{"id":43218,"date":"2017-12-11T11:16:27","date_gmt":"2017-12-11T16:16:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/?p=43218"},"modified":"2017-12-12T13:57:06","modified_gmt":"2017-12-12T18:57:06","slug":"favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/","title":{"rendered":"Favorite Adult Books 2017 [in The Booklist Reader]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"What sweet agony to have so many fantabulous, freakin\u2019 spectacular books from which to cull. I\u2019ve got my 2017 favorite adult titles down to a baker\u2019s dozen, chosen under great duress. They\u2019re presented in alphabetical order \u2013 opposed to actually ranked, a feat which just might send me over the edge.<\/p>\n

 
\n <\/p>\n

\"\"Augustown<\/a><\/strong> by Kei Miller<\/p>\n

Teary Kaia comes home to his grandmother-cum-great-aunt Ma Taffy with his dreadlocks (the Rasta symbol of his Nazirite vow) hacked off by his teacher, who claims Kaia’s hair is a sign of insolence. Attempting to calm Kaia \u2013 and herself \u2013 Ma Taffy imparts \u201cthe story of the flying preacherman,\u201d the (real-life) charlatan-turned-August Town prophet, Alexander Bedward. Over the decades, racial, political, economic dissonance plagues the Augustown-ies, especially threatening to Kaia\u2019s mother, who was supposed to thrive, not just survive.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"Exit West<\/a><\/strong> by Mohsin Hamid<\/p>\n

Hamid\u2019s exceptional, timely fourth novel showcases the impulses driving immigration, especially when rooted in violent conflict. In an unnamed city, Saeed and Nadia meet, fall in love, and plan their future together, but a militant takeover forces them to flee their homeland. Hamid reveals their journey, during which escape happens through \u201cdoors\u201d only accessible via the right contact at the right price. Both mellifluous and jarring, Exit <\/em>is a profound meditation on the unpredictable transience of human existence and the immeasurable cost of widespread enmity.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"The Golden Legend<\/a> <\/strong>by Nadeem Aslam<\/a><\/p>\n

Aslam takes readers to a small stretch of Grand Trunk Road, Asia\u2019s ancient thruway linking Bangladesh to Afghanistan, to fictional Zamana in contemporary Pakistan. One morning, an American stops his car on the historical thoroughfare and starts shooting. Among the dead is local architect Massud. Almost immediately, officials pressure Massud\u2019s wife Nargis to publicly forgive the murderer \u2013 an alleged American diplomat \u2013 ostensibly to avoid an international incident. To save herself \u2013 and even more the lives of those she loves who still live \u2013 Nargis must flee, setting in motion a journey toward both liberation and damnation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"The Great Passage<\/a> <\/strong>by Shion Miura, translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter<\/p>\n

At 27, Majime is recruited to help compile The Great Passage<\/em>, an \u00fcberdictionary destined to guide users across a vast sea of words. The socially awkward logophile embarks on an almost two-decade journey, during which he comes to understand the deepest meanings of friendship, dedication, and everlasting love. For Anglophone readers, this Japanese bestseller arrives as a symbiotic accomplishment: translator Carpenter renders the complicated Japanese wordplay of Miura’s whimsical original into an exceptional English delight.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"Her Body and Other Parties: Stories <\/strong>by Carmen Maria Machado<\/p>\n

Equal parts fantasy, celluloid culture homage, dystopic apocalypse, even farce, Machado\u2019s eight stories relentlessly defy labels. Women\u2019s physical beings get shrunken in \u201cEight Bites,\u201d and erased in \u201cReal Women Have Bodies.\u201d Women lose agency in \u201cThe Husband Stitch\u201d and \u201cDifficult at Parties.\u201d A woman must face sudden parenthood in \u201cMothers.\u201d A worldwide fatal plague gets parsed through an \u201cInventory\u201d of lovers. Twelve seasons of Law & Order: SVU<\/em> get pixelated into 272 \u201cviews\u201d in \u201cEspecially Heinous.\u201d And a writing residency turns horrific in \u201cThe Resident.\u201d No body is safe.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"Home Fire<\/a><\/strong> by Kamila Shamsie<\/p>\n

Shamsie’s utterly exquisite adaptation of Sophocles\u2019 Antigone<\/em> features two British-Pakistani families caught between loyalty, religion, politics, and the international war on terror. Although just one in a substantial library of Antigones through centuries, cultures, and countries, Shamsie\u2019s latest is a compelling stand-out to be witnessed, honored, and deeply commended.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body<\/strong><\/a> by Roxane Gay<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery body has a story and a history,\u201d Gay begins. The daughter of Haitian immigrants, raised upper-middle-class, Gay was smart, privileged, loved, and thin, like the rest of her family. Until she wasn\u2019t: \u201cWhat you need to know is that my life is split in two. . . there is the before and after. Before I gained weight. After I gained weight. Before I was raped. After I was raped.\u201d Weight protected her, until her corpulence became a \u201ccage\u201d from which Gay attempts to write herself free: \u201cThis is a book about learning … to allow myself to be seen and understood.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"The Leavers<\/a><\/strong> by Lisa Ko<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone had stories they told themselves to get through the days,\u201d Deming Guo muses on his 22nd birthday, summing up a lifetime of leaving and being left. Deming, also known as Daniel Wilkinson, provides half of the dual narrative of Ko\u2019s achingly insightful, gorgeously redemptive debut. The other half belongs to Deming\u2019s \u201cMama,\u201d also known as Peilan Guo, Polly Guo, and Polly Lin. In an uncertain world of what-if\u2019s and what might\/could\/should-have-been\u2019s, the pair searches for ways to live beyond mere survival.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"The Mountain<\/a><\/strong> by Paul Yoon<\/p>\n

In Yoon\u2019s second collection, loss and longing cause men and women to move, and often keep moving, sometimes in search of sanctuary, other times seeking escape. Criss-crossing the globe from the Hudson River to Shanghai, Sakhalin Island to Incheon, rural England to autonomous Spain, Yoon proves himself a literary alchemist, transforming tragedy into beauty with deft reminders of our universal connections.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"Pachinko<\/a><\/strong> by Min Jin Lee<\/a><\/p>\n

Lee\u2019s luminous, haunting epic covers almost a century, four generations, and three countries, depicting an ethnic Korean family that cannot even claim a single shared name because, as the opening line attests: \u201cHistory has failed us.\u201d In 1910, Japan annexes Korea, usurping the country while attempting to erase Korean identity. Amid the tragedies that follow, a Korean family migrates to Japan, where they live as second-class immigrants, where no level of achievement, integrity, or grit can change their status as reviled foreigners. Lee\u2019s profound novel of losses and gains explored through the social and cultural implications of pachinko-parlor owners and users is shaped by impeccable research, meticulous plotting, and empathic perception.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"Temporary People<\/a><\/strong> by Deepak Unnikrishnan<\/p>\n

Unnikrishnan\u2019s debut of (very) loosely interlinked stories is set in the United Arab Emirates, the country where he grew up, but can never claim as “home.” He gathers the tales of these temporary people who live as perpetual foreigners, as disposable workers with precarious futures. Combining surreal symbolism and linear narrative, wordplay and lists, family history and mythic retellings, Unnikrishnan uses fiction to \u201c[illuminate] how temporary status affects psyches, families, memories, fables, and language(s).\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky<\/a><\/strong> by Lesley Nneka Arimah<\/p>\n

Unpredictable, original, and unique, Arimah\u2019s dozen stories include motherless women who create phantom babies of hair, a family splintered by opportunity and distance, feuding gods, a resigned mother and daughter on the run, a mathematician who attempts to convert humanity into numbers. The UK-born, Nigerian- and U.S.-raised Arimah transforms her global citizenry into a magnificent fiction debut.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"You Don\u2019t Have to Say You Love Me: A Memoir<\/a><\/strong> by Sherman Alexie<\/p>\n

Especially for audiophiles, if you listen to one book this year, choose this one: with his uniquely sing-songy cadence, almost-chuckles, and uncontainable tears, Alexie narrates the stories of his difficult youth, his lifesaving education, his struggles between familial obligations and leaving the Spokane Indian Reservation, the losses he faced and the gains he made to become \u201cone of the Indians with the most social power.\u201d Prompted by the 2015 death of his mother, Alexie delivers a book both \u201chealing and wounding.\u201d<\/p>\n

Published<\/strong>: “Favorite Adult Books, 2017,” The Booklist Reader<\/em>, December 6, 2013<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What sweet agony to have so many fantabulous, freakin\u2019 spectacular books from which to cull. I\u2019ve got my 2017 favorite adult titles down to a baker\u2019s dozen, chosen under great duress. They\u2019re presented in alphabetical order \u2013 opposed to actually ranked, a feat which just might…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":43219,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[121,5,287,142,330,366,90,67,21,6,76,37,38,7243,404,296,6535,17,66],"tags":[7255,6608,6668,7235,7633,7242,7213,7293,7404,7632,7442,7481,652,2475,7256,7316,7587,7317,3304,295,7320,331,7135,511,6101,1104,7405,7241,7588,7484],"class_list":["post-43218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-absolute-favorites","category-adult-readers","category-african","category-black-african-american","category-british-asian","category-caribbean","category-caribbean-american","category-chinese","category-chinese-american","category-fiction","category-japanese","category-korean","category-korean-american","category-lists","category-native-american-first-nations","category-pakistani","category-repost","category-south-asian","category-translation","tag-augustown","tag-bookdragon","tag-booklist","tag-booklist-reader","tag-carmen-maria-machado","tag-deepak-unnikrishnan","tag-exit-west","tag-golden-legend","tag-great-passage","tag-her-body-and-other-parties","tag-home-fire","tag-hunger","tag-juliet-winters-carpenter","tag-kamila-shamsie","tag-kei-miller","tag-leavers","tag-lesley-nneka-arimah","tag-lisa-ko","tag-min-jin-lee","tag-mohsin-hamid","tag-mountain","tag-nadeem-aslam","tag-pachinko","tag-paul-yoon","tag-roxane-gay","tag-sherman-alexie","tag-shion-miura","tag-temporary-people","tag-what-it-means-when-a-man-falls-from-the-sky","tag-you-dont-have-to-say-you-love-me"],"yoast_head":"\nFavorite Adult Books 2017 [in The Booklist Reader] - BookDragon<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Favorite Adult Books 2017 [in The Booklist Reader] - BookDragon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What sweet agony to have so many fantabulous, freakin\u2019 spectacular books from which to cull. I\u2019ve got my 2017 favorite adult titles down to a baker\u2019s dozen, chosen under great duress. They\u2019re presented in alphabetical order \u2013 opposed to actually ranked, a feat which just might...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"BookDragon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-12-11T16:16:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-12-12T18:57:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2017\/12\/best-adult-books-2017-featured-630x315.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"630\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"315\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@SmithsonianAPA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Favorite Adult Books 2017 [in The Booklist Reader] - BookDragon","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Favorite Adult Books 2017 [in The Booklist Reader] - BookDragon","og_description":"What sweet agony to have so many fantabulous, freakin\u2019 spectacular books from which to cull. I\u2019ve got my 2017 favorite adult titles down to a baker\u2019s dozen, chosen under great duress. They\u2019re presented in alphabetical order \u2013 opposed to actually ranked, a feat which just might...","og_url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/","og_site_name":"BookDragon","article_published_time":"2017-12-11T16:16:27+00:00","article_modified_time":"2017-12-12T18:57:06+00:00","og_image":[{"width":630,"height":315,"url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2017\/12\/best-adult-books-2017-featured-630x315.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@SmithsonianAPA","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/","url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/","name":"Favorite Adult Books 2017 [in The Booklist Reader] - BookDragon","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#website"},"datePublished":"2017-12-11T16:16:27+00:00","dateModified":"2017-12-12T18:57:06+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#\/schema\/person\/a00f6dcfcb279c75f3f992ad2919d51d"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/favorite-adult-books-2017-booklist-reader\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Favorite Adult Books 2017 [in The Booklist Reader]"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#website","url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/","name":"BookDragon","description":"Books for the Diverse Reader","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#\/schema\/person\/a00f6dcfcb279c75f3f992ad2919d51d","name":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/79b5f08575e8962bd00388cd126d374b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/79b5f08575e8962bd00388cd126d374b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/twitter.com\/@SmithsonianAPA"],"url":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/author\/riemert\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43218"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43218"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43218\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43228,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43218\/revisions\/43228"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}