December 15, 2023: Volume XCI, No. 24

DECEMBER 15, 2023 | VOL. XCI NO. 24

FEATURING 251 Industry-First Reviews of Fiction, Nonfiction, Children’s, and YA Books

THE BEST BOOKS OF 2023

INDIE

The Best 100 Indie Books of the Year + Our Full Dec. 15 Issue

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FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK

AS 2023 DRAWS to a close, we pause to remember the authors, illustrators, and other literary figures we’ve lost over the past 12 months.

Here are just a few: Russell Banks died on Jan. 8 at age 82. Known for novels featuring blue-collar characters facing loss, Banks was a Pulitzer Prize finalist twice, for Continental Drift (1985) and Cloudsplitter (1998); his 1991 novel, The Sweet Hereafter, was made into a film. � e died on Kenzaburo �O March 3 at age 88. The Japanese author was known for such novels as A Personal Matter (1964), a reckoning with the birth of his disabled son; A Quiet Life (1990); and The Changeling (2000). He received the Nobel Prize in literature in 1994.

Ian Falconer died on March 7 at age 63. The author and artist was best known for Olivia (2000), a bestselling children’s picture book about a smart and multitalented piglet; the book received a Caldecott Honor and spawned an entire series.

Anne Perry died on April 10 at age 84. The prolific crime novelist, author of The Cater Street Hangman (1979) and A Dangerous Mourning (1991), was convicted of murder as a teenager in New Zealand; the case was the subject of the film Heavenly Creatures.

Martin Amis died on May 19 at age 73. The son of acclaimed British novelist Kingsley Amis, Martin Amis won recognition in his own right with such novels as Money (1984), London Fields

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(1989), and, most recently, the autobiographical Inside Story (2020).

Ama Ata Aidoo died on May 31 at age 81. The Ghanaian novelist and playwright was known for works that explored the lives of women in her home country, including No Sweetness Here (1970), Our Sister Killjoy (1966), and Changes (1991).

Cormac McCarthy died on June 13 at age 89. The award-winning McCarthy was widely considered one of the great American fiction stylists of his generation, a reputation built on such novels as All the Pretty Horses (1992), No Country for Old Men (2005), and The Road (2006).

Milan Kundera died on July 12 at age 94. The Czechoslovakia-born writer, who was involved with the anti-Soviet reform movement of the Prague Spring, is best known for his novel The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984), adapted for an Oscar-nominated film.

Ed Young died on Sept.

29 at age 91. The children’s

book author and illustrator was born in China and came to the U.S. as a young man; he’s remembered for a host of books, including Lon Po Po: A Red-Riding Hood Story From China, which won a Caldecott Medal in 1990.

Khaled Khalifa died on Sept. 30 at age 59. The Syrian author, whose works had been banned in his home country, was known for novels such as Death Is Hard Work, a finalist for the National Book Award in translated literature in 2019.

Louise Glück died on Oct. 13 at age 80. The award-winning poet, known for collections such as The Wild Iris (1992) and Faithful and Virtuous Night (2014), was the most recent American writer to receive the Nobel Prize in literature, in 2020.

A.S. Byatt died on Nov. 16 at age 87. The English novelist and sister of author Margaret Drabble won the Booker Prize for her 1990 novel, Possession.

TOM BEER

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

IN MEMORIAM

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Contents YEAR IN REVIEW

4

CHILDREN’S

Audiobooks

6

Book to Screen

8

Seen and Heard FICTION

12

Editor’s Note

13

Reviews & News

21

On the Podcast: Bryan Washington

31

Booklist: Book Club Discoveries From 2023

One of the most coveted designations in the book industry, the Kirkus Star marks books of exceptional merit.

78

Editor’s Note

79

Reviews

89

Booklist: Graphic Novels for Tweens

OUR FRESH PICK The lines between friends and enemies blur for a young descendant of Beowulf when monsters threaten her New Jersey town.

108

Editor’s Note

Read the review on p. 79

109

Reviews & News

115

Booklist: Books That Make Perfect LastMinute Gifts

YOUNG ADULT

PURCHASE BOOKS ONLINE AT KIRKUS .COM

NONFICTION

INDIE

124

The Best Indie Books of 2023

Reviews & News

136

47

On the Podcast: Jana Monroe

Best Indie Books Author Spotlight

140

Editor’s Note

59

Booklist: Nonfiction Books That Read Like Thrillers

141

Reviews

159

Booklist: Indie Books of the Month

40

Editor’s Note

41

ON THE COVER: Illustrations by August Lamm; background by Amguy on iStock

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“A truly absorbing mystery by a writer at the top of her game.”

—Kirkus Reviews (starred review) Publishers Weekly Bestseller “…an expertly paced thrill ride.”

—Publishers Weekly ISBN-13: 979-8888452110

“Nothing short of brilliant.”

—Annabel Monaghan, National Bestselling Author “Reef Road is magnificent. It has left me shaken to the core.”

—Luanne Rice, New York Times Bestselling Author For All Inquiries, Please Email deborah@roycemail.com • deborahgoodrichroyce.com Kirkus Reviews 121523 FOB_F.indd 2

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r

KIRKUS REVIEWS Co-Chairman HERBERT SIMON

Co-Chairman MARC WINKELMAN

Publisher & CEO MEG LABORDE KUEHN mkuehn@kirkus.com

Editor-in-Chief TOM BEER tbeer@kirkus.com

Chief Marketing Officer SARAH KALINA skalina@kirkus.com

President of Kirkus Indie CHAYA SCHECHNER cschechner@kirkus.com

Publisher Advertising

Nonfiction Editor ERIC LIEBETRAU eliebetrau@kirkus.com

& Promotions RACHEL WEASE rwease@kirkus.com Indie Advertising & Promotions AMY BAIRD abaird@kirkus.com

Author Consultant RY PICKARD rpickard@kirkus.com Lead Designer KY NOVAK knovak@kirkus.com Social Media Coordinator SEYANNA BARRETT sbarrett@kirkus.com Kirkus Editorial Senior Production Editor ROBIN O’DELL rodell@kirkus.com Kirkus Editorial Senior Production Editor MARINNA CASTILLEJA mcastilleja@kirkus.com Kirkus Editorial Production Editor ASHLEY LITTLE alittle@kirkus.com Copy Editor BILL SIEVER Magazine Compositor MARISELA SMUTZ

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Fiction Editor LAURIE MUCHNICK lmuchnick@kirkus.com Young Readers’ Editor LAURA SIMEON lsimeon@kirkus.com Young Readers’ Editor MAHNAZ DAR mdar@kirkus.com Editor at Large MEGAN LABRISE mlabrise@kirkus.com Senior Indie Editor DAVID RAPP drapp@kirkus.com Indie Editor ARTHUR SMITH asmith@kirkus.com Editorial Assistant NINA PALATTELLA npalattella@kirkus.com

Indie Editorial Assistant DAN NOLAN dnolan@kirkus.com Mysteries Editor THOMAS LEITCH Contributing Writers GREGORY MCNAMEE MICHAEL SCHAUB

Contributors

Alana Abbott, Nada Abdelrahim, Colleen Abel, Stephanie Anderson, Kent Armstrong, Mark Athitakis, Colette Bancroft, Robert Beauregard, Elizabeth Bird, Amy Boaz, Susan Breitzer, Kate Brody, Jessica Hoptay Brown, Jeffrey Burke, Abby Bussen, Timothy Capehart, Catherine Cardno, Tobias Carroll, Charles Cassady, Ann Childs, Amanda Chuong, Anastasia M. Collins, Rachael Conrad, Adeisa Cooper, Sara Davis, Michael Deagler, Dave DeChristopher, Elise DeGuiseppi, Amanda Diehl, Steve Donoghue, Jacob Edwards, Lisa Elliott, Lily Emerick, Gillian Esquivia-Cohen, Joshua Farrington, Brooke Faulkner, Angela Firkus, Katie Flanagan, Mia Franz, Jackie Friedland, Roberto Friedman, Jean Gazis, Carol Goldman, Melinda Greenblatt, Tobi Haberstroh, Geoff Hamilton, Lynne Heffley, Zoe Holland, Katrina Niidas Holm, Abigail Hsu, Ariana Hussain, Kathleen T. Isaacs, Darlene Ivy, Kristen Jacobson, Wesley Jacques, Kerri Jarema, Ivan Kenneally, Stephanie Klose, Carly Lane, Christopher Lassen, Tom Lavoie, Judith Leitch, Maya Lekach, Donald Liebenson, Maureen Liebenson, Coeur de Lion, Corrie Locke-Hardy, Barbara London, Patricia Lothrop, Kyle Lukoff, Sandy MacDonald, Kirk MacLeod, Michael Magras, Thomas Maluck, Collin Marchiando, Michelle H Martin, Matthew May, Jeanne McDermott, Sierra McKenzie, Carol Memmott, J. Elizabeth Mills, Tara Mokhtari, Clayton Moore, Karen Montgomery Moore, Lisa Moore, Molly Muldoon, McKenzi Murphy, Jennifer Nabers, Christopher Navratil, Liza Nelson, Mike Newirth, Therese Purcell Nielsen, Katrina Nye, Tori Ann Ogawa, Mike Oppenheim, Emilia Packard, Andrea Page, Derek Parker, Sarah Parker-Lee, John Edward Peters, Jim Piechota, William E. Pike, Judy Quinn, Kristy Raffensberger, Kristen Rasmussen, Matt Rauscher, Amy B. Reyes, Jasmine Riel, Kelly Roberts, Lizzie Rogers, Gia Ruiz, Lloyd Sachs, Bob Sanchez, Caitlin Savage, E.F. Schraeder, Jerome Shea, Sadaf Siddique, Karyn N. Silverman, Linda Simon, Wendy Smith, Mo Springer, Sharon Strock, Mathangi Subramanian, Jennifer Sweeney, Deborah D. Taylor, Paul Teed, Renee Ting, Bijal Vachharajani, Jenna Varden, Christina Vortia, Barbara Ward, George Weaver, Erica Weidner, Natalie Wexler, Sam Wilcox, Angela Wiley, Vanessa Willoughby, Kerry Winfrey, Marion Winik, Livia Wood, Bean Yogi, Jean-Louise Zancanella

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S YE C AT RI O I NN R E V I E W // A U D I O B O O K S

OUR FAVORITE AUDIOBOOKS OF 2023 FICTION Bahni Turpin is the ideal voice of Aretha in Kashana Cauley’s hilarious novel The Survivalists (Brilliance Audio, 10 hours and 23 minutes), about an ambitious Black attorney who discovers that the coffee entrepreneur she’s dating lives with doomsday preppers. Aretha has never heard of Black survivalists, but she can’t argue with the idea that Black people should always prepare for the worst. Turpin’s reading is funny but also empathetic as the increasingly erratic Aretha starts to rethink her career and principles while coping with a variety of contemporary disasters.

Making readers care about an unsympathetic character can be tricky, but Robin Miles, who reads Dennis Lehane’s searing Small Mercies (HarperAudio, 10 hours and 23 minutes), excels at revealing the conflicted soul of Mary Pat Fennessy, the desperate mother whose teenage daughter goes missing on the eve of Boston school desegregation in 1974. Tough Mary Pat was raised in South Boston, and Miles nails her accent. But there’s more to Mary Pat than her outer shell, and Miles’ interpretation enhances Lehane’s intense, insightful window onto ingrained racism.

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Patchett’s Tom Lake (HarperAudio, 11 hours and 22 minutes) is one of the best performances of 2023. When her grown daughters return to the family cherry orchard in Michigan during the pandemic, Lara Nelson recounts the tale of her youthful romance with movie star Peter Duke. Streep adds significant depth and richness to a story about how we stumble unwittingly into our lives, highlighting small differences in tone between the young, inexperienced Lara and the mother in her late 50s. Her work underscores Patchett’s poignant elegy for the chaos of youth and her gentle reminder that we should dare to seek happiness, even in dark times.

Reader Dion Graham is a lively, knowing presence in Colson Whitehead’s Crook Manifesto (Random House Audio, 10 hours and 47 minutes), a rollicking story of 1970s Harlem, where crooks and scammers, hard cases and Black militants, dirty cops and crafty politicians all crash together as the city’s troubles ignite like a Molotov cocktail. Graham’s deep voice carries much gravitas, and he’s terrific at delivering lines like “Crooked stays crooked and bent hates straight”—the perfect mouthpiece for Whitehead’s chatty wisdom.

NONFICTION George: A Magpie Memoir (Simon and Schuster Audio, 8 hours and 58 minutes), written and narrated by Frieda Hughes, is the cross-species love story of the year. Though the author reveals how much she hates to be introduced as the daughter of Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath, this story is all the more powerful in light of her past. After moving to rural Wales in 2004, Hughes wondered if she and her husband would ever re-establish a social life—but those concerns receded the day she rescued a baby magpie and named it George. This diary of the two years that followed, read in her bright British accent, is audio joy.

The Times: How the Newspaper of Record Survived Scandal, Scorn, and the Transformation of Journalism, by Adam Nagourney (Penguin Random House Audio, 18 hours and 53 minutes): Devoted readers of the Times will find themselves obsessed with this peek behind the scenes, 1976-2016, read with flair by Robert Petkoff.

As Nagourney traces a throughline of great aspirations—and the hubris

Headphones: Jukka Aahlo/Unsplash

Kirkus contributors and editors nominate their top listens of the year.

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A U D I O B O O K S // Y E A R I N R E V I E W

that goes with them—we witness the rise and fall of Jayson Blair, Howell Raines, Jill Abramson, and Judith Miller as well as following the paper’s struggles with institutional racism, sexism, and the advent of the digital era.

Once you get to know Mary Rodgers, you can imagine her saying she’s glad she died before the publication of Shy: The Alarmingly Outspoken Memoirs of Mary Rodgers (Spiegel & Grau by OrangeSky Audio, 15 hours and 45 minutes) so the wonderful Christine Baranski could be drafted to read it. Believe the subtitle: Mary Rodgers will alarm you, seemingly holding nothing back as she lionizes her father (musical-theater legend Richard Rodgers), vilifies her mother, and portrays the midcentury Manhattan theater crowd, led by her adored Stephen Sondheim. Her co-author, drama critic Jesse Green, reads his own footnotes and commentary.

Poet Safiya Sinclair delivers an exquisite reading of How To Say Babylon: A Memoir (Simon & Schuster Audio, 16 hours and 46 minutes), which chronicles her coming-of-age in a Rastafarian family in rural Jamaica— one of the best audio memoirs of this or any year. Sinclair’s voice is girlish, her Caribbean diction elegant, her rendering of patois powerful and authentic. It was a gift for language that opened the door for her, allowing Sinclair to escape the confines of Rastafarian patriarchy as a published poet in her teens. That gift infuses this narrative, too, sentence by transporting sentence.

MIDDLE GRADE The Swifts: A Dictionary of Scoundrels

by Beth Lincoln (Listening Library, 9 hours and 53 minutes): This mystery about an eccentric English family whose names have been chosen from the dictionary introduces readers to the Swifts, including Shenanigan, her sisters, Phenomena and Felicity, and KIRKUS REVIEWS

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their Arch-Aunt Schadenfreude. British actor Nikki Patel’s pitch-perfect delivery maintains the slower speed that’s developmentally appropriate for young listeners while still expressing all the text’s drama and hilarity. Listen now, before the sequel comes out in April 2024.

Barely Floating by Lilliam Rivera (Listening Library, 5 hours and 46 minutes): 12-year-old Nat’s joy at finding a synchronized swimming team where she’ll be embraced as an accomplished, determined athlete—who’s also fat and Latina—is dampened by her well-meaning parents’ concerns. Can she fulfill her dreams, persuade her parents, and remain true to friends who believe in her? Bilingual actor Victoria Villarreal’s narration animates Nat’s memorable story, highlighting its strong emotions and keeping listeners engaged through dramatic twists and turns.

that’s enhanced by the poems’ layout on the page. While that visual element is lost in the audio version, it’s more than compensated for by the cadence, rhythm, and emotional immediacy of the author’s narration.

Connie Ogle is a writer in Florida. Marion Winik is host of the NPR podcast The Weekly Reader. Laura Simeon is a young readers’ editor.

YOUNG ADULT The Reunion by Kit Frick (Simon & Schuster Audio, 7 hours and 32 minutes): Take four teenagers—a pair of twins, their cousin, and a boy whose dad is marrying into the family—on a winter break trip to Cancún and throw in lots of family drama. Is it any surprise when someone goes missing? While this suspenseful thriller told through flashbacks via multiple points of view may seem like a tricky candidate for audio, the cast of talented narrators—Zac Aleman, Andre Bellido, Marisa Blake, Kurt Kanazawa, and Angel Pean—does a superb job.

All the Fighting Parts by Hannah V. Sawyerr (Recorded Books, 5 hours and 14 minutes): This honest, gut-wrenching debut novel about a teen girl who was sexually assaulted by the widely admired pastor of her church is ideal for the verse format: Each carefully chosen word and skillfully constructed phrase carries an impact DECEMBER 15, 2023 5

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S YE C AT RI O I NN R E V I E W // B O O K T O S C R E E N

BEST OF 2023: OUR FAVORITE ADAPTATIONS The 1619 Project (streaming on Hulu) This powerful miniseries draws on The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story (2021), edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman, and Jake Silverstein, an expansion of the widely acclaimed New York Times Nikole Hannah-Jones Magazine series first pub- in The 1619 lished in 2019. The book Project. insightfully explores the consequences of slavery on American life as well as Black Americans’ key contributions to American culture. This documentary series concentrates on six of the book’s 18 essays, adding new interviews and other material. One standout, “Capitalism,” draws on an essay by Matthew Desmond to delve into how the enslavement of Black people fostered a cruel (and ongoing) economic system. Those who are already familiar with The 1619 Project will find the show to be a fine companion piece, and Luciane Buchanan and Gabriel Basso in The Night Agent.

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newcomers will enjoy it as an excellent introduction.

The Night Agent (streaming on Netflix) Shawn Ryan, best known for his gritty FX cop drama The Shield, created this streaming series loosely adapted from Matthew Quirk’s 2019 spy thriller, which features several new characters and subplots. The story’s tense, irresistible setup remains intact, with surveillance specialist Peter Sutherland (played by Hillbilly Elegy’s Gabriel Basso) monitoring a secret, rarely used phone line for the White House; when he finally receives a call, it’s from a woman whose parents have been brutally murdered. The situation drags Sutherland into a complex conspiracy.

The show features plenty of twists and turns, as well as lively action scenes that will satisfy even the most jaded spy-fiction fans. A second season is in the works.

Obsession (streaming on Netflix) Josephine Hart’s Kirkus-starred 1991 novel, Damage, was once adapted as a critically acclaimed theatrical film, directed by Louis Malle and starring Jeremy Irons and Juliette Binoche.

This new, highly watchable limitedseries version is a tense psychological

Charlie Murphy and Richard Armitrage in Obsession.

thriller about a doctor whose secret affair with his son’s mysterious fiancee, Anna Barton, rips apart several lives. Berlin Station’s Richard Armitage is quite good as the tortured main character, and Indira Varma (Game of Thrones) and Rish Shah (Ms. Marvel), as his wife and son, respectively, also do fine work. But Halo’s Charlie Murphy steals the show with her portrayal of troubled soul Anna.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. (streaming on Starz) Many readers will be shocked to learn that it took more than half a century for Judy Blume’s middle-grade classic to be adapted for the screen. It was well worth the wait, as the resulting film is a remarkably amusing and thoughtful work. Ant-Man’s Abby Ryder Fortson stars as sixth grader Margaret, whose family moves from New York City to suburban New Jersey in the 1970s; she deals with the resulting social stresses by having onesided chats with God. Writer/director Kelly Fremon Craig (The Edge of

Clockwise from lower left: Dan Power/Netflix, Patti Perret/Hulu, Ana Blumenkron/Netflix

In a year overflowing with book-to-screen content, these were eight standout movies and shows. BY DAVID RAPP

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SECTION Rachel McAdams and Abby Ryder Fortson in Are You There God?

Clockwise from lower left: Michael Moriatis/AMC, Dana Hawley/Lionsgate, Wilford Harwood/Hulu, Todd Williamson/Getty Images for Entertainment Weekly, James Van Evers/Julu

Seventeen) preserves Blume’s famously frank and funny storytelling style, and the entire cast is superb—particularly Rachel McAdams, who offers an award-worthy turn as Margaret’s mom.

Dark Winds, Season 2 (streaming on AMC+) This first-rate police-procedural series is based on the late Tony Hillerman’s bestselling mysteries featuring Navajo Tribal Police Lt. Joe Leaphorn and younger cop Jim Chee. This season is again set in the 1970s and is an adaptation of People of Darkness (1980), which mainly focuses on Chee’s unofficial investigation into the theft of a wealthy man’s lockbox and a truck-bomb murder. The show gives Leaphorn and Officer Bernadette Manuelito plenty to do, as well.

Kiowa Gordon does a creditable job as Chee, but the show belongs to Westworld’s Zahn McClarnon, who’s riveting as the incorruptible Leaphorn, and Jessica Matten, whose ambitious Manuelito may have viewers wishing for a spinoff. Instead, viewers can look forward to a third season of Dark Winds, scheduled for early 2025.

Jessica Matten and Zahn McClarnon in Dark Winds.

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The Other Black Girl (streaming on Hulu) Zakiya Dalila Harris’ Kirkus-starred 2021 novel intriguingly combines elements of the outlandish 1993 movie thriller The Temp and the Oscar-winning horror film Get Out. This streaming series is a mostly faithful adaptation that tells the story of Nella Rogers, the only Black editorial assistant at publisher Wagner Books, whose life is changed after the hiring of a confident new Black assistant named Hazel-May McCall. The young woman encourages Nella to voice her concerns about a problematic Black character in a novel by one of the firm’s Sinclair Daniel in bestselling The Other Black Girl. authors, but Nella finds her white bosses unreceptive, to say the least. As Nella starts questioning Hazel-May’s motives, she receives a series of anonymous notes urging her to “Leave Wagner Now.” The tale’s later revelations make the show a must-watch, as does Sinclair Daniel’s tense portrayal of Nella.

The Irrational (streaming on Peacock) At first blush, this NBC crime drama seems like a fairly standard detective show. It stars Jesse L. Martin (of Law & Order fame) as Alec Mercer, a behavioral science professor whose insights into human nature help him solve cases for the FBI and other clients. What sets this show apart is that it’s based on a nonfiction bestseller: Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions, which received a Kirkus star back in 2008. Like Ariely, Mercer frequently cites studies that show how people often make choices based on flawed, illogical thinking. As a result, Martin’s

character frequently delivers short, diverting speeches about human behavior—sometimes in an actual classroom Jesse L. Martin setting. It’s a low-key puzzle-solving show with modest ambitions, but Martin’s charm goes a very long way, and his banter with Travina Springer, who plays Mercer’s free-spirited sister, is consistently fun to watch.

Black Cake (streaming on Hulu) This streaming-series adaptation of Charmaine Wilkerson’s 2022 bestseller opens in the 1960s with teenager Covey Lyncook fleeing her Caribbean homeland on the day of her arranged wedding. It’s just the first of many hardships she faces before immigrating to the United States under an assumed name. In later years, she keeps many secrets about her traumatic early life from her adult children, Benny and Byron Bennett; only after her death do the estranged siblings learn a great many truths about their mother. The show presents viewers with a sweeping international saga, full of tragedy and danger, while also offering sharp commentary on the immigrant experience and the complexity of familial connections. It’s further enhanced by Mia Isaac’s affecting performance as the young Covey; she’s definitely a talent to watch.

David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.

Mia Isaac in Black Cake.

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BELIEVE IT OR NOT...

AS 2023 DRAWS to a close, it’s time for

all of us in the literary world to reflect solemnly on the books that touched us and changed us this year.

On second thought, let’s not. There will be plenty of time for earnestness in 2024. This was a bizarre year for news in pretty much every field, and the book world was no exception. We started off 2023 with an oversharing memoir from one of the world’s most famous redheads, and things just got weirder from there. From an owl taking over a library to Jane Austen becoming a star on an app beloved by teens, 2023 had an odd news story for every reader. Here are nine of our favorites—enjoy while listening to some Lou Bega and drinking an icecold White Claw. (Or whatever. We won’t judge.)

JAN. 5: Leave it to Prince Harry to start 2023 off with a wang. Days ahead of the publication of his highly anticipated memoir, Spare, Page Six reported that the Duke of Sussex

revealed in the book that while he was at the wedding of his brother, Prince William, he was suffering from a frostbitten penis, sustained on a visit to the North Pole—and had attempted to treat it with a cream made by Elizabeth Arden. (What exactly was he doing with his—actually, never mind.

We don’t want to know.) Britons were likely horrified by Harry’s disclosure but relieved that at least they didn’t have to think about Boris’ johnson.

FEB. 12: For centuries, owls have symbolized wisdom and knowledge—so you would think that a college would be happy when one of their ranks decided to take up residence in its library. You would be wrong! When a barred owl fell through the chimney of the McCain Library at Agnes Scott College in Georgia, it showed no signs of leaving, forcing the school to shut the building down. Students named the feathered intruder Edgar Owlen Poe, but the college insisted on hiring a falconer to have it evicted anyway,

A barred owl checked into a college library in Georgia.

before it could even check out its favorite book. Rude.

MAY 8: When one bookstore owner and TikTok user noticed a blank space where a title should be in Flatiron Books’ summer catalog, the bookseller came up with a theory: 4C Untitled Flatiron Nonfiction Summer 2023 would actually be a memoir from Taylor Swift, who is, according to Google, a singer-songwriter of some sort. “Evidence” for the theory included the fact that the book would be 544 pages, and the digits 5, 4, and 4 add up to 13, Swift’s lucky number. Unfortunately for Swifties everywhere, the book instead turned out to be an oral history of South Korean boy band BTS. Cruel summer, indeed.

From left: Prince Harry, Taylor Swift, and Arthur

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Prince Harry: Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images; Swift: Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images; Arthur: Bill Clark/Roll Call; Owl: Carlos A. Carreno/Getty Images

The book world sure gave us some weird, wacky, and wonderful news stories in 2023. Here are some favorites. BY MICHAEL SCHAUB

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Hale: Monica Schipper/Film Magic; King: Scott Eisen/Getty Images for Warner Bros.; Gay: Marie-Louise Gay

SECTION

JULY 31: The Sunshine State leads the nation in book challenges and bans, but that simply wasn’t good enough for a Florida man named Bruce Friedman, who became enraged by a book about—you might want to sit down; this is scandalous—a cartoon aardvark’s party. Friedman filed a complaint with the Clay County School District over Arthur’s Birthday, a book featuring the glasses-wearing third grade mammal. Friedman’s objection stemmed from the fact that the book mentions a popular party game. “PROTECT CHILDREN!!”

Friedman calmly wrote. “IT IS NOT APPROPRIATE TO DISCUSS ‘SPIN THE BOTTLE’ WITH ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CHILDREN.” If this guy freaks out this much about spin the bottle, we’d hate to see his reaction to Twister.

AUG. 18: The verdict is in: TikTok users are simping for Jane Austen.

The video-hosting service unveiled the winners of its first-ever TikTok Book Awards U.K. and Ireland, and along with some familiar names from the online community—Holly Jackson and Alice Oseman—Austen scored the prize for best BookTok revival. Austen won the award for Pride & Prejudice, her 1813 novel about the low-key situationship between Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy. Austen wasn’t able to accept the prize—evidently, she’s giving “died in 1817”—but the verdict is clear: She understood the assignment, and we should all let her cook.

AUG. 31: The school district in the Texas town of Katy, which has become something of a book-ban capital, paused buying new books for its libraries in June. Later, a Twitter user posted what appeared to be a screenshot of a Facebook message from Morgan Calhoun, a Katy ISD board member, that seemed to call out IttyBitty Kitty-Corn, a 2021 children’s book written by Shannon Hale and illustrated by Leuyen Pham, which follows KIRKUS REVIEWS

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From left: Shannon Hale, Stephen King, Marie-Louise Gay

a kitten who wants to be a unicorn.

Calhoun wasn’t happy that “the main character [wants] to transform into something they are obviously not.” It’s unclear whether the offending book was indeed responsible for the school district’s buying pause, but we’re willing to bet there’s an order in for Little Miss Fluffypaws, the Cat Who Was Happy Being a Cat Because Imagination Is the Work of the Dark Lord Satan.

SEPT. 7: Stephen King has given readers throughout the world nightmares with his scary novels, but that pales in comparison to the horror he’s inflicted on his wife, fellow author Tabitha King. In an interview with Rolling Stone, the writer confirmed that he was such a fan of Lou Bega’s 1999 hit “Mambo No. 5” that his wife threatened to walk out on him.

“I played that a lot,” he said. “I had the dance mix. I loved those extended play things, and I played both sides of it. And one of them was just total instrumental. And I played that thing until my wife just said, ‘One more time, and I’m going to fucking leave you.’” While that would have been the most justified divorce in the history of Maine, the couple remains married, although that might change if Stephen King discovers Aqua’s “Barbie Girl.”

SEPT. 28: Mark Meadows has been a lot of things: real estate developer, U.S. congressman, chief of staff to Donald Trump, co-defendant in a racketeering trial. But he’s never been a drinker—or at least he wasn’t before accidentally getting wrecked on hard seltzer at a White House meeting, an

anecdote that former assistant Cassidy Hutchinson related in her memoir, Enough, published by Simon & Schuster. Meadows downed three and a half cans of White Claw—blackberry and grapefruit flavored—before realizing that the drinks were less La Croix and more frat boy. “My head started feeling funny, and I look down at the can and I saw that it was alcohol,” Meadows recalled. “I’m drinking alcohol on a Monday morning and I’ve never had a drink before.” It’s currently unknown whether Meadows will employ the “Ain’t no laws when you’re drinking Claws” defense at his planned Georgia trial.

OCT. 10: The recent spate of book bans and challenges in schools and libraries makes no sense, but a review of titles by an Alabama library system managed to reach new depths of absurdity. The Huntsville-Madison County Public Library system flagged more than 200 books for possible removal, one of which was a 2013 children’s book, Read Me a Story, Stella, about a girl and her younger brother enjoying a nice summer day. The reason the book was flagged? It was written and illustrated by Marie-Louise Gay, whose surname somehow set off alarm bells. The library system’s executive director said that the book would not actually be removed, but the fact that it was flagged is sure to cause concern for authors worldwide. (Well, maybe not novelist Susan Straight.)

Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.

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3.25 x 4.5

3.25 x 4.5

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DEBUTS TO REMEMBER AS 2023 COMES to a close, I’d like to celebrate some of the exciting writers who made their debuts this year.

The fiction year started off strong with The New Life by Tom Crewe (Scribner, Jan. 3), a novel set in Victorian England about two men who collaborate on a report about the lives of gay men at a time when homosexuality was illegal—Oscar Wilde’s trial and imprisonment are incorporated into the plot.

Our starred review calls it “a smart, sensual debut.”

Egyptian comics artist Deena Mohamed’s Shubeik

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Lubeik (Pantheon, Jan. 10) is an entrancing graphic novel that imagines a world where wishes can come true—but they’re subject to strict rules and regulations enforced by a sprawling bureaucracy.

“The book is exceptionally imaginative while also being wonderfully grounded in touching human relationships, existential quandaries, and familiar geopolitical and socio-economic dynamics,” according to our starred review.

In Lucky Red (Dial Press, Jun. 20), Claudia Cravens shakes up the traditional

Western by putting a 16-yearold girl in the driver’s seat of a wagon headed to Dodge City. Bridget soon begins a career as a sex worker—a “sporting woman”—and, along the way, discovers that what she really wants is another woman. Our starred review says, “Cravens shakes the dust off tired tropes and delivers a shining example of what an old-fashioned page-turner can accomplish.”

Set in 1950s Maine, Rachel Eliza Griffiths’ Promise (Random House, Jul. 11) examines the Jim Crow era in the North.

The narrator is 13-year-old Cinthy Kindred, who, along with her older sister, Ezra, grows increasingly aware “of the ways in which their lives will differ from those of their white schoolmates,” according to our starred review. “A stunning and evocative portrait of love, pride, and survival.”

The Deep Sky by Yume Kitasei (Flatiron, Jul. 18) features an Earth not unlike our own, riven by climate disasters, and a spaceship that left the planet 10 years ago, carrying 80 women with the mission of starting over someplace else. (They’re each expected to be inseminated and reproduce.) After a decade in stasis, the crew has awakened, and someone tries to sabotage the mission.

But who, and why? This is

“cerebral SF, tackling both humanitywide problems and the smaller but ever present conflicts closer to home,” according to our starred review.

Rebekah Bergman’s The Museum of Human History (Tin House, Aug. 1) imagines a treatment that can pause aging and numb pain. Is it connected to the red algae bloom that biotech researcher Naomi Wilhem was investigating when she drowned years ago? And why isn’t Naomi’s daughter, Maeve, who’s been asleep for 25 years after she, too, almost drowned, not getting visibly older? “With melancholy imagination, Bergman elegantly tackles nothing less than the entire arc of human history,” according to our starred review.

In Justin C. Key’s short story collection The World Wasn’t Ready for You (Harper, Sept. 19), the author uses “the tropes of horror and science fiction with intelligence, compassion, and wry abandon to analyze and analogize racial misunderstanding,” as noted in our starred review. One man is released from prison after his body is transformed into a breeding ground for spiders, while another finds his AI doppelgänger going too far.

Laurie Muchnick is the fiction editor.

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

LAURIE MUCHNICK

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EDITOR’S PICK Over one hot July weekend at Bob’s Boxing Palace in Reno, Nevada, eight young boxers fight to the finish.

Bullwinkel’s first novel, following the story collection Belly Up (2018), begins with a poster and a bracket for “The 12th Annual Women’s 18 & Under Daughters of America Cup at Bob’s Boxing Palace,” with first-round pairings and names that will become incantations as this unusual and striking novel unfolds. Artemis Victor vs.

Andi Taylor; Kate Heffer vs.

Rachel Doricko; Iggy Lang vs. Izzy Lang; Rose Mueller vs. Tanya Maw. Each match unfolds both in the physicality of the dusty ring and in the consciousnesses of the fighters, their coaches, parents, and other spectators in the tiny audience.

These Titles Earned the Kirkus Star

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There’s not a single line of dialogue in the book, but rather a hypnotically intense, God’s-eye narrative voice that describes the hits and misses of each round and plumbs the backstories of each boxer: One is haunted by a terrible experience as a lifeguard; one has developed a “weird hat” philosophy based on a rotting coonskin hat; one calms herself by reciting the digits of pi; two are cousins known as prodigies in their small hometown. The girls’ bodies are evoked just as memorably: One has a purple stain on her lip that has shaped her experiences since infancy; one has legs that look like “bundles of dry pasta covered in skin”; one has looped braids sticking out of her headgear, making droopy circles on her back.

15 American Spirits

By Russell Banks

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Headshot

By Rita Bullwinkel

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You Glow in the Dark

By Liliana Colanzi; trans. by Chris Andrews

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Significant Others

By Zoë Eisenberg

Headshot Bullwinkel, Rita | Viking | 224 pp. $28.00 | Nov. 7, 2023 | 9780593654101

As each fighter advances, she takes the spirit of the girl she’s bested with her to the next round: “Usually, as a tournament progresses, there is a feeling of whittling, of a group of many reduced to a single champion, but here in Bob’s Boxing Palace, at the Daughters of America tournament, as each bout has been fought, there has

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Anita de Monte Laughs Last

By Xochitl Gonzalez

23

The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years

By Shubnum Khan

been the feeling of accumulation.” For each young woman, Bullwinkel also conjures a life ahead, and these brilliantly imagined future selves add to the richness of the characterizations.

The classic momentum of a sports narrative unfurls in unusually lyric and muscular language: a ferocious novel.

27

Nightwatching

By Tracy Sierra

39

The Catch

By Amy Lea

35

Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect

By Benjamin Stevenson

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Holiday Country Atrek, İnci | Flatiron Books (272 pp.) $28.99 | Jan. 9, 2024 | 9781250889461

A young woman spending the summer in Turkey becomes entangled with a man from her mother’s past.

“Turkey is, without a doubt, the most beautiful country in the world,” says 19-yearold Ada. She would know: She’s spent every summer there since she was a young child, returning with her Turkish mother, Meltem, to visit her grandmother in a sleepy seaside town, and leaving behind Ada’s father, a successful Silicon Valley tech worker.

Though these holidays aren’t exactly idyllic—there’s always tension between Ada’s controlling grandmother and “stoic,” depression-prone Meltem— this summer is particularly fraught.

Ada’s father has disclosed an affair, and Meltem is using the time away to decide the marriage’s future. When Levent, an ex-flame of Meltem’s, pops up in town, Ada thinks it could be the perfect chance to matchmake; she’s rooting for her melancholy mother to embrace the life Ada suspects she’s always wished for in Turkey. “It suddenly becomes very important to me that she fall in love with this man, that she reclaim the precision of her vocabulary,” declares Ada. To Ada’s surprise, though, she’s the one who develops feelings for Levent, and her attempts to reach into her mother’s past to alter her future may end up altering Ada’s own irrevocably. In this, her debut, Atrek writes keenly of the liminality of the first-generation American—though Ada is confident and headstrong, her American life with her American boyfriend never seems to fit her, but neither does Turkey, where the language never rolls off her tongue perfectly and cultural touchstones sometimes bewilder her.

Despite the collisions of all the characters’ longings, this is a book full of pleasures: Turkish food, the sparkling 14 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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Aegean, the laze of late summer, and, ultimately, of the difficult mysteries of mothers and daughters.

An elegant portrayal of the overlap between mothers and motherlands.

Fourteen Days: A Collaborative Novel Ed. by Atwood, Margaret & Douglas Preston Harper/HarperCollins (384 pp.) | $32.00 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780358616382

A Decameron-esque storytelling collaboration with a Covid-19 premise.

Thirty-six authors contributed to this lively and predictably somewhat uneven work of fiction sponsored by and benefiting the Authors Guild Foundation, styled as an unclaimed manuscript found in New York’s lost property office. The narrative within is set on the rooftop of a Lower East Side “six-floor walk-up with the farcical name of the Fernsby Arms, a decaying crapshack tenement that should have been torn down long ago,” per the lively frame story penned

by Douglas Preston in the persona of Yessenia Grigorescu, the building’s super. From a notebook left by her predecessor in the job, Yessie knows the tenants by evocative sobriquets: The Lady With the Rings, Amnesia, Eurovision, Hello Kitty, the Poet, Vinegar, and so forth. They come up to the roof at 7 p.m. to participate in the huzzah for health care workers, which was a nightly ritual during Manhattan’s lockdown, and then settle into the routine of sharing stories, each written by a different author. One is constantly flipping to the backmatter to see who wrote what; though not all authors are household names, plenty are—Emma Donoghue, Dave Eggers, Diana Gabaldon, John Grisham, Erica Jong, Tommy Orange, Scott Turow, Luis Alberto Urrea, Meg Wolitzer, and more—though it’s not always the big names who contribute the best work. Fortunately, Preston’s frame

story keeps everything moving. Day One gets off to a rollicking start, with stories from Merenguero’s Daughter and The Therapist, actually Maria Hinojosa and Celeste Ng. Anchored in Dominican and Chinese culture, respectively, these stories introduce a theme of diversity that’s one of the joys of the book. There are ghost stories, a war story, many tales of betrayal and revenge, and a report on Shakespeare’s plague experience by scholar James Shapiro. Little to no information is provided about the process behind the book, how contributors were chosen, etc. Since celebrity-watching is part of the draw, that could have been fun.

A multicultural tribute to the New York lockdown experience. Many parts are moving and/or funny; others, easy to skip.

Girls With Bad Reputations Axelrod, Xio | Sourcebooks Casablanca (448 pp.) | $16.99 paper | Feb. 6, 2024 9781728261997

The Lillys return in this follow-up to The Girl With Stars in Her Eyes (2021), with new romance and more musicindustry drama.

Ever since Kayla Whitman’s older brother, Zach, handed her a pair of sticks and encouraged her to play, she’s never felt more herself than she does behind a drum set. But having been born Katherine Yolanda Larrington, daughter of celebrated academics Geoffrey and Gisele Larrington, comes with a lifetime of high expectations. Kayla knows that her life as a college dropout who’s the drummer for up-and-coming rock band the Lillys would never meet her mother’s exacting standards, so she’s decided to keep her two lives—in one, the dutiful daughter; in the other, following in her late brother’s footsteps as a touring musician—entirely separate. Tyrell Baldwin also understands something KIRKUS REVIEWS

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This is a dark tale in which death is dealt out remorselessly, family ties are fatal, and a well-meant deed can turn virtue into complicity.

AMERICAN SPIRITS

about not living up to expectations.

Barely coping with the fallout of having been kicked out of school after false accusations of plagiarism and assault ruined his chances at an academic career, Ty is living at home with his grandfather when he’s offered a job as a tour bus driver for the Lillys. When Kayla and Ty bond over a shared love of books, their connection quickly turns romantic. But as the Lillys’ star continues to rise, media scrutiny follows, and both Kayla’s and Ty’s pasts are put under a spotlight.

And they’ll have to decide whether to wilt or grow in its glare. The author tackles a lot in this sequel—including weighty topics such as death, grief, microaggressions, racial profiling, and false imprisonment—which sometimes results in tonal whiplash. But the characters are compelling and richly drawn, and the text smartly leans more on sharp dialogue in this installment.

Readers will no doubt chant for an encore.

Kirkus Star

American Spirits Banks, Russell | Knopf (224 pp.) | $28.00 March 5, 2024 | 9780593536773

Three stories unearth the bitterness and violence seething in a working-class American town.

These long narratives by the late Banks are all set in the northern New York village of Sam Dent that featured in The Sweet KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Hereafter (1991). But where that story dealt with a tragedy that affected the whole town, these explore the welter of pain that can afflict a single house.

In “Nowhere Man,” a feud between neighbors escalates when one of them finds himself threatened on social media. This is a community where guns are commonplace and Banks’ choice of victim is pointedly cruel. He also weaves in Trump, the Proud Boys, and home-grown militias, expanding the range of one of his recurring themes, toxic masculinity. “Homeschooling” has a Hallmark-wholesome, Trump-friendly family adjusting to next-door neighbors who comprise white married lesbians and their four adopted Black children. When those kids suggest that all is not well in their household, the adults trade bitter words that lead to an awful outcome. Banks plants doubt about the virtue and veracity on both sides, fostering an ambiguity that challenges any facile finger-pointing. In “Kidnapped,” the grandparents of a young man who lost his father to war and his mother to drugs open their door one evening to find two drug thugs looking for human leverage in a deal gone bad.

This is a dark tale in which death is dealt out remorselessly, family ties are fatal, and a change of heart or a well-meant deed can turn virtue into complicity. All these stories include ruminations on the passage of time, changes and damage in the landscape, and the values and aspirations sustained from generation to generation.

The tone in these passages is almost elegiac: hymns to a past when fewer wounds were self-inflicted.

Grim but compelling narratives from this fine writer.

Acts of Forgiveness Cheeks, Maura | Ballantine (320 pp.) $28.00 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780593598290

In a U.S. that’s just elected its first female president, the members of a Black family find themselves divided when a federal reparations act is proposed.

Wilhelmina “Willie” Revel grew up watching her father, Max, who owned a construction company, work tirelessly to provide financial security and upward mobility for his family, having been haunted by his own father’s inability to secure a mortgage because of his race. Willie goes to college to become a journalist, and just as she’s starting to make a name for herself as a reporter for the Village Voice, she’s offered a job with the U.S. Senate campaign of Elizabeth Johnson, one of her former professors. Unfortunately, though, her father gets sick, and Willie needs to go home to take over the business.

Eleven years later, now-President Johnson puts forward the Forgiveness Act, which would formally apologize for slavery in part by providing reparations of $175,000 to each descendant of slaves. Willie is now a single mother to a young daughter and is attempting to keep her father’s business afloat. When she decides to undertake the genealogical work required to file for the money, she unintentionally provokes her brother, parents, and grandfather, all of whom have different perspectives on why it’s a bad idea to go poking into the family history, even as the U.S. deals with a violent backlash. Cheeks’ debut novel seeks to explore the question of “whether forgiveness could be political, and, if so, could it last.” The story doesn’t quite address this ambitious question for the nation at large, instead focusing on the many costs that not knowing where one comes from can take on a person, as well as the social and interpersonal effects DECEMBER 15, 2023 15

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of racism. Willie is depicted with tremendous care, but there is at times too much narrative distance from the large cast of supporting characters.

A freshly told, complex family drama with an intriguing premise.

The Fox Wife Choo, Yangsze | Henry Holt (400 pp.) $27.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781250266019

The rich Asian tradition of fox folklore provides the backdrop for Choo’s complex and atmospheric tale of identity and discovery set in early 1900s Manchuria.

Snow (later also referred to as Ah San) narrates the story of her search for a shadowy figure—the photographer Bektu Nikan—during the waning days of the Qing dynasty. She crosses Manchuria and travels to Japan in her efforts to locate the man she believes is responsible for the death of her very young daughter. Snow’s slow reveal of her trek and travails is often whimsical or wry and is particularly informative about the habits and practices of the shape-shifting foxes who are believed to appear in human form. Quite reasonably, this knowledge is derived from Snow’s own experiences…as a fox. Running on an eventual collision course is the slowly evolving story of a private investigator, the aging Bao, whose initial assignment is to determine the identity of a woman whose body was found frozen and dead outside a restaurant. As he follows the scant clues in that case, he becomes more and more enmeshed in circumstances that lead him into the orbit of Snow and her growing posse of humans and foxes. (Events in Bao’s early childhood have encouraged his belief in the presence of human-seeming foxes and have also left him with the personally and professionally helpful ability to discern when a lie is being told.) As the circuitous and 16 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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alternating stories unfold and begin to converge, coincidence and historical events play out. Snow’s difficulties as both a fox and a young woman in a man’s world are clearly drawn, as is the pathos of Bao’s situation as a gentle soul who’s always been in search of something or someone.

An intriguing vulpine mystery worth the suspension of disbelief.

Kirkus Star

You Glow in the Dark Colanzi, Liliana | Trans. by Chris Andrews New Directions (144 pp.) | $14.95 paper Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780811237185

Bolivian writer Colanzi’s latest collection, which earned her the Ribera del Duero International Short Story Prize.

Tinged with futuristic flourishes and set largely in the Bolivian Altiplano, these stories examine the aftermath of terrible trespasses, mostly only whispered about. The opening story, “The Cave,” emerges in fragments—a prehistoric mother, a time traveler, and a pair of star-crossed lovers are just a few who run across the title locale—showing the fleeting transience of people across the arc of time. Most notably, a pair of stories break down the mechanics and the radioactive consequences of colonialism. In the future, “Atomito” is the name of the heroic mascot of an industrial nuclear plant in South America that’s not only poisoning people but also corrupting a society looking for blame.

Conversely, the sharp title story that ends the collection shows the raw consequences of a real 1987 event known as the Goiânia accident, in which hundreds were poisoned with radioactivity. Because short stories are fleeting, they’re sometimes lacking in characterization, but Colanzi is gifted at focusing on people during their most intense moments while

simultaneously indulging her interest in time and its capacity to bury dark deeds. “The Debt” finds a young woman on the verge of giving birth grappling with her heritage, and “The Narrow Way” shows forbidden fruit’s effect on an isolated faith. Meanwhile, “Chaco” wanders into straight-up horror with the story of a young man possessed by the Indigenous Mataco man he murdered. The longer stories are richer but the shorter entries don’t lose a step. In fact, the most bitter story, “The Greenest Eyes,” concerns a girl who, in a Grimm-like fairy tale, longs for “the mint-colored eyes of her dreams,” only to lose paradise in the process.

The “alien gaze” is a keen instrument for dissecting the human condition, and Colanzi employs it to great effect here.

Union Station Downing, David | Soho Crime (408 pp.) $27.95 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781641293570

Can a former double agent escape the dark shadow of “the Good War”?

The prolific Downing’s World War II spy thriller series continues with a complex portrait of 1953 America and Germany. British journalist and former double agent John Russell, now living in Los Angeles with his actress wife, Effi Koenen, and teenage daughter, Rosa, is doing research for a potentially controversial book about American corporate ties to Nazi Germany. Effi has landed a role on the hit sitcom Please, Dad, and Rosa plans to attend art school.

Meanwhile, Russell’s friend Gerhard Ströhm is in Moscow with other German delegates attending the funeral of Joseph Stalin. The political situation in Europe is arguably even dicier than usual, with the future of the Soviet Union in question and German allegiance unclear. Stateside, KIRKUS REVIEWS

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the aftermath of the war is on display in racial prejudice and the McCarthy witch hunts. Turmoil disturbs the happy Please, Dad family when cast member Laura Fullagar is investigated for a possible communist past.

Closer to home, Russell comes to the slow and unsettling realization that he’s being followed. The trip he and Effi take to Germany thickens the plot further. Downing’s focus is broad, with passing references to the recently ended Korean War, the Rosenbergs, and the burgeoning L.A. smog problem—potent reminders that many events around the world are interrelated. While grounded in deep research, the story is told through the journeys of a handful of fully fleshedout characters.

A gripping depiction of America at a turning point.

Kirkus Star

Significant Others Eisenberg, Zoë | Harlequin MIRA (352 pp.) $28.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780778369660

A makeshift throuple— described from two alternating perspectives— makes for intricate, intimate complications.

More than a decade out of college, Jess and Ren are still roommates, sharing a rescue dog and a house in Hawaii. Jess is the hyper-responsible partner: Raised in alcohol-soaked poverty, she’s determined to maintain economic security at all costs—a likely outcome, given that she majored in business and runs her own real estate firm. Ren, bartender and part-time fitness instructor, has devolved into the child in this dyad. Though the two share expenses (loosely), Ren has grown accustomed to letting Jess attend to all the more taxing, adult routines of cohabitation: cooking, cleaning, etc. Though the two are very close, snuggling and sharing KIRKUS REVIEWS

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confidences, their relationship has never turned sexual. After a few halfhearted explorations with partners of varying genders, Jess has decided that she’s just not into it. Ren pegs her as not necessarily asexual—“maybe just aromantic.” For her part, Ren is guiltlessly free with her favors. When a drunken night with a visiting botany professor (described just vaguely enough to sound universally attractive) results in pregnancy, Ren, already at loose ends, decides to see it through, and then the professor reappears. Jess, rosily envisioning her role as co-parent, jumps right on board. That’s the setup—before ambivalence seeps in from all sides. The author is a whiz at conveying complex emotions, often with a swift metaphor. When the anxiety-prone Jess suffers a bout of guilt and shame, she recalls the dual emotion as having “blossomed like spores all over [her] body.” The women’s distinctive voices are artfully delineated and come across as fully three-dimensional. It doesn’t hurt that the sex scenes, when they arise, are not only believable but evocative.

This accomplished first novel artfully limns romantic cross-currents in a thoroughly contemporary setting.

Daybreak Gallagher, Matt | Atria (256 pp.) | $26.99 Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781501177859

An American veteran seeks a purpose in war-torn Ukraine.

Two former American soldiers arrive in Ukraine not long after the Russian invasion. They are Luke Paxton, the protagonist, and Han Lee—though Paxton is known as “Pax,” which feels meaningful in a book about the effects of war. Gallagher writes, “…Lee hadn’t been able to shake the sense of lost purpose in the homeland so now he was here, to again carry the gun.” Pax is also looking for a sense

of purpose—he tells a fellow veteran, “I came to help….But I don’t know how”—although he’s also looking for an old flame named Svitlana Dovbush. Eventually, Pax and Lee part ways, and Pax finds himself adrift in Lviv. He does reconnect with Svitlana, who in the intervening years has gotten married and had a son; Pax learns that her marriage is fraying, and that her husband is away on the front lines of combat. Gallagher mostly sticks to Pax’s perspective, but notably, it’s through Svitlana that we learn how they parted ways years before. Several of the novel’s Ukrainian characters take pains to point out how little the well-intentioned Americans know about the conflict. Bogdan, a recruiter, tells them, “I’ve been surprised how many arrivals are willing to fight and kill for my country…yet have no idea the war has been going for eight years.”

And there’s tension surrounding Pax’s place in the narrative; late in the book, Svitlana tells him, “Don’t you dare do that thing that makes everything in the world about you.”

It’s an absorbing character study of a man purging the ghosts of one war by attempting to fight in another.

An understated look at the physical and psychological effects of war.

Kirkus Star

Anita de Monte Laughs Last Gonzalez, Xochitl | Flatiron Books (352 pp.) $28.99 | March 5, 2024 | 9781250786210

An undergraduate at Brown University unearths the buried history of a Latine artist.

As in her bestselling debut, Olga Dies Dreaming (2022), Gonzalez shrewdly anatomizes racial and class hierarchies. Her bifurcated novel begins at a posh art-world party in 1985 as the title character, a Cuban DECEMBER 15, 2023 17

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American land and body artist, garners recognition that threatens the ego of her older, more famous husband, white minimalist sculptor Jack Martin.

The story then shifts to Raquel Toro, whose working-class, Puerto Rican background makes her feel out of place among the “Art History Girls” who easily chat with professors and vacation in Europe. Nonetheless, in the spring of 1998, Raquel wins a prestigious summer fellowship at the Rhode Island School of Design, and her faculty adviser is enthusiastic about her thesis on Jack Martin, even if she’s not. Soon she’s enjoying the attentions of Nick Fitzsimmons, a well-connected, upper-crust senior.

As Raquel’s story progresses, Anita’s first-person narrative acquires a supernatural twist following the night she falls from the window of their apartment —“jumped? or, could it be, pushed?”—but it’s grimly realistic in its exploration of her toxic relationship with Jack. (A dedication, “In memory of Ana,” flags the notorious case of sculptor Carl Andre, tried and acquitted for the murder of his wife, artist Ana Mendieta.) Raquel’s affair with Nick mirrors that unequal dynamic when she adapts her schedule and appearance to his whims, neglecting her friends and her family in Brooklyn. Gonzalez, herself a Brown graduate, brilliantly captures the daily slights endured by someone perceived as Other, from microaggressions (Raquel’s adviser refers to her as “Mexican”) to brutally racist behavior by the Art History Girls. While a vividly rendered supporting cast urges Raquel to be true to herself and her roots, her research on Martin leads to Anita’s art and the realization that she belongs to a tradition that’s been erased from mainstream art history.

An uncompromising message, delivered via a gripping story with two engaging heroines.

For more by Xochitl Gonzalez, visit Kirkus online.

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Green Dot Gray, Madeleine | Henry Holt (320 pp.) $27.99 | Feb. 27, 2024 | 9781250890597

After embarking on her first grown-up job, an idealistic 20-something begins an affair with a married colleague.

Hera Stephen, 24, lives with her father in Sydney, Australia. She’s used grad school to delay adulthood as long as possible, but now it’s time for her to join the ranks of her corporate friends and get a “real job.” After several disastrously frank interviews, she takes a position as a news organization’s comment moderator, where her soul-sucking responsibility is to read, parse, and color-code the vitriol of online discussions. It’s at this job that she meets Arthur Jones, a soft-spoken journalist with whom she starts up a message-based flirtation (hence the title, referencing the green dot that indicates a user is online). By the time Hera finds out that Arthur is married, it’s already too late—she’s enamored.

Gray’s writing skillfully captures the passion of their early trysts. The sex scenes crackle with energy, and the chemistry between Hera and Arthur is believable and seductive. You may find yourself rooting for them against your better instincts, even as Hera begins to neglect her friends and her delightful, supportive father. As the book tracks the increasingly doomed love affair (including through the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic), the only thing keeping the narrative from devolving into something grim and cynical is Hera’s dynamic and snarky voice. She addresses the reader directly at times, preempting any criticism and attempting to mitigate her own bad decisions. Her narration is peppered with references to music and pop culture, the things that define your personality in your 20s, when you’re still searching, as Hera is, for some kind of identity. Just as much of the narrative unfolds digitally as it

does IRL, and Gray deftly incorporates FaceTime, Instagram, and an unnamed company chat platform into the text.

A breezy, heartfelt coming-of-age story for Gen Zers concerned with how to grow up without growing cold.

The Chaos Agent Greaney, Mark | Berkley (528 pp.) | $27.00 Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780593548141

Futuristic robots take center stage in the Gray Man’s latest bloody adventure.

Courtland “the Gray Man” Gentry and Zoya Zakharova are lovers trying to enjoy a peaceful hideaway by Guatemala’s beautiful Lake Atitlán when a tiny drone with facial recognition capabilities tracks them down. A worldwide manhunt is underway for them, and Russia has a capture-orkill order out on Zoya. For those just tuning in to the series, by the way, the twosome used to be mortal enemies. Now one of the planet’s most infamous killers for hire is after them, an evildoer named Scott Kincaid, aka Lancer. But on to the main plot: Multibillionaire Anton Hinton is building a lethal autonomous weapon driven by artificial intelligence. Strangely, over a 34-hour period, 10 people involved in AI and robotics have been murdered around the world. Hinton insists he’s just trying to bring some sanity into the world: With these machines engaging in any necessary fighting and doing so with perfect judgment, human wars could become a thing of the past. Wait a sec, just looking for the perfect cliche. Oh yes: What could possibly go wrong? Greaney, a terrific action writer, has jumped the shark (oops, another cliche; it won’t happen again, sorry) with a science fiction setup involving bomb-wielding hexacopters, rifle-wielding robot dogs, and a superintelligent creature named Cyrus who’s controlled by 800 IBM mainframe computers. So who will KIRKUS REVIEWS

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get control of this technology? China, maybe. Or, as series regular Zack Hightower says as he wipes his bloody nose, “America…. Fuck, yeah.” In a scene emblematic of the story’s chaos, Zoya lies in a dead man’s blood as the man’s left leg is hit, “and it snapped and shattered the bone there, bits of meat spraying in all directions.” And, in a contemplative moment with Zoya, Court says he just wants to be with her in peace, while he wonders if he’d “ever be able to stop killing motherfuckers who deserved to die.” Indeed, violence is the point of his life.

Greaney could dial back the bloodletting a notch and still have an exciting story.

The Devil’s Daughter Greisman, Gordon | Blackstone (350 pp.) $26.99 | Jan. 23, 2024 | 9798212342575

Hired by wealthy Wall Street financier Louis Garrett to find his missing teenage daughter, Lucy, scuffling New York P.I. Jack Coffey uncovers a child sex ring.

The time is the late 1950s. Lucy, Coffey hears soon after taking the case, has actually been abused by her father. For mysterious reasons, she doesn’t want to be found, showing up in public one minute and disappearing the next. In his efforts to save her, Coffey puts himself in the path of bad guys who make a practice of beating him up and shooting him. That doesn’t sit well with his devoted girlfriend, V (for Victoria), a super-successful fashion model who could be off getting richer on European runways instead of tending to Coffey’s wounds. But her loyalty has no limits, culminating in an outlandish action scene in which this Texas girl shows off her shooting skills.

In his first novel, TV screenwriter Greisman does an entertaining job of recycling crime fiction tropes. He’s good at capturing the varied looks KIRKUS REVIEWS

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and sounds of Manhattan, populating the story with fictionalized celebrities from the era. The problem with the name-dropping is that it’s never clear how Coffey, a product of Hell’s Kitchen who fought in World War II, became tight with eccentric geniuses like Marlon Brando and jazz great Thelonious Monk—or what Greisman was thinking in rendering them as such squares. (Brando’s liveliest moment is saying how much he likes having his life threatened.

“It’s all grist for the creative mill,” the Method man says.) The beautiful model’s attraction to the schlubby Coffey is also hard to figure. It might work in another kind of novel, but in this noir setting, it’s pure fantasy.

A well-crafted throwback thriller softened by celebrity worship.

Goodbye Girl Grippando, James | Harper/HarperCollins (352 pp.) | $30.00 | Jan. 9, 2024 9780063223844

A feud between a pop-singing phenom and her ex-husband pulls Florida lawyer Jack Swyteck into a whirlpool of murder, betrayal, and modern-day piracy.

Music mogul Shaky Nichols has sued his ex, the single-named Imani, for defaming him by charging that he stole much of her back catalog when EML Records, the company he controls, simply bought the copyrights in secret. (He’d been about to present them to her as a surprise, Shaky claims, when she filed for divorce.) Even though Imani publicly accused Shaky of pirating her music and urged her zillions of fans to retaliate by pirating the recordings he owns, Jack, her lawyer, manages to get Shaky’s suit dismissed without prejudice, but the trouble doesn’t go away.

Even worse, the trouble is linked to the corpse of Tyler McCormick, who was strangled and chained to a piling

on Florida’s Isola di Lolando 12 years ago. The FBI presses Imani to meet privately with Russian oligarch Vladimir Kava, whose teenage granddaughter wants a private concert, so that she can wear a wire and record him acknowledging that he and his son, Sergei, are running a global digital piracy operation. When that meeting doesn’t come off as planned, Jack finds himself back in court with his unreliable client, who’s charged, like her ex, with that 12-year-old murder, each co-defendant eager to throw the other under the bus. Meanwhile, Jack’s agreement with his wife, FBI agent Andie Henning, that they won’t discuss their jobs runs aground once again, and his former client and sometime investigator Theo Knight’s trip to London suddenly casts him in the role of accessory to a kidnapping and puts him squarely in the Kavas’ crosshairs.

Enough eye-popping plot developments for a miniseries, which may be exactly the idea.

The Second Sword and My Day in the Other Land: Two Novellas Handke, Peter | Trans. by Krishna Winston Farrar, Straus and Giroux (192 pp.) | $27.00 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780374601447

Two novellas by the noted, sometimes controversial Austrian writer and Nobel laureate.

Whereas in his nonfiction Handke can be polemical and strident, in his fiction he is rather more subtle—at least to a point. This brace of novellas is no exception. In the first, he opens with a never quite fully defined man who addresses himself in the mirror, saying, “So this is the face of an avenger!” He’s not a superhero, but instead a man who roams the streets of his adopted Paris in search of a journalist who’s landed a roundabout insult upon him >>> DECEMBER 15, 2023 19

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Ending the legacy of abuse...a story that begins in south Texas and ends at a sycamore tree in Tennessee.

ISBN: 978-1-950495-33-7 [paperback] ISBN: 979-8-212640-89-3 [audiobook] ISBN: 978-1-950495-34-4 [eBook]

“Jennie Helderman’s thoroughly documented book proves the cycle of domestic violence can be broken, hope exists for the batterer and the abused, and the written word has the power to heal.”

—Retired Lieutenant Lynn D. Hesse, Author of Well of Rage

“…a life-story of emancipation, personal fulfillment, and escape—not only from a padlocked cabin in the woods, but from a backwards anti-feminist culture into the broader world of contemporary human rights that is America's mainstream attitudes towards women's rights.”

—Midwest Book Review For Agent Representation and Information on Film Rights, Email jenniehelderman@gmail.com • jenniehelderman.com Kirkus Reviews 121523 Fiction_F.indd 20

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P O D C A S T // F I C T I O N

Fully Booked

Novelist Bryan Washington (Family Meal) joins us on a special episode dedicated to the Best Fiction of 2023.

BY MEGAN LABRISE

EPISODE 346: BRYAN WASHINGTON

EDITORS’ PICKS:

Absolution by Alice McDermott (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) White Cat, Black Dog by Kelly Link (Random House) Witness by Jamel Brinkley (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) Good Women by Halle Hill (Hub City Press) A New Race of Men From Heaven by Chaitali Sen (Sarabande) Games and Rituals by Katherine Heiny (Knopf) An Island Princess Starts a Scandal by Adriana Herrera (Canary Street Press) Ana María and the Fox by Liana De la Rosa (Berkley) Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (Pantheon) Marry Me by Midnight by Felicia Grossman (Forever) The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese (Grove) Same Bed Different Dreams by Ed Park (Random House) The End of Drum-Time by Hannah Pylväinen (Henry Holt) Fully Booked is produced

by Cabel Adkins Audio and Megan Labrise.

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On this episode, Bryan Washington joins us to discuss Family Meal (Riverhead, Oct. 10), one of Kirkus’ Best Fiction Books of 2023.

Washington is a writer from Houston whose debut novel, Memorial, was one of the Best Fiction Books of 2020, as well as a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in fiction. He is the author of the short story collection Lot, a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, and an assistant professor in creative writing at Rice University.

Here’s a bit from our starred review of his poignant sophomore novel, Family Meal: “Food, family, and sex drive this intimate novel about the difficult search for true connections.

“After the tragic death of his boyfriend, Cam returns to Houston adrift, struggling with drug and sex addiction, and often seeing Kai’s ghost. He gets a job as a bartender and finds himself pulled into the life and family of TJ, his former best friend, from whom he had drifted.…Co-workers aren’t just colleagues, but members of a family focused on achieving something together, whether that’s hanging on to one of the last gay bars in a fast-gentrifying Houston neighborhood or nourishing body and soul in TJ’s family bakery.…

“Washington brilliantly commits to his style and preoccupations in a novel about the often winding journey to family.”

Washington shares some highlights from book tour in the U.K. and Japan, and notes the differences between touring Family Meal and his debut novel, which published in October of 2020. We then discuss Houston neighborhoods Montrose and the Heights; how every place is a palimpsest; how the characters in Family Meal make a practice of revising themselves and

Family Meal

Washington, Bryan

Riverhead | 320 pp. | $28.00 | Oct. 10, 2023 9780593421093

their relationships to one another; how families form themselves within communities; the questions that arise about how to live a queer life in the absence of an abudance of queer role models; how characters accept care from one another; quotation marks; and much more.

Then fiction editor Laurie Muchnick tells us what it took to determine the year’s top 100 titles.

Megan Labrise is an editor at large and host of Fully Booked.

To listen to the episode, visit Kirkus online.

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by suggesting that his mother once rejoiced at the Anschluss by which Nazi Germany absorbed Austria into the Reich, “which made her a supporter, a Party member.” Not so subtle among the narrator’s wanderings are the encouragements he receives from an Arab shopkeeper: “‘Kill! With a sword. Mah al-saif. Off with his head!’

He didn’t ask for details; in his eyes, insulting a mother deserved nothing less than death.” One wonders, too, at Handke’s characterization of an African cook: “Back to Africa? Didn’t they need magicians there who practiced a different kind of juju, magicians like him?” Questionable racial asides notwithstanding, Handke’s protagonist is all talk and no action: The metaphorical sword he carries is one that merely carves the offender from memory. In the second novella, as if a German-language rejoinder to Juan Rulfo’s novel Pedro Páramo, an orchard keeper endures a period of madness profound enough to scare the neighbors: “…now and then there was something distinctly odd, uncanny, even sinister about me.” After pondering his demons at considerable length, he makes his way across a lake that divides his country from the next, only to find it apparently devoid of people—a commentary, one might suppose, on the recent pandemic.

Improbably, in the ruins, he finds something approaching happiness, even if he still terrifies even his own children.

Enigmatic and sometimes troubling, and so trademark Handke.

The Great Divide Henríquez, Cristina | Ecco/HarperCollins (336 pp.) | $30.00 | March 5, 2024 9780063291324

An anti-imperialist fairy tale about the building of the Panama Canal.

Henríquez’s novel begins in 1907, with work on the canal well underway, 22 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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An anti-imperialist fairy tale about the building of the Panama Canal.

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and reveals how its construction changes the lives of multiple characters of varying nationalities, classes, and races, each in Panama for their own reasons. Henríquez is skilled at juggling the many subplots. Among the central characters, Ada Bunting from Barbados is the stereotypical sentimental heroine. The biracial 16-year-old has come to Panama to earn money to save her ailing sister’s life; she gets a job nursing the sick wife of wealthy, idealistic, but emotionally stunted malaria researcher John Oswald (whose under-explored complexity makes him one of the book’s more interesting characters).

Plucky Ada begins a tepid romance with young Panamanian Omar Aquino, whose broken relationship with his fisherman father Francisco exemplifies the divided loyalties and resentments of Panamanians treated as second-class citizens in their own country. Francisco sells to fishmonger Joaquín, whose wife ropes her husband into organizing a demonstration of passive resistance against Canal Commission orders to dismantle and move her entire hometown. A host of other characters are sketched in, from an Antiguan cook who undermines Ada to an inept French doctor, an intuitive palm reader, and a Barbadian sugar planter in love with Ada’s mother but too weakwilled to fight for her. Along the way, Henríquez plugs in the history that many North Americans probably don’t know: the Panamanian civil war and intervention by the United States, which paid the country, newly independent from Colombia, $10 million dollars for full control of the Canal Zone. The depiction of white North Americans and Caribbean planters as at best clueless, more often mercenary and cruelly racist,

is undoubtedly accurate. Unfortunately, and despite Henríquez’s lyrical prose, they never feel fully realized as individuals. Neither does virtuous Ada, the noble Panamanians, or Mrs. Oswald, a representative of white female victimhood who has sacrificed her intellectual ambition for a loveless marriage.

Despite panoramic ambitions, the novel never quite catches fire.

Welcome to the Hyunam-Dong Bookshop Hwang Bo-reum | Trans. by Shanna Tan Bloomsbury (320 pp.) | $28.99 Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781639732425

A former high-flying corporate employee quits her job, leaves her marriage, and opens a neighborhood bookstore and cafe outside Seoul.

Yeongju doesn’t know how to run a bookstore, but she feels compelled to answer her internal call to do just that, trying to find solace in books as she did as a child. As she works to rediscover herself through reading, she collects friends, regulars, and co-workers who also take comfort in the gentle routines of the Hyunam-dong Bookshop, named for the neighborhood in which it’s located. There’s Mincheol, a high school student who becomes a staple at the bookstore, and his mother, who stops in daily for coffee and a chat. Jungsuh often sits for hours in the cafe, seemingly doing nothing, before she finally starts crocheting and then knitting. Jimi, who runs Goat Beans, the roastery from KIRKUS REVIEWS

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which Yeongju sources the coffee beans for her cafe, becomes a close friend. Minjun, who’s been drifting ever since college, trying unsuccessfully to find a permanent job and feeling uncertain about whether his routine of yoga, work, movies, and sleep is enough, becomes the bookstore’s barista and first full-time, well-paid (Yeongju insists) employee.

Seungwoo is a corporate worker whose online hobby dissecting the written word morphs into a book deal and subsequent seminar series. The book follows Yeongju’s efforts to expand the bookshop to make it profitable, and her search for meaning and value in her efforts. Together, Yeongju and her friends and colleagues spend much time discussing the meaning of life, whether or not work has value, and the aftereffects of burnout.

A snapshot of life in a quiet corner of Seoul examines how reading can help give voice to emotions, worries, and dreams.

The Kamogawa Food Detectives Kashiwai, Hisashi | Trans. by Jesse Kirkwood | Putnam (240 pp.) | $25.00 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780593717714

A father-daughter restaurant duo serves up six cozy vignettes in the first installment of this bestselling Japanese series, translated by Kirkwood.

In the back streets of present-day Kyoto, Koishi Kamogawa and her father, Nagare, are running a restaurant that isn’t your ordinary dining spot. Sure, the Kamogawa Diner features mouthwatering cuisine, but the thing that sets it apart is the way Koishi and Nagare scrupulously re-create meals from their clients’ hazy memories, investigating all avenues in their quest for authenticity. In “Nabeyaki-Udon,” an older widower seeks to experience the dish just the way his late wife KIRKUS REVIEWS

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used to make it. In “Mackerel Sushi,” a distinguished gentleman of means hopes to taste sushi just like he used to eat on the veranda of his neighbor’s home as a boy. And time is of the essence for a piano teacher on a desperate quest to re-create the perfect “Tonkatsu.” Given that only a vague ad in Gourmet Monthly has alerted people to the restaurant’s existence—the ad doesn’t even include an address— clients seem to happen upon the place by sheer luck, or perhaps fate.

Though each of the six stand-alone chapters follows the same formulaic recipe, Kashiwai’s unique blend of seasonings is more than enough to transform each into a five-star-worthy dish. Koishi and Nagare strive to re-create not only the precise dishes their clients want, but also to envelop them in a warm memory blanket of nostalgia. Readers won’t find dead bodies or scandalous affairs here, but they will eagerly devour each morsel of this miso soup for the soul, complete with a purring cat called Drowsy for good measure.

A nourishing collection of bite-sized stories with a hearty dash of savory flavor.

Kirkus Star

The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years Khan, Shubnum | Viking (320 pp.) | $28.00 Jan. 9, 2024 | 9780593653456

A haunted house full of haunted people is the setting for this lively, moving tale.

When 15-yearold Sana Malek and her widowed father move from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Durban in 2014, they land in a once-glorious mansion overlooking the sea, now a ramshackle rooming house presided over by a kindly old man called Doctor. Sana is familiar with ghosts, having been haunted all

her life by the spiteful ghost of her previously conjoined twin sister, who died soon after they were separated.

So she recognizes that the house teems with them. She forms tentative bonds with some of the place’s corporeal residents, a group of contentious older women. But she’s more interested in the departed, and she begins to unravel their stories, especially when she finds a long-locked bedroom with diaries and photos that are evidence of a couple in love. In 1919, we learn in the book’s second timeline, a dashing, wealthy young Muslim man named Akbar Ali Khan left his village in Gujarat. Eventually he settled in Durban, following an arranged marriage in India with his modern Anglophile wife, Jahanara Begum. They have a son and daughter, but their marriage never warms, despite the spectacular house and gardens he builds for them.

Then he does fall in love, with a Tamil girl hired to work in his sugar factory.

Meena rejects him, but he takes her as another wife anyway, patiently winning her over until their love catches fire. Akbar isn’t the only one in love with Meena; the djinn of the title, an ancient creature weary of the world, is enchanted. But Jahanara’s bitter jealousy of Meena will lead them all to a terrible fate. Almost a century later, Sana will put it all together—but will that bring catastrophe? Khan’s prose is lush and lovely, her pacing skillful, and she successfully weaves a complex plot with a large cast.

A ghost story, a love story, a mystery— this seductive novel has it all.

Keep Your Friends Close Konen, Leah | Putnam (384 pp.) | $18.00 paper | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780593544723

A recently separated Brooklyn mother loses her one new friend and chases the woman down for answers.

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left her controlling husband, makes a new friend at the playground. Alex, Mary’s 2-year-old son, whines that he’s hungry, and the beautiful young mother sitting next to them on the bench offers up a bag of potato chips.

This is Willa, and at this vulnerable moment in Mary’s life, she’s thrilled to connect with someone so attentive and engaging. After leaving her husband and the wealthy milieu that came along with him, Mary has been struggling to build a new life.

Her relationship with fun, irreverent Willa is the one bright spot in her drearier new existence. Willa invites Mary to the opera, arranges play dates with their little boys, and fills in the gaps left by Mary’s now-estranged in-laws. Mary begins to rely heavily on Willa and maybe even love her, which is why, when Willa suddenly and inexplicably ghosts Mary, it’s so devastating. With nothing left for her in Brooklyn, Mary moves upstate with Alex, eager to start over. It’s a shock when she bumps into someone near her new home who looks exactly like Willa, but the woman insists her name is Annie. As the story unfolds, Mary learns information about Willa that she could never have imagined.

This is a fast-paced, plot-driven novel that manages to poke fun at millennial parenting and the culture of wealthy Brooklynites. Although the number of coincidences and outlandish opportunities for scheming may stretch credibility, Konen does an admirable job of building suspense and keeping readers guessing. The story is perhaps tied up a bit too neatly at the end, but most readers will find themselves sufficiently surprised by the ultimate reveal.

A thrilling and unpredictable hunt for answers that pays off.

For more by Leah Konen, visit Kirkus online.

The German Room Maliandi, Carla | Trans. by Frances Riddle Charco Press (137 pp.) | $15.95 paper Jan. 23, 2024 | 9781999859336

A woman moves to Germany in search of a new beginning—but can she truly escape her past?

Abandoning her ex-boyfriend and her unfulfilling job in Buenos Aires, the unnamed Argentinian narrator of Maliandi’s novel returns to Heidelberg, where she and her family lived for the first five years of her life. There, she hopes to find “some place that [is] mine, a place of my own, far away from everything.”

Instead, the narrator, who seems to be “directionless” and “drifting,” is met with a series of unexpected and challenging events: She discovers that she’s pregnant, and she doesn’t know whether the father of her child is her ex-boyfriend or a one-night-stand; she befriends a Japanese student, Shanice, who dies by suicide, and then befriends Shanice’s unsettled, grieving mother; she reunites with Mario, a family friend from her earlier Heidelberg days, only to begin a romance with Joseph, whom she presumes is or once was his lover.

Each encounter with these complex worlds undoes Maliandi’s protagonist a little further—can she survive as an expectant mother in a foreign country? Through the protagonist’s relationship with Shanice’s mother, Mrs. Takahashi, Maliandi examines matrilineal cycles and questions of generational inheritance: Her protagonist is expecting a daughter in the same city where she was once a child, while Mrs. Takahashi must bury her daughter in a country thousands of miles from home. The line between mother and daughter begins to blur: “I have fitful dreams of a little girl playing in a clearing in the woods. It could be me or it could be another little girl, it could be my daughter.”

A deeply moving exploration of doing

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and undoing, birth and death—of what we inherit and what we choose to reject.

Cold Victory Marlantes, Karl | Atlantic Monthly (352 pp.) $28.00 | Jan. 9, 2024 | 9780802161420

In his new novel, Marlantes moves from the jungles of Vietnam to the spectral tundra of a very cold Cold War–era Finland.

It’s 1947. Arnie Koski, a U.S. Army colonel, has a delicate mission: As military attaché in Finland, a tributary state to Nazi Germany during the war but now a buffer against an increasingly inimical Soviet Union, he has to keep a bunch of constituencies happy, not least the Pentagon brass. Arnie’s wartime friend, a Soviet officer named Mikhail Bobrov, is now his counterpart in Helsinki, with a different agenda but the same need for tightrope-walking skills. Their wives, Louise and Natalya, who form a careful friendship of their own, share that need, too.

Louise is sometimes overwhelmed but no-nonsense, for “Army wives [are] used to getting things done alone.”

The soulful, cautious Natalya’s life is more complicated still, for she lives under the doubtful eye of Oleg Sokolov, a colonel in the secret police, who monitors every step the Bobrovs take. For all that, Arnie and Mikhail hatch a friendly-wager plot to race by skis across northern Finland in February, perhaps not the smartest but certainly a suitably macho scheme.

Alas—and here Marlantes’ rather relaxed narrative picks up speed—Louise and Natalya take the contest up a notch, with Louise sketching out a press release: “Two war heroes, friends and allies, making money for a joint Soviet-American orphanage project.”

When, thanks to subterfuge, it actually lands in the hands of the press and the contest is widely publicized, governments get involved—and, naturally, things get ugly. Marlantes is better KIRKUS REVIEWS

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History, mystery, and fashion blend in this alluring novel.

T H E L O S T D R E S S E S O F I T A LY

than Tom Clancy when it comes to the human element, but he’s similarly fascinated by militaria (“a Shpagin could fire a thousand rounds a minute”) and historical detail. All in all, it’s not John le Carré or Alan Furst, but it serves.

A few longueurs aside, there’s enough cat and mouse here to keep Cold War thriller buffs engaged.

The Lost Dresses of Italy McLaughlin, M.A. | Alcove Press (304 pp.) $29.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781639105649

A 19th-century poet and a 20th-century fashion curator are the creative women whose lives intertwine in this mix of fact and fiction.

The Italian city where Shakespeare set Romeo and Juliet is the intriguing backdrop to this suspenseful dual-time-period drama about love and loss. In 1947, Marianne Baxter travels to Verona to help a longtime friend curate an exhibition of dresses that once belonged to the renowned Victorian poet Christina Rossetti. After World War II, the dresses were discovered in a trunk hidden in one of the city’s museums.

Marianne is a grieving American war widow determined to find out more about the dresses’ history so she can infuse the exhibit with their backstory. She can’t fathom why the enigmatic Christina hid them after visiting Italy nearly a century earlier, and the mystery deepens when she finds a threatening note tucked inside one of the gowns. In the novel’s alternate storyline set in 1865, Christina discovers a letter and a vintage emerald pendant left to her by her late KIRKUS REVIEWS

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father. In the letter he asks that she travel to Italy to return a stolen book of Dante’s poetry to one of Verona’s libraries. Christina, like Marianne nearly a century later, hopes her trip to Verona will offer opportunities to start over, but an anonymous threat and a personal attack put her on guard. While this novel’s two engaging storylines take place in different time periods, the similarities between Marianne and Christina enrich both narratives as each woman confronts threats, danger, and violence during her travels. Fans of Adriana Trigiani will delight in this novel’s Italian flavor, and armchair travelers will relish its detailed accounts of Italian art, architecture, and history. Like a lovingly curated museum exhibit, McLaughlin’s artful novel envelops readers in the artistic endeavors of its characters.

History, mystery, and fashion blend in this alluring novel.

A Wild and Heavenly Place Oliveira, Robin | Putnam (416 pp.) | $28.00 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780593543856

When, on instinct, Samuel Fiddes performs a heroic act, he sets in motion a passionate and tragic romance that will take him halfway around the world.

Glasgow in the late 1870s is a study in contrasts. There are wealthy families, like the MacIntyres, who employ dozens of servants to see to their comfort, and there are orphans like Samuel and his sister, Alison, who grew up in a Catholic orphanage until the nuns’ abuse got to be too much, and they ran away. When

Samuel saves little Geordie MacIntyre from a runaway carriage, he and his sister are invited for dinner at the MacIntyres’ home, where he beholds Hailey, whom he has admired from afar at church. They begin a tentative romance, only to be ripped apart when the MacIntyres lose everything in a bank collapse and decide to emigrate to America—Washington Territory, to be exact—for the available mining work. Terrible journeys ensue, and hardship, and bitterness.

Hailey marries a local miner to save her family from ruin just before Samuel arrives to find her, and the novel follows the next several years as they try to deny their passion, as Samuel becomes a successful shipbuilder, and as Hailey carries the burdens of a broken family. While Oliveira may not break genre conventions in any meaningful way, she writes with such conviction and sensory detail that one cannot help but be transported into the world of these characters, both primary and secondary, the roughness of the place, and its wild beauty. Overall, this novel is as easy to slip into as a favorite sweater; even the potentially unfamiliar setting is gorgeously rendered and always a surprise. The history of Seattle seems lesser known than many other cities of the era, and it adds a lovely note to the star-crossed love story.

Predictable in almost every way—but, surprisingly, no less enjoyable for it.

Past Crimes Pinter, Jason | Severn House (288 pp.) $31.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781448312122

Criminal enterprise on a grand scale.

By 2037, the Metaverse has grown up to become Earth+, the digital home to most human activity, while Earth–, the actual world, has been neglected and degraded. One of the primary enterprises of Earth+ is DECEMBER 15, 2023 25

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Undeniably disquieting.

W AY F A R A W AY

entertainment, and the biggest and most lucrative entertainment venue is Past Crimes, where subscribers can experience simulations of the world’s most notorious crimes. There’s an amusement park (simulated) called Murderland, and though murder predominates there, all manner of mayhem is included. Like streaming television, Past Crimes and its competitors are always seeking new material. Cassie West is an agent of VICE, one of Past Crimes’ competitors; her job is to secure licenses from the families of crime victims, who will then populate new simulations. But, almost as soon as the book begins, Cassie’s world falls apart: Her house burns down with her husband, Harris, inside, and that fire is just one of a number of suicidal conflagrations, collectively called the Blight, that are deemed to have been Harris’ responsibility. Past Crimes swoops in, scoops up the license, and begins to build a new simulation. Cassie believes her husband is innocent of actually inspiring and organizing the Blight, and the plot recounts her efforts to prove this. Past Crimes itself turns out to be a criminal enterprise, and though much deception and violence ensues, Cassie is battered but unbowed. Pinter’s setup offers great opportunities for satirical observations, the most obvious being the national appetite for true crime, and the satiric elements are among the highlights of the book. The extrapolation of the Metaverse into Earth+ is also deft, compelling, and horrifying.

Unfortunately, the characterization is less accomplished, the dialogue often wooden, and the plot too reliant on coincidence and serendipity.

Marvelous stagecraft, but not a great play.

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Way Far Away Rosero, Evelio | Trans. by Victor Meadowcroft & Anne McLean New Directions (96 pp.) | $13.95 paper March 5, 2024 | 9780811238076

An elderly man in search of his missing granddaughter travels to a bizarre town.

The latest book from Colombian author Rosero to be published in English is a novella, spanning fewer than 100 pages—but it packs in a whole lot of dread and horror. The story opens with 70-year-old Jeremías Andrade being shown his room by a hotel landlady; it’s “a sort of coffin” adorned only by “a single, lopsided painting: the face of Jesus Christ, pale and bloodied, with one eye faded by the damp. Exactly like Christ winking at you.” The landlady warns him to “beware of the nightmares,” and her ominous statement proves prescient.

The Andean town seems cursed, blanketed in mist and covered with mouse carcasses. Jeremías encounters a variety of townspeople, mostly unfriendly, including a child kicking what appears to be the severed head of an old woman and a blind woman who says, “Those disgusting mice come from every corner of the globe to die here, this is the town of mice, the only town on Earth where all the world’s mice come to die, the only one. Have you come here to die as well?” Jeremías eventually reveals that he’s come in search of his missing 9-year-old granddaughter, Rosaura; he’s advised to look for her in “the losing place”: “Do not call out to one who cannot hear you. Go and look for her in silence.”

Rosero’s prose, as translated by McLean and Meadowcroft, is straightforward and unshowy, which renders the undercurrent of horror all the more effective. His portrait of a town without pity, populated by residents who range from odd to demonic, is excellent, while the dialogue is unexpected and, at times, terrifying. This is an unrelentingly dark book; readers with a taste for the unsettling will find much to admire.

Somewhat subtle but undeniably disquieting.

Last Acts Sammartino, Alexander | Scribner (224 pp.) $27.00 | Jan. 23, 2024 | 9781982196745

This darkly comic debut tells of how a father and son try to cope with misfortune.

David Rizzo is almost 60 when his 30-year-old son, Nick, ODs, flatlines, and then is revived. Driving to the hospital makes the father miss an appointment to sell his struggling gun store, which is located in a low-traffic “commercial wasteland” in Phoenix, Arizona. His car is towed because he parked in a space reserved for medical staff. His credit card is declined at the rehab where he planned to leave Nick. Such is life for the hapless Rizzo, whose chief pleasure is TV, especially the ads. But wait! There’s more! Business actually improves at the gun shop after Nick makes an ad offering to donate a portion of every sale to a local rehab center. Then Rizzo sells an assault rifle to a young man who subsequently fires 200 rounds in a local high school. He doesn’t kill or injure anyone, but since he was underage, Rizzo goes to prison.

He also largely disappears from the book. Nick shows he’s his father’s son through a string of bad business and personal decisions, such as partnering with a local entrepreneur who mixes poor judgment and fraud and leaving a former junkie pal in charge of the gun KIRKUS REVIEWS

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store. Sammartino takes clever shots at marketing, philanthropy, business ethics, and gun violence—although it’s risky to exploit school shootings, even in black comedy. It’s also questionable to sideline Rizzo after he’s been the narrative’s focus and most developed character for 100 pages. But in this ode to losers, one could do worse than relying on Nick, whose main traits are inadequacy and remorse. Sammartino does have a knack for edgy writing, and occasionally he pauses to observe the world in well-crafted patches of staccato, propulsive prose.

An uneven first outing but brimming with promise.

Kirkus Star

Nightwatching Sierra, Tracy | Pamela Dorman/Viking (368 pp.) | $29.00 | Feb. 6, 2024 9780593654767

As a blizzard rages outside, a woman and her young children try to elude a home invader.

It’s midnight, and a mother has just gotten her frightened 5-yearold son back to sleep when she hears an unexpected “wheeze of weight” on the stairs. She sees a tall stranger slink onto the landing. He’s wearing plastic gloves and his grinning face is uncovered, indicating he doesn’t intend to leave evidence or witnesses, and his sneakers are dry despite the storm, suggesting he's planned ahead and expects to stay a while. He misses her watching from the shadows, instead making a beeline for the 1722 New England colonial’s modern addition, but that also means he now separates her from her phone, computer, car, and gun.

Few options remain, so she scoops up her son, rouses and hushes her 8-yearold daughter, and creeps downstairs.

Long ago, someone walled in their beehive oven’s “messy flues,” leaving an empty space accessible via a hidden KIRKUS REVIEWS

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panel. The trio slips inside, hoping the intruder will get frustrated and flee, but he makes himself comfortable and starts trying to break them.

With school preemptively canceled and the nearest neighbors half a mile away through feet of snow, nobody can save them but her. Straddling the line between psychological thriller and domestic horror, Sierra’s auspicious debut immediately plunges readers headlong into its unnamed protagonist’s waking nightmare. The tense, emotionally resonant close-thirdperson narrative intercuts the man’s relentless assault with the woman’s own self-recriminations, imagined in her absent husband’s hypercritical voice. Well-timed flashbacks add context and poignancy.

Fiercely feminist and viscerally terrifying.

Your Absence Is Darkness Stefánsson, Jón Kalman | Trans. by Philip Roughton | Biblioasis (456 pp.) | $18.95 paper | March 5, 2024 | 9781771965811

A multigenerational saga about hard living in rural Iceland.

This hefty novel from the veteran Icelandic novelist opens with a case of lost memory: An amnesiac man wakes up in a churchyard and makes his way to the farmlands in the country’s more sparsely populated northern reaches. There he gathers stories about the residents’ often dour lives: infidelities, fatal car wrecks, early promise hitting the skids. Stefánsson’s novel encompasses a host of characters, but two of their stories occupy the bulk of it. In one, Guðríður, a 19th-century farmer’s wife, captures the imagination of a priest and journal editor with a philosophical essay about earthworms; the intellectual and romantic flirtation that ensues threatens to upend both of their lives. Another storyline turns on her great-great-grandson, Eiríkur, who’s half-successfully used

his musical talent to manage a relationship with his father and find love, even if one longtime partner was married. Early on, the main drama involves Eiríkur’s arrest for shooting at a truck—a thin peg to hang a long novel on. And Stefánsson’s historical meanderings, including matters of faith, sex, and religion (Kierkegaard is repeatedly mentioned), can test a reader’s patience. Yet in evoking melancholy, Stefánsson (and translator Roughton) have ably elicited the feeling that “it can be so difficult to live that it’s visible from the moon.”

And his descriptions of the northern Icelandic landscape are elegantly written and a perfect match for the vibe.

“Your eyes shine so beautifully when you talk about your fjord…that the sadness disappears from them,” one of Eiríkur’s lovers tells him. “Keep going, don’t stop!” A series of song references, from Tom Waits and Leonard Cohen to various Scandinavian acts, supports the notion that the sadness has a kind of music to it; the novel is appended with “Death’s Playlist.”

A relentlessly somber yet lyrical study of grief across decades.

The Last Days of the Midnight Ramblers Tomlinson, Sarah | Flatiron Books (304 pp.) $28.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781250890481

A ghostwriter finds herself pulled into the mysterious past of a legendary rock band.

When ghostwriter Mari Hawthorn gets the opportunity to work with legendary model Anke Berben, she knows that this could be the boost her career needs. Anke is most famous for having had romantic relationships with three members of the Midnight Ramblers—one of the defining rock acts of the 20th century and still going strong today— and she needs someone to help tell her story. Mari, whose career >>> DECEMBER 15, 2023 27

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F I C T I O N // S E E N A N D H E A R D

Le Carré’s Son To Write New George Smiley Novel

Nick Harkaway will bring back his father’s famous character in a book coming next year.

John le Carré’s son Nick Harkaway will bring back his father’s most famous character in a new novel.

Viking will publish Harkaway’s novel featuring George Smiley, the spy who figured in nine of le Carré’s books, next fall, the press announced in a news release. The book is still untitled.

Smiley, who in le Carré’s novels works for the British intelligence agency MI6 (“the Circus”), was introduced to readers in the 1961 novel Call for the Dead, and returned the following year in A Murder of Quality.

He appeared in some of le Carré’s most famous books, including The Spy Who Came in From the Cold and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier,

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Spy. The new novel will focus on Smiley’s career in the years in between the events of those two books.

Harkaway is the author of several previous novels, including The Gone-Away World, Tigerman, and Gnomon.

He has also written two thrillers, The Price You Pay and Seven Demons, under the pen name Aidan Truhen.

In a statement, Harkaway said, “It… seems as if we need the Smiley stories back now because they ask us the questions of the moment: what compassion do we owe to one another as human beings, and at what point does that compassion become more important than nation, law or duty?”

—MICHAEL SCHAUB

To read our review of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, visit Kirkus online.

Massimiliano Donati/Awakening/Getty Images

SEEN AND HEARD

Harkaway has written thrillers of his own.

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AWARDS Winner of B&N Discover Prize Is Revealed Amanda Peters’ The Berry Pickers took home the bookseller’s award for a debut novel.

Courtesy of Amanda Peters

Amanda Peters’ The Berry Pickers is the winner of Barnes & Noble’s 2023 Discover Prize, given annually to a debut novel, the bookseller announced in a news release.

Peters’ book, published Oct. 31 by Catapult, follows two people: Joe, the brother of a Mi’kmaq girl who went missing years before in Maine, and Norma, a woman who discovers that her wealthy parents have been keeping secrets from her. In a starred review, a critic for Kirkus wrote that Peters “beautifully explores loss, grief, hope, and the invisible tether that keeps families intact even when they are ripped apart,” calling the novel “a quiet and poignant debut from a writer to watch.”

Barnes & Noble CEO James Daunt said in a statement, “There is something very special about starting on a debut novel and finding

For our review of The Berry Pickers, visit Kirkus online.

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you are in the grip of a precocious talent.

Amanda Peters’ writing is fabulously compelling. Our booksellers love this book, and we are thrilled to name it our 2023 Discover Prize winner.”

Peters’ book beat out five other debut novels for the award: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah’s Chain-Gang All-Stars, John Manuel Arias’ Where There Was Fire, Brinda Charry’s The East Indian, Henry Hoke’s Open Throat, and Alice Winn’s In Memoriam.

The winner of the $10,000 award is voted on each year by Barnes & Noble booksellers.

Last year, the prize went to Tess Gunty for The Rabbit Hutch.—M.S.

Peters' debut novel is collecting honors.

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B O O K L I S T // F I C T I O N

Book Club Discoveries From 2023

2

For more great book club fiction, visit Kirkus online.

1 Maame

4

By Jessica George

A fresh, often funny, always poignant take on the coming-of-age novel.

1

2 The Postcard

By Anne Berest

The anguish and horror of genocide arrive with fresh impact in an absorbing personal account.

3 Ink Blood Sister Scribe

By Emma Törzs

A fantastic magical adventure, not to be missed.

4 Save What’s Left

By Thao Thai

Thai has created three strong, unique women determined to find their own paths despite daunting circumstances.

By Elizabeth Castellano

6 Death Valley

Clearly, the key requirement for successful beach house ownership is a (possibly illegal) sense of humor. Bring it on!

A 100 percent Broder take on grief and empathy: embodied but cerebral, hilarious but heart-wrenching.

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6

5 Banyan Moon 3

By Melissa Broder

5

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has stalled, needs to be that somebody. She’s desperate for this job, but she finds herself immediately charmed by Anke—even as she works to uncover what really happened the night the band’s lead singer, who was married to Anke at the time, drowned in 1969. As Mari gets to know Anke, the band’s lead guitarist, Dante Ashcombe, and the rest of the musicians, she finds herself drawn into their world and eager to uncover the band’s mysteries. Tomlinson, a bestselling memoir ghostwriter herself, makes Mari’s job and desire to hunt down the truth feel realistic. As the prologue states, “Ghosts do it for three reasons: money, access, praise.”

Although Mari starts out needing the money, it’s easy to understand why she soon wants to be part of the band’s inner circle. The plot itself, though, is quite slow-moving, likely because much of it takes place in conversation rather than action.

An in-depth but sometimes repetitive look at the world of rock ’n’ roll.

The Unmaking of June Farrow Young, Adrienne | Delacorte (320 pp.) $28.00 | Oct. 17, 2023 | 9780593598672

Her grandmother’s death sends a North Carolina woman on a quest to discover the truth behind a family secret.

June Farrow has always known that the women in her family are cursed to succumb to “madness,” as they call it. It’s why she’s never let herself fall in love, and why she’ll never let herself become a mother.

She’s determined to be the last of the Farrow line. After the death of her beloved grandmother, however, she has to come to terms with the fact that she’s been seeing things that aren’t there for the better part of a year.

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A newly minted FBI agent reckons with her demons.

ORIGINAL SINS

with an impossible picture of June’s mother (who disappeared soon after June was born) sends June on a journey to investigate what truly happened to her mother and whether she has any hope of saving herself. The setup of this novel is engaging: a missing mother, a family curse, a small town with secrets. Unfortunately, the book is structured such that almost all of its biggest moments—all the reveals and climactic scenes—occur off-screen, with June discovering that they have happened rather than experiencing them herself. The same is true of the requisite romance: Due to the circumstances, June is dropped into a relationship that’s been going on for years though she has no memory of it, and all the falling-in-love segments are vague memories, rather than experiences depicted on the page. It’s hard to relate to a romance that’s told rather than shown. The mystery is intriguing, the characters fun, the prose well done, but the narrative is structured in a way that just doesn’t work.

An intriguing story with lackluster execution.

Original Sins Young, Erin | Flatiron Books (352 pp.) $28.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781250799425

A newly minted FBI agent reckons with her demons and faces Trumpera politics and toxic masculinity in the beginnings of a post-Covid world as she tracks down a serial killer who has re-emerged after 30 years.

Not long after the harrowing events of The Fields (2022), former Black Hawk County, Iowa, police sergeant Riley Fisher, now with the FBI, finds herself embroiled once again in a horrific investigation, this time set during a brutally cold winter in Des Moines. After disappearing into the ether for nearly 30 years, a masked man widely known as the Sin Eater has reappeared, leaving images of a snake and an apple near the body of his victim and sending the city into a panic. When the newly elected governor—the first woman in that position—receives a death threat, it falls to Riley to track down the Sin Eater before he can strike again.

Big-city politics take center stage as Young attempts to illuminate the struggles and violence faced by so many people, often without justice, and the difficulties women contend with in male-dominated fields. Riley is a complex and compassionate character who grapples with her own trauma, reckoning with how it's shaped her while also attempting to move on from it. She struggles with the guilt of leaving her young niece back in Black Hawk County while her family is still healing in the wake of the events of The Fields, and she becomes frustrated with a new partner who might not be on the up and up. Her resilience and tenacity as she’s thrown curveball after curveball—in both the case and her personal life—will have readers rooting for her as she puts the pieces of the mystery together. But while Riley’s character contains nuance, the other characters feel two-dimensional and fail to help this installment stand out.

A somewhat predictable and heavyhanded thriller.

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M Y S T E R Y // F I C T I O N

A Killer Romance Blackburn, Maggie | Crooked Lane (304 pp.) $29.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781639106356

A bookshop owner who suspects her guest author is up to no good finds that the truth is more complicated than she knows.

Summer Merriweather fondly memorializes her late mom by continuing Hildy’s tradition of hosting “Romance by the Sea,” inviting authors to take part in the special event at her Beach Reads Bookstore on the little coastal island of St. Brigid, North Carolina. After all, what’s a better way to celebrate Valentine’s Day than with tales of love? But Summer can’t get into the new book

by Lana Livingston, her upcoming guest author—as a former English professor, Summer really doesn’t approve of recasting Romeo and Juliet with a happy ending. That’s not her only objection to Lana, about whom Hildy wrote “no friend of mine” in her notes on the author’s previous visit— but what does that mean? Summer is distracted from her bewilderment when a hard ankle turn leaves her stuck in a walking boot, heavily medicated. It’s lucky she gets so much support from her cousin Piper and Glads, her mother’s best friend. Mr. Darcy, the bird Summer inherited from Hildy, is there to cheer her up, though he can’t mitigate her dismay over Lana’s upcoming reading. When Det. Liam Connor shows up asking about Lana’s whereabouts, Summer begins to suspect there’s something fishy about her guest author, and an internet search suggests that Lana may not be who she says she is. When For more mysteries, visit Kirkus online.

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Lana’s found dead, Summer’s willing to write off the whole mess until the police accuse Glads of the crime; Summer then knows she has to find the true killer.

A mystery with such limited stakes for the lead character is a low-risk-and-reward offering.

The Hollow Dead Coates, Darcy | Poisoned Pen (304 pp.) | $16.99 paper | Feb. 13, 2024 9781728239248

Australian author Coates ups the ante yet again in the fourth installment of her Gravekeeper series.

Since Keira Collis is the only one in the town of Blighty with second sight, she’s the natural person for Victorian spirit Cora Wentworth to approach with a complaint when they meet in Pleasant Grove Cemetery: She’s been buried under the wrong name. A little poking around reveals that Cora was married to Phillip Wentworth, a noted poet who wasn’t much of a provider or helpmeet, and she’d prefer that her headstone carry her maiden name of Cora Yates instead. Pastor Adage, who’s provided Keira with a home ever since she arrived in Blighty with memories extending back only as far as faceless people hunting her, says he’ll replace headstones only if they’ve been damaged. But that’s a small problem compared to the epic crimes associated with the shady conglomerate Artec.

Aided by her new friends Zoe and Mason, Keira’s eluded Artec in the past, but now the evil empire, which is seeking to take over Pleasant Grove as the latest move in its global scheme to harness the dead for data and energy, is competing unofficially with freelance sociopath Gavin Kelsey to see who can be the first to destroy Keira for good. Coates provides just enough information about earlier installments to give newbies the grounding they

need, but her target audience is clearly fans who don’t care how thinly imagined her characters are in light of their expected lifespans.

No, the dead won’t stay buried.

Would you?

The Holy Terrors Green, Simon R. | Severn House (192 pp.) $31.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781448311637

Minor celebrities gather in a building with a historically large body count. What could go wrong?

The ghost of Agatha Christie hovers over Green’s frothy whodunit, which features a haunted setting and colorful characters who arrive there in a considerately slow procession before the inevitable murder. The Stonehaven town hall, arguably the most colorful character of all, is introduced first, as a modest country building but also “the most haunted hall in England,” a trademarked identity. Handsome young Alistair Kincaid, newly appointed bishop of All Souls Hollow in London, arrives simultaneously with glamorous actress Diana Hunt, who openly flirts with him. They’re followed by eager television producer June Colby, host of the ghost-hunting reality show they’ve all come to film. Shabby, acclaimed medium Leslie Derleth arrives next, followed by charismatic comedian Toby Marsh and celebrity chef Indira Singh, the final guest. Once the table is set, subsequent chapters feature eerie, presumably ghostly happenings and a lot of engaged dialogue, fleshing out the character portraits and planting tiny seeds of suspense. Readers’ patience may be tried when they have to wait more than halfway through the tale before anyone is murdered. But things move quickly once a character declares, “It’s clear the killer must be one of us.” And there’s an alternate solution: The killers are the murderous DECEMBER 15, 2023 33

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F I C T I O N // M Y S T E R Y

An unusually violent and methodical killer terrorizes 1866 London.

M U R D E R BY L AM P L I G HT

ghosts they’ve gathered to troll. After all, the house is credited with 27 deaths…and one disappearance. Could it be? More violence and more twists play out before the final surprise.

A sleek and appealing, if overlong, homage to vintage whodunits.

Murder by Lamplight McDonough, Patrice | Kensington (336 pp.) $27.00 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781496746368

An unusually violent and methodical killer terrorizes 1866 London in McDonough’s debut.

D.I. Richard Tennant has just received evidence that Franz Meyer, a tailor hanged two years ago, may not have been the Railway Murderer after all, and he’s in no mood for another round of serial homicide. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what the murder of Rev. Tobias Atwater, found dead and castrated inside a sewer pipe, kicks off. As if he and his sergeant, Jonathan Graves, hadn’t troubles enough, Dr. Andrew Lewis, the doctor he’d asked to examine the body, has been laid low by heart disease and has sent his granddaughter instead. Julia Lewis is a fully qualified physician, but she took her medical degree in far-off Philadelphia, and she’s a female who has no business climbing around filthy places examining corpses. Predictably, Julia turns out to be filled with a wide range of progressive attitudes that would make her right at home in the 21st century, and predictably, her sparring with Tennant gradually develops into something more complicated, even though Julia 34 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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tells her aristocratic great-aunt that “marriage with him would not be a companionable union of equals.” But McDonough keeps the pace brisk as the body count rises, each corpse physically violated, each discovered with a balloon, amid a series of increasingly disturbing revelations about the calamitous effects of the cholera outbreak that began back in 1832 and has returned repeatedly with a vengeance— just like the malefactor whom cheeky Illustrated London News reporter Johnny Osborne prematurely dubs “the musichall murderer.”

The spree of period murders, capped by a welcome surprise, provides the perfect backdrop for debates about gender politics.

Easter Basket Murder Meier, Leslie, Lee Hollis & Barbara Ross Kensington (320 pp.) | $27.00 | Jan. 23, 2024 9781496740236

Three stories chronicle the manifold perils of Easter egg hunts.

Meier’s title story reminds you that egg hunts are not just for kids.

When the Tinker’s Cove Chamber of Commerce sponsors a raffle offering shoppers a chance to win a basket of goodies for collecting 10 egg-shaped stickers from local merchants, local reporter Lucy Stone is torn between seeking out stickers and trying to massage the promotion into a newsworthy story. She gets to do both when the basket’s big prize—an egg-shaped miniature from famous sculptor Karl Klaus— goes missing, and she decides that the best way to find it is to interview the

participating shopkeepers, collecting stickers at each door. Once the missing egg leads to murder, she gets a juicy story to boot. Hollis’ “Death by Easter Egg” features a child-centered hunt that’s more traditional until Hayley Powell’s grandson, Eli, switches baskets with security guard Raymond Dobbs, who’s playing Easter Bunny at the community egg hunt, and Dobbs dies from anaphylactic shock after eating peanut butter–filled chocolate eggs.

Though she’s concerned about Eli’s parents’ laissez-faire parenting, Hayley nevertheless resists saddling toddler Eli with the blame for Dobbs’ demise and sets about finding the real culprit. Ross’ “Hopped Along” features a doting aunt whose 6-year-old nephew, Jack, interrupts his hunt to report finding the Easter Bunny lying dead nearby. Julia Snowden rushes to the scene to find a man in a Peter Rabbit–style morning coat lying in a garden. He isn’t dead, as his subsequent disappearance attests.

But murder follows quickly, and finding a solution to the puzzle proves a good deal harder than helping Jack fill his Easter basket.

Another dose of holiday mayhem from a reliable trio.

Random in Death Robb, J.D. | St. Martinʼs (368 pp.) | $30.00 Jan. 23, 2024 | 9781250289544

An alarmingly rapid series of random attacks on young women sends Lt. Eve Dallas and her NYPSD peeps into overdrive.

Aspiring singer Jenna Harbough, who’s followed the band Avenue A for years, has come to Club Rock It to hear them play and to pitch her own demo video to her idol, lead singer Jake Kincade. Instead, she dies in Kincade’s arms after a stranger jabs her arm with a hypodermic needle filled with nasty toxins and flees during the time it takes the authorities to arrive. The perp, who’s evidently planned his murderous KIRKUS REVIEWS

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M Y S T E R Y // F I C T I O N

assault carefully, has left so little evidence that the only thing Dallas is confident of is his gender. More evidence follows the very next night, but at a high cost: the death of Arlie Dillon, who turned out with her friends to hear the band Arrow. This time the friends can offer more clues about the killer, and Dr. Mira, the top NYPSD profiler, tells Eve he’s clearly an incel, a teenage dork taking his revenge on the female sex for spurning his attentions and denying his masculinity. Linking the killer to an upscale pair of tasseled loafers helps Dallas and her partner, Det. Delia Peabody, launch a search among New York’s privileged, but it will take a third attack to provide the crucial evidence they need to narrow the pool of suspects down to one. In her latest installment, Robb goes easy on the background details and the updates on the private lives of Dallas and her circle to concentrate on sweating the details, and many readers absorbed in the story will forget that it takes place in the near future and not this week.

Puts the “procedure” rewardingly back into the police procedural.

A Pie To Die For Rue, Gretchen | Crooked Lane (320 pp.) $29.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781639106257

Convinced that an island outsider is up to no good, a pie shop owner encourages police to investigate him, at the risk of seeming like a suspect herself.

Este March is getting ready for the off-season, when Split Pine Island in northern Michigan shuts down to everyone but locals as November ushers in cold weather.

That means selling tourists their last meals from her family-owned Lucky Pie Diner, famed for its pies, some of which bring the eater good luck through a magical recipe. So tourists naturally want to get one last chance at luck before next summer rolls around. Este is distracted from her KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Stevenson rivals his golden age models in his willingness to sprinkle every scene with clever clues.

EVE RYO N E O N TH I S TR AI N I S A S U S P ECT

preparations for the final days of the season when her latest produce order is tripped up in transit. Instead of the reliable Denny McAvoy delivering her latest order from Evergreen Produce, some new guy named Jeff Kelly shows up with produce at double the price and half the value. And no strawberries! Este tries to keep it positive, but when new guy Jeff is found dead on a boat, she imagines that she might not be the only one he rubbed the wrong way. She’s certain that non-local Mick Gorley has something to do with Jeff’s demise. After all, Mick and daughter Jersey have managed to skirt the island’s needlessly complex housing laws, so who knows what other roundthe-back schemes they may be working?

Este tries to convince local sheriff Tom Cunningham of Mick’s guilt, but her interest in the case makes her look more like a suspect than a concerned citizen. Maybe she should eat a piece of her own lucky pie before she’s put on the hook for Jeff’s murder.

A sweet treat for mystery mavens looking for something not too challenging.

Kirkus Star

Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect Stevenson, Benjamin | Mariner Books (336 pp.) | $30.00 | Jan. 30, 2024 9780063279070

The 50th annual Australian Mystery Writers’ Festival, taking place aboard a long-distance train bound from Darwin to Adelaide, is punctuated by

snarky dialogue, murder, and a zillion inventive misdirections.

“Why [am] I here?” wonders Ernest Cunningham, whose struggles to write his second book are interrupted by his invitation as a headliner at the festival-on-wheels, which will turn into the setting of his new book. Thriller writer S.F. Majors, former forensic pathologist Alan Royce, and artsy one-named Wolfgang are all much better known than he is. So is Lisa Fulton, even though she hasn’t published a novel in 20 years. And of course Henry McTavish, the bestselling creator of Detective Morbund, is in a different league altogether. After making a series of disingenuous promises about future developments—since he’s narrating the tale in the first person, for instance, he will definitely survive, and the killer’s name will be mentioned exactly 106 more times going forward—Ernest gets down to business with a combination of zeal and obliviousness. True to his word, he chronicles more than one murder, reveals a multitude of other felonies from burglary to rape, links the current mystery to a much older case, and sets the stage for a series of escalating reveals, one of them interrupted so many times that the self-anointed detective complains, “There’s not normally this much heckling in a denouement.” Stevenson rivals his golden age models in his willingness to sprinkle every scene with clever clues, outdoes them in setting up a dazzling series of false conclusions, and leaves them in the dust for modern-day fans with an appetite for self-reflexiveness.

No, it’s not for everyone—but if you want to read a supercharged metapastiche like this, this is exactly the one to read.

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B O O K T O S C R E E N // F I C T I O N

Book to Screen Joan Didion Biopic in the Works

Janet Fries/Getty Images

Matthew Wilder’s film will chronicle a day in the life of the iconic author.

A biopic of Joan Didion is in the works, Deadline reports.

Matthew Wilder (Your Name Here, American Martyr) will write and direct the film, which will tell the story of a day in the life of the iconic essayist and novelist. In the film, Didion will encounter Black Panthers and Nancy Reagan. An epilogue will be set in an AI-fueled dystopian California.

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Didion, who died in 2021, was known for her dry wit and caustic observations about American culture and her home state of California. Her nonfiction books included the essay collection Slouching Towards Bethlehem and the memoir The Year of Magical Thinking; she was also known for such novels as

Play It as It Lays and A Book of Common Prayer.

With her husband, John Gregory Dunne, she wrote the screenplays for films including The Panic in Needle Park and True Confessions. A documentary about her, Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold, was released in 2017; it was directed by one of her nephews, actor Griffin Dunne.

“I read every published word Joan wrote, then put it all in a blender,” Wilder told Deadline. “We took all the history and the culture of the period, and what was

going on in Joan’s head, and created something fastmoving, lyrical and strange.

It moves fast, and it feels like the movie Didion might’ve made with [filmmaker Michelangelo] Antonioni in L.A. at the end of the ’60s.”

Wilder’s movie is as yet untitled.—M.S.

To see how we reviewed five essential books

by Joan Didion, vist Kirkus online.

Didion is the subject of a 2017 documentary.

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F I C T I O N // R O M A N C E

Fangirl Down Bailey, Tessa | Avon/HarperCollins (384 pp.) | $18.99 paper | Feb. 13, 2024 9780063308367

A professional golfer trying to make a comeback hires his biggest fan to be his caddy.

Despondent and demoralized at his terrible season, professional golfer Wells Whitaker decides to quit the pro circuit. He’s already been dumped by his mentor, his sponsors, and his agent—why not throw in the towel himself? The only person left on his side is Josephine Doyle, his most devoted fan, a woman so dedicated to his career that she’s given herself the moniker “Wells’s Belle.” Josephine has been following the golfer’s career for years, and she can’t help but feel betrayed when he abandons the game. After a hurricane destroys her family’s Palm Beach pro shop, Josephine is surprised to find Wells at her door. He’s had a change of heart and is determined to give himself one last chance on the pro circuit. Wells has secured a spot at an upcoming tournament in San Antonio and wants Josephine to be his caddy. She can’t say no. The money she earns will allow her to rebuild the shop and afford health insurance, which is crucial for managing her diabetes. Once they’re at the tournament, their obvious camaraderie and their chemistry make them the target of gossip and speculation in the press. Wells feels intensely possessive and protective of Josephine while still respecting her autonomy, and Josephine learns that her faith in him was not misplaced. Although several of the initial plot pieces feel manufactured, the emotional connection between Josephine and Wells is vibrant and alive. They fit together perfectly, with each growing and benefiting from their professional and romantic partnership. Bailey delivers her trademark high-heat, spicy romance, but it’s the emotional 38 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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connection between Wells and Josephine that makes the book a winner.

This golf romance is a winner.

At First Spite Dade, Olivia | Avon/HarperCollins (400 pp.) | $18.99 paper | Feb. 13, 2024 9780063215917

A woman takes up residence in a “spite house” located four feet from the home of her ex-fiance’s brother.

When Athena Greydon buys her fiance, Johnny Vine, a “spite house”—a 10-foot-wide home created to annoy the neighbors—in his hometown of Harlot’s Bay, Maryland, as a wedding present, she isn’t expecting him to call off their engagement soon after. But, at the encouragement of his older brother, Matthew, who thinks she’s irresponsible, he does just that. Athena, though, has no desire to sell the impulsively purchased home. Instead, she’s going to move in and make Matthew’s life a living hell because he just so happens to be her new nextdoor neighbor. Despite everything Athena does to irk him, like blasting erotica audiobooks at full volume, Matthew remains surprisingly nice.

Dade thoughtfully includes trigger warnings at the beginning of the book because, while Athena is drawn in all her chaotic and petty glory, she’s reckoning with a lot of intense emotions—namely, loneliness and heartbreak. She goes through an accurately portrayed depressive episode, which injects a heavy, sorrowful tone that contrasts with the rest of the book. Matthew is calm and caring, not wanting to add to Athena’s heartache while attempting to be mindful of their mutual connection to Johnny. The biggest downside of the book is Dade’s attempt to do too much. Pop culture references and memes are shoehorned into a mental health journey that often shifts the

focus away from the romance. Some jokes run a little too long, and that space could have been used to further untangle the knot of Athena and Matthew’s complicated dynamic.

Dade’s romances, though, routinely show that people contain multitudes and that life is about offsetting personal pain with things that bring joy, and this one is no exception.

Though the slow-burn romance is unbalanced, there’s a nuanced and intimate depiction of depression and caretaking.

Her Adventures in Temptation Frampton, Megan | Avon/HarperCollins (352 pp.) | $9.99 paper | Jan. 23, 2024 9780063224292

A lady mathematician conducts a scandalous experiment.

It’s not Miss Myrtle Allen’s fault that she’s not married yet.

She’s had at least 27 proposals, but none of those men understand Babbage’s Table of Logarithms or are likely to tolerate her supposedly “difficult to deal with” self. Her brother the Viscount is on the verge of giving her an ultimatum when an opportunity presents itself in the form of Mr. Simeon Jones, an artist with a scandalous reputation who needs to make a sudden departure from her family’s country house. She will abscond with him to London in order to prove that she can support herself using her prodigious math skills; Simeon agrees to take the unusual woman with him mainly because she offers to pay and he’s desperate for funds, but also because he’s a softie. Despite experiencing both attraction and opportunity on their illicit trip, it’s not until he drops her at her family’s London home that she dares to ask for a kiss. And when Myrtle opens the front door, she finds that her time in London is about to unfold KIRKUS REVIEWS

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R O M A N C E // F I C T I O N

a bit differently than expected, and she’ll need to call on her only friend in the city for help: Simeon. The third book in Frampton’s School for Scoundrels series features yet another hero who’s got a lot to prove alongside a heroine who doesn’t quite fit in with society and doesn’t care to, both of which Frampton continues to write well. The plot is a bit contrived, but that’s easy to overlook thanks to the refreshing heroine, who shines throughout, especially in several skillfully developed scenes featuring the inexperienced Myrtle unabashedly enjoying the benefits of learning about sex from a rake.

As the Bastard Five make only brief appearances in this volume, it can easily be read as a stand-alone, but the book will be enjoyable for fans of the series as well.

A strong historical romance for fans of bluestocking love stories.

Kirkus Star

The Catch Lea, Amy | Berkley (416 pp.) | $18.00 paper Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780593336618

When a fashion influencer is forced to crash in a rural Canadian town, she doesn’t expect to find herself falling for one of the locals.

Melanie Karlsen’s brand is in desperate need of rescuing.

Although she’d initially carved out a social identity for herself as a fashion influencer, she’s becoming disillusioned with the perfectly edited facade she projects to the world. Accepting an all-expenses-paid spa vacation seems like the perfect reset for both herself and her job, but a mix-up strands her in what may be the least likely place: a remote fishing village in Nova Scotia. The B&B where she manages to book a last-minute stay could barely be described as rustic, and its owner, fisherman Evan Whaler, is KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Two escapees from the Victorian underclass find each other across a crowded ballroom.

NEVER BLOW A KISS

even less hospitable. While Melanie resigns herself to counting the days until she can leave, an accident at sea finds her tangled up in an inadvertent lie—that she’s Evan’s fiancee. Before they can tell his family the truth, Mel and Evan reluctantly decide that maintaining their fake engagement might actually help them both. It’s easy to set a deadline to definitively call things off, but as they’re forced to play things up for the sake of Evan’s family, they’re each slowly realizing that there’s more truth to their feelings than they’d like to admit.

Lea’s talent for writing complicated but ultimately likable characters is on full display as things between Melanie and Evan become more and more comically disastrous before they start to get better, and her expert knack for comedy makes this story a standout.

This last chapter in Lea’s Influencer series is a heartwarming wrap-up with a strong sense of place and hilarious side characters.

A sweet conclusion to a swoony contemporary romance trilogy.

Never Blow a Kiss Lovise, Lindsay | Forever (352 pp.) | $16.99 paper | Jan. 23, 2024 | 9781538740521

Two escapees from the Victorian underclass find each other across a crowded ballroom.

Emily Leverton is a terrible governess—understandably, since she was “raised a dirt-poor thief”—but she’s learned enough to escape her criminal family and make a quiet, respectable living among the gentry.

Or so she thought; when she gets a mysterious invitation, she realizes that at least one person knows the truth about her past. A woman calling herself The Dove asks Emily to become a spy for her organization, whose mission is to keep an eye on the misdoings of the ton from within their own homes, taking advantage of the fact that no one pays attention to governesses. Zachariah Denholm, on the other hand, can’t avoid attracting attention. Though he’s new money, thanks to railroad investments, and a detective constable to boot, by 1838, high society literally can no longer afford to ignore any bachelor with a fortune. When Zach catches sight of Emily in the background at a ball, he immediately knows she’s not like the other women in his life, but despite being intrigued, he can’t be distracted, as he’s tracking down an active serial killer known as the Evangelist. His detective work keeps overlapping with Emily’s spycraft, though, and the more their paths cross, the more they are attracted to each other. But Emily has more than one big secret in her past, and both are in real danger as other secrets are unearthed. Lovise’s debut deftly combines equal parts romance and mystery, and though many of its twists and turns won’t surprise readers, it’s an engaging story from the darker side of Victorian society.

Some minor historical anachronisms stand out because the rest of Lovise’s writing is so strong, but they’re easily overlooked thanks to the banter and steamy chemistry between Emily and Zach. Readers will look forward to meeting the next member of the Secret Society of Governess Spies.

A strong historical romance debut, for fans of Sarah MacLean and Erica Ridley.

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Nonfiction

ERIC LIEBETRAU

THOUGH I’M A live-music

junkie, I don’t read an inordinate number of music books, especially biographies, unless the subject is truly unique (Lou Reed) or one of my favorite bands or musicians (Phish). I’m drawn more to music stories that approach the subject matter from a less straightforward angle, whether it’s a hyperfocused look at an indispensable period of an artist’s life or the excavation of an obscure recording studio or independent record label (see David Menconi’s history of Rounder Records, Oh, Didn’t They Ramble). December offers two such books: Live From the Underground: A History of College Radio (Univ. of North Carolina, Dec. 5), by Katherine Rye Jewell, is a treasure trove for anyone whose musical tastes were shaped by college radio.

That certainly includes me: After college, I spent nearly a year delivering pizza in Durham, North Carolina, before I got my first job in publishing, and I vividly recall listening to the latenight student radio shows from UNC and Duke. Those

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stations introduced me to a wide array of seminal indie bands (Pavement, the Pixies, Tortoise, Yo La Tengo), as well as the wondrous world of Afrobeat (Fela Kuti, Ebo Taylor, Antibalas), now one of my favorite genres.

Jewell’s well-researched book takes me back to those wide-eyed days, offering what our reviewer calls “some wonderfully obscure tales— such as UCLA’s attempt to buy then-faltering KROQ, which turned around and presented playlists that were heavily influenced by what was happening on college radio, thus becoming a station without pedigree until emerging as ‘a launchpad to commercial success for underground artists in the 1980s.’” The review continues, “Another anecdote from Jewell’s deeply researched files concerns Sean Hannity, who was noxious even back when he was a student DJ on UC Santa Barbara’s station—and who, fired for his calumnies, recruited the ACLU to defend him, an affiliation he probably wouldn’t want to admit today.” The book is not only “a pleasure for fans

of alt-rock and its dissemination”; it’s also a potent nostalgia trip for readers who miss the immeasurable influence of terrestrial radio.

Alt-rock would not exist without the rock revolution of the 1960s, and Jimi Hendrix was one of the leading lights of that musical generation. Screenwriter Jonathan Stathakis gives us a fresh look at the guitar Jedi in Jimi and Me: The Experience of a Lifetime (Permuted Press, Dec. 5), written with Chris Epting.

In 1969, Hendrix asked the author to meet him in Manhattan to work on a film that would have no dialogue, instead featuring Hendrix’s guitar playing to drive the action. Though the film

never got off the ground, Stathakis left the project with plenty of stories. As our reviewer writes, “[T]heir connection gave Stathakis an insider’s view of Hendrix’s life—creative process, relationships, management issues, and how he navigated the tumultuous 1960s as a Black artist—as well as historic events like Woodstock.

The author’s observations are probably more valuable than anything Hendrix revealed in their conversations.” A must-read for all Hendrix fans, the book “provides an entertaining glimpse into rock history.”

Eric Liebetrau is the nonfiction editor.

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

MUSIC BOOKS IN A DIFFERENT KEY

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EDITOR’S PICK An acclaimed Black poet examines the state of her soul through the lens of race in linked essays.

Parker is good at snappy titles, clever formulations, and bitter humor, all on display in these provocative and personal reflections, structured as a kind of symphony of themes and metaphors asserted and reprised. One of the central images is the slave ship, which features in essays with titles like “Everything Is a Slave Ship” and “Reparations (Or, Strategies for Boat Repair).” Positing that “[a] Black person can access the feeling of an ancestor if the conditions are so constant and familiar,” she describes experiencing herself to be below deck on a slave ship, for example,

These Titles Earned the Kirkus Star

when paying taxes, having sex with a white man, or when “reading poems about dead Black people to an allwhite crowd in August 2014, after the police gunned down three in one week, on a wood plank stage in a makeshift basement bar.”

Her white friends appear as a Greek chorus of doubt, reminding her she never picked cotton and she’s from suburban California.

Elsewhere she analyzes the term African-American, its “hallowed hyphen, bridging Before and After, redistricting Myth and Fact, as transitive as the slave ship and as stagnant.” Her suggestion for reparations is “free therapy”; she herself has had plenty of the notfree kind, detailing sessions with a series of therapists

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Infectious Generosity

By Chris Anderson

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The New York Game

By Kevin Baker

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Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here

By Jonathan Blitzer

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Parker, Morgan | One World/Random House (224 pp.) | $28.00 | March 12, 2024 9780525511441

dating back to her college days in New York. Named, she reveals, after a supporting character on The Cosby Show, she attends the Bill Cosby trial and wonders if we can’t “burn the man and keep the culture.” Her unhappy single state is

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Spinoza

By Ian Buruma

Says Who?

By Anne Curzan

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Carson McCullers

By Mary V. Dearborn

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Disillusioned

By Benjamin Herold

KIRKUS REVIEWS

You Get What You Pay For: Essays

Madness

By Antonia Hylton

The Life of the Qur’an

By Mohamad Jebara

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Here After

By Amy Lin

another theme: She’s “a poet who has never experienced true romantic love.

I believe this is an American tragedy.”

As Parker puts it herself, “Words are ductile, delicate, and loaded like that.” Never more so than in her hands.

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Waiting for the Monsoon

By Rod Nordland

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You Get What You Pay For

By Morgan Parker

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I Survived Capitalism and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt

By Madeline Pendleton

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The Ancient Art of Thinking for Yourself

By Robin Reames

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My Name Is Barbra

By Barbra Streisand

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True Believer

By James Traub

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NONFICTION

There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension Abdurraqib, Hanif | Random House (352 pp.) | $32.00 | March 26, 2024 9780593448793

The acclaimed poet and cultural critic uses his lifelong relationship with basketball to muse on the ways in which we grow attached to our hometowns, even

when they fail us.

Growing up in Columbus, Ohio, Abdurraqib, author of A Little Devil in America and Go Ahead in the Rain, was in awe of the talents of such local basketball players as the legendary LeBron James (“a 14-year-old, skinny and seemingly poured into an oversized basketball uniform that always suggested it was one quick move away from evicting him”) and Kenny Gregory, who went on to play college basketball for the Kansas Jayhawks. Abdurraqib’s complex love of the sport and its players mirrors the complexity of his love for his home state, where he’s spent time unhoused as well as incarcerated, and where his mother passed away when he was only a child. “It bears mentioning that I come from a place people leave,” he writes. Yet, despite witnessing the deaths of friends and watching the media deem his home a “war zone,” the author feels unable to leave. “Understand this: some of our dreams were never your dreams, and will never be,” he writes. “When we were young, so many people I loved just wanted to live forever, where we were. And so yes, if you are scared, stay scared. Stay far enough away from where our kinfolk rest so that a city won’t get any ideas.” Structured as four quarters, delineated by time markers echoing a countdown clock, the narrative includes timeouts and intermissions that incorporate poetry.

Lyrically stunning and profoundly moving, the confessional text wanders 42 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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through a variety of topics without ever losing its vulnerability, insight, or focus. Abdurraqib’s use of second person is sometimes cloying, but overall, this is a formally inventive, gorgeously personal triumph.

An innovative memoir encompassing sports, mortality, belonging, and home.

Kirkus Star

Infectious Generosity: The Ultimate Idea Worth Spreading Anderson, Chris | Crown (272 pp.) | $30.00 Jan. 23, 2024 | 9780593727553

An inspiring, timely book about ways to bring out the best in people rather than focusing on the worst.

We are living in an age of monetized anger, writes Anderson, who’s helped launch more than 100 magazines. If we don’t change course soon, the disease will be terminal. Thankfully, the author offers a remarkably straightforward remedy: Think less about commerce and more about simple, grassroots generosity. As the head of the TED organization, Anderson has lived the idea, bringing interesting and useful ideas to millions of people for free. In this uplifting book, the author examines how social media has become a maze of algorithms designed to glue people to screens in a fog of simmering resentment, unwilling to even talk to strangers, let alone help them. Yet signs of change do exist, and Anderson recounts stories of people acting generously—the hairdresser who started to give free cuts to homeless people or the anonymous donors who distributed substantial grants to help good causes. Video records of these incidents and many similar ones were circulated online; in numerous cases, people who watched them were inspired to become generous themselves, volunteering at or making a donation to a worthy

organization. Anderson sees this pattern as proof that social media can be a positive force—and that many people want to be generous. He cites research showing that those who perform realworld generous acts are happier than self-centered people who live online.

“Whether our collective future is a good one or not depends largely on whether the majority of people give more to the world than they take from it,” he writes, continuing, “Generosity is a key ingredient for a contented life.”

A joyful road map away from a polarized, selfish society to the hopeful, humane place where we should be.

Clay and Bones: My Life as an FBI Forensic Artist Bailey, Lisa G. | Chicago Review Press (304 pp.) | $28.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 9781641606516

A memoir by the first female “forensic sculptor” in the FBI. Books by forensic experts— those who use science or art to solve crimes—are a minor genre, but this is a solid addition. Retired FBI forensic artist Bailey loved art but couldn’t afford college. Sharp and hardworking, she sped through Navy technical training and became a graphic artist at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, before answering a newspaper ad for an illustrator at the FBI. In 2001, she joined a staff of about 50 full-time (and hundreds of part-time) forensic artists who work at law enforcement agencies across the country. What they produce is not art but evidence, mostly composites (a face reassembled from descriptions and remains) or “age progressions” based on a past photo. The miraculous re-creations by fictional TV forensic artists are often exaggerated, but real-life forensics occasionally solves crimes, and the accounts of cases always make for compelling reading. Bailey KIRKUS REVIEWS

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NONFICTION

An exemplary sports book.

TH E N EW YO R K G AM E

Character Matters: And Other Life Lessons From George Herbert Walker Bush Becker, Jean | Twelve (368 pp.) | $30.00 April 16, 2024 | 9781538758571

developed an interest in producing an accurate human face from a naked skull, often from long-dead remains.

Although familiar to veteran whodunit readers, the reality of such reconstructions is far more complex, requiring an encyclopedic knowledge of a skull’s innumerable muscles, tendons, nerves, and fat deposits and the ability to approximate a vanished visage. Dramatic crime-solving “hits” are rare but deeply satisfying. In the first 100 pages, the author delivers an entertaining account of the life and work of an FBI forensic artist.

From there, she recounts the first of many conflicts with supervisors and alternates details of bizarre forensic assignments and increasingly painful encounters with obnoxious bosses, some of which led to legal action. Readers will fume along with Bailey, but they may wish that her description of a dysfunctional work environment at the FBI were less intensely personal and included other examples from colleagues.

Despite occasional narrative distractions, a gruesomely vivid book.

Kirkus Star

The New York Game: Baseball and the Rise of a New City Baker, Kevin | Knopf (528 pp.) | $35.00 March 5, 2024 | 9780375421839

A brilliant writer makes a convincing case that New York City is, and always has been, the center of the baseball universe.

The concept of this book— the intertwined KIRKUS REVIEWS

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history of baseball in New York City from its origins to the mid-1940s— seems overly ambitious. Yet Harper’s contributing editor Baker, author of The Fall of a Great American City and America the Ingenious, is more than equal to the task, delivering a remarkably entertaining mixture of sports and social history. “For the last two centuries,” he writes in the first chapter, “the game’s trajectory has followed the city’s many rises and declines, its booms and its busts, its follies and its tragedies.”

Baker, who co-authored the Reggie Jackson memoir Becoming Mr. October, lays waste to several origin myths about baseball and provides a wealth of well-researched material.

He chronicles the evolution of the layout of the field and rules of the game, traces the organization of New York’s baseball clubs, and provides fascinating detail about the professionalization of the game by a host of characters both admirable and detestable. (His history of the formation of the National League is excellent.) From Babe Ruth in the buff to the Miracle of Coogan’s Bluff, Baker combines top-shelf historical scholarship with the literary panache that marks the best sports writing, yielding a narrative gem that’s fast-paced, intricate, and consistently engaging. As implausible as it might seem, given the length and breadth of the book, readers will be left hoping that Baker is hard at work on a sequel to guide them through the upheaval of the Giants and Dodgers leaving New York, George Steinbrenner’s Yankees, and the story of the Mets.

Until then, savor this massively impressive book by a talented author who is clearly in love with his subject.

An exemplary sports book.

A collection of lessons from a widely admired politician.

Becker, former chief of staff to George H.W. Bush and author of the memoir The Man I Knew, again pays homage by bringing together a wide range of sources to expound on Bush’s “leadership skills and style, about his big heart, his humility, his courage, his character.”

In his introduction, former secretary of state James A. Baker calls Bush a “wise and honorable gentleman,” an assessment that is echoed throughout, not least in Dan Quayle’s epilogue.

Bush, he writes, “always putting the needs of the country before his own— embodied the values of integrity, loyalty, and selflessness.” To former British prime minister John Major, Bush “could be shy; diffident; was a good listener; and spoke only when he had views worth sharing. He was also decent, wise, incorruptible, and had a gift for seeing the best—or, at least, finding some good—even in the worst of people.” Bill Clinton, who defeated Bush for the presidency, cited Bush’s commitment to families and children.

“In countless moments small and large, fleeting and historic,” Clinton recalled, “there was an essential part of George’s character that embraced our common humanity.” Nancy Pelosi, who shared “a beautiful friendship” with Bush and his wife, Barbara, remembered their love and devotion to one another; and despite most Republicans’ disdain for San Francisco, Bush offered unwavering support after a devastating earthquake in 1989. Even New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, whose work sometimes irritated Bush, attested that “he never lost sight of the fact that humanity was more important than DECEMBER 15, 2023 43

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NONFICTION

ideology.” Becker hopes that his example will shine at a time of political divisiveness and vulgar rhetoric. Bush, she writes, taught her “how to lead with integrity; how to give back; how to make a difference,” and most of all, “How to be a better person.”

A timely portrait of dedication.

Who Owns This Sentence?: A History of Copyrights and Wrongs Bellos, David & Alexandre Montagu Norton (288 pp.) | $28.99 | Jan. 23, 2024 9781324073710

A sprawling popular history of copyright law.

“Most copyrights of commercial value now belong not to artists, but to corporations,” write Princeton literature professor Bellos, author of Is That a Fish in Your Ear?, and lawyer Montagu. A case in point is the catalog of Bruce Springsteen, which he sold for $550 million to the Sony Music Group at the end of 2021. Sony will monetize that catalog in numerous ways, licensing it for advertisements, soundtracks, etc.—and that corporate ownership, unless sold or subdivided, will extend so many years in the future that it will still be in force in the next century.

This is a far cry from the original intent of copyright, which, in the U.S. at the time of the drafting of the Constitution, held for a two-year period when the creator could enjoy exclusive rights, after which it entered the public domain. The problem with copyright law, as it unfolds in this book, is not just that it is corporate controlled, but also that individual artists make pennies to the corporations’ dollars—a matter that’s likely to become ever more complicated in the age of AI. Who owns the creations of the machines? That’s a matter of massive debate. In the current environment, those corporations—whose lobbyists have been strongly involved in every 44 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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recent revision of copyright law—treat each other with the courtesies of gentlemen thieves while crushing any individual who would dare repurpose or reproduce even a few seconds’ worth of protected material, which flies in the face of creation via imitation and reinterpretation, a fundamental mechanism of art. What seems certain, by the authors’ account, is that corporate control is not likely to lessen in the coming years.

A gimlet-eyed analysis of a system that protects a corporate status quo at the expense of independent invention.

Wake Up America: Black Women on the Future of Democracy Ed. by Blain, Keisha N. | Norton (256 pp.) $28.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781324065609

Black women leaders demonstrate how we can create “an inclusive and multiracial democracy.”

Echoing Fannie Lou Hamer’s call to “wake up” to the urgency of addressing the unfinished business of “building democracy,” Blain, author of Until I Am Free and Set the World on Fire, brings together an impressive roster of Black women to discuss some of the most divisive issues facing us today.

Among other topics, the contributors address reproductive and voting rights, racial equity in health care, equal pay, economic justice, and disability and LGBTQ+ rights. In the introduction, Blain astutely notes that Black women, having historically endured the most brutal deprivation of citizenship and human rights, “are uniquely positioned to combat injustices in our society.” They’re also the most dedicated voting bloc in America today. In the first part of the book, Laphonza Butler, former president of EMILYs List, recently appointed as California senator after the death of Dianne Feinstein, writes about how the devastating

rollback of Roe v. Wade in 2022 should only reenergize the movement to elect pro-choice women to public office.

Raquel Willis movingly argues that despite increased visibility and acceptance of the LGBTQ+ community, the voices of trans people continue to be sidelined. In the second part, “Building Power,” Dr. Rhea Boyd weighs in on racial inequity in the broken American health care system, and Donna Brazile discusses what she is known for as a Democratic strategist: breaking through sexist barriers to initiate “coalition building.” In the final section, “Combating Hate,” contributors take on the systematic and often violent indignities that still confront Black Americans. Dr. Jacqui Lewis writes eloquently about the Zulu concept of ubuntu, or the fierce sense of humanity that binds us all. Most contributors offer a historical context and specific strategies for moving forward.

A dynamic chorus of voices leading the way in bolstering a true democracy.

Kirkus Star

Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here: The United States, Central America, and the Making of a Crisis Blitzer, Jonathan | Penguin Press (544 pp.) $32.00 | Jan. 30, 2024 | 9781984880802

A New Yorker staff writer examines the tragedy of Central America against the backdrop of U.S. immigration policy.

From the beginning, the U.S. has meddled in the affairs of Central America’s nations, some of them autocracies. This tinkering, particularly in the Reagan years, led to murder, civil war, and, decades later, a stream of migrants desperate to flee rampant poverty and violence. “For more than a century, the U.S. has devised one policy after another to keep people out of the country,” writes Blitzer. “For KIRKUS REVIEWS

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more than a century, it has failed.”

Jimmy Carter continued Reagan’s oppressive foreign policy to such an extent that Salvadoran government torturers called one technique “the Carter,” and Barack Obama kept many of George W. Bush’s brutal policies in place. Even as American politicians wrestled with developing a comprehensive immigration policy with paths to citizenship, Central Americans continued to enter the U.S., many to be lost to gang violence. “By the early 1990s,” writes the author, “gang-related killing accounted for more than a third of all homicides in Los Angeles County.”

After deportation, gang members and their victims alike became raw meat in the violence that continued to envelop El Salvador and Honduras. In the former country, the MS-13 gang, feared in immigrant communities in the U.S. just as much as back home, killed 87 people in just 72 hours, while a government crackdown reiterated the vicious suppression of the civil war years. Meanwhile, conditions on the U.S.–Mexico border have worsened as thousands of Central Americans clamor to enter the U.S., braving diversion tactics that have included separating children from their families and placing adults in conditions that resemble concentration camps. It’s a sorrowful yet urgent topic, and Blitzer navigates it with both journalistic rigor and compassion.

A sobering, well-reported history in which no one emerges a winner.

Kirkus Star

Spinoza: Freedom’s Messiah Buruma, Ian | Yale Univ. (216 pp.) | $26.00 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780300248920

A fresh biography of one of the leading lights of the Enlightenment, whose views on rational thinking and secularization still resonate.

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In this illuminating exploration of the life and work of Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677), Dutch writer and historian Buruma fashions a well-articulated argument for revisiting the seminal philosopher’s works on ethics, politics, and religion. Spinoza was born into a devout Sephardic family in Amsterdam during the Dutch Golden Age, when many religions were tolerated but the dominant views were Calvinist. Early on, he enthusiastically imbibed the freethinking ideas in the city, learned Latin, communed with Mennonite friends who were reading Descartes, and espoused radical ideas about the nature of God. In 1656, the synagogue issued a herem, or ban, against him, essentially ostracizing him from the Jewish faith.

Reliant upon his wealthy friends, he worked as a teacher and lens grinder in Rijnsburg, a village outside Leiden.

Buruma looks closely at Spinoza’s central radical notion of God. “What he had done was something very few of his contemporaries could follow, for he had severed God from any transcendence,” writes the author.

“Since God is self-causing, infinite, and eternal, God cannot by definition stand outside the world, any more than nature can. The entire universe is God.” Spinoza was a strong supporter of democracy, an “enemy of dogma,” and a believer in universal rationalism, above all else, serving as the inspiration for Enlightened philosophers in the next centuries. Cautious at a time of political and religious instability, he barred publication of his significant text Ethics and other works until after his death. Buruma also examines how, despite their divergent views, people from the English Romantics to Marx and Einstein later claimed to be Spinozists, and why his views on freedom of thought are still important.

An elegant, relevant biography of a vital thinker.

For more by Ian Buruma, visit Kirkus online.

My Side of the River Camarillo Gutierrez, Elizabeth St. Martin’s (272 pp.) | $29.00 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781250277954

A second-generation immigrant’s story of holding her dreams, her parents’ expectations, and America’s demands in balance.

Born in Arizona to Mexican parents on tourist visas, Camarillo Gutierrez was told from an early age that she would need “to be the best.”

This directive became her mantra as she moved through her childhood in Tucson, and both volatility and education were driving forces. In this debut memoir, the author, a product manager at a big tech company, leaves almost no facet of the immigrant experience unexplored: dire economic circumstances, arbitrary and opaque visa policies, the premium placed on achievement, organizing in the face of rising anti-immigrant sentiment.

Camarillo Gutierrez’s life and interests have breathtaking scope. We follow her from scenes set at the gate between Mexico and the U.S. to the halls of the Ivy League and positions in finance and technology, and the author offers memorable thoughts about religion, the environment, and mental health.

She displays the voice, insight, and personal connection to turn any one of these topics into its own volume. At a few points in the narrative, however, the scope is unmatched by the depth, leaving some threads without continuity, others without closure, and many with surface-level analysis. If this trait sometimes leaves readers unsure where to focus, it also reveals the enormity of the pressure immigrants in America, especially immigrant youth, must withstand—the compromises and sacrifices that must be made, the contradictions that elude reconciliation. Camarillo Gutierrez’s open and candid personal exposition hints not only at the tensions inherent in her own life, but also at those in >>> DECEMBER 15, 2023 45

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“An undeniably unique metaphysical adventure.”

— Kirkus Reviews (starred review) for Shallcross: The Underwater Panthers

ISBN: 978-0-9894256-8-1

“Surreal, poetic and unforgettable: a truly original voice.”

“Another beautifully original, striking, and poetic novel.”

— Kirkus Reviews (starred review) for Shallcross: The Blindspot Cathedral

ISBN: 978-0-9894256-2-9

— Kirkus Reviews for Flame Vine

ISBN: 978-0-9894256-0-5

“An unforgettable tale...”

— Kirkus Reviews (starred review) for Shallcross: Animal Slippers

“...the work of a brilliant novelist.”

— Blue Ink (starred review) for Shallcross: Animal Slippers

ISBN: 978-0-9894256-4-3

Order this award-winning series in paperback or Kindle Kirkus Reviews 121523 NONFICTION_F.indd 46

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P O D C A S T // N O N F I C T I O N

EDITORS’ PICKS:

Throwback by Maurene Goo (Zando Young Readers) There Was a Party for Langston by Jason Reynolds, illus. by Jerome & Jarrett Pumphrey (Caitlyn Dlouhy/ Atheneum) Lou Reed: The King of New York by Will Hermes (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward (Scribner) ALSO MENTIONED ON THIS EPISODE:

Selected Letters of Langston Hughes, edited by Arnold Rampersad & David Roessel with Christa Frantantoro Lou Reed: A Life by Anthony DeCurtis Loaded: The Uncensored Oral History of the Velvet Underground by Dylan Jones Sitting in St. James by Rita Williams-Garcia THANKS TO OUR SPONSORS:

The (First) Revolution in the Minds of the People by James C. Thompson II Racee Acee and the Toboggan Race by Debbie Hepner Dark Agendas of Power by Kevin Glenn A Cup of Malice by John Cain At the Court of Broken Dreams by Laurence Baillie Brown Fully Booked is produced

by Cabel Adkins Audio and Megan Labrise.

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Fully Booked

Former FBI agent Jana Monroe recounts a trailblazing career in law enforcement. BY MEGAN LABRISE

EPISODE 343: JANA MONROE

On this episode, Jana Monroe joins us to discuss the memoir Hearts of Darkness: Serial Killers, the Behavioral Science Unit, and My Life as a Woman in the FBI (Abrams, Oct. 10). Monroe’s lauded law enforcement career included 22 years at the FBI, where she was one of the first female profilers in its Behavioral Science Unit, focusing on serial homicide cases.

As such, she had the distinction of being the agent who helped train Jodie Foster for her role as Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs. (Of course, the moviemakers didn’t get every detail exactly right, as she’ll tell you, but Foster, overall, earned high marks.)

While much of her work was behind the scenes—and literally underground, where the BSU offices were located—she once posed as an aerobics instructor to infiltrate the Mafia, shed her four-inch heels to chase down a suspect (she caught them!), and has felt the buzz of bullets whipping through her hair.

These and many other remarkable stories are on offer in her candid, insightful debut memoir. Here’s a bit from Kirkus’ review: “The author is clear about the determination it took to thrive in the ‘male-driven and male-defined world of the FBI.’ She makes no bones about the challenges she faced, nor does she shy away from describing the ‘psychological toll’ of the job. Refreshingly, Monroe injects some humor amid the descriptions of pure evil…[T]he author is an affable narrator, and her career accomplishments need no embellishment. Fans of true crime will find much to enjoy in this absorbing chronicle of criminology.”

Monroe tells me why she chose to dedicate Hearts of Darkness to the many victims of violent crimes and the loved ones who grieve their loss, and how she wrote the book to encourage others—especially women—to pursue their

Hearts of Darkness: Serial Killers, the Behavioral Science Unit, and My Life as a Woman in the FBI Monroe, Jana

Abrams | 320 pp. | $28.00 Oct. 10, 2023 | 9781419766114

professional goals. We chat about her work as the first operational assistant director at the FBI, in charge of helping create and develop its cyber division; her work in the FBI’s BSU; the positive experience of mentoring Jodie Foster for her role in The Silence of the Lambs; the relatively negative experience of mentoring another famous actor who shall remain nameless (on the podcast, but not the page); the dangers of leaving your crime scene analysis photos on the wall; her love of Dirty Harry; the time she shed her four-inch polka dot heels to chase down a suspect; the importance of keeping an open mind, even when interviewing convicted killers; and much more.

Then editors Laura Simeon, Mahnaz Dar, Eric Liebetrau, and Laurie Muchnick share their top picks in books for the week.

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American culture and policy. By bringing readers into the precarious and emotional positions that these tensions force individuals and families to endure, she invites deeper, more compassionate analysis and conversation.

A moving story of the humanity at the center of the often-breathless and uninformed immigration debate.

Kirkus Star

Says Who?: A Kinder, Funner Usage Guide for Everyone Who Cares About Words Curzan, Anne | Crown (320 pp.) | $28.00 March 26, 2024 | 9780593444092

A leading specialist in communication romps through the debates around the proper, improper, and colorful use of language.

Curzan, a professor of English language, literature, linguistics, and education, knows enough about the rules of language to make fun of them when appropriate (look no further than the word funner in the subtitle). She acknowledges that she, like many other people concerned with language, is constantly fighting a psychological battle. One side is the “grammando,” who wants to correct the technical mistakes of others; the other is the “wordie,” delighting in the ever evolving landscape of language.

With this in mind, the author happily dives into a host of current issues, including the conversion of nouns to verbs, double negatives, gender-neutral titles, the difference between less and fewer, and when to take literally literally.

Many of these issues are the subject of heated discussion within the lexicographic community, but that’s nothing compared to the arguments over commas, colons and semicolons, and— Curzan’s personal favorite—dashes.

Linguistically speaking, it’s a jungle out 48 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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A strong indictment of a failed child welfare system, but with an unexpectedly happy ending.

SAFE

there. Along the way, the author looks at the best ways to use conjunctions to start a sentence and prepositions to end them, as well as the changing status of apostrophes. With interesting anecdotes and examples, she largely comes down on the “wordie” side, noting that strict adherence to the rules of grammar can often end in a clumsy mess. Better, she advises, to look for clear and fair-minded communication, with writing that is stylistically pleasing and honest. “And there are lots of ways to use language effectively, far beyond what we may have learned as ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ in school,” she writes. It’s a suitable conclusion to a book that is, in a word, fun.

As a guide through the labyrinth of language, Curzan provides a road map that makes for an enjoyable, informative journey.

Safe: A Memoir of Fatherhood, Foster Care, and the Risks We Take for Family Daley, Mark | Atria (304 pp.) | $28.99 Jan. 30, 2024 | 9781668008782

An adoption becomes a nightmare for a California couple.

“As a gay man…I never had a pregnancy scare force me to ponder important questions like: Am I ready to be a parent?” So writes Daley early on, noting that he and his husband, Jason, shared the desire to become parents to one or more of the roughly 120,000 children awaiting adoption at any given moment.

Many find foster homes due to an appallingly common scenario whereby a biological parent neglects or abuses a child, often as a result of addiction.

As part of a new wave of same-sex parents involved in the adoption of children, Daley and Jason have found themselves to be pioneers of a sort.

“We wouldn’t be the first men to raise children without a mom,” writes the author, “but the gravity of what that might mean for a child had never crossed my mind.” As it turns out, the adoptees had fewer qualms, and soon they were calling Daley “dad.”

Enter a regime in which child protection and child welfare are wobbly and easily conflated categories, where the primacy of keeping biological families together trumps potential danger to children, and where competent social workers leave in droves, burned out, while bureaucratic drones set the rules.

In a complex series of negotiations and legal back and forth, Daley and Jason lost their would-be adoptees: “I had envisioned a future in which we would always be in their lives, but Ethan and Logan were sent back to a home not yet ready for them and there was nothing more I could do to protect them.”

It took more endangerment to the children and more wrangling before the couple found much more than they had bargained for.

A strong indictment of a failed child welfare system, but with an unexpectedly happy ending that speaks to the power of love.

To read the review of another entertaining book about grammar, visit Kirkus online.

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Kirkus Star

Carson McCullers: A Life Dearborn, Mary V. | Knopf (512 pp.) | $40.00 Feb. 27, 2024 | 9780525521013

The triumphs and tragedies of an American writer.

Drawing on abundant archival material, much not available to earlier biographers, Dearborn offers a thorough, passionate recounting of the life of Carson McCullers (1917-1967), a writer with an “unerring instinct for the outsider’s life.” As a young child, Carson (born Lula Carson Smith in Columbus, Georgia) “was marked out as special.” Her parents decided she would become a concert pianist, a goal Carson energetically pursued, though she expressed interest in being a composer or writer. In 1934, she went to New York, apparently intending to enroll at Juilliard, but she wound up taking writing classes at Columbia instead. Soon after, on a visit home, she met the handsome James Reeves McCullers, also an aspiring writer, and, like Carson, a heavy drinker. They clicked immediately, although, Dearborn notes, “in their relationship, she was emphatically the beloved.” Carson, tall and gangly, preferred to dress in men’s clothes, which she said she found more comfortable.

She and Reeves married in 1937, but Carson’s most passionate attractions were to women. Her first awakening to love was for her piano teacher; she later became obsessed with the Swiss writer Annemarie Schwarzenbach, harbored “erotic feelings” for producer Cheryl Crawford, and fell in love with her therapist, a married woman. Bisexual and androgynous, Carson made gender fluidity “a thread through her major works.” Dearborn chronicles Carson’s rise to fame, including the 1940 publication of The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, her friendships with the likes of Tennessee Williams and Truman Capote, and the severe health issues and KIRKUS REVIEWS

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alcoholism that undermined her. Strep throat in childhood led to rheumatic fever and, by the time she was 30, two major, disabling strokes. Alive to “the dangers and ecstasies of otherness,” Carson, Dearborn writes, was defined by queerness, as an artist and a woman.

A well-researched, sensitive literary biography.

Dinner on Monster Island: Essays De Rozario, Tania | Harper Perennial/ HarperCollins (192 pp.) | $18.99 paper Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780063299665

A penetrating series of personal essays from a writer and visual artist.

Growing up as a multiracial, fat, and queer person in Singapore, De Rozario, author of And the Walls Come Tumbling Down and Tender Delirium, has long experience with exclusion. In school, she was enrolled in a mandatory weight-loss program; at home, her mother staged an exorcism to drive the queerness out of her tween body. “Everything in which she staunchly believed—thinness, heterosexuality, god—I wholeheartedly rejected,” writes the author. Readers will be impressed by her stoicism and hard-won wisdom. Though De Rozario tempers her rejection by mainstream society and her family with an irrepressible spirit and resilience, she doesn’t sugarcoat her challenges. A memorable thread throughout is her adult reckoning with her birth country and family as an expat. Her deceased mother, in particular, is a poignant point of examination, with the author revisiting in intimate detail her mother’s difficult parenting, formative memories that still inform who she is today. “Obviously, we cannot take our pasts with us,” she writes. “Somehow, this is both gain and loss.” The dual tones of heartbreak and relief provide ample backdrop for her investigation of her past self. Interwoven with this personal material are

focused, incisive cultural analyses of women in the horror genre. De Rozario discusses classic films such as Ringu, The Exorcist, and Carrie, alongside explorations of the horrors of being a young girl rejected by society. The weight of the author’s cultural criticism works to deepen the personal narrative, and the author ties those aspects together in a way that feels both natural and compelling. This simultaneously lucid and experimental text will appeal to those seeking a memoir that scratches a layer deeper than expected. Thematically and stylistically, this is a book with resonance.

An engaging blend of personal narrative and the meaning of “monsters” within the horror genre.

Read Write Own: Building the Next Era of the Internet Dixon, Chris | Random House (320 pp.) $31.00 | Jan. 30, 2024 | 9780593731383

A tech entrepreneur sounds a call for a new internet free of predatory capitalist control.

The early internet was a libertarian’s paradise, its backbone built on government technology that was effectively released into the public domain. However, writes the author, “starting in the mid-2000s, a small group of big companies wrenched control away.” Those companies have not only laid claim to the vast bulk of internet traffic; they’ve also established networks on which other entities are dependent. If you want to start an online company, you must go through the intermediation and monetization protocols established by mega-corporations.

“The network,” Dixon adds, “went from permissionless to permissioned.”

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words and creations. As an example, he notes that while no company owns email protocol “and anyone can access it,” corporations have still managed to get their hands on it; in a blockchain environment, any subscription fees or ad revenues that accrue go to creators and not “network intermediaries,” thus encouraging innovation and investment. A case study in how this innovation has been stifled is the decline of RSS, technology that was harder to negotiate than the free services such as Twitter and Facebook, which aggregated content at the cost of effectively creating a captive audience. The technology underlying blockchain is arcane, and while Dixon does a game job of explaining it to civilians, readers are still likely to be mystified by many aspects. It doesn’t help that many of its protocols center on the murky world of cryptocurrency, of which readers should rightly be suspicious.

A sharp-edged manifesto for “new networks with better architectures”— better because they’re free of corporate control.

Swamp Monsters: Trump vs. DeSantis―The Greatest Show on Earth (or at Least in Florida) Dixon, Matt | Little, Brown (336 pp.) | $30.00 Jan. 9, 2024 | 9780316397223

Inside the rise and (likely) fall of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ 2024 presidential ambitions.

As the leader of one of the country’s most politically divided states, DeSantis has gained (and chased) national attention for his pugnacious attacks on Disney, public health officials, and LGBTQ+ youth. Dixon, a national politics reporter for NBC News and former Florida bureau chief for Politico, doesn’t have much to share about his main subject’s inner feelings, but that’s less a function of the author’s 50 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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reporting chops than DeSantis’ notoriously aloof demeanor (he “has a social circle that could fit in the back seat of a Mini Cooper”). Instead, Dixon focuses on Sunshine State realpolitik, explicating Florida’s recent political history and DeSantis’ skill at strong-arming the state’s legislature and leveraging wealthy donors, his constant Fox News appearances, and the early support he drew from Donald Trump. Dixon also has a deep well of sources to explain—if not humanize—the governor. As his presidential ambitions accelerated in 2022, DeSantis sought to brand himself as a “sensible” alternative to Trump, but with Trump leading the race, DeSantis has struggled to separate himself while still kissing Trump’s ring. Dixon goes deep on the governor’s efforts to land endorsements and find a message that might resonate with voters, which is mainly a chronicle of missteps. (His glitchy candidacy announcement on Twitter was just the start.) Add to that a growing reputation as being a bit odd— Dixon offers a host of details about when DeSantis was seen gobbling down the contents of a pudding cup with his fingers—and DeSantis is unlikely to capture America’s heart in 2024. Still, the book is valuable as a time capsule of the right’s recent obsession with culture wars and how DeSantis was able to take advantage—for a time.

Trump once called DeSantis a “brilliant cookie.” Read within to watch him crumble.

Cool Food: Erasing Your Carbon Footprint One Bite at a Time Downey Jr., Robert & Thomas M. Kostigen Blackstone (286 pp.) | $26.99 | Jan. 23, 2024 9798200962372

Eating to fix the planet.

Working with climate journalist Kostigen, founder of the Climate Survivalist column for

USA Today and author of The Green Book and Hacking Planet Earth, Downey Jr. serves up food that’s not just hip (as it surely is) but can also be useful in containing or even reversing climate change. Cool food, write the authors, is “a holistic approach to making the world a whole lot better by simply making more informed decisions about something that each and every one of us does anyway—eat.” Those informed decisions require doing a little homework—for example, chasing down sources of locally grown organic food that is appropriate to its season (no Chilean strawberries in January) and finding restaurants that are committed to the humane treatment of animals and to pesticide-free plants. Among other things, the authors counsel that seeking out “ancient grains” such as amaranth is one step to getting away from environmentally damaging mass-produced products. Perhaps curiously, they name rice among the baddies while writing that “wheat is the best cool food to eat,” but the environmental reasoning seems basically sound, even if readers with celiac disease won’t benefit much from the advice. Some of their recommendations are unremarkable—Francis Moore Lappé counseled lowering if not cutting out meat consumption half a century ago—but much is broadly practical.

It’s good to know, for instance, that lentils not only pack a powerful protein punch but also have “a puny carbon footprint.” Scattered liberally throughout the vibrant graphics-heavy book are various delightful recipes, including lentil and tomato dahl with whole-meal roti bread, which ticks all the healthful and environmentally sensitive boxes, and aromatic tofu pho, with a dozen kinds of veggies and flat rice noodles.

Lotus root, anyone? A pleasure, and an education, for climate-conscious foodies.

To read a review of Hacking Planet Earth, visit Kirkus online.

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Coming Out as Dalit: A Memoir of Surviving India’s Caste System Dutt, Yashica | Beacon Press (264 pp.) $29.95 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780807045282

A Brooklyn-based Indian journalist recounts her childhood “passing” as a higher caste and provides an elucidating history of Dalit discrimination

and activism.

In a thoroughgoing work previously published in India in 2019—and expanded here with two new chapters, “Silicon Valley, Model Minority, and the Myth of Castelessness” and “The Reckoning of Caste in Tech”—Dutt reveals the persistent prejudice still surrounding this ancient system of oppression. Although outlawed by Indian law, discrimination against “untouchability”—those who traditionally fall into the lower castes such as Dalit (“manual scavengers”)— stubbornly persists. Laws about “reservation,” or affirmative action quotas such as the 22.5% allowed for Dalits in civil service jobs, only add to the prejudice and resentment among Indian social classes. Born in a Dalit family aspiring to educational and material success for generations, Dutt was taught by her mother to “pass” as upper-caste Hindu in her early schools and social settings in order to avoid the stigma of being Bhangi, or “low caste.”

The author instructively compares this common practice of “passing” to light-skinned Black Americans passing for white. As Dutt discovered, learning perfect speaking English was crucial to gain entrance to the best schools and secure lucrative employment. In an illuminating history lesson, the author explores the influence of early Dalit activist B.R. Ambedkar (1891-1956) and the incremental progress in Dalit rights, at least in the public sector.

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especially in the Indian-dominated tech industry. Dutt reveals how Indian media features relatively few Dalit views and how the mainstream feminist movement has essentially ignored Dalit voices. Her own “coming out” occurred after years of inward searching, as well as engagement with other Dalits struggling with many of the same issues.

Both a moving personal story and a useful educational examination of persistent discrimination.

Busting the Bankers’ Club: Finance for the Rest of Us Epstein, Gerald | Univ. of California (380 pp.) $26.95 | Jan. 23, 2024 | 9780520385641

An economics professor catalogs the countless ways in which the financial system fails ordinary consumers while favoring the wealthy.

“Finance,” writes Epstein, “is an essential and highly productive part of our economic system; but the financial system can also be a source of stagnation, instability, inequality, and crisis.” The essential inequities in the system have been laid bare at several points, but especially in the financial crisis of 2007-2008, when many corporations and financial institutions walked away unscathed at a cost to taxpayers of $50,000 to $120,000 per household—and not the mega-wealthy households, you can be sure. Some systemic fundamentals are simply off, Epstein shows: A speculator hedges on whether a stock’s value will rise, not whether the company behind it is successful or failing, ethical or criminal.

Interestingly, he notes, the long period between 1945 and 1980, marked by stable but constant growth with almost no financial crises across the globe, ended in the turbulence of the Reagan era and beyond—when, by no coincidence, regulations on the financial industry were abolished or weakened. The bankers’ club of Epstein’s title has flourished on the backs of consumers, abetted

by policy suggestions from influential economists, who “were not just innocent bystand­ers: they helped to bring on the catastrophe.” To counter these complex problems, the author proposes thorough reforms of many kinds, including the imposition of a new round of regulations. More comprehensively, Epstein encourages an expanded public banking sector—shorthanded as “banks without bankers”—that, in truth, are devoted less to private profit than to providing low-cost services and low-interest loans to encourage smallscale investments, greater availability of higher education to low-income students, construction of affordable housing, and the like.

A cleareyed view of the financial system’s woes, all addressable if only the political and economic will is there.

Smoke and Ashes: Opium’s Hidden Histories Ghosh, Amitav | Farrar, Straus and Giroux (416 pp.) | $32.00 | Feb. 13, 2024 9780374602925

An insightful study of the opium trade as a shadowy background to the rise and fall of nations.

Indian novelist Ghosh became interested in the opium trade while doing research for his acclaimed Ibis trilogy, and this book could be considered both background addendum to those novels and a stand-alone book. “It is a measure of opium’s peculiar ability to insert itself into human affairs that it has created many echoes and rhymes between past and present,” writes the author, who has also written a number of nonfiction books, including The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable. The idea of opium as a malignant force permeates the narrative, as the author traces its role in the development of global trade as well as the growth of countries and corporations. There isn’t >>> DECEMBER 15, 2023 51

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Book to Screen Darren Aronofsky To Direct Elon Musk Biopic

Taylor Hill/WireImage

A24 will produce a film based on Walter Isaacson’s biography of the tech CEO. Darren Aronofsky is set to direct a film for entertainment company A24 based on Walter Isaacson’s Elon Musk, Variety reports.

Isaacson’s biography of Musk, the controversial owner of X (formerly known as Twitter) and CEO

of SpaceX and Tesla, was published in September

by Simon & Schuster. In a starred review, a critic for Kirkus called the book “alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.”

Aronofsky is known for his often dark films, including Requiem for a Dream (based on the Hubert Selby Jr. novel), Black Swan, and Mother!

His latest movie, The Whale, earned three Academy Award nominations, including one for Brendan Fraser, who won in the best actor category.

Isaacson’s books have been adapted for the screen before. His 1992 biography of Henry Kissinger formed the basis for the television movie Kissinger and Nixon, while his 2011 book, Steve Jobs, was adapted into an Oscar-nominated 2015 film directed by Danny Boyle.

Variety speculated about who might play Musk in Aronofsky’s film, noting that internet users have already suggested Rami Malek, Matt LeBlanc, Robert Downey Jr., and Jesse Eisenberg (who played Musk’s hated rival Mark Zuckerberg in the film The Social Network). The magazine offered a few of its own suggestions, including Jon Hamm, Kathy Bates, and Musk himself (his “ego would be up for it,” writes reporter Todd Spangler).

On X, Musk didn’t offer any casting suggestions, but he did signal his approval for the adaptation, writing, “Glad Darren is doing it. He is one of the best.”—M.S. For a review of Walter Isaacson’s Elon Musk, visit Kirkus online.

Aronofsky is known for dark films that score Oscar nominations.

Historical Fiction from Sibylline Press

“An often painful but uplifting novel by a writer at the top of her game.”

ISBN: 9781736795422

—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Sibylline Press KIRKUS REVIEWS

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“A 3.25 x 4.5 compelling work that explores the fragility of family history.”

—Kirkus Reviews ISBN: 9781736795484

Publishing the brilliant work of women authors over 50

For more information visit sibyllinepress.com

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much that opium has not touched in some way in the past two centuries.

Ghosh examines how opium, under British colonial direction, became a major part of the Indian economy during the 19th century and the nation’s primary export to China. The social impact in both countries was devastating and, according to Ghosh, fed into a breakdown of trust in governing institutions in China. Opium spread around the world with Indian immigration, and in many regions, it was legal until recent times. The cultivation of poppies is so lucrative that it has proved impossible to eradicate, and Ghosh calculates that more opium is now produced than ever.

Much of the growth is tied to the rise of opioid addiction in the U.S., which the author sees as a key reason for the fraying of the country’s social fabric.

Some readers may feel that the author sometimes overstates his case, yet his central thesis of opium’s destructive nature is impossible to deny.

A well-informed, readable, disturbing journey down a dark avenue of history.

The Fine Art of Literary Fist-Fighting: How a Bunch of Rabble-Rousers, Outsiders, and Ne’er-DoWells Concocted Creative Nonfiction Gutkind, Lee | Yale Univ. (304 pp.) | $35.00 Jan. 23, 2024 | 9780300251159

An in-the-trenches view of the birth and growth of creative nonfiction.

Although he admits to being a motorcycleriding outsider without many academic credentials and plenty of opinions, Gutkind, author of You Can’t Make This Stuff Up, promises a little more mayhem with his title than he delivers. Sure, he has an elephant graveyard’s worth of bones to pick with some writers—John D’Agata, keep your eyes peeled—and he admires a 54 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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Assassination buffs and students of spycraft will find this intriguing and endlessly enigmatic.

A WOMAN I KNOW

few brawling writers (Hemingway, Mailer). The fist-fighting he mentions is of a more genteel kind, however: the sniffy dismissals of creative nonfiction as “bullshit,” in the words of one New York Times Book Review editor, who added, “I don’t know what it is other than people making stuff up.” Gutkind’s definition is more circumstantial. Though the genre allows for some embroidering, creative nonfiction is a more or less factual way of detailing the episodes (“writing in scenes”) that make up people’s lives, whether one’s own or another’s. In this, creative nonfiction owes broadly to the new journalism of the 1960s and 1970s, with exponents such as Truman Capote, Tom Wolfe, and Hunter S. Thompson. Gutkind sagely notes that this broad leeway has allowed for women and members of ethnic and social minorities to forge ahead somewhat more fully than in other fields. Among his most admired exemplars is Joan Didion, who “labored over each sentence, establishing an intimacy with her voice that would sustain her work and inspire readers and writers far longer than most of the other new journalists,” and James Baldwin, whose essays of the 1950s perhaps prefigured new journalism. Whatever the case, this memoir/critical history will please some readers and tick off others, which seems to be precisely the point.

Budding journalists and students of creative writing will find plenty of red meat in Gutkind’s pages.

For more from Lee Gutkind, visit Kirkus online.

A Woman I Know: Female Spies, Double Identities, and a New Story of the Kennedy Assassination Haverstick, Mary | Crown (544 pp.) | $35.00 Nov. 14, 2023 | 9780593727812

A cat-and-mouse search for a woman’s identity opens onto a shadowy corner of the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

Filmmaker Haverstick’s title is ironic, for the woman in question—Jerrie Cobb—is essentially unknowable. An unsung participant in NASA’s Mercury program, she was trained as an astronaut along with a dozen other women volunteers: “She’d been the first to ace the physical exams and had then gone on to tackle flight simulators, endurance tests, and spatial orientation studies, something the others hadn’t done.”

When NASA scrubbed the women’s program, deeming men alone to be potential astronaut material, Cobb faded into the woodwork. Not quite: She logged time in Cuba as a supposed confidant of Fidel Castro, turned up in Mexico at the same time as Lee Harvey Oswald, explored the headwaters of the Amazon and advocated for its Indigenous peoples, spoke Spanish fluently—and was a CIA agent. Or was she? Cobb, a skilled pilot, was also on the tarmac at the Dallas airport as Oswald was making his way there, apparently to be transported elsewhere. Complicating the picture is a chain of false identities, pseudonyms, and the possible existence of another woman KIRKUS REVIEWS

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of the same skill set and physical appearance named June Cobb. “If Jerrie’s life was intertwined with June Cobb’s as a CIA cover,” writes the author, “then Lee Harvey Oswald was a covert player in intelligence, too.” Haverstick takes a few speculative steps into the engineers of the assassination—maybe Castro, maybe the Mafia, maybe renegade intelligence insiders. No definitive answer emerges, of course, but meanwhile, Jerrie Cobb’s fascinating life reveals her to be “a spy, an explorer, a gambler, an astronaut, an illusionist, a narcissist, and a con”—and, to say the least, a puzzle.

Assassination buffs and students of spycraft will find this intriguing and endlessly enigmatic.

Only Say Good Things: Surviving Playboy and Finding Myself Hefner, Crystal | Grand Central Publishing (240 pp.) | $30.00 | Jan. 23, 2024 9781538765678

One of Hugh Hefner’s widows discloses the joys and pitfalls of life at the Playboy Mansion.

A self-described “good girl” born in Arizona, Hefner (b. 1986 as Crystal Harris) grew up in a family fractured by the early death of her father. In 2008, as a “dazzled, starry-eyed” 21-year-old San Diego State psychology major, she was “chosen” to attend the annual Playboy Halloween party. She soon began dating Hefner, and she moved swiftly from girlfriend, to centerfold, to a member of Hef’s “modern harem,” to becoming his third wife in 2012, and, ultimately, his caretaker. The author reveals intimate details of the regimented structure inside the estate’s “exotic zoo of girls and animals” and some rather unsurprising behind-thescenes bedroom antics—which, even on their first night together, felt “odd KIRKUS REVIEWS

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and robotic—like Hef was just going through the motions of something that had once been fun and sexy.”

Instead of the lavish fantasy life she’d imagined, things became “transactional,” with “no wiggle room to say no,” including mandatory unpaid appearances on the TV program The Girls Next Door. The author was required to adhere to cruelly critiqued appearance, weight, and fashion standards, as well as a tight curfew (“the pantry staff would start frantically calling my phone at exactly 6:01 p.m.”). She ended up retreating to her tiny vanity to enjoy peaceful minutes to herself away from the all-seeing eyes of Hef and his “bossy” longtime secretary. “Playing the role of someone else’s image of you every day and every night is exhausting,” she writes.

When Hef died at age 91 in 2017, the author promptly left the property and began resuming the kind of life she’d left behind many years before. Her frank memoir scratches some of the glitter off Playboy’s notorious legacy of sexual freedom, luxury, and excess.

An illuminating tell-all.

Kirkus Star

Disillusioned: Five Families and the Unraveling of America’s Suburbs Herold, Benjamin | Penguin Press (432 pp.) $32.00 | Jan. 23, 2024 | 9780593298183

A well-informed, ambitious narrative about the simmering inequities in American suburbs.

Though Herold grew up in “a middle-class white family that passively accepted suburbia’s bounty,” he convincingly argues that numerous factors, including “sweeping demographic changes, rising housing costs, and the vanishing heart of America’s middle class,” alongside the troubling history of segregation enforced

by structural racism, have created a systemic crisis: “Suburbia is now home to a collision of competing dreams, each of which seems to be crumbling.” In his energetic debut, Herold chronicles how he “traveled the country, immersing [himself] in the lives of families on the front lines of suburban change,” tracking several families’ arcs amid the mostly declining fortunes of representational suburbs, including communities outside Atlanta and Dallas, progressive Evanston, Illinois, and the notoriously troubled city of Compton, California, arguing that these locales each demonstrate a “larger pattern of racialized development and decline.”

Indeed, he discovers a disturbingly pervasive entropy in areas across the U.S., including Penn Hills, located outside an increasingly gentrifying Pittsburgh. Contrastingly, the author portrays the “anxiety about the erosion of long-standing privileges” of a conservative white family who moved to a new Texas exurb where they encountered similar strife concerning finances, infrastructure, and education budgets. Herold ably navigates these issues, particularly the divisive role played by school board politics (“public education in America had become a hot-button issue”) and sets the dreams of these diverse families against regional history. The author was still conducting interviews during the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, which further fractured each community’s social cohesion.

As he writes, “conflicts over masks, vaccines, and racial equality were all raging anew.” Herold adeptly manages the sprawling storytelling and subtopics (albeit frequently focused on bureaucratic minutiae) with empathy, varied scenes, and well-rounded characterizations.

A deeply valuable study of the decline of suburbia.

To read more about the deterioration of the suburbs, visit Kirkus online.

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Are You Prepared for the Storm of Love Making?: Letters of Love and Lust From the White House Hoobler, Dorothy & Thomas Hoobler Simon & Schuster (304 pp.) | $28.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781668014844

Excerpts of letters in which U.S. presidents proclaimed their love—and, occasionally, lust.

The correspondence assembled by the Hooblers, husband-andwife historians, isn’t as provocative as the title suggests. (The title comes from an 1894 letter Woodrow Wilson wrote to his first wife, Ellen, after a long absence, promising “innumerable kisses,” “passionate embraces,” and “the storm of love making with which you will be assailed.”) More often, the letters are fairly restrained proclamations of courtship and affection, though there are occasional hints of distinct personalities. Rutherford B. Hayes, deeply religious, laments his “sin” of taking the time to “spoil good paper with wretched scribbling” to his future wife; Harry S. Truman, writing his future wife, Bess, during World War I, feared proposing marriage because “I don’t think it would be right for me to ask you to tie yourself to a prospective cripple.” Tender notes abound, written with various degrees of skill—Ulysses S. Grant better than any of the ones included. Living presidents are scarce, though Jimmy Carter offers a creditable love poem to his wife, Rosalynn. There are some intriguing outliers: George H.W. Bush awkwardly pleads with his wife Barbara to “Try to be closer in, more—well er romantic—on camera. I am practicing the loving look, and the creeping hand.

Yours for better TV and more demonstrable affection.” Excerpts from James Buchanan’s notes build on speculation he was gay. Most notoriously, Warren Harding’s bawdy notes to his lover are thick with purple prose: “I love your poise / Of perfect thighs / When they hold me in paradise.” The Hooblers 56 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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provide helpful context about the letters, many previously unpublished, but the contents themselves are often pro forma greeting card–grade sentiments that shed only modest light on the presidents’ feelings, let alone legacies.

A glimpse—only somewhat revealing— of how our presidents loved.

Dear Sister: A Memoir of Secrets, Survival, and Unbreakable Bonds Horton, Michelle | Grand Central Publishing (352 pp.) | $30.00 | Jan. 30, 2024 9781538757154

A scarifying story of domestic abuse, murder, and justice gone awry.

The sister of the title is Horton’s own, Nikki, a young woman whose difficult life got incalculably worse when her boyfriend forced her to participate in pornography that involved rape and battery—and who then beat and tortured her himself.

Although a police officer tracked these videos on porn sites and recommended prosecution, “Nikki…was embarrassed and scared of the repercussions,” as Horton writes of her sister. She was also afraid for her safety. The consequences became far more severe when, at the breaking point, Nikki shot her boyfriend dead and was immediately charged with homicide. Brought to trial, Nikki had perfect-storm misfortunes: Her defense was unprepared and,

by Horton’s account, barely competent, while for reasons of her own, the prosecutor was determined to paint a portrait of Nikki as a conniver who had engineered a murder, “a manipulative liar who faked abuse allegations and murdered [him] in his sleep, when he was defenseless.” In fact, they learned that the boyfriend was planning to murder Nikki and then kill himself. The prosecutor was successful, and in the course of the cascading results that followed— and that beggar belief in their patent injustice—Nikki was sentenced to a term

that, even when procedural errors were unveiled under appeal, was reduced from possible life imprisonment to just a few years—“a monumental victory,” if one that still presumed Nikki as the guilty party. Horton is hardly dispassionate in her presentation, but she is admirably evenhanded in showing the devastation that the events wrought on the children and extended families involved on all sides—all of whom, Horton affectingly writes, have shared in the trauma of crime and punishment.

A troubling narrative that calls for judicial reform—and more judicial accountability—to protect those who suffer abuse.

Kirkus Star

Madness: Race and Insanity in a Jim Crow Asylum Hylton, Antonia | Legacy Lit/Hachette (368 pp.) | $30.00 | Jan. 23, 2024 9781538723692

A thoroughgoing, often shocking exposé of segregation in the treatment (or nontreatment) of mental illness.

NBC News reporter Hylton documents the history of Crownsville Hospital in Maryland, founded in 1911 as the Hospital for the Negro Insane. Getting to the story was not easy: The archives were incomplete because “the state had destroyed or lost most of the files preceding the year 1960, and others they had allowed to become contaminated with asbestos.” Unsurprisingly, the more controversial the past episode, such as the murder of a patient or systematic abuse, the likelier the documents were to have disappeared. Even so, in digging into the archives and seeking out those with firsthand or secondhand memories of the place, the author uncovered profoundly unsettling stories. One concerns an educator who, upon entering Crownsville after a case of typhoid KIRKUS REVIEWS

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fever had affected his mental health, “was just another inmate.” He was also effectively enslaved, and though Maryland was not in the Confederacy, it did permit slavery until 1864. In the Jim Crow era, Crownsville’s population swelled, its inmates growing tobacco and food crops under the supervision of white overseers; inside the walls of Crownsville, whites also governed the lives of Black people who were less treated than incarcerated. “Crownsville’s founding took vestiges of chattel slavery—from the style of the rolls to the financial recordkeeping format used on plantations—and translated them to a clinical setting,” writes Hylton, and the administration of the hospital remained remarkably consistent even after Maryland ordered the desegregation of state mental hospitals in 1962. Meaningfully, Hylton closes by examining the racialized discrepancies in mental health care today as they played out in the New York subway murder of Jordan Neely in 2023.

An excellent work of journalism and a strong contribution to the literature of both mental health care and civil rights.

Kirkus Star

The Life of the Qur’an: From Eternal Roots to Enduring Legacy Jebara, Mohamad | St. Martin’s Essentials (304 pp.) | $30.00 | Feb. 27, 2024 9781250282361

A vibrant biography of the holy book of Islam.

Islamic scholar Jebara, author of Muhammad, the World-Changer, presents a well-researched, manageable study of the vastness that is the Qur’an. In many ways, the book works as a threefold history—of a book, a man, and a religion—as the author capably intertwines the stories of the Qur’an, Muhammad, and the Muslim religion in general. Jebara approaches KIRKUS REVIEWS

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the Qur’an as a true subject for biography, no less so than its prophet. “The Qur’an,” he writes, “was not a book per se or any other kind of physical object, but rather an unfolding experience—its own unique category of living being.”

This living Qur’an both slumbers and cries out, and the author takes special care to identify the Qur’an’s silences: periods of weeks or months during which no revelations occurred, followed by short bursts of verbiage or lengthy outpourings. For Jebara, the living Qur’an’s voice also changes and adapts to new situations. “No longer soothing pain or addressing doubts, the Qur’an spoke in the voice of a praising mentor,” he writes at one point.

Throughout, Jebara shows how the Qur’an is more than a static sacred text.

It is a lively entity with personality and agency, and one only fully understood in its historical context. The author delves into such diverse topics as linguistics and the Jewish diaspora in the Middle East to set the stage for readers’ historical journey. Finally, Jebara reflects on the Qur’an’s place in modern Islam. “The words of the Qur’an are omnipresent—yet its spirit lies dormant,” he writes. Despite the challenges this sacred text faces in modern society, Jebara is optimistic: “The critics…have it backward: The Qur’an is not the source of the Muslim world’s problems, but its untapped solution.”

Appropriately epic and consistently erudite, yet accessible for lay readers.

On Locations: Lessons Learned From My Life on Set With The Sopranos and in the Film Industry Kamine, Mark | Steerforth (224 pp.) | $25.00 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781586423803

An in-depth account of one man’s experience with the film and TV industry from the point of view of the crew.

Kamine, award-winning executive

producer of The White Lotus, chronicles his career through various set locations. He started in 1993 as a location assistant for the film Quiz Show, and he later moved on to become the set location manager for The Sopranos, on which he worked for all seven seasons. The author describes the ups and downs of balancing a family life with the demands of “a typical roving movie career,” which began with moving from job to job with little initial pay or stability, to a successful career working with David Chase on The Sopranos and on films such as Men in Black II, which, at the time, was projected to “have the biggest budget of any movie in the history of the world.” Film buffs will be fascinated

by Kamine’s focus on elements that viewers are never meant to see—location scouting, gatekeeping politics, “the blurring of professional and personal lines that people in power often cross,” and even the occasional surprise, such as the author receiving a small speaking part in an episode of The Sopranos. The author shows exactly how much work goes into scouting, securing, and filming a location, ensuring that all those involved are appeased, often with cash, and how the costs go up significantly when the film or show becomes increasingly popular.

“I don’t mean for anyone to think that I am claiming, based upon the fact that I worked on what is widely regarded as one of the best series in the history of television, personal credit,” he writes. Nonetheless, his detailed examination of the behindthe-scenes work on these projects is illuminating.

An engrossing, unique look at one man’s journey through the production of film and TV.

For more on The Sopranos, visit Kirkus online.

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5 Nonfiction Books That Read Like Thrillers

1 An Inconvenient Cop: My Fight To Change Policing in America

By Edwin Raymond with John Sternfeld

An urgent exposé, essential to understanding the fractured state of policing in America.

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2 A Death in Malta: An Assassination and a Family’s Quest for Justice

3 The Lumumba Plot: The Secret History of the CIA and a Cold War Assassination

By Paul Caruana Galizia

By Stuart A. Reid

A memorable book of a courageous crusade for justice.

An evenhanded work of deep scholarship that clearly elucidates a largely hidden piece of U.S. foreign policy.

4 Two Roads Home: Hitler, Stalin and the Miraculous Survival of My Family

By Daniel Finkelstein

An excellent contribution to the literature of the Shoah and a moving homage to the will to endure.

5 Whistles From the Graveyard: My Time Behind the Camera on War, Rage, and Restless Youth in Afghanistan

By Miles Lagoze

Gonzo, ghoulish, and unforgettable: one of the strongest books yet to emerge from America’s misadventure in Afghanistan.

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Renegade: Defending Democracy and Liberty in Our Divided Country Kinzinger, Adam with Michael D’Antonio Open Field (320 pp.) | $30.00 | Oct. 31, 2023 9780593654163

The former Republican representative from Illinois reflects on the abhorrent fanaticism of the current GOP. When Kinzinger was elected to the House of Representatives in 2010, his conservative religious upbringing and distinguished service in the Air Force were assets that propelled him forward as a rising star within the GOP. However, due to his decision not to support Trump’s candidacy in 2016 and subsequent condemnation of Trump following the 2020 election, his standing within the Republican Party was severely diminished, leading him to not seek reelection in 2022. “I had dedicated my working life to becoming a kind of star within the GOP and for a time, that was who I was,” writes the author. “Now, to my surprise, all that effort has led me to the point where, instead of acting as a GOP champion, I am required to act as its critic.” Kinzinger’s book joins a spate of other works by Republican leaders condemning the escalating destructiveness within the party. The author delivers a compelling insider’s view of the chaos of Congress, from the partying (“think of Animal House but with expensive whiskey instead of beer, aged steaks instead of pizza, and no cash required”) to the laborious, often failed efforts to get measures approved on the floor. He offers piercing critiques of the most damaging obstructionists, headed

by Jim Jordan, Mick Mulvaney, and Kevin McCarthy (“a political windsock”), and he shines a favorable light on John Boehner, praising him for his ability to get things done. The author is at least respectful of many of his Democratic counterparts, with positive remarks grudgingly applied. Kinzinger’s 60 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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outspoken crusade culminated in his participation in the Jan. 6 hearings, and he provides an in-depth perspective on the details involved in that investigation.

A sharp assessment of the dark threat to democracy posed by the Trump-controlled GOP.

Thunder Song: Essays LaPointe, Sasha taqwšəblu | Counterpoint (256 pp.) | $27.00 | March 5, 2024 9781640096356

A Coast Salish woman explores contemporary Indigeneity.

This collection of deeply personal and yet insistently political essays ranges across a series of intertwined topics of acute relevance to Indigenous America. Extending some of the discussions she began in her first book, Red Paint: The Ancestral Autobiography of a Coast Salish Punk, LaPointe explores the importance of sustaining ancestral relations, the difficulty of balancing the imperatives of opposed cultural worlds, the toxic biases of the mainstream media, and the injustices and lethal prejudices of the severely flawed American health care system.

Among the most vivid of the author’s thematic emphases is the therapeutic and liberatory potential of music.

The story of LaPointe’s octogenarian great-grandmother’s collaboration on a symphony—“the first to be based on Coast Salish spirit songs with lyrics in Lushootseed, the traditional language”— provides a memorable model of creative possibilities realized in the face of daunting barriers. With sensitivity and bracing frankness, the author describes her own attraction to the punk subculture and her evolving negotiation of its deep-rooted exclusions. Readers gain an intriguing perspective on how modern Western and traditional Indigenous lifeways might coexist in new cultural forms, along with insights into the challenges of attempting such blending.

Also incisive is LaPointe’s commentary on how her assertion of a Two-Spirit identity has made loving relationships possible in defiance of Western norms: “I say I love you to my partner in the traditional way, in a way that reaches beyond the colonizer’s language. I do this in memory of my ancestors and all the ways they had to fight for their kind of love. A love that comes without resources and ownership.” These passionate essays, adamant in their activist pleas, reflect hard-won wisdom, as well as the representative significance of the author’s experiences.

Probing and poignant reflections on Indigenous America.

Guns, Girls, and Greed: I Was a Blackwater Mercenary in Iraq Lerette, Morgan | Knox Press (272 pp.) $30.00 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9798888450888

An ex-Blackwater contractor’s account of the 18 months he spent in Iraq between 2004 and 2005.

As military veteran Lerette writes, he joined Blackwater “to help rebuild Iraq, protect diplomats, and make a shit-ton of money in the process. I was successful with the latter two.” At the time, the situation was “anarchy.” The armored trucks he and his colleagues were told they would drive were actually “soft-skinned vehicles,” and their personal body protection was inadequate. “This [was] a shitshow, but after the military, it [didn’t] faze me,” he writes. “The Air Force sent me into Iraq with a single chest plate with the option of choosing to put it in the front or the back of my Kevlar vest.” The author is unsparing in his depiction of the bloody combat and the toll it took on men who worked through incipient PTSD by “getting wasted, ordering hookers, and screaming in the hallway.” Lerette is also unafraid to share the colorful expletives he and his colleagues used KIRKUS REVIEWS

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among themselves—and which appear on almost every page. At the same time, in the tradition of Joseph Heller, Lerette manages to see gallows humor in almost every situation. Aware of his own mortality and expendability, for example, he likens the “white-trash mug shot” ID badge to “a medallion Flavor Flav would envy.” Like “a character at an amusement park,” he was simply a short-term hire meant to play a role with no intrinsic meaning other than to help an organization profit from a conflict to which the U.S. government would not commit ample troops.

Though not likely to appeal to a general audience, this book will no doubt interest those seeking a boots-on-theground perspective on both Blackwater and the Iraq War. Gritty, candid, and darkly funny.

Kirkus Star

Here After: A Memoir Lin, Amy | Zibby Books (272 pp.) | $19.99 March 5, 2024 | 9781958506325

A debut memoir about all-consuming grief.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Lin’s husband, Kurtis, died suddenly while participating in a virtual half-marathon, with no identifiable cause of death. In this powerful exploration, the author poignantly translates the depths of her grief, its steady beat of pain, and its ever attendant tears.

While navigating her husband’s cremation and memorial, Lin also learned that she was facing her own threatening health condition. Thus, during the early days of her widowhood, she had to deal with her own treatments and recovery. She recounts this time period in short, deceptively simple sections, laying bare the searing emotion and absurd logistics that filled the days, months, and years that followed her husband’s death. The author masterfully intertwines these sections with KIRKUS REVIEWS

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vignettes depicting her life and relationship with Kurtis, from their first dates through mundane meal prep during marriage. These scenes also are open and stripped down, arguably as tender as the passages about grief, exposing an abiding, all-absorbing love. “Everyone is so afraid of grief,” writes Lin, “and this fear is dangerous to the grieving.”

While this text does not remove that fear—indeed, it may compound readers’ discomfort by making the blistering agony of another person’s loss so unavoidable—it does reveal the danger of not holding space for the bereaved.

In allowing herself to sit in both the sadness and the beauty of her love story, and inviting readers into her isolation, Lin stakes a claim on empathy that is not about regaining strength and moving on, but rather about merely surviving by opening a window that prevents acute grief from exploding. As the author navigates the wake of her inexplicable loss, readers will be both humbled by and grateful for the way she brings us into her world.

A beautifully visceral and emotionally intimate depiction of young widowhood.

The Minotaur at Calle Lanza Madu, Zito | Belt Publishing (144 pp.) $19.95 paper | April 2, 2024 9781953368669

An author’s trip to Venice takes a distinctly Borgesian turn.

In November 2020, soccer club Venizia F.C. offered Nigerian American author Madu a writing residency as part of its plan “to turn the team into a global entity of fashion, culture, and sports.”

Flying to Venice for the fellowship, he felt guilty about leaving his immigrant parents, who were shocked to learn upon moving to the U.S. years earlier that their Nigerian teaching certifications were invalid, forcing his father

to work as a stocking clerk at Rite Aid to support the family. Madu’s experiences in Venice are incidental to what is primarily a story about his family, especially his strained relationship with his father, who was disappointed with many of his son’s choices.

Unfortunately, the author’s seeming disinterest in Venice renders much of the narrative colorless. He says the trip across the Ponte della Libertà bridge was “magical,” but nothing he describes—the “endless water on both sides,” the nearby seagulls—is particularly remarkable. Little in the text conveys a sense of place or the unique character of his surroundings. Madu is at his best when he focuses on family dynamics and his observations that, in the largely deserted city, “I was one of the few Black people around.” He cites Borges, giving special note to the author’s “The House of Asterion,” in which the minotaur “explains his situation as a creature and as a creature within the labyrinth” of multiple mirrors. This notion leads to the Borgesian turn in the book’s second half, when, in an extended sequence, Madu imagines himself transformed into a minotaur, with “the head of a bull” and his body “larger, thicker, powerful but also cumbersome.” It’s an engaging passage, although stylistically out of keeping with much of what has come before.

An intriguing but uneven family memoir and travelogue.

The Stolen Wealth of Slavery: A Case for Reparations Montero, David | Legacy Lit/Hachette (368 pp.) | $30.00 | Feb. 6, 2024 9780306827174

A sharp account of the massive wealth extracted from enslaved people in America.

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Corporate Bribery Network, Montero shows that this wealth is responsible for America’s rise to world leadership. The author is a diligent researcher, and he marshals his facts meticulously. Unpaid Black labor created immense quantities of agricultural and industrial production, as well as infrastructure that enriched white Americans, especially in the north. Many of today’s large corporations grew and prospered from slave labor, while southern farmers, including all but a minority of plantation owners, were “chronically in debt, many on the verge of being broke.” The author is convincing in his declaration that this extraction was “the largest money-laundering operation in American history,” although scholars might deny Montero’s claim that historians have paid little attention; indeed, he quotes liberally from their writing.

Just as drug cartels profit not by growing their product (which is not terribly profitable) but by transporting and supplying it, northern businesses did the same with cotton and other commodities. Montero devotes most of the book to detailed accounts of 19th-century entrepreneurs, corporations, and banks who prospered off the backs of enslaved people, using the money to create purportedly legitimate businesses.

Corporations do not perish with their founders, and many have long boasted of their staying power without mentioning the source of their vast financial reserves. A robust reparations movement emerged early in the 21st century, but its future remains uncertain. The author concludes by recounting legal actions against banks and corporations that have profited from slavery. Public demands for reparations have produced a flurry of apologies and some voluntary contributions to Black institutions, but no significant payments to date. Perhaps this book, featuring a foreword by Michael Eric Dyson, can invigorate the movement.

An expert history and defense of the reparations movement that will hopefully persuade detractors.

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The Work of Art: How Something Comes From Nothing Moss, Adam | Penguin Press (432 pp.) $45.00 | April 16, 2024 | 9780593297582

A magazine editor asks a few dozen artists about their processes.

Moss, the former editor-in-chief of New York magazine, has always been fascinated by evidence that shows “artists caught in the act of making art…tossed-off sketches and more considered studies, unfinished work, meandering notes to self, scribbled lyric fragments, marked-up text, mad outlines. I find them almost inexplicably beautiful in all their genres.” In this handsome book, he interviews more than 40 creators in all disciplines who “walk me through, in as much detail as they could muster, the evolution of a novel, a painting, a photograph, a movie, a joke, a song, and to supply physical documentation of their process.”

Many of the creators are well known, including Stephen Sondheim, Louise Glück, Twyla Tharp, and George Saunders. Others may be either less familiar or not someone readers would expect to see in a book about artists—such as Moses Sumney, a genre-blurring Ghanaian American singer-songwriter with an “ethereal falsetto”—Moss calls him an “indie sexpot”—and Ian Adelman and Calvin Seibert, creators of elaborate sand castles, who intrigued Moss with their devotion to “creating something meant to perish.”

The book is amply illustrated, with sketches for dress designs, notes on animation, preliminary concepts for buildings, doodled ideas on coffee-stained napkins, and more. Moss occasionally makes curious statements, as when he writes that Sofia Coppola “had a childhood of privilege, which only makes her emergence as a major filmmaker that much more impressive to me.” Even those who agree she’s a

fine director might argue that being Francis Ford Coppola’s daughter may have eased her path to prominence.

For the most part, however, this is an inspiring work, especially for anyone struggling to create art and wondering whether the slogs and endless false starts are worth the effort.

An encouraging book dedicated to the pleasures and agonies of making art.

If Love Could Kill: The Myths and Truths of Women Who Commit Violence Motz, Anna | Knopf (272 pp.) | $29.00 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780593534151

A forensic psychotherapist offers a series of moving case studies of female offenders.

Motz, the author of Toxic Couples and The Psychology of Female Violence, has dedicated much of her 30-year career to “working with women who commit unspeakable acts of cruelty and abuse.” While these offenders make up a small percentage of incarcerated people, the author notes that this type of crime “often goes underground, occurring in the private and domestic realm in ways that may never come to light.” Motz devotes a chapter to each patient, holding these pathologies up to the light, such that they may be “better understood” and “opportunities for rehabilitation” can be reclaimed.

She begins with Mary, a 45-yearold woman who spent half her life “detained in a secure hospital” after she set fire to her apartment upon losing custody of her infant. Mary selfharmed by burning herself, the “surest indicator of rage and a deep need for care that persisted beneath [her] inert exterior.” Motz details the “cautious, painstaking,” years-long therapeutic work that eventually allowed for Mary’s release into the community.

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women who harm themselves; the second, women who harm their children; and the last section discusses those who commit violence against other adults. Motz meticulously chronicles how she came to learn that for these women, “intensely difficult life experiences,” often including childhood abuse, were the context in which “violent or unstable behavior” manifested.

One patient, Amber, a perpetrator of sexual offenses against children, including her own daughter, had been groomed and abused by a relative as a child. Though these crimes have likely generated tabloid headlines, Motz maintains an eloquent, scholarly, and compassionate approach to her patients, even when their actions are beyond the pale.

A well-considered and sobering look at the psychology of women who commit violent crimes.

The Hammer: Power, Inequality, and the Struggle for the Soul of Labor Nolan, Hamilton | Hachette (272 pp.) $30.00 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780306830921

The transformative potential of organized labor.

Labor journalist Nolan makes his book debut with a rousing look at union activities across the country and an impassioned argument for the protection of workers’ rights. Noting the small percentage of unionized workers in America, the author emphasizes the correlation between the decades-long decline in union membership and the commensurate increase in inequality.

“Even in the bluest and most unionfriendly states in the country,” he writes, “less than a quarter of working people are union members.” Many states—South Carolina, for one—are openly hostile to unions. In Las Vegas, the casino industry has continued to try to break the work of the Culinary Union, whose 60,000 members include KIRKUS REVIEWS

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housekeepers, porters, food servers, and cooks. In California, child care workers joined with domestic workers and school support staff to unionize.

“A union,” Nolan reports, “does not need to arise out of a single group of workers who come to the same building every day and get paid by the same company. A union can be made from any coherent group of working people with a common interest—even if they are spread across a thousand miles of distance and work individually out of their homes and are not allowed to be a union, according to the current law.” Hospitality workers in Miami, fast food workers in West Virginia, Nabisco employees in Portland, Oregon, and graduate students at Yale all serve as examples of successful efforts to unionize, even as they fight resistance from recalcitrant bosses.

Nolan interweaves his investigation of particular unions with a profile of Sara Nelson, a tireless union leader who became head of the Association of Flight Attendants in 2014 and emerged as a forceful spokesperson for workers’ rights. United labor, he writes, has the power to change the economic, social, and political landscape.

Spirited reporting on workers’ lives.

Kirkus Star

Waiting for the Monsoon Nordland, Rod | Mariner Books (272 pp.) $27.99 | March 5, 2024 | 9780063096226

Fighting back against a nearly fatal health crisis, a renowned foreign correspondent reviews his career.

New York Times journalist Nordland, a Pulitzer Prize winner, has reported from more than 150 countries. Working in Delhi on July 4, 2019, he had a seizure and lost consciousness. At that point, he began his “second life,” one defined by a glioblastoma multiforme tumor. “From 3 to 6 percent of glioblastoma patients

are cured; one of them will bear my name,” writes the author, while claiming that the disease “has proved to be the best thing that ever happened to me.”

From the perspective of his second life, which marked the end of his estrangement from his adult children, he reflects on his first, which began with a difficult childhood in Philadelphia. His abusive father was a “predatory pedophile.” His mother, fortunately, was “astonishingly patient and saintly,” and Nordland and his younger siblings stuck close together. After a brief phase of youthful criminality, the author began his career in journalism at the Penn State campus newspaper. Interspersing numerous landmark articles—some less interesting than others, but the best are wonderful—Nordland shows how he carried out the burden of being his father’s son: “Whether in Bosnia or Kabul, Cambodia or Nigeria, Philadelphia or Baghdad, I always seemed to gravitate toward stories about vulnerable people, especially women and children—since they will always be the most vulnerable in any society—being exploited or mistreated by powerful men or powerful social norms.” Indeed, some of the stories reveal the worst in human nature.

A final section, detailing his life since his diagnosis in chapters such as “I Forget the Name of This Chapter: On Memory,” wraps up the narrative with humor, candor, and reflection.

This is a man who has seen it all, and he sure does know how to tell a story.

Joyce Carol Oates: Letters to a Biographer Oates, Joyce Carol | Ed. by Greg Johnson Akashic (336 pp.) $28.95 | March 5, 2024 9781636141169

A collection of letters invites readers into the prolific author’s life and thoughts.

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New Book by Pope Francis Coming in 2024

HarperCollins will publish the pontiff’s Life, My Story Through History next spring.

Pope Francis will reflect on his life and share his thoughts on hot-button issues in a new book.

HarperCollins announced in a news release that it will publish the pontiff ’s Life, My Story Through History in the U.S. as well as several other countries in North America, South America, and Europe.

Francis was born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in 1936 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and worked as a bouncer and a chemist before becoming a Jesuit priest in 1969. He was an archbishop and cardinal before ascending to the

papacy in 2013, becoming the first Jesuit elected to lead the Roman Catholic Church.

Francis’ book, HarperCollins says, will be “an extraordinary journey through the decades to retrace the most significant stages of our time through the memories of the Pope. These include the fall of [the] Berlin Wall, [Jorge Rafael] Videla’s coup in Argentina, the moon landing in 1969, and even the 1986 World Cup where [Diego] Maradona scored ‘the hand of God’ goal that went down in history.”

The book will also feature Francis’ thoughts on climate change, racism, war, and abortion. Parts of the book will be written by journalist Fabio Marchese Ragona, who will provide historical context on the pope’s life.

In a statement, Francis said, “This book was written so that people, especially younger people, can listen to the voice of an elderly person and reflect on what our planet has experienced, so as not to repeat the mistakes of the past.”

Life, My Story Through History is slated for publication in the spring of 2024.— M.S.

The pope’s most recent book was published in October.

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Vatican Media via Vatican Pool/Getty Images

SEEN AND HEARD

For other books by Pope Francis, visit Kirkus online.

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AWARDS Michelle Obama Among the Nominees for Audiobook Grammy

The former first lady won the award in 2020 for narration of her memoir, Becoming.

The nominees for the 2024 Grammy Awards were announced, with five titles in the running in the best audio book, narration, and storytelling recording category.

Michelle Obama was nominated for her audiobook version of her book The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times.

Obama won the award in 2020 for the narration of Becoming.

Meryl Streep earned a nomination for her recording of Brian Selznick’s children’s fantasy novel Big Tree.

Streep and several other authors were nominated in 2021 for their narration of E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web. Obama, Rick Rubin, and Bernie Sanders were nominated for narrating their own memoirs.

Also nominated were three authors narrating their own books: William Shatner for Boldly Go: Reflections on a Life of Awe and Wonder (co-written with Joshua Brandon); Rick Rubin for The Creative Act: A Way of Being; and Sen. Bernie Sanders for It’s OK To Be Angry About Capitalism.

Five nominees were also announced in the “best spoken word poetry album” category: Queen Sheba for A-You’re Not Wrong B-They’re Not Either: The Fukc-It Pill Revisited; Prentice Powell and Shawn William for For Your Consideration ’24: The Album; Kevin Powell for Grocery Shopping With My Mother; J. Ivy for The Light Inside; and aja monet for when the poems do what they do. The Grammys will be awarded at a televised ceremony on CBS on Feb. 4, 2024.—M.S.

Jean Catuffe/GC Images

For our review of The Light We Carry, visit Kirkus online.

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“remarkable collection of prolonged glances into the past, bathed in a sort of warm convivial glow.” Johnson, who’s published multiple books of fiction and nonfiction, including an authorized biography of Oates, first wrote to her from college in 1975. She was supportive of his writing, even offering to write letters of recommendation, and they eventually became good friends. Throughout, Oates displays her witty, humorous, and sly style. In a letter from 1987, she writes about her “adventure” publishing a novel under a pseudonym, desirous of an undetectable “new identity.”

Elsewhere, she seeks advice about her work and critiques Johnson’s stories.

Oates describes herself as “inward, secretive, and obsessive,” noting later, “I seem always to have loved to write— shamelessly. But at such length!” In addition to novels and short stories, she discusses her “other” career as a playwright. Composing a play about Thoreau “was one of the most fascinating and haunting periods of writing I’ve ever experienced!” She believes John Updike wasted his “brilliant” prose on unworthy characters, and Sense and Sensibility is “slow, dull, didactic, and unsparkling.” Wuthering Heights, on the other hand, is “simply sui generis.” Oates is happy that her Princeton colleague Toni Morrison won the Nobel Prize, and she writes at length about pets, book covers, literary gossip, and her love of boxing. On the writing process, she notes, “Anything is easier than the first six weeks or so of a novel!” In the last letter—from December 26, 2006—Oates mentions an upcoming “elegant” New Year’s Eve party at Steve Martin’s apartment in New York City.

An interesting barometer of Oates’ development as a writer over 30 years.

For more on birding, visit Kirkus online.

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Birding To Change the World: A Memoir O’Kane, Trish | Ecco/HarperCollins (368 pp.) | $28.99 | Feb. 27, 2024 9780063223141

A human rights journalist embraces environmental justice.

O’Kane had been an investigative human rights journalist, hate crimes researcher, and writing teacher in a women’s prison before she moved to New Orleans in July 2005 to teach. A month later, Hurricane Katrina destroyed her house. As she witnessed her possessions drowned in the floodwaters, she realized “how much harm I had done just by the way I lived,” and she vowed to live differently.

In her engaging debut memoir, O’Kane recounts her transformation into an avid bird watcher and environmental activist. She has devoted thousands of hours to watching birds, “filled thirtythree field notebooks with scribblings on their doings and dramas, helped raise baby chickadees, bluebirds, wrens, and swallows in tiny birdhouses, volunteered in a baby bird nursery at a wildlife rehabilitation hospital, and taught hundreds of college students and children about them at two major universities.” The first was the University of Wisconsin, where the author enrolled in graduate school. A class in ornithology set her on an unexpected path to closely observe the 141 bird species that inhabited Madison’s Warner Park, across from her house. When she became aware of plans to dramatically change the park, she marshaled community support, which evolved into Wild Warner, a neighborhood environmental defense group. As part of her graduate studies, she started a program pairing local schoolchildren with undergraduate students who served as birding mentors, a program she established again when she took a position at the University of Vermont. Her students, she proudly reports, are working nationwide “as teachers, environmental educators, urban planners, land

stewards, lawyers, journalists, researchers, and environmental activists. They are scientists, nature center directors, and school garden coordinators.” Birds, she attests, “forged a new neural pathway in my brain, a joyful pathway” and a deep connection to community.

A delightful homage to birds and nature in general.

Go Home for Dinner: Advice on How Faith Makes a Family and Family Makes a Life Pence, Mike with Charlotte Pence Bond Simon & Schuster (352 pp.) | $30.00 Nov. 14, 2023 | 9781982190361

The former vice president embarks on a Christianfocused look at family.

In this preachy little treatise, Pence, writing with his daughter, Bond, describes how “the fate of nations, including this one, ultimately comes down to the strength of the family.” This isn’t a book about politics, though there are a few wan mentions; nor is it about Pence’s time in office, although he does allow that some of his friends warned him that signing on as Trump’s running mate “would be the end of my career.” The only words about Jan. 6, 2021, come from Bond, who writes that when she commented that the invasion was “unforgivable,” she was quickly upbraided by her mother, who threw out a Bible verse about God alone having the power of forgiveness (never mind the gallows out on the lawn).

God comes in for the lion’s share of the credit, to be sure, whether placing the idea that Pence should go into politics after his stint as a conservative radio host—here, the author praises another paragon of godly virtue, Rush Limbaugh—or affording the Pence family a good model for their daily devotions, of which, yes, going home for dinner is a central tenet. Apart from the usual obeisance, Pence spends KIRKUS REVIEWS

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much of the text discussing how bad things are in comparison with the good old days inside his head, which would seem to be the 1950s, a time when “Americans used to have more respect for our nation’s history, for the people who sacrificed to make this country the beacon of freedom that it is today….

As the saying goes, those who forget history are destined to repeat it. We can acknowledge the injustices of the past and still be grateful to the people who brought forth the nation.”

A pious exercise in preaching to the choir.

Kirkus Star

I Survived Capitalism and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt: Everything I Wish I Never Had To Learn About Money Pendleton, Madeline | Doubleday (336 pp.) $24.30 | Jan. 16, 2024 | 9780385549783

A vivid account of the many challenges millennials face while trying to make it in an unforgiving economy.

Pendleton opens her illuminating book with a tragedy: the suicide of a boyfriend who was suffering from the torments of money trouble and could see no way out of it. “That day,” she writes, “I learned a horrible lesson: capitalism is a matter of life and death.

The stakes are high, and if you lose, it might come for you in ways you’d never expect.” As the author notes, the economic landscape could be characterized as dog-eat-dog, except that dogs are more cooperative and better socialized than all that. Exhibit A is a photographer the author worked for who effectively bilked her out of a quarter of her paycheck; fortunately, she jumped studios to work for another photographer who was far more honest. This story leads to a sobering observation for the corporation-haters in the crowd: KIRKUS REVIEWS

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“Businesses are not intrinsically any more ethical just because they are small.

If anything, data shows they tend to be less ethical overall.” Pendleton, like so many of her generation, trained hard for life in the economic doldrums, growing up poor in Fresno, California (“one of the poorest cities in the country”), and entering the workforce just in time for the Great Recession.

A punk rock ethos also helped the author cultivate a mutual-aid, fight-thepower outlook on life, which plays out in both her personal story and in the short chapters of enumerated points of advice on things like what a credit score means and how to navigate workplace relationships (“Remember that your coworkers are not your friends”). All of this is extremely helpful to those who, like Pendleton, would otherwise have to figure it out for themselves.

Move on, Jim Cramer. Here’s the real deal—smart, undaunted, and eminently wise.

Of Greed and Glory: In Pursuit of Freedom for All Plant, Deborah G. | Amistad/HarperCollins (288 pp.) | $28.99 | Jan. 9, 2024 9780062898494

A cogent study of how racialized abuse of justice is a feature—not a bug—of American life.

“Several hundred thousand Americans are caged in American jails every single day, not because they are necessarily guilty of a crime but because our wealth-based justice system targets those who don’t have the money to post bail….And the vast majority of those caged are poor, Black, and brown.” So writes Plant, editor of Zora Neale Hurston’s Barracoon, providing an example in her brother, who is now in Angola state prison in Louisiana, a state that, a legal scholar notes, “has some of the toughest sentencing laws in the country.” It’s no accident that those

who cannot afford first-rate lawyers wind up in such places—or that some of these prisons sit on the sites of former slave plantations. Much of Plant’s advocacy focuses on an amendment to remove the constitutional qualification that slavery and involuntarily servitude are forbidden except in the punishment of crime, meaning that Angola’s prisoners, among others, are de facto enslaved.

Again, this is no accident: The state’s penal economy of agriculture and manufacture depends on a steady supply of people who are “duly convicted,” often by “Black Codes” that excessively punish infractions such as vagrancy or being a public nuisance, most of which, like the presumption of the inherent criminality of Black citizens, are wholly subjective on the part of the justice system. Plant’s argument is somewhat repetitive but always on point. Interestingly, she extends the realm of involuntary servitude to include women in the post-Dobbs era who “are now subject to the same kind of criminalization that re-enslaved and colonized Black citizens have suffered. ‘The law’ has been weaponized to bring women back under due subjection to their ‘masters.’”

A compelling argument against the systemic abuse of justice as a weapon of oppression.

A Paradise of Small Houses: The Evolution, Devolution, and Potential Rebirth of Urban Housing Podemski, Max | Beacon Press (272 pp.) $28.95 | March 26, 2024 | 9780807007785

A history of the “common everyday houses” that have served large numbers of working- and middle-class households in the U.S. Podemski— author, illustrator, and transportation planner for Los Angeles—dreams of DECEMBER 15, 2023 67

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affordable housing that’s light-filled and spacious, connects people to their neighbors, fits seamlessly into mixeduse and walkable neighborhoods, and has “the potential to change and adapt.” He seeks “a diversity of housing at a range of scales that reflect the unique circumstances of individual neighborhoods.” Chronicling his travels in a host of American cities and Vancouver, British Columbia, he focuses on specific housing types in each, including shotgun houses in New Orleans, bungalows in Portland, Oregon, and multifamily triple-deckers in Boston. The L.A. dingbat, built in the 1950s and 1960s, is two floors of wood-framed, stucco-clad apartments hovering over parking spaces, while the Philadelphia row house, constructed when the city industrialized, is a narrow, brick-clad, three-story home meant for the working class. With the exception of Houston, whose anemic land-use controls have given rise to wide, two-story town houses sitting above a two-car garage and crowding their lots, the author praises his examples for serving the needs of owners and renters and encouraging neighborliness.

Podemski also offers a brief history of each city’s spatial development and considers the precursors and successors to each housing type. Despite his implicit interest in what can be mass produced, he includes two bespoke examples: Tiny Tower (three levels on a 12-by-20foot footprint) in Philadelphia and 3106 St. Thomas Street (10.5 by 45 feet, metal clad, one story) in New Orleans.

Podemski makes two important points: First, the vibrancy of a neighborhood depends on its type of housing; second, housing affordability is dependent on lot size and housing type. His argument is convincing.

A thoughtful history of affordable housing that establishes the basis for reasoned discussion and well-informed policy.

For more on the art of rhetoric, visit Kirkus online.

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The Unclaimed: Abandonment and Hope in the City of Angels Prickett, Pamela & Stefan Timmermans Crown (336 pp.) | $30.00 | March 12, 2024 9780593239056

An unsettling study of how social fracturing and community breakdown underpin lonely deaths.

America’s epidemic of loneliness has engendered another troubling crisis: a sharp rise in the number of unclaimed decedents. Without a family member stepping up, it falls to local governments to provide a burial or cremation, with the remains usually being interred in common, anonymous graves. Lost souls, nameless bodies, forgotten lives: This is a dispiriting but important story, and sociologists Prickett and Timmermans approach it with both compassion and gravitas. In the U.S. each year, tens of thousands of decedents go unclaimed, but the authors focus their research on four cases in Los Angeles. The reasons for lonely deaths vary widely, although substance abuse, mental illness, and homelessness often play a large part.

Many decedents had grown apart from their family and friends, sometimes due to a conflict long past. Others didn’t have much of a support system to begin with, and as they aged, their social circle contracted and eventually disappeared. Prickett and Timmermans look at funeral costs as an element that might discourage family members from claiming a relative’s body and conclude that this is seldom a driving issue, compared to simply not caring. Much of this material is unbearably sad, but the authors do identify some threads of hope, for example the growing trend of neighborhood communities and church groups holding regular funeral services for unclaimed decedents. “Holding hands with strangers around the gravesite of the unclaimed as surrogate

family members,” they write, “is an act of forgiveness and hope….Even if it may seem there are other social problems more pressing and worthy of our limited time, the unclaimed remind us that unless every body counts, nobody counts.”

A poignant and disturbing book, researched and written with appropriate sensitivity, care, and dignity.

Kirkus Star

The Ancient Art of Thinking for Yourself: The Power of Rhetoric in Polarized Times Reames, Robin | Basic Books (304 pp.) $30.00 | March 19, 2024 | 9781541603974

scholar of A rhetoric makes the case that reviving the teaching of rhetoric and language can help bridge our destructive political and social divide.

Reames, a professor of English at the University of Illinois–Chicago, breathes life into the study and technique of rhetoric, specifically why words are selected and how they can be used to change one’s thinking about delving below the surface of ideology in order to yield more civil and productive interaction. The author aptly demonstrates her expertise about the development of rhetoric in Athenian democracy, especially how the Sophists cleverly exploited language to manipulate public opinion, and she compares and contrasts the rhetorical strategies of Greek demagogues such as Gorgias and Alcibiades to modern-day use and abuse of language by politicians and public figures. Reames also poignantly leans on her own difficult and frustrating rhetorical relationship with her late father to illustrate how ideological assumptions and an unwillingness or inability to break free from our own KIRKUS REVIEWS

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“hermeneutic circles” can establish and deepen division and misunderstanding, a story that’s painfully relatable. The history of rhetoric that the author presents is fascinating, and the parallels she draws to the modern world are sharp and sprinkled with both bluntness and wit. Reames concludes the book with several practical and useful tips for thinking rhetorically in such a contentious era.

Unfortunately, the people who most need to read this book—political and media demagogues, fearmongers, and keyboard warriors who amplify our polarized society—probably won’t.

Even if they did, it’s difficult to say if they would heed the author’s advice or double down on their sophistry.

Nonetheless, the rest of us should seriously consider the wisdom Reames offers, eschew the comfort of ideological reinforcement that she outlines, and, most importantly, think for ourselves by holding our beliefs to rigorous questioning.

Required reading for any thinking person.

Mirrors of Greatness: Churchill and the Leaders Who Shaped Him Reynolds, David | Basic Books (464 pp.) $32.50 | Jan. 23, 2024 | 9781541620209

A new biography of Winston Churchill, who may have had the stuff of greatness but also had major flaws.

Even from a distance of over 70 years, Churchill remains a fascinating, compelling, and polarizing figure. So much has been written about him that it’s difficult to imagine there’s anything else to learn. Reynolds, emeritus professor of international history at Cambridge and author of many acclaimed books of history—including FDR’s War and From World War to Cold War—tries a new tack, looking at the allies, rivals, and family members who KIRKUS REVIEWS

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influenced Churchill’s psychological and political development. His father was a distant, stern figure, although Churchill later rewrote him as a less unpleasant person. Churchill had some respect for Neville Chamberlain, but he also saw him as overly trusting.

He thought that Hitler was essentially a gangster but had a peculiar liking for Mussolini, perhaps because of Il Duce’s sense of history and his anticommunist views. Churchill and Roosevelt got off to a rocky start but eventually developed a mutual respect and even affection, which became the core of the “special relationship” between their nations. Churchill’s belief in his destiny served him well when Britain was standing alone, but it prevented him from seeing how the world had changed after 1945. He never understood why India would want to leave the British Empire, and he was mystified by Gandhi. Through all this was his wife, Clementine, his sharpest critic and most loyal ally.

Reynolds offers some intriguing insights, but he often takes detours to cover well-trod ground, which makes the book a mixed bag for serious students of British history.

However, it should appeal to readers seeking to learn more about Churchill’s life and times.

By looking at those who influenced Churchill, Reynolds sheds some light on his achievements and failures.

American Woman: The Transformation of the Modern First Lady, From Hillary Clinton to Jill Biden Rogers, Katie | Crown (304 pp.) | $30.00 Feb. 27, 2024 | 9780593240564

A historical study of the soft power of modern First Ladies.

As a White House correspondent for the New York Times who’s covered two presidential administrations, Rogers has reported

recently on the Hunter Biden custody case involving his unacknowledged daughter, Navy. The author uses the life and career of Jill Biden as a springboard to discuss the evolving nature of the modern First Lady role, starting with Hillary Clinton.

As Rogers writes, the word ambition is not often associated with First Ladies.

Even though she was often pilloried for her ambition, Clinton was the first lawyer in the role, and she was also a highly competent policymaker charged with putting together a national health care bill in the first 100 days of her husband’s presidency.

“No First Lady had ever tried to push the boundaries of her role so far and so fast,” writes Rogers about the resulting backlash. In contrast, Laura Bush, the soft-spoken librarian and teacher, did not get involved in the administration policies of her husband. “She was not there to push George toward policy or to mediate some of the more conservative voices in his ear,” writes the author. “She was there to remind him where he came from.” Outspoken Michelle Obama left her high-paying job to help her husband’s campaign, while Jill Biden has continued to work at a community college. Melania Trump was the most enigmatic of the modern First Ladies, defined largely by her absence and Sphinxlike demeanor and sometimes odd behavior and comments. All of Rogers’ subjects faced controversies and “struggle[d] with feeling understood.”

The author’s detailed coverage of the Bidens, from their earliest days, reveals a symbiotic partnership, and Jill emerges as a fiercely protective mother and wife, not easily forgiving of disloyalty.

A well-written, extensively researched account of a challenging role in the public eye.

For more on Churchill, visit Kirkus online.

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A W A R D S // N NO ON NFFIICCTTIIO ON N

AWARDS Winner of the Cundill History Prize Is Revealed Tania Branigan won the award for Red Memory, a finalist for the Kirkus Prize.

Dan Chung

Tania Branigan’s Red Memory: The Afterlives of China’s Cultural Revolution has won the 2023 Cundill History Prize, given annually to a “book that embodies historical scholarship, originality, literary quality, and broad appeal.”

The book, published in May by Norton, explores the lingering effects of Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution on the lives of Chinese citizens.

In a starred review, a Kirkus critic called the book—a finalist for the Kirkus Prize and the Baillie Gifford Prize—“a heartbreaking, revelatory evocation of ‘the decade that cleaved modern China in two.’”

Philippa Levine, the chair of the Cundill Prize jury, said, “Haunting and memorable, Tania Branigan’s sensitive study of the impact of the Cultural Revolution on the lives and psyches of an en-

tire generation in China affected every juror, as it will every reader. All of us found ourselves unable to stop thinking about this extraordinary book. All of us were deeply moved by the trauma she so vividly describes and by the skills on which she drew in doing so. This is a must-read.”

The Cundill History Prize, presented by McGill University in Montreal, was established in 2008, and comes with a cash prize of $75,000. Previous winners include Anne Applebaum for Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1944-1956 and Tiya Miles for All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake.—M.S. For a review of the book, visit Kirkus online.

Branigan was also a finalist for the Baillie Gifford Prize.

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The Death of Tony: On Belonging in Two Worlds Sileika, Antanas | Stonehewer Books (248 pp.) | $21.95 paper | March 5, 2024 9781738993345

A novelist reflects on a life rooted firmly in his native Canada but lived spiritually in his parents’ homeland of Lithuania.

The son of immigrants who fled Russian and German incursions into Lithuania during World War II, Sileika grew up in “the glow of postwar prosperity.” Early on, his parents’ turbulent past held no interest for him.

Like his equally Canadianized brothers, Sileika was interested in hockey, baseball, suburban life, and the wondrous unknown of his future. Even though the author was “deep under [the] imperial spell,” native Canadians still called him out as a “foreigner.” By the time he reached college, his love for Canada—and in particular, his “imaginary… homeland of England”—had “evolv[ed] from empire and commonwealth to language alone.” Rather than be known as Tony, the author embraced his identity as a cultural outsider with newly opened arms and reverted to his Lithuanian birth name, Antanas. That heritage-reclaiming act marked the beginning of a personal revolution— not just as an individual but also as a writer. Though he was always “knee deep in Lithuanians,” his more conscious preoccupation with his parents’ distant homeland didn’t begin until after the birth of his children in the 1980s. Just as he and his first-generation Lithuanian wife began immersing their children in the ancestral heritage both had taken for granted, Lithuania began its bid to break free of a crumbling Soviet empire. At the same time, the newly politicized author was drawn into the unfolding narrative of national struggle. Those experiences, as well as the ones that marked his own coming-of-age as the son of Lithuanian immigrants, later became fodder for 72 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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the novels Sileika began to publish in the 1990s. Intelligent and observant, his memoir illuminates the experiences of a little-discussed ethnic group while probing the meanings of real and imagined homelands.

A thoughtful reading experience.

If You See Them: Young, Unhoused, and Alone in America Sokolik, Vicki | Spiegel & Grau (336 pp.) $30.00 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781954118492

Rebuilding the shattered lives of unhoused youth.

Sokolik, the founder and CEO of Starting Right, Now (SRN), makes a moving debut, recounting her journey from charitable citizen to prominent advocate for the “unseen and unprotected population” of unaccompanied, unhoused youth. Coming from wealth and privilege, the author looked for ways to help those less fortunate, such as delivering Thanksgiving dinners to needy families. “I wanted to show the world that I was a good and useful person,” she writes.

“It was a way to protect myself from judgment.” When she became aware of the large number of unhoused high school students in her Florida community, she saw an opportunity to make a lasting impact. “Each unaccompanied youth has lived a patchwork life,” she writes, dealing with violence, abuse, loss of one or both parents, hunger, arrests, loneliness, and sometimes addiction. At first, Sokolik focused on a few teenagers by finding them housing, sifting through the obstacles within federal and state safety nets to get them benefits, smoothing a path to employment, and working with social workers and school counselors to ensure ongoing support. Spurred by her city’s mayor, she founded SRN, which offers students mentoring, tutoring, and extensive programming to help them “figure out how to be

who they are” and who they hope to become. In her detailed profiles of many of these young men and women, Sokolik highlights the challenges involved in helping them, including negativity, distrust, and various mental health issues. “People who have lived through trauma don’t heal overnight,” she writes. “You have to keep showing up for them, often in ways they don’t expect.” The author faced personal challenges, including “letting go of unrealistic expectations” and her tendency to be overbearing. Nevertheless, as she reveals, her stubborn faith and tireless activism have led to some impressive successes.

A timely and truly inspiring memoir.

Churchill’s American Network: Winston Churchill and the Forging of the Special Relationship Stelzer, Cita | Pegasus (368 pp.) | $29.95 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781639364855

The author of Dinner With Churchill and Working With Winston returns with a study of Churchill’s visits to the U.S. Even though Churchill visited only half a dozen times over 50 years, not always for far-reaching purposes, this lively account will amuse collectors of Churchilliana. Stelzer reminds readers that her subject was half American. His mother, a wealthy American heiress, married Randolph Churchill, who became a leading political figure. Moving in the highest circles of both nations and fiercely dedicated to her son’s career, she worked hard to smooth his path. As a junior officer, he traveled to Cuba to report on Spanish forces battling rebels. An imperialist throughout his life, he favored Spain. After a lecture tour in the U.S. in 1900, nearly 30 years passed before he returned for two more tours, now a political celebrity. As befitted his stature, he met KIRKUS REVIEWS

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the crème de la crème, including the president, Hollywood superstars, and wealthy industrialists, most of whom succumbed to his charms, often loaning him their mansions and private railroad carriages. Churchill did badly in the 1929 crash and suffered serious injuries when a car struck him, but this barely slowed him down. Stelzer concludes her story in the early 1940s. By that time, Churchill was one of the most famous British figures in the eyes of many Americans, and even those opposed to entering the war looked kindly on him. Despite the title, this is not primarily a history of Churchill’s efforts to win hearts and minds, but rather a breezy record of his travels, the important people he met, the media attention he received, and the speeches he delivered. Because income for lectures, articles, and books preoccupied him throughout his life, the author devotes a good amount of attention to the fees he earned.

A cheerful chronicle of Churchill’s excursions in America.

Be Not Afraid of My Body: A Lyrical Memoir Stewart, Darius | Belt Publishing (260 pp.) | $19.99 paper | Feb. 6, 2024 9781953368904

For “a blackboy growing up in the projects” in Knoxville, Tennessee, the stakes of coming out as both gay and HIV-positive proved to be quite high.

Stewart, a published poet and doctoral fellow in literary studies at the University of Iowa, takes his title from a Walt Whitman poem.

The subtitle signals that the chapters, while rooted in memories of actual events, take the form of poetic passages in which fact is often difficult to separate from fiction. Some chapters read like prose poems, including “Delirium Tremens” and the haunting concluding piece, “Skin KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Hunger.” Stewart does not shy away from disclosing difficult parts of his past, including his childhood “praythe-gay-away nightly rituals that had [him] hunched beneath the covers in the darkest dark”; teenage attempts to pass for straight (a “mission… doomed to failure”); a descent into substance abuse; and often pondering the “diminishing pleasures of succumbing to lust.” He also recalls the time “Daddy caught me prancing around my bedroom wearing my sister’s fluffy, pink slippers, pretending to be queen of my own parade.”

The author reminds readers about the enduring stigma of being HIV-positive for Black gay men and other people of color, and he movingly invokes the humiliation of being called for contact tracing after his HIV diagnosis. “I was a public health crisis,” he writes. Throughout, Stewart is a candid and engaging guide to his demimonde, invoking “the thrill of being reckless” in sexual exploits and describing drag queens who “carry themselves with as much dignified femininity as a mayor’s wife.” His honest portrayal of his life is a worthy prose counterpart to works by the late gay poet Essex Hemphill, whom he clearly reveres, reprinting several of his poems in this book, including “Between Pathos and Seduction.”

A memorable portrait of Black gay life, from poverty and adversity to accomplishment and poetry.

Kirkus Star

My Name Is Barbra Streisand, Barbra | Viking (992 pp.) | $47.00 Nov. 7, 2023 | 9780525429524

A gloriously massive memoir from a sui generis star.

When Keith Richards and Bruce Springsteen published 500-page memoirs, that seemed long—but as we learned, they really

did have that much to say. Streisand doubles the ante with 1,000 pages. In addition to chronicling her own life, the author offers fascinating lessons on acting, directing, film editing, sound mixing, lighting, and more, as revealed in detailed accounts of the making of each of her projects.

As Stephen Sondheim commented about her, “It’s not just the gift, it’s the willingness to take infinite pains.”

The pains really pay off. With every phase of her life, from childhood in Brooklyn to her 27-year-romance with current husband, James Brolin, Streisand throws everything she has— including her mother’s scrapbook and her own considerable talent as a writer—into developing the characters, settings, conversations, meals, clothes, and favorite colors and numbers of a passionately lived existence.

In the process, she puts her unique stamp on coffee ice cream, egg rolls, dusty rose, pewter gray, the number 24, Donna Karan, Modigliani, and much more. Among the heroes are her father, who died when she was very young but nevertheless became an ongoing inspiration. The villains include her mother, whose coldness and jealousy were just as consistent.

An armada of ex-boyfriends, colleagues, and collaborators come to life in a tone that captures the feel of Streisand’s spoken voice by way of Yiddishisms, parenthetical asides, and snappy second thoughts. The end is a little heavy on tributes, but you wouldn’t want to miss the dog cloning, the generous photo section, or this line, delivered in all seriousness: “Looking back, I feel as if I didn’t fulfill my potential.”

What a talent, what a career, what a life, and what a treat to relive it all with this most down-to-earth of demigods.

For more on Barbra Streisand, visit Kirkus online.

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Kirkus Star

True Believer: Hubert Humphrey’s Quest for a More Just America Traub, James | Basic Books (528 pp.) $35.00 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781541619579

A welcome resurrection of the life of an often-forgotten but significant political figure.

Veteran journalist Traub, author of What Was Liberalism? and The Freedom Agenda, delivers a memorable, admiring portrait of Hubert Humphrey (1911-1978). Son of a small-town South Dakota pharmacist, Humphrey graduated high school as the class valedictorian. After dropping out of college during the Depression, he returned a few years later to complete three years of classwork in two years. He also worked in a drug store to support himself and his family, and he graduated Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude from the University of Minnesota. In graduate school, thesis advisers extolled his intelligence, enthusiasm, and charisma and suggested that politics would be a better fit than academia. He became a rising force in the Democratic Party, and in 1945, he “became the youngest person ever elected as mayor of Minneapolis.”

He made headlines during the 1948 Democratic National Convention, fighting successfully to substitute a strong civil rights plank for the usual platitudes. President Harry Truman tried to discourage this approach; southerners hated it and formed the Dixiecrat Party, which, pundits agreed, guaranteed Truman’s defeat. Traub agrees with most scholars that Humphrey’s effort helped in the north more than it hurt in the south. Elected senator by a landslide in 1948, he proposed many liberal reforms.

Working with his mentor Lyndon Johnson, he was able to pass some of them.

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necessary for a campaign. Assuming the vice presidency in 1964, he was marginalized, exerting little influence over the U.S.’s disastrous involvement in Vietnam. Concluding this highly readable biography, Traub suggests that it was not rising conservatism but the antiwar movement that assured Humphrey’s defeat in 1968.

An astute analysis of one of the last New Dealers.

The Primary Solution: Rescuing Our Democracy From the Fringes Troiano, Nick | Simon & Schuster (352 pp.) $30.00 | Feb. 27, 2024 | 9781668028254

A bold proposal for significant political change.

In his debut book, Troiano, executive director of Unite America, a philanthropic venture fund that promotes nonpartisan election reform, argues forcefully for abolishing partisan primaries that allow participation only by voters registered as Republican or Democrat. These elections attract very low turnout by “tiny factions of voters on the fringes who are most likely to participate and the special interests that aim to influence them.” In 2022, 8% of voters in partisan primaries determined 83% of House contests. The author explores several options for reforming primaries to allow for better representation. “All registered voters,” he asserts, “regardless of their party affiliation, should have a say in choosing the final candidates for president.” Currently, 15 states block independents, and another 15 prevent cross-party voting. Louisiana, Washington, California, and Alaska, though, have abolished partisan primaries, and Troiano argues that adding six states to that roster would significantly reduce the “toxic levels of polarization” blighting the political landscape: “The twenty senators and dozens of House members from those states, roughly divided by party, would be liberated

from the Primary Problem and no longer under the threat of being primaried by the fringes.” Politicians instead would aim to build support from the widest possible coalition. Troiano offers several models for election reform, including a change in electoral vote counting. In addition, he makes a case for a national primary day, which would follow a generous vetting period, so that early-primary states would not get disproportionate attention. The author draws on numerous studies as well as his experience as a congressional candidate (he ran as an independent in 2014) to make a strong case for “disentangling the process of nominating candidates, which should belong to the parties, from the process of electing candidates, including primaries, which should belong to the public.”

A fresh, timely political analysis.

The Internationalists: The Fight To Restore American Foreign Policy After Trump Ward, Alexander | Portfolio (384 pp.) $32.00 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780593539071

An examination of world affairs in the post-Trump years.

Ward, an award-winning journalist specializing in national security, notes that foreign policy played only a modest role in the 2016 election, and Trump limited himself to the lowbrow jingoism that delighted his followers: portraying dictators as admirable leaders who get things done and immigrants as threats to the nation. The author begins with a pertinent question: “How would Biden, a president who came of age in a time when America was the undisputed superpower, attempt to make it genuinely great again—respected and trusted by its allies, feared by its enemies, and no longer willing to kowtow to the despots that Trump seemed so enamored of?” When he took office, the new president and his administration focused on “foreign KIRKUS REVIEWS

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policy for the middle class,” negotiating a five-year extension of the nuclear arms reduction treaty with Russia, thus making the world a little safer and suggesting the possibility of productive talks. Soon after, Biden was forced to confront the disastrous situation in Afghanistan. An advocate of reduced involvement in Afghanistan ever since his years as Obama’s vice president, he proceeded with the withdrawal. Despite 20 years and more than $1 trillion of assistance, few had confidence in the Afghan army, but U.S. intelligence determined that it could resist for several years. Few officials foresaw such a rapid collapse, and Ward’s cogent account of what followed makes for simultaneously illuminating and painful reading. But memories of foreign debacles are short, and the administration addressed another massive problem when intelligence officials determined, six months before it occurred, that Russia was preparing to invade Ukraine.

Readers know what happened next, so Ward’s expert account of earnest diplomacy and consultation with allies lacks urgency, but history buffs will be fascinated nonetheless.

A sturdy deep dive into the Biden approach to international relations.

Sons of Chinatown: A Memoir Rooted in China and America Wong, William Gee | Temple Univ.

Press (280 pp.) | $35.00 | March 1, 2024 9781439924877

A memoir about Chinese immigrants navigating exclusion-era politics and other struggles in America.

Journalist Wong, author of Yellow Journalist: Dispatches From Asian America, first visited his father’s rural village in Guangdong province in 1994 with his extended family. His father, Sam Gee, as he was mostly known in his new home of Oakland, had been able to KIRKUS REVIEWS

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slip under the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 via a well-rehearsed practice among Chinese seeking immigration at the time. As Wong writes, “the so-called paper son scheme” relied on U.S.-born Chinese clans to attest to immigrants’ familial relations when they came through the Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco.

In 1912, Gee arrived as a teenager, and it would be another two decades until he was able to bring the rest of his family over from China. While living and working in Oakland, Gee had multiple daughters before the author, the coveted son, was born in 1941.

In this intimate story of a Chinese American family making a life in Oakland, Wong unearths poignant, previously unknown details about Gee and his early years hustling to sell lottery tickets during the Depression; being shot four times by his “paper brother” in 1940 and surviving; and the shady financial backing for his ultimately successful Oakland restaurant, Great China, which thrived until he died in 1961 and served as “our family’s universe” for nearly two decades. The author also chronicles his own life, including his career as a journalist, his stint in the Peace Corps in the Philippines, and his marriage to a white woman. By the end of this ultimately uplifting narrative, Wong displays a deeper understanding of his sometimes obdurate, yet determined, perseverant parents. Pair this one with Ava Chin’s Mott Street.

A forthright account of a family’s success in building a strong, positive Chinese American identity.

Where Rivers Part: A Story of My Mother’s Life Yang, Kao Kalia | Atria (336 pp.) | $28.99 March 19, 2024 | 9781982185299

A Hmong author explores her mother’s tumultuous life.

In this follow-up to The Latehomecomer and The Song Poet, Yang chroni-

cles the life of her mother, Tswb, who was born to Laotian Hmong parents in the shadow of a war. Before her birth, the U.S. Army recruited Hmong men to fight in the alleged war against communism. When the Americans left, the local Lao government began to persecute Hmong families for their support of enemy troops, forcing many Hmong— including Tswb’s family—to adopt a nomadic life in the jungle, hiding from violent governmental retribution. After years of separation from her home village, Tswb, 16, met and married a handsome man named Npis, after leaving her family in the middle of a chaotic evacuation of their jungle camp. A few days later, she saw her mother and family for one of the last times in her life. Tswb fled with Npis’ family to Thailand and the U.S., while her mother would live in Laos until her burial in Tswb’s brother’s backyard. The lack of family unity is something Tswb mourned for the rest of her life: “It had been twenty-four years since my mother had died…. This was the impasse of my life. To be with my mother.

To be away from my husband and my children. Why couldn’t we all be together?” At its best, the book is compassionate, lyrical, tender, and insightful. Unfortunately, the narratorial voice often feels alienated and overwritten, a contrast that the stunningly intimate prologue— which the author wrote from her own perspective—renders particularly stark. Nonetheless, Yang offers an engaging story of escape, redemption, and heartbreak; as in her previous books about Hmong culture, she also effectively highlights an ethnic group that’s rarely represented in American literature.

An occasionally uneven yet spirited and gripping memoir of the enduring bonds of family.

For more from Kao Kalia Yang, visit Kirkus online.

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Children's

MAHNAZ DAR

A PICTURE IS worth a thousand words, but one bite of a beloved dish can convey more emotion than a literary master’s entire oeuvre—just think of Proust’s madeleine.

Food is entwined with memory. It’s often synonymous with identity, family, culture.

In short, it speaks volumes, as these recent middle-grade works demonstrate.

In Kate O’Shaughnessy’s Lasagna Means I Love You (Knopf, Feb. 21), cooking and food are stepping stones in a young girl’s search for family. When Mo’s grandmother dies, she’s sent to live with foster parents. She soon finds an outlet for her grief: collecting other people’s family recipes and posting them online…and, she hopes, learning more about her own family. Though Mo grapples with sorrow, loneliness, and even rage, O’Shaughnessy leavens the heavy subject material with humor and heart. Ultimately this tale is rooted in joy as Mo forges connections while exploring her newfound passion.

Cooking wunderkind Flynn McGarry, 25, sees himself as an artist and food as his medium. His 78 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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memoir, This Is Not a Cookbook: A Chef ’s Creative Process From Imagination to Creation (Delacorte, April 18), illustrated by Adil Dara, details his trajectory from hosting dinner parties at 13 to opening a New York City restaurant at 19. Most readers won’t have access to the opportunities McGarry enjoyed—for instance, his parents allowed him to adapt their dining room into a professional-style kitchen—but would-be chefs will be charmed by his quirky narrative and stirred by his passion and vision; his account of pioneering a recipe for “beet Wellington” is especially compelling.

Can food transform the world? Readers will be convinced it can after finishing The Antiracist Kitchen: 21 Stories (and Recipes) (Orca, Oct. 17), edited

by Nadia L. Hohn and illustrated by Roza Nozari.

In this moving, inspired work, kid-lit authors of color share favorite recipes while mulling race, culture, and racism. Food can engender shame, as illustrated by stories of kids who are teased for seemingly unusual

lunches, but it also has the power to effect change, foster understanding, and help us learn who we are. Janice Lynn Mather discusses how preparing plantains allowed her to grapple with the feeling that she wasn’t truly Bahamian, while “Mami’s apple and guava cake” helped Ruth Behar balance her Cuban and American identities.

With Chinese Menu: The History, Myths, and Legends Behind Your Favorite Foods (Little Brown, Sept. 12), Grace Lin shows that what we eat nourishes not only our bodies but our minds. Organizing her gorgeously illustrated book like the menu of a typical Chinese American restaurant, with sections devoted to teas, soups, side

orders, and main courses, she displays both a storyteller’s flair and a researcher’s doggedness as she delves into the lore behind everything from chopsticks to fortune cookies. Though dishes such as General Tso’s Chicken are often dismissed as inauthentic compared with the cuisine eaten in China, Lin makes clear that these foods reflect the determination and creativity of the immigrants who adapted them for an American palate: “Chinese American cuisine is the flavor of resilience, the flavor of adaptability, the flavor of persistence and triumph.

Above anything, this food is the flavor of America.”

Mahnaz Dar is a young readers’ editor.

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

FOOD, GLORIOUS FOOD BOOKS

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CHILDREN’S

EDITOR’S PICK The lines between friends and enemies blur for a young descendant of Beowulf when monsters threaten her New Jersey town.

In this graphic novel spinoff from Cavallaro’s Nico Bravo series, red-haired monster hunter Eowulf Wegmund loves battling mystical foes in real life as well as participating in role-playing games with her friends. After seeing aloof Amadeus Hornburg being bullied at school, she befriends him. Her parents warn her against hanging out with a Hornburg, and her gaming squad, who dislike him, are equally displeased. Eowulf feels like everyone is keeping secrets from her, but her anxiety must go on a back burner

These Titles Earned the Kirkus Star

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when rampaging monsters descend upon her quiet, suburban town. With her trusty sentient sword, Roger, she plunges into battle—only to find the battle lines blurry: Whom can she really trust?

This new series hits a masterful note in its complex symphony of tween angst; Eowulf knows that something is amiss, and watching her forge ahead with candor and impulsivity makes her a compulsively relatable and endearing hero. Vivid, kinetic illustrations propel the adept plotting, and the coloring by Yeom makes the exciting battles positively blaze on the page. Nico Bravo aficionados will be pleased with winking nods to the trilogy throughout, and the clever, cliffhanging

83

Jam, Too?

By JaNay Brown-Wood; illus. by Jacqueline Alcántara

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Eowulf

By Mike Cavallaro; colors by Irene Yeom

Eowulf: Of Monsters & Middle School Cavallaro, Mike | Colors by Irene Yeom | First Second | 224 pp. | $15.99 paper | Feb. 13, 2024 9781250846433 | Series: Eowulf, 1

epilogue will certainly hook all readers. Eowulf reads white; there is racial diversity throughout the supporting cast.

85

The Observologist

By Giselle Clarkson

87

The Partition Project

By Saadia Faruqi

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Bugs

By Miriam Forster; illus.

by Gordy Wright

91

A Flicker of Hope

By Cynthia Harmony; illus. by Devon Holzwarth

92

Elijah’s Easter Suit

By Brentom Jackson; illus. by Emmanuel Boateng

A pitch-perfect tale of friendship and fantastical foes. (Graphic fantasy. 8-12)

95

Is This a House for Hermit Crab?

By Megan McDonald; illus. by Katherine Tillotson

96

Little Sisters

By Tomo Miura; trans. by Nanette McGuinness

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CHILDREN’S

Pepper & Me Alemagna, Beatrice | Hippo Park/Astra Books for Young Readers (48 pp.) | $18.99 Jan. 16, 2024 | 9781662640506

A child has a complex relationship with a large scab that forms after a bad fall.

In a straight forward, childlike voice accompanied by charmingly naïve mixed-media illustrations, a pale-skinned narrator with long red hair recounts the story of a scraped knee and its aftermath. A few days after a fall and “you-knowwhat” dripping down the child’s leg, a humungous scab forms. Though adults reassure the child that it will go away soon, “we kept staring at each other, the scab and me…I was afraid it would stay forever.” The “hideous” scab is a source of constant distraction, the “worst one in the whole world,” but it follows the little one everywhere, so the child decides to name it Pepper. Pepper becomes a companion through the summer, and the scab slowly changes, pulling at the surrounding skin and shrinking.

“Sometimes it seemed like she was smiling at me,” the child notes, and soon the little one begins to share stories, thoughts, and dreams with Pepper. Then one morning, Pepper is gone. She is found among the bedsheets, small and sad. Alemagna deftly captures feelings of loss over something inconsequential to adults but of outsized importance to a child.

Off-kilter compositions create an uneasiness that offsets the sweet childlike scenes, allowing for complicated emotional responses.

A uniquely moving story about an unlikely subject. (Picture book. 4-8)

For more

by Beatrice Alemagna, visit Kirkus online.

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A uniquely moving story about an unlikely subject.

PEPPER & ME

Super Space Weekend: Adventures in Astronomy Alméras, Gaëlle | Trans. by David Warriner Greystone Kids (96 pp.) | $21.95 Oct. 3, 2023 | 9781778400667 Series: Science Adventure Club

In this French import, three animal friends spend a weekend in a treehouse observatory, learning about the universe and

what makes it tick.

With—initially at least—varying degrees of enthusiasm, Squeak, Orni, and Castor walk away from a city’s light pollution to see night skies thickly strewn with stars open up overhead. The trio then receive a schooling in basic astronomy (“the MOTHER OF ALL SCIENCES!” as astro-geek Squeak proclaims), from the lives of stars and planets to the electromagnetic spectrum and the Big Bang. The topics don’t appear to be organized in any logical order, and readers will likely be left puzzled by the author’s (or perhaps translator’s) unexplained reference to the asteroid belt’s “very peculiar location between Mars and Jupiter,” not to mention being misled by simplistic claims that solar flares are “not dangerous” (they can be) and that planets are by definition “alone in their orbit.”

Still, by and large the facts are sound and presented in easily digestible bits interspersed with amusing banter.

The three campers, portrayed Walt Kelly–style as anthropomorphic figures with the heads of rodent- or birdlike animals, share borderless panels with images of stellar and interstellar phenomena set against bright white or solid black backdrops.

Young skywatchers can test their knowledge by filling in the names of select constellations on a set of sky maps at the end.

Not exactly seamless or systematic but lighthearted enough to draw a crowd. (Graphic nonfiction. 8-10)

The Ocean Gardener Anganuzzi, Clara | Tiger Tales (32 pp.) $18.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781664300279

A girl and her marine biologist mother save a coral reef.

Ayla lives on an island surrounded by “a vast turquoise ribbon—a coral reef.” Not only does Ayla love swimming through the vibrant underwater habitat, but she also appreciates its importance to the surrounding environment.

She’s shocked one day to discover that a section of the reef looks pale and colorless—and that vast numbers of fish are leaving the area.

Ayla’s mother explains that rising ocean temperatures are responsible for the reef’s condition and for the fish’s mass exodus. All is not lost, though, because Ayla’s mom has an idea. Together, Ayla and her mother gently and carefully harvest healthy, living coral and place it into a tank in their home. There, submerged in water that’s the right temperature, the coral grows. Eventually, Ayla and her mother move the coral back into the ocean, where Ayla lovingly tends to it until it thrives. Will Ayla’s hard work be enough to allow her beloved fish to return? This delightful, informative, child-friendly story, based on the work of marine biologist Chloé Pozas (who’s interviewed in the backmatter), KIRKUS REVIEWS

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lyrically and cleverly incorporates a slew of fascinating facts. The bright, detailed illustrations, dominated by hues of blue, will captivate young readers, as will the idea that we can all do something to save our planet. Ayla and her mother are brown-skinned.

characters have skin the white of the page, but racial diversity is implied through the variety of hair colors and textures.

Rainbowsaurus

Barnes, Derrick D. | Illus. by Jez Tuya Workman (176 pp.) | $16.99 paper Jan. 2, 2024 | 9781523505548 Series: Who Got Game?

A stirring tale about preserving precious marine life. (Picture book. 4-8)

Antony, Steve | Crocodile/Interlink (32 pp.) $17.95 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781623717001

Come along and find the Rainbowsaurus!

A family, consisting of what appears to be two dads and three kids, climbs a rainbow in search of the Rainbowsaurus. Along the way, they meet animals of various colors until they finally encounter the huge Rainbowsaurus, who, it turns out, was there all along. Illustrations drawn with lively linework convey motion and energy, and the bright hues of the animals and people’s clothing pop against a stark white background. Compared to the rest of the animals, the Rainbowsaurus isn’t quite as appealing, with vertical stripes of every color in no particular order that clash as the creature stands under a classic rainbow.

Young readers will surely demand dramatic readings, however, and will especially delight in the mismatched animal sounds—a quacking bear, a gobbling cow! The meter of the text flows well in most places, making it easy to read and reread. Any young children will love to have this book in their library, but families with same-gender parents will especially appreciate the representation. Human

For more by Steve Antony, visit Kirkus online.

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Exciting, colorful, and inclusive.

(Picture book. 3-5)

Who Got Game?: Basketball: Amazing but True Stories

Two-time Kirkus Prize winner Barnes highlights some potentially unfamiliar records and achievements on the court.

The author positively pours out facts and anecdotes about lesser known, or at least less celebrated, “batters, buzzer-beaters, and record-breakers”—from tributes to the early barnstorming “Black Fives” and Wataru “Wat” Misaka, the NBA’s first non-white player, to accounts of Scott Skiles’ 30 assists in 1990 and Bernard King, who came back to finish a Hall of Fame career after shattering a knee. Despite noting that basketball is enjoyed across the world, “from Boston to Barcelona to Beijing,” he seldom glances overseas, and notwithstanding a nod to Title IX, the scattered accounts of the feats of women high school, collegiate, or WNBA players and teams definitely don’t get equal time. Still, with contagious enthusiasm, he invites readers to marvel at trick dunks and fullcourt shots of the past, weird games such as the NCAA contest that ended up 258-141, and other wonders—not to mention the careers of players, coaches, and even announcers and executives from the usual marquee names to coach Pat Summitt (1,098 wins), A.C. Green (1,192 consecutive games), and 5’3” pro Tyrone “Muggsy” Bogues. Even non-fans will enjoy the breathless tales of miracle comebacks

Barnes dishes out on his way to a closing pep talk. The mostly brownskinned cartoon figures in Tuya’s action scenes properly underscore the narrative tone by sporting fierce game faces or appropriately amazed expressions.

Fast-break fun for both students and non-students of the game.

(Nonfiction. 10-13)

The Love Report Volume 2 Béka | Illus. by Maya | Trans. by Ivanka Hahnenberger | Hippo Park/Astra Books for Young Readers (200 pp.) | $19.99 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781662640599

Lola, Grace, and their friends continue to explore the ups and downs of love.

Grace struggles with shuttling back and forth between her newly divorced parents.

Meanwhile, Lola is focusing less on romance and more on her friends, including helping Adele turn her new studio into a place where they can develop their respective artistic passions. Smarmy, arrogant Sean asks out Felicity; when she says no, he attempts to turn the entire school against her, but the other girls back her up. When Adele’s art starts selling out at a local gallery, she’s invited to Sardinia to paint a mural, and she brings Lola and Grace along. There, the girls learn more truths about romance and relationships even as a development back home creates a compelling cliffhanger for the next installment. Translated from French, this graphic novel is a big improvement over the first volume. Though most characters’ faces remain similar looking, friendship takes center stage here and allows for deeper ruminations on love. The series still struggles to deliver messages about topics such as coercion, harassment, and loneliness without resorting to overblown caricatures—most of the male characters are one-dimensional, and DECEMBER 15, 2023 81

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A romp through the neighborhood guided by wordplay.

W A S I T A C AT I S A W ?

one of the girls has a cartoonishly neglectful mother. But the emphasis on the girls’ commitment to one another helps the messages land more smoothly and provides hope for the third book. Most characters present white; Grace is Black.

A solid step in the right direction for the series. (Graphic fiction. 10-15)

Was It a Cat I Saw? Bontje, Laura | Illus. by Emma Lidia Squillari Amicus Ink (32 pp.) | $18.99 March 12, 2024 | 9781681529042

A romp through the neighborhood guided by wordplay.

From kayak and racecar to her very own name, Hannah finds palindromes wherever she goes. While she’s engaging in imaginative play one day, her “radar” goes off and she encounters a boy named Adam who has lost his beloved cat, Otto. Hannah and Adam embark on a quest for his missing feline while encountering palindromes along the way. After an ebullient search, they finally find their “taco cat” (Otto is gobbling tacos up by a dumpster), and Hannah and Adam further embrace their palindromic spirit by retracing their steps back home. All palindromes used in the text are highlighted in bold, making them easy to identify for those young readers still grasping the concept.

Astute readers will notice Otto hiding in many spreads, along with a yellow line throughout the watercolor illustrations representing the path taken by the kitty as well as the eventual journey taken on by the two wordsmiths.

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to the coziness of the story. Those looking to use this as a read-aloud might want to pre-read beforehand, since some of the palindromes are awkwardly placed to accommodate their usage (“race fast, safe car”). Both protagonists read as white.

Budding palindrome enthusiasts will want to put this on their radar and make more than a peep along the way.

(Picture book. 4-7)

Zips and Eeloo Make Hummus Boukarim, Leila | Illus. by Alex Lopez Andrews McMeel Publishing (80 pp.) $11.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781524884352

An alien duo comically attempt to make hummus.

Zips is a tentacled, single-eyed orange extraterrestrial, while pal Eeloo is a cute childlike green creature with crab-pincer hands. Together, they host a self-styled cooking show in which they impart culinary wisdom based on their extensive knowledge of human food, garnered over the course of nearly one week on Earth. Overconfident Zips has come to the table ill-prepared. Realizing how interminably long the dried beans must soak leads to frustration. Managing the machinations of the mysterious food processor tests Zips’ dexterity. A missing ingredient requires a risky dash to the grocery store. When the aliens finally complete their concoction, readers will have learned a lot about both of them: Zips’ bombastic attitude belies a general lack of knowledge on all things human, while it turns out

that Eeloo’s pincer hands have many useful applications in the kitchen.

Their humorous quest mirrors a caregiver and child experimenting in the kitchen, a location where many readers may have experienced failure, persistence, and, hopefully, a final tasty victory. The structure of the comic is rather rigid, with pages generally composed of four panels of dialogue emphasizing the duo’s interplay, but the story is most exciting when they break beyond that, making messes and reacting to challenges with visual gags.

A mix of simple comedic ingredients with a few twists as garnish makes for a funny, fast read. (Graphic fiction. 6-9)

Extra Innings Bowen, Fred | Peachtree (144 pp.) | $16.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781682634110

Fourteen-year-old Mike McGinn is a promising pitcher for his baseball team, the Rays, but his father sees baseball as a frivolous hobby.

Mike’s dad thinks he should be working this summer, so the teen takes a job caddying at the local country club while continuing to hone his pitching skills. But sometimes hard work and solid pitching aren’t enough, as Mike finds when his team makes it to the final game of the end-of-season tournament. The game goes into extra innings, and though Mike’s pitching is top-notch, the results aren’t quite what the Rays had expected. Still, Mike learns important lessons along the way. Bowen balances action both on and off the field as Mike and his father slowly come to understand each other a little better. Baseball fans will especially appreciate the baseball For more by Fred Bowen, visit Kirkus online.

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terminology and slang and the descriptions of the Rays’ various games and Mike’s pitching. They’ll also enjoy learning that this story is based in part on a historical baseball game—in 1959, Pittsburg Pirates pitcher Harvey Haddix threw 12 perfect innings against the Atlanta Braves, only to lose in the 13th. The Rays’ summer schedule, game line-ups, league standings, pitching schedule, a scoreboard, and team statistics provide an immersive reading experience. Physical descriptions are minimal, though character names imply diversity in Mike’s community.

Will tide over youngsters longing for the start of the sport’s spring season.

(Fiction. 8-12)

Kirkus Star

Jam, Too? Brown-Wood, JaNay | Illus. by Jacqueline Alcántara | Nancy Paulsen Books (32 pp.) $18.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780593323762

A cumulative story with rhythm, rhyme, and a bopping bunch of percussionists.

Nearly every day, a brown-skinned man carries a conga drum across the street and plays on the beach where all can hear: “pat-a-pat-a, pat-pat.”

The young narrator, who has brown skin and curly brown hair, longs to join in, but without an instrument, this seems impossible. As the narrator watches from across the street, a skateboarding djembe drummer asks to join in, followed by a woman with a shekere, a man with zills, a biking couple with maracas, and an adult and child with bongos. Each percussion instrument has its own onomatopoeic sound that undulates across the pages as the beat variations grow. Unable to resist any longer, the narrator shyly asks, “Can I jam, too?” The way the protagonist joins in changes everything. In Alcántara’s richly colorful illustrations, the blues of sky and ocean, the tan sand, and the lush, green land remain constant KIRKUS REVIEWS

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while the musicians add as much color as they do sound, illustrating the amazing way that making music can bring people together and create community. Alcántara effectively captures the diversity of the characters in this African diasporic setting, illustrating various skin tones, hair styles and textures, clothing styles, fabric patterns, and more. With nearly singable text, this tale beckons readers to move.

A fantastic book-jam that delights the ear just as much as the eye. (Picture book. 4-7)

The Only Lonely Fairy Button, Lana | Illus. by Peggy Collins Pajama Press (32 pp.) | $18.95 Feb. 27, 2024 | 9781772783025

Friendship isn’t always easy, even for fairies, but Leah and Allie figure it out.

After Leah fails to find friends who want to play fairies with her, she falls to the floor in protest and laments being the “only lonely fairy.” When she casts off her green fairy wings, Allie, who has been watching from afar, returns them. In no time at all, Allie has happily tried the wings on, and the two children are working together to create a set of pink wings for Allie. Now, they’re the two happiest fairies in the land, but they’re also perceptive enough to notice another child looking longingly at their wings. The final illustration shows the happiest three fairies in the land, each wearing fairy wings. Bright artwork, dominated by pastels, shows a diverse classroom. Leah and her friends are generally presented against a plain white background, making this a good read-aloud choice. Clearly capturing the children’s emotions, the illustrations can help start conversations about whether Leah’s actions are helping or hurting her chances of making a new friend and about what Allie is feeling as she watches.

An author’s note encourages parents

and guardians to help kids practice social-emotional skills as they learn to approach and ask friends to play. Leah has light tan skin, while Allie and the third, unnamed friend present Asian.

A simple story that will sprinkle fairy dust on budding preschool friendships.

(Picture book. 3-6)

Nana in the Country Castillo, Lauren | Clarion/HarperCollins (40 pp.) | $19.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 9780544102170

Expectations are upended when a grandmother visits her grandchild in the country.

The young narrator is thrilled. The child’s city-dwelling Nana is about to visit, and at last the little one will be able to introduce her to all sorts of new experiences. Yet when the day in question arrives, Nana seems oddly at home in this rural environment. She’s not surprised by the geese, the insects, or the baby birds in a nest. With some sadness, her grandchild reflects, “I can’t show Nana how to do anything in the country.” All that changes in the night, though, when Nana and the child realize that a sheep has gotten loose in a thunderstorm. Instantly our young hero springs into action, gently leading the sheep back home with treats. The next day, the child shows Nana how to give animals water and how to find eggs, but Nana says that even with all that, the country is “filled with the most magical thing”: her grandchild. Castillo gently probes a child’s sense of uselessness with great understanding. Her perfectly honed child’s-eye perspective makes clear how important it is for grown-ups to occasionally be “taught” by youngsters.

Gentle ink watercolors and pastels drill home this necessary message.

Characters present white.

A book that truly sympathizes with young children’s need to earn the respect of their elders. (Picture book. 3-6)

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Numeracy drives this tale, but superhero action keeps the pedal to the metal.

THE SHRINKING SETBACK

The Divmulti Ray Dilemma: A Math Graphic Novel: Learn Multiplication and Division!

Chad, Jon | Workman (144 pp.) | $12.99 paper | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781523512065 Series: The Solvers, 1

Endowed with awesome powers thanks to an Arithmetic Meteor, three young friends work to defend the “math-centric city of Computropolis” from evil in this series kickoff.

First villains up: Null Void (and her “vile cohorts”), who snatch the newly invented Divmulti Ray—which allows users to multiply or divide anything—for their nefarious purposes. The Solvers—Leo, Shahi, and Moe—multiply their powers, calculate their way out of numerous pickles, and, bottom line, send their nemesis packing after cleverly foiling her schemes. Along the way, there are frequent pauses so that their sidekick Duncan (they also have a feline assistant, Rosy, who minds the Math Mansion when they’re out) can explain topics such as factors, skip-counting, and long division.

Action takes a distant backseat to instruction here, but Chad depicts both clearly and puts Leo, Shahi, and Moe at the head of a cast notably diverse of species as well as race.

Along with demonstrating that there are usually multiple ways of arriving at correct answers, he also repeatedly challenges the invidious notion that multiplication and division aren’t useful in daily real life. Leo, Duncan, 84 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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and Null Void are light-skinned, Shahi is dark-skinned, and Moe is tan-skinned; Moe uses they/them pronouns.

Adds up to a promising, challenging start. (Graphic superhero nonfiction.

9-11)

The Shrinking Setback: A Math Graphic Novel: Learn Fractions and Decimals!

Chad, Jon | Workman (144 pp.) | $12.99 paper | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781523512775 Series: The Solvers, 2

In this STEM-centric series’ second episode, learning to manipulate fractions and decimals helps three young superheroes defend the Arithmetic Meteor, which gave them their powers, from archnemesis Null Void.

Unwisely accepting free cans of Micro Cola from the thinly disguised, light-skinned villain leaves the suddenly mouse-sized Solvers—lightskinned Leo, dark-skinned Shahi, and tan-skinned Moe (who uses they/ them pronouns)—in desperate straits.

Only by learning how to make, convert, add, subtract, multiply, and divide fractions and decimals are they going to be able to make sense of the ingredients for an Enlarging Formula and various other helpful concoctions. Much instruction ensues, with careless mistakes (notably one that subjects them to Sudden Additional Shrinking Syndrome: “We got SASSed!!”), definitions of terms,

step-by-step examples, and problems laid out so that motivated readers can do the figuring right along with the costumed trio. Leo and Moe travel realistic learning curves while Shahi does most of the explaining, but all three wind up on the same page in time to put things right and deliver a rousing cheer: “Hooray for fractions!”

“Hooray for decimals!” “Hooray for math!” The message that facility with fractions and decimals is helpful in daily life gets a good airing, too.

Numeracy drives this tale, but superhero action keeps the pedal to the metal. (Graphic superhero nonfiction. 9-11)

Hair Oil Magic Chouhan, Anu | Bloomsbury (40 pp.) $18.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781547611041

A young South Asian girl revels in her family’s ritual of hair oiling.

Meenu always looks forward to Sundays, when her mother gently massages sweet-smelling oils into her hair.

To Meenu, this feels like “floating stars twinkling around her heart!” and washing the oil leaves her hair shiny and soft. One Sunday, Meenu decides to mix up the magic oils all by herself but struggles to re-create the magic of her mother’s concoction. When her slippery hands lead to a mishap, a disappointed Meenu cries in frustration. As her mother gently washes her hair—without the oils—the magical feeling returns, to Meenu’s surprise. Biji, her grandmother, explains that the magic lies in her mother’s love and in passing down this shared ritual. Mommy explains that her mother used to oil her hair, as did her mother’s mother, stretching back many generations. A happier Meenu basks in the warmth and love of her family and treats her mother to her own Magic Hair Day. This is a sweet, deeply relatable story centered on a common South Asian KIRKUS REVIEWS

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ritual. Cartoonish illustrations depict large-eyed characters and swirls of color—appropriate, given the theme of magic. Cultural markers—the kara, a stainless-steel bracelet worn by the women, and framed pictures of a turbaned man and the Golden Temple—cue the family as Sikh.

A tender celebration of the simple traditions that bind families. (Picture book. 4-8)

Kirkus Star

The Observologist: A Handbook for Mounting Very Small Scientific Expeditions Clarkson, Giselle | Gecko Press (120 pp.) $24.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781776575190

What can you see right under your nose?

In this engaging guide, Clarkson invites young readers to pay attention to the small things around them. Drawing her audience of potential naturalists in with wonderfully humorous cartoon drawings and carefully chosen examples, she addresses them directly. Her handbook has the appearance of a journal, interspersed with sketches and text in a font that resembles handwriting.

After an overview on “observology” (the study of looking) and suggestions on honing the powers of observation, she organizes her remaining four chapters by easily accessible locations (“a damp corner,” “pavement,” “a weedy patch,” and “behind the curtains”). She describes what might be seen and suggests some methodology.

Most of her discoveries, from slugs to

For more illustrated by Giselle Clarkson, visit Kirkus online.

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butterflies, will be familiar to North Americans, although this book was first published in New Zealand. She provides instructions for convincing a fly to go outside, sneaking up on a bug, relocating a spider, and even collecting one’s finds (suitably discarded or dead). Clarkson notes that drawing helps one notice small details—indeed, this title was inspired by her own experiences, and several illustrations are based on her photos. The text is full of information and the presentation immensely appealing; this book will have readers sharpening their senses in no time.

A charming work sure to spark a lifelong habit of looking closely at the natural world. (Nonfiction. 8-12)

Love and Hugs: Spring Colliston, Tracey | Boxer Books (32 pp.) $12.99 | Jan. 16, 2024 | 9781914912320

Spring arrives to the delight of friendly woodland creatures who eagerly welcome its signs.

The changing season brings colorful buds, raindrops and puddles, and blooming flowers. Little readers will encounter descriptions and images of spring alongside the characters. The illustrations convey the joy of the season.

All the critters are charming and adorable. Mouse is irresistible, poking out of the bottom of a tree, and Owl steals each scene with its rounded head and beady black eyes. Though they are largely expressionless, they nevertheless display curiosity, wonder, and playfulness through their body language and the book’s text. Some images appear almost collagelike in texture thanks to the papery finish on the tree trunks and the gentle ridges on the leaves and grass. Other illustrations appear like delicate watercolors, especially the stunning blend of the rainbow’s hues across a sky filled with raindrops. Plenty of lovely details await: Bumble Bee and Mouse staying dry under a hanging

leaf, a chick snuggled in a tulip, Mouse catching drops of water in a cup for paintbrushes. A palette of pure pinks, yellows, and pale greens and blues captures the feeling of a world returning to life after a long winter. The book takes on a familiar topic, but it’s elevated by the charming art.

A lovely tribute to all things spring.

(Picture book. 2-5)

I Do Not Eat Children Cutler, Marcus | Little, Brown (40 pp.) $15.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780316474726

A towering red creature is outsmarted by a child.

“I would never eat a child,” says a tall critter, who holds a hand over its heart and makes a scout’s honor gesture. A line of 10 racially diverse children (one of whom uses a wheelchair) flank the not-monster at the outset, resembling an ensemble waiting to take a bow at a curtain call.

Kids disappear with each turn of the page, leaving behind accessories such as a soccer ball or a trumpet to mark their place in the lineup. Though we see the nameless “monster” reaching for unsuspecting tots and burping up a green cloud containing possessions belonging to the kids, it skirts around the label and the idea that it would ever eat children. “Maybe it is you who eats children,” the red-skinned beastie supposes, pointing toward the reader.

Readers will enjoy flipping back and forth to see which children have vanished as the not-monster denies all involvement in the rapid and reliable disappearances. The text is spare and direct, with the only dialogue coming from the not-monster until the very last spread. What happens to this antihero? The last standing child, with puffy pigtails and dark skin, declares, “I do eat liars.” And the creature cleanly disappears in a scene sure to elicit chuckles.

Kids will gobble this tale up. (Picture book. 3-5)

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Every Bunny Is a Yoga Bunny Davison, Emily Ann | Illus. by Deborah Allwright | Nosy Crow (24 pp.) | $17.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9798887770567

A restless young bunny turns to yoga when she gets lost in the woods.

Yo-Yo bounces, jiggles, wiggles, and giggles. Grandpa decides that he’s going to teach her—and all the little bunnies—yoga in order to help them feel calm. Roly and Flo don’t seem to have any trouble following along as Grandpa demonstrates the various poses, but Yo-Yo is easily distracted.

When she follows a butterfly into the forest, she winds up lost. But she uses what Grandpa taught her, and each calming move and deep breath helps her think clearly and find her way back to the other bunnies. Newly empowered by her skills, Yo-Yo draws on them at times when she feels too wiggly to relax. Many little readers will relate to Yo-Yo’s can’t-sit-still energy, and the included poses are simple and approachable for all ages.

The final pages invite readers to try yoga; images show Yo-Yo in each pose with a basic description. The story demonstrates the universal benefits of slowing down and quieting the mind; a teacher or caregiver could easily use the book as a lead-in to an age-appropriate yoga practice. The illustrations are sweet and inviting, and Yo-Yo is an exuberant and adorable protagonist. Details such as candles and books in the cozy, snuggly bunny warren are endearing.

A soothing tale for even the wiggliest of little ones. (Picture book. 3-6)

For more by Emily Ann Davison, visit Kirkus online.

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A soothing tale for even the wiggliest of little ones.

EVE RY B U N NY I S A YO G A B U N NY

The Crayons Love Our Planet Daywalt, Drew | Illus. by Oliver Jeffers Philomel (32 pp.) | $9.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 9780593621080

Daywalt and Jeffers’ wildly popular Crayons have an important ecological message.

Though climate change is never mentioned, the book nevertheless gently introduces responsibility for Planet Earth. As in previous titles, the main text is in a large black font, while the Crayons’ dialogue is presented in a smaller, gray font. Blue begins by showing off a blue-tinged image of the globe (land masses are depicted in a darker hue). Green takes over: “Yay, Trees! I did those!”

Beige breaks in, pointing to a tiny wheat plant next to two large trees: “And wheat! I did the WHEAT!” Beige puts wheat front and center throughout—even on White’s drawing of mountaintop ice caps. When Red, Yellow, and Orange display drawings of various fruits, Beige interjects, “And WHEAT. Wheat is totally fruit.” Diplomatic Purple politely responds, “Um. NO. It is not.”

Purple attempts to dissuade self-important Beige, but it all ends happily as the Crayons join hands and proclaim: “Our planet has all of us too, in many shapes, colors, and sizes.”

Beige and Purple reconcile, with Beige adding, “And it’s our job to keep the planet safe.” Young children will easily absorb this positive message.

Although these characters have had many outings, their quiet humor still succeeds, and fans will definitely want this new entry.

A droll exploration of color and nature—and a welcome reminder to safeguard our planet. (Picture book. 3-5)

The Wrong Book Daywalt, Drew | Illus. by Alex Willmore Philomel (40 pp.) | $18.99 | Feb. 27, 2024 9780593621967

A bookmark accompanies readers through a book as the sounds that the creatures and things within make become increasingly bizarre.

First, an apple goes “crunch” when you eat it. Sure. Then a flower says, “CHUGGA CHUGGA CHOO CHOO!!!!” What? And then a bicycle— or wait, isn’t that a puppy?—belches.

Huh. When an “elephant”—actually, a brown-skinned firefighter—says, “DING-DONG!” the bookmark has had it and must correct the unseen narrator: “It’s a firefighter, and a firefighter says stuff like ‘Hey! Let’s go put out that fire!’” As the story progresses, more and more creatures make the wrong noises. Bicycles referred to as lions moo, a chicken (dubbed a fish) goes “SPLISH-SPLASH-SPLISH!” and a shark (“a yummy hamburger”) says, “BAWK BAWK BAWK and COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO!” Finally, the increasingly distressed bookmark makes one last attempt to right the inaccurate onomatopoeia. This fastpaced tale balances the narration’s straightforward delivery of inaccurate statements with the bookmark’s initial confusion and later frustration to create a hilarious subversion of expectations. Little ones will delight in the obvious errors, and the right reader KIRKUS REVIEWS

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will be able to deliver the various “moos” and “beeps,” with humorous results. Exuberant illustrations—the hyper-expressive bookmark is especially funny—as well as the use of different typefaces further compound the ridiculousness of the characters’ antics, making for a colorful and high-energy reading experience.

Chaotic fun, perfect for read-alouds.

(Picture book. 3-5)

Kirkus Star

The Partition Project Faruqi, Saadia | Quill Tree Books/ HarperCollins (416 pp.) | $19.99 Feb. 27, 2024 | 9780063115811

Borders and roots take on new meaning in this coming-of-age story.

Pakistani American seventh grader Mahnoor Raheem, an aspiring journalist, and Talha, her older brother, are instructed by Abba to greet their grandmother with “happy faces”—Dadi is leaving Lahore to live with them in Sugar Land, Texas. But smiling is hard for Maha. She’s had to give up her bedroom for Dadi and move into the attic, and she even has to take care of her after school. She’s excited about media studies, her new elective, but even that goes awry when they’re assigned to make documentary films, something Maha believes isn’t real journalism. Meanwhile, she meets Ahmad, a new student from Pakistan, and her best friend, Kim Hoang, unsuccessfully tries to interest her in their book report project. But she’s immersed in conversations with Dadi about the Partition, something Maha knew nothing about. The Partition forced Dadi to leave her home in the Punjab and settle as a refugee in the newly created Pakistan.

Replete with food-related memories, heart-wrenching stories, and warm tales of friendship, this is a riveting KIRKUS REVIEWS

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read. Maha confronts her own prejudices about the value of stories and what constitutes newsworthiness. In the process, she personally unravels her history and heritage (in ways that resonate with her American classmates who are also made to feel that they look like they’re “‘from somewhere else’”) and forges a new understanding of herself and her relationships.

brevity leaves unanswered questions (Why are sea coconuts disappearing?

Are sea heart pods edible?) but may inspire readers to do further research.

Sacred, toxic, ancient, medicinal, sadly vulnerable, or special in other ways, these are trees to know and cherish.

Powerful and timely. (Fiction. 9-14)

Budding arborists, environmentalists, and collectors of unusual information will find treasures here. (Illustrated nonfiction. 8-12)

Incredible: Stars of the Plant World

Little Mo and the Great Snow Monster

Flouw, Benjamin | Twirl/Chronicle (48 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9782408049898

Foreman, Michael | Thames & Hudson (32 pp.) | $16.95 | Jan. 9, 2024 9780500653449

Astonishing, overachieving trees impress in this oversized album.

An accomplished illustrator, Flouw admits that in the past, he’s often drawn trees in the background of his artwork without giving a thought to different species.

Redressing that slight, he depicts some extremes of the tree world, notable for “size, longevity, strength” or other unique characteristics. Starting with useful brief definitions of vocabulary (photosynthesis, range, inflorescence) and a note on nomenclature, Flouw organizes his 49 subjects into 16 groups.

Considering that the goal is specificity, the illustrations are surprisingly stylized, but Flouw demonstrates that flat, quasi-geometric forms can still convincingly convey a tree’s individuality. A general description of each type is accompanied by a specific example, like a banyan in India called Thimmamma Marrimanu, known for its five-acre canopy, or the rare King’s holly in Tasmania, a clone of an original 43,600-year-old plant. Readers will also learn about the elephant cactus, waterborne algae such as the giant kelp, the 82-foot-long leaves of the royal raffia palm, the smelly rafflesia and titan arum (aka corpse flower), and the jackfruit, which produces the largest fruit of any tree. The entries’

A diminutive, possumlike creature outsmarts monsters, if inadvertently.

It snows and the river freezes over. Little Mo’s parents, going out to forage, caution him to remain in their cave and not to tread on the ice. But a bored and lonely Little Mo ventures outside anyway and builds snow friends. He hides when enormous, dinosaurlike monsters emerge and settle into the cave. Mustering some courage, Little Mo explains that they must leave.

The biggest monster chases Little Mo, threatening to devour him—but, running across the frozen river, the heavy creature falls in. While the other monsters attempt to rescue their pal, Little Mo easily skims across the ice and ascends a snowy hill. He slips and rolls…and rolls, eventually turning into a gigantic snowball. This behemoth panics the monsters, who flee.

The snowball splits and opens just as Little Mo’s parents return, bearing food. He assures them that he didn’t get bored while they were gone, and the gigantic footprints Dad sees belong to visitors he chased off. This cute, if unoriginal, U.K. import will appeal to all readers who fantasize that, though they’re small, they can handily vanquish larger foes; kids will root for Little Mo all the way. >>> DECEMBER 15, 2023 87

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A BOOK THAT TEACHES THAT EVEN ONE PERSON CAN IMPACT CHANGE POWERFUL ENOUGH TO CHANGE THE WORLD.

“A WHIMSICAL BUT WELL-GROUNDED ENVIRONMENTALIST TALE.” —KIRKUS REVIEWS (STARRED REVIEW) ISBN: 978-0-9888916-9-2

“REFRESHING, BEAUTIFUL, AND MEANINGFUL; A STUNNER.” —THE PRAIRIE'S BOOK REVIEW

FOR AGENT REPRESENTATION OR INFORMATION ON PUBLISHING AND FILM RIGHTS, EMAIL HELLOWONDERWORLDUS@GMAIL.COM THENIGHTTHESTARSWENTMISSING.COM • HELLOWONDERWORLD.COM

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L IDLRDERNE’N S’S BO OKLIST C //HCIH

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6 Graphic Novels for Tweens 1 Enlighten Me (A Graphic Novel)

By Minh Lê, illus. by Chan Chau

A thoughtful, humorous, community-centered exploration of identity and Buddhism.

2 Fry Guys

By Eric Geron, illus. by Jannie Ho

Spud-tacular.

3 The Witch’s Wings and Other Terrifying Tales

By Tehlor Kay Mejia, illus. by Junyi Wu, Justin Hernandez, Alexis Hernandez & Kaylee Rowena

A quick, compelling, and creepy collection that’s sure to be a reader favorite.

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4 Timothy Dinoman and the Attack of the Dancing Machines

3

4

5

By Steve Thueson

A high-octane adventure fueled by humor, whimsy, and teamwork.

5 Curlfriends: New in Town

6

By Sharee Miller

A delightful coming-ofage story.

6 Stories of the Islands

For more middle-grade graphic novels, visit Kirkus online.

B y Clar Angkasa

A beautiful, powerful addition to the pantheon of feminist folktale reimaginings.

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Readers don’t have to believe in magic to enjoy what this tale has to offer.

GO TO WIZARD’S WHARF

The illustrations are lively, and the monsters aren’t too scary.

Let’s hear it for all the little guys: Who doesn’t dream about getting the upper hand once in a while? (Picture book. 4-7)

Kirkus Star

Bugs: A Skittery, Jittery History Forster, Miriam | Illus. by Gordy Wright Abrams (80 pp.) | $24.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 9781419761133

An information-packed survey of creepy-crawlies and how they came to flourish.

Almost every ecosystem on Earth needs bugs: for cleanup, for pollination, and as essential parts of the food chain. But what is a bug? And why are there so many (more than 10 quintillion) of them? This beautiful book delves into the classification of arthropods—which include insects, spiders, and scorpions—and travels far into prehistory to answer those questions and show how these creatures have evolved. “Toolbox” sidebars consider anatomy and behavior, including legs, eyes, wings, communication, and camouflage.

Full pages are devoted to examples of significant scientific orders, past and present, such as Palaeodictyoptera, an order that included winged insects that died out toward the end of the Permian period. Forster uses proper scientific nomenclature; explanations of exoskeletons, for instance, are clear 90 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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and complete. Exclamation marks are numerous but justified, given the inclusion of such fascinating details: Scorpions’ “exoskeletons glow under UV light!” “Dragonflies can…even do instinctive math!” A bug “Hall of Fame” recognizes extremes, such as the goliath spider, which weighs nearly a quarter-pound. The author acknowledges that scientists still don’t know everything about insects—research opportunities await burgeoning scientists. Final pages of text describe ways to catch, house, handle, and help bugs.

Gordy’s masterly gouache illustrations make every page—even those depicting the creepiest of creatures—a pleasure; his images and many timelines are both informative and gorgeous.

Aspiring entomologists, paleontologists, and artists won’t want to miss this one. (Nonfiction. 8-12)

Go to Wizard’s Wharf Frost, Maddie | Viking (96 pp.) | $12.99 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780593465424 Series: WOMBATS!

Two wombats realize that real friendship is more important than anything— even a can’t-miss theme park.

Albert owes Pickles a favor, which is the catalyst for the misadventure that follows.

Pickles wants to go to Wizard’s Wharf.

The magic-themed amusement park leaves Albert visibly unimpressed, while Pickles has a ball. The place is a money vacuum that Albert calls out for its fakery, but Pickles is convinced the

magic is all real. They run into their friend Platters the platypus, who shows off a secret attraction that isn’t open to the public yet. The pair become separated. Two Beings of Unexplained Magic—little, monsterlike creatures with wings—join Albert on his search for Pickles, though he refuses to believe they’re real. Relying on his ability to predict his pal’s movements, Albert works to track Pickles down. Layouts are clear, with three to five panels per page, while a multipage roller-coaster sequence is a little more twisty. Readers may find themselves split between giggling at Pickles’ antics and questioning what the adorably harebrained wombat brings to the friendship. Straitlaced Albert asks nothing from Pickles except to clean up after making a mess.

By the end, however, both wombats agree on the value of their friendship.

Readers don’t have to believe in magic to enjoy what this tale has to offer.

(Graphic fiction. 6-9)

The Liars Society Gerber, Alyson | Scholastic (304 pp.) $14.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781338859218

Through lying by omission, Weatherby earns a scholarship to an elite school, where she’s ready to use her position for the greater good.

The Boston School is proud of its sailing team. After Weatherby Walker wins a district regatta, beating Jack Hunt, who comes from one of the Boston School’s favored families, she’s offered a scholarship on the condition that she sail for the school.

The only problem is, Weatherby accidentally used illegal sails that offered her an advantage. She decides not to admit her mistake; she’s desperate to attend Boston, her late, estranged father’s alma mater—especially since someone recently anonymously mailed her father’s old school journal to her.

This is just the start of the mysteries and revelations to come, including KIRKUS REVIEWS

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ones that lay bare her family’s history and connections and deceptions by powerful people, all of which threaten ecological disaster. Everyone’s lying about something—and some of the lies are deadly. Last Heir, the Boston School’s elite secret society, seems designed to support corruption, indoctrinating generations of students and making them complicit. The chapters alternate between Weatherby’s and Jack’s perspectives; they’re both sympathetic characters from whom there’s much to learn about friendship and trust. This first entry in a new series sets up a solid premise, with white leads Weatherby and Jack and their somewhat racially diverse schoolmates confronting a powerful system. What happens next is left to be revealed in the sequel.

Absorbing intrigue with a cliffhanger ending. (Mystery. 9-13)

The Yellow Leaves Are Coming Gladstone, James | Illus. by François Thisdale | Red Deer Press (32 pp.) | $23.95 Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780889956834

An exploration of the changing seasons.

Unnamed characters, perhaps siblings, with brown skin and hair, observe their natural surroundings in the rain. Detailed, realistic portraits with blended colors show a gray-hued, autumnal neighborhood, while a striking single yellow leaf floats off a branch. “The yellow leaves are coming, though the last leaf just fell,” but the children “know the leaves will come again.” The rest of the narrative examines all the seasonal changes big and small that occur over the course of a year until the following fall, focusing on sights, sounds, and tactile feelings. “First there is the rain and the chill wind that blows…” The children observe “empty branches” from their patio. Next the siblings watch from their window as their neighborhood is blanketed with snow. They KIRKUS REVIEWS

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welcome spring as “old leaves float in curb rivers” and “colours begin their mixing.” They’re then seen enjoying scenic moments in summer until gray creeps once more into the corners of the scenery and “the chill wind returns in blasts and bursts,” leading to a scene of the two kids admiring a majestic tree laden with golden leaves once again. The illustrations perfectly match the muted tone of the poetic lines, bringing into focus the tactile experience of the natural world.

Gentle and quiet, a narrative that stimulates the senses. (Picture book. 5-8)

Kirkus Star

A Flicker of Hope: A Story of Migration Harmony, Cynthia | Illus. by Devon Holzwarth | Viking (32 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780593525760

Like the monarch butterfly, Lucía’s father migrates according to the seasons, retracing the steps of his ancestors.

Springtime means a journey north for Papá and for the monarch butterflies that flit around their garden in Michoacán, Mexico.

Soothing a tearful Lucía, Papá tells her he’ll return when the weather cools and their “winged ancestors” lead him home. This heartwarming story connects butterfly and human migration and shows how both are natural and part of deep-rooted life patterns. Monarch butterflies follow the same migratory route as previous generations; Lucía’s father, a migrant laborer, journeys north in search of work, following the harvests just as his ancestors did. Though Lucía stays behind, her life also follows the cycles of seasons. While her father is gone, she learns to weave ocoxal-leaf baskets from her mother and grandmother, using the same technique as previous generations. With autumn’s return comes Día de los Muertos, and Lucía

welcomes back her father, along with the monarchs. The prose is simple yet elegant; the love between Lucía and her father reverberates deeply through subtle echoes such as the detail of the ocoxal hat Papá wears in the fields.

The digitally finished watercolor, colored pencil, and crayon illustrations are richly textured and engrossing, with line- and brushstrokes enhancing the emotion. The characters have brown skin.

A beautiful story about cycles and traditions that shines a light on migration.

(Picture book. 4-8)

The World Is Ours To Cherish: A Letter to a Child Heglar, Mary Annaïse | Illus. by Vivian Mineker | Random House (40 pp.) | $18.99 $21.99 PLB | Feb. 27, 2024 | 9780593568019 9780593568026 PLB

A tale that imparts important messages about the beauty and magic of the world—and encourages readers to treasure it.

“There is magic all around you,” an unseen narrator notes. “You are part of this magic.” Directly addressing young readers, Heglar gently observes that so much of the world has changed for the worse, yet there’s still so much to cherish: fireflies, morning birds singing, a cool breeze on a hot day, trees that shield us from the wind.

Despite the drastic effects of climate change, Heglar makes it clear that as long as we have hope and continue to work together, we can change the world for the better. The text reads like a lovely, delicate poem threaded with urgency, compassion, honesty, and optimism. Heglar discusses the dangers of a changing world in ways that are appropriate and approachable for children but that never ignore the dire realities facing the planet. The themes of the magic of hope and beauty will tug at readers’ heartstrings. Those who feel moved should look to the author’s note, which briefly discusses climate change, and the appended First Steps DECEMBER 15, 2023 91

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for Changing the World, a list of five specific actions readers can take.

Mineker’s soft, inviting illustrations complement the text and depict people diverse in terms of age and skin tone.

An honest and hopeful call for climate caretaking. (Picture book. 4-6)

Friends Are Fun Henry, Steve | Holiday House (32 pp.) $14.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780823454785 Series: I Like To Read

Having good friends is always OK. Pete, a colorful parrot, lives alone on an island in the middle of the sea. Pete’s OK with this. A sign reading “Pete,” nailed to a palm tree, announces the parrot’s presence. One day, Turtle comes, asking to stay; Pete says OK, and the pair enjoy fishing together. Dog arrives next and wants to stay. Pete issues the usual response, though a trifle doubtfully, and the trio play companionably. Then Elephant comes. Pete agrees, looking even more skeptical—the little island is looking smaller by the minute—but all get along. What comes next? A storm. That’s not OK, but Elephant helps her friends, letting them nestle on her body when they’re blown off the island. The following morning, Elephant and Dog depart, and Pete invites them back anytime they want to return; Turtle remains with Pete on the island. Pete’s not alone anymore—which is very OK. A new sign—reading “and friend”—goes up under “Pete.” This cute, simple story will be great fun for children getting into the reading groove. Each page features just one, or occasionally For more by Steve Henry, visit Kirkus online.

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two, brief sentences with predictable patterns. Emergent readers will hone their skills on basic sight words and words that use long and short vowel sounds. The dynamic illustrations depict expressive, wide-eyed pals and help focus attention on the spirited action.

A more-than-just-OK tale for new readers who appreciate lively friendship stories. (Early reader. 4-7)

Kirkus Star

Elijah’s Easter Suit Jackson, Brentom | Illus. by Emmanuel Boateng | Doubleday (32 pp.) | $18.99 $21.99 PLB | Jan. 23, 2024 | 9780593649954 9780593649961 PLB

If you can’t find what you want, make it.

Elijah, a young Black child, attends Third Avenue Church, where the two rules of Easter are “show up” and “look good.” Last year, Mother Green’s “hat the size of Saturn” earned a shoutout from Reverend White; the year before, it was Deacon Brown’s head-to-toe red getup.

Hoping to be the first kid ever to earn the preacher’s Easter kudos, Elijah tries hard to find the right outfit. But nothing seems right. Mother Green and Deacon Brown tell Elijah that when laws prevented African Americans from shopping in stores, they repurposed family clothes to make new ones; knowing where “every stitch of cloth came from” made it special.

Deacon Brown reminds Elijah that Easter isn’t about competition but about honoring history. Elijah goes home and gathers fabrics that hold fond memories to create his Easter suit. Jackson’s culturally rich text, which rhymes at key moments, and Boateng’s vibrant images—particularly of the textured patterned of clothing— make for a delightful and entertaining read. From character names to illustrations depicting each person with

a unique physique and style, these creators’ attention to detail is notable.

The backmatter explores the role of slavery and the post–Civil War era to explain why Easter ensembles have historically been so important in the Black community.

A wonderful story of a tradition as unforgettable as the fabulous titular suit. (Picture book. 3-7)

Pedal, Balance, Steer: Annie Londonderry, the First Woman To Cycle Around the World Kirkfield, Vivian | Illus. by Alison Jay Calkins Creek/Astra Books for Young Readers (40 pp.) | $18.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 9781635926828

A cycling novice takes up an extraordinary challenge.

Two men offered $10,000 to the first woman to circumnavigate the globe by bike.

Annie Londonderry—full name Annie Cohen Kopchovsky Londonderry (1870-1947)—a 24-year-old Jewish homemaker, had never ridden a bike, but she needed that money. The deal had a few stipulations: She had to earn $5,000 while traveling and return in 15 months or less. As a child, Annie had faced challenges learning English as a recent Latvian immigrant. Now she mastered cycling—in two lessons. On June 25, 1894, Annie left Boston with only an extra pair of undergarments.

Roads were rough; she ate sparingly and occasionally slept on the ground.

Eventually, Annie doffed her skirts, instead opting for bloomers. She traded her bike for a lighter, faster, brakeless men’s racer, changed directions, and boarded a Europe-bound ship, where she gave paid lectures. She made her way through Asia, sailed the Pacific, and crossed the United States.

Journalists reported on the exploits of Annie, who continued earning money by lecturing. On September 12, 1895, she completed her journey, 14 days early. This fast-paced, well-written KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Any child who has displayed art and found it misunderstood will find a kindred soul in this story.

HOW DREADFUL!

tale tells the story of a remarkable, determined woman. The quirky, lively illustrations, rendered in oil paint with varnish, sometimes presented as vignettes, nicely capture period settings and details. The mantra “pedal, balance, steer” “careens” throughout the artwork, the words and letters playfully stretching out; quotes from Annie are interspersed throughout.

A fascinating, larger-than-life personality is deservedly brought to readers’ attention in this fine offering. (Informational picture book. 6-10)

Ride Beside Me Knisley, Lucy | Knopf (40 pp.) | $18.99 $21.99 PLB | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781984897190 9781984897206 PLB

A mother and child bike with a community of fellow riders.

As they set off for their morning ride, both are equipped with helmets and snacks, ready for an adventure through their town. Along the way, they meet up with neighbors and community members on different types of bicycles, from an extra-tall ride to a recumbent bike. The rhyming text is narrated by the child, who rides on a special seat on the front of Mom’s bike. The book’s title page includes a small flyer announcing “Group Ride, Saturday 9-5, up the hill and back down!” though the text doesn’t make explicit mention of this group ride. As the pair pedal through town, they join forces with a slowly building wave of riders who move together safely. The young narrator comments how fresh the air smells when the road is empty of cars, a KIRKUS REVIEWS

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nod to the positive environmental impact of biking. With their bright, flat colors, the charming illustrations depict riders of various ages, skin colors, and sizes, and the endpapers are packed with examples of bicycles and riders. The child and mother are light-skinned. Upbeat verse highlights the benefits and joys of biking, and though it’s clear that cycling is a more environmentally friendly transportation option compared with driving, the book never verges on didacticism.

As pleasant and breezy as a bike ride.

(Picture book. 3-5)

Seeds of Change Laden, Nina | Illus. by Sawyer Cloud Roaring Brook Press (40 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781250810076

A lyrical guide to community building through agriculture.

Succinct rhyming couplets tell the story of a Black child taking action in a village in Madagascar. The little one sows seeds that ultimately yield an inspirational garden and so much more. The unseen narrator notes that seeds of strength, compassion, gratitude, and hope are all crucial parts of caring for our community: “Sow seeds of strength, / ride out the storm. Sow seeds of compassion, / make hearts warm.” As the little one enlists the support of the other young children in the village, their shared determination and cooperation through even the stormiest weather are profoundly motivational

as the narrator suggests that readers “Rise above the gloom / and find the courage to bloom.” The concepts of gardening and seeds are undoubtedly accessible early metaphors, and the pairing of verse and art smartly turns growing food into lessons on equality, justice, and nonviolence. Digital illustrations feature rich earth tones and the lush coloring of diverse fruit and vegetables. In an author’s note, Laden discusses how her experiences gardening informed her narrative, while Cloud’s illustrator’s note explains how she took inspiration from time spent in Madagascar’s Ankarafantsika National Park.

Fruitful and nourishing in good measure. (Picture book. 3-6)

How Dreadful!

Lebourg, Claire | Trans. by Sophie Lewis Transit Children’s Editions (36 pp.) | $18.95 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781945492785

In this charming tale of perspective, a little moth loses faith in her own artistic skills.

On Monday, Paty the moth remembers that she has an art exhibition opening on Thursday and no art to display! In a panic, she calls up three of her friends—Isabelle the spider, Pierre the caterpillar, and Mona the shrimp—and asks them to pose for her. Unfortunately, each is incensed by the results. Poor Paty is chagrined, but before she can cancel the show, Thursday arrives, and a splendid gatefold in the book reveals an elegant gallery and creatures complimenting each of Paty’s subjects in turn. Though Isabelle, Pierre, and Mona were unable to see Paty’s brilliance, others can appreciate what they did not. At the end, young readers are encouraged to paint a portrait of their own; a blank canvas is provided, with images of insects taking selfies nearby. Ethereal brushstrokes and the lightest of tones and hues give this French import both allure and verve DECEMBER 15, 2023 93

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by turns. And while one might well wonder if a book about an art opening would be appealing to children, the need to have our creative endeavors not simply appreciated but recognized is universal.

Any child who has displayed art proudly and found it misunderstood will find a kindred soul in this utterly amiable story. (Picture book. 3-6)

Winston Chu vs. the Wingmeisters Lee, Stacey | Rick Riordan Presents/ Disney (368 pp.) | $17.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 9781368075398

Winston Chu finds himself entangled in the family dynamics of sorcerous magpies expelled from heaven in this duology closer.

After foiling the plans of Mr. Pang—a magpie in human form, who had an enchanted shop filled with oddities—Chinese American Winston, older sister Philippa, and best friends Mav, Bijal, and Cassa are on high alert. Mr. Pang warned them that Mr. Gu, his magpie brother who’s posing as an environmental lawyer, is the real enemy; his campaign to become mayor of San Francisco is just the beginning. After breaking the spells cast on them and discovering Mr. Gu’s lair on the Magic Isle, the group realizes his endgame: As part of his mayoral campaign, Mr. Gu placed booths offering free internet access throughout the city, turning users into Birdbrains.

The birds, who now possess human brains, make up his “unstoppable army.” Winston, Philippa, and their racially diverse friend group reluctantly team up with Mr. Pang to try to send Mr. Gu back to heaven. Readers need to be familiar with the events of Winston Chu vs. the Whimsies (2023) in order to follow the packed, quickpaced plot of this sequel. Mirroring the sudden twists, somewhat random 94 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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magic used, and solutions that seem to come out of the blue, the worldbuilding can feel a bit overwhelming and the storyline can be tricky to follow. As before, allusions to Chinese folklore are woven into the story.

At times chaotic but a magical romp nevertheless. (Fantasy. 8-12)

Today Is for You! Lloyd-Jones, Sally | Illus. by Kevin Waldron Candlewick (48 pp.) | $17.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 9781536225068

Calling all kids: Today is yours; make the most of it!

In this U.K. import with pages bursting with colors, groups of kids do all sorts of playful, active stuff—they occasionally rest, too—and cavort in indoor and outdoor settings. While that’s going on, empowering, exhilarating rhymes, set against colored backgrounds in a slew of multicolored, boldfaced sizes and fonts, exhort readers to grab TODAY by the horns and make it completely theirs.

There’s no time to waste. But then, who would want to? Readers are told there’s so much for kids to do today, and on every day, that they should seize every moment! It’s noteworthy that almost no adults are depicted in the bold, very dynamic mixed-media illustrations: This is strictly child territory. There’s a commendable, uplifting message for youngsters here: Do you, be you, and be proud of whoever you are. But while all this is inspiringly kid-centric, it all goes on a bit too long, and youngsters may run out of steam after a while, especially given that many points are repeated throughout: “Jump up and smile / And take a bow. / When is today? / Exactly now.” Characters throughout are diverse in terms of race and ability.

I Am Not the Easter Bunny!

McBeth, T.L. | Flamingo Books (40 pp.) $12.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780593528457

Despite clues to the contrary, this little white rabbit insists that he is not the Easter Bunny.

White fur and cottontail, cute bow tie and vest, and a basket of painted eggs: Must be the Easter Bunny! But this determined rabbit refuses to admit that he’s the famous holiday hopper. In a style reminiscent of Mo Willems’ Pigeon and Elephant & Piggie books, McBeth’s rabbit directly addresses an unseen narrator; the bunny’s dialogue is presented in speech bubbles.

When the narrator asks about the bow tie, the bunny explains that it “was a gift from my grandmother, thank you very much!” And when the narrator observes the rabbit “hopping! Just like the Easter Bunny!” the bunny responds, “Well, I don’t have a car! And my bus pass is in my other vest!” Kids follow along as the bunny gets dressed, goes to the store, and purchases eggs and sweets.

Little readers will enjoy being in on the joke (this is clearly the Easter Bunny) and the playful back and forth. The book lends itself well to a lap-sit read-aloud; adult readers will enjoy adopting different voices for the narrator and the bunny. The final reveal shows the bunny dragging an enormous “Happy Easter!” basket piled high with decorated eggs. The cartoonish illustrations and cheeky dialogue give this tale plenty of personality and zest.

A story starring a funny and argumentative bunny that makes for a read-aloud gigglefest. (Picture book. 3-6)

For more by T.L. McBeth, visit Kirkus online.

An enthusiastic reminder to rejoice in being yourself every single day.

(Picture book. 4-7)

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A fascinating history of the porcelain god and other sanitary (and unsanitary) practices.

A STI N KY H I STO RY O F TO I L ETS

Kirkus Star

Is This a House for Hermit Crab?

McDonald, Megan | Illus. by Katherine Tillotson | Neal Porter/Holiday House (40 pp.) | $18.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 9780823452194

After 30-plus years, McDonald’s acclaimed first title gets bright new illustrations in this reissue.

A hermit crab that’s outgrown his shell seeks a suitable replacement onshore—he needs to stay safe from porcupine fish. His investigations lead him from a too-heavy rock to a too-noisy tin can and on to driftwood (too dark), a plastic pail (too deep), and a burrow (too crowded). After rejecting a fishing net (“too many holes”), the hermit crab is swept out to sea, where a porcupine fish sets its sights on him. The crab races over to a sea snail, whose shell proves empty.

Hermit Crab climbs inside, and the porcupine fish swims off. McDonald’s tale sparkles as brightly as ever, with patterned repetition perfect for both group and one-to-one sharing.

A former children’s librarian, she helps young children identify with the tiny crab’s quest for safety and independence while tacitly acknowledging that they might know more about the inefficacy of the creature’s test homes. (Driftwood isn’t just dark inside; it floats. And a net’s more hole than not.) Tillotson’s vibrant mixed-media illustrations ramp up the drama early, with the porcupine fish looming offshore as Hermit Crab KIRKUS REVIEWS

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begins his search. The quest unfolds through double-page spreads, and it all comes to a satisfying resolution, with Hermit Crab in a new home that fits “just right.” Up-to-date facts on hermit crabs and resources are appended.

A fresh, welcome return for a timetested tale. (Picture book. 4-8)

Jimmy’s Rhythm & Blues: The Extraordinary Life of James Baldwin

States, but he remained connected to the struggle for rights in his home country, using his unique talent to write and speak about the Black experience. Writing in verse, Meadows employs vivid imagery to convey Baldwin’s passion for writing, his desire for freedom, and his love for friends and family. The stories she chooses to highlight provide a full picture of the iconic writer and demonstrate his importance in African American literary history. Digital illustrations complement the text with a rich, warm palette.

A high-quality introduction to an important figure in American literature.

(Picture-book biography. 4-8)

A Stinky History of Toilets: Flush With Fun Facts and Disgusting Discoveries

Meadows, Michelle | Illus. by Jamiel Law Harper/HarperCollins (48 pp.) | $19.99 Jan. 30, 2024 | 9780063273474

Meikle, Olivia & Katie Nelson | Illus.

by Ella Kasperowicz | Neon Squid/ Macmillan (48 pp.) | $17.99 | March 5, 2024 9781684493739

Early life experiences and talent set James Baldwin on the path to greatness.

James Baldwin, called “Jimmy” by family and friends, grew up in Harlem during the Great Depression. He loved reading and found a way to express himself through writing, which became an important part of who he was. One of his teachers, Orilla Winfield, nurtured his interest in the arts, taking him to plays and museums, and when he was in junior high, he was mentored by poet Countee Cullen. Jimmy initially followed in his father’s footsteps by becoming a preacher, until he realized writing could mean so much more. He sought out other creatives and eventually moved to Europe. In Switzerland he fell in love with painter Lucien Happersberger and completed Go Tell It on the Mountain (1953), his first published novel. In Europe, he felt free from the discrimination of life in the United

Coverage of an essential hygienic appliance and what preceded it.

Starting with numbers (How much poop do humans produce?) and basic biological facts (What is poop, anyway?), the authors move briskly through highlights of the cultural and scientific story of our dealings with our excreta, from the Stone Age to the present, around the world. Unavoidably, there are gross moments, such as the Vikings’ very nasty parasites, and shocking ones, including the Mongols’ plague-spreading germ warfare, but these bits add to the thrill inherent in this material. Happily, the British Jamaican nurse Mary Seacole gets a small tribute for her work treating cholera; both she and John Snow, the first public-health detective, deserve to be better known, as does the Elizabethan inventor of the flush toilet.

And the Chinese get credit for inventing both toilet paper and sewer pipes.

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We learn about the positive side of poop, which has uses in agriculture and as fuel. Modern sanitation methods are also described, and though future developments elude prediction, ingenious solutions for astronauts and Antarctic scientists might hold hints. Flat-color art with varied compositions is clear, instructive, amusing, and simplified but roughly accurate in depicting clothing and period settings. People throughout are racially diverse.

A fascinating history of the porcelain god and other sanitary (and unsanitary) practices. (Nonfiction. 6-10)

My Mother’s Tongues: A Weaving of Languages Menon, Uma | Illus. by Rahele Jomepour Bell | Candlewick (32 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781536222517

Musings on multilingualism.

Sumi’s mother speaks two languages: Malayalam and English. She speaks Malayalam because she grew up in the Indian state of Kerala, where Malayalam is the local language. She speaks English because she learned it in school in India; years later, she would immigrate to America. Similarly, Sumi learned Malayalam—“my first tongue”—from using it with family at home in America. Sumi learned English by listening to other people at school and in the neighborhood; mother and child are now comfortable in both tongues.

Sumi explains that learning a new language can be difficult—Sumi’s mother struggled with American English when she arrived in the U.S., while Sumi needs help speaking Malayalam when visiting relatives in India. While learning a language might be challenging, it also opens so many doors, which is why Sumi considers multilingualism to be the ultimate superpower. The illustrations, which mimic tapestries, are a 96 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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clever companion to the text, which often invokes a weaving metaphor to explain the feeling of bi- and multilingualism. At times the book feels more like a lecture than a story. Still, it conveys an essential message about the power of language, and the lyrical narratorial voice beautifully balances curiosity and playfulness.

A charming ode to the joy of learning new languages. (Picture book. 3-8)

Kirkus Star

Little Sisters Miura, Tomo | Trans. by Nanette McGuinness | Arctis Books (40 pp.) | $18.00 Feb. 27, 2024 | 9781646900398

What would life be like with a younger sibling?

A young girl imagines life with a little sister, who “would be just like me, only smaller.” As the girl’s imagination grows, a little sister appears, and the two build towers, play hide-and-seek, jump on the sofa, and share a sweet treat. Magically, more little sisters appear, like the brooms in “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” until a multitude of them are snuggling together and a whole line of little sisters are wiggling away.

But then they all disappear, and the child is alone. Nevertheless, she finds happiness in her family just the way it is. Translated from French, Miura’s delightful prose is simple yet earnest, leaving ample space for well-crafted, spare illustrations. Miura wields white space to give the girl room for her imagination to expand. Little by little, the sisters conquer that space until they fill the page—literally and metaphorically—as they wildly splash paint all over a blank canvas. The perspective stays distant until Miura zooms in on the protagonist’s joyful expression as she dreams of having droves of playmates. Young readers anticipating, even hoping for, siblings will delight in all the ways these sisters play with and enjoy each other.

All the siblings have skin the white of the page, pink cheeks, and short dark hair.

Start with imagination, add a sprinkle of mischief, and stir for pure joy!

(Picture book. 2-5)

Sydney’s Big Speech Newsome, Malcolm | Illus. by Jade Orlando Harper/HarperCollins (32 pp.) | $19.99 Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780063141414

A young girl finds her voice.

When Mr. Simmons asks the class to stand and introduce themselves on the first day of school, Sydney, a Black girl, decides to go last. As every worst-case scenario floods her mind, she opts out of introducing herself altogether.

Later, Mr. Simmons asks the students to prepare speeches about what they want to be when they grow up.

Sydney frets, but her father inspires his apprehensive scholar by sharing examples of outstanding Black women political leaders such as Kamala Harris, Condoleezza Rice, Carol Moseley Braun, and Shirley Chisholm. Sydney reveals that she would like to be a great leader someday and agrees that she’ll have to make speeches. Sydney’s father confides that he, too, is shy and has had to practice the art of public speaking. Sydney practices, but she still feels nervous the night before her big speech. With a little extra love from her dad—and a viewing of President Barack Obama’s “Yes We Can” speech—Sydney gets the extra push she needs to assert herself.

Newsome tells a sweetly empowering story, while Orlando’s illustrations, a combination of watercolor and digital media, are whimsical, charming, and inviting; the crayon images of her heroes that Sydney tapes to her wall are an especially nice touch. Mr. Simmons is Black; the class is diverse.

Wonderful inspiration for young introverts. (Picture book. 4-8)

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A marvelous manifesto reminding all of us to look within to find what ignites our spark.

T H E S PA R K I N YO U

Habitats: A Journey in Nature Pang, Hannah | Illus. by Isobel Lundie 360 Degrees (40 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781944530419

Split-page illustrations offer views of flora and fauna in six habitats

worldwide.

Taking the same layered approach as Pang’s Seasons (2021), illustrated by Clover Robin, this outing transports young wildlife lovers from the Namib Desert to deep waters off the Australian coast and points between. The journey begins in the Borneo rain forest with quick descriptive lines and spot images of four or five animals and plants that reside at each level from canopy to ground, opposite four successively wider outdoor settings in which the animals pose. A look at the ocean takes readers from the area just above the water to the sunlit zone to the twilight zone and, finally, to the deep sea. The author neglects to identify many of the animals on display in the art as she goes, and her claim that a slipper flower native to the Andes was “discovered” by Charles Darwin could have been better phrased. Still, if some of Lundie’s flora and fauna seem to float over the backgrounds, everything is easily recognizable, and if her visual transitions between the layered

For more by Hannah Pang, visit Kirkus online.

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partial pages aren’t consistently smooth, at least she tries to keep the format from being just a perfunctory gimmick. Armchair travelers will enjoy each luxuriantly detailed stop and will agree with the author that they all “connect together into one amazing home.”

Engaging content and format, despite a few rough edges. (Informational picture book. 6-8)

The Spark in You Pippins, Andrea | Random House Studio (40 pp.) | $18.99 | $21.99 PLB | Jan. 9, 2024 9780593380093 | 9780593380109 PLB

An imaginative youngster attends a festival.

If anything could inspire a spark, it’s undoubtedly a Brazilian Carnival. Dedicated “to the artists and makers who use their creativity, ingenuity, and wild imaginations to conjure up the magical delight of Brazilian Carnival every year,” this is a vibrant, visually stimulating picture book about a Black-presenting youngster who attends the festival.

The book opens with the child making a mask, then setting off with a loving parent. Told in the second person, the text is simple yet powerful; readers are told that “There’s a spark in you” and that “whenever you have an idea,” it “dances in your smile.” It accompanies you wherever you go, “shimmering when you discover something new.” Though at one point, the little one feels overwhelmed by the noise and crowds, the spark is always there, “glowing as

quiet comfort in your heart.” Each page is an exuberant, rousing display of color, showcasing the loud, festive annual celebration. Bright, flat colors portray people dancing, playing instruments, selling coco verde and other foods, and buying beads. The illustrations are inclusive, depicting bodies of various sizes, shapes, complexions, and abilities. Backmatter includes instructions for creating a mask.

A marvelous manifesto reminding all of us to look within to find what ignites our spark. (Picture book. 4-8)

The Only Way To Make Bread Quintero, Cristina | Illus. by Sarah Gonzales Tundra Books (40 pp.) | $18.99 Oct. 3, 2023 | 9780735271760

Families make different kinds of bread that share a common ingredient: love.

In a bustling apartment building, various families of diverse races and ethnicities are making bread. Told in a voice that evokes the absolutist tone of a child, the story opens with the pronouncement, “The only way to make bread is like this.”

What follows, however, is not a single recipe to follow but an exploration of what all bread has in common and what makes each kind of bread unique. For instance, you might use flour that’s “soft and white as fresh snow” or “pale yellow and powdery fine” or “coarse and heavy like a pile of teeny tiny rocks.” Different ingredients—“a handful of this,” “a dash of that”—and cooking techniques involving ovens, frying pans, and fires finish the job. In the end, the important thing is to find someone to share it with, “because bread must always be broken together.” It may look and taste different, but “all bread is delicious.” The warm tones and textures of Gonzales’ colored pencil illustrations evoke the feeling of being in a kitchen baking bread with >>> DECEMBER 15, 2023 97

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loved ones. The backmatter includes descriptions of the 11 breads featured in the story and recipes for Colombian arepas and Filipino pandesal.

A celebration of differences and the commonalities that unite us. (Picture book. 3-7)

Kadooboo!: A Silly South Indian Folktale Rao, Shruthi | Illus. by Darshika Varma Page Street (32 pp.) | $18.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 9781645677895

A retelling of a South Indian folktale about a delicious sweet with a unique name.

While playing at his friend Anya’s house, Kabir smells something scrumptious. It turns out that Anya’s father is frying up coconut-filled dumplings called kadooboo. Anya’s father sends Kabir home with some warm kadooboo, but Kabir must run back to his house before it begins to rain. On his way, he repeats the word kadooboo to himself so that he’ll know what to tell his mother. While he’s trying to remember the three-syllable word, he runs into several friends, who end up joining him: Josh, who invites Kabir to read comic books with him; Ganesh, who tells Kabir to enjoy some of the coconuts his father is harvesting; and Zara, who’s playing cricket and calls out to Kabir to duck to avoid a stray ball. As he speaks to each of them, the name of the treat gets mixed up in his head. Is it called a book-oodoo? A duck-oo-boo? Or something else entirely? It’s not until he arrives home and the sounds of the rising storm boom outside the house that he remembers the word kadooboo—just in time to share the sumptuous food with his friends. The characters’ varying skin tones, hair textures, and names truly represent India’s diversity. The illustrations’ vibrant neon palette wonderfully complements the fanciful text, which makes generous use of onomatopoeia.

Bouncy, joyful, and delectable. (Picture book. 3-8)

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A delectable celebration of a bicultural identity.

SEOUL FOOD

I Am Osage: How Clarence Tinker Became the First Native American Major General Rogers, Kim | Illus. by Bobby Von Martin Heartdrum (40 pp.) | $19.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 9780063081161

A nation honors an extraordinary warrior who never forgot his identity.

Every year since 1942, the Osage people have sung their ceremonial drum song to remember the first Native American general, Clarence Tinker, who was killed during the Battle of Midway in World War II. Rogers (Wichita) shares Major General Clarence Tinker’s heartaches and successes and honors his legacy of service. She explains how, years before he was born, the Osage were removed from their land by European settlers. As a child, Tinker was sent to boarding school and made to give up his Indigenous customs. He refused to forget them, however, and constantly reminded himself that he was Osage.

He joined the Army Air Corps and longed to serve in World War I, but his commanding officer wouldn’t allow it. (“Is it because I am Osage?” he wondered.) He eventually realized his dream of becoming a pilot, and in 1942, he became the highest-ranking Indigenous American in history.

The repeated phrase “I am Osage” establishes a rhythm throughout the story, like a drum beat, and appears at pivotal points in Tinker’s life. Von Martin’s bold, photorealistic images complement the text; lighter, superimposed images of his ancestors make it clear that Tinker’s Osage identity

was a constant source of strength.

Rogers’ storytelling brings to life a kindhearted, resilient historical figure who was devoted to his community.

Spotlights a commendable role model and his rich heritage. (Picture-book biography. 6-10)

Just Try It! Rosenthal, Phil & Lily Rosenthal | Illus. by Luke Flowers | Simon & Schuster (40 pp.) $18.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781665942638 Series: A Phil & Lil Book

With one taste of despised mustard, a child pivots from rejecting new foods to seeking them.

Dad takes Lil to a food truck festival. Lil, who narrates the story, is nervous; this child’s list of acceptable foods is short (pizza, rice, grilled cheese, french fries, and vanilla ice cream). Dad loves varied tastes and repeatedly reminds Lil of his rule: “Just try it!” With a “YECCCH!” or an “EWWWWWW!” Lil refuses a bagel loaded with toppings, linguini with clams, Peking duck, pizza with spinach and garlic, and a pretzel covered with Lil’s most hated of foods: mustard.

Frustrated, Lil accidentally knocks the pretzel onto Dad’s shirt. Lil apologizes, takes a lick of mustard…and instantly learns to appreciate every rejected offering. Lil then uses the title mantra to pressure Dad onto a nausea-inducing roller-coaster ride. Bright, cartoon-style illustrations emphasize the pair’s upbeat mood. Food neophobia, or an aversion to eating anything novel, has complex psychosocial roots. But in this blithe little fable, the child’s resistance is completely overcome with a single accidental exposure, and the formerly KIRKUS REVIEWS

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picky eater immediately becomes a novelty seeker. The turnaround here is implausible; if this book creates any expectations of a sudden dramatic change in a child’s behavior, that would be a disservice. Both Dad and Lil are light-skinned.

Amusing but misleading on the nutritional and behavioral fronts. (Picture book. 4-8)

Seoul Food Russell, Erin Danielle | Illus. by Tamisha Anthony | Viking (40 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780593464380

When extended family gathers, a biracial child must figure out a menu that will satisfy everyone’s taste buds.

Hana is excited to learn that Grandpa and Grandma Williams, who are Black and live in South Carolina, and Harabeoji and Halmoni, who are from South Korea, will soon visit. Hana, who’s always wished both sets of grandparents could be closer, wants to plan a special dinner. What should they serve? Daddy suggests pizza or tacos.

Mommy proposes something French.

Each possibility is dismissed by Hana as “not special enough” or “too hard.”

After Daddy encourages Hana not to give up, the child ponders. Hana remembers making a yummy pot of gumbo with Grandpa and Grandma Williams and cooking “sweet, sour, and spicy” kimchi-jigae with Harabeoji and Halmoni. Inspired, Hana starts cooking and even begins to dance as the pot bubbles and simmers with the various flavors mixing. All the grandparents arrive to a table set with condiments from both cuisines. Is it Korean food? Is it soul food? Hana proclaims, “It’s Seoul food!” As everyone raves about the kimchi gumbo and the grandparents make plans to visit one another, Hana reveals that love is the “ingredient that brings us all together.” Charming cartoon illustrations are layered with a warm KIRKUS REVIEWS

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palette and textured lines, while the delightfully child-centered story is sure to resonate with young readers.

A delectable celebration of a bicultural identity. (Picture book. 5-8)

Motion Schaefer, Lola M. | Illus. by Druscilla Santiago | Charlesbridge (40 pp.) | $16.99 Feb. 27, 2024 | 9781623542450 Series: Hands-On Science

A primer on pushes and pulls.

As they did in Matter (2023), Schaefer and Santiago continue to explore basic scientific concepts. Their latest is an interactive introduction to force, “a push or pull that can change the motion or shape of an object.” The author explores gravity (simplistically defined as “a force that pulls objects toward Earth”), friction, inertia, and acceleration. But first, she invites readers into the physics lab, where sharp eyes will find the supplies they’ll use in their investigations: whipped cream, sandpaper, a track and marbles, beanbags, a jar of dirt, and even a notebook (a nice touch). As in previous series titles, readers are asked to physically engage with the book.

Kids are told to blow on an image of sand, then to touch a button on a lab-vac to clean it up, which leads to an explanation of how a vacuum works. Outside the lab, on a playground, a diverse group of children and adults demonstrate forces at work.

(In an online guide for the series, the publisher builds on this idea with a playground-based lesson.) A final, sure-to-please activity asks children to construct a teeter-totter out of a Popsicle stick and a drinking straw, which

For more by Lola M. Schaefer, visit Kirkus online.

provides another example of pulls and pushes and gives readers the opportunity to propel a small object into the air. (Be prepared for enthusiastic demonstrations.) The combination of clear, concrete examples, reader interaction, and humor works well.

A child-friendly introduction to a scientific concept. (Informational picture book. 5-9)

Lola and the Troll Schultz, Connie | Illus. by Sandy Rodriguez Razorbill/Penguin (40 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780593527634

A group of kids take a troll to task.

A troll named Tom lives in Lola’s neighborhood. In Rodriguez’s delicate artwork, he’s tall and bizarre looking, with party hats for ears and oven mitts over his hands, and as kids walk past, he holds up signs plastered with insulting messages tailored to what he sees. No one likes the troll, but his comments cut. Most try to avoid Tom, but a light-skinned girl named Lola takes the messages to heart and slowly changes herself in an attempt to avoid criticism. After Lola has a heartfelt conversation with a bookstore owner about how bullies are the ones who are really afraid, she and the other kids stand up to the troll, revealed to be a short, light-skinned boy who’s “new to this neighborhood” and “just wanted… attention.” Many pages are crammed full of text, and one central metaphor feels overexplained as Lola describes herself as “tall on the inside,” which is apparently “what counts.” This story attempts to deliver an old-fashioned message about bullying through the modern concept of an internet troll, but neither element works especially well in this earnest text that naïvely imagines that all conflicts can be resolved through conversation and that trolls can be scared away through honesty and confidence.

Too idealistic by half. (Picture book.

5-8)

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A girl forms a friendship with an Icelandic natural wonder.

AN G E L A’ S G L AC I E R

Angela’s Glacier Scott, Jordan | Illus. by Diana Sudyka Neal Porter/Holiday House (32 pp.) | $18.99 Jan. 2, 2024 | 9780823450824

A girl forms an intimate friendship with an Icelandic natural wonder.

On the day she’s born, Angela’s father introduces her to Snæfellsjökull, an enormous glacier visible from Reykjavik. Before Angela can walk, they hike there, daughter atop Dad’s back. Her father teaches her to say the glacier’s name using the rhythm that their footfalls tap out: “SNÆ (left foot) FELLS (right foot) JÖ (left foot) KULL (right foot).”

(The title page offers pronunciation guidance.) As Angela grows, she makes solo treks and listens, with her whole body, to the glacier’s colors, sounds, and temperature. Angela also lets the glacier listen to her as she confides secrets. But eventually life intrudes, and she spends less time hiking. Her heart feels different; her father guesses she’s stayed away too long. Angela returns and reacquaints herself with her friend. She knows she can’t halt the passage of time—indeed, an afterward notes that because of climate change, the glacier will be gone within 20 years—but promises she’ll always visit and listen. That night, her heart beats the rhythm of her beloved friend’s name. This is a gentle story about how a bond with nature can transform one’s life; it may inspire readers to engage with their own surroundings. The lovely illustrations, created with gouache watercolors enhanced digitally and dominated by blues, capture the glacier’s magnificence and Angela’s fierce love. She and 102 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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her dad are light-skinned.

A reminder not only of nature’s delicate beauty, but also of its fragility. (Picture book. 6-9)

Ten Little Rabbits Sendak, Maurice | Harper/HarperCollins (32 pp.) | $19.95 | Feb. 6, 2024 9780062644671

A posthumously published tale of overly prolific bunnies from a master of the picture-book form.

A young magician bows before readers and releases a rabbit from his hat. More and more rabbits appear.

As the book counts from one rabbit to 10, the boy becomes increasingly frustrated with the sheer number of bunnies appearing from his headwear. His irritation is alleviated only when the narrator declares, “So then— he made them vanish again!” Now the numbers count down, and with every rabbit gone the child grows distinctly happier and more lighthearted. Originally created in 1970 as a pamphlet for a fundraiser for Philadelphia’s Rosenbach Museum, this book is visually similar to such Sendak crowd-pleasers as the Nutshell Library titles, particularly One Was Johnny (1962). Adult fans seeking the darker and weightier subject matter associated with the author’s later works would do best to look elsewhere. Children, however, will be drawn to the escalating tide of fuzzy bunnies and will share the protagonist’s sense of satisfaction at watching them go. The artwork is filled with simple charm, and the counting

element proves to be a nice plus as well. The protagonist has skin the white of the page.

As a counting book, fun. As a new Sendak book, by its mere existence, notable. (Picture book. 2-4)

Mighty Scared: The Amazing Ways Animals Defend Themselves Silver, Erin | Illus. by Hayden Maynard Orca (32 pp.) | $21.95 | Feb. 13, 2024 9781459836068

Glimpses of some of the grosser ways wild animals respond to stress or attacks.

Obvious defensive behaviors like hiding and flying away get nods, but mostly Silver goes for the gusto with introductions to projectile-vomiting fulmar birds, blood-squirting horned lizards, spitting camels, and other creatures with similarly repulsive strategies. In a questionable decision, the author gives the inherently crowd-pleasing premise a jokey bent by having each animal speak informally for itself: “I also fry all my food. What? An electric eel’s gotta eat too. You use a microwave, don’t you?” “They call me Assassin.

Assassin Bug…I’ve been trained to go on the attack when I’m scared. Take a look at my dead-bug backpack.”

The afterword, in which she points out to young readers how their own instinctive reactions mimic (some of!) the ones she describes, seems likewise strained. In the illustrations, a drab palette and static compositions leach most of the drama from Maynard’s stodgy predator/prey encounters, but he does at least depict the wild cast with reasonable fidelity. The book opens and closes with racially diverse sets of human figures in outdoor settings.

A juicy topic, but the author tries too hard and the illustrator not hard enough. (Informational picture book. 7-9)

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No Filter Skovron, Kelley | Scholastic (272 pp.) | $7.99 paper | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781338893168

Amateur photographer Janessa “Jinx” McCormick makes an eerie discovery through her camera lens.

It’s summer in Greenbelt, Maryland, located just outside Washington, D.C., and 12-year-old Jinx is busy taking photographs for local businesses, various cosplayers, and a friend who wants to break into acting. What starts off as an inexplicable smudge on all the photos she’s taken eventually turns into something much more sinister.

Along with the light horror elements, a parallel thread explores Jinx’s mental health while she struggles with OCD in the wake of her father’s death. This struggle is the most powerful part of the novel, more suspenseful and compelling than the spooky elements.

Readers will be more curious about what happened to both Jinx’s father and mother and what she’s keeping bottled up in therapy than what’s causing the smudges on her photographs.

Jinx is a richly drawn, well-imagined character, mature in many ways and yet somehow still very young. The racially diverse supporting characters who surround Jinx, who reads white, are also well developed; each forms an important piece of the storyline.

Though the two plotlines seem to be more parallel than braided together, the insights the book offers into Jinx’s inner thoughts and feelings make this a valuable, interesting read.

An absorbing, well-characterized story for readers seeking something mildly scary. (Horror. 9-12)

For more by Kelley Skovron, visit Kirkus online.

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Will entice sports fans and nonathletes alike.

THE LONGEST SHOT

The Longest Shot: How Larry Kwong Changed the Face of Hockey Soon, Chad & George Chiang | Illus. by Amy Qi | Orca (104 pp.) | $24.95 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781459835030

A long-overdue spotlight is shone on Larry Kwong, who in 1948 became the first Chinese Canadian to play in the NHL. Born in 1923 to immigrant parents and raised in Vernon, British Columbia, Larry excelled at hockey early on. Though times were tough during the Great Depression, he and his siblings were resourceful; they played on frozen ponds and used old boots for goal posts and frozen horse manure for pucks. Bold, detailed illustrations bring to life major moments in Larry’s life. At 18, he began playing for the Trail (British Columbia) Smoke Eaters, but WWII brought everything to a standstill. He sought out opportunities to play even when he was drafted, but despite his great talent and popularity, the NHL still overlooked him. After he was finally chosen to join the New York Rovers—a minor-league team—he was eventually given the chance to play in an NHL game with the New York Rangers…but only for the last minute of the game. Disappointed, he turned to opportunities abroad. Despite the oppression he confronted, his revolutionary role and innovations on ice were recognized later in his life.

This concise, absorbing narrative will entice sports fans and nonathletes alike. Footnotes and captions provide context to the discrimination Larry

faced, from the laws that made immigrating to Canada difficult to the racist attitudes of the overwhelmingly white NHL.

An informative and engaging biography that pays tribute to an extraordinary life. (Biography. 8-12)

Waci! Dance!

Speidel, Sage | Illus. by Leah Dorion Red Deer Press (24 pp.) | $23.95 Feb. 10, 2024 | 9780889957275

A Native mother and child experience the thrill of a powwow.

“On the morning of a hot summer day, / you heard the powwow drums over the hill.” The parent and child journey until they reach the site of the powwow. The mother unwraps the child from a cradle board, and the two participate in the sacred community ceremony.

Infused with Indigenous joy, the narrative combines stylized text told from the perspective of the mother addressing her child, Lakota words, and vivid images. Cultural touchstones, including ribbon skirts and beaded hapans (moccasins), are lovingly depicted in Dorion’s swirling, boldly colored art. When the child dons powwow regalia, the mother exclaims, “Lila wašté!” (Lakota for “very good/very proud,” according to a helpful glossary). Relatively spare narration allows young readers to follow the fanciful images and repeating onomatopoeia as this Native family begins to waci—dancing and celebrating life “for our loved ones and relatives.” Though this emotive DECEMBER 15, 2023 103

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tale will resonate most with children familiar with the atmosphere of a powwow, young people of all backgrounds will appreciate it. In an author’s note, Speidel (Lakota/ Cree) calls the story “a celebration of my Lakota culture,” while in an illustrator’s note, Dorion says that she “combined Lakota patterns…with design elements from my own Métis culture.”

An exuberantly illustrated tribute to the powwow tradition of waci. (Picture book. 3-6)

Treehouse Town Sterer, Gideon | Illus. by Charlie Mylie Little, Brown (40 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780316592628

A cast of kids guide readers through an imaginary magical world.

Created and run by children, Treehouse Town is an idyllic community located in the canopy of a forest. Whether you prefer swinging from vines or curling up with a good book in a squirrel nook, Treehouse Town has something for everyone.

Free from hierarchy, it’s mostly a harmonious place where everyone works together to take care of each other.

Still, the narrator admits that sometimes conflicts arise. Luckily, thanks to the residents’ mutual love, trust, and respect, these problems pass quickly.

It’s clear that this imaginary utopia is the perfect place to stay and play…or to snuggle up for a rest—good dreams guaranteed! The book’s greatest strength is its vibrant, detailed illustrations that feature racially diverse children alongside a host of woodland creatures. The imaginative contraptions the children use, from trapdoors to telescopes, are particularly impressive; making use of marvelous use of color and light, Mylie has created a stunningly specific world. Though the kids get up to plenty of wild adventures—a child balances on a rhino’s 104 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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head on one spread; on another, youngsters play “birdball” while suspended aloft by avian pals—the gracefully composed illustrations have a cozy charm. Unfortunately, the text teems with clunky couplets that feel clumsily out of step. Still, those who can look past the verse to the sumptuous images will find an entertaining, immersive read.

Still, the animals in the digitally created yet painterly illustrations are all cute, truth be told, and many little listeners will identify with Little Bunny’s frustration.

Underwhelming text buoyed by soaring visuals. (Picture book. 4-8)

Letters to My Darling Daughter: Dear Daughter, This Is My Love Letter to You...

The Cutest Brave Little Bunny

Sugar Snap Studio | Walter Foster Jr. (32 pp.) | $18.99 | March 5, 2024 9780760385210

Steuerwald, Joy | Nancy Paulsen Books (32 pp.) | $18.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 9780593462706

Even the cutest bunny contains multitudes.

“One lovely spring day, a fluffle of bunnies was born.” All the farmyard inhabitants go to see them, and each marvels at how cute the seven baby bunnies are. The smallest of the bunny siblings disagrees. “I’m not cute,” she insists.

After the babies grow a bit, the littlest wants a better view of the barnyard, so she decides to climb a sheep. “Be careful, little cutie,” says the sheep. “You will fall!” “I’m NOT cute!” replies Little Bunny. “I’m BRAVE!” Little Bunny falls several times but eventually makes it to the top. When a goat calls her cute for pushing a bucket of greens, she again denies it: “I’m NOT cute! I’m HELPFUL!” When she meets a small yellow chick, she preemptively shouts out that she isn’t cute. Little Chick schools Little Bunny on accepting compliments and knowing one’s strengths. Though the idea that we are more than our appearances is an important one, it’s slightly undercut when Little Chick encourages Little Bunny to be less “mean” when asking the other animals to acknowledge her other strengths. And it’s only Little Bunny who’s told she needs to make a change; the other barnyard residents never realize the error of their ways.

A fine, fresh farmyard fable. (Picture book. 2-6)

Lovingly empowering girls to be the best they can be.

This sweet gift book contains a series of thoughtful letters from a caring parent to a daughter. Younger girls will appreciate the book’s positive messages, which can be shared and reinforced at bedtime, while older daughters can tuck this book into their suitcases and appreciate the words of wisdom and support as they move out into the world. Each spread contains a letter that affirms how special the daughter is and shares a life lesson, such as “be yourself,” “be kind,” “love your body,” “go easy on yourself,” and “cherish the moments of pure joy.” The last page depicts a lined sheet of paper for parents to add a personalized lesson for their own daughter. Digitally created artwork generally features simple backgrounds that allow the more vibrantly illustrated children and letters to stand out. The visuals depict girls and families of diverse ethnicities, as well as a child using a wheelchair, swimming, spending time with friends, speaking up for something that matters, and working to help the natural world.

One spread features a brown-skinned female-presenting astronaut who travels to different places but always carries her daughter in her heart.

Gentle advice for darling daughters everywhere. (Picture book. 4-7)

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Tender guidance for young Christian readers.

A CUP OF LOVE

Wolves in Helicopters Tagholm, Sarah | Illus. by Paddy Donnelly Andersen Press USA (32 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9798765625316

A tiny bunny conquers her fears.

Hop awakens “trembling and cold” after a nightmare in which she was chased by wolves. Though Hop’s mother soothes her and offers coping suggestions each time (“Next time you have the bad dream,” Mommy tells her, “burrow deeper under the ground into another dream”), the wolves still haunt her, and her fears grow as her slumber is disturbed by first 100, then 1,000, 100,000, and even 1,000,000 of those furry beasts. In desperation she recalls her mother’s reminder that she controls her own dreams and need not fear those imaginary wolves—even if they are flying in helicopters or overwhelming her in great numbers.

Turnabout is fair play, especially in dreams, and Hop finally overcomes her trepidation. The use of purples, blues, and yellows in the illustrations adds to the feeling of anxiety and tension as the colors swirl in almost psychedelic fashion across the pages.

The wolves are frighteningly fierce and threatening until they’re put in their places by Hop, whose decision to stand her ground is captured through

For more by Sarah Tagholm, visit Kirkus online.

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an intense close-up of her eye. The coziness of Hop’s comfortable burrow contrasts vividly with the intimidation of the wolves’ woods. Repetitive phrases trace Hop’s evolution from timid to self-assured.

Encouragement for youngsters facing similar anxieties. (Picture book. 5-7)

A Happy Place Teckentrup, Britta | Tiger Tales (32 pp.) $18.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781664300392

A youngster follows a star on an illuminated nighttime journey.

Restless, a teddy bear cast aside, a brownskinned child reaches out to a bright star shining through a die-cut bedroom window. “Follow me, whispers the star, / and I will help you find a happy place.” With the star firmly in hand, the young tot leaves home and walks past the river, over the hills, and into the enchanted woods.

A dusky haze of pinks and blues surrounds a (mostly) circular cutout of the moon, encouraging everyone to dance by its light. Animal inhabitants, found in peek-through die-cut snippets (“a tippy-toed squirrel,” “a long-eared hare,” “and a pair of starry-eyed stoats”), all sing and dance together until they get sleepy. The star then whispers that it’s time to go home. But has the youngster really ever left the safety of the snuggled-up covers? Only the star knows for sure.

Deep, shadowy hues, highlighted by pops of other muted colors, are comforting rather than frightening.

Nighttime is one of Teckentrup’s specialties, and this gently soothing tale

is no exception; it’s sure to have little ones on their way to the sweetest of dreams in no time.

Dreamlike, quiet, delightful. (Picture book. 3-6)

A Cup of Love: Relationship Goals for Kids Todd, Michael | Illus. by Joel Santana WaterBrook (40 pp.) | $14.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 9780593192641

As he did with his nonfiction work for adults, Relationship Goals (2020), Christian megachurch pastor Todd shows young readers how developing a close bond with God can strengthen relationships with family and friends.

A mother encourages her daughter to talk to Jesus the same way she would to a best friend. Mom goes on to tell her daughter about relationship goals. Jesus should be first on her list of goals. A glowing, brown-skinned Jesus is depicted praying beside the young protagonist as her mother urges her to make goals. First, it’s important to wake up and thank the Lord and to pray every morning. Through it all, her parents will “help you learn what makes God glad.” The young daughter notices another kind of relationship when she sees Mom getting dressed up for a night out with Dad. When the child cries because she wants to go, too, her father uses an analogy of a faucet pouring water into cups to show how God pours love into people, who then share it with those they care about: “We can’t pour out love unless God first pours in. That’s why it’s important to spend time with Him.” Santana’s visuals are vivid, at times resembling stills from an animated movie, while Todd’s story effectively uses metaphor to make the concept of godly love accessible to a young audience—though it’s not likely to resonate with children who aren’t part of a Christian faith. The family is Black.

Tender guidance for young Christian readers. (Picture book. 4-8)

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Taxi, Go! Toht, Patricia | Illus. by Maria Karipidou Candlewick (32 pp.) | $17.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 9781536231533

A taxi heads into the city.

Rhyming text addresses a perky, smiling taxi as it makes its way through town taking fares, driving through rain and sun, and speeding along (“Careful, Taxi— / not too fast!”). Colorful, kid-friendly illustrations depict the town’s racially diverse occupants: families and friends, bus riders, cyclists, pedestrians, travelers with roller bags, ice cream eaters, dog walkers, firefighters who use a ladder to rescue a cat, and people shielding themselves with umbrellas against the rain. An elderly resident uses a walker, and a child with a limb difference plays soccer. Observant readers will spot the town’s many animal inhabitants as well. This very busy taxi is constantly on the go, finding time to deliver passengers to different events and locations, including the airport, before eventually bringing a family home as the sun goes down, when it’s time for all to go to sleep. Young transportation enthusiasts will enjoy this energetic ride and will slip into sleep when the taxi slows down, though adults reading it aloud may have trouble maintaining the rhyme, as the text is sometimes split between pages.

Still, this bright and breezy selection is sure to be enjoyed, savored, and hailed by the very young.

A lively and cheerful day in the life of a taxi. (Picture book. 2-5)

For more by Patricia Toht, visit Kirkus online.

A lively and cheerful day in the life of a taxi.

TA X I , G O !

Mommy’s New Friend

Milkweed for Monarchs

Tougas, Shelley | Illus. by Sara Palacios Roaring Brook Press (40 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781250624406

Van Zandt, Christine | Illus. by Alejandra Barajas | Beaming Books (40 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781506489308

A young girl acclimates to a changing family dynamic.

When That Guy comes to pick Mommy up for dates, Lily’s inclined to hide behind the curtains or stick her tongue out. Instead, she gives him a fake smile and introduces herself. When Lily goes out with That Guy and Mommy, she must be on her best behavior, and she has to get used to doing other things with That Guy, such as inviting him to her science fair. Things begin to shift, however, after she shows Daddy and That Guy her rocket ship schematics and, later, Daddy tells her that That Guy seems nice. When That Guy picks Lily up from school, she introduces him as Carl, and they play hide-and-seek in the park on the way home. Lily realizes that her life may have space for Carl after all. Told in the second person, this endearing story perfectly encapsulates the uncertainty children feel when their separated parents begin dating someone new. The sweet, warm-toned artwork is simple yet effective in conveying Lily and her blended family’s journey. This is an ideal book for families facing similar situations who need to show children that while it’s OK to feel a range of emotions, it’s also important to make room for new family members. Lily is biracial, Mommy presents as Black, Daddy as white, and Carl is brown.

Migrating monarch butterflies must have milkweed.

This colorful title presents the development of monarch butterflies, from egg to caterpillar to chrysalis to flight and migration.

Van Zandt uses a dual text—lyrical quatrains supplemented by exposition in a smaller typeface—set on bright, animation-style illustrations. A female monarch returns from a southern winter to seek out a place to lay her eggs. The author emphasizes the butterfly’s need for milkweed to provide for the next generation. What stands out are the in-depth, step-by-step descriptions and illustrations of the stages of the monarch’s development.

Notably, Van Zandt mentions the ways milkweed defends itself against monarch caterpillars. Beginning with a panorama of monarchs leaving, presumably, Mexico or California, Barajas then uses close-up angles to show details of the egg laying and hatching, the changing caterpillar and chrysalis colors, and a newly hatched butterfly’s crumpled wings, ending with a smaller group of monarchs flying away. Early on, Van Zandt makes clear that monarch migration extends over four generations. She ends with a note describing her own developing interest in monarchs, the threats they face (including habitat loss, which makes finding milkweed more challenging),

A thoughtful portrayal of family.

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ways young readers can help, and fun facts about butterfly senses. This is familiar ground in picture books as well as early science education, but it’s an engaging introduction nonetheless.

Informative in both pictures and words.

(Informational picture book. 4-8)

Bright Stars of Black British History

which makes up for the small font size and lengthy paragraphs, which may discourage some readers. The remarkable watercolor illustrations beautifully frame the text.

A much-needed resource that shines a light on historical figures who deserve to be far more well known. (Collective biography. 8-14)

I Love Myself

Williams, J.T. | Illus. by Angela Vives Thames & Hudson (160 pp.) | $19.95 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780500652923

Wong, Wai Mei | Illus. by Julia Vasileva Orca (32 pp.) | $21.95 | Feb. 13, 2024 9781459836181

A collection highlighting the contributions of unsung Black people who made lasting impacts on British history.

The author notes that from the first century, when the Romans conquered Britain, Black people have fought to create better lives for themselves and the world around them, their collective efforts making space for future generations to thrive. John Blanke was a royal trumpeter in the Tudor court who negotiated his salary by boldly petitioning Henry VIII. Olaudah Equiano, a formerly enslaved man who eventually bought his freedom, “practically invented the book tour” after publishing his autobiography in 1789 in an effort to abolish slavery. Feminist poet and activist Una Marson founded a women’s magazine in 1928, advocated for the rights of people of color worldwide, and worked as a BBC broadcaster during World War II. Presented chronologically, this collection provides brief but detailed profiles that explore these people’s vast accomplishments while placing their stories into historical context.

Each section is devoted to a different era and begins with a historical overview. Williams is intentional about creating space for potentially lesser known names. The writing is energetic and knowledgeable,

A child finds opportunities for self-love.

Each page begins with the phrase “I love myself,” with an example that follows. “I love myself even when I’m not perfect” is paired with an image of the nameless young narrator on a bike with training wheels. “I love myself when I say, ‘no’” accompanies an illustration of the protagonist holding up a hand to another youngster trying to take the child’s toy. Other examples include “I love myself when I tell my stories with crayons,” “when I try to understand my big feelings,” and “when I say ‘I’m enough.’” The concise text and refrains serve as mantras; indeed, many of the situations will apply to readers’ own lives. The child’s inner self is illustrated as an imaginary dog- or bear-like character who cheers the young narrator on at every turn. While this is meant to make a nebulous topic feel more concrete, caregivers might need to connect a few dots for little readers. The textured illustrations have a tender feeling that complements the text well; overall, this is a solid starting place to spark conversations about self-acceptance and one’s inner self.

The child has light brown skin and dark hair; no gendered pronouns are used. Other characters are diverse in terms of hairstyles and skin colors.

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The Wild Zommer, Yuval | Doubleday (32 pp.) | $18.99 Feb. 27, 2024 | 9780593708989

Hope for the future flows through this environmentalist story.

In the beginning there was “the Wild,” and it was good.

Pictured here as a large, anthropomorphized, dragonlike creature upon which all the land-based world resides, the Wild welcomes all living things, “from the shallow shore to the deep ocean.” It gives all beings what they need, even the humans who eventually appear.

Unfortunately, in time the humans take more than they need, justifying their greed by saying, “The Wild is so huge and giving that there will always be enough for us.” As people plow and mine, burn and dump, smoke fills the air, garbage litters the ground, and the Wild looks stunned and weakened. Still, one light-skinned boy notices the Wild’s suffering and speaks out, warning that they are hurting it. He’s joined by other, racially diverse people, and in time the Wild recovers. This time, however, “nobody took without giving something back.” Out of seeming necessity, the story simplifies situations down to their most essential parts, leaving little room for nuance.

Languid and lovely art is filled with tiny natural details. Meanwhile, an understated text in which no one seriously objects to the fight for the environment makes this a rather lowkey call to action.

A sweetly told tale but ultimately a toothless one. (Picture book. 3-6)

For more by Yuval Zommer, visit Kirkus online.

A meaningful entry point to a complex, lifelong practice. (Picture book. 3-5)

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SIX TO READ BEFORE THE YEAR IS OVER IN A WORLD where attention spans are short and people are always anticipating the next new thing—even in the book world, where patience is rewarded!—it’s easy to miss some real gems. Before we enter 2024, make sure you check out these 2023 titles that may have flown under your radar. They present original voices and memorably told stories.

All That It Ever Meant by Blessing Musariri (Norton Young Readers, Jan. 3): It may come in at under 200 pages, but this slim novel

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from an award-winning Zimbabwean author carries an emotional impact out of all proportion to its length.

When Mama dies and the family starts unraveling, Baba takes 14-year-old Mati and her siblings to Zimbabwe to visit family. During their road trip, British-born Mati meets Meticais, a fantastical being only she can see.

Free Radicals by Lila Riesen (Nancy Paulsen Books, March 21): Mafi, 16, has an ordinary public persona and an undercover role as

her school’s anonymous prankster-for-hire, doling out doses of karma. She also has a dual cultural identity as the blond daughter of an Afghan immigrant dad and a white American mom. Family traumas, Islamophobia, institutional exploitation of diversity, and the fear-motivated secrets of loving parents converge in this page-turning debut.

The Bones of Birka: Unraveling the Mystery of a Female Viking Warrior by C.M. Surrisi (Chicago Review Press, April 18): The Vikings have inspired a legion of myths and misconceptions, a testament to their hold on our imaginations—and the ways we use this historical people to support contemporary cultural narratives.

Surrisi offers a meticulously researched, clearly explicated account of a fascinating 19th-century archaeological find: a settlement in Sweden with a grave containing bones that continue to upend our assumptions about Viking gender roles.

Hope Against Hope by Sheena Wilkinson (Little Island, May 9): Ireland’s complex, painful history of division and strife is given a human face and a hopeful twist in this charming, accessible story that centers on a Belfast hostel for Catholic and Protestant girls.

Polly, 15, flees domestic

LAURA SIMEON

and emotional burdens, leaving behind her village for Helen’s Hope and staking out bold dreams for her future. But rising political tensions spill over, affecting the young women residents.

I’d Rather Burn Than Bloom

by Shannon C.F. Rogers (Feiwel & Friends, July 11): This gut-wrenching debut tells the story of Marisol, a white and Filipina teen whose life is spiraling out of control in the wake of her mother’s sudden death.

Wracked with guilt over their conflict-filled relationship, Marisol manifests her grief through harmful acting out, soon landing her in juvie.

But a new friendship opens up a path to genuine healing and self-acceptance.

I’ll Tell You No Lies by Amanda McCrina (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Aug. 1): Would you trust a stranger you’ve just met, someone the government regards as dangerous? The summer of 1955, right before she leaves for college, Shelby and her intelligence officer father move to upstate New York’s Griffiss Air Force Base, where she meets Soviet defector Maksym, a Ukrainian pilot.

When he’s suspected of being a KGB agent, Maksym turns to Shelby for help, setting off a nail-biting series of events.

Laura Simeon is a young readers’ editor.

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

Young Adult

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EDITOR’S PICK A young Black nonbinary activist copes with the enormity of a cancer diagnosis and medical racism, while facing the deep pain and deep love of the life they’re trying to save.

Upon being diagnosed with leukemia at 23, Nehanda embarked on a devastatingly steep learning curve about the cancer poisoning their blood and the pieces of their life and self that cancer had thrown into stark relief. Nehanda swiftly found that the casual bigotry, emotional abuse, and neglect they’d dealt with all their life were potently envenomed by ableism and might together kill them faster than the disease ravaging their body. Yet, as their struggles connected Nehanda

These Titles Earned the Kirkus Star

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more deeply to elders and ancestors, they were able to dig through the detritus of others’ expectations and harms and connect with themself as well. Told in a collection of poems and short essays, the book opens with warnings that readers won’t find a John Green novel in its pages and that the author-narrator will fail readers’ expectations—ghoulish and inspirational alike.

Nehanda infuses queer Black disabled resilience and wretchedness into a poetic sinew that stretches, tears, and heals again and again, unspooling the mundane trauma of trying to survive as Black, fat, queer, trans, and disabled despite (and to spite) systems built to hasten their erasure.

This memoir is kindred

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Pangu’s Shadow

By Karen Bao

For the Stolen Fates

By Gwendolyn Clare

Bless the Blood: A Cancer Memoir Nehanda, Walela | Kokila | 400 pp. | $18.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780593529492

intersectional storytelling that searingly responds to Audre Lorde’s call in The Cancer Journals.

Shatters mirrors and windows to reveal the jagged

Bright Red Fruit

By Safia Elhillo

A Tempest of Tea

By Hafsah Faizal

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Bless the Blood: A Cancer Memoir

By Walela Nehanda

shards of self-determination: “gently volatile” and absolutely crucial. (writer’s note, reading list) (Memoir/poetry.

14-adult)

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Black Girl You Are Atlas

By Renée Watson; illus. by Ekua Holmes

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Dead Things Are Closer Than They Appear

By Robin Wasley

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The Hampton House Mystery Alexander, Ellen | BHC Press (210 pp.) $23.99 | $14.95 paper | Feb. 20, 2024 9781643973791 | 9781643973807 paper Series: The Dinswood Chronicles, 4

A summer campout near a supposedly haunted house turns deadly for a teenage amateur sleuth and her friends in the latest entry in the Dinswood

Chronicles series.

Nancy Drew fans will feel right at home in this fourth stand-alone episode, as rising Dinswood Academy junior Emma Higsby, joined by classmates Doug Harwood, Sebastian Conners, and Martha Merriweather (who’s also Emma’s best friend), hear rumors of mysterious doings near a creepy, isolated house. In a strungout caper hung about with handy coincidences—as well as standard-issue elements from a cryptic message and a hidden tunnel to armed kidnappers and arson—the young sleuths uncover evidence of chicanery in high places. Meanwhile, even as they’re being chased and threatened, previously doused flames of passion flare up again between Emma and Doug.

Along with including an improbable twist regarding a new friend who’s an adoptee, the author lets her adolescent characters escape any serious consequences for housebreaking and other mischief as they head, in a delayed but sudden rush, toward a tidy resolution.

Alexander shoehorns in an arrest and confession, while never giving the villain even a brief walk-on role and leaving unresolved apparently contradictory revelations about the FBI’s role

For a mystery series inspired by a classic, visit Kirkus online.

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A strongly written work that pulls no punches.

PA N G U ’ S S H A D O W

in all of this. Characters read white.

A thinly disguised pastiche with a notably hurried wrap-up. (Mystery. 12-14)

My Life Off-Key Anderson-Dargatz, Gail | Orca (96 pp.) | $10.95 paper | Feb. 13, 2024 9781459834798 | Series: Orca Anchor

A teen faces challenges after learning her dad is not her biological father.

After Jen’s performance at her high school talent show, she’s discomfited when an older man in the audience gives her roses—and completely thrown when he tells her that his name is Mike, and he’s her father. Jen already has a dad, Steve, but her mom confirms that she had an affair with Mike, that he’s Jen’s biological father, and that Steve doesn’t know. The entire family, including Ella, Jen’s 9-year-old sister, must deal with the fallout, especially when Steve moves out. Jen struggles with questions about her identity, whether she’s at fault for the problems in her parents’ marriage, and if she still has a place in her family.

But as she gets to know Mike and his son, her half brother, Jack, and learns about things they have in common, both large (she and Mike are talented musicians) and small (she, Mike, and Jack have the same favorite ice cream flavor), she realizes that she’s the same person, and her family is expanding, not shrinking. This accessible novel for reluctant readers puts its protagonist into a high-drama situation; the portrayals of Jen and the other characters do an excellent job of modeling

reflecting on one’s emotions, asking direct questions, and sharing their feelings with others. Jen and her family read white.

Both a coming-of-age story and a road map for processing difficult emotions.

(Fiction. 12-18)

Kirkus Star

Pangu’s Shadow Bao, Karen | Carolrhoda (288 pp.) | $19.99 Feb. 6, 2024 | 9781728477510

Two teen girls accused of murdering their boss will be sent to their moon’s penal colony unless they can find the real killer.

Seventeen-year-old Aryl Fielding’s true passion is dance, but her coveted research apprenticeship at the Institute for Natural Exploration honors her parents’ sacrifices as immigrants from agricultural G-Moon Two to affluent G-Moon One. Sixteen-year-old blackhaired and olive-skinned Ver Yun left her industrially ravaged home of G-Moon Three to apprentice at the lab so she could search for a cure for the degenerative disease that has left her disabled. Aryl, who has “bronze skin and mahogany ringlets,” sees Ver as an opportunistic know-it-all; Ver thinks Aryl is a slacker who skates by on her intimidating physical superiority.

When Investigator Cal Eppi, the girls’ supervisor, is murdered, the police automatically charge them, the immigrant offworlders. With only days left until their trial, they move from mutual distrust to working together.

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As their rivalry turns to romance, they take on powerful people who are hiding big secrets. This dual-perspective tale maintains a vivid connection to each narrator’s voice while keeping up an exciting pace and unfurling a satisfying mystery. The portrayals of queer people, immigrant families, and those living with chronic pain and disability are well executed in this work, which is set in a world infused with Asian cultural elements.

Hard to put down: a strongly written work that pulls no punches while providing much-needed representation.

(Science fiction mystery. 13-18)

My Throat an Open Grave Bovalino, Tori | Page Street (320 pp.) $18.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9781645679301

A young woman reckons with the consequences of being an outcast and the risks of defining her own truth.

Stuck in the dead-end Appalachian town of Winston, Pennsylvania, 17-year-old Leah has few plans and little hope for her future. Having to watch over Owen, the baby brother everyone fawns over, only fuels her frustration.

When Owen goes missing from his crib while under her watch, Leah is forced to confront the dangers of the nearby woods. She takes responsibility for what happened, repeating self-recriminations that at times slow the pace, and enters the home of the mysterious Lord of the Wood, a feared otherworldly entity responsible for generations of missing children.

Despite her lifetime of indoctrination with town lore warning against the perils of anything to do with the Lord, Leah proposes a bargain in exchange for Owen’s safe return—but failure would come at a steep price. The more time Leah spends away from home, the more she’s drawn to all she was raised to fear as she aims to redress the wrongs of Winston’s lost kids in a KIRKUS REVIEWS

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slow-burn, supernatural interrogation of what it means to be a “good girl.”

Bovalino explores how young women attempt to balance social pressures and desire, and the result delivers slightly more suspense than terror. Leah reads white; there are brown-skinned supporting characters.

A mild but satisfying blend of folk and psychological horror. (Horror. 14-18)

Heartless Hunter Ciccarelli, Kristen | Wednesday Books (400 pp.) | $20.00 | Feb. 20, 2024 9781250866905 | Series: The Crimson Moth, 1

When the Blood Guard revolted against the Sister Queens and the purging started, no witch was safe, until the Crimson Moth arrived and began smuggling them away.

Rune Winters has been hiding her magical abilities for two years, ever since the revolution that claimed the lives of her grandmother and so many others. Seen as “a darling of the New Republic” for her role as an informer, Rune spends her evenings at lavish events with the wealthy, collecting secrets about witch raids and arrests.

Later, while disguised as the Crimson Moth, she uses this information to save lives. But now that she’s 18, Rune is expected to marry. If she must have a husband, she intends “to make the most strategic choice”—someone like Gideon Sharpe, her good friend Alex’s older brother and one of the Blood Guard’s most notorious witch hunters. Gideon has firsthand experience with witches; their “heinous acts” are why he hunts them and why he’s willing to get close to Rune and discover whether she’s really the Crimson Moth. What starts as a game of wits for each of them turns into a beautiful relationship that forces them to reconsider their earlier beliefs. Told in alternating viewpoints, this intriguing story explores questioning one’s

beliefs and viewing the world through a different lens. The main characters are cued white.

An addictive first installment that sets readers up for a series full of magic and romance. (Fantasy. 14-18)

Kirkus Star

For the Stolen Fates Clare, Gwendolyn | Feiwel & Friends (368 pp.) | $20.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 9781250230768 | Series: In the City of Time, 2

To save Earth, Willa must protect the editbook introduced in the Ink, Iron, and Glass series.

Though this is a duology closer to In the City of Time (2022), fans of Clare’s previous books will find in it a continuation of beloved characters. The third-person narration focuses mostly on time-traveling transgender cyborg Willa, biracial Tunisian Muslim Faraz, and thwarted villain Aris (the older brother of earlier hero Leo), who’s on a redemption arc. Willa and nonbinary android Saudade are back in 1891 Italy in order to prevent whatever caused the cataclysm, and their first step is acquiring Elsa’s powerful editbook. But after everything they’ve been through, Elsa and company aren’t about to give up custody of it.

The time-travel related timeline manipulations are expertly plotted, and the flashback placements of Aris skillfully reveal the depths of his motivations and traumas. Aris and Leo’s storyline includes Pasca, their disabled brother, who emerges as a fully fleshed out personality in his own right, deepening the brothers’ tangled relationship. An interesting parallel between Aris and Willa regarding vulnerability, which gives both characters emotional resonance, enhances rather than distracts from the narrative tension as Willa and Saudade get ever closer to finding DECEMBER 15, 2023 111

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Crowd-pleasing fun laced with political fire: a winner.

A TEMPEST OF TEA

out who caused the cataclysm and how to prevent it. Willa’s romantic story arc includes a longing to get back to Riley and Jaideep, with positive representation of both queer and polyamorous relationships.

A fantastically woven, intelligent story with real gems of characters. (Science fantasy. 12-adult)

The Boy Lost in the Maze Coelho, Joseph | Illus. by Kate Milner Candlewick (320 pp.) | $19.99 March 5, 2024 | 9781536236415

A contemporary teen finds common ground with an ancient Greek hero in this work by U.K. Children’s Laureate Coelho.

Seventeen-year-old Londoner Theo has grown up for the most part without a father figure and often feels this absence in his day-today life: “Manhood’s become a rock / I cannot lift alone.” While learning about Greek mythology in English class, Theo finds solace in the tale of Theseus and his labors, and so he makes Theseus’ quest to find his father the focus of his project. Theo receives encouragement for his series of poems from kind Mr. Addo, his teacher. He also begins the search for his own lost father, leading to parallel storylines: “Just like him / I’ll map my wrath / by searching for my father’s path.” As Theo experiences his own versions of Theseus’ adventures, he constructs his understanding of manhood. Additionally, growing up with a white mother, he confronts the complex reality of his Black and biracial identity, adding 112 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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another layer to his turmoil. Written in verse with nods to the classic Choose Your Own Adventure genre, this clever, well-paced novel leans into its interwoven format. While some parts might occasionally feel opaque to readers who are unfamiliar with Theseus, the general theme of grappling with what it is to be a man is compelling and clear. The tale of the Minotaur is relayed in a particularly refreshing and poignant way. Milner’s moving ink illustrations bolster an already vivid story.

Thoughtful and well executed. (Verse novel. 14-18)

Kirkus Star

Bright Red Fruit Elhillo, Safia | Make Me a World (384 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 | 9780593381205

A teen poet in Washington, D.C., becomes entangled with an older man as she tries to break free from her mother’s expectations.

Sixteen-year-old Sudanese American Samira Abdullahi has long had a tarnished reputation within her ever watchful community. She continually challenges her strict mother’s rules, yearning for the freedom to express herself: “i want the world, / all of it, & it is on the other side / of our front door, outside my mother’s / house &, it seems, outside my mother’s love.” Samira’s defiance leads to her being grounded for the summer, save for the poetry workshop her aunt already paid for. Bored, she connects with Horus on an online

poetry forum; he initially appears kind and attentive, providing the affection she craves—but over time, his controlling tendencies surface, and Samira neglects her other relationships.

Through the poetry workshop, however, Samira forms new connections, discovers her own identity as a poet, and finally sees Horus clearly. Elhillo masterfully portrays the universal theme of naïve first romance, including the potential for exploitation in moments of vulnerability, through the perspective of a girl who’s grounded in the Sudanese diaspora. Notably, the intricate relationship between Samira and her mother is authentic, highlighting the complex connections between immigrant mothers and their daughters. The poems eloquently convey Samira’s experiences, making the novel relatable to readers whether or not they’ve faced similar challenges.

A stunning work that deeply explores poetry, the complexities of identity, and the longing for love. (Verse fiction.

13-18)

Kirkus Star

A Tempest of Tea Faizal, Hafsah | Farrar, Straus and Giroux (352 pp.) | $19.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 9780374389406 | Series: Blood and Tea, 1

Bestselling author Faizal returns to the universe of We Hunt the Flame (2019) with a stand-alone duology opener.

Orphaned Arthie, brownskinned with mauve hair, has created a criminal empire out of sheer pluck despite being Ceylani in Ettenia, where laws favor white people. She pulled legendary pistol Calibore from a stone plinth (though the prophecy that doing so would make her the nation’s leader turned out to be a hoax). She’s also built Spindrift, a teahouse-cum-bloodhouse, where she gathers secrets from wealthy humans KIRKUS REVIEWS

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and vampires, amassing power and security. Now Arthie has her sights set on vengeance—and the Ram, Ettenia’s masked monarch. When she and Jin, her brother-by-choice (who’s cued East Asian), are drawn into a heist, they assemble a diverse crew of immigrants whose roles riff on genre archetypes.

The lush prose pulses with feeling as revelations are dropped and the tension ratchets up, keeping the pages turning as the motley gang plans to infiltrate a vampire society, retrieve a stolen ledger, and double-cross one of the Ram’s guards (who might be planning to double-cross them). Their ultimate goal: taking down the colonizing Ettenians and the exploitative East Jeevant Company. It’s all very exciting right up to the action-packed finale, which promises more conspiracy and (hopefully) justice to come.

This compelling read offers interesting commentary on our society while feeling entirely real within the context of its own worldbuilding.

“To Your Health,” “We Are Family,” and “Teachers and Grades and Homework—Oh My!” Several writers reflect on the effects of absent parents.

Readers also hear the voices of teens with disabilities. Some entries express their writers’ dreams for emotional contentment, love, and physical comfort. In keeping with the title, most of the content is practical counsel: Seek out those who allow you to be true to yourself, maintain good study habits, get involved with clubs, and don’t give up. There’s even advice on mastering public transit. Middle schoolers contributed to “Advice to My Future Self,” expressing their hopes and fears for the future and sharing guidance. Phrases that might seem hackneyed coming from an adult read as authentic when voiced by peers in the rhythms of spoken-word poetry or direct, heart-to-heart prose. The writing is punctuated by the teens’ original paintings, drawings, digital compositions, and photography.

the help of a mysterious guard named Archer, even as Apollo’s behavior becomes more and more controlling.

The pacing and plot feel stagnant at first, with Evangeline remembering things in flashes and moments of brief feelings, but things finally pick up once her memories return. With the point of view rotating among Evangeline, Apollo, and Jacks, there are few narrative surprises, but it’s intriguing to delve into the minds of an antagonist and a Fate. The story’s inclusion of the legendary Valors and the fantastical fairy-tale setting are unfortunately overshadowed by the love triangle’s dramatic tug-of-war romance. Likewise, the book’s various themes—power, hope, stories, and the nature of humanity—are of interest but handled in an unfocused way.

The conclusion, at least, is satisfying, and it hints at future tales set in this world. Evangeline, Jacks, and Archer read white; Apollo has dark hair and olive skin.

Advice to 9th Graders: Stories, Poetry, Art & Other Wisdom

A Curse for True Love

The Girl, the Ring & the Baseball Bat

Crowd-pleasing fun laced with political fire: a winner. (Fantasy. 13-18)

Ed. by Friedman, Amy | Out of the Woods Press (196 pp.) | $21.95 paper Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781952197024

Drawing from the life experiences of teens, this collection was crafted by participants in the PATHfinder Club, which has merged with POPS the Club, the organization behind eight previous anthologies.

Created by and for “individuals who have been impacted by incarceration, detention, and deportation,” this anthology provides nourishment and support and increases awareness.

The entries are grouped into sections by theme, including “It All Goes by So Fast,” “Emotions in Motion,” KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Poignant and encouraging cheerleading from the trenches. (Anthology.

13-18)

Garber, Stephanie | Flatiron Books (448 pp.) $20.99 | Oct. 24, 2023 | 9781250851208 Series: Once Upon a Broken Heart, 3

Despite living her happily-ever-after, Evangeline can’t help but strive to recover her lost memories in this trilogy closer.

Evangeline Fox awakens in the strong arms of Prince Apollo, her apparent husband, who swears to protect her from the evil Lord Jacks, who stole her memories. Unfortunately, Evangeline remembers nothing of her long and complex journey in the Magnificent North or her past romances; only the pain in her heart lets her know something is missing. At Wolf Hall, Evangeline seeks ways to unlock her missing memories, including enlisting

Frustratingly slow and lacking in magical wonder. (Fantasy. 14-18)

Gomera-Tavarez, Camille | Levine Querido (256 pp.) | $19.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 9781646142651

Gomera-Tavarez’s sophomore novel brings three New Jersey teens together with talismans that are seemingly tailor-made for their struggles.

Dominican Caro seeks to escape from Mami’s constant critiques by defying her standards at nearly every turn, while her younger sister, Rosie, seeks an out through academic success. When Zeke, the new Jamaican kid from Miami, tags along on the sisters’ covert trip to Queens, he finds his own outlet through their burgeoning friendship. The first-person narrative shifts among all three protagonists, >>> DECEMBER 15, 2023 113

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B O O K L I S T // YYO OU UN NG GA AD DU ULT LT

6 YA Books That Make Perfect Last-Minute Gifts 1

1 Lion’s Legacy

By L.C. Rosen

An entertaining, emotional rush tackling critical subjects.

2 Catfish Rolling

By Clara Kumagai

An intriguing, contemplative tale.

3 What the River Knows

By Isabel Ibañez

A romantic, heart-pounding adventure.

4 The Totally True Story of Gracie Byrne

2

5 Wish of the Wicked

By Danielle Paige

This sprawling, actionpacked origin story, layered in mystique, will pull readers into its fascinating world.

3

4

6 Seven Minutes in Candyland

By Brian Wasson

An effervescent story of self-discovery that showcases the importance of finding strength in vulnerability.

5

6

For more YA books to gift this holiday season, visit Kirkus online.

By Shannon Takaoka

A warmhearted story that will resonate with anyone who has ever dreamed of reinventing themselves.

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highlighting each one’s perspective on shared events, their particular struggles, and the discovery of their magical powers through the enchanted objects they find—a jacket, a baseball bat, and a pink stone. Rosie wrestles with her sense of justice and expectations of meritocracy as her dream of transferring to elite Innovation Technical Institute is stolen. Caro seeks to reform her rebellious ways but struggles with finding her own identity rather than one rooted in opposition to her mom. Though Zeke seems the most sure of who he his, his queer identity, and his ethos of living in the moment, he too struggles with a complicated maternal relationship, grieving the mom he felt never truly knew him. Though a coming-of-age quest for identity is at the heart of the unfolding drama, family challenges, generational trauma, and critiques of carceral systems and the underfunding of public schools are woven throughout, adding deep subplots leading up toward the ultimate climax.

An original voice spins an urban, magically realistic, modern tale.

(Fiction. 13-18)

Dropped!

Kuipers, Alice | Orca (96 pp.) | $10.95 paper | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781459837744 Series: Orca Anchor

Survival of the most popular on a remote island.

Six teens are dropped on Adventure Island, the tropical setting of the internet reality show Dropped!, in which contestants try to survive while currying favor with viewers at home.

The stakes are high: The contestant with the most audience approval at the end of five days wins $250,000 and a trip to Dubai. Dex is “awesome at social media,” having grown up with a single mom who, seeking validation and a sense of community, has shared his life online since 116 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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his infancy. Having experienced a humiliating breakup with his girlfriend (and a failed, livestreamed, drunken attempt at reconciliation that cost him followers), Dex feels pressure to win. Knowing that the cameras are always rolling, he teams up with stunning, savvy Amina, and the likes start rolling in. To keep up the momentum, Dex puts himself in increasingly dangerous situations—but is winning worth it if people get hurt?

This short novel packs in a lot as it gently explores concepts that will resonate with teens growing up immersed in social media. Is a life curated for public consumption worth living? The engaging writing and quick pacing make this a fast and fun read sure to hook readers looking for compelling characters and situations but without a hefty page count. Names cue some ethnic diversity in the cast.

A compact, existential, reality-show adventure with strong reluctant reader appeal. (Adventure. 12-18)

All This Twisted Glory Mafi, Tahereh | Harper/HarperCollins (416 pp.) | $17.99 | Feb. 6, 2024 9780062972507 | Series: This Woven Kingdom, 3

With all jinnkind advancing toward Tulan, Alizeh must hasten to secure both crown and land to protect her people in this follow-up to These Infinite Threads (2023).

Alizeh knows that accepting King Cyrus’ proposal of marriage will bring her the power to protect her people and seek her destiny, but she’s unprepared to deliver the death that will release him from the Devil’s torment.

Cyrus guards the terms of his deal with Iblees closely, but his passionate feelings for Alizeh, first implanted in sensuous dreams by the fallen jinn, are their own kind of torture. He refuses to believe that Alizeh’s feelings of contempt have evolved into real

tenderness and desire for him. For her part, Alizeh cannot completely trust Cyrus, bound as he is to Iblees, even if she desperately wants to. Further complicating matters are the arrival of Prince Kamran and Alizeh’s Ardunian friends—the prince wants revenge against the Tulanian king for the death of his grandfather and demands an explanation of Alizeh’s perceived betrayal. Stunned by the accusation, Alizeh realizes that her feelings for Kamran have dissipated and is further shocked by his belief that the prophecy foretells their union. But the truth of the prophecy may not be yet known, and the devil, ever the master of deceit, has never lost a wager. Mafi continues her stunning, spellbinding epic narrative of secrets, confusion, and burning desire in a volume that’s more about characterization than action but is still a fast, gripping read.

Captivating. (Fantasy. 14-18)

With a Little Luck Meyer, Marissa | Illus. by Chuck Gonzales Feiwel & Friends (368 pp.) | $20.99 Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781250618931

Fortune favors the nerd in this heartwarming novel by bestselling novelist Meyer.

Sixteen-year-old Jude is content to live a quiet life, creating art, waging Dungeons & Dragons campaigns, hanging with his best friend (a girl named Ari), and pining over Maya, his unrequited crush. One night, while working at his parents’ record store, Ventures Vinyl, he stumbles across a ruby-red 20-sided die, which he pockets for later use. Suddenly, Jude conquers coin flips, slays a pop quiz, and vanquishes a vending machine— and starts to wonder if perhaps his new die has magical powers. After snagging a pair of VIP tickets to a sold-out concert, Jude seizes the opportunity to ask Maya on a date. But as the two get to know each other better, KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Jude starts to wonder whether his vision of her aligns with reality. And what about the feelings Ari unexpectedly stirs in him? When Jude loses his precious die, and his luck takes a turn for the worse, he’s forced to face a terrifying fact: His fortune may well depend solely on his own choices. This humor-infused romance features a likable cast of racially diverse characters, both main and ancillary: Jude is coded white, Maya is Black, and Ari has Mexican heritage. Noah, a sparkly side character, uses they/them pronouns. Jude’s breaking of the fourth wall to address readers adds charm to the story, as do his comics, which are interspersed throughout.

Wonderful, witty, and as sweet as spun sugar. (Romance. 13-18)

We Got the Beat Miller, Jenna | Quill Tree Books/ HarperCollins (352 pp.) | $19.99 Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780063243385

After being assigned the volleyball beat, an aspiring journalist must confront her history with the team captain.

Jordan Elliot, a white-coded lesbian high school junior who self-identifies as fat, takes her work on the school paper very seriously, even when she doesn’t get the editorship she wanted. Being forced to spend time with the former friend who betrayed her—Mackenzie West, with her “summer-tanned skin and blonde hair that fell down her back in perfect waves”—is harder to swallow. But with her friends’ support, Jordan commits to writing the best articles she can about both the volleyball team and Mack. As she and Mack hang out, talking through how and why Mack hurt her, Jordan’s romantic feelings are revived. If they’re going to truly move on, though, Jordan must first confront her fear of rejection.

The characters display an intriguing balance of endearing qualities and KIRKUS REVIEWS

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flaws that together add to the emotional impact of their choices. Jordan’s genuine love for her friends and their hilarious banter further flesh out their world, making the non-romantic sections as enjoyable as the flirting and heart-to-hearts that Jordan and Mack share. Queer characters both exist casually and get to have their unique experiences highlighted, and Jordan’s existence as a fat person is explored in ways that inform her personality and highlight her insecurities without becoming the entirety of who she is.

A textured high school rom-com that serves up a lot of heart. (Romance.

13-18)

The Someday Daughter O’Clover, Ellen | HarperTeen (336 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780063255081

The daughter of a famous self-help author struggles when she must join a tour celebrating the 25th anniversary of her mother’s bestselling book, Letters to My

Someday Daughter.

Logical, driven, precise Audrey is everything Camilla St. Vrain, her yoga-practicing, emotionally distant, image-conscious mother, is not, but she still winds up accompanying her on a nationwide press tour. This means that Johns Hopkins–bound Audrey must give up a place in a prestigious summer program for pre-med students at UPenn that her similarly ambitious boyfriend is attending.

Along for the tour is Sadie, the accomplished young doctor Camilla hired to introduce Audrey to medical professionals around the country.

They’re also accompanied by three spontaneous interns, Cleo, Mick, and Silas. Audrey’s evolving relationships with each of them, but particularly with Silas, to whom she is quickly drawn, turn out to be the catalyst she needs to re-examine many of her thoughts about herself and her place

in the world. Audrey’s transformation from non-emotive and somewhat flat to multidimensional is portrayed with convincing complexity and appealing measures of both humor and earnestness. Some readers may anticipate the twist toward the end, but it still adds an interesting layer to this contemporary drama. Most characters read white; Chloe is Japanese American.

Sadie is married to a woman. There’s a brief, entertaining encounter with a character from O’Clover’s Seven Percent of Ro Devereux (2023).

Poignant, heartfelt, and often funny.

(Fiction. 13-18)

10 Hours To Go Parrack, Keely | Sourcebooks Fire (344 pp.) | $11.99 paper | Feb. 6, 2024 9781728256795

A long drive home goes drastically wrong in this dramatic survival novel.

After a visit to her Oregon dream college, California senior Lily finds her return travel plans derailed by a wildfire. Enter erstwhile best friend Natasha, who just happens to be in Portland; through the girls’ moms, she knows Lily needs a ride. The small talk is tense but tolerable—until Natasha unexpectedly picks up Elke in Eugene.

Elke was expelled from middle school thanks to Lily, which led to the rift in Lily’s relationship with Natasha. Even with the wildfire encroaching, Natasha and Elke insist on stopping for doughnuts. When Natasha hits a motorcycle in the parking lot and they drive off, the enraged biker pursues them deep into the forest. Readers learn this was all a ploy by Natasha and Elke to scare Lily (the motorcyclist is in on it): payback for what happened in eighth grade. But the wildfire is tearing through the forest, setting the teens up for a night that will test their mettle, force them to rely on each other, and perhaps even rebuild their old bonds.

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The monster here is an increasingly common environmental threat. The breathless writing, with most chapters ending in cliffhangers, feels appropriate, creating a sense that the air has been sucked from the room. The peril the teens endure makes the saccharine ending a cleansing sigh of relief. Main characters read white.

No slow burn here—this extreme homeward-bound tale thrills.

(Thriller. 14-18)

The Crimson Fortress Raman, Akshaya | Clarion/HarperCollins (432 pp.) | $18.99 | Nov. 14, 2023 9780358468349 | Series: Ivory Key Duology, 2

Reunited siblings Vira, Riya, Ronak, and Kaleb finally possess the legendary Ivory Key, only to discover that it unlocks a centuries-old secret that could lead to everyone’s demise in this follow-up to the 2022 series opener.

The Ivory Key was supposed to be the solution to Ashoka’s dwindling source of magic, but Vira and her sister and brothers must work together by splitting up to decode the artifact’s cipher and understand its true potential. As they pursue their mission, each rajkumaari’s and rajkumaara’s individual journey continues to be fraught with betrayal and danger. Maharani Vira is unexpectedly dethroned by the Council; Riya now possesses within her an unpredictable and unwanted magic; Ronak’s unfulfilled need to escape his betrothal and exonerate Kaleb leads him to make precarious choices; and Kaleb ventures to a neighboring country to investigate the emperor and learn more about his biological mother’s side of the family. But as they dig deeper into Ashoka’s hidden magical history, they’re challenged by the mysterious Kamala Society, which originally sealed the magic quarries, and the Order of the Mayura, a cultlike group who 118 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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worship a goddess whom they believe will grant her followers great power upon her resurrection. Deception and peril occur at every twist and turn in Raman’s thrilling duology closer, set in an Indian-inspired setting. Even more compelling are the dynamic, nuanced relationships among the protagonists, which fuel their individual growth and self-actualization.

A satisfying finale to a tale of magic, self-discovery, and family.

(Fantasy. 13-18)

Hope Ablaze Rana, Sarah Mughal | Wednesday Books (384 pp.) | $20.00 | Feb. 27, 2024 9781250899316

A Pakistani American girl’s commitment to her family’s legacy of resistance poetry is put to the test.

Eighteen-yearold Nida Siddiqui keeps quiet about her aspirations as a poet—“to be accepted outside the bubble” of her community. Her political poetry, performed at a local Muslim venue and a national all-Muslim tournament, makes her mother fear for her safety; Nida’s uncle has been incarcerated on terrorism charges after going viral with his radical poetry. When Nida prays in a public park before a rally for a Democratic Senate candidate, she’s perceived as a potential terrorist by police, treated with scorn by the officers and the politician, and has her hijab yanked off. Unbeknownst to her, someone enters the scathing poem she writes in response in a contest.

She wins, the poem makes the news, and the politician threatens to sue her for defamation and slander. Nida spirals into doubts about her poetry, family legacy, and the best way to handle the controversy in relation to her Muslim community. Using a mix of free verse and prose and blending realism with fabulism, Rana explores themes of wrongful incarceration and

systemic Islamophobia. Unfortunately, the poetry is often repetitive and lacks emotional resonance, while the magical elements are too literal to be effective. The author attempts to weave Nida’s family history into political events, but the portrayal of her growth remains unconvincing.

An ambitious premise that falters in its execution. (Fiction. 13-18)

Billy Buckhorn and the Rise of the Night Seers Robinson, Gary | 7th Generation (293 pp.) $14.95 paper | Feb. 27, 2024 9780966931754 | Series: Thunder Child Prophecy, 2

In this sequel to Billy Buckhorn and the Book of Spells (2023), our hero faces and must defeat more supernatural forces.

Billy, a Cherokee 16-year-old, is still discovering his powers, which include leaving his physical body to enter the spirit realm, hearing the thoughts of animals, and growing at an astounding pace. Following in the tradition of his beloved Grandpa Wesley, a medicine man, Billy is learning how to control his abilities in order to help his people. Chigger is still trying to figure out his place relative to his magical best friend, which makes him an easy target for manipulation by a Night Seer conjurer on a quest for power and revenge. All of this takes place against the backdrop of the tribal council’s discussion of the cosmic clock (“less than six months remained on the dial!”) and the impending Native American

For more Indigenous speculative fiction, visit Kirkus online.

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Armageddon. With the help of his family and friends, Billy sets out to deflect the bad deeds of the Night Seers and help prevent a war with the Underworld. Robinson, who is of Cherokee and Choctaw descent, once again delivers a novel that’s filled with interesting Cherokee myths, folklore, and traditions. Unfortunately, the prose is trite and clunky at times and the dialogue isn’t sufficiently differentiated between the characters, who need more development to feel like fully fleshed individuals.

Rich in cultural details but lacking in worldbuilding. (Fantasy. 12-18)

Your Fault Ron, Mercedes | Trans. by Adrian Nathan West | Bloom Books (450 pp.) | $12.99 paper | Dec. 5, 2023 | 9781728290768 Series: Culpable, 2

A romantically entangled stepbrother and stepsister in Los Angeles navigate their tumultuous history and take their relationship to new levels in this translated title by an Argentinian author.

Nick and Noah are madly in love: Their mutual attraction is established as the book opens with Noah’s 18th birthday party, during which she and Nick have an explicitly described sexual encounter behind the pool house. This fiery scene sets the stage for twists and turns in the lovers’ journey, including a separation when Noah is forced to go on a monthlong mother-daughter European tour. But reminders of their pasts (chronicled in the 2023 series opener, My Fault) threaten to undermine their stability. Nick’s wealthy estranged mother makes an unfortunate appearance, while Noah is haunted by the trauma of her father’s violent death. The blend of everyday complications (jealousy, parental disapproval) with frothy visions of high-society life is at once lacking in subtlety and intimately KIRKUS REVIEWS

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irresistible. The series initially gained popularity on Wattpad, and the novel follows the episodic structure typical of works on that site; sensual encounters occur at reliable intervals.

Still, the characters and their milieu feel formulaic, and the writing is stilted. The differences between the two—Nick is five years older and has an office job; Noah has just finished high school—makes their suffocatingly possessive relationship feel particularly squirm-worthy. Nick and Noah and their families read white.

Plenty of heat but not enough substance to keep the fire burning.

(Romance. 16-18)

Till Human Voices Wake Us Roque, Rebecca | Blackstone (350 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 27, 2024 | 9798212340083 Series: The Violet Hour Trilogy, 1

Seventeen-year-old Silencia Lucero investigates the disappearances of teens in her town after her best friend dies under mysterious circumstances.

Despite insinuations by the Summerset police, Cia is certain that Alice Booker, an aspiring journalist, did not drown herself in the local quarry over a broken heart.

Alice’s search for her ex-boyfriend, Noah, had led her down a trail that connected his case to those of other missing teens from their town, and the morning before she died, Alice told Cia what she’d learned. Alice also voiced her suspicions about the relevance of bonedust, the drug that’s been sweeping through Summerset in recent years. Cia is no stranger to bonedust: Her biological father produced it in his basement, until he was killed in the same house fire that left 5-year-old Cia an orphan with burn scars and a prosthetic leg. When Cia finds Alice’s carefully hidden phone, it reveals that Alice had stumbled onto something much more dangerous than she could handle. Roque delivers

a gripping debut centered on a town that has turned away from its most vulnerable population and allowed them to fall prey to sinister forces.

Themes of addiction and systemic corruption weave through the tense central mystery, which pits Cia against a killer who doesn’t hesitate when choosing targets. Cia is white and has two dads; there’s diversity in race and gender identity among the supporting characters.

An absolute nail-biter. (Thriller. 13-18)

Tender Beasts Sambury, Liselle | McElderry (416 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 27, 2024 | 9781665903523

A Black Canadian private school student tries to solve a series of gruesome murders connected to her family.

Seventeen-year-old Sunny Behre is good at fooling people.

After the death of her mother, Ainsley, Sunny embraces her role as the perpetually smiling golden child among the five siblings. Her family owns Behre Academy, a Toronto private high school that depends on donations to educate young people in need. With Ainsley gone, Sunny considers herself the ambassador for the school. When Dom, her younger brother, is charged with murdering his girlfriend, Ainsley’s loss feels even more pronounced.

One day after school, Sunny stumbles upon the chilling sight of the mangled body of a fellow student—and of Dom, who’s been released while awaiting trial, with blood on his hands. Dom maintains his innocence, and although Sunny isn’t entirely convinced, she races to uncover the actual killer.

As the campus body count ramps up, Sunny realizes that Ainsley kept secrets, including details about a violent night that changed Sunny’s parents’ young lives forever. Told through Sunny’s first-person narration, Sambury’s latest taps into the DECEMBER 15, 2023 119

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skin-prickling discomfort of a slasher film to explore the heavy inheritance of generational trauma. Identity, the intersection of race and privilege, and the nuances of class are handled with care, though the rules governing the supernatural elements are not fully explained.

A creepily potent story of a family legacy that gives terrifying shape to monsters real and imagined.

(Horror. 14-18)

Daughter of the Bone Forest Skye, Jasmine | Feiwel & Friends (432 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 27, 2024 | 9781250872456

In the Cursed Kingdom, witches and familiars— humans who can shapeshift into animals— create powerful bonds through elaborate courtship rituals that give them power—and perhaps even bring them love.

A chance encounter with Princess Shaw, a powerful witch known as Death’s Heir for her prophesied leadership in an imminent war, sends Rosamund Holt to the prestigious and elitist school Witch Hall.

Rosamund doesn’t want to leave her Gran, who was exiled after she went feral during a wolf shift. She’s also afraid that her robust shifting abilities will mean being drafted by a kingdom she has no interest in going to war for, given how it’s treated her family. Once entrenched in the magical school, Rosamund realizes she’s a powerful familiar and enjoys her studies. She balks when Shaw chooses to court her, however.

Rosamund tries to deny her connection with Shaw, and she can’t help wondering what the princess really wants from her. Peopled with queer characters representing the breadth of the gender spectrum, this epic hero’s journey is at turns touchingly romantic and graphically violent. The 120 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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action unfolds in a vivid and original world that leaves readers with a cliffhanger ending that promises more adventures with the compelling protagonists. Rosamund is light-skinned with “hay-colored hair”; Shaw has “pale sepia skin,” and there’s racial diversity in the supporting cast.

A robustly imagined, intrinsically queer, and romantic high-fantasy epic.

(Fantasy. 14-18)

The Boyfriend Wish Teerdhala, Swati | Katherine Tegen/ HarperCollins (336 pp.) | $19.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9780063279155

A wish for the perfect boyfriend causes a teen to rethink all her plans.

Seventeen-year-old South Indian American Deepa Josyula is on a mission to have the “perfect Edison High School experience.” She and best friend Lily even have The List filled with items to accomplish. But Deepa’s junior year isn’t going according to plan, thanks to a disastrous day that includes romantic rejection and being paired on a student council project with childhood nemesis (and neighbor) Vikram Mehta. Luckily, Amamma, her grandmother, gifts her the last jasmine bloom from their garden. According to Amamma, it’ll grant her heart’s greatest desire. Skeptical Deepa wishes for the boyfriend of her dreams. Enter Rohit D’Souza, the very handsome new boy next door, who not only looks just like the inspiration photo for her perfect boyfriend but also ticks off very specific details from The List. Deepa might have become a believer. To prove to the universe that she’s “earned the blessing” she’s been granted, Deepa creates a plan to woo Rohit. But is “picture perfect” enough? And what of the boy who’s always been next door? Caught up in her penchant for planning, Deepa will need to live in the moment and learn that a little chaos can be OK—great

even. Filled with classic rom-com scenarios, this novel has plenty to delight readers. Deepa makes for an engaging lead, and her journey toward embracing uncertainty is satisfying.

Charming. (Romance. 12-18)

Bunt!: Striking Out on Financial Aid Ukazu, Ngozi | Illus. by Mad Rupert Colors by K Czap | First Second (288 pp.) $17.99 paper | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781250193513

A group of art students face their greatest challenge yet: being athletic.

Molly Bauer, a queer Black girl, is set to enter the Peachtree Institute of Collegiate Arts, her dream art college located in her hometown of Peachtree, North Carolina, on a full-ride scholarship.

Unfortunately, due to various mishaps, Molly isn’t informed that her scholarship is no longer valid, and she’s shocked to learn that she owes $39,000 for her first year’s tuition.

Her moms don’t have that kind of money. Desperate, she reviews the college’s scholarship documents and discovers a way to get free tuition—a sport scholarship given to every member of a team that wins a varsity-level game. Molly hatches a plan with her less-than-enthusiastic best friend, PICA dropout Ryan, who’s white. She convinces him to coach the softball team she pulls together—a racially diverse group of artists with varying degrees of athletic ability. Molly forms new friendships, but she learns things that change the way she views her hometown forever. The characters have well-developed personalities, and their interactions thoughtfully explore themes of teamwork, coming out of your shell, trusting in yourself, and learning to rely on others as the pressure to win a game mounts.

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tension and emphasize the nail-biting action on the field.

A heartfelt story of passion, teamwork, and overcoming the odds. (Graphic fiction. 14-18)

Kirkus Star

Dead Things Are Closer Than They Appear

self-absorption, isolation, connection, family, loss, grief, and empathy.

A thrilling, moving, and fantastical apocalyptic novel that readers won’t want to put down. (Fantasy. 14-18)

Kirkus Star

Black Girl You Are Atlas

Wasley, Robin | Simon & Schuster (416 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 | 9781665914604

Watson, Renée | Illus. by Ekua Holmes Kokila (96 pp.) | $18.99 | Feb. 13, 2024 9780593461709

When someone releases long-suppressed magic in her small town, Sid fights zombies to find her missing brother.

Seventeen-year-old Sid Spencer feels like she’ll always be a sidekick, never the main character. After growing up in Wellsie as a Korean adoptee with white parents (she and her Korean adopted brother, Matty, comprise half the town’s Asian population), she feels like a nobody. Wellsie is built on a fault line where “lingering energy manifests” as rainbowlike ghosts, drawing tourists.

But when the fault line is ruptured, the released magic creates a zombie apocalypse, and Matty goes missing.

His friend Brian reveals to Sid that they are Guardians, the magical chosen few who protect the fault line. Now Matty’s running from a magic-hungry killer, and Sid’s determined to find him.

Joining Brian and the other Guardians, she ventures into an overgrown forest filled with the undead—and an armed man and his gang who want to release all the magic. While struggling with regular teenage issues like friendships and crushes, Sid must find a way to survive this new, earth-shattering reality and save her loved ones. This dark debut is a pitch-perfect balance of fantasy, horror, humor, and romance. The story is well paced, with action and suspense interspersed with quiet moments of raw emotion and human connection.

The thoughtfully developed characters grapple with issues of race, insecurities,

Two acclaimed, award-winning creators team up to present this moving, introspective poetry collection celebrating the possibilities of Black girlhood complemented by atmospheric mixed-media illustrations.

Showcasing varied poetic forms such as free verse and tanka, Watson reflects on coming of age as a Black girl in a society that habitually flattens Black experiences into easily digestible stereotypes. The opening poem, “Where I’m From,” is inspired by the work of Puerto Rican writer Willie Perdomo, and it peels back the layers of Watson’s identity, creating a harmonious alchemy of personal and cultural history that incorporates familiar touchstones and inheritances like “east coast hip-hop and island tradition.” Themes of resilience and perseverance are interwoven throughout, exploring how Black girls’ existence is often a testament to survival. Some poems contemplate the trauma that results from systemic racism and misogynoir; “A Pantoum for Breonna Taylor” notes how white supremacy weaponizes the basic necessity of rest: “Breonna, who reminded us that Black women / are not even safe in our sleep.” But Watson doesn’t dwell in despair; she finds safety in the healing power of love. Other poems, including “Lessons on Being a Sky Walker,” are rallying cries, encouraging Black girls to honor their roots

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and cherish their versatility. Watson’s reconstructions of childhood delights and teenage wounds examine the collision of race, gender, and class.

Holmes’ tender, vibrant art enhances the poems.

A compelling ode to self-resurrection and Black sisterhood that finds muchneeded light in the world’s darkness.

(Poetry. 12-18)

Kill Call Wooten, Jeff | CamCat Books (320 pp.) $19.99 | Feb. 20, 2024 | 9780744307597

All Jude wanted was to have a fun, normal senior year, but the Dream changed everything.

Seventeen-year-old Jude Erickson was an average teenage boy until he realized he was a Dreamer, like his father. In the Dream, Jude watches—from the killer’s perspective— as fellow senior Hanna Smith dies at the hands of a hammer-wielding killer.

Jude understands that he has a special responsibility: saving Hanna’s life by preemptively taking out her murderer.

But Jude’s mission goes awry when the would-be murderer escapes before harming Hanna, who at first believes Jude wanted to kill her. Now, it’s up to the two of them to find out who wants her dead and stop them before they make another attempt on her life. The suspects are numerous, and the clock is ticking. Jude narrates this harrowing tale of prophetic visions and bloody secrets set in Arkansas under stormy skies. While there are plenty of fights, the use of violence is always tempered by questions of ethics as Jude struggles with his supposed duty to preemptively kill killers. Well-developed subplots center on Jude’s attempts to woo his love interest, Molly Goldman, and the high school football team’s exploits on the field, where Jude plays defense.

Most characters are cued white.

A riveting thriller that explores morally gray areas. (Supernatural thriller. 14-18)

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SEEN AND HEARD

Police Called After Teen Checks Out Library Book

Armentrout: Franggy Yanez Photography; Park: Nara Shin

The activists who filed the report called the Jennifer L. Armentrout novel “pornography.”

After a 17-year-old checked out a copy of Jennifer L. Armentrout’s Storm and Fury from a high school library, two members of the right-wing group Moms for Liberty called the police to report “pornography given to a minor in a school,” the online newsletter Popular Information reports.

Jennifer Tapley and Tom Gurski made the police report in Santa Rosa County, Florida. The two are active in Moms for Liberty, a group well known for challenging books they see as objectionable in schools.

Armentrout’s novel, published in 2020 by Inkyard Press, is a romance fantasy novel about an 18-year-old woman who is losing her vision and can communicate with ghosts. The

Book to Screen A Film Adaptation of Snowglobe Is in the Works Soyoung Park’s novel, first published in South Korea, will be released in the U.S. next year.

Park’s upcoming novel received a starred review from Kirkus.

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A film based on Snowglobe, the young adult dystopian thriller from South Korea that is scheduled for publication in English next year, is now in the works.

CJ Entertainment, the film production company known for movies such as Snowpiercer and the Oscar-winning Parasite, is developing the film, Delacorte Press said in a news release.

Snowglobe, written by Snowglobe Soyoung Park, was published in South Korea in 2020. It is set in a dystopian world wracked by climate change, where residents of a domed city are protected from the freezing cold and their lives form the basis of a 24-hour reality TV program. When one

book contains a sex scene, Tapley said.

In an interview with a deputy sheriff, Gurski said the librarian who let the student borrow the book had committed a “third-degree felony.” Tapley said, “The governor says this is child pornography. It’s a serious crime. It’s just as serious as if I handed a Playboy [magazine] to [my child] right now, right here, in front of you.”

The sheriff’s office referred the case to the school district, then closed it, according to Popular Information’s Judd Legum.

Kasey Meehan of the literary nonprofit PEN America told Legum, “Professional librarians apply sensible measures to curate their collections for diverse audiences of readers, and they should not be punished for making knowledge accessible to students that falls well short of the well-established legal standards for obscene materials.”—M.S. Armentrout writes in the popular “romantasy” genre.

To read more about book bans and challenges, visit Kirkus online.

of the city’s prominent residents is found dead, a teenage girl lookalike from outside the city is asked to take her place.

The English-language version of the novel, the first in a duology, is translated by Joungmin Lee Comfort. In a starred review, a critic for Kirkus called it “transporting and unputdownable; an appealing combination of deep and page-turning.”

Delacorte vice president and senior executive editor Krista Marino said in a state-

ment, “As I read Snowglobe for the first time, I was shocked by how a debut author was able to take familiar tropes and create a story that was completely original and transportive.

Again and again, I was surprised and delighted by its twists and turns, and impressed by Soyoung Park’s astute commentary on consumerism, identity, and what our future holds.”

The English-language translation of Snowglobe is slated for publication on Feb. 27, 2024. There’s no word yet on a release date for the film adaptation.—M.S.

For a review of Snowglobe, visit Kirkus online.

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The Best Indie Books of 2023

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Tpopova via iStock

One of the many glorious things about Indieland’s list of Best Books? Readers can take a multigenre tour and visit, for example, a lightly fictionalized Armenia with a bisexual, Brooklyn-based feminist author; a child’s casita enlivened by the rich cultures of her Haitian dad and Dominican mom; or The Hague with a judge who oversaw the Iran– United States Claims Tribunal. Indie brings the depth and the breadth! Enjoy.

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My Proudest Moment Achtman, Lindsay | Illus. by Andra Pana For the Love of Literacy (32 pp.) | $18.99 April 15, 2023 | 9781733525022

A clever tale that may upend traditional expectations and bolster young athletes’ confidence.

La Casita Hispaniola Aristhyl, Yajaida & Michelson Aristhyl Illus. by Brittany Gonzalez | Self (32 pp.) | $12.99 paper | June 9, 2023 9798397797962

A fresh family tale with vivid illustrations.

Beautifully textured writing in a compelling tale that ponders identity and belonging.

Buster: A Life in Pictures Barnett, Ryan | Illus. by Matthew Tavares | Knockabout Media (96 pp.) $20.99 | Dec. 1, 2022 | 9781778288302

A nuanced and surprisingly tender depiction of a movie giant and a vanished industry.

I Eat Men Like Air

Bell , Francesca | Red Hen Press (96 pp.) $22.00 | May 9, 2023 | 9781636280790

Berman, Alice | Vanguard Press (294 pp.) | $12.99 paper Jan. 26, 2023 | 9781800165229

The Girl Who Counted Numbers Bernstein, Roslyn | Amsterdam Publishers (284 pp.) | $24.95 | $19.95 paper Oct. 12, 2022 | 9789493276376 9789493276369 paper

An engrossing mystery wrapped in a coming-of-age story and the heartrending legacy of the Holocaust.

Judging Iran: A Memoir of The Hague, the White House, and Life on the Front Line of International Justice Brower, Charles N. | Disruption Books (352 pp.) | $29.95 | April 11, 2023 9781633310704

A superb, intensely readable account about a striking career in international law.

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Agabian, Nancy | Nauset Press (348 pp.) | $23.99 paper May 9, 2023 | 9798985969238

What Small Sound A moving and musical set of poetic works.

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The Fear of Large and Small Nations

An intriguing whodunit with richly drawn characters.

True Immortals Bratman, Steven | Self (478 pp.) $17.99 paper | May 5, 2023 9798393653156

A thematically rich, brainy, and meditation-worthy “what-if” considering the ramifications of a life in which death has no sting.

The Way of Humanity: According to Chasidic Teaching Buber, Martin | Trans. by Bernard H. Mehlman & Gabriel E. Padawer Reform Judaism Publishing (CCAR Press) (88 pp.) | $11.95 paper July 10, 2023 | 9780881236378

Timeless wisdom made fresh and accessible.

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The Most Excellent Immigrant: Stories Budman, Mark | Livingston Press (138 pp.) | $17.95 paper | Oct. 20, 2022 9781604893342

Unfortunately, a book for our times—vivid enough to grab us and not let go.

Unsinkable: Cancer, Five Boats, and My 500 710-Kilometre Sea Swim

She Who Burns

A bold, uplifting testament to the tenacity of the human spirit.

Unmaking the Bomb: Environmental Cleanup and the Politics of Impossibility Cram, Shannon | Univ. of California (222 pp.) | $85.00 | $29.95 paper | Oct. 10, 2023 9780520395114 | 9780520395121 paper

A powerfully researched and important look at the ravages of nuclear waste remediation.

Welcome to the Silent Zone Csák, Viktor | Writing Systems (402 pp.) | $19.99 | $12.99 paper 9786150174457 | 9786150173993 paper

A creatively accomplished, atmospheric, and gripping adrenaline rush for monster fans.

Sing, Mama, Sing Delgado, Anne | Illus. by Elen Khalatyan Quiet Trail Books (32 pp.) | $17.99 | $11.95 paper | Sept. 27, 2022 | 9798986466590 9798986466583 paper

A sweet, love-filled lullaby with a wonderfully diverse group of mothers and kids.

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Chernov, Mstyslav | Cherry Orchard Books/Academic Studies Press (544 pp.) | $29.95 | Oct. 11, 2022 9781644699881

A set of captivating tales of strangers in a very strange land.

Corcoran, Alan | Illus. by Jack Spowart Tivoli Publishing House (303 pp.) $12.99 paper | Aug. 17, 2023 9781838365028

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The Dreamtime

Coulter, Myrl | FriesenPress (299 pp.) | $37.99 | $23.99 paper 9781039166943 | 9781039166936 paper

Riveting family saga with themes of female empowerment creatively tied to tarot lore.

Sand Dollars by the Seashore Creel, E.G. | Illus. by Elizaveta Kres Self (28 pp.) | $12.99 paper June 14, 2023 | 9798398345582

An easy-to-understand guide with an important message for young shell collectors.

Brahma’s Weapon: Stories Debi, Ashapurna | Trans. by Prasenjit Gupta | CreateSpace (296 pp.) $19.95 paper | Oct. 1, 2013 9781492162216

A hypnotically beautiful collection of stories by a literary master.

Tales of Whimsy, Verses of Woe DeRoche, Tim | Illus. by Daniel González | Redtail Press (92 pp.) $19.99 | Jan. 24, 2023 9780999277614

Joyous poems; supremely worthy of a Baldersquash Medal, regardless of whether or not it exists.

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In Turbulent Waters

The Babel Apocalypse

Etchie, Timothy | iUniverse (672 pp.) $39.99 | $28.99 paper | June 26, 2022 9781663240880 | 9781663240866 paper

Evans, Vyvyan | Nephilim Publishing (388 pp.) | $13.99 paper May 2, 2023 | 9781739996222

A raw and often brilliant crime story.

A perfect fusion of SF, thriller, and mystery—smart speculative fiction at its very best.

Longing: Poems of a Life

Troll

Feld, Merle | Central Conference of American Rabbis Press (114 pp.) $16.95 paper | Nov. 14, 2022 9780881236262

Fitzgerald, David | Whiskey Tit (590 pp.) | $24.00 paper | Feb. 23, 2023 9781952600326

A fine collection that brings secret travails to life with passionate intensity.

Together We Decide: An Essential Guide for Making Good Group Decisions Freshley, Craig | Greenleaf Book Group Press (304 pp.) | $22.44 | Sept. 13, 2022 9781626349506

A thorough and friendly guide to why group decisions matter.

Majority Goldsmith, Abby | Podium Publishing (594 pp.) | $18.99 paper | Aug. 21, 2023 9781039442726

An Earth-shaking opening to the chronicle of a rapacious galactic empire.

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Don’t Look Away: My Life With Autism Glisik, I.Z. | IGM LEGACY d.o.o. (258 pp.) | $24.90 | $17.90 paper May 23, 2022 | 9789619544846 9789619544853 paper

Bold and illuminating writing about autism.

The Night the Stars Went Missing Gonzalez , Arthur J. | Illus. by Krapivina Olga | Self (88 pp.) | $16.99 Nov. 1, 2023 | 9780988891692

A whimsical but well-grounded environmentalist tale.

What Ben Franklin Would Have Told Me

The Year of Mourning: A Jewish Journey

Gordon, Donna | Regal House Publishing (330 pp.) | $19.95 paper | June 8, 2022 9781646032303

Grant, Lisa D. | Central Conference of American Rabbis Press (218 pp.) | $19.95 paper June 1, 2023 | 9780881236071

A soulful journey that offers surprises and unforeseen victories.

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A cynical, misanthropic, foulmouthed novel that no curious reader will be able to put down.

A welcome Jewish resource for making the journey through loss.

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Wolf Trees

The Genesis Backup

Hartsock, Katie | Able Muse Press (104 pp.) | $19.95 paper | Sept. 15, 2023 9781773491202

Harwin, Dale | Trans. by Kate Oden Self (402 pp.) | $14.99 paper Nov. 18, 2022 | 9798363874710

A dynamic and accessible set of poems brimming with ancient lore.

Razor-sharp writing and mind-blowing scientific conceptualization make this a top-notch, Crichtonesque thriller.

As the Sycamore Grows

The Basilisk

Helderman, Jennie Miller | Lucid House Publishing (380 pp.) | $19.99 paper May 2, 2023 | 9781950495337

Herin, Miriam | Wisdom House Books (658 pp.) | $24.99 paper April 30, 2022 | 9798986104904

At times a difficult read, but the humanity...shine[s] through.

A richly textured medieval tale told with gripping suspense, keen intelligence, and aching emotion.

A Debt to the Stars

Masterpiece

Hincker, Kevin | Self (286 pp.) $22.99 | $14.99 paper | April 20, 2023 9798391909873 | 9798987630129 paper

Enjoyable, funny, and thoughtprovoking speculative fiction.

The Cello Still Sings: A Generational Story of the Holocaust and of the Transformative Power of Music Horvath, Janet | Amsterdam Publishers (412 pp.) | $26.98 | $23.95 paper Feb. 27, 2023 | 9789493276819 9789493276802 paper

A poetic, nuanced tribute to the power of music and family.

A Walk Between Raindrops

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Hoffman, Alexandra | Illus. by Beatriz Mello | Wishing Star Publishing (32 pp.) | $11.91 paper | Jan. 4, 2023 9781778071041

Samuel’s story comes to life through compassionately drawn characters, warm dialogue, and joyful illustrations.

Soft Targets Inks, Benjamin | Double Dagger Books (189 pp.) | $15.24 paper May 17, 2023 | 9781990644542

A very effective fictional exploration of an ordinary U.S. soldier’s experience serving in Afghanistan.

Friendship Games

Jahn, Amalie | BermLord (326 pp.) $19.99 | June 27, 2023 | 9780991071395

James, Mark | Defiance Press & Publishing (292 pp.) $18.95 paper | Feb. 20, 2023 9781959677215

A superior, sisterly road drama with a last-act surprise.

A profound and thought-provoking thriller examining humankind’s self-destructive tendencies.

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Roll Back the World: A Sister’s Memoir Kasdan, Deborah | She Writes Press (256 pp.) | $17.95 paper | Oct. 17, 2023 9781647425715

Intricate and affecting, Kasdan’s debut finds hope in the saddest of stories.

Broken: The Suspicious Death of Alydar and the End of Horse Racing’s Golden Age Kray, Fred M. | Live Oak Press (346 pp.) $26.95 | $17.95 paper | Apr. 18, 2023 9798987213803 | 9798987213810 paper

A poignant and thorough look at a real-life horse-racing mystery.

Starlite Latt, Jonathan | The Chapel Perilous (360 pp.) | $16.95 paper | Dec. 6, 2022 9798986331508

An entertaining and promising beginning for a neo-retro spacefaring adventure series.

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Rules for Whistleblowers: A Handbook for Doing What’s Right Kohn, Stephen Martin | Lyons Press (440 pp.) | $50.00 | $22.99 paper June 1, 2023 | 9781493072804 9781493059263 paper

Definitive and compulsively readable.

Darkness Calls: An Inspector Cecilie Mars Thriller Krefeld, Michael Katz | Trans. by Ian Giles | Podium Publishing (300 pp.) $16.99 paper | May 1, 2023 9781039424975

Choice Nordic noir featuring a pressure-cooker scenario, gripping action, and nervewracking psychological tension.

Katelyn’s Crow Laufer, Mary Beth | Illus. by Kathleen Phillips Poulsen | Self (391 pp.) $9.99 paper | Nov. 18, 2022 9781737442004

A work that thoughtfully examines a child’s encounter with the complex natures of people and other creatures.

Protectress

Perfect

Leonard, Kendra Preston | Self (208 pp.) $8.18 paper | Feb. 1, 2022 9781950730636

Loo, Theresa | Illus. by Beverly Arce Magnus Rex (40 pp.) | Dec. 1, 2023 9798987567302

A clever, illuminating feminist take on Greek mythology.

An excellent book on finding an ideal pet for one’s family.

The Penny Mansions

You Stole My Name

Mayfield, Steven | Regal House Publishing (322 pp.) | $19.95 paper Oct. 24, 2023 | 9781646034000

McGregor, Dennis | Blue Star Books (32 pp.) | $18.99 | Aug. 8, 2023 9781941325988

A delightful romp with memorable characters.

Poems that will be perfect for animal lovers, with gorgeous illustrations worthy of framing.

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Sweet Fire Mitchell, J.P. | Illus. by Fuuji Takashi FreedomSong Press | 9798218055189

A vibrant book with a good lesson for young leaders.

The Queen of Gay Street Mollica, Esther | Idée Fixe Books (204 pp.) | $16.99 paper Nov. 8, 2022 | 9798986958118

An entertaining, often poignant portrait of New York romance blending humor with heartache.

Nature Ninja Saves the Natural World Moloney, Tania | Illus. by Jelena Sardi Nurture in Nature Books (31 pp.) | $14.99 paper | Aug. 2, 2023 | 9780645730500

Nature plus ninjas make a winning combination!

Notes From the Road: A Filmmaker’s Journey Through American Music Mugge, Robert | The Sager Group (364 pp.) $24.32 | March 28, 2023 | 9781958861103

Amen to an absorbing thriller that succeeds on many levels.

‘World Citizen’: Journeys of a Humanitarian Olson, Jane | Self (429 pp.) | $34.95 Oct. 19, 2022 | 9781513695693

A stirring account of humanitarianism.

The Fitful Sleep of Immigrants

Riddles Island

A riveting yarn with a charismatic tempter.

Lucy Dreams: Or the Unremarkable Life of Jeremy Moore Pierpoint, Paul E. | Self (292 pp.) | $9.95 paper | July 7, 2022 | 9798839901711

A magical and moving work.

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Morales, J.E. | BookBaby (300 pp.) $14.95 paper | May 23, 2023 9781667893488

A vibrant, entertaining panorama of music-making and the picaresque struggle to capture it on film.

Ortega-Medina, Orlando | Amble Press (335 pp.) | $20.95 paper | April 25, 2023 9781612942636

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The Cathedral Murders

Pat, Jan E. | Self (267 pp.) $12.99 paper | June 26, 2021 9798644014545

This visionary glimpse into humankind’s potential future is an absolute must-read for fans of post-apocalyptic fiction.

Master, Minion Podolsky, Paul | Still Press (446 pp.) | $16.00 paper Dec. 13, 2022 | 9780998667355

A potent, well-crafted thriller that’s a page-turner of the highest order.

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B E S T B O O K S O F 2 0 2 3 // I N D I E

Shallcross: The Underwater Panthers Porter, Charles | Self (270 pp.)

9780989425681

An undeniably unique metaphysical adventure.

The Art of the Sales Meeting: Performance Techniques for Confidence and Results Prangley, Chris | Lioncrest Publishing (244 pp.) | $25.15 | $19.99 paper May 18, 2023 | 9781544538303 9781544538280 paper

An appealingly fresh and energetic look at rethinking the sales meeting.

To a High Court: Five Bold Law Students Challenge Corporate Greed and Change the Law Proto, Neil Thomas | FriesenPress (348 pp.) $35.99 | $22.99 paper | April 14, 2023 9781039180499 | 9781039180482 paper

An enjoyably readable and fascinating day-by-day account of a landmark Supreme Court case.

Black Artists Rock!: The Cool Kids’ Guide A-Z Reese, Cara | Bea and Jo Press (58 pp.) $19.99 | Nov. 28, 2022 | 9781088057285

A dynamic celebration with all-ages appeal.

Good Awkward: How To Embrace the Embarrassing and Celebrate the Cringe To Become the Bravest You Pryor, Henna | Ideapress Publishing (200 pp.) | $27.95 | Sept. 26, 2023 9781646871452

A well-researched and well-designed call to embrace awkwardness.

Creating Beauty From the Abyss: The Amazing Story of Sam Herciger, Auschwitz Survivor and Artist Richardson, Lesley Ann | Amsterdam Publishers (384 pp.) | $26.95 | $17.85 paper | April 28, 2022 | 9789493276123

A gripping, harrowing account of suffering and hard-won humanity.

Murder in Third Position Robbins, Lori | Level Best Books (260 pp.) | $16.78 paper | Nov. 22, 2022 9781685121969

A highly entertaining whodunit with a twisty plot and plenty of biting ballet intrigue.

Reef Road Royce, Deborah Goodrich | Post Hill Press (320 pp.) | $27.00 | Jan. 10, 2023 9781637584965

A truly absorbing mystery by a writer at the top of her game.

Making Friends With Monsters Rostirolla, Sandra L. | Pinkus Books (298 pp.) | $28.00 | $15.95 paper April 4, 2023 | 9780999189177 9780999189184 paper

A rich, compelling tale that deftly explores bleak themes for young readers.

This May Be Difficult To Read: But You Really Should (for Your Child’s Sake) Rubman, Claire N. | Educational & Parenting Matters (254 pp.) | $19.99 paper | Nov. 18, 2022 | 9798987086117

A wide-ranging and winningly compassionate revamping of how to think about children’s reading.

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I N D I E // B E S T B O O K S O F 2 0 2 3

To Bird or Not To Bird Russell, S.J. & Lucy Noland | Illus. by Kaity Lacy | Archimedes’ Printing Shoppe & Sundry Goodes (40 pp.) | $21.99 April 3, 2023 | 9781955517058

A great book for young nature lovers showcasing two unique ecological niches.

Copy Desk Murders Searle, Newell | Calumet Editions (268 pp.) | $18.99 paper | Jan. 26, 2023 9781959770442

A strong start to a new mystery series with a fine sense of place.

Daughters of the Occupation: A Novel of WWII Sanders, Shelly | HarperCollins (400 pp.) | $26.99 | May 3, 2022 9780063247895

A gripping historical saga that skillfully addresses the trauma of the Holocaust.

All Tomorrow’s Parties: The Velvet Underground Story Shadmi, Koren | Life Drawn (180 pp.) | $29.99 | Aug. 22, 2023 9781643375632

Lush drawings and a captivating narrative combine for a wonderful telling of the Velvet Underground story.

Finding a Place To Stand: Developing SelfReflective Institutions, Leaders and Citizens Shapiro, Edward R. | Phoenix Publishing House (204 pp.) | $34.95 paper Sept. 11, 2019 | 9781912691333

An observant, discerning work on understanding and improving organizations.

The Crypt: Shakedown Sigler, Scott | Aethon Books (585 pp.) $24.99 | Oct. 3, 2023 | 9781949890846

A high-stakes, highly entertaining interstellar adventure.

Living River: The Promise of the Mighty Colorado Showalter, Dave | Braided River (192 pp.) | $39.95 | April 15, 2023 9781680516326

An informative examination and celebration of the beautiful and endangered Colorado River and its importance for people and wildlife.

The Work: A Jigsaw Memoir Sklar, Zachary | Olive Press (214 pp.) | $19.95 paper Dec. 27, 2022 | 9781954744967

A beautifully written account of a principled life.

My Love for You Is Like a Garden

Dirt on Fire

Smetana, Laura | Flying Cardinal Press (38 pp.) | $19.99 | $13.99 paper March 1, 2023 | 9781737140962 9781737140979 paper

A vibrant, twisty, and entertaining yarn about an unlikely transplant growing deep roots.

Smith, Lonon | Manuscript

Endearing, engaging text pairs well with gorgeously executed illustrations for a joyful read.

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B E S T B O O K S O F 2 0 2 3 // I N D I E

Immortalised to Death Squire, Lyn | Level Best Books (262 pp.) | $16.95 paper | Sept. 26, 2023 9781685123581

An engaging and entertaining alternate take on a mammoth literary figure’s fate.

The Modern Management Mentor: Next-Level Tools for New Managers Stone, Christine Sandman | Wise Ink Creative Publishing (192 pp.) $22.00 paper | Sept. 12, 2023 9781634896313

A well-designed and wide-ranging primer for team management.

Bea and Honey: The Secret

Abuela’s Fideo: A Story of a Grandma’s Love

Teetsel, Claudia | Illus. by Judith Gosse BookBaby (34 pp.) | $13.99 paper Sept. 26, 2022 | 9781667855134

Tijerina, Gabriela | Del Alma Publications (40 pp.) | $16.99 $9.99 paper | Dec. 3, 2022 9781736418239 | 9781736418222 paper

A touching story to help guide young readers through grief by emphasizing love.

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A tender tale of love and food triumphing over loss.

Artefactum

The Bereaved

Tobal, J.E. | Mindstir Media (448 pp.) $19.95 paper | Nov. 11, 2022 9781958729526

Tracey, Julia Park | Sibylline Press (274 pp.) | $17.99 paper Aug. 8, 2023 | 9781736795422

Complex, conceptual speculative fiction that’s rendered with breathtaking ease.

An often painful but uplifting novel by a writer at the top of her game.

The Corroding

Trempealeau

Tracey, Ty | Self (614 pp.) | $13.99 paper Nov. 18, 2022 | 9798364364210

Umhoefer, John T. | Manuscript (395 pp.)

A complex, cinematic, engrossing horror novel with thrills and chills galore.

An unpredictable and surprising thriller.

Refugee

Uglier

Uschuk, Pamela | Red Hen Press (104 pp.) | $16.95 paper | May 10, 2022 9781636280196

Vincent, Kelly | Self (360 pp.) $12.99 paper | July 31, 2023 9781958342114

A mordantly tender triumph rich with natural imagery.

A powerfully moving YA novel that will hopefully enlighten as much as it entertains.

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Libretto Wadsworth, Ann | Wheatmark (356 pp.) $36.95 | Sept. 22, 2022 | 9781627879873

A leisurely, moving tale of intimacy and art with a lovingly drawn Italian setting.

Rearranged: An Opera Singer’s Facial Cancer and Life Transposed Watt, Kathleen | Heliotrope Books (384 pp.) | $22.00 paper Oct. 10, 2023 | 9781956474343

A heart-rending journey recalled with lucidity and poise.

Echoes From the Hocker House Watts, Virginia | Devil’s Party Press (237 pp.) | Nov. 17, 2023

Entrancing, edgy, and melodramatic tales with a palpable bite.

Apsara Whitfield, Pearl | PonderosaSage (433 pp.) | $8.30 paper | Dec. 23, 2021 9798784990266

A captivating tale of survival and love full of rich period details.

Firefly Lullaby Weiss, Karen | Tricycle Books (32 pp.) | Dec. 15, 2023 9781737586906 | 9781737586920 paper

An enchanting debut that captures the magic of nighttime backyard music.

Good News, Bad News, Who Can Tell?

Ed. by Worth, Don | Archway Publishing | (268 pp.) | $15.34 $17.99 paper | Nov. 6, 2022 9781665730709 | 9781665730716 paper

A novel, thought-provoking angle on the recent world health crisis.

True Stories of the Philosophical Theater Yerucham, S. | XlibrisUS (792 pp.) $37.14 | $32.99 paper | Jan. 10, 2023 9781669857310 | 9781669857303 paper

A brilliantly written nonfiction account of a man’s search for meaning in the odd picaresque of his life.

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Young, Alison | Center Street/ Hachette (352 pp.) | $21.38 April 25, 2023 | 9781546002932

A hard-hitting and timely report on a pervasive threat.

Adela Zamudio: Selected Poetry & Prose

Adventures of Takuan From Koto

Zamudio, Adela | Trans. by Lynette Yetter Fuente Fountain Books (320 pp.) | $29.95 paper | July 4, 2022 | 9780984375677

Zhong, Ryu | Anno Ruini Books (549 pp.) | $20.99 | $15.99 paper Aug. 6, 2023 | 9789083346007 9789083346014 paper

Confident, stirring writing by a prescient poet.

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Pandora’s Gamble: Lab Leaks, Pandemics, and a World at Risk

A rapidly expanding quest with a seemingly endless supply of mischief and surprises.

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Fresh, warm books for giving and sharing.

Artwork from The Voice in the Hollow

QR TK

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Illustration © 2023 by Will Hillenbrand

Visit here for books perfect for gift giving!

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I N D I E // Q & A

MEET THE AUTHORS includes every kind of book imaginable, from children’s picture books and poetry collections to graphic novels and hard-hitting nonfiction, along with plenty of fiction and autobiography, of course. We emailed the authors of four of these books to learn a bit more about their work.

Husband-and-wife authors Yajaida and Michelson Aristhyl often draw inspiration from their rich cultural heritage.

Yajaida is from the Dominican Republic, while Michelson is from Haiti, and the two play music and cook foods from their countries of origin. (They now live and work in Lee County, Florida.) A desire to share their heritage with the world led to their picture book, La Casita Hispaniola, illustrated by Brittany Gonzalez, the story of a young girl who celebrates both her parents’ cultures.

Journalist and author Roslyn Bernstein, who has written about art and culture for a variety of publications including Guernica and Tablet, drew on personal experience to write her novel The Girl Who Counted Numbers. The narrative follows a first-generation New York City teenager on a trip in the early 1960s to Israel, where she absorbs the vivid sights and sounds of a young nation teeming with ghosts.

In 2012, after his father suffered a stroke, Alan Corcoran ran 35 marathons in 35 consecutive days around his home country of Ireland. He raised €15,000 for charity and found the material for his debut memoir, Marathon Man. After his father died of cancer in 2016, Alan set out to swim the length of Ireland. He completed this feat in 2019, raising an additional €30,000 for charity. He chronicles the adventure in his new book, Unsinkable: Cancer, Five Boats, and My 500 710-Kilometre Sea Swim, as well as in a 2022 film he co-directed.

Donna Gordon’s debut novel, What Ben Franklin Would Have Told Me, packs an emotional wallop: Lee, a young history buff in the late 1970s suffering from progeria, has a life expectancy that does not extend into adulthood. While on an educational trip to Washington, D.C., Lee learns the history of his caretaker, Tomás, an Argentinian whose wife and child number among that country’s Disappeared. The pair form an unlikely investigative partnership, hoping to reunite Tomás with his family.

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ROSLYN BERNSTEIN

What was the real-life inspiration for the story in your novel?

In 1961, when I was a college student at Brandeis University, I joined a group of social science students for a trip to Israel. The goal was to understand the dynamics of a young country: its politics, its economics, and its people, many of whom were survivors

Aristhyls: Jessica Bunger and Michael Von Pick/Evoke Studio; Bernstein: Glenda F. Hydler

OUR EDITORS’ LIST of the Best Indie Books of 2023

YAJAIDA AND MICHELSON ARISTHYL

What inspired this story?

We wanted to create a book to teach young children about the beauty of diversity and inclusion, all while highlighting our own family’s culture and traditions. In it, we also wanted to express our desire for our countries, Haiti and the Dominican Republic, to find

Photo Credit goes here

Get to know some of the creators behind this year’s best Indie books. BY TOM BEER

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Q & A // II N ND D II E E peace and solidarity despite their history of turmoil.

In the book, you explain that food tells a story about the countries you’re from. Why did you choose to highlight these dishes?

In our culture, like in many others, love is expressed through food. The dishes we chose to highlight are the most traditional in our cultures and also our favorites. In both Haiti and

Photo Credit goes here

from the Holocaust. The country was just beginning to welcome new immigrants.

Since I understood Hebrew, I spent my time eavesdropping on [people’s] conversations—life in the concentration camps and the struggles of immigrants who worked in construction and as housekeepers.

Everyone was talking about the Adolf Eichmann trial.

Did you do research on the trial, or did you decide to rely on your own memories?

While I relied heavily on my memories of the 1961 Israel trip, I researched many aspects of the Eichmann trial: books and articles about the concentration camps, and newspaper

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the Dominican Republic, when we were growing up, shopping for a meal meant going to the market to buy fresh ingredients. You got to see, taste, and smell all the different fruits, vegetables, and spices. You also got to see the goats and chickens, and you could pick which one would be taken home.

Then began the actual cooking process, which has so many steps that seemed tedious as children, but we learned that each step guaranteed deliciousness in every bite. Finally came sitting together with family to enjoy the feast and share stories that we have always cherished. We’ve continued this tradition with our family

accounts of personal testimonies. Particularly valuable in my research were Deborah E. Lipstadt’s The Eichmann Trial and Hannah Arendt’s Eichmann in Jerusalem. Another valuable resource was the exhibit The Capture and Trial of Adolf Eichmann at the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City, which featured the glass booth he was tried in.

Can you tell us something about the striking photograph on the cover?

A colleague suggested that I look through the archives of the Israel Museum, where he had seen the work of Liselotte Grschebina, a German Jewish photographer.

so we don’t lose these great traditions and opportunities to come closer.

Music is a big part of the book, too. Can you talk about the role it plays in your lives?

Not only are we both part of families of musicians, but we are musicians ourselves, and we play in a band, Karibbean Groove, sharing the music of our countries.

We play reggae, kompa, souk, merengue, and salsa to celebrate all the sounds of the Caribbean. We play in our town and all over the state in many culture festivals. Currently, we’re working on an original song for our book.

Born in 1908, Grschebina closed her studio just before Hitler came to power and immigrated to Palestine in 1934. Her work appealed to me because it was in the style of the Bauhaus school, with diagonals and shadows. The cover photo I chose (Untitled, 1960) was perfect for my novel—a young girl dressed in black against white buildings, a girl searching for something or someone.

What were some of the highlights of promoting the book this year?

In addition to Zoom events and podcasts, I gave many in-person talks at public libraries in SoHo, Greenwich Village, and Monticello, New

Were you able to do live events for the book this year? Any memorable highlights?

This year we did over 10 live events at schools and libraries across our city and are scheduled to do many more in 2024. At each event, we do craft time, where the children and [their families] create a musical instrument, and after we read, we teach them how to play it and dance to music from both countries. Our favorite moments, besides the music, are seeing how excited the crowd is to learn the different Creole and Spanish words we teach them during the reading.

—M.D.

York, and at the Tribeca Synagogue. Tablet’s executive editor, Wayne Hoffman, did an excellent segment with me on the Unorthodox podcast, which focused on the theme of secrets. We talked about the twists and surprises in my novel. Especially memorable to me was being named a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award for Debut Fiction.—T.B.

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I N D I E // Q & A

DONNA GORDON

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their passions drove me to create Marathon Man and Unsinkable. If I can entertain and make people laugh or cry along the way, that’s a bonus.

who had progeria. Around the same time, I was involved with a project with Amnesty International. I met people from all over the world, people who had been imprisoned and tortured for so-called crimes against the government. Two of the people I met were from Argentina and had been among the Disappeared under the dictatorship of Jorge Videla during what came to be known as the Dirty War, which lasted from 1976 to 1983. People were being picked up off the street and separated from their families.

Disappeared in Argentina?

Issues of time connected the two characters: For Lee it was accelerated time, and for Tomás it was lost time. I knew if I put them in a room, they would begin to need one another.

What inspired you to tell your story in both a book and a film?

I read a book about multistage sea swimming, and the challenge intrigued me: I dreamt of swimming the length of Ireland. When my dad died of cancer, that

What was the original idea that started you working on the book?

Two experiences converged to bring Lee and Tomás together in my story. I had volunteered at a camp in Sebago, Maine, for kids who had life-threatening illnesses and their parents. I met a boy

What inspired you to connect Lee’s story with Tomás’ struggle and the

What was the writing experience like?

I’m an urban planner by profession, used to writing within the confines of structured descriptive reports. I found the creative freedom of memoir writing to be challenging, fun, and exciting. I’d caught the bug and had a fire in my belly to build on my experience and develop my writing and publishing skills with Unsinkable. I took about three months off [from] writing while promoting Marathon

Your story is set in the late 1970s—was it a challenge to re-create that world on the page?

Yes! I made two trips to Washington, D.C., to get to know the neighborhoods of Dupont Circle and Georgetown, along with Ford’s Theatre, where Lincoln was assassinated and where some key scenes were set. I made time and distance calculations for driving, walking, and taking buses. I felt

Photo Credit goes here Corcoran: David Murphy; Gordon: Margaret Lampert

ALAN CORCORAN

adventure pulled me in like a whirlpool. In all likelihood, my most significant achievements wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for the experiences of others—the distance running of Eddie Izzard, Terry Fox, Dean Karnazes, and Gerry Duffy, shared through inspiring films and books. The idea that sharing my stories might encourage others to pursue

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Man and then dove headfirst into creating Unsinkable.

Who is the ideal reader for your book?

My story will probably resonate most with readers affected by cancer, people who’ve lost loved ones, those who want uplifting stories, swimmers, adventure lovers, and people intrigued by the ins and outs of accomplishing a challenging goal—with an Irish slant on it.

Were you able to do live events for the book this year?

Any memorable highlights?

Sadly, I had to publish Marathon Man in isolation during Covid. It was extra special to experience my first in-person

book launch for Unsinkable, sharing stories and beers with friends in Canmore, Alberta.

What book (or books) published in 2023 were among your favorites?

The Comfort Crisis: Embrace Discomfort To Reclaim Your Wild, Happy, Healthy Self by Michael Easter; Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey; Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design by Charles Montgomery; and The Psychology of Money: Timeless Lessons on Wealth, Greed, and Happiness by Morgan Housel are recent reads I’ve enjoyed.

—KATHERINE KING

different from the norm. I’ve been surprised by the fact that men and women of all ages have enjoyed the book.

Photo Credit goes here

like I was in the landscape, experiencing it all with them.

I’m also a visual artist, and I spent a lot of time trying to put myself into a given space and letting myself describe it carefully.

Who is the ideal reader for your book?

An ideal reader might be someone who’s struggling with being different, or who perceives her/himself to be

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What book (or books) were among your favorites in 2023?

Western Lane by Chetna Maroo; this novel’s about squash, and I’m an avid tennis player.

All-Night Pharmacy by Ruth Madievsky, The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese, Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. There are too many to name. And I like to pay attention to the books coming out from indie publishers!

—ARTHUR SMITH

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Indie COMBING THROUGH our Best of Indie list is always an interesting end-of-year exercise. Which trend percolated through our sample size of 100 books in 2023? Stewardship, a call for protection of all of Earth’s flora and fauna. Whether that means encouraging action, managing limited resources, or exposing potential harm, the books that captured Indie reviewers’ and editors’ attention this year focused on repairing the world.

Pandora’s Gamble: Lab Leaks, Pandemics, and a World at Risk (2023) catalogs the ways governments all over the world gamble with people’s lives by studying and experimenting with viruses and bacteria in labs with poor safety

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protocols. Alison Young, an investigative journalist, cites numerous laboratory leaks and accidents, including a 1978 smallpox outbreak at a lab in Britain, a 1979 anthrax release from a Soviet bioweapons lab, contaminated wastewater leaks at a U.S. Army research institute in 2018, and on and on. The author lists the various ways lab safeguards fail— equipment malfunctions, aging pipes, breaches in biohazard suits, and plain old stupidity (Young found one containment-lab door shut with duct tape). Our reviewer calls Pandora’s Gamble “a hard-hitting and timely report.”

Shannon Cram outlines the colossal failure of the U.S. government to

properly manage nuclear cleanup in Unmaking the Bomb: Environmental Cleanup and the Politics of Impossibility (2023). Cram, an associate professor in the School of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at the University of Washington Bothell, focuses on the Hanford site in eastern Washington state, a 580-square-mile decommissioned nuclear complex the New York Times has described as “the largest and most contaminated of all the weapons production sites.”

Kirkus’ reviewer notes, “In prose that’s both calm and solidly grounded in cited research, Cram presents a flatly devastating book about egregious mismanagement at the Hanford site and, more broadly, about the United States government’s calculation of risk in the field of nuclear waste disposal.”

Pamela Uschuk’s poetry collection Refugee (2023) portrays the overlapping effects of social injustice, illness, and climate change alongside the beauty of woods and waterways: “Feel the warmth of an otter’s last dive / before ice takes the river. Police sirens / fade like contrails across the exhausted heart of this land.” In another poem, Uschuk “ingeniously juxtaposes the migration of

the monarch butterfly with the emigration of people from Central America,” says Kirkus’ reviewer, who calls the work a “spellbindingly compassionate collection rooted in the belief that redemption remains possible.”

In Living River: The Promise of the Mighty Colorado (2023), author and photographer Dave Showalter makes the case for the immediate protection of one of this country’s most essential and beloved resources, the Colorado River system.

More than 40 million people, multiple ecosystems, and two countries depend on the river. Nearly all of the Unites States’ winter agriculture is grown using water from the massive system, whose water rights are dictated by laws created more than 100 years ago.

The author provides his own perspective and those of other experts “to vividly portray the beauty and diversity of the lands along the river’s 1,450-mile journey,” according to our review. Showalter provides “an informative examination and celebration of the beautiful and endangered Colorado River and its importance for people and wildlife.”

Chaya Schechner is the president of Kirkus Indie.

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

TRENDSPOTTING IN 2023

CHAYA SCHECHNER

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INDIE

EDITOR’S PICK Colón offers an inspirational memoir about escaping a dreadful childhood to become a successful entertainer in the late 20th century.

The author’s family was from Puerto Rico, but she felt estranged from any Latine identity while growing up in the Bronx. When she was not yet 4 years old, her father put her in an orphanage and had her mother committed.

Colón unsuccessfully tried to run away from the institution and lived at the home until she was a teenager.

She reports enduring both physical abuse and cruel punishments; when she wet the bed, she remembers having to kneel on the floor with the wet sheet wrapped around her head.

The author was able to see the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall and take dance classes, which put her on a path to becoming a performer. She was accepted

These Titles Earned the Kirkus Star

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into the High School of Performing Arts and was able to live with a foster family starting in 1970.

Colón began performing, and, to escape her status of being a ward of the state (which would have continued until she was 21), she married her boyfriend when she turned 18. She left him due to his violent behavior and went on tour for six months with the No, No, Nanette company. By 1983, Colón had returned to New York, where she worked her way up to being a Rockette for the 1990 Christmas Spectacular. The author’s story is dramatic and compelling, boasting many twists and appearances by celebrities such as Freddie Prinze and Chita Rivera.

Colón engagingly describes dancing at lunchtime in high school (as in the movie Fame) and auditioning for Bob Fosse (“He stared up at

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Lilly

By Lillian Colón

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Cold Record

By Eric Ferguson

Lilly: The First Latina Rockette Colón, Lillian | Self | 216 pp. | $34.99 $24.99 paper | Sept. 26, 2023 9781737971818 | 9781737971825 paper

the balcony, arms crossed, cigarette still in his right hand, as he said, ‘Would you ask her to do a double pirouette, please?’”); she also nicely conveys how she acquired a strong sense of self-preservation as well as a Latine identity (while dancing with The Latins).

Each hardship brought

a new realization that propelled her on to success—she describes her heartbreaking mistakes and inspiring developments honestly and movingly.

A thoughtful account of personal discovery and the pursuit of dancing dreams in ’70s and ’80s America.

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Sister

By Leia M. Johnson; illus. by S.J. Winkler

153

Love Lifted Me

By William C. Noble

For more Indie content, visit Kirkus online.

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II N ND D II E E

Journey To Merveilleux City Barbé Hammer, Stephanie | Picture Show Press (226 pp.) | $15.99 paper Oct. 2, 2023 | 9798985069037

When a passenger seems to disappear during a surreal train journey to Quebec, a group of strangers comes together to work out what happened in Barbé Hammer’s mystery.

Worlds collide in this novel set aboard a train headed across the United States to Quebec, bound for the titular city. Mack, a teacher-in-training and bagpipe musician of mixed Scottish/Salvadoran heritage, is on his way to a piping convention when he meets Allison, a no-nonsense goth girl who has twisted her ankle while on the train. While the two seem immediately at odds (Allison’s brusque personality rubs Mack the wrong way; he asks Allison if she fell “out of [her] black leather post-punk stroller” as a child), when Allison reports that the elderly man she befriended on board has vanished, Mack agrees to help her find him. They encounter a sweep of eclectic characters, including Jimmy, an Evangelical rodeo star; Joe, a former congressman and actor / Afghanistan vet / Princeton graduate; and a Chinese social media influencer documenting her trip across the United States. “We have not seen any guns,” comically notes the culture-shocked influencer, who goes by May-Bel, in one of her vlogs. Despite Allison’s and Mack’s efforts, which include enlisting the help of the congressman and May-Bel, no one seems to be able to confirm that the old man even exists. Heavily referencing classic films and novels like Murder on the Orient Express and The Lady Vanishes, Barbé Hammer crafts a sly, satiric story that takes the tropes of a trainset whodunit and brings them into the 21st century, exploring themes of race and discrimination (one of the narrators is a Black female writer, 142 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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who reflects on her position in society and in the narrative), psychology, and spirituality. While the characters’ introductions feel heavy-handed, and the author’s depictions of characters can be cliched—particularly in the case of the eye-liner-bedecked Allison—the author succeeds in delivering a fastpaced and deceptively complicated novel that balances suspense and social commentary. Some readers may find the novel’s quirks off-putting, but those who climb aboard will enjoy the winding journey.

Satire meets mystery in this entertaining update of Hitchcock and Agatha Christie.

Parallel Secrets Barrs, ML | Wild Rose Press (352 pp.) $18.99 paper | Sept. 25, 2023 9781509249787

In Barrs’ novel, a former reporter investigates the case of a missing 10-year-old girl.

When young Rose Willwood disappears from the central Missouri town of Walkers Corner, the various alerts that result attract the attention of unemployed reporter Vicky Robeson. She was fired three months ago from her job at a local TV news station and is currently enjoying her unstructured time with her boyfriend, Pete Harris, in Colorado, but she has a history with Walkers Corner. Nine years earlier, she worked on the story of a little girl named Lisa Dee, who’d been found walking alone, covered in blood, very close to where Rose recently went missing. Wondering if there’s a connection between the two cases—and seeking some kind of closure—Vicky and Pete travel to the small town, where a massive search is underway to find the missing girl (and where, as Vicky reflects, “she’d lived when everything in her life jumped tracks”). Once in town, Vicky reconnects with her former newsroom colleague Kerry James to

bring herself up to speed on the case; the more she investigates, the more she seems to be putting herself in danger.

Barrs unfolds her tale with practiced ease, deploying an effective array of red herrings to keep readers guessing along the way. She also increases the narrative tension by periodically shifting the point of view. As a result, readers get to hear from a variety of perspectives, including the little girls themselves, and the sometimes-conflicting tales feature tiny extra clues scattered throughout.

As characters, Vicky and Pete occasionally feel underdeveloped, but readers will nevertheless become involved in Vicky’s quest for personal redemption.

A moody and effective missing-person mystery-thriller.

American Ringer Benning, Alan | FriesenPress (288 pp.) | $21.99 paper | Oct. 6, 2023 9781039178014

A scammer working multiple cons in the late 1980s discovers the dangers of swindling gone wrong in Benning’s thriller.

Richard Montrose, on the cusp of 40, exudes confidence, dressing in Savile Row suits and succeeding in business with a keen mind that leans hard into dishonesty. The Brit also has a showstopper girlfriend, Jennifer Peterson, who’s fond of wearing transparent blouses, with buttons either strained or undone, and pink miniskirts that show off her sculpted, tanned legs. Richard has his crooked fingers in a lot of pies. He is big into horseracing; his horse, Vagabond, runs at Ascot. He also has a car dealership, and a property development company with offices in England and Spain. His business pursuits often suffer cash flow problems, which he solves with creative bookkeeping.

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to Barcelona to check on his Montrose Village property development.

There they meet Richard’s friend and employee, Juan Constantine, who tells Richard that Mafia head Fernando Vergara wants to become his business partner. Things soon fall apart for Richard on multiple levels when Dodson is arrested on a fraud charge and violence accompanies Vergara’s demands. Richard and Jennifer are flawed, sexy, compelling characters who remain likable in spite of their moral bankruptcy. Scenes move at a fast clip, and the location descriptions are travelogue-perfect. The bad guys are truly evil, and some characters are tortured in over-the-top ways that may turn off some readers. But the prose can be delightful, as when Jennifer meets Juan’s stunning wife: “Jennifer was not used to competition of such quality.”

An international thriller with a strong start, a quick pace, and a finish that’s in the money.

The Connection Playbook: A Practical Guide to Building Deep, Meaningful, Harmonious Relationships Chaleff, Andy | Meaningful Relations (282 pp.) | $19.95 paper | Sept. 19, 2023 9798988572015

Chaleff presents a thoughtful guide on how to forge new connections and improve existing ones.

Human connection is fundamental to survival, so it’s vital to know how to build these meaningful and necessary bonds.

In this book, the author presents readers with a “playbook” for how to navigate connections in their everyday lives. He uses personal anecdotes and concrete and familiar real-world examples to explain his ideas, resulting in a straightforward read. The book is organized around six distinct concepts, each contained in its own KIRKUS REVIEWS

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section: “The Essential Conditions for Connection,” “Connection Killers,” “Opening the Door to Connection,” “Creating Context for Deepening Connection,” “Advanced Skills for Deepening Connection,” and “Navigating Tricky Connections.” Although these sections build on one another as the book goes on, readers can easily skip around and read what piques their interest. At the end of each section, Chaleff features exercises that allow readers to apply what they’ve just learned to their own lives; those who complete these are likely to get the most out of this book. (They may also explore chapter-recap videos, accessible via QR codes.) Chaleff’s clear love of formulas, coupled with his conversational storytelling tone, has the effect of inviting readers into his discussions, which never feel like lectures. As he puts it, the book’s core idea is that “If we can’t see how we create barriers between ourselves and others, we have no way of dealing with those barriers….Love, compassion, and connection…are our natural state when we remove the barriers that prevent us from living in that state.” In a world that’s slowly emerging from the Covid19 pandemic, during which many people struggled with building and maintaining relationships, this book is a must-read.

A book that offers pertinent and practical connection-building advice in an easily digestible format.

Eclipse Arts Chastaine, Michelle | Self (138 pp.) $7.99 paper | Aug. 8, 2023 | 9798851778728

Seventh graders strive to follow their dreams at a magical school for the arts in Chastaine’s middle-grade novel.

A story in the magical boarding school vein with its own thoughtful approach, this lively fantasy, the first in a series, is well grounded in

real-life concerns, including pressures from peers and parents, shaky self-confidence, and the importance of self-advocacy. Liska, Ephy, and Airin have just started seventh grade at the Eclipse Supernatural School for the Arts, where the students and faculty include witches, ghosts, phantoms, and even a Christmas elf.

Liska is a shifter, able to take on the form of a fox. Ephy, from Olympia, is half-human, half-goddess. Airin is a banshee. All three face parental disapproval or disdain for their chosen artistic fields: Liska’s father insists that she carry on the family tradition of dance, but Liska is determined to study music; Airin, a subservient protector of the Darklighter family of enchanters, hopes to become a singer; and Ephy’s unloving mother (“who only smiled for photos”) pressures her to emulate her favored demigod brother’s TV and social media celebrity, but Ephy wants to use her light-shaping ability in the theater.

Some of the colorful fantasy elements could use additional fleshing out (what is actually taught in the “Unlivables” class for friendly Ghosts and Ghouls?), but the author’s empathy for young people struggling to follow their own paths despite internal and external challenges resonates, starting with the novel’s dedication to “anyone who has ever felt like they didn’t quite fit in” (this empathy is underscored when, as a simple, everyday courtesy, the characters introduce themselves to each other with their preferred pronouns). Friendships with like-minded peers and a few supportive adults make a difference, as does a defining moment in which Liska, Ephy, and Airin work together to create an original, autobiographical musical performance for a school competition. The novel’s third-person narration alternates perspectives between the three main characters— and intriguingly touches on a fourth when exploring what drives arrogant cellist Oliver Darklighter to bully Airin without excusing his behavior.

Supernatural preteens face relatable challenges in this deftly balanced fantasy tale.

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A Better Message (in a Mess-Age): Vol. 1: Audio Optometry Coleman, Michael | multi-SENSE (252 pp.) | $21.99 paper | Nov. 8, 2022 9798987054901

Coleman urges advertisers to up their game with ads that tell compelling stories in this primer.

The author, a radio creative production director and advertising professional, surveys the contemporary advertising landscape, in which consumers are constantly bombarded with information; commercials have about five seconds, he estimates, to make an impression before they’re skipped over and forgotten. Coleman advises advertisers to eschew the polished, empty verbiage of traditional adspeak and to avoid frenetic overselling. “Bad ads,” he observes, “use a glut of laser beam sound effects, explosions… processed phrases from filtered and equalized voices, flashing lights, and pretty faces to distract us, ramming as much information down our throats as possible.”

Instead, the author suggests that companies connect with audiences through emotionally resonant, open-ended dialogues, like the classic ice-breaker pitch, “What would you do for a Klondike Bar?” Drawing on his radio background, Coleman emphasizes “audio optometry,” meaning sound design that evokes visual images—a sizzle that conjures steaks on a grill, for example. He continues with a soup-to-nuts discussion of advertising principles, including fundamentals (an ad’s most important task is hammering home the company’s name, so consumers remember it); proper ad targeting (no lip gloss commercials on football broadcasts); the nuances of copywriting (he explains why “unique” sounds better than “different” and “guarantee” sounds better than “promise”); and the loftiest of marketing philosophies (he enjoins corporate branding strategists to ask the question, “Why does your company 144 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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A thought-provoking and satisfying romance for readers who love happy endings.

BRIGHTEST LIGHT OF SUNSHINE

exist?”). Coleman contextualizes all of this material with interesting dives into neurology and language processing and proffers practical advice on even the most abstruse topics—he asserts that funny ads should have “a comedic rise in tension building to a compelling surprise”—all conveyed in tart, punchy prose (running an incompetent ad is like “writing your brand name on a tennis ball, then hurling it at people’s heads as they walk by”). Marketing managers and advertising agencies will find wonderfully readable insights into their trade here.

An entertaining, no-nonsense guide for connecting with consumers.

Potatoes for Pirate Pearl

Concepcion, Jennifer | Illus. by Chloe Burgett | Feeding Minds Press (40 pp.) $18.99 | Sept. 19, 2023 | 9781948898157

Concepcion’s illustrated children’s book tells a story about farming and friendship.

Pirate Pearl is an accomplished seafarer, but she feels the food aboard her ship—hardtack biscuits—could be improved. Spotting land, she hops into a small raft with her parrot, Petunia, and paddles to shore. After a long journey, the pirate spots a huge red barn; tuckered out, she collapses but quickly finds herself hoisted into a wheelbarrow by Farmer Fay. The new acquaintance gives Pearl potato soup, which rejuvenates her. Dazzled by this new food, the pirate wishes to be shown the entire potato-growing process. She learns what vitamins potatoes contain, and she’s shocked by various types of farm technology, including sprinklers and tractors. Farmer Fay is kind

enough to let Pearl drive the tractor and then explains how potatoes signal that they’re ready to be harvested by dropping their flowers. Pearl wonders if she could grow them aboard her pirate ship and then becomes intrigued by the fact that potatoes can be eaten in many different ways. The next morning, Pearl’s reluctant to leave the farm, but she takes a bunch of potatoes back to her ship and embarks on a new journey. Over the course of this book, Conception delivers an appealing and informative story as Pearl makes new discoveries and a new friend. Burgett’s full-color cartoon illustrations are lighthearted and adorable; Pearl is portrayed with pale skin, and Farmer Fay is an older woman of color with light-brown skin. In a lovely touch that evokes the style of a graphic novel, some spreads include scrolls, used as illustration text inserts. Back matter includes helpful recipes and information about growing potatoes on one’s own. With luck, more agricultural adventures for Pirate Pearl will be on the horizon.

A sweet, well-developed tale that will entice and educate young readers.

Brightest Light of Sunshine Coney, Lisina | (480 pp.) | $16.99 paper Dec. 19, 2023 | 9798987758342

Sparks fly as two friends searching for peace and stability find each other in Coney’s debut romance novel.

Twenty-twoyear-old Grace Allen is in her final year as an English major in college when she walks into a tattoo shop in search of adornment for her KIRKUS REVIEWS

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ribs. Though she chickens out, she does meet Samuel Callaghan, known as Cal, the tattoo parlor owner and a caring, gentle giant who later intervenes when Grace is accosted by a sleazy guy at a party. Cal and Grace become friends, slowly unveiling their past trauma to each other and inserting themselves into each other’s lives. Four years earlier, Grace was assaulted, and she has been trying to rebuild and cope with her anxiety ever since. Cal grew up with an alcoholic mother and is now acting as a father figure for his little sister, Maddie. The author alternates narrative perspectives between Cal and Grace, exploring their emotions as they begin to feel more for each other than just friendship, making the story well paced and exciting. It’s an archetypical friends-to-lovers romance, but the familiarity of the trope does not mean Coney falls into cliche; instead, through misunderstandings and the complexities of human emotions, the story has the reader yearning for happiness for both of the main characters, who help each other to grow and change while gaining greater independence in their lives. In particular, Coney’s depiction of Grace’s growing confidence—gained through teaching ballet and writing her own children’s book for a college class—makes for a compelling journey, reassuring the character (and any reader who has experienced similar trauma) “that the soil [she has] been planted in is fertile enough to make [her] bloom under any circumstances.” This novel may be a romance at heart, but it is as much about moving on from adversity—without pretending it can be forgotten—as it is a love story.

A thought-provoking and satisfying romance for readers who love happy endings.

Beauty in the Beast: Flora, Fauna, and Endangered Species of Artist Ralph Burke Tyree Cook, C.J. with Paige Herbert | South Pacific Dreams Publishing (256 pp.) $39.95 | Nov. 7, 2023 | 9780998422466

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A collection of paintings centers on endangered animals.

During World War II, Ralph Burke Tyree was deployed to Samoa, an island in the South Pacific, and he became enchanted with its “idyllic beauty.” In fact, he loved it so much he moved his family there for years, later taking up residence on Guam and Hawaii (Oahu, Maui, and the Big Island).

Beginning in the late 1960s, he turned his attention to flora, especially passion flowers, magnolias, and hibiscuses. In the last 10 years of his life—he died in 1979—his preoccupation was the depiction of animals, “celebrating creatures big and small, common and endangered, and local and foreign.”

His principal focus was endangered or threatened animal populations—he made a concerted effort not just to capture their feral beauty, but also to raise public awareness about their vulnerability. Cook and Paige Herbert (the artist’s granddaughter) reproduce in this gorgeous assemblage of vividly colored works dozens of Tyree’s paintings from the last decade of his life. The authors include an edifying running commentary that not only discusses the paintings themselves and Tyree’s evolving artistic techniques, but also the animals depicted and the extent to which their populations are imperiled. And while Tyree’s stunning portrayals of animals are the book’s primary emphasis, the authors feature an impressive variety of works beyond that category, including portraits of people and depictions of plants and flowers. The heart of the volume is the paintings themselves, which are startlingly vibrant—saturated colors take on a striking depth and texture when Tyree paints with oil on French silk black velvet. A foreword was contributed by the artist’s daughter, Marda Tyree Herbert, who furnishes a loving tribute to her father’s devotion to his work and his “creative genius.” The authors’ mastery of the subject is magisterial—this book is a remarkable feat of

artistic scholarship. For those who are already familiar with Tyree’s massive body of work as well as those who have never heard of him, this volume is a visually arresting portal into his mature paintings.

A beautiful art book filled with rigorously researched commentary.

Finding Home: (Hungary, 1945) Cycon, Dean | Koehler Books (378 pp.) | $19.79 paper | June 13, 2023 9798888240755

In Cycon’s historical novel, six concentration camp survivors return to their small town in Hungary.

Descending onto the platform from the “Special Train” with trepidation, an emaciated group of six—five men and one 18-year-old girl—stare warily at the group of policemen sent to greet the ragtag remnants of the town’s Jewish community, who were deported to Auschwitz one year earlier. They are Yossel Roth, the baker; Oskar Lazar, the butcher; the brothers Mendel and Herschel Fischer, both farmworkers; Eva Fleiss, a student pianist; and Naftali Nachman, a Hassid from Kosveg, an Orthodox community just outside town. Their loved ones were all murdered and their spirits and bodies were brutalized in Auschwitz.

Still, they retain the hope of recapturing a semblance of normalcy in the town they called home—only to discover that everything they once possessed has been taken from them in their absence. Yossel’s bakery now belongs to the underling who worked for him, and Oskar’s butcher shop has been appropriated as well. Naftali returns to Kosveg and discovers that all of the houses in the tiny community have been destroyed. When Eva walks to her father’s beautiful house and knocks on the door, it is opened by the mayor’s wife, dressed DECEMBER 15, 2023 145

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A diverting horror comedy that makes way for an absorbing coming-of -age story.

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in the clothes and jewelry that once belonged to Eva’s mother. Historically and dramatically compelling, Cycon’s multilayered narrative unspools the under-reported story of endemic postwar antisemitism. The story is lifted by a bit of mysticism and a philosophical debate about the restorative power of music. The plot is propelled by Eva’s determination, despite her unspeakable losses, to take her place in Budapest’s prestigious Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music. In one of Cycon’s most indelible character portrayals, readers learn that Eva maintained her sanity during nine months of horror in the death camp by playing an imaginary piano (“This is what I would play when the trains arrived and I saw the people...herded into the gas chambers”), her fingers flying across her mattress, ringing out notes only she could hear.

A haunting, emotionally challenging read, with frightening contemporary relevance.

My Mischievous Wheelchair David, Molly | Illus. by Solomiia | Semper Grata Publishing (38 pp.) | $21.99 | $12.99 paper | Nov. 8, 2023 | 9781957696263 9781957696270 paper

A youngster uses a wheelchair that has a mind of its own in David’s picture book.

Grace is a little girl with pale skin and brown hair who wears a heart-shaped pendant necklace. After she works hard on her schoolwork to be named student of the month, her 146 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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wheelchair starts misbehaving. First, in class, the wheelchair starts speaking out of turn, asking Grace’s classmates and friends questions, and the teacher notices: “Grace, remember to raise your hand to talk. It’s not polite to disrupt the class.” The wheelchair also makes her late to the library, invades the teachers’ lounge, and throws paper airplanes in class. Later, it apologizes and says, “Everyone notices you and talks to you, but nobody notices me or interacts with me. That hurts my feelings.” So, Grace gets her friends involved in helping to decorate the wheelchair with streamers and paint.

Solomiia’s full-page, full-color cartoon illustrations don’t always match the story in a meaningful way; for example, the first page shows an unnamed girl in front of a world map, while the text introduces Grace’s excitement about possibly becoming student of the month. The text itself is minimal, consisting of occasional brief descriptions amid dialogue. The story is entertaining throughout, however, and the relationship between Grace and her wheelchair is especially dynamic.

A diverting tale about an emotional wheelchair.

The Dirt Girl Dee, Jodi | Illus. by Jodi Dee, Sara Roche & Ed Espitia | Self (32 pp.) | $17.99 Feb. 14, 2019 | 9780998527703

A nature-loving girl is at first treated as an outcast, then accepted by her peers in Dee’s picture book.

Red-haired, pale-skinned Zafera is often covered with dirt. She

weaves flowers and leaves into her hair and carries her school supplies in a wicker basket. She’s eager to go to school with other children for the first time, but she’s immediately met with teasing: “Why do you have twigs in your hair?” one child demands; the socially inexperienced protagonist accepts that this must just be the way children play. Zafera generously invites all the children to her birthday party, where they discover that her whole lifestyle is built around nature. Soon, even the popular girls are wearing sticks in their hair, wanting to be more like Zafera. While the message of accepting others who live differently is solid, the idea that everyone will “see your light,” as Dee puts it, feels like a dubious promise. Although the children’s about-face is a stretch, and Zafera’s perpetual good nature in the face of cruelty feels implausible, the beauty and wonder of Zafera’s home, in tune with the Earth around her, is lovingly depicted. The digital illustrations by Dee, Roche, and Espitia are brightly lit and boldly colorful, creating a strong contrast between the regimented world of the school and Zafera’s nature-centric home.

A beautiful book that stretches believability.

Eddie and the Vegetarian Vampire Desmond, Dennis M. | Saguaro Books (250 pp.) | $30.99 | $14.99 paper Feb. 28, 2023 | 9781736696781 9798831437607 paper

A young orphan in World War II–era Boston befriends a surprisingly genial vampire in Desmond’s debut middlegrade comedy.

Eddie is perfectly fine with being sent to a cell in the basement of the orphanage where he lives. It’s meant to be a punishment, but he sees it as a nice break KIRKUS REVIEWS

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from chores. He even has a friend down there: Barty, a bat who eats peanuts that Eddie smuggles down there for him. The 12-year-old boy is shocked, however, when Barty transforms into a vampire named Count Bloodless. The soft-spoken creature of the night fortunately hates the idea of drinking blood, and Eddie’s willing to help him find vegetarian foods, even though he wonders if the count, who has an unfamiliar accent, might be a German spy. Eddie keeps his new fanged pal a secret from everyone at the orphanage, with the notable exceptions of his benevolent history teacher, Sister Kate (who doesn’t believe him), and his charming best pal, Mugsy. But a few of the friends belong to the Order of the Fang—a group that’s dead-set on destroying all vampires. Eddie and Mugsy must keep Count Bloodless safe and, for good measure, well fed. Humor abounds in Desmond’s tale; for example, Eddie, who carries and routinely reads a dictionary, often uses “big words,” except for ones starting with e (since a bully ripped those pages out).

The book features abundant nostalgia, as well, including comparisons of Count Bloodless to Bela Lugosi’s depiction of Dracula, and a reference to someone “launching into the jitterbug” at a dance. The endearingly nerdy Eddie’s individual relationships with Mugsy, the count, and Sister Kate are delightful and rewarding, and heartfelt moments take precedence over those that showcase supernatural abilities. For instance, Eddie learns that his parents, whom he doesn’t remember, are alive and vows to reunite with them; meanwhile, potential adoptive caregivers all but ignore the hopeful Mugsy.

A diverting horror comedy that makes way for an absorbing comingof-age story.

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Kirkus Star

Cold Record Ferguson, Eric | Self (385 pp.) | $23.95 $14.45 paper | Sept. 22, 2023 9798394718434 | 9798368260587 paper

In Ferguson’s legal thriller, a deputy district attorney must navigate an unexpectedly twisty case.

After college sophomore Haylee Branch is found raped and strangled at her friend Jacinta Cantrell’s father’s mansion in a Northern California suburb, the police immediately arrest a young man named Andrew Rodarte. He tells police that he was at the scene of the crime that night, but that he left before Haylee was killed. Enter John Patrick Howland, a deputy district attorney who narrates much of the novel (along with police detective Mark Wade and Haylee’s mother, Marta). Gradually, Rodarte’s story begins to crumble. He admits at trial to killing Haylee, but says it was a tragic outcome of consensual rough sex; nonetheless, he’s found guilty of first-degree murder and gets a sentence of 25 years to life. That should have been the end of the story—an outcome that provides at least some comfort to the victim’s loved ones.

But about a decade later, Rodarte files a habeas corpus plea that offers a new account of events that, amazingly, becomes more believable as the cops and the lawyers dig into it. Readers, too, will find the new development to be quite credible and realistic. The book takes readers all the way to the end of the knotty case, showing that justice can be a very messy thing—a concept that gradually reveals itself to be the novel’s overarching theme.

Ferguson presents his readers with a story that begins as a relatively straightforward Law & Order–style procedural, but soon takes readers on a ride that turns out to be much wilder than your average TV mystery.

The author has nearly two decades of experience as an attorney in Southern California, and his deep knowledge of court proceedings is on full display through his novel’s many twists and turns. His trial scenes show his keen eye for detail, but also showcase his ability to take things at a very slow pace when necessary. At another point, Ferguson presents a speech at a parole hearing that’s a masterpiece of tempered emotion and hard-earned wisdom. His greatest strength as a writer, however, is characterization; his players come across as real people caught up in real lives, and readers are likely to find themselves affected by their tribulations. The author treats his main character, Howland, with especially keen sensitivity, showing him to be a good man who’s far more capable than he gives himself credit for.

Certainly, the lawyer would make a fine companion for someone—and on the final page, readers get a hint that that might happen. He also shows a distinct talent for shifting readers’ perceptions by taking characters’ stories in unexpected directions. The prose also shows impressive wit at times, as when defense attorney Ted Stauber is described as caught off guard, “like a cowboy on a skateboard”; at another point, the same attorney is said to look “ready to complete the trial by murdering his client.”

A remarkable and compelling courtroom drama.

Hail Infernal World Ferguson, Rick | Mr. Phabulous (474 pp.) | $18.99 paper | Sept. 24, 2023 9781732566262

A renegade Union soldier breeches Hell to save a little girl in Ferguson’s sprawling fantasy novel.

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killing his only friend, Sgt. Valentine Schmidt, in a drunken accident. He washes up at the farm of a fetching widow named Jenny Mabry, where his suicidal despondency lifts as he takes to Jenny’s bed and bonds with her 8-year-old daughter, Beatrice.

When Bea is possessed by a devil, an itinerant monk convinces Von Beck to descend to Hell to retrieve her soul. A magic ritual duly deposits Von Beck in an underworld teeming with devils, demons, witches, ghosts, hellhounds, fauns, centaurs, imps, and a working class of damned human souls. The place is full of horrors (“One soul carried his own intestines piled in his arms. A leering devil decapitated another; the torso chased its own rolling head, picked it up, placed it back on its shoulders”), but also contains surprising amenities, including bustling towns, taverns serving great beer, and dragon-driven railroads and airships. Von Beck is joined on his quest to rescue Bea’s soul by succubus sisters Mezyss and Meänia and the shade of Valentine, now a font of occult lore; their travels through Hell’s nine circles get them into countless bloody fights with monsters and introduce them to mythical potentates like Lilith and the horse-fly devil Beelzebub. Also searching for Bea is the devil Marchosias and his master, the Magus, who wants to appropriate Bea’s innocent soul-power to seize Hell’s throne. As he becomes embroiled in various plots and power-plays, Von Beck slowly cottons to his identity as the legendary warrior Arturus, Guardian of Fate and Warlord of the Damned, who plays a central role in prophecies.

This first book in Ferguson’s Hellfire Saga series feels like a mashup of Cold Mountain, The Exorcist, and a steampunk rendering of Dante’s Inferno; its strands don’t always mesh well. Von Beck starts out as the antihero in a Civil War novel written in gritty, evocative prose: “Summoning strength, he pulled deeply from the brown rotgut in his canteen and scrambled into his uniform.

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A powerful, often heart-wrenching collection of essays tackling the history of the American South.

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and chicory and back into column.”

But in Hell, Von Beck’s character is overshadowed by the bewildering spectacle swirling around him as he struggles to get his bearings amid the underworld’s lurid grotesquerie (“When the lictor’s abdomen split open to reveal a second mouth filled with razored yellow fangs, Von Beck heard madness calling”) and byzantine politics, and the grandiose destiny he’s groping toward doesn’t seem appropriate for the grizzled, disillusioned man we first met. Still, Ferguson’s worldbuilding is engrossing, with plenty of colorful, energetic characters to take up the slack—the tough-talking, ass-kicking, red-skinned succubae are a hoot—and action scenes that are well paced and riveting. The result is a devilishly rousing adventure story.

An entertaining pistol-and-sorcery fantasia set in a mesmerizing underworld.

Written in the Sky: Lessons of a Southern Daughter Foster, Patricia | Univ. of Alabama (224 pp.) $24.95 paper | Sept. 26, 2023 9780817360962

Foster explores the persistent legacy of racism in the Deep South in this nonfiction anthology.

Part memoir, part social commentary, this collection of deeply personal essays reflects on Southern history, with particular emphasis on the intersections of class, race, and gender, through vignettes from the author’s own life. Two essays on Foster’s visit to

Montgomery, Alabama’s National Memorial for Peace and Justice, a site dedicated to the legacy of Black victims of lynching, aptly bookend the volume. The opening essay (the titular “Written in the Sky”) is written as a letter to the author’s great-niece, using the trip to the memorial as context to answer the 5-year-old’s haunting question: “Do you ever meet yourself?” This question of “who am I” runs through the book to the final essay, “Archive of the Dead,” which returns to the memorial as the author reflects on the life of a Black domestic worker, Maddy, who was once employed by her family. Born in Alabama, Foster was part of a generation of postwar white southerners who embraced “the sentimentality of easy solutions, do-gooder notions, and the up-by-thebootstraps mentality that fueled so much of popular philosophy.” As a 20-something caseworker in western Tennessee assigned to work with poor white sharecroppers and junk haulers, she encountered the “sour meanness and desperation, racial injustice, ill health, and lack of resources that so often accompanied poverty.” There is ample social commentary on offer, from the author’s thoughts on Donald Trump to a 2004 profile of female students at Tuskegee’s Booker T. Washington High School that explores issues of white flight and crumbling infrastructure. A professor emerita at the University of Iowa’s MFA Program in Nonfiction and author of multiple novels and nonfiction books, Foster fully displays her literary talents here as the work demonstrates a profound sensitivity to history, nuance, and self-reflection.

A powerful, often heart-wrenching collection of essays tackling the history of the American South.

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Overlord Fullilove, Eric James | Atmosphere Press (318 pp.) | $18.99 paper | Aug. 3, 2023 9781639889617

In a near future wracked by climate chaos, a ruined United States faces the threats of a brutish military government and a new, genetically modified species of predators.

Fullilove forecasts a dire near future in this cli-fi dystopian novel. Global warming and melting ice caps in the mid-21st century have led to land masses suddenly submerging while sea levels pitilessly rise under pounding superstorms and serial hurricanes.

Cuba, New York state, Florida, and California drown. In Washington, D.C., the climate change–denying Republican government—laden with racist, religious conservatives—is overthrown by rogue general Cody Freeman, who secretly took environmental predictions seriously. Freeman institutes a secret plan called Project Overlord, replacing do-nothing Washington politicians with a harsh military police/prison state. New “detention centers” sprout everywhere; millions of refugees are killed outright (with a special emphasis on minorities); and the U.S. capital moves to Cleveland. America’s nuclear weapons go on high alert against foes Russia and China. Regarding China, a 2019 flashback shows Victor Frankenstein–esque scientists gene-splicing endangered polar bears to enable them to survive the altered environment, with increased intelligence, size, and teeth. Now, these “mogli” creatures are ubiquitous, amphibious alpha predators. The backstory is delivered in a mosaic of flashbacks while, in the present, a multiethnic Overlord troubleshooting team is led by an attractive, deadly Cuban American ex-cop named Madison Cervantes. Badass survivors of incarcerations, rapes, ethnic cleansings, and mogli maraudings, the squad undertakes suicidal salvage missions to stabilize the crumbling KIRKUS REVIEWS

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nation’s economy and infrastructure.

The author’s typhoon-force storytelling chops do not quite propel this series opener all the way through. But the prose will often keep eyeballs riveted, though an ending leaves much dangling for the sequel. Category 5 racial pathologies (echoing Hurricane Katrina and George Floyd) tinge the disaster stuff while the eco-preaching, if not exactly muted, still takes a back seat to slam-bang action. The monsters make a nostalgic throwback to those beasts-onthe-loose thrillers published in the wake of Peter Benchley’s Jaws. Yet Fullilove’s big, juicy question is whether Freeman really is a foul villain (he makes “Hitler look like an innocent schoolboy!”) or a tragic, pragmatic strongman, prepared to sacrifice himself to save a shattered homeland. Cli-fi fans will be tempted to read the over-the-top story in one sitting.

Partisan power grabs and sea monsters swirl in this engaging, adrenaline-charged cli-fi tale.

Loaves of Torah: Exploring the Jewish Year Through Challah Harper, Vanessa M. | Central Conference of American Rabbis Press (321 pp.)

Nov. 6, 2023 | 9780881233797

Harper explores the Torah through imaginative challah creations.

“Challah is no ordinary bread,” writes the author, a rabbi; “it is rich with religious and spiritual resonance, as well as powerful sensory memories that are often connected to community and culture.” As described in the book’s introduction, which surveys the long history of the eggy, yeasty, braided bread throughout Jewish history, challah has long been a staple of Jewish cultures throughout the diaspora. By the 18th century, Ukrainian Jews were baking “increasingly elaborate challah shapes for different holidays” (birds and ladders for the pre–Yom Kippur fast, hands for Hoshana Rabbah, and keys for the Shabbat after Pesach), while Moroccan

Jews were embedding whole eggs in a “thin ‘cage’ of dough” to represent Haman’s evil eye during Purim. After exploring this rich legacy, the bulk of the book takes readers through the Torah, with individual chapters devoted to Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, respectively. The major stories from these biblical books are given brief synopses, along with learned commentary from Harper that balances astute scholarship (backed by hundreds of citations) and exegesis with applications to daily life. An assistant rabbi at Temple Beth Elohim in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with an advanced degree in Hebrew literature, the author is a talented scholar and teacher, both strengths on full display as she distills complex, theologically dense material into an easy-to-read format. While this narrative on its own makes for a thoughtful book, the triumph of this volume lies in its highlighting of the gorgeous, creative interpretative bread that accompanies each story. While on the surface, Harper admits, “Challah dough may have some limits as an artistic medium,” the variety, symbolism, and beauty of the loaves are the undeniable stars of the book, displayed in full-page, high-quality glossy photographs. The book’s final section includes tips on baking and shaping challah, enabling readers to learn more about the Torah while participating in “Floury Fun.” A rare combination of cookbook and theological commentary, both visually stunning and profound.

Bodies of Water Harrison, Claire Baldwin | Self (223 pp.) $22.99 | $16.99 paper | Aug. 3, 2023 9798854841535 | 9798853468863 paper

Harrison’s YA novel, set in 1980s California, tells the tale of a young girl facing her grief over losing her beloved sister.

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her 28-year-old sister, Laura, dies unexpectedly. The aftermath of such a loss would be tough for any sibling, but Laura, who married a man named Steven, cared for Anna like a mother after their parents’ deaths in a flood more than a decade ago. After Laura’s death, Anna leaned on a couple of friends, Jack and Tessa, with whom she spends time. One of Laura’s friends, Kim Sanders, becomes Anna’s ally in her investigation into a secret of Laura’s that involves the place their parents died: Riverwood, New York. Anna has vivid dreams, and she can sense their approach: “The flickering light seemed brighter and brighter, and I leaned back and threw my arm across my eyes. A dream was coming.” As Harrison develops the story, the dreams start to show significant connections to Anna’s past and Laura’s secret. The italicized dream descriptions, written in the third person, are followed by an informative note from Laura written in bold; in the first note, for example, readers learn of a woman named Christine, who plays a critical role in the story. Kim also reveals that Laura had planned a trip to Riverwood for Anna’s birthday; Anna finds the plane tickets and asks Kim to accompany her on her journey.

Overall, this is an intriguing novel in which the quest narrative delivers an intriguing story that deeply explores questions of identity. In Riverwood, the narrative offers readers a twist that effectively allows the protagonist to move forward in her life without Laura; she thinks back on her sister’s words of wisdom, which have a long history: “You are who you think you are, so always think of yourself at your very finest.”

A thoughtful coming-of-age story that takes unexpected turns.

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Women in Politics: Breaking Down the Barriers To Achieve True Representation Hayashi, Mary Chung | MKC Press (208 pp.) | $18.99 paper | Oct. 25, 2023 9798989003907

Hayashi offers a how-to guide for women seeking political office.

The author, a former California state legislator, award-winning health care advocate, and writer, presents a hard-hitting account of her experience as an Asian American woman in politics, using her personal history and the stories of other female politicians (both well known and less so) to provide actionable advice for women with similar ambitions. The book begins autobiographically, with an account of the author growing up as part of a Korean immigrant community and struggling to move beyond the “good girl” expectations of her culture: “being good meant keeping my thoughts and opinions to myself. Any direct communication—even direct eye contact—was discouraged, and avoiding conflict altogether was expected.”

Hayashi broadens her focus to examine the structural challenges women face when running for office—and holding that office once won. She looks in depth at the intersectional issues involved in public office, comparing the challenges women belonging to different racial minorities face: “Racial barriers compound the many other obstacles faced by all women, making it even harder for minority women to achieve positions of power and leadership. This is the case with our ability to receive endorsements, raise campaign money, and win votes.” The book is a well-crafted and thoughtful guide for aspiring women officeholders, but it has some limitations; sexuality is not addressed, and the text only makes vague mention of “minority religious groups” who might be subject to social media hate. For example, Hayashi fails

to acknowledge the Jewish identity of Jael Silliman, who’s written about the Indian Jewish community she hails from and proudly identifies with, identifying her as simply “a south Asian woman.” These reservations aside, this is a valuable guide for women interested in pursuing a career as an elected official.

An important look at how far women have come and still have to go in politics.

Experiential Billionaire: Build a Life Rich in Experiences and Die With No Regrets Hilton, Bridget & Joe Huff | Someday Publishing (316 pp.) | $17.09 paper Sept. 8, 2023 | 9798988837411

Hilton and Huff present an anecdotal approach to increasing the real value of your life.

The authors commence their debut nonfiction collaboration with some of the stark questions every reader has likely asked at one point or another: “When was the last time you had a once-in-a-lifetime experience?

What about just a memorable one?

What about something you did for the first time? Was it months ago? Years?”

Hilton and Huff provide context for these questions by pointing out that most people have experienced lifelong conditioning on the subject of wealth, taught that a large reserve of currency is the bedrock of happiness.

The authors seek to overturn this view, urging their readers to imagine their experiences are treasures and to take a “treasure map” approach to life, interrogating each decision with questions like “Does it make you grow?” or “Does it bring you joy?” rather than “Does it make you money?” Hilton and Huff flesh out their precepts with an array of stories relating their own experiences, such as Huff, who was expelled from high school and sank KIRKUS REVIEWS

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into drug addiction until he sorted out what was truly valuable in his life (“Instead of making excuses, I made plans and set goals”). The text employs clear, approachable prose filled with optimism and enthusiasm. In a series of fast-paced chapters, the authors offer dozens of strategies for increasing the nonmonetary value of every moment (including detoxing from digital overuse). But Hilton and Huff are quick to emphasize the practical right alongside the philosophical—the goal isn’t just to live like you’ll die tomorrow; it’s also about building for a better future. Readers feeling stuck in their routines will embrace this breath of fresh air.

An energetic, readable reminder that life is about much more than work and money.

Minimum Safe Distance Ho Yen, X. | Grand Unification Monastery (398 pp.) | $14.99 | $11.49 paper Oct. 17, 2022 | 9780976615828 9780976615811 paper

In Ho Yen’s debut SF novel, aliens and humans meet at a crossroads for humankind.

In the 22nd century, humankind labors to restore Earth following the ravages of the 21st. Unbeknownst to them, two aliens observe their work from the remote safety of the moon. One is the Ethnologist, a crafty and dispassionate recorder of human endeavors.

The other is the Cosmologist, whose traumatic past makes him deeply empathetic and who harbors something of an independent streak. Both are members of a migratory transspecies alien collective known as the SelfMade. They are acutely aware of an impending “Catastrophic Cosmological Event” that will destroy Earth’s segment of the galaxy, but they are unsure if and how they should intervene to help save humanity. Down on Earth, specifically in Quebec, KIRKUS REVIEWS

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Laurence Levesque is a high-functioning autistic girl forced to deal with the cruelty of “normal” children.

She’s cared for by an ailing single mother until lymphoma makes her an orphan. Meanwhile, in Iowa, Matt Hutney is raised in a violent, religious household until his father murders his mother, consigning Matt to years of foster care. As Laurence and Matt grow up (to become a prominent AI scientist and a radical anti-secularist, respectively), their fates become linked inextricably with those of the two aliens, each of whom decides to get a bit more hands-on when it comes to human affairs. Ho Yen’s prose style varies based on which characters he is following, from the grit and suspense of Hutney’s chapters to the wry serenity of the SelfMade: “The Ethnologist admitted to its having left a message for a journalist. ‘Harmless fun,’ it said to the Cosmologist. ‘Something to break the monotony.’ The Cosmologist did not admit to having coopted a rover to observe an individual human.” Ho Yen’s descriptions of advanced technologies should please fans of hard SF, but what really makes the book work are the questions it raises about what it means to be a person and a member of a species.

A thoughtful, inventive SF fable.

Kirkus Star

Sister Johnson, Leia M. | Illus. by S. J. Winkler Phoenix Books (40 pp.) | $18.99 May 23, 2023 | 9781736130339

A young girl struggles with saying goodbye to foster siblings in Johnson’s picture book.

When the parents of the young narrator (who has curly brown hair, green eyes, and light brown skin) announce that they will be welcoming a new kid into their family, the child first expects a baby sibling. Soon, she is welcoming a baby to the home— but, “After four sleeps, she went to

live with her grandmother, who loved her very much.” Next, they take in a boy who is just a little younger than the narrator. They become fast friends; when he goes back to live at his mom’s house, parting is difficult. It takes time before the family is ready to try again. But soon a new foster sister arrives, the same age as the narrator, who gets to stay and become her forever sister. There are few books about foster care from the point of view of the child who has to say goodbye when foster siblings are relocated, and Johnson’s spare, thoughtful text helps readers imagine what it might be like to love someone while knowing they might have to leave. Winkler’s soft-edged, painterly illustrations perfectly capture the spectrum of emotions. This is a sensitive and sweet exploration of what it means to be a foster family.

A gentle, affecting picture book about opening hearts and homes.

The Committee Will Kill You Now Lycette, JL | Black Rose Writing (256 pp.) | $21.95 paper | Nov. 9, 2023 9781685133122

In Lycette’s novel, a hospital intern struggles with sleep deprivation, a shocking mistake, and a dark chapter in medical history.

It’s 1992, and 28-year-old Noah Meier is just keeping his head above water in his first year at a Seattle hospital. For a medical intern, it’s a year of 36-hour shifts, little sleep, and no life outside of work. His father was a surgeon, and although Noah’s a gifted writer, he gave up his dream of getting a master of fine arts degree to go to medical school instead. At the hospital, one of his colleagues commits suicide, but Noah has no time to grieve and is immediately back at work. He makes a careless mistake (“What should he do? What the hell DECEMBER 15, 2023 151

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should he do? What had he done?”) that results in one of his patients requiring emergency surgery. As the fallout from the error upends Noah’s life, he reads an old journal that his father kept, which addresses the birth of dialysis in the 1960s. Only a handful of patients were allowed to receive the treatment at the time, and they were chosen by committee. As surprising connections between the past and the present come to light, Noah must make a major decision about his future. Lycette’s novel successfully immerses the reader in the active hospital environment and the lives of its young doctors. Along the way, the author clearly illustrates the industry’s successes and innovations, and provides some necessary critiques as well. Lycette, a doctor herself, makes the wise decision to center the narrative around only two patients’ stories, which focuses the narrative and keeps it grounded when it could have easily become frenzied. The author also effectively portrays supporting characters and addresses widespread sexism in the medical field, especially among surgeons. Overall, Noah’s story is skillfully written, incisive, and unafraid to confront ethical issues head-on.

A thought-provoking work about young doctors, modern medicine, and ethical quagmires.

Many Paths: A Poet’s Journey Through Love, Death, and Wall Street McEver, Bruce | C&R Press (368 pp.) $19.44 paper | April 15, 2022 9781949540277

McEver’s memoir chronicles an extraordinary life.

The author— an Eagle Scout, U.S. Navy officer, investment banker, entrepreneur, cancer survivor, world traveler, philanthropist, and poet with graduate degrees from Harvard’s 152 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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The author's anger at the state of journalism is palpable.

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business and divinity schools—details what has been, by any measure, a remarkable personal history. The narrative opens dramatically with the sudden death of the author’s beloved first wife, Georgia, a talented singer, on Christmas Day. McEver’s appetite for achievement, interest in investing, and lifelong love of nature, reading, and travel all took root early. His early career in investment banking provided the experience and connections he needed to launch his own successful firm. Along the way, he began keeping a journal, exploring spirituality, and writing poetry.

Stepping back from his day-to-day involvement in the firm after his wife’s death allowed him to further pursue these interests. He also earned a second graduate degree in theology, created a foundation to promote religious literacy, and forged new relationships with women. More than 40 of the author’s published poems (or excerpts from them) are featured in the text, on themes as diverse as air travel, prayer flags, and pelicans.

In both his poetry and his prose, McEver mixes the mundane—stopping for fast food at “a white square building, as welcoming as an ice cube”—with the sublime, such as the spiritual epiphany in the title poem: “and something unnamable / says again, then again: / There are many paths.” He provides excessive detail in some areas (summaries of one banking deal after another will appeal only to Wall Street insiders) while glossing over key moments in important relationships. Still, this candid account of an interesting man leading a multifaceted, eventful life touches on timeless and universal questions and offers many teachable moments.

An eventful autobiography of a financier turned poet.

Unfit To Print: A Modern Media Satire Miller, G. Wayne | Crossroad Press (270 pp.) | $14.99 paper | Sept. 22, 2023 9781637895825

In Miller’s satirical novel, a failing columnist at an imperiled newspaper gets unexpected help in resurrecting his career.

In director Billy Wilder’s searing film Ace in the Hole (1951), a disgraced journalist lands a job on a small Albuquerque, New Mexico, newspaper and waits for a story he can hype that will return him to the big time. Here, Nick Nolan, a former Pulitzer Prize– nominated social justice columnist for the Boston Daily Tribune, has only one month—12 columns—to turn his click total around, or the bean counters at SuperGoodMedia who just bought the centuries-old paper will banish him to the suburban beat. His fortunes change when he writes a column about Amber Abbott, an 8-year-old in a persistent vegetative state, whose mother—Nolan’s former lover—claims that the Virgin Mary speaks to her daughter. The story goes viral, attracting thousands of new subscribers, and the paper’s new publisher demands that Nick stay on top of the story. As the new owners institute rules promoting “good news,” Nick finds himself in thrall to the clicks his story generates— until he meets Benjamin Franklin in a diner. Yes, it’s the historical Benjamin Franklin, who offers his help. “You’ve hit a low point,” he says, adding, “I am here to help you and hopefully others in a profession that was so dear to me.” While reader mileage will vary KIRKUS REVIEWS

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on the introduction of this fantastical element, the author’s anger at the state of journalism is palpable and will speak to readers who, like Nick, see Seymour Hersh and Maggie Haberman as heroes. Satire is heightened reality, but this book too often reads like grim nonfiction, with its click-bait headlines (“She Hid Under the Bed To Spy on Her Husband but Instantly Regretted It”) and odious hedge funds buying up community newspapers, only to decimate these former pillars of the community. Still, Miller is fighting the good fight, and unlike Ace in the Hole, his tale offers a sense of hope.

A novel that illuminates what the author calls “a sickening reality” but could use more dark humor.

A Mirror for the Blind: Reflections of a Digital Seoul Mu, Jeong | Trans. by Mark Allen Brazeal METRIC (218 pp.) | $21.99 | $11.99 paper Sept. 7, 2023 | 9791198200242 9791198200235 paper

In Mu’s novel, a group of recent Korean college graduates navigate the unyielding competitiveness that permeates both professional and personal life.

Youngbaek Kim has much to be proud of—after he graduates from the prestigious Sky University, he lands a job at Corporation P, the second biggest company in Korea. However, he is plagued by discontent; he studied philosophy in college and feels stymied by the tediously banal routines of office life. Also, he constantly frets about money—it seems impossible that he will ever save enough to buy a home that others will be impressed by, and he fecklessly tries his hand at investment. His friends, Dongjoo Lee and Inyoung Choi, both seem much happier and much better positioned to win the endless rat race that dominates their lives. Dongjoo Lee is a KIRKUS REVIEWS

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programmer at the top corporation in Korea and handsomely compensated, while Inyoung Choi has a job in the civil service, a position coveted for its stability. However, they are both just as anxious about the future as Youngbaek, and as envious of him as he is of them. The author artfully depicts the Korean obsession with success and a society that strictly separates winners and losers through a process of “verification.” “Verification became a source of envy with everyone trying to take the successes of those around them and spin them as their own. It is high school all over again, with students using Photoshop to falsify their college entrance exam scores to receive verification from the community.” Youngbaek sees a chance at happiness when he becomes engaged to Jungyoon, a woman with whom he falls deeply in love—but her mother talks her out of it, convincing her that she and Youngbaek “just aren’t in the same league,” and that she can find someone with better financial prospects.

Mu’s tale is impressively thoughtful—he reflects, with great clarity, on the ways in which Korea’s socioeconomic liberalization discarded one prohibitive hierarchy for another. As Youngbaek observes, “There are always more stairs to climb. Stairs upon stairs upon stairs...I guess Korea’s ancient class system of endless hierarchies, has really only changed in name. It will continue to loom over me and on to future generations. Still, climbing endless stairs is different from the impossibility of climbing up a family tree.” Friendships are almost necessarily converted into rivalries, and romantic connections are reduced to opportunities for social climbing, each date conducted in a metaphorical “interrogation room.” The author’s writing has a lapidary elegance to it—he subtly creates an atmosphere of melancholy and sad inevitability, as if there is no escape from the cultural pressures of Korean life. The plot moves at an unhurried pace, which can seem excessively languorous, and there is more than a touch of adolescent melodrama in Youngbaek’s tortured angst—a self-indulgent

theatricality that borders on ponderousness. Still, Mu’s depiction of Korean life, especially as experienced by its younger generation, is marvelously meticulous and rendered with great emotional power.

A moving and meditative account of the crushing demands of Korean careerism.

Kirkus Star

Love Lifted Me: Stories From the Childhood of a Replacement Child Noble, William C. | WestBow Press (94 pp.) | $10.99 paper | March 21, 2023 9781664293960

Noble presents a series of autobiographical short stories about growing up in Georgia.

In 1914, 26 years before the author was born, a boy known as “Little William” died from the flu at the age of 5. Little William was the son of the author’s maternal grandmother, Mamie; according to Noble, it was a death that she would never get over. Noble describes himself as Little William’s “replacement child.”

In a series of stories that run to no more than a few pages each, the author describes growing up with this responsibility, as well as the many characters around him. It was a life dotted with peculiarities; he referred to his mother, Lucy, as “sister” until the age of 13. The stories take place in rural southern Georgia, in an area home to a cotton gin and two general stores. Bennett, Noble’s father, ran one store; the author writes that he “used me like a servant, treating me the way he had been treated by his own father” and was someone who “no one seems to have really known.” Such descriptions are the most striking aspect of the work; in simple prose, the author details how his grandmother would consult a Ouija board “when the DECEMBER 15, 2023 153

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future was unclear or marked by economic worries, or when health matters were fearful.” Though the entire book amounts to less than 100 pages, the characters and their quirks are memorable. Some are tragic, like a girl at Noble’s elementary school who was “accidentally” shot by her father. Even if some of the writing can feel generic (one character “was mad, with anger and rage directed especially toward those in the foreground of her life”), the individuals ultimately come alive.

A plain, revealing look at the contours of rural life in the American South.

The Cruel Dark Northwick, Bea | Northwick Books (226 pp.) | $25.99 | $14.99 paper Oct. 31, 2023 | 9798988473824 9798988473817 paper

Northwick offers a gothic romance about a young woman with a tragic past who discovers more tragedy while working as a researcher at a decades-old estate.

The story picks up with Millie Foxboro’s journey to a place called Willowfield; the estate is located 120 miles outside Boston, where she works in a bookstore. She’s been hired as a research assistant by brooding professor Callum Hughes, a noted scholar of Celtic lore and the wealthy owner of a large perfumery business. Millie learns of the professor’s own difficult past and the ghosts that continue to haunt him and the once-grand Willowfield. As the story goes, when the professor brought his new wife to the sprawling estate, the pressure of the house became overwhelming; as a result, she spiraled into an obsession with evil spirits of Celtic folklore and the unusual flora that adorn the mansion. She eventually threw herself into a nearby ravine and drowned in the river at the bottom, plunging Callum into profound grief. When Millie arrives, the estate has fallen 154 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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Plucky and perilous—a fast-moving fantasy romance adventure.

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into disrepair and is haunted by many things, including memories that oddly parallel events in her own difficult past. Northwick presents a dark love story that sparkles with elements of gothic horror and more modern romance as Millie explores the dark secrets hidden in Willowfield’s shadows and reveals a few of her own, showing the devastating effects of trauma. Rich and lush natural scenery winds its way around this work like a pervasive vine: “There were pergolas, cherry blossom tunnels, and innumerable bramble arches and clusters of broom waiting patiently to flower.

A majestic weeping willow sighed low over a murky pond where a stone kelpie reared half out of the water, searching for a rider.” The prose often reflects the conflict between staid society and the wildness within each of the characters. While some readers may struggle with the slow-burn romance and often quiet tone, many will find this work to be thrilling.

A haunting and atmospheric work that’s likely to captivate genre fans.

Tales of Witches and Wyverns Ramsey, S. | Self (252 pp.) | $9.99 paper July 12, 2023 | 9798852072115

In Ramsey’s YA debut, a teenage girl quests through Afallon, the island of Arthurian legend, to rescue her best friend.

Fifteen-yearold Enid Davies and 16-year-old Dylan Roberts live near the Welsh town of Celliwig. They have been best friends for the last nine years, ever since Dylan rescued Enid from bullies. Lately, something more

than friendship has sparked between them, but Dylan must leave Celliwig to attend school in London. Enid takes solace in Bendith, an enormous hound she befriends in the woods, and she wonders if things will change between her and Dylan. They certainly will: On the evening of Enid’s 16th birthday party, Dylan is revealed as a shapeshifting wyvern (a species of dragon) prince from Afallon Isle, the Avalon of Arthurian legend. He is abducted back to his homeland by the evil queen Malagant. Transported through a fairy circle that is activated by the wizard Merlin himself, Enid journeys to Afallon to rescue Dylan, accompanied by Bendith and Dylan’s cruel and conceited cousin, Aeddan.

Opposed by implacable creatures from Welsh mythology, can Enid and her companions win through to face Malagant and free Dylan? Ramsey’s prose style is straightforward though somewhat excitable, with numerous stock recourses to eyes “narrowing,” “widening,” “bulging,” and “blazing”; hearts get a workout “hammering,” “soaring,” “pounding,” and “racing.”

Enid and Dylan evince natural voices when writing letters to each other, but their actual speech tends toward the stilted over-formalism of high fantasy: “I’m so sorry you had to endure any of it. Was it merely a coincidence that you and Dylan ended up in the same spot?”

The book’s greatest strength lies in Enid’s character. She exhibits a teen’s doubts and insecurities but is fiercely loyal, determined, and compassionate. In a world filled with powerful creatures, she looks into the hearts of those around her and solves problems by using her intelligence. It is through Enid’s personality that commonplace tropes such as love triangles and enemies becoming friends take on a persuasive magic. The story itself moves quickly, racing through peril KIRKUS REVIEWS

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and uncertainty. All told, teen fantasists will find much to like here.

Plucky and perilous—a fast-moving fantasy romance adventure.

Deadly Secrets From Pond Island: A Vanessa Hutchins Mystery Raymond, Olivia | Long House Press (330 pp.) | $9.99 paper | Aug. 26, 2023 9781737556640

In Raymond’s crime thriller, an ex-lawyer digs into an old murder case in a small town.

Forty-eightyear-old Vanessa Hutchins had a promising career as a criminal defense attorney at one of Pittsburgh’s top law firms. Then, on impulse, she quit her job, left the city, and purchased a home—sight unseen—on Pond Island Drive in the small, rural town of Port Logan, Ohio. She knew the house would require a bit of work, but she wasn’t prepared to discover it filled to the brim with the possessions of its previous owner: “All she could see were piles of trash, boxes, clothes, ramshackle furniture, and nonsensical clutter.” Just as she begins to worry that she’s made a massive mistake, Vanessa discovers a trove of documents related to a local murder trial that happened more than 30 years ago.

She also learns from her new neighbors that the previous resident of her home, a retired purchasing agent for the local police department, underwent a strange personality change following the death of his wife. Can these two things be connected? As Vanessa begins to dig into the evidence, she discovers things about the crime that

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she feels compelled to investigate. It looks like Vanessa’s days of cracking criminal cases haven’t ended; she’s just entered a less-formal next chapter.

Vanessa’s reasons for moving away from the big city aren’t entirely convincing, however, and readers will find themselves caught up in the mélange of Port Logan locals and their secrets as her investigation proceeds at a slow, deliberate pace. Over the course of the novel, Raymond’s confident prose also ably captures the oppressiveness of small-town life, as when Vanessa gets an unwholesome vibe from a local diner as she searches for clues: “To her, no number of celebratory pictures, memorabilia, or burning sage bundles could dispel the negative energy oozing from this place.”

An engaging slow-burn investigation of a suburban crime.

Honeymoon at Sea: How I Found Myself Living on a Small Boat Redmond, Jennifer Silva | re:books (240 pp.) | $22.99 paper | Sept. 19, 2023 9781738945207

An American freelance writer reflects on how her longtime wanderlust eventually led to her and her husband traveling the world together on a sailboat.

At some point, everyone fantasizes about what it might be like to leave the familiar behind and embrace a life of adventure—but very few people follow through. Redmond is one of those few.

Born to a working-class family in suburban California, Redmond was raised to seek out new experiences wherever possible. When she was young, her mother took her and her two siblings on a whirlwind trip around Europe, where they immersed themselves in the many sights and experiences that each city had to offer. Redmond’s passion for exploration and yearning for excitement led her to act in

community theater productions once her family was stateside in San Diego.

This childhood interest eventually led her to New York City in 1984, where she hoped to pursue a career in acting. After finding little success and returning to San Diego, the author got married to artist Russel Redmond in 1989 and soon began one of the most significant roles of her life: as a sailboat captain, navigating the seas with her spouse. Over the course of this memoir, the author skillfully employs descriptive language to make readers feel as if they’re aboard the boat with her and her husband: “The next day we were both in the cockpit, basking in the weak winter sun as we sailed north.

The wind was light, but not so light as to make us want to motor. The seas were calm, and we were gliding along over the swells with minimal pitch and roll.” She also effectively gives readers insight into the process of provisioning supplies once in port, the foods she and her husband enjoyed—even when she had to sift weevils from pasta—the culture they encountered when they ventured to shore, and the sense of community that they built with fellow sailors. Above all, however, this story shows that when two people love each other, they can be happy anywhere.

Readers who are passionate about sailing will particularly appreciate Redmond’s life journey.

Membershift: Why Members Leave and the Strategies Proven To Bring Them Back Sladek, Sarah L. | Authority Publishing (180 pp.) | $24.99 paper | Sept. 14, 2023 9798886360295

Sladek outlines why and how associations must re-tool to be member-centric in this nonfiction guide.

According to the author, who has “volunteered and worked for, consulted with, and DECEMBER 15, 2023 155

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researched membership organizations for two decades,” these organizations, many of which have experienced declining membership for years, must take an obvious yet surprisingly overlooked strategic action: putting the needs and interests of their members first. In this book, Sladek highlights an organization that does this—the home services contractors association Nexstar Network—and discusses the ways an association can move toward the desired objective of making “at least 80 percent” of its work exclusively focused on its membership. Tactics include putting the word membership into staff titles to underscore their member-centric responsibilities; regularly surveying membership, including via quick polls and small-group meetings, to continuously tailor and refine programs and services; and engaging all generations of members, including putting younger members on boards and offering student memberships. The author also emphasizes the importance of the “EIOU test” when creating member benefits: Make them “Exclusive” to members; “Include” benefits in the price of dues; be accessible “Online” in order “to match the pace of the talent economy”; and address “Urgent” needs. At the end of each chapter, Sladek offers workbook-style sets of questions to assess current operations and map out next steps. The author builds on the warnings that she sounded in The End of Membership as We Know It (2011) in this new, self-described “wake up call” urging hidebound member associations to adapt to the times or risk extinction.

Sladek provides ample demographic evidence to support her case, detailing how emerging digital-native generations have different criteria for joining and participating in associations that differ from those of generations past. Her discussion of the various dysfunctions that associations fall prey to (including toxic boards and excessive non-member-focused events) will be wince-inducing yet recognizable to many, with her mantra to “put members first” serving as an effective guiding principle to help drive this critical organizational transformation.

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A helpful playbook to counter declining membership.

The Still Small Voice Stanley, Brenda | Twisted Pen (310 pp.) $17.99 paper | Sept. 27, 2023 9798989017614

After being shunned for years, a daughter returns home to unravel her family’s darkest secret in Stanley’s novel.

Twenty-eightyear-old Madison Moore has mixed feelings when she receives the news that her dying father is desperate to see her. Many years ago, in 2006, her conservative Mormon family shut her out because of what they saw as her rejection of their moral and religious values. Now married and living near Las Vegas, Madison has built a good career for herself as an investigative journalist and fears that a return home to Orem, Utah, will put her back into a conflict she’d left behind. She arrives at her father’s bedside, only to find that he wants to confess his complicity in a decades-old miscarriage of justice that condemned a woman to life in prison for a murder she didn’t commit. Unable to fully explain what happened, he presents Madison with an album of old photographs that he claims will reveal the woman’s innocence: “I have the proof,” he tells her; “I’ve kept it a secret all these years.” Madison can’t find the proof in the album, and her quest for the truth tests her professional skills and stretches her emotions to the breaking point. Meanwhile, the rest of her family resents what they see as her vengeful desire to tarnish their reputation, and they become more suspicious of her motives after learning of the contents of her father’s will.

Much of the novel effectively focuses on Madison’s frustration: not only with her intolerant family but also on the wrongly convicted prisoner,

who, it turns out, seems uninterested in evidence that might exonerate her.

The book also delves into intriguing themes, including the effects of long-buried family secrets, unspoken fears, and unresolved conflicts, and readers will find Stanley’s treatment of these issues almost as compelling as the mystery itself. The story’s eventual resolution is a surprising one that will reward readers for the time they spend with this well-crafted book.

A skillfully written mystery about family drama and a quest for redemption.

Living: Inspiration From a Father With Cancer Stewart, Jeff | Wadsack-Stewart (312 pp.) | $19.99 paper | May 10, 2023 9798987669112

Stewart’s cancer diagnosis prompted a reflective memoir filled with advice for his children.

After years of trying unsuccessfully to donate his kidney, the author was finally accepted as a live donor by Duke University in July 2022; he needed just one more CT scan to make sure that he had two functioning kidneys. That was when the transplant team informed him that he had two small cancers, one in his kidney and the other around his small intestines. Stewart was told it would require one operation performed by two surgeons to remove the cancers, one for the kidney and the other for the gastrointestinal stromal tumor (a GIST). The surgeries were performed on the same day. The author is a healthy 50-year-old (except for the cancers, he adds jocularly), and the five-year survival odds were at an optimistic 97%…until the doctors discovered during surgery that the GIST was a more complicated tumor than what was expected. Next steps included chemotherapy and radiation. A health care consultant in the pharmaceutical industry (and a former KIRKUS REVIEWS

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A compelling story of a life transformed by the experience of medical mission work.

N O C R Y I N G I N T H E O P E R AT I N G R O O M

Jeopardy! College Champion), Stewart understands all the numbers and scientific terminology. He is able to sort through, process, and skillfully communicate all the intricate details of his cancers, treatments, and associated side effects, which makes the narrative highly informative. There are more than a few tense moments as readers wait along with the author for the results of a test or a prognosis. But this is more than a book about cancer; despite some scientifically detailed sections that are challenging to read, the memoir is lighter in tone than most others in this genre, filled with humor and optimism. For Stewart, the glass is decidedly half-full. Many chapters devoted to guidance for his children are only one or two paragraphs in length, frequently witty as well as wise: “Inspiration # 74: Smart people read,” ironically follows “Inspiration # 73: You can’t learn to ride a bike by reading a book.” For Jeopardy! fans, there is also a delightful chapter on the making of a champion.

Complex and thoughtful, with a refreshingly upbeat attitude.

Ozzie Tillit, L.B. | My Easy Read Books (175 pp.) $11.50 paper | June 13, 2022 9781735264219

In the first book of a new YA series, Tillit paints a portrait of a Black high school football player struggling to find his own way in life.

As the third member of the Waxman family to play football at Hancock High, Ozzie KIRKUS REVIEWS

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appears to have it all. He has talent as an offensive and defensive tackle and is a strong candidate to be recruited by a university; indeed, he seems more likely to find success than his father or his brother, Vic, who’s currently the team’s assistant coach. But Ozzie doesn’t love the game as his family members do: “I kept waiting for that same intensity.” This disparity causes Ozzie angst as he navigates high school and his relationship with his girlfriend, Zonta Jones. Although he’s popular, he doesn’t have close friends, aside from high school freshman Vashon Wilkes, whom he’s known for years. He does meet a new student in school, however: an unhoused girl named Lilly Orem. His teammates engage in casual racism: “They threw out comments all the time full of hateful stereotyping. They didn’t hold back. Race, gender, or any trait at all were fair game.” In the interactions of these various characters, Tillit effectively addresses such issues as bigotry, homelessness, and mental health.

The author also builds tension as Vic makes Ozzie change positions—a situation for which the teenager doesn’t feel prepared: “I understood how to be perfect with perfect preplanned plays.

For me, winging it was impossible.” An unexpected turn of events only intensifies Ozzie’s struggle. Over the course of this novel, Tillit deftly weaves a story of hope into an account of typical high school challenges. Along the way, Ozzie learns who his true friends are, people who are there for him when it counts. The author also includes an authentic police intervention toward the end of the novel.

Overall, the story is engaging without being preachy, which will appeal to many YA readers.

A thoughtful tale of finding hope amid life’s trials.

No Crying in the Operating Room: My Life as an International Relief Doctor, From Haiti, to South Sudan, to the Syrian Civil War Wang, Cecily | Gatekeeper Press (198 pp.) $21.99 | June 14, 2023 | 9781662936845

Wang’s memoir presents the experiences of a dedicated, international trauma surgeon.

In this remembrance, the author effectively provides an inside look at her medical relief work around the world. In the process, she reflects critically on the problems of an American medical system that’s too often encumbered by bureaucracies that compromise patient care in favor of institutional imperatives. Born in Taiwan, Wang immigrated with her family to San Francisco when she was 8 years old, and her first years in her new home were difficult. She was embarrassed by her accent when she spoke English, she says, so she cultivated “selective mutism” for two years—speaking Mandarin at home but remaining silent in school. She was an outstanding student, but her desire to become a doctor angered her mother, who wanted Cecily to have a life as an artist. Despite these obstacles and others recounted in this engaging memoir, Wang achieved her dream and began practicing surgery. During a medical mission to earthquake-devastated Haiti in 2010, she performed dozens of life-saving operations on injured patients; it was a form of medical practice that she found unexpectedly rewarding. Overall, this book presents a sincere and moving narrative as the author brings her readers into the gritty, emotionally challenging world of medical relief around the world. Wang is a clear-eyed narrator whose perspective on these issues is well worth reading. For example, in Haiti, and in subsequent missions in DECEMBER 15, 2023 157

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South Sudan, Myanmar, and Syria, Wang found that she was free to put her desperately ill patients first, as she was no longer bound by the impersonal decisions of insurance companies or hospital bureaucrats.

She worked with teams of dedicated professionals to provide care directly to those who needed it under difficult conditions; in South Sudan, her shelter consisted of “metal walls and a tarp for a roof,” which only partially kept out the rain. Along the way, as Wang says in these pages, her love for her profession deepened, and she developed a reformer’s perspective on Western medical practices.

A compelling story of a life transformed by the experience of medical mission work.

The Story Is Not Enough Woodruff, Alan P. | Self (500 pp.) | $34.95 paper | June 22, 2023 | 9798399405575

Woodruff presents a hands-on guide to writing a novel.

Early in this extensive work, the author offers an analogy: Writing a novel is like making a stew. It is not enough to simply know the necessary ingredients—one must know how the ingredients work together to form a whole. In the pages that follow, the ingredients of a good story are examined with the goal of helping the reader create a satisfying piece of writing. As Woodruff covers broad topics, like plot-driven stories versus character-driven stories, and more specific concerns, such as the use of chapter breaks, the reader is taken on a tour of various narrative concepts. The crux of the work is the author’s “Normandy” system for writing a novel, which emphasizes creating a step-by-step outline before engaging in the actual writing of the book. Once the process of the outline is complete, the writer is free to tackle their story in a free-flowing manner; Woodruff uses his own past 158 DECEMBER 15, 2023

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works and the work of other writers as examples. Later sections offer guidance on everything from naming characters (“avoid names that are too esoteric”) to determining when an incident belongs in a prologue. The work dives into the nuts and bolts of the writing process—rather than regurgitating generic platitudes about writing from the heart, the book presents a method for doing just that.

The system is detailed enough to give direction without being too strict, and the author makes sure to address both writers who need to thoroughly pre-plan every aspect of their stories and those who prefer to start with a general idea and “let the story tell itself.” The book is lengthy, and some of the topics, such as a comparison of linear and non-linear storytelling, can be dense. Readers interested in the subject are likely to be familiar with many of these concepts, but the work is packed with practical information.

Helpful, occasionally obvious advice for the aspiring novelist.

Red Snow: A Twisted Fairy Tale Wright Jr., Robert | Witch Way Books (309 pp.) | $17.50 | $14.00 paper Aug. 22, 2023 | 9798988995739 9798988995722 paper

Three supernatural women come together to fight evil and save their land in Wright’s fairy-tale-inspired horror-fantasy YA novel.

Seventeen-year-old Snow White has pale skin, dark hair, rose-red lips, and a thirst for blood.

The vampire princess has lived with her need to feast on others since birth, but unlike other vampires, she has a soul and can freely walk in sunlight. Her mother died long ago, and after marrying her evil stepmother, her father lost his life as well. Now, her stepmother is holding the throne until Snow White

comes of age; the older woman plots against the younger, spreading vicious rumors about her. She also has her groundskeeper take Snow White into the Forbidden Forest, where, after telling her the truth about her stepmother, he dies while saving her from bandits. Snow White soon finds she’s not completely alone, however, when she meets teenage vegan werewolf Red Riding Hood. The two aren’t safe for long, as they must fight a group of vampires and then escape from Red Riding Hood’s angry werewolf pack, including her furious grandmother.

They first make their way to a cabin on a mountain where seven brothers offer them safety and shelter for a time. If the young women can escape their enemies’ clutches, they’ll have to go to the Charming Kingdom to meet up with teenage Cinderella, a good witch in training. Wright has created a fantastical setting with intriguing reinventions of classic tales, transforming their characters into modern, spunky heroes. Each shows brand-new complexity; for example, Snow White’s heart of gold is juxtaposed with her vampiric needs.

The story is full of memorable side players as well, including the Grim, a talking cat who helps Snow White on her journey. The work is further aided by Wright’s excellent use of humor, as well as action scenes that pack a punch: “The huge gamekeeper swung his axe once again, catching another bandit across the body. The man let out a bloodcurdling scream as another bandit rushed up behind Garth and sunk his rusty sword into the gamekeeper’s back.”

An exciting fantasy tale with entertaining reinventions of classic characters.

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B O O K L I S T // I N D I E

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Indie Books of the Month

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3

4

1 Nature Ninja Saves the Natural World

By Tania Moloney; illus.

by Jelena Sardi

A sure-fire inspiration for budding environmentalists.

2 Adventures of Takuan From Koto

By Ryu Zhong

A rapidly expanding quest with a seemingly endless supply of mischief and surprises.

3 A Dark White Postscript

By E.R. Bills

A compact, harrowing story of a vengeful curse unleashed.

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5

4 One Thing Better

6

By Jessica Sherry

A complex and hugely satisfying contemporary romance between genuine, flawed people.

5 The Night the Stars Went Missing

By Arthur J. Gonzalez; illus. by Krapivina Olga

A whimsical but well-grounded environmentalist tale.

6 Pandora’s Gamble

By Alison Young

A hard-hitting and timely report on a pervasive threat.

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S TATEMEN T

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1. Title: Kirkus Reviews 2. Publication Number: 078-070 3. Date of Filing: September 6, 2023 4. Issue Frequency: Twice a month (1st & 15th) 5. Number of Issues Published Annually: 24 6. 2023 Annual Subscription Price: $179.00 7. Complete Mailing Address of Office of Publication: Kirkus Media LLC 2600 Via Fortuna, Suite 130, Austin, TX 78746 8. Headquarters Office of Publisher: Kirkus Media LLC 2600 Via Fortuna, Suite 130, Austin, TX 78746 9. Full Names and Complete Mailing Addresses: Publisher and CEO: Meg Kuehn, Kirkus Media LLC 2600 Via Fortuna, Suite 130, Austin, TX 78746 Editor in Chief: Tom Beer, Kirkus Media 65 West 36th St., Suite 700 New York, N.Y. 10018

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Publication Title: Kirkus Reviews Issue Date for Circulation Data Below: Oct. 1, 2023 Extent and Nature of Circulation: National distribution to libraries, publishers, publicists and other publishing professionals.

Average No. Copies Each Issue During Preceding 12 Months

No. copies of Single Issue Published Nearest to Filing Date

5476

5476

4207 0 149

4207 0 149

0 4356

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1477 0 0 0 1477 5833 114 5947 74.68%

1477 0 0 0 1477 5833 114 5947 74.68%

Meg Kuehn, CEO

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