Good news, fiction lovers: This season will bring plenty to
delight you, no matter what you like to read.
‘Birnam Wood’ by Eleanor CattonCatton follows her Booker-winning debut novel, “The Luminaries,”
with an eco-feminist thriller. Birnam Wood is a “guerrilla gardening
collective” in New Zealand struggling to stay solvent. After its founder sets
her sights on an abandoned farm, she tussles with an American billionaire over
its fate — the group wants to use the land for crops, while he (supposedly)
wants to build a doomsday bunker there.
اضافة اعلان
‘Pineapple Street’ by Jenny JacksonJackson’s day job is a book editor, and she has worked with
authors like Cormac McCarthy, Kevin Kwan and Gabrielle Zevin. In her debut novel,
she tells the story of a wealthy — though they might say “comfortable” —
family, the Stocktons, and their Brooklyn Heights brownstone. Darley gave up
her trust fund for love, while her younger sister, Georgiana dives headlong
into an affair. All the while, their sister-in-law, Sasha — who comes from a
modest background — is trying to navigate her place while living in the
family’s house with her husband, Cord. A comedy of manners (and errors).
‘River Spirit’ by Leila AboulelaAfter a revolutionary announces himself the Madhi, or the
redeemer, a war breaks out in 19th-century Sudan over the legitimacy of his
messianic claim. During a village raid, Akuny is orphaned and taken in by her
father’s friend Yaseen, a merchant, whose promise to care for her charts a path
for both of their lives for years to come.
‘Take What You Need’ by Idra NoveyIn her latest, Novey looks at a young woman’s unresolved
feelings toward her family and home, braiding a story of art, ambition, and
passion. Leah and her former stepmother, Jean, had been estranged when Jean
dies. After her death, Leah returns to the small Appalachian town where she
grew up to assess her inheritance. It’s been years since she was last there,
and in Jean’s home, she finds a living room of welded metal sculptures — and a
mysterious young man.
‘Heart Sutra’ by Yan Lianke. Translated by
Carlos Rojas.Part satirical campus novel, part love story, “Heart Sutra”
centers on a religious university in Beijing whose director has been organizing
tug-of-war competitions between members of China’s five major religions:
Buddhism, Daoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, and Islam. Two teenagers — a
Buddhist jade nun and Daoist master — form a bond that makes them question
their commitments to organized religion and wonder if they should pursue a
secular life together.
‘Hello Beautiful’ by Ann NapolitanoIn homage to “Little Women,” Napolitano’s new novel follows four
sisters, the Padavanos, and the man who changed their lives. Tragedy upended
William’s childhood, and years later, when his college girlfriend, Julia,
welcomes him into her lively home, he feels both a part of the Padavano family
and yet still an outsider. That dynamic follows the group into adulthood,
particularly as secrets threaten to drive the family apart.
‘Flux’ by Jinwoo ChongThe three main characters of this time-traveling debut are all
grieving, and as you would expect, in flux: Bo, who is eight, has just lost his
mother, while Brandon, 28, has been offered a job at an experimental (if
mercurial) time travel company. Blue, who is in his 40s, is a witness in the
company’s trial after three employee deaths. Along with explorations of time
and identity, Chong weaves in some noirish elements, too.
‘Lone Women’ by Victor LaValleLaValle, the author of “The Changeling” and other horror novels,
returns with an atmospheric Western. One day in 1915, Adelaide, a young Black
woman, lights her childhood home on fire and flees California with only a trunk
containing “everything that still matters.” LaValle brings his signature style
to the West: “Monsters can mean a lot of different things,” he has said,
including real-world social commentary. “If you couch it in something with
claws, or wings, or fur, suddenly people don’t feel quite as resistant to hearing
about it.”
‘Commitment’ by Mona SimpsonCalifornia, 1975: Walter Aziz, an aspiring architect, needs to
pay his way through Berkeley, while his sister, Lina, who is illegally
attending a well-funded public school in Los Angeles, is angling for an Ivy League
acceptance. But when their mother checks into a psychiatric facility, the
siblings — along with their younger brother — must reconcile their commitments
to their family and to themselves.
‘Sea Change’ by Gina ChungAfter Ro’s boyfriend leaves to train for a Mars mission, her
best friend gets engaged and the mall aquarium where she works decides to sell
Dolores, the giant Pacific octopus her missing biologist father discovered.
Amid all these upheavals, Ro needs to grapple with her past and forge a way
forward.
‘The New Earth’ by Jess RowWinter Wilcox is getting married, and desperately wants her
family to reconcile. The previous years have been dense with conflict: Her
mother revealed that her biological father was Black; Winter’s sister was
killed by an Israeli Forces sniper; her brother became a monk; and their father
took a vow of silence at a Zen monastery in Vermont. Can they all cast aside
their loneliness and come together again?
APRIL
‘Romantic Comedy’ By Curtis SittenfeldSally, a comedy writer, drafts a sketch poking fun at her male
colleagues who date their show’s female celebrity hosts, in an attempt to prove
this wouldn’t happen if the genders were reversed. But the same week, she strikes
up a rapport with a pop star, Noah Brewster, and all bets are off. (Out
April 4)
‘Greek Lessons’ by Han Kang. Translated
by Deborah Smith and Emily Yae Won.In this slim novel by the International Booker Prize-winning
author of “The Vegetarian,” a teacher losing his vision and a student losing
her voice build a friendship during night-school Greek lessons. A story of
connection amid profound loss. (Out April 18)
‘Small Mercies’ by Dennis LehaneKnown for novels like “Mystic River” and “Shutter Island” — plus
writing on TV shows including “The Wire” and “Boardwalk Empire” — Lehane is
back with a thriller set in the summer of 1974, just before Boston’s
desegregation busing crisis reached a boiling point. One night in August, Mary
Pat’s daughter goes missing and a young Black man is found dead on the train
tracks. Though the episodes seem unrelated, Mary Pat’s search for answers leads
directly to the Irish mob. (Out April 25)
MAY
‘Chain Gang All Stars’ by Nana Kwame Adjei-BrenyahThis new novel by Adjei-Brenyah, the author of “Friday Black,”
follows a televised gladiator circuit where convicted murderers fight to the
death for the chance to win their freedom. Loretta Thurwar is just a few kills
away from civilian life, and she is grappling with the guilt of leaving behind
her teammate and lover, Hamara, known as Hurricane Staxxx. (Out May 2)
‘The Covenant of Water’ by Abraham VergheseVerghese’s earlier novel “Cutting for Stone,” following the
lives of two boys who were conjoined at the skull and born to a nun in
Ethiopia, was a runaway bestseller. In this new epic, Verghese traces the birth
of modern India through the experience of a family in Kerala that seems to be
cursed: A member of each generation has drowned. (Out May 2)
‘The Ferryman’ by Justin CroninProspera, a utopian society, sends its elders to be reborn on
the Nursery, a nearby island. Proctor Bennett is the ferryman who shuttles the
bodies back and forth between the islands, and though he is by all counts
“successful,” he is haunted by a recurring dream. But when his estranged father
boards his boat with a message for him (“The world is not the world. You’re not
you.”) Proctor sets off to make sense of his existence. (Out May 2)
‘The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece’ by Tom
HanksFor his first novel (he is also the author of a story
collection), Hanks spins a Hollywood tale that leaps between decades and
perspectives. Characters include a comic book artist in the 1970s, the
present-day film director transforming that comic book into a franchise and a
film studies professor writing about the production. Comic books by Hanks
himself (and illustrated by Robert Sikoryak) are interspersed throughout the
text. (Out May 9)
‘Retrospective’ By Juan Gabriel Vázquez. Translated by Anne McLean.While in Barcelona for a retrospective of his work, Colombian
film director Sergio Cabrera looks back on the events that shaped him. Using
over 30 hours of conversations recorded between 2013 and 2020, plus “countless
emails and text messages” with Cabrera and others, Vásquez reconstructed the
real director’s life, episode by episode, in this genre-bending novel. During
the early days of pandemic, he writes in the author’s note, “ordering someone
else’s past was the most efficient way of contending with the disorder in my
present.” (Out May 9)
‘The Guest’ by Emma ClineCline’s previous novel, “The Girls,” centered on a Manson-like cult;
her new thriller takes a close look at how the young, broke and beautiful
operate in spaces of extreme wealth. After her (much) older lover kicks her
out, Alex must talk her way into an extra week out East. Her grift leads her to
a fratty seasonal rental, an art collector’s mansion and a fling with a
troubled heir. (Out May 16)
‘Yellowface’ by R.F. KuangKuang, 26, is the bestselling author of “The Poppy War” trilogy.
Her fifth novel in as many years probes questions of identity, power, and
narrative ownership in book publishing. When struggling writer June Hayward’s
“stupidly, ridiculously successful” Asian American classmate dies in a freak
accident, she publishes her friend’s next manuscript under the pen name Juniper
Song — which is just as problematic as it sounds. (Out May 16)
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