Talk about a new kind of family ...
What sweet agony to have so many fantabulous, freakin’ spectacular books from which to cull. I’ve got my 2017 favorite adult titles down to a baker’s dozen, chosen under great duress. They’re presented in alphabetical order – opposed to actually ranked, a feat which just might...
*STARRED REVIEW Arimah's debut collection comprises a dozen surprising, affecting stories. Narrator Adjoa Andoh sublimely intensifies the author's already breathtaking prose into an irresistible, spectacular performance, as she effortlessly modulates her distinctive voice, picking up genders and generations, cadences and accents, and just as easily discards...
*STARRED REVIEW Skipping and dancing home from school, a young girl carries in one hand a dream catcher she's made, and with the other she holds onto her Grandpa. "How do you say grandfather in Cree?" she asks. And suddenly their walk turns somber as Grandpa...
'Home Fire' is an exquisite modern tragedy about families caught between religion, politics That Home Fire is among the recently announced 2017 Man Booker Dozen means it arrives stateside with quite the notable stamp of approval. The novel is considerably more affecting than that other longlist...
*STARRED REVIEW At 27, Majime – whose very name means “serious, diligent” – is recruited from sales by the Dictionary Editorial Department of Gembu Books to help compile The Great Passage, an überdictionary destined to guide users across the vast sea of words. Socially awkward Majime embarks...
Q&A with Thi Bui: Writer, Illustrator, Teacher On the cover of Thi Bui’s The Best We Could Do: An Illustrated Memoir is a perfect quote: “A book to break our heart and heal it,” blurbs fellow Vietnamese American refugee and 2016 Pulitzer Prize winner for fiction...
'The Golden Legend' tells a magnificent story of terror and dignity I must confess: I missed my deadline. I simply didn’t want to finish this book. Letting go of Nargis, Lily, Helen, and Imran felt like a visceral cleaving. While Nadeem Aslam’s previous novels, including Maps...
*STARRED REVIEW "There's magic in this world. And miracles." In his second translated work to hit stateside (after The Investigation), bestselling Korean author J.M. Lee – again linguistically enabled by gifted translator Chi-Young Kim – will make you believe. Lee's silent protagonist sits in a New York...
Talking about families can sometimes be daunting for kids, especially when you can't check off those expected, so-called "traditional" boxes on who's who of your bestest loved ones. Sitting in her classroom discussing "what we thought made our family special," one little girl is not...
*STARRED REVIEW Presenting her dozen stories in six interlinked pairs, Shobha Rao uses the savage 1947 Partition of India and Pakistan as her narrative center, with reverberations moving outward beyond borders, cultures, countries, and generations. A 13-year-old's would-be widowhood spent in a refugee camp is the best...
Anna is 7 when her father disappears. In 1939 Krakow, Poland, being Jewish is enough to condemn people to death. When the Swallow Man appears – so named for his ability to conjure and communicate with birds – the unlikely pair reluctantly recognize in each other not...
Barbara Thorson is most definitely not your average fifth-grader. She refuses to buy the "motivational speaking" going on in the front of the classroom on career day, quipping to the less-than-esteemed guest, "I already have a 'career,' thank you." Indeed, Barbara's calling is so much greater:...
*STARRED REVIEW In his sublime "foreword [that] might be better thought of as an afterword," physician and bestselling author Abraham Verghese reveals that he came to know Paul Kalanithi "most intimately when he'd ceased to be." That, too, is true of every listener here. Neurosurgeon Kalanithi died in...
For those of us of a certain (old) age, we might remember an animated rabbit used to sell artificially colored, chemically flavored powder that altered milk into some sort of sweet goop: Quiky the Quik Bunny would quip "You can't drink it slow, if it's Quik."...
The single-page "author's note" which introduces this stupendous, otherwise-wordless wonder is a full story unto itself: Guojing reveals her lonely childhood growing up in 1980s China under the one-child policy. Her parents worked, and she was often cared for by her grandmother. But sometimes when...
Winter is quickly settling around us ...
Oh, oh, oh. What a perceptive, thoughtful, gorgeous gift are these pages. Yes, if books have a soul, this would be it – not to mention history, context, and universal appeal bound in as well. Guyanese British poet/playwright/children's writer John Agard 'transcribes' the story of Book over the centuries and...
