In the tradition of Elizabeth Strout's Olive Kitteridge and Daniel Mason's North Woods, Ben Shattuck's The History of Sound is its own resonant collection of interconnected stories. The pacing of each keeps you turning pages unlike any short story collection I've read. That's probably because, like with musical couplets, each story has a companion that elucidates or twists the previous story. Set in and with great reverence for New England, the literary couplets are written in very different voices and styles. One story, for example, is written in the style (with the audio version performed in the voices) of a Radiolab episode. Its companion, "The Auk," touches on natural history as its narrator speaks in first-person of the tender gifts exchanged with his wife as she slips into dementia. "The Auk" is one of my favorites in the collection; another being "The Journal of Thomas Thurber," an epistolary story read pitch-perfectly by Nick Offerman in the audio version. This is a breathtaking book that is worth listening to, reading and re-reading, and soon watching. I understand a movie version of the title story is due in 2025.

Thanks to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Set in a small town in Australia, and loosely inspired by the Heaven’s Gate cult and Comet Hale-Bopp in 1997, this debut novel is about a young woman still reeling from the hit-and-run death of her beloved husband. Written as a literary thriller, with a slower pace and more reflection, it’s about obsession in many facets, including how it can overtake a psyche in the wake of searing grief. Main character Sylvia Knight does a lot of mind- and soul-searching via astronomy, art, music, literature, tarot, geometry.
“My hope was that, if nothing else, the comet, like the celestial equivalent of a Rorschach inkblot, might cause me to face proof of a truth I had on some level long known, but been unable to see.”

The question, according to author Ruby Todd, becomes how to recover personal power, faith in life, and one’s place in the world.

I would recommend this to those who like slow-burn literary thrillers featuring astronomy, mystery, romance, and reflections on grief, humanity, and mortality.

An amnesiac unable to remember her childhood, Julia Lombardi is an artists' model in 1948 Italy. An artist herself, she jumps at the opportunity to model for the celebrated Salvador Dalí. The catch is that she must do so in the creepy Sacro Bosco, a garden full of giant mythological monsters. The place and its dark and enigmatic host, Ignazio, feel familiar, but in a way that terrifies her. Why does Ignazio seem so familiar, and why does Dalí ceaselessly insist that Julia consume pomegranate when she clearly dislikes the fruit? Many more surreal and Dalíesque questions ensue, as this twist on the Persephone myth plays out.
As somone who enjoys foodoir and vivid food writing, I was excited that food was such a prominent focus in the novel. And the food did sound delicious, but it was mostly listed as menu items. I would have liked the flavors, smells, and sensations of the foods to be described in more detail, but Julia kept bailing on meals because of the same fears and creepy feelings. I wanted "Like Water for Chocolate" and got characters who annoyed me rehashing the same conversations and repeating the same trepidations and confusions. That said, I was interested enough in the mystery to keep reading until the end.

Ethnographer/anthropologist Laurence Ralph tells the tragic story of Luis Alberto Quiñonez. Sito, as he was known, was the 19-year-old half-brother of Ralph's stepson. Ralph grapples with the backstory and aftermath of Sito's murder, recounting Sito's experiences with juvenile detention and the criminal justice system. In so doing, the author weaves in theories of justice and themes of masculinity, criminalization, violence, and mourning.

This is not just a riveting, nuanced account of murder, grief, and revenge. It reckons with "the spirit of revenge that's embedded in our legal system so that future generations don't repeat our mistakes." It imagines the possibility of restorative justice and the transformation of a legal system that is openly stacked against people of color and the impoverished. It imagines the possibility of healing.
I would recommend this to those looking for a gripping memoir combined with compelling sociological study.

Thanks to Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

It turns out there's no recipe for group living. While this memoir meanders, it lays out the possible ingredients. It provokes thought, suggesting a refreshed vision of home and family, posing questions about sustainable living, shared commitments, and the past and future of communal living. Questions such as, "How can we begin to experiment outside the status quo? How can we learn to see companionship itself as both home and wealth?"
I would recommend this to those who like their memoirs with a side of questioning the status quo. Recipes are included, which is always a bonus.

Thanks to Spiegel & Grau and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Margo's dad has retired from his WWE pro-wrestling career and endured another stint in rehab before he moves in with Margo, his bastard daughter, who's recently gotten pregnant by her married English professor and has decided to have the baby, despite living in a shared apartment with fellow college students, losing her job, getting less than no help from her mother, and having no idea what she herself is doing as a mother. So why not try her hand (and new mom body parts) as an OnlyFans creator? What could go wrong?
Themes: coming of age, new motherhood, controlling your own narrative, 
POV: we get the main character's POV from both first and third person -- "It's true that writing in third person helps me," Margo says. "It is so much easier to have sympathy for the Margo who existed back then than try to explain how and why I did all the things that I did."
Setting: mostly Margo's four-bedroom, one-bath apartment somewhere near the  Fullerton College campus in Fullerton, Calif. Margo lives geographically close to Disneyland, but her situation is emotionally distant from the Happiest Place on Earth
Timeline: present day, between now and when OnlyFans was created in 2016
I loved it. Why? Author Rufi Thorpe managed to successfully tie in pro wrestling, OnlyFans, and the Virgin Mary. Margo and her supporting characters were richly drawn. And as laugh-out-loud funny as this book was, there were also philosophically challenging questions posed. Margo grew to have empathy for others and what they'd created for themselves, but also for her past self and the choices she'd made.
"I like getting to be the me now watching the past me. It's almost a way of loving myself. Stroking the cheek of that girl with my understanding. Smoothing her hair with my mind's eye."
(The only thing I didn't like was that the douchey baby daddy wears a Duke sweatshirt in one scene where he's supposed to look extra-douchey and pathetic. Oof, that hurts a Blue Devil's heart.)
This is a five-star-plus read that I highly recommend
Thanks to William Morrow and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

The cover of God Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer shows a young Black man's face overlaying an institutional-looking building in the background. The lines of the drawing, specifically of the man's head, blur, as if his multicolored facets aren't yet able to sustain a stable image. It beautifully represents the gist of Joseph Earl Thomas's debut novel, which is told over the course of one hectic shift at a Philadelphia hospital. Joseph Thomas, who not coincidentally shares the author's name, is a med tech in the emergency department, where he knows every other patient, including his mother, presumed biological father, uncle, great-grandmother.

"A boy who used to beat me up is here for STD testing."

"In the trauma bay there's a lanky girl I knew from middle school named Diamond."

I say that the setting is the hospital, but really it's Joey's mind. He weaves narration of his daily ER routine with flashbacks from gaming with his kids the night before, from his own impoverished childhood, from his tour in Iraq as an army medic, and so on. Throughout his stream-of-consciousness narration, he speaks of hunger and trauma and when is his bff Ray gonna show up with Joey's hoagie and Otis Spunkmeyer muffin?
Therein lies the hook.

This book is phenomenal in how it captures the focus and distraction of both a mind and a trauma center in chaos. Its intense but intimate language is not easy to begin, but by about 15 percent in, I began to see the method in the seeming madness and I was drawn in, mesmerized by its genius. I was already a fan of Thomas's memoir Sink, but the two together make me an even more avid fan.

Thanks to Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Christina Lynch's latest novel is a love letter to the pony/human bond. It's a whodunnit murder mystery. And a tribute to fables. It's also a call to respect all creatures great and small. The main characters change and grow more empathetic as the truth emerges of what really happened that night twenty-some years ago when 12-year-old Penny and her beloved pony were torn from one another.
I'm a fan of Christina Lynch's. This is a very different book, way more fantastical than The Italian Party, which I prefer for its espionage thriller vibes and Italian setting. What I appreciate most about Pony Confidential are its revelations about all things pony. I will continue to seek out Lynch's books.

Tracy Chevalier writes a fascinating historical fiction novel digging deep into the traditions, family bonds, artistry, and commerce of Murano glassmakers through the ages. The speculative aspects of the novel, specifically the play with time, felt awkward, but it enabled the glassmaking trade to evolve and change while the cast of characters remained the same. Led by Orsola Rosso, the characters are vividly drawn, with the major focus on women's lives, constraints, and boundary-pushing in an ever-changing, ever-pivoting Venice.

Thanks to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Debut author Kaliane Bradley has splashed deep into the lore of a doomed polar explorer, Graham Gore. And she has surfaced with a time travel romance/spy thriller that deals with mixed-race identity, inherited trauma, and not just living in, but doggedly working for, a country whose imperial legacy controls history. Maybe dogged isn't the right word for this speculative fiction novel's protagoniste, whose name we never learn, though we understand that her "bizarre Eurasion double-barrelled surname" offers a clue to her family history. As a Ministry of Time employee, she is assigned the task of acting as historical bridge to Graham Gore, a kind and exceedingly charismatic Victorian naval officer who has been brought from his time to hers, somewhere in the near future. An expat from history, the polar explorer refers to his bridge as "little cat," a nickname which hints at his feelings for her. The ensuing intrigue and romance that spark from this pairing fuses genres and ideas. The result is humorous and thought-provoking and had me rapt. What does it really mean to make history, to alter the future?

Thanks to Avid Reader Press and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Afflicted with a bizarre, uncurable -- and sentient -- disease, Aubry Tourvel has not been able to stay longer than a couple days in any one place since she was 10, ever since she came across a strange puzzle ball on her walk home from school. Aubry's life becomes a never-ending epic, full of adventure and wonder and encounters with places and experiences and humans of all stripes. This debut novel is a coming-of-age tale, travelogue, and magical-realism-tinged adventure in self-discovery -- all rolled into one metaphorical puzzle ball. It asks, what if you could live only in the present? What would your story look like then? What would the world look like? And what would that world's stories and the library that housed those stories look like? It looks like a life-affirming, journey, as far as this coming-of-age story would demonstrate. I'm still puzzling out the ending, but overall an enthralling read.

The unnamed cleaner works the night shift at an unnamed company in an unnamed city. In this dark comedy, author Brandi Wells shines glaring, humming overhead light on a grimy, mundane occupation. Is this titular character despicable? No. Deluded? Definitely. She has mommy issues, thus a driving need to care for others. Yet she has no actual human connections. She fancies herself the office hero, the company savior, despite not knowing what the company does, and despite not ever having met the people she's saving. Is the Cleaner likeable? That's not even the right question. The point isn't how we like her. It's how we're led to sympathize with her -- the unseen, unappreciated service worker who keeps things running in spite of the indignities. Wells allows us to know this character in granular detail. We cringe at her inappropriate snooping and disturbing behavior, but then we cringe at the obliviousness and detritus that she must deal with each night. Not everyone will like this novel. Without chapter breaks or named characters, it rambles and drudges because that is how this character rolls. No wonder she is driven to rise above. I was with her all the way.

Set on a 1950's divorce ranch, this excellent debut novel taps into the fascinating, not-often-explored history of Reno, Nevada's quickie divorce industry. Lois Saunders, née Gorski, loves her alone time, her free time, especially when it comes to movies and movie ephemera. She has a talent for bringing out a woman's best features with makeup, but she's not great with other women in general, or at least the socially-reined-in women she's been around all her life. She doesn't 'get' them; they don't 'get' her. So when she meets fellow divorcée Greer, an odd but charismatic and glamorous woman who seems to see Lois, she's drawn into Greer's orbit. Will Lois be able to shrug off her past, the social constraints and men -- her father and soon-to-be-ex-husband -- who have prescribed her life thus far? Will Greer be there for her instead? I was enthralled with the characters, the historical details, and the vibrant writing of this novel, but I especially appreciated the literal ending of the book, which uses a classic and powerful storytelling technique that signals a pivot. Brava, Rowan Beaird. I can't imagine this book won't be a movie itself someday soon.

Carl Safina blends ecology and natural science with philosophy to show the inextricable connections between nature and human existence. Over the course of their homebound Covid-19 year, the author and his wife rescue a fledgling owl who had been left for dead. Through interactions with and observations of Alfie the owl and her eventual mate and three owlets, Safina muses about humanity's belief systems (philosophy, theology, technology) through history and how we've arrived at the separation of man and nature and our planet's crisis conditions.
"If one has not been raised to inquire about relationships, one might see a living thing as nothing but a product model. One would miss that living is a correspondence with the surroundings, a matter of taking in and putting forth ... Each species is in continual conversation with other individuals, various species, and the land- and waterscapes of their time and place."
Safina weaves owl behavior with philosophy, using transitions that are often fluid but occasionally jarring. Overall a reflective and gorgeously lyrical book with an appeal that makes so much sense.

To call these linked stories would do this sweeping novel injustice. The stories are rooted to the ground, overgrowing one another to create a marvelous forest -- a wondrous palimpsest. The novel's fertile ground is a single house in the woods of Western Massachusetts, inhabited by first one soul then another and another. All iterations feature richly drawn characters -- Puritan lovers gone wild, an English soldier utterly infatuated with apples, his spinster twin daughters torn by passion and envy. Further inhabitants -- humans, as well as a mountain lion on the prowl and a ravenous beetle -- claim proceeding chapters. This novel looks at history and the cycles of nature, asking where do we fit in, what are our roles -- during and after our lives? What are our passions, what do we do with them, and how do these actions affect this place we inhabit? I was totally enthralled, beginning to end. Highly recommend.

It's "a house with heavy bones," a place where Margaret can sink her roots into the ground. The gorgeous Victorian with cobalt paint, neat white trim, and a wrap-around porch is going for a price so low, she and Hal triple-check it. So what if, once they move in, they realize the walls bleed and prankster ghosts wreak havoc on the place every September? After the fourth September, Hal has had enough, and off he goes, disappearing. No matter, Margaret is home, and she's not one to run from horror. She remembers The Exorcist as being enjoyable and fairly entertaining. She has learned, after raising a daughter, and especially over the course of her marriage to Hal, that "every situation, no matter how unusual, has rules. They might be strange rules, and they might be difficult to figure out, but once they are learned, they can be followed. And everything works out."
And what a ride it is to watch how things work out in this supernatural psychological horror novel that takes its cues from classic haunted house literature and movies. There's bits and bobs from Shirley Jackson, Stephen King, The Exorcist, Get Out. It's no wonder that debut novelist Carissa Orlando has a doctorate in clinical-community psychology. Like all great horror writers, she uses this novel to address themes of trauma -- in this case, due to violence and things we don't talk about in families. Great horror novels set up a safe space for us to explore emotions of pain, to help us face our fears, and to find meaning in even our darkest experiences. This is a great horror novel. If you like haunted house stories with generous helpings of dark, twisted humor and emotional resonance, run like you're being chased to The September House.

This novel melds historical fiction with magical realism to tell the stories of four women straining against the limitations imposed on them in Victorian England. The patriarchy very much pins them down, like specimens. In fact, when two of the women, Etta and Natalya, inexplicably grow wings, a young surgeon with a god complex holds them captive in his seeping London basement in order to mount an exhibit of "his angels." They are no more than scientific specimens in Edward's eyes, and he treats them as such. The other two women are Edward's wife, Annie, from whom he has kept his captives secret, and a talented writer and budding journalist named Mary. Short, alternating chapters are told from the perspectives of each of the four, plus the increasingly ambition-crazed Edward. Chapters are introduced by a charming illustration that signals the chapter's POV character -- Etta the botanist is represented by an oak leaf, Mary the journalist by an inkpot and quill, Natalya the Orkney Islands dweller by a seashell, Annie the artist and beleaguered wife by a painter's palette, and Edward by a key. This book is for those who like a well-paced plot, descriptive prose, and strong female characters who overcome grief and hopeless situations to finally find their wings.

In this debut supernatural thriller, a young Cree woman's dreams lead her back home, where a wheetigo (windigo) preys on the family's grief for her grandmother and her sister. Mackenzie has tried to run away from her family and their losses, but her nightmares have started to bleed into reality and she returns home to relearn the strength of family, community, and connection to the land. "That's the best and worst thing about being connected to everything: you are a part of it all, but you can't choose what gets sent out into the world. Or what can find you." This is a supernatural horror thriller that explores generational trauma, touching on themes of grief and family and the devastation wrought on native lands by industrial greed and negligence. An impressive debut by Jessica Johns, a member of Sucker Creek First Nation in Treaty 8 territory in Northern Alberta, Canada.

Thanks @DoubledayBooks and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Resilience, survival, adaptability. These are all themes of this novel told in four parts -- power, water, light, time. Wanda Lowe is named for the catastrophic storm that opens this memorable novel. She is born in a not-too-distant future Florida, with its power grid and social fabric unraveling. As Wanda's personal losses mount, we see what she gains in the spaces that remain. I keep returning to imagery and themes in this powerful book, with its hopeful tone despite its civilization's devastation. The blip of magical element in the book had me scratching my head at first. Was it really necessary? As I reflect upon its impact on the narrative, my answer leans yes. Because, again: Hope is light in the darkness. The author has done her homework in creating a post-climate-disaster Florida and surviving/survivalist characters making do with what and how the world changes. I'll forgive her for using the words 'row' and 'oar' so many times when referring to paddling a canoe.

"Everyone must decide for themselves whether this world and life in it is a kindness or an unkindness, a blessing or a curse." This novel is a marvel, difficult to classify, easy to admire. Told in alternating chapters, switching from the past to the novel's present time of 1984, The God of Endings is the saga of a lonely, immortal woman. It is at once a vampire novel, a psychological thriller, and an exploration of the human condition in general, motherhood in particular. It is also a coming-of-age novel, wherein the point-of-view character Anna/Anya/Colette takes 460 pages and more than 200 years to move forward, facing her greatest fear. If, like me, you love a saga with sides of fantasy, mythology, history, thriller vibes, and gorgeous prose, this debut novel is a must-read.