The Night Ocean Paul La Farge Penguin Press Release Date: March 7, 2017 ISBN 978-1-1019-8108-5 I cracked open the cover of Paul La Farge’s novel The Night Ocean in trepidation, because Lovecraftian dark fantasy is not something I actively seek out. I will read a work if it’s considered “Lovecraftian” […]
A City Dreaming Daniel Polansky Regan Arts Release Date: October 4, 2016 ISBN 978-1-68245-038-3 I knew nothing of author Daniel Polansky when, on the recommendation from a friend, I picked up a copy of his novel Low Town. It turns out I enjoyed that book so much that I sought […]
Rare Objects Kathleen Tessaro Harper Release Date: April 12, 2016 ISBN 978-0-0623-5754-0 In 2013, Kathleen Tessaro’s novel, The Perfume Collector, became one of my favorite reads of all time despite it not falling within the parameters of my preferred genre. Now, three years later, her newest book has been released, […]
The Burning Light Bradley P. Beaulieu and Rob Ziegler Tor.com Release Date: November 1, 2016 ISBN 978-0-7653-9086-8 New York City. The future. Manhattan is flooded, some buildings still tenable, but many abandoned, rusted and moldy, full of squatters and junkies. Transport moves via watercraft. Worldwide, humanity relies on mind-linking networks […]
Sweetbitter Stephanie Danler Alfred A. Knopf Release Date: May 24, 2016 ISBN 978-11-0187-594-0 Sweetbitter, the debut novel from newcomer Stephanie Danler, is a lot like New York City: completely wrapped up in itself, which means it is sometimes incredibly pretentious, and at other times absolutely perfect. It is, however, uniquely […]
The Museum of Extraordinary Things Alice Hoffman Scribner First Edition: February 18, 2014 ISBN 978-1-4516-9356-0 Part fairy tale, part morality play, part historical fiction, Alice Hoffman’s 31st novel, The Museum of Extraordinary Things, pays homage to New York City in 1911. While much of the action takes place prior to […]
Visible City Tova Mirvis Houghton Mifflin Harcourt ISBN: 978-0-544-04774-7 Despite living in a city of over eight million people, the characters in Tova Mirvis’s recently released novel, Visible City, feel utterly alone. Set in a New York City neighborhood, Mirvis masterfully weaves the lives of her characters together through random […]
On this day, December 3, in 1857, Joseph Conrad was born in Berdichev, Imperial Russia (modern
Ukraine, then a part of Poland). While he settled in England and wrote in English, he always considered himself a Pole. Heart of Darkness, one of the most famous of his 20 novels (which explores colonialism and the attitudes regarding what constitutes a barbarian versus civilized society) is considered one of the best English novels of the 20th century, as is his novel Lord Jim, which chronicles a crew’s abandonment of its disabled ship. Conrad died in England in 1924 at age 66.