Albert Goldbarth Tavern Books ($10) This 36-page collection, inspired by the winding down of NASA’s space exploration program, uses its poem-essays to advocate a continued fascination with the greater unknown. Space is not a metaphor for Albert Goldbarth here, nor does it need to be—the cosmos are a stable and omnipresent source of untapped mystery, […]
Catherine Knutsson Atheneum Books for Young People ($9.99) A member of the Metís nation, Catherine Knutsson lyrically weaves native lore and a tense, fascinating tale in her debut novel, Shadows Cast by Stars. Knutsson’s protagonist Cassandra can see “shades,” people’s totem animals, though she’s uncertain what her own totem is. Her gifts come from the Old Way […]
From Adele to Ziggy, The Real A to Z of Rock and Pop Dylan Jones Picador ($25) “It's not what you like but what you are like that's important,” wrote Nick Hornby in High Fidelity—words that come to mind when perusing Dylan Jones's sprawling testament to the music he's loved and hated over his adult […]
Myfanwy Collins Pank ($14.95) Myfanwy Collins’s collection of stories I Am Holding Your Hand is the literary equivalent of a bag of marbles: some stories are large, some stories are small, some are transparent and some are opaque. Yet each story contains the arced and swooping patterns of a tiny universe. Most of these stories are less […]
Libba Bray Little, Brown Books for Teens ($19.99) When Evie gets drummed out of Ohio for uncovering a scandal with her special powers, it is the best thing that could have happened to her. It is the Roaring Twenties, and Evie’s bobbed cut and short skirts don’t fit in with Ohio’s more conservative circles, let […]
My Life in the Pursuit of the Afterlife Raymond Moody, MD and Paul Perry HarperOne ($15.99) While Raymond Moody’s name is now synonymous with afterlife studies, he started out studying astronomy and philosophy. When he heard of a physician who came back from the dead and reported seeing a light, his career path was changed […]
Daniel Smith Simon & Schuster ($25) A retrospective investigation into the potential origins of the author’s anxiety, there is little scientific framework to Daniel Smith’s Monkey Mind and even less speculation about modern society’s effects on the human psyche. Instead, Smith limits his exploration to his own troubled psychology, somehow managing to hold his affliction at bay […]
Thani Al-Suwaidi Antibookclub ($15) Thani Al-Suwaidi’s novella The Diesel is a miasmic study of gender, religion, and ambition within the context of contemporary Islam. In his first work of fiction, poet Al-Suwaidi (born in the United Arab Emirates in 1966) writes with the narrative economy of an imagist, yet with the informed disconnect of a Modernist. Originally […]
Anton Chekhov Translated by David Helwig Designed and decorated by Seth Biblioasis ($14.95) In a pairing seemingly made in aesthetic heaven, Biblioasis has released a quaint and stunning edition that combines Seth’s vividly drab illustration with the patient and diligent prose of Chekhov. This trio of linked stories, penned toward the end of Chekhov’s career, […]
Azareen Van Der Vliet Oloomi Dorothy, a Publishing Project ($16) In Fra Keeler, Iranian-American writer Azareen Van Der Vliet Oloomi turns in a peculiar, surreal narrative of self-exploration and the problematic nature of inheritance. The novel traverses increasingly cloudy waters, only occasionally landing upon moments of clarity—usually when the narrator interacts with other characters. For the […]