis by Robert D. Putnam (2015).Read about another entry on the list.
The Harvard professor who wrote Bowling Alone here weaves tales of his hometown, Port Clinton, Ohio, with the latest economic and social science data to demonstrate how rising income inequality is eroding the American Dream.
Right now, I’m finishing up Bloody Rose by Nicholas Eames, which is the sequel to Kings of the Wyld, both from Orbit Books.About Daughters of Forgotten Light, from the publisher:
I read KotW last year and loved it. It’s all about mercenary bands that are treated like rock stars, because they hunt down dangerous monsters and kill them. Time has passed since the golden age of monster killing, and the greatest band in the land, Saga, is getting put back together by leader Golden Gabe, in order to save his daughter Rose from a horde of monsters closing in on her and her fellow mercs.
In Bloody Rose, the story continues with the titular character and her band, who...[read on]
Deep space penal colony Oubliette, population: scum. Lena “Horror” Horowitz leads the Daughters of Forgotten Light, oneVisit Sean Grigsby's website.of three vicious gangs fighting for survival on Oubliette. Their fragile truce is shaken when a new shipment arrives from Earth carrying a fresh batch of prisoners and supplies to squabble over. But the delivery includes two new surprises: a drone, and a baby. Earth Senator Linda Dolfuse wants evidence of the bloodthirsty gangs to justify the government finally eradicating the wasters dumped on Oubliette. There’s only one problem: the baby in the drone’s video may be hers.
“A Confederacy of Dunces,” by John Kennedy TooleRead about another book on the list.
The most unique, hilarious, lovable, hateable, and tragic leading man. Ignatius and his world, including all of the thoroughly entertaining, deranged characters, made me love this book very, very much. Ignatius in the Levy Pants factory is one of my favorite things in life.
The entry begins:I once imagined twenty-something Jessica James, the titular character of the series, played by Jennifer Lawrence or Emma Watson because they both are spunky young heroines. Now, at only 28, somehow Jennifer Lawrence feels too old—maybe because she’s won so many awards and played more mature roles.Visit Kelly Oliver's website.
So for Jackal, the latest installment in the Jessica James Mystery series, I’m thinking of Saorise Ronan, a fantastic actress who proved her comic chops in Lady Bird, where she was smart-mouthed (like Jessica) but also vulnerable. And in Brooklyn she was self-sufficient, strong and lovely. Hanna is my favorite. She played a genetically engineered badass. Talk about girl power!
I still like Emma Watson because along with being a great actress, she’s a feminist and she has a book club. You gotta like an actress with a book club! Okay, I’m rethinking...[read on]
How do ordinary Muslims deal with and influence the increasingly pervasive Islamic norms set by institutions of the state and religion? Becoming Better Muslims offers an innovative account of the dynamic interactions between individual Muslims, religious authorities, and the state in Aceh, Indonesia. Relying on extensive historical and ethnographic research, David Kloos offers a detailed analysis of religious life in Aceh and an investigation into today’s personal processes of ethical formation.Learn more about Becoming Better Muslims at the Princeton University Press website.
Aceh is known for its history of rebellion and its recent implementation of Islamic law. Debunking the stereotypical image of the Acehnese as inherently pious or fanatical, Kloos shows how Acehnese Muslims reflect consciously on their faith and often frame their religious lives in terms of gradual ethical improvement. Revealing that most Muslims view their lives through the prism of uncertainty, doubt, and imperfection, he argues that these senses of failure contribute strongly to how individuals try to become better Muslims. He also demonstrates that while religious authorities have encroached on believers and local communities, constraining them in their beliefs and practices, the same process has enabled ordinary Muslims to reflect on moral choices and dilemmas, and to shape the ways religious norms are enforced.
Arguing that Islamic norms are carried out through daily negotiations and contestations rather than blind conformity, Becoming Better Muslims examines how ordinary people develop and exercise their religious agency.
The Prisoner in the Castle by Susan Elia MacNealRead about the other entries on the list.
Maggie Hope has swiftly become the quintessential female spy of the WW2-era. A brilliant cryptographer, courageous secret agent, and incisive investigator—it seems there’s nothing Maggie cannot do. Each novel allows readers to delve into another aspect of WW2 spy-craft, and another intricate setting to be swept off into adventure.
I tend not to read my contemporaries while I’m in in the midst of writing and/or editing a novel and I’m doing both at the moment. I steer away as I’m concerned the author’s voice might bleed into my head. I write voice before plot so I must be careful to keep the demarcation clear. For whatever reason, I don’t have that concern with the classics. If they can improve my writing, game on. Right now, I’m rereading Eleven, a collection of Patricia Highsmith’s short stories written between 1945 and 1970 and first published as a collection in 1980. She is a master of the craft. Who else can write a story about death by snails that leaves you trembling on the edge of your seat?About What She Gave Away, from the publisher:
Even the introduction catches my attention, written by another grandmaster, Graham Greene. He doesn’t categorize her writing as...[read on]
Revenge is anything but sweet in this twisty thriller about two women with very different lives locked in the same deadly game.Visit Catharine Riggs's website.
Imagining the best way to destroy a person’s happiness is Crystal Love’s favorite game. Devious and unpolished, the plus-sized loan analyst couldn’t be more out of place in her new town of Santa Barbara, where the beautifully manicured women never age and theocean views stretch farther than the million-dollar lawns. And yet her eye for the power dynamics at play in this tony community is dead accurate.
Kathi Wright, on the other hand, has made it her life’s work to fit in with the plastic people who surround her. But when her husband—a wealthy bank president—dies suddenly, she’s left with nothing. Then the FBI shows up, asking questions she can’t answer and freezing assets she once took for granted.
While Kathi struggles to outrun the mess caused by her husband’s mysterious death, Crystal seems focused on her game. But why? And who are her targets?
Spanning two years and told in Crystal’s and Kathi’s alternating voices, this tautly plotted novel reveals the power of choice and the price of revenge.
Grief and guilt are the ghosts that haunt you when you survive what others do not….Visit Paula Munier's website.
After their last deployment, when she got shot, her fiancé Martinez got killed and his bomb-sniffing dog Elvis got depressed, soldier Mercy Carr and Elvis were both sent home, her late lover’s last words ringing in her ears: “Take care of my partner.”
Together the two former military police—one twenty-nine-year-old two-legged female with wounds deeper than skin and one handsome five-year-old four-legged Malinois with canine PTSD—march off their grief mile after mile in the beautiful remote Vermont wilderness.
Even on the Fourth of July weekend, when all of Northshire celebrates with fun and frolic and fireworks, it’s just another walk in the woods for Mercy and Elvis—until the dog alerts to explosives and they find a squalling baby abandoned near a shallow grave filled with what appear to be human bones.
U.S. Game Warden Troy Warner and his search and rescue Newfoundland Susie Bear respond to Mercy’s 911 call, and the four must work together to track down a missing mother, solve a cold-case murder, and keep the citizens of Northshire safe on potentially the most incendiary Independence Day since the American Revolution.
It’s a call to action Mercy and Elvis cannot ignore, no matter what the cost.
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