Shelf Awareness Archives - Page 11 of 19

Prefecture D: Four Novellas by Hideo Yokoyama, translated by Jonathan Lloyd-Davies [in Shelf Awareness]

21 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Japanese, Repost, Short Stories, Translation

Hideo Yokoyama (Seventeen) might not yet have a following in the U.S. like some of his compatriot mystery writers – Keigo Higashino and Natsuo Kirino, for example – but the acclaim he's earned in his native Japan will likely spread to English-language readers. With Jonathan...

Class Act by Jerry Craft [in Shelf Awareness]

20 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Black/African American, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Middle Grade Readers, Repost

Welcome back to a new year at Riverdale Academy Day (RAD) School in Jerry Craft's entertaining follow-up to his 2020 Newbery Medal-winning debut, New Kid. Wannabe artist Jordan reunites with his closest friends: Liam, who arrives from his family's Riverdale mansion via chauffeur, and Drew, who...

The Bear and the Moon by Matthew Burgess, illustrated by Cátia Chien [in Shelf Awareness]

16 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific, Repost, South American, Taiwanese American

A young bear wakes from a long nap to be greeted with a surprise: "It was red as a berry and round like the moon with a long silver string drifting brightly in the breeze." What Matthew Burgess' adorable ursine hero does with the unexpected...

A Measure of Belonging: Twenty-One Writers of Color on the New American South edited by Cinelle Barnes [in Shelf Awareness]

15 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Black/African American, Filipina/o American, Indian American, Latina/o/x, Nonfiction, Repost, South Asian American, Southeast Asian American

Edited by memoirist and essayist Cinelle Barnes, A Measure of Belonging gathers 21 "established and emerging" writers of color with Southern ties – by birth, immigration, relocation. The resulting collection examines, defines, and confronts the idea of belonging. A highlight is Carnegie Medal-winner Kiese Laymon's (Heavy)...

The Hole by Hiroko Oyamada, translated by David Boyd [in Shelf Awareness]

14 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Japanese, Repost, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW In Hiroko Oyamada's intriguing parable-like The Hole, a young childless couple, Asa and Muneaki, trade urban for rural when Muneaki is transferred for work. They end up living rent-free next door to his parents in a conveniently vacated rental house his parents own. While...

Bring Me the Head of Quentin Tarantino: Stories by Julián Herbert, translated by Christina MacSweeney [in Shelf Awareness]

13 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Latin American, Latina/o/x, Mexican, Repost, Short Stories, Translation

The genre-hopping, award-winning Mexican writer, poet, musician, and teacher Julián Herbert made his English-language debut with Tomb Song, an autobiographical novel focused on his relationship with his late mother, a prostitute dying of leukemia. His nonfiction The House of the Pain of Others is a hybrid...

White Ivy by Susie Yang [in Shelf Awareness]

12 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Chinese American, Fiction, Repost

Susie Yang's electrifying debut novel, White Ivy, has well earned its spot on the longlist for the Center for Fiction's 2020 First Novel Prize. Part immigrant story, part elitist takedown, part contemporary novel of wicked manners, White Ivy is an unpredictable spectacle. At 2, Ivy Lin...

Each of Us Killers by Jenny Bhatt [in Shelf Awareness]

06 Oct, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Indian, Indian American, Repost, Short Stories, South Asian, South Asian American

*STARRED REVIEW Debut collections rarely prove even in quality and efficacy, which makes Jenny Bhatt's 15 compelling stories in Each of Us Killers even more memorable. Peripatetically spread across continents, Bhatt's characters are often caught between expectations, desires, and boundaries. Bhatt opens with a bang – literally. In...

Welcome to the New World by Jake Halpern, illustrated by Michael Sloan [in Shelf Awareness]

23 Sep, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Biography, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction, Repost, Syrian, Syrian American, Young Adult Readers

Welcome to the New World made its debut as a biweekly comic strip in the New York Times that "chronicle[d] the arrival and experience of a single [Syrian] family." The author/illustrator team, Jake Halpern and Michael Sloan, went on to win the 2018 Pulitzer Prize...

Somewhere in the Unknown World: A Collective Refugee Memoir by Kao Kalia Yang [in Shelf Awareness]

21 Sep, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Biography, Black/African American, European, Hmong American, Memoir, Myanmarese (Burmese) American, Nonfiction, Repost, Syrian American, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

"The people in this book are people from your lives," Kao Kalia Yang writes to her three sleeping children in the final chapter of her affecting hybrid nonfiction collection, Somewhere in the Unknown World: A Collective Refugee Memoir. Minnesota – where Yang has lived for...

Fly on the Wall by Remy Lai [in Shelf Awareness]

18 Sep, by SIBookDragon in Australian, Australian Asian, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Indonesian, Middle Grade Readers, Repost, Singaporean

Duplicating the prose and graphic hybrid format of her award-winning debut, Pie in the Sky, Indonesia-born Remy Lai presents Fly on the Wall, another pitch-perfect middle-grade book about the longing to belong. As the youngest Khoo, 12-year-old Henry is "FORBIDDEN from Doing Anything on His Own...

Dead Girls by Selva Almada, translated by Annie McDermott [in Shelf Awareness]

17 Sep, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Memoir, Nonfiction, Repost, South American, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW "As a girl, I sensed that there wasn't really anywhere I was safe," Selva Almada (The Wind That Lays Waste) reveals in the chilling author's note about growing up in a provincial Argentinian town. By 8, Almada had already experienced verbal sexual abuse, accosted...

Julián at the Wedding by Jessica Love [in Shelf Awareness]

09 Sep, by SIBookDragon in Black/African American, Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Repost

Introduced in author/illustrator Jessica Love’s 2018 Julián Is a Mermaid, self-expressive Julián returns for a command performance in Julián at the Wedding, this time with a fabulous partner-in-play, Marisol. Repeating her memorably affecting formula of minimal text/maximum art, Love again offers another sparkling gift to...

Igifu by Scholastique Mukasonga, translated by Jordan Stump [in Shelf Awareness]

28 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, African, European, Fiction, French, Repost, Short Stories, Translation

*STARRED REVIEW A Rwandan exile living in France, Scholastique Mukasonga pulled from her extraordinary life to write two notable memoirs, Cockroaches and The Barefoot Woman (a 2019 National Book Award Translated Literature finalist). Autobiographical elements continue to haunt her exquisite collection, Igifu, through five wrenching stories. Born in 1956, Mukasonga had a...

My Favorite Memories by Sepideh Sarihi, illustrated by Julie Völk, translated by Elisabeth Lauffer [in Shelf Awareness]

21 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Children/Picture Books, European, Fiction, Iranian, Repost, Translation

A globally collaborative trio – Iranian German author Sepideh Sarihi, Austrian artist Julie Völk, and U.S. translator Elisabeth Lauffer – present lucky audiences My Favorite Memories, a poignant, hopeful journey of transition and relocation. "I was brushing my hair when Papa came in and told...

Sweet Time by Weng Pixin [in Shelf Awareness]

20 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Repost, Singaporean, Singaporean American, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American

In Singaporean artist Weng Pixin’s striking debut graphic collection, Sweet Time, the connecting theme throughout is clarified in the fourth story, "Ballad," using the commonly repeated "he loves me, he loves me not" refrain. As anonymous fingers peel a bloom's petals, the panels flip between...

Inferno: A Memoir of Motherhood and Madness by Catherine Cho [in Shelf Awareness]

19 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, Korean American, Memoir, Nonfiction, Repost

*STARRED REVIEW Ultimately, Inferno is a love story: raw, unfiltered, wrenching, lifesaving. Catherine Cho, a Korean American literary agent living in London, makes her debut with a scorching memoir about the postpartum psychosis that nearly destroyed her – but didn't. On November 4, 2017, Cho and husband, James,...

That Time of Year by Marie NDiaye, translated by Jordan Stump [in Shelf Awareness]

18 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, European, Fiction, French, Nonethnic-specific, Repost, Translation

At a little more than 100 pages, That Time of Year by Marie NDiaye (Ladivine) might initially seem spare. The intriguing complexity, however, contained in her superb novel underscores again why she is one of France's most lauded contemporary writers, having received her country's highest...

Luci Soars by Lulu Delacre [in Shelf Awareness]

14 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Latina/o/x, Repost

With more than three dozen publishing credits, bilingual author/illustrator Lulu Delacre (Us, in Progress) knows how to balance text and art to achieve memorable literary results. In Luci Soars, Delacre introduces a girl whose noticeable difference – she doesn't have a shadow – draws out...

Addis Ababa Noir edited by Maaza Mengiste [in Shelf Awareness]

11 Aug, by SIBookDragon in Adult Readers, African, Black/African American, Fiction, Repost, Short Stories

Born in Addis Ababa, NEA fellow Maaza Mengiste (The Shadow King) takes readers home to "a growing city taking shape beneath the fraught weight of history, myth, and memory." As one of the editors for Akashic Books' ongoing Noir series, Mengiste gathers "some of Ethiopia's...

BookDragon Shelf Awareness Tag