Book Review

I knew I wanted to read Death in Her Hands , Ottessa Moshfegh's newest novel, before I knew anything about it. Moshfegh's My Year of Rest and Relaxation was one of the best books I read in 2019 —a darkly comic novel about a young woman's extended hibernation with a battery of prescription meds—and I couldn't wait to see what the author would do next.

I took a road trip recently—a long road trip—and downloaded a few audiobooks to pass the time. One was The Push , a debut novel by Ashley Audrain. And oh. My. Gosh.

This coming weekend is the unofficial kickoff to summer. Which means summer reading. Which means—for lots of folks—a little something light and funny, maybe set in a sunny locale.

During a visit to my local bookstore a couple weeks ago, a bookseller ushered me over to the nonfiction table and grabbed a copy of Between Two Kingdoms by Suleika Jaouad. “A Memoir of a Life Interrupted” was the subtitle. On the cover, a photo of the author and her terrier, Oscar, atop a goldenrod-colored Volkswagen bus.

The COVID-19 pandemic turned some of my friends into master do-it-yourselfers. Quarantined at home, they took on home improvement projects, learned to quilt, went crazy with sourdough starters and baked artisan breads. Me—not so much. I grew some tomatoes. I cooked some meals. But when it comes to most practical life skills, I’m still sorely lacking. Enter, Sharon and David Bowers.

Sometimes it’s the smallest books that pack the most powerful punches. Think George Orwell’s Animal Farm , John Steinbeck’s The Pearl , Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea . None are much longer than an average short story, but they tackle heavy themes such as communism, greed, and the struggle between good and evil. Address Unknown is just such a work.

Novelist Patricia Engel was born to Colombian parents. Her newest novel, Infinite Country , is a wonder of storytelling no doubt inspired by, if not her own upbringing, then the stories of countless immigrant families who seek a better life in the United States.

My friend Carrie keeps chickens in her backyard in Wichita, and whenever she goes out of town, I volunteer to feed and check on them. Chicken sitting, I call it. It’s not a bad gig and comes with rewards, like the occasional fresh egg with a yolk so orange and creamy, it doesn’t even resemble the ones you get in the grocery store. So I know a little bit about chickens and the people who love them. That’s why I picked up Jackie Polzin’s debut novel, Brood —a slender little story about one woman’s attempt to keep four chickens alive amid the frigid cold, searing heat and countless predators around her Minnesota home.

There are times when you don’t finish a book in time for a book club discussion but you go anyway. I mean, it’s all about the wine and conversation, right? But then there are times when you’re halfway through a book that’s full of twists, turns and gasp-inducing surprises, and you just have to send your regrets: “See you next month,” I told the KMUW Literary Feast regulars recently. Because SPOILERS.

You might be asking yourself, “How many novels about World War II does a person really need to read?” And the answer is: at least one more.

About three years ago, author Kristin Hannah began writing a novel about hard times in America—the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history, economic collapse, massive unemployment and income inequality. “Never in my wildest dreams,” Hannah writes in the author’s note of her new novel, “did I imagine that the Great Depression would become so relevant in our modern lives.”

For a writer like me to review a writer like Joan Didion seems downright ridiculous. Didion is an icon, a legend—a writer of novels, memoir and nonfiction that will be studied by journalists and writing students long into the future.

It’s a new year—thank goodness—and a great time to take stock of your reading habits and set new goals for what and how you’d like to read in 2021. One great way to do that is to join a reading challenge.

I’m not a regular reader of “Southern Living” magazine—save the occasional recipe for shrimp and grits if I’m feeling homesick—and I don’t believe I’ve ever picked up an issue of “Garden & Gun.” But the magazine pieces that make up Rick Bragg’s latest book make me want to buy a subscription. Where I Come From: Stories from the Deep South is a collection of personal columns by the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author, who is probably best known for his memoir, All Over but the Shoutin’ . Bragg grew up dirt poor among the ridgelines of northeastern Alabama, and his love for the place shines through in this collection, which sparkles with the wit and tenderness of a Pat Conroy novel. Topics range from Harper Lee to hot chicken, fire ants to Fat Tuesday, and “grandmothers with their arms full of fat babies and their giant purses stuffed with butterscotch candies and Juicy Fruit.” He recalls the perils of trying to travel in winter—“You do not really fly out of Birmingham,”

Several years ago, when I read the 2012 novel Beautiful Ruins , I recall setting the book down and promising myself that I would read anything and everything Jess Walter ever wrote. The man can spin a tale better than almost any novelist alive today—and his newest work, The Cold Millions , does not disappoint.

There’s a lot of talk these days about “Own Voices” novels. It’s a term that refers to an author from a marginalized or under-represented group writing about his or her own experiences, from an authentic, lived perspective.

Earlier this year, as the coronavirus began to spread across the globe, Alice Quinn reached out to American poets to see what they were writing under quarantine. The result is Together in a Sudden Strangeness , an anthology that reflects the fear and isolation the pandemic wrought, as well as the deep reflection and creativity that has come from it.

Irish author Maggie O’Farrell won this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction for Hamnet , a novel inspired by and named after William Shakespeare’s only son—and the possible inspiration for his tragedy “Hamlet.”

Don and Mimi Galvin had a dozen children—10 boys and two girls—born between 1945 and 1965, perfectly spanning the baby boom.

In Yaa Gyasi’s new novel, Transcendent Kingdom , a Stanford Ph.D. candidate named Gifty studies reward-seeking behavior in mice and the mysterious synapses that can lead to addiction or depression. She does it because her brother, Nana, was a gifted basketball player before an injury led to an OxyContin addiction and eventually to a deadly heroin overdose. And she does it because her mother, a Ghanaian immigrant, is depressed and living in her bed. Gifty wants to better understand the science of suffering. Meanwhile, she grapples with the evangelical faith of her youth -- and the salvation it once promised her. “‘What’s the point of all this?’ is a question that separates humans from other animals,” Gyasi writes. “Our curiosity around this issue has sparked everything from science to literature to philosophy to religion. When the answer to this question is ‘Because God deemed it so’ we might feel comforted. But what if the answer to this question is ‘I don’t know,’ or worse still,

In her debut novel, The Bright Side Sanctuary for Animals , Kansas native Becky Mandelbaum tells the story of a mother-daughter pair and also of the prairie, a landscape she reflects with detail in this passage about the melodramatic Kansas sky:

I guess I’ve been on a bit of a short-story kick lately. After reviewing Susan Minot’s new book, Why I Don’t Write , and rediscovering the lovely, independent little universes of short fiction, I picked up another new collection—Laura van den Berg’s I Hold A Wolf By the Ears —and dove right in. And this one, my friends, is even better.

It’s been three decades since author-playwright Susan Minot has published a collection of short fiction. So perhaps it’s fitting that her new one, which is being released this week, is titled “Why I Don’t Write: And Other Stories.”

I knew I wanted to read Death in Her Hands , Ottessa Moshfegh’s newest novel, before I knew anything about it. Moshfegh’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation was one of the best books I read in 2019 —a darkly comic novel about a young woman’s extended hibernation with a battery of prescription meds—and I couldn’t wait to see what the author would do next.

The tiny town of Merinac, Kansas -- the setting of KJ Dell’Antonia’s new novel, “The Chicken Sisters” -- is a fictional place. But anyone familiar with a two-lane stretch of road in southeast Kansas will immediately recognize it: This is “Chicken Dinner Road” -- home of Chicken Annie’s and Chicken Mary’s, two restaurants that sit about 300 feet apart and have been the center of a fried chicken debate for 70 years.

“You have to wonder what goes through the mind of a man like Micah Mortimer,” Anne Tyler begins her newest novel. “He lives alone; he keeps to himself; his routine is etched in stone.” Micah, the persnickety main character in Redhead by the Side of the Road , likes things just so. He starts his daily run precisely at 7:15. He works as a tech consultant and moonlights as the building super. He keeps his apartment neat and clean and orderly. He’s a good guy with a good, predictable life. Until one day, a teenager shows up at Micah’s door claiming to be his son. (He’s not, they quickly establish.) Even so, the surprise throws the middle-aged curmudgeon’s life off-kilter and forces him to reevaluate much of his carefully circumscribed existence. I’ll stop there on the storyline to avoid any spoilers, but suffice it to say, the novel is classic Anne Tyler. She’s been writing for more than a half-century now, and this book -- her 23rd -- has all the charm we’ve come to love. Of course, some

Chelsea Bieker’s debut novel, Godshot , is the story of Lacey May Herd, a 14-year-old girl stuck in Peaches, a drought-stricken, God-forsaken town in California’s Central Valley. Most of the town’s residents follow Pastor Vern, the caped and glitter-adorned leader of Gifts of the Spirit Church, who promises to bring back the rains—as he’s reputed to have done before—so long as his worshippers remain faithful. When Lacey May’s alcoholic mother is banished from the church, the teen goes to live with her grandmother, Cherry, and discovers the dark personal assignment Vern has in store for her. Bieker’s novel sparkles with vivid descriptions of the sun-scorched landscape Lacey May inhabits. Water is so scarce, the church performs baptisms in warm soda. Flies swarm incessantly around Cherry’s house, a plague reminiscent of Amityville. Lawn painters spray the dirt neon green. Fresh fruits and vegetables have disappeared, replaced by bologna sandwiches and pigs’ feet from a can. It’s bleak.

I loved Grant Snider’s new book from the moment I pulled it out of the bag—a pleasant sort of surprise bag, thanks to COVID-era curbside pickup at my local independent bookstore. “I Will Judge You By Your Bookshelf,” a collection of Snider’s one- and two-page comics, features a die-cut cover with an adorable character peeking out from behind a crowded bookshelf.

Writers & Lovers , the latest novel by Lily King, centers on 31-year-old Casey Peabody, a weepy, anxious wanna-be novelist reeling from her mother’s sudden death. The setting is Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1997. Casey lives in a converted shed attached to a garage. She walks her landlord’s dog each morning—she doesn’t even know the dog’s name—and rides her banana bike to and from her job waiting tables in Harvard Square. Her mail consists of wedding invitations and final notices from debt collectors. She’s a woman without a plan. Except for one thing: She writes. She keeps writing, and keeps hoping, even though nearly all her friends tell her it’s past time to give up her dream. When she drops her stack of manuscripts at a post office to ship them to prospective agents, the postal clerk remarks, “Let’s hope your next six years are a little more exciting, sweetie pie.” The novel chronicles Casey’s dating life with somberness and humor. About one prospective date, a man with serious

As an avid reader, I envisioned a government-issued, weeks-long stay-at-home order as the ultimate excuse to tackle my shelves of unread books, to finally catch up on some old classics, to read for hours or even days at a time. None of that has happened.

Over the past week, as we’ve hunkered down at home, public libraries, book publishers and others have begun offering free services to keep readers reading. And let’s face it: There’s no better time to escape with a good book.

This past week, as our country has been dealing with the global pandemic of COVID-19, I’ve been listening to The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of 9/11 , an audiobook that chronicles in vivid detail one of the worst disasters in American history.

Ann Napolitano’s new novel opens with a transcontinental flight from New York to Los Angeles. Among the passengers boarding the plane are 12-year-old Edward Adler, his parents and older brother. We learn quickly that this particular flight doesn’t have a happy ending — the plane crashes near Denver, killing almost everyone aboard. Only Eddie survives.

Lizzie the librarian has a long list of worries -- her drug addict brother; cranky professors lining up at the help desk; her bum knee; the end of the world. She is the narrator behind Jenny Offill’s newest novel, “Weather,” a slender but powerful book that reads like a collection of random thoughts but so accurately reflects the fragmented, Twitter-inspired mindset of our modern times.

I should begin by saying, I’m a sucker for weird. Weird food. Weird art. Weird newspaper stories about 37-pound cats that people line up to adopt from the local Humane Society. So when I heard about “Little Weirds,” a book by actress and comedian Jenny Slate, I thought, “Wait a second . . . ‘Weird’ as a noun? I’m here for it.”

“Heart of Junk,” a new novel by Luke Geddes, opens with uptight Margaret watching two vendors unpack their wares at the Heart of America Antique Mall – a large but struggling operation in Wichita, Kansas.

Sometimes, the best thing you can do for your reading life is to revisit the kinds of books that made you fall in love with reading in the first place – the early chapter books or middle-grade novels that illustrate the power of great storytelling. That’s the reason I picked up “To Night Owl From Dogfish,” a collaboration by authors Holly Goldberg Sloan and Meg Wolizter that had me feeling like a tween again.

If you’re a parent, you know the feeling: You’re with your child in a grocery store, or restaurant, or theater, or airplane, and they pitch a fit so sudden and volcanic, you worry they might spontaneously combust, right there on the spot. You imagine them aflame, fueled only by rage, destroying everything in their path – the epic meltdown.

An epigraph at the start of Carmen Maria Machado’s memoir quotes author Zora Neale Hurston: “If you are silent about your pain, they’ll kill you and say you enjoyed it.”

On New Year’s Day 2013, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gene Weingarten carried an old green fedora into a restaurant in Washington, D.C., and asked three strangers to pluck a day, a month and a year out of the hat. They picked December 28, 1986.

Early in Ann Patchett’s new novel, “The Dutch House,” the narrator, Danny, poses a question to his sister, Maeve: “Do you think it’s possible to ever see the past as it actually was?”

For people around the world – and particularly in Kansas – Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka is a symbol of extremism and hate.

In her debut novel, “The Dearly Beloved,” author Cara Wall tells the story of two couples over decades of love and friendship — all of it centered on the exploration of faith and the struggle to find meaning in life.

Since her groundbreaking autobiography, “Brown Girl Dreaming,” Jacqueline Woodson has used spare prose to tell rich, multilayered stories in a fraction of the space other writers require.

“Even in death the boys were trouble.” From its opening line, Colson Whitehead’s new novel, “The Nickel Boys,” vividly tells the story of a spot in the Florida panhandle where construction crews unearthed a brutal history.

I’m not enrolled in any classes this fall, but all those pencils, notebooks and forced-smile back-to-school photos in my Facebook feed have me thinking about one of my favorite literary genres: the campus novel.