17 new books to invigorate your December reading.
At the beginning of every month, I make a silly little pile of books that I’m hoping to read in the next 30-ish days. Inevitably, the pile is always like 20 books tall and I only end up reading a third (if that) of them, but it’s fun! Here are 17 new books coming out today that you can add to your toppling TBR pile.
Also, while we have you with your wallet open, this is a gentle reminder that the Harper Collins Union is taking donations; please please please give what you can!
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Cormac McCarthy, Stella Maris
(Knopf)
“McCarthy’s art is transcendent even as it takes no prisoners, an achievement akin only to the oeuvres of his greatest peers, Toni Morrison and Philip Roth. He will endure.”
–Oprah Daily
John le Carré, A Private Spy
(Viking)
“The engrossing letters in A Private Spy—curated with great affection and care by [Tim] Cornwell, who sadly passed away in May 2022—are not unlike an exquisite bespoke suite crafted by a master.”
–BookPage
Marguerite Duras, tr. Emma Ramadan and Olivia Baes, The Easy Life
(Bloomsbury)
“Marguerite Duras writes brilliantly and strongly … her language and writing shine like crystal.”
–The New Yorker
Bushra Rehman, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion
(Flatiron)
“Rehman’s masterful prose, peppered with Urdu phrases, evokes rich emotional and social nuances regarding a particularly sensitive divide between generations in a community of immigrants trying to hold on to their culture even as they make new lives for themselves in a new country.”
–Booklist
Sam Lipsyte, No One Left to Come Looking for You
(Simon & Schuster)
“[A] twisty caper, a reverberant period piece and an affectionate parody of the youthful quest for authenticity.”
–Shelf Awareness
Bora Chung, tr. Anton Hur, Cursed Bunny
(Algonquin)
“Nothing concentrates the mind like Chung’s terrors, which will shrivel you to a bouillon cube of your most primal instincts.”
–Vulture
Jane Smiley, A Dangerous Business
(Knopf)
“The vivid historical details and vibrant characters bring Smiley’s setting to glorious life. This seductive entertainment is not to be missed.”
–Publishers Weekly
Tegan Nia Swanson, Things We Found When the Water Went Down
(Catapult)
“Things We Found When the Water Went Down is an ethereal, mixed media mystery novel about what we lose when the strongest, most vulnerable among us are made to disappear.”
–Foreword Reviews
Bethany Brookshire, Pests: How Humans Create Animal Villains
(Ecco)
*Donate to the Harper Collins Union Solidarity Fund*
“An entertaining and pensive perusal of the human-wildlife conflict problem that calls to mind Mary Roach’s Fuzz.”
–Booklist
Jessica Grose, Screaming on the Inside: The Unsustainability of American Motherhood
(Mariner)
“A deeply researched and highly relatable analysis of American motherhood, past and present.”
–Kirkus
Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir, tr. Brian Fitzgibbon, Animal Life
(Grove Press)
“At times poetic and philosophical, Animal Life is a uniquely crafted novel that concerns itself with light and darkness, purpose and coincidence, fear and hope.”
–Booklist
Elizabeth Bryer, tr. María José Ferrada, How to Turn Into a Bird
(Tin House)
“Enchanting … As in Ferrada’s past work, this one has much to say on themes of acceptance, conformity, and societal expectations.”
–Publishers Weekly
Bill Cotter, The Splendid Ticket
(McSweeney’s)
“…colorful … there’s much to admire in Cotter’s story of rebirth and fate.”
–Publishers Weekly
Kate Andersen Brower, Elizabeth Taylor: The Grit & Glamour of an Icon
(Harper)
*Donate to the Harper Collins Union Solidarity Fund*
“A well-researched, gossipy portrait of a star.”
–Kirkus
Kevin Powell, Grocery Shopping with My Mother
(Soft Skull)
“Kevin Powell returns with a poetic time capsule written with love in honor of his mother’s evolution.”
–Mahogany L. Browne
Jenni Quilter, Hatching: Experiments in Motherhood and Technology
(Riverhead)
“Melding intimate memoir and enlightening medical history … A sensitive, politically astute examination of reproduction.”
–Kirkus
Marc Myers, Anatomy of 55 More Songs
(Grove Press)
“Wall Street Journal arts writer Myers continues his explorations of the kind of popular music that turns from melody to earworm … Myers does a fine job of getting behind the hits.”
–Kirkus
