Books

As she approached the age of 40, Dionne Ford, co-editor of the 2019 anthology Slavery’s Descendants, wondered how she had become “an invisible woman.” Who was she behind the mask she’d created to survive white supremacy and evade her struggles with mental illness? In Go Back and Get It: A Memoir of Race, Inheritance, and

Adding Dungeons & Dragons miniatures to your roleplaying game really brings the campaign to life! Dungeons & Dragons (or really, any RPG) is already the perfect medium for active storytelling. You are more than an audience; you are an active participant, shaping the story around you, crafting a WORLD around you. A great Dungeon Master

The lights started shortly after Matthew Vollmer’s mother died. It was the fall of 2019, and Vollmer’s father now lived alone, sleeping in the same bed where his wife of decades had released her final breath. He had spent 10 years caring for her as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases slowly took their toll. Now Vollmer,

In the winter, I love to sit in front of the fireplace show on Netflix and cuddle up with a good audiobook. I sip warm tea while listening to something like Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times by Katherine May, narrated by Rebecca Lee. Lee’s soothing voice with May’s comforting words

“I could see why so many stories were set in lighthouses,” thinks Julia, the titular narrator of Julia and the Shark, upon reaching her family’s unusual new home for the summer. “It’s a good place for adventures even before you go inside.” In this illustrated middle grade novel, award-winning British writer Kiran Millwood Hargrave (The

We reach the end of March with a selection of books from a set of up-and-coming crime authors who are bringing fresh ideas and large helpings of innovation to the crime fiction genre. These include Scottish author Robbie Morrison’s second crime novel, a debut from Australian Ashley Kalagian Blunt, Ajay Chowdhury’s third crime novel and

Eb didn’t mean to mess up Flow’s brand-new shoes, and Flow would never hit a girl, but in Kelly J. Baptist’s Eb & Flow, an accident leads to angry words, then a fistfight and then a 10-day suspension from school for seventh graders Ebony (Eb) and De’Kari (Flow). As they stare down two weeks at

Grace Linn is a 100-year-old widow of a WWII veteran, a grandmother, and a craftivist. On Tuesday, she spoke at a Martin County, Florida school board meeting to protest the removal of 80+ books from the school library. Her statement has gotten a lot of media coverage, and she was later interviewed on MSNBC, Fox

The ending of her popular Shetland series saw Ann Cleeves turning to a new character, DI Matthew Venn, a gay man based in North Devon. But although readers said a sad farewell to Jimmy Perez in Wild Fire, there’s still one familiar face that just keeps on going. We’re talking about DI Vera Stanhope, Northumberland’s

Although Leta McCollough Seletzky wasn’t born until eight years after the 1968 assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., she has always been haunted by the photo of that tragic night—one of the most recognizable images of the 20th century. And no wonder, since in it, her then 23-year-old father, Marrell “Mac” McCullough, can be

Ah, to be alive during the Twitter era. It’s a blessing and a curse, isn’t it? On the one hand, you’ve got the thoughts and opinions of millions of people across the globe right at your fingertips. On the other hand, what if those thoughts and opinions are ones you never asked for on topics

Australian author Megan Davis works in movies and travels the world, and has settled on Paris for her psychological thriller debut. With film credits include In Bruges, Atonement and the Bourne franchise, she lived in France for a time which helps with the authenticity of the Paris setting. The Messenger is a rare combination of

Little Cap is a shy, anxious mushroom who feels safest when surrounded by the comforts of home and the companionship of his best friend, Gustav, a lovable slug. But one day, Little Cap discovers that the gate of his white picket fence is open and Gustav is nowhere to be found, so he musters his

If you thought we hit “full names in book titles” in YA prior to this seasonal roundup, you’d be wrong. This trend continues to grow, and in the world of spring 2023 YA books, it’s one that will showcase how YA is becoming more thoughtful and intentional when it comes to creating more diverse, inclusive

It’s been six years since Victor LaValle published his acclaimed modern fairy tale, The Changeling. Now the author returns with another fantastical story that could only take place in America. Set in 1914 Montana, Lone Women follows Black homesteader Adelaide Henry, who, after the mysterious death of her parents, flees her home in California with

I am wholeheartedly a word game nerd. I love them. I’m still playing Wordle over a year since I started, and my family’s group chat is still going strong. Recently, on vacation, I heard my mom finish the New York Times mini crossword from the other side of the hotel room by the sound alone.

Is there any problem that cannot be overcome with the help of a good cup of tea? It certainly seems unlikely as, whether due to the comforting warmth it provides or the reassuring ceremony involved in its preparation, tea has been making people feel better for millennia. In the present day, the versatile beverage even

I don’t believe I’ve ever met a pasta I didn’t like. There are, however, many pasta shapes I’ve not had the pleasure of meeting—yet. In An A–Z of Pasta, Rome-based author Rachel Roddy introduces readers to 50 of them, some of which, like brichetti, are not often found beyond specific Italian regions. (As if I

In the summer of 2016, the speculative magazine Fireside Fiction published #BlackSpecFic: A Fireside Fiction Company Special Report. The findings were deeply troubling: Out of more than 2,000 stories published in 2015 in mainstream paying markets, only 38 were by Black authors. To put it bluntly, that’s less than two percent. The dearth of BIPOC

Translated by Robin Pickering-Iazzi — Fact and fiction fuse in feminist Italian author Maria Rosa Cutrufelli’s first novel, Tina, Mafia Soldier, which is also the author’s first to be translated into English. Originally published in 1994, Tina Cannizzaro’s story was inspired by that of Emanuela Azzarelli, a young woman who became the leader of a

In previous bestselling, award-winning books such as The Invention of Hugo Cabret, Wonderstruck and The Marvels, author-illustrator Brian Selznick has centered his richly imagined, deeply cinematic stories on children growing up alone and navigating worlds both dangerous and wonderful. Selznick explores similar themes in Big Tree, but this novel’s children aren’t human; they’re the seeds

Debut crime author Kitty Murphy moved from London to the west coast of Ireland 20 years ago, and it is her adopted country that features in Death in Heels, which is set amid the drag community of Dublin, in a fictional club called Trash. Kitty talks with Dr Jacky Collins about the book and its

The latest book by journalist Alex Mar (Witches of America) is a valuable contribution to the true crime genre. Taking its title from a verse in the Gospel of Matthew, Seventy Times Seven: A True Story of Murder and Mercy begins with a heinous murder but then follows the difficult, inspiring path of forgiveness and

The winners of the 2023 National Book Critics Circle Awards were announced last night at the New School. Books published in English in 2022 were eligible to win in six categories — Nonfiction, Fiction, Biography, Autobiography, Poetry and Criticism. Additionally, the best first book won the John Leonard Prize award, and this year is the

Having guided the redoubtable DI Geraldine Steel through 14 non-cosy cases, English crime author Leigh Russell has shifted her focus from the police procedural to the more gentle side of the crime genre with Barking Up the Right Tree. The first book in the A Poppy Mystery Tales series, it offers a plucky protagonist, a

Raul loves the guitar and volunteers as a music therapist with his uncle, a pastor, although he holds secret doubts about his family’s faith. It’s while volunteering that Raul meets Danna, who loves lists, poetry and food. In fact, Danna loves food so much that she believes that it can help restore her beloved grandfather,

For years, hundreds of high-profile manuscripts — including early versions of books by Margaret Atwood and Sally Rooney — were stolen in a phishing scheme. The most puzzling part of the case was that nothing seemed to come from these thefts; uthe manuscripts were not leaked or sold, as far as anyone could tell. So

It seems like ages since we’ve been to the Ozarks, the Southern mountain range that seems to be such a great setting for rural noir crime fiction. Eli Cranor is back with his second book to fix that, though. That’s our lead book this week, but we think choosing the next title to add to

Dani’s drab days are revived by color and beauty when a tree is planted in the “sometimes dusty, sometimes puddly” hole in the sidewalk in front of her home. Now, instead of waking each morning to the clamorous cacophony of city traffic, Dani greets her day with birdsong from nesting friends outside her window.  Dani