Melissa Febos! Mike Tyson! Taylor Jenkins Reid! 26 new books out today.
The summer is here! And while that message is perhaps inescapably bittersweet this year, what with the world being on fire in ways both metaphorical and all-too-literal, it remains a truth universally acknowledged that a day of delightful weather can make many things just a bit better. And why not have some scintillating new reading material by your side in that summer shine?
Today, I offer up twenty-six new titles to consider in fiction and nonfiction. You’ll find much to be excited about here, including new work from Melissa Febos, Molly Jong-Fast, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Susan Choi, and Edward Hirsch, as well as a stunning array of powerful debuts and work from up-and-coming authors. You’ll find urgent political work, playful texts, unexpected forays into well-known figures and fields, lyrical explorations of history and the natural world, queer histories, pop culture, and more.
I hope you start your summer off with some of these wonderful new books. It’ll be worth it.
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Lydi Conklin, Songs of No Provenance
(Catapult)
“This novel is a wild ride! A ribald romp asking profound questions about art-making, kink, self-deception, repair, and grace. Joan Vole is an unforgettable character and Lydi Conklin is a daring, delightful writer. I’ll read anything they write.”
–Claire Vaye Watkins
Austin Taylor, Notes on Infinity
(Celadon Books)
“I adored this book. It follows two Harvard students developing an antidote to aging. I have an absolute fascination in start-ups from colleagues’ stories of Google in its early days. This delivered in that respect, but in so many others, too: love, and partnership, and being the only woman in the room, growing up and deciding who you wish to be. It is very clever, but it has a huge, messy heart, which is exactly what I love in a book.”
–Abigail Dean
Dylin Hardcastle, A Language of Limbs
(Dutton)
“A Language of Limbs is a queer novel in vital, masterful conversation with itself, and Hardcastle’s visceral, propulsive prose inexorably and generously draws the reader into this conversation—about the violence of metamorphosis, the joyful confusion between self and other, and all the ways we strive to create meaning on the spectrum between chance and destiny. This book will stay with you.”
–Olivia Wolfgang-Smith
Melissa Febos, The Dry Season
(Knopf)
“Only Melissa Febos could write a memoir of her sexual abstinence and make it like a game of Clue. How to catch a thief when the thief is yourself? And the thief of yourself, too? A profound, distilled, untying of a complex knot—Febos riddles out the ways we might subjugate ourselves even with the ways we imagine we are liberated.”
–Alexander Chee
Molly Jong-Fast, How to Lose Your Mother: A Daughter’s Memoir
(Viking)
“A gripping memoir about mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, loss and healing, and what it means to finally accept your past and become an adult. Despite being raised in the shadow of fame, Molly tells a story that is both uniquely specific and utterly, exquisitely relatable.”
–Lori Gottlieb
Anelise Chen, Clam Down: A Metamorphosis
(One World)
“A marvelously funny and affecting memoir that reads like no other….Brilliant and unpredictable, it reveals something essential and hidden about the nature of clams, humans, inheritance, rational thinking, obsessions, and love. This book is the companion we all need.”
–Rivka Galchen
Vaishnavi Patel, Ten Incarnations of Rebellion
(Ballantine Books)
“[A] powerful, compelling alt history that not only explores Great Britain’s colonialist violence and draws on Indian myth and religious tales but also presents challenging questions about what sacrifices it takes to build a truly effective revolutionary movement….[The] novel is propelled by its characters, the female leaders of a rebellion that will take out an entire oppressive regime, and their debates, support for one another, and determination to see an independent India.”
–Booklist
Taylor Jenkins Reid, Atmosphere: A Love Story
(Ballantine Books)
“Thrilling…heartbreaking…uplifting….Taylor Jenkins Reid’s novel, Atmosphere, is the fast-paced, emotionally charged story of one ambitious young woman finding both her voice and her passion as she fights to become one of the first female NASA astronauts in the 1980s. You’ll barrel through this electric novel, rooting for the women to not only succeed in the space program but to soar. A pitch-perfect ending….I loved it.”
–Kristin Hannah
Susan Choi, Flashlight
(FSG)
“[Flashlight] pushes the boundaries of family, ethnicity, society, country, and history by challenging, parsing, and piecing together the complicated multitudes of tangled identities….[Choi] brilliantly shines the titular flashlight on each of her characters, catching their habits and quirks, exposing their intimacies.”
–Booklist
Edward Hirsch, My Childhood in Pieces: A Stand-Up Comedy, a Skokie Elegy
(Knopf)
“For decades, Edward Hirsch has wielded one of American poetry’s most unforgettable voices. To have him apply his big brain and wicked wit to a memoir is a major literary event. Hirsch mines his upbringing with both the verve of David Sedaris and the literary pedigree Joyce brought to his portrait of the artist as a young man. Part standup, part wail from the bowels of Skokie, My Childhood in Pieces is an instant classic. Buy this book!”
–Mary Karr
Alice Bolin, Culture Creep: Notes on the Pop Apocalypse
(Mariner Books)
“It feels impossible that anything could top Alice Bolin’s staggeringly brilliant 2018 collection, Dead Girls, but—naturally—she’s back to top herself. Culture Creep is an unforgettable, gut-churning ride into the hell of Millennial girlhood, from its nightmarish roots to its disquieting future. This book will not comfort you. But it will make everything clear.”
–Carmen Maria Machado
Michael Koresky, Sick and Dirty: Hollywood’s Gay Golden Age and the Making of Modern Queerness
(Bloomsbury)
“From its elegant and impassioned introduction through a text that is historically grounded and glittering with insight, this is destined to become an instant classic. Koresky brings his strength as one of the finest and most knowledgeable film critics writing today to locating the strands of queer cinema within the history of cinema writ large, especially through the years of censorship….His portrait of The Children’s Hour and its various permutations is a spellbinder in itself.”
–Molly Haskell
Aram Mrjoian, Waterline
(Harpervia)
“A gripping journey through time, Mrjoian brings readers deep into the heart of the Armenian Genocide and its ripples across generations. With a voice wholly unique in its style, Mrjoian weaves a powerful tapestry of survival, identity, and resilience…[a] rare great novel….Mrjoian is able to find the beauty in the brutality of this history, and in the unyielding spirit of family. Waterline is a must read—intense, moving, and unforgettable.”
–Morgan Talty
Megan Giddings, Meet Me at the Crossroads
(Amistad)
“Giddings has created a world that feels both extremely relatable and unknowingly mystical….The writing is an engaging mix of witty and cutting….The characters have great depth, and Ayanna’s college experiences, especially, stand out for a touching mix of standard early 20s angst, deep depression, and the feeling of freedom that comes with being an adult for the first time. A brilliant, magical tale of grief and growth.”
–Kirkus Reviews
Nini Berndt, There Are Reasons for This
(Tin House Books)
“There Are Reasons for This is messy-beautiful, gorgeous, compelling. I was struck by the want depicted here; a specific hurt that comes from finding something kindred only to wind up losing it. Nini Berndt makes lovely work of this bruise-writing, the kind of devastation that leaves you with your fist pressed to your lips, aching hard for everyone involved. This is a queer gut punch of a novel. I adored it.”
–Kristen Arnett
Jeff Koehler, Matisse in Morocco: A Journey of Light and Color
(Pegasus Books)
“In 1912, Matisse sailed for Tangier with his wife. He needed to escape the Parisian art scene and find inspiration elsewhere. In an engaging biography, journalist Koehler recounts Matisse’s two stays in Morocco. Reproduced in vibrant color plates, Matisse’s ‘lush, sensual’ paintings give striking proof of his artistic reawakening in Tangier. A revealing look at an iconic painter.”
–Kirkus Reviews
Mark Kriegel, Baddest Man: The Making of Mike Tyson
(Penguin Press)
“Mark Kriegel, one of America’s finest living sportswriters, has found the perfect subject in Mike Tyson….Who else but Kriegel—an old-school reporter with a novelist’s touch and feel for the human condition—could peel back the decades of villainization, self-mythology, and shtick that have obscured the story of the rise of the most famous fighter since Muhammad Ali? Gritty, soaring, searing, and funny, Baddest Man is the best sports biography I have read in years.”
–Jonathan Mahler
Adam Weymouth, Lone Wolf: Walking the Line Between Civilization and Wildness
(Crown)
“Lone Wolf is a major addition to the lupine literary canon—at once a gripping animal adventure story and a thoughtful meditation on history, wanderlust, and belonging in a globalized world.”
–Ben Goldfarb
Lucas Schaefer, The Slip
(Simon & Schuster)
“How can a book be uproarious and thought provoking, devil-may-care and philosophical, as full of life in all its ugliness and beauty and strangeness as Lucas Schaefer’s The Slip? Complicated and comic, this is a novel about what it means to long to be otherwise, with a mystery at its heart, as well as love and ruthlessness and the kind of crazy imagination missing lately from American fiction. You may not be ready for it, but this is a book which will grab you by the lapels, the throat, the heart, the hand: everywhere.”
–Elizabeth McCracken
Maria Reva, Endling
(Doubleday)
“In Maria Reva’s all-around brilliant novel Endling, the fate of some snails serves as a harbinger for the fate of Ukraine. The book is funny and smart, full of science, longing and adventure, all the while reminding us what the world stands to lose, and what it has already lost. This is essential reading.”
–Ann Patchett
Jonathan Parks-Ramage, It’s Not the End of the World
(Bloomsbury)
“It’s Not the End of the World is a gonzo queer dystopic thriller. Jonathan Parks-Ramage explodes sentimental genre conventions with shoot-em-up style, satirical verve, and an exuberant view of the end.”
–Kyle Dillon Hertz
Brando Simeo Starkey, Their Accomplices Wore Robes: How the Supreme Court Chained Black America to the Bottom of a Racial Caste System
(Doubleday)
“[A] passionate, deeply researched, humanistic story of how African Americans have evoked the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments as a bulwark against a racial caste system from the Jim Crow era to the present, and how their efforts have often been met with faulty reasoning, disavowals of reality, and obfuscation by a Supreme Court that has repeatedly shut its doors to their claims. Elegantly composed in a personal style that makes its stories come alive…sorely needed.”
–Kenneth W. Mack
Bryan Burrough, The Gunfighters: How Texas Made the West Wild
(Penguin Press)
“A captivating exploration of the Wild West, delving into the era of gunfighters with literary flair and historical depth . . . Burrough expertly separates fact from folklore….A fascinating work of history that challenges readers to reconsider the role of the West’s legendary gunfighters in shaping the identity of the United States.”
–Library Journal
Matthew Gavin Frank, Submersed: Wonder, Obsession, and Murder in the World of Amateur Submarines
(Pantheon)
“Matthew Gavin Frank is a master storyteller. A poetic true-crime cousin of Truman Capote’s classic In Cold Blood, Submersed navigates the horrific murder of journalist Kim Wall, the eccentric culture of the DIY submersible community, and our human relationship to large bodies of water. Believe me, you won’t be able to put this book down until you arrive at the very last page. It’s stunning, commanding, and haunting all at once.”
–S. Kirk Walsh
Claire Lynch, A Family Matter
(Scribner)
“I read this bone-chilling, soul-affirming novel on the edge of my seat, as though I’d been waiting for it for years. A Family Matter is structurally exciting, emotionally resonant, and deeply effective. Claire Lynch explores themes our culture fears, and in doing so, promotes healing of our world.”
–Chloe Caldwell
Allison King, The Phoenix Pencil Company
(William Morrow)
“Remarkable….Part speculative, part multigenerational family epic, part historical record, part coming-of-age romance, it is, like the mythical titular phoenix, all magic….King radiantly explores memory, storytelling, archiving, history, and the subjective unreliability of all that we think we know.”
–Booklist
