The Best Reviewed Books of the Week
1. The Château by Paul Goldberg
(3 Rave, 4 Positive)
“…a scathing satire of Trump’s America … Goldberg’s mordant satire – invoking and channeling a distinguished Russian literary tradition extending back to Gogol – hits home and bites hard … Bill is a male version of Maxine Tarnow, the gumshoe heroine in Pynchon’s The Bleeding Edge. While Pynchon’s similarly dark satire of a fallen America has greater breadth and is much more lyrical, The Château shares its genre, structure and tone – as well as nostalgia for a younger self and more idealistic era, when so much more seemed possible.”
–Mike Fischer (The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)
*
2. Brass by Xhenet Aliu
(3 Rave, 2 Positive)
“With Brass, Aliu has introduced herself as a major new literary voice … the novel expands magnificently as it introduces a parallel narrative: Elsie’s now-teenage daughter, Luljeta, heading down a similar path, littered with regrets … The shift makes for a shatteringly intimate mother-daughter tribute, a love letter brimming with pain.”
–David Canfield (Entertainment Weekly)
Read an essay from Xhenet Aliu here
*
3. The Sky Is Yours by Chandler Klang Smith
(3 Rave, 2 Positive)
“Chandler Klang Smith has unleashed her own slipstream, genrefluid monster of a book—that also happens to be fun, visceral, heartbreaking, and genuinely funny. The Sky Is Yours is bursting with ideas and characters, and I’d advise you take a break after reading it, because other books are probably going to seem a bit black-and-white for a while.
–Leah Schnelbach (Tor)
Read an excerpt from The Sky Is Yours here
*
4. Self-Portrait With Boy by Rachel Lyon
(1 Rave, 4 Positive)
“Think the tough tone of something like Rachel Kushner’s New York/Italian art and politics novel, The Flamethrowers, or Olivia Laing’s atmospheric nonfiction book about New York, The Lonely City … By foreclosing the question of Lu’s decision, Lyon avoids the contrived quality built into her plot. Instead, the focus here shifts more to Lu’s ambition, her tortured rationalizations and the harsh limits of the world she’s desperate to climb out of.”
–Maureen Corrigan (NPR)
*
5. Ultraluminous by Katherine Faw
(1 Rave, 4 Positive)
“Startling, poignant, raw . . . The success of Faw’s seismic story lies in a protagonist who, however improbably her life, is dynamic, true, and ultimately her own savior. Daring and original.”
–Katherine Uhrich (Booklist)
Read an excerpt from Ultraluminous here
**
1. So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
(8 Rave)
“With this book, Ijeoma Oluo gives us — both white people and people of color — that language to engage in clear, constructive, and confident dialogue with each other about how to deal with racial prejudices and biases. And this dialogue is critical … this book is much-needed and timely. It is more than a primer on racism. It is a comprehensive conversation guide.”
–Jenny Bhatt (The National Book Review)
Read an excerpt from So You Want to Talk About Race here
*
2. Directorate S by Steve Coll
(7 Rave)
“In the pages of Directorate S, the story is delivered with a literary prowess that has been absent in previous western accounts of America’s longest running war. The dance of blame, with the US swaying at one moment towards Pakistan and the next towards Afghanistan, is a choreography familiar to CIA chiefs, US presidents and writers who have tackled the subject. Coll refuses to follow this tired tune, and the result is masterful.”
–Rafia Zakaria (The Guardian)
*
3. Getting Off by Erica Garza
(4 Rave, 4 Positive, 1 Mixed)
“[Getting Off] is comparably affecting. The memoir shines light on the lonely (albeit impressively multi-orgasmic) world of a woman who binges not on food or pills, but on hookups and ‘getting off’ …her prose is appealingly no-frills and accessible. She writes in the style of one who knows better than to linger too long on the eroticism of her memories — one who has learned the hard way how crucial it is to keep dangerous rushes of euphoric recall in check … As a narrator, Garza is a master of identifying such dark, postcoital feelings as these.
–Cat Marnell (The New York Times Book Review)
*
4. The Gambler by William C. Rempel
(5 Rave, 2 Positive)
“Reading about Kerkorian is a bit like reading a movie script, complete with family evictions, wartime derring-do, smarts, and almost miraculous luck. William C. Rempel’s The Gambler has it all … William Rempel has told a heck of a story in detailing Kirk Kerkorian’s life. It gets a bit bogged down in the details of some of the financial schemes that bankrolled his big ideas, but that may be a plus for readers interested in how the big money is played at high stakes. At the very least, it’s a story about an extraordinary man who outsmarted everyone around him and became an American legend.”
–Larry Matthews (The Washington Independent Review of Books)
*
5. When They Call You a Terrorist by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and Asha Bandele
(4 Rave, 3 Positive, 1 Mixed)
“Her deeply felt memoir is a blueprint of how that silence exploded into a scream heard around the world … Co-written by poet and journalist Asha Bandele, this personal and political book, subtitled ‘A Black Lives Matter Memoir,’ is also timely. It comes during a still-unfolding moment when women are demanding to be heard … Like Baldwin, Khan-Cullors wants only for her nation to live up to its ideals, and afford everyone the same opportunities and protections.”
–Renée Graham (The Boston Globe)
***
