What To Read

Notable releases for July include Richard Russo's latest novel, Colson Whitehead's sequel to Harlem Shuffle, the latest from Silvia Moreno-Garcia, and Ann Beattie's new collection of short stories.

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Somebody’s Fool by Richard Russo

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author returns to the setting of his bestselling Nobody's Fool and Everybody's Fool for a final visit with many of the same beloved characters. This time around, a mysterious corpse has the locals abuzz in a “wise and witty drama of small-town life,” per Publishers Weekly. In The New York Times, Hamilton Cain writes that Russo has "saved the best for last" for this final installment of the North Bath trilogy.

One of Us Is Back by Karen M. McManus

The bestselling YA author brings back the Bayview Crew in the thrilling third installment of the One of Us Is Lying series. When an ominous billboard announces a dangerous new game, everyone’s got a target on their back.

Open House by Robert Coover

In this inventive tale by the acclaimed experimental writer, a mix of scammers and well-heeled guests gather on the 100th floor of a luxurious Manhattan penthouse for a mysterious event. What comes next is a debauched, masterful work of metafiction that casts an acerbic eye on life in modern America. *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

Prom Mom by Laura Lippman

A woman haunted by an infamous high school scandal returns to Baltimore many years later to confront her notorious past. CrimeReads reveled in this “incredibly layered and tense COVID-era thriller [that] tells multiple stories about its main characters…whose pasts are linked by tragedy and tawdry gossip, and whose current lives are connected by something more powerful: the desire for a second chance.”

Speech Team by Tim Murphy

In this nostalgic Gen X yarn by the author of Correspondents and Christodora, four high school buddies reunite over a friend’s suicide to dissect an unsettling chapter from their past. "This semiautobiographical update of the Big Chill trope" gives classic movie vibes, according to Kirkus. "Misfit kids of the 1970s and '80s—here's the class reunion you were waiting for."

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Contradiction Days: An Artist on the Verge of Motherhood by JoAnna Novak

Publishers Weekly hailed this “courageous and moving memoir” by a pregnant poet battling creative block and depression who’s also obsessed with the reclusive painter Agnes Martin. Taking a page from her idol, she heads off to a solitary retreat in Taos, New Mexico where the famous artist lived hermetically for much of her life. 

Too Late to Stop Now: More Rock'n'Roll War Stories by Allan Jones

The veteran British music journalist behind Uncut magazine takes us backstage with this raucous collection of tales from the glory days of rock’n’roll. Featuring a who’s who of legendary artists like The Rolling Stones, Sting, Elton John, R.E.M and many more, these over-the-top anecdotes and rockin’ stories hit all the right notes.  

The Country of the Blind: A Memoir at the End of Sight by Andrew Leland

This courageous personal chronicle is by an editor at The Believer who’s losing his vision to a degenerative disease. As the author begins to go permanently blind, he embarks on a quest to better understand the world of the sightless in a moving journey The New York Times hailed as a “wonderful cross-disciplinary wander.”

Notable Releases for the Week of July 17, 2023

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Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead

This sequel to Harlem Shuffle from the two-time Pulitzer prize winner is one of the most anticipated books of the summer. It’s a noir caper and family drama set in 1970’s New York teeming with hustlers, con artists, drug dealers and plenty of crooks.

Zero-Sum: Stories by Joyce Carol Oates

A new collection of twisted tales from one of the most prolific and important writers of our time, Zero-Sum pits suicidal writers, vengeful high schoolers, obsessed students and disturbed mothers in an “existential battle between humanity and the destructive forces it has unleashed,” per The New York Times.

Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

The latest from the author of Mexican Gothic and The Daughter of Dr. Moreau is a horror-infused thriller set in 1990s Mexico City about a lost film haunted by a Nazi curse. Publishers Weekly raved, “The complex female characters are particular standouts. This is a knockout."

Emergency: Stories by Kathleen Alcott

Since the release of Alcott’s epic novel America Was Hard to Find, fans have been waiting for her follow-up. Whether in seedy hotel rooms or sophisticated dinner parties, the female characters featured in her new collection of seven stories are all searching for something meaningful and beautiful amidst their various struggles of poverty, addiction, sexual power conflicts. Kirkus found “exquisite insights about women’s agency and the corrosiveness of male privilege. Stories that are worth reading twice.”

Onlookers: Stories by Ann Beattie

These powerful short stories set in Charlottesville, Virginia, the site of an infamous 2017 white nationalist rally, tackle the city’s complicated past by tracing the interconnected lives of its residents. It’s the author’s “best in more than two decades,” according to The New York Times. 

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Jackie: Public, Private, Secret by J. Randy Taraborrelli

"I have three lives," Jackie O told a former lover, "public, private and secret." In this revealing biography, the author of numerous bestselling books about the Kennedy clan delivers on all three. This book is the product of thirty years worth of interviews with friends, family, and lovers of the iconic former First Lady.

Look: How to Pay Attention in a Distracted World by Christian Madsbjerg

This timely manifesto from a New School professor combines practical wisdom along with insights from art, philosophy, anthropology and more to make the case for paying attention in a world pulsing with distractions. The Financial Times praised this “compelling account showing that when we pay attention, ‘new understanding will almost always emerge."

Strip Tees: A Memoir of Millennial Los Angeles by Kate Flannery

An anticipated memoir chronicling the rise and fall of the controversial fashion brand American Apparel through the eyes of one of its first employees. This tell-all captures the convoluted sexual politics and outrageous antics of the iconic LA-based company in a “an edge-of-your-seat cinematic narrative,”  per author, book influencer and publisher Zibby Owens.

Wasteland: The Secret World of Waste and the Urgent Search for a Cleaner Future by Oliver Franklin-Wallis

An eye-opening investigation of the multi-billion dollar waste industry. To understand the world’s ever-growing garbage problem, a GQ editor encounters nuclear waste, dives down British sewers, and travels to African landfills clogged by Western donations. 

Other New Releases This Week:

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Tropicália by Harold Rogers

Vanishing Maps by Cristina García

The Deep Sky by Yume Kitasei

The Collector by Daniel Silva

How Can I Help You by Laura Sims

The Block Party by Jamie Day

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Encounterism: The Neglected Joys of Being in Person by Andy Field

Easy Money: Cryptocurrency, Casino Capitalism, and the Golden Age of Fraud by Ben McKenzie

Notable Releases for the Week of July 11, 2023

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All-Night Pharmacy by Ruth Madievsky

A darkly comic adventure through the Los Angeles underground from an LA-based Moldovan writer and pharmacist. This highly anticipated debut follows a recent high school graduate on a feverish search for a misfit older sister who’s mysteriously vanished. *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

Nothing Special by Nicole Flattery

In this sharp Sally Rooney-endorsed novel, a 17-year-old girl in New York lands a job transcribing a strange novel for Andy Warhol. What follows is a coming-of-age journey amid the upheaval of the 1960s that The New Yorker praised for being “a great book about Warhol with almost no Andy Warhol in it.” *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

Ripe by Sarah Rose Etter

From the author of The Book of X comes this surreal journey through a corporate dystopia set in Silicon Valley. A young woman battles her existential dread and an unexpected pregnancy as she navigates the tech world’s promise amid its equally disturbing reality. *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

Excavations by Hannah Michell

In this debut thriller set in Seoul in the 1990s, a stay-at-home mom whose husband vanishes in a skyscraper collapse joins forces with the owner of an upscale gentlemen’s club to unearth the truth about her missing husband.

Counterweight by Djuna, translated by Anton Hur

At last, a translation into English of the Korean sci-fi legend whose true identity remains shrouded in mystery. In this critically-acclaimed cyberpunk detective caper, a Korean conglomerate builds a towering elevator into space while humanity’s fate hangs in the balance. *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

The Vegan by Andrew Lipstein

An ambitious New York financier’s life begins to unravel after a prank gone terribly wrong. The latest from the Last Resort author is a strange, page-turning parable of money and morality set among the handsome brownstones of Brooklyn’s elite.   

Elsewhere: Stories by Yan Ge

The English language debut from the critically acclaimed author of Strange Beasts of China.  These nine surreal short stories hop deftly between eras and continents with a dry humor and literary gymnastics that Nylon found “haunting, dreamlike, and addictive as a melatonin-induced slumber.” *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

A Likeable Woman by May Cobb

In this sexy Texas thriller, a woman returns to her affluent hometown to investigate her mother’s mysterious passing. Guided by the secrets hidden in her dead mother’s unpublished memoir, she unravels a sinister plot with deadly consequences.

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The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet by Jeff Goodell 

An urgent warning about the calamitous effects of rising temperatures across the globe from a 2020 Guggenheim Fellow. As wildfires rage and ice caps melt away, Rolling Stone’s longtime climate expert provides a carefully-researched and brilliantly told survey of this existential challenge. *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

The Parrot and the Igloo: Climate and the Science of Denial by David Lipsky

The tragicomic yet true story of how anti-science sentiment and climate change denial upended the environmental movement from the bestselling author of Absolutely American and Although of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself. It’s an exasperating but fascinating exploration that begins in the days of Thomas Edison and continues with today’s climate-scoffing politicians and other science-denying zealots. *A Tertulia staff pick for July.  

Other New Releases This Week:

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My Husband by Maud Ventura

The Beast You Are: Stories by Paul Tremblay

Promise by Rachel Eliza Griffiths

The Militia House by John Milas

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Eight Bears: Mythic Past and Imperiled Future by Gloria Dickie

Bogie & Bacall: The Surprising True Story of Hollywood's Greatest Love Affair by William J. Mann

Notable Releases for the Week of July 3, 2023

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The Librarianist by Patrick deWitt

In the latest from the author of The Sisters Brothers and French Exit, a random act of kindness upends the lonely life of a retired librarian. It’s a bittersweet novel that offers an intimate glimpse inside a solitary man’s remarkable life, which the Star Tribune found “bright and entertaining from beginning to end.”

The Exhibitionist by Charlotte Mendelson

A marriage is set to implode when two artists (one famous, the other less so) gather for a family weekend. Set in London’s posh environs and brimming with long-simmering family secrets, ambition, egos, betrayals and biennales, this Women’s Prize-longlisted work is the fruit of the New Yorker’s resident gardening expert. 

 Trinity by Zelda Lockhart

A penetrating exploration of Black history told through three generations of a family with deep southern roots. This history-steeped saga from a Hurston-Wright Award Finalist delves into the historical atrocities, tribulations and triumphs of the Black experience.

The Housekeepers by Alex Hay

This thrilling historical heist novel pits the servants against the rich in a dramatic and glamorous setting. When a canny Mayfair housekeeper is fired by her wealthy employers, she concocts a brilliant plot to exact revenge on the night of London’s biggest bash. 

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How We Do It: Black Writers on Craft, Practice, and Skill by Jericho Brown 

Edited by the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and author of The Tradition, this writer’s manual celebrates the Black creative spirit and provides insight into how some leading Black literary voices have translated their stories and experiences into the written word. Featuring the literary wisdom and creative advice of over 30 ground-breaking writers including Nikki Giovanni, David Omotosho Black, Natasha Trethewey, Barry Jenkins, Jacqueline Woodson, Tayari Jones, and Angela Flournoy, this practical guide is a must-have for teachers, students and fans of Black literary craft. *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

Evidence of Things Seen: True Crime in an Era of Reckoning by Sarah Weinman

The New York Times Book Review’s crime columnist has compiled fourteen riveting cases told by leading voices in the true crime genre. From an unsolved lynching that exposes police malfeasance, to systemic abuse of incarcerated women, to Atlanta’s infamous Spa shootings, this gripping true-crime anthology paints an eye-opening portrait of American society.   

Owner of a Lonely Heart: A Memoir by Beth Nguyen

One of the season’s most anticipated memoirs, this book by the author of Stealing Buddha's Dinner shares the history of her fractured relationship with a mother she’s barely met since leaving Vietnam as a refugee as a baby. Kirkus called this emotional story about the ravages of war, migration and motherhood “quietly moving... A ruminative, unadorned, lyrical look at origins, family, and belonging." *A Tertulia staff pick for July.

Our History Has Always Been Contraband: In Defense of Black Studies by Colin Kaepernick, Robin D. G. Kelley, and Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

Following attempts to ban Black Studies content in AP courses and elsewhere, this anthology is a timely statement about the importance of the Black Studies discipline. "The centuries-long attack on Black history represents a strike against our very worth, brilliance, and value. We’re ready to fight back. And when we fight, we win," writes activist and football star Colin Kaepernick in his preface to this book. This wide-ranging compilation features works of literature, political theory, law, psychology, sociology, gender and sexuality studies, queer and feminist theory and history from the likes of Frederick Douglass, Anna Julia Cooper, Zora Neale Hurston, W. E. B. Du Bois, James Baldwin, June Jordan, Angela Y. Davis, Robert Allen, bell hooks, Barbara Christian, Cathy J. Cohen, Khalil Gibran Muhammad, and others. 

The Light Room by Kate Zambreno

A mother’s candid exploration of parenting in uncertain times by the Guggenheim Fellow and author of Heroines. This thoughtful memoir ponders what it means to bring a new life into a world besieged by climate change, political and social turmoil. Harper's Bazaar was moved by a “sense of hope that will especially resonate with anyone who's soldiered through pandemic-era parenting."  

Other New Releases This Week:

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The Devil's Flute Murders by Seishi Yokomizo

Pete and Alice in Maine by Caitlin Shetterly

Wolfsong by Tj Klune

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Twentieth-Century Man: The Wild Life of Peter Beard by Christopher Wallace

The Red Hotel: Moscow 1941, the Metropol Hotel, and the Untold Story of Stalin’s Propaganda War by Alan Philps