Out this week: Local Girls by Caroline Zancan; The Star Side of Bird Hill by Naomi Jackson; The Mountain Story by Lori Lansens; Kay Boyle: A Twentieth-Century Life in Letters; Killing Monica by Candace Bushnell; and a new translation of the poems of Catullus.
Tuesday New Release Day: Zancan; Jackson; Lansens; Bushnell; Catullus
Serial Stories
Julian Fellowes, the creator of Downton Abbey, launches his novel Belgravia today, and it’s bringing back serialization. Our own Garth Risk Hallberg writes on the literary pedigree of Downton Abbey.
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Tuesday New Release Day: Tyler; Shriver; Watson; Tremblay; Raymond; Juchau
Out this week: Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler; The Mandibles by Lionel Shriver; As Good as Gone by Larry Watson; Disappearance at Devil’s Rock by Paul Tremblay; My Last Continent by Midge Raymond; and The World Without Us by Mireille Juchau. For more on these and other new titles, go read our Great 2016 Book Preview.
Seducing, Conquering, Discovering
An heroic L Magazine contributor read all 1,597 pages of Jan Kjaerstad‘s Wergerland Trilogy (brought to you by our friends at Overlook and Open Letter) to bring you this review.
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Books for the Trump Era
“[T]hat might be what liberal readers needs right now: Not just portraits of the Brexit and Trump-voting domestic Other, but a clearer sense of their own worldview’s limits, blind spots, blunders and internal contradictions.” The New York Times‘s Ross Douthat assembles a “Books for the Trump Era” reading list, including Michel Houellebecq’s Submission, Christopher Lasch‘s The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy, and Samuel P. Huntington‘s Who Are We? The Challenges to American National Identity. You can also read our own review of Houellebecq’s latest here.
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What’s the point?
“What’s the point of reading literature?” Electric Literature shares a video that offers a compelling 4-point answer.
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Mark Haddon Takes to the Stage
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time author Mark Haddon will see his debut effort as a playwright hit the stage next month. The Independent tries to get the scoop. “So now we have this game of chess, in which you ask me what my new play is about, and I choose not to tell you what it’s about.”
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