June 1, 2025: Volume XCIII, No. 11

FEATURING 302 Industry-First Reviews of Fiction, Nonfiction, Children’s, and YA Books

The Katabasis author headlines a special Science Fiction & Fantasy Issue

R.F. KUANG MAKES DARK ACADEMIA EXTRA HELLISH

FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK

OUR SCIENCE FICTIONAL WORLD

LET’S FACE IT: We’re living in the world that science fiction made. Perhaps we don’t inhabit colonies on Mars or commute in flying automobiles, as SF writers of the 1950s envisioned, but there’s no doubt that the innovations of Big Tech— from the internet and smartphones to driverless cars and 3-D printing—have transformed our society into something more, well, Orwellian than it once was. Now artificial intelligence is poised to revolutionize the way we live still further, propelling us into a science fiction future straight out of the imaginations of Arthur C. Clarke or Isaac Asimov. To help us better understand the technology and its impact, there’s a host of recent nonfiction to be read, including Christopher Summerfield’s These Strange New Minds: How AI Learned

To Talk and What It Means (Viking, March 11) and Parmy Olson’s Supremacy: AI, ChatGPT, and the Race That Will Change the World (St. Martin’s, 2024).

But as so often is the case, fiction can take us beyond straight facts to feel what AI could mean for human life. By imagining speculative scenarios well outside our current reality, SFF writers chart a course for us—and deliver a warning. Here are a few recent works that incorporate the possibilities—and the dangers—of AI into their storylines:

We Lived on the Horizon by Erika Swyler (Atria, Jan. 14):

On page 1 of this novel, readers are introduced to Parallax, the AI system that is literally wired into the walls of Bulwark, a thriving desert city built centuries ago. “Parallax

Frequently Asked Questions: www.kirkusreviews.com/about/faq

Fully Booked Podcast: www.kirkusreviews.com/podcast/

Advertising Opportunities: www.kirkusreviews.com/book-marketing

Submission Guidelines: www.kirkusreviews.com/about/publisher-submission-guidelines

Subscriptions: www.kirkusreviews.com/magazine/subscription

Newsletters: www.kirkusreviews.com

For customer service or subscription questions, please call 1-800-316-9361

is not separate from the city of Bulwark’s residents,” writes the author, “and has never considered themselves to be—the system does not question function or purpose, and they are secure in their reason for existence.” Scared yet? Our starred review calls the book “singularly stunning and stunningly singular.”

The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami (Pantheon, March 4): This novel dispatches its protagonist to a women’s “retention center” after a federal agency determines, based on biometric data collected while she slept, that she’s at high risk of committing a crime. Once at the center, Sara and her fellow inmates are enlisted to evaluate the credibility of AI-generated images for a software subcontractor—a chilling vision of the inescapable loop by which we’re both targeted and exploited by technology. It’s an “engrossing and troubling dystopian tale,” according to our starred review.

Luminous by Silvia Park (Simon & Schuster, March 11): Set in an indeterminate future where North and South Korea have been unified, Park’s first novel

situates its sibling protagonists, Jun and Morgan, in a world gone fully robotic— including bionic appendages and a robot sibling who was introduced into the family and then removed without explanation. Our starred review calls it a “messy, visionary debut.”

Awakened by A.E. Osworth (Grand Central Publishing, April 29): “Society talks about the future of artificial intelligence in so many erroneous ways,” posits this winning fantasy novel in which a coven of transgender New York City witches wields magic against a nefarious AI that threatens its way of life. The book is a “charming, magical romp with a focus on the importance of finding and building queer community,” according to our starred review. Couldn’t we all use a little less technology—and a little more magic—in our lives?

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

TOM BEER

Science Fiction & Fantasy Issue

Co-Chairman

HERBERT SIMON

Publisher & CEO

MEG LABORDE KUEHN mkuehn@kirkus.com

Chief Marketing Officer

SARAH KALINA skalina@kirkus.com

Publisher Advertising & Promotions

RACHEL WEASE rwease@kirkus.com

Indie Advertising & Promotions

AMY BAIRD abaird@kirkus.com

Author Consultant

KEELIN FERDINANDSEN kferdinandsen@kirkus.com

Lead Designer KY NOVAK knovak@kirkus.com

Magazine Compositor

NIKKI RICHARDSON nrichardson@kirkus.com

Kirkus Editorial Senior Production Editor

ROBIN O’DELL rodell@kirkus.com

Kirkus Editorial Senior Production Editor

MARINNA CASTILLEJA mcastilleja@kirkus.com

Kirkus Editorial Production Editor

ASHLEY LITTLE alittle@kirkus.com

Copy Editors

ELIZABETH J. ASBORNO

LORENA CAMPES

NANCY MANDEL BILL SIEVER

Co-Chairman

MARC WINKELMAN

Editor-in-Chief TOM BEER tbeer@kirkus.com

President of Kirkus Indie

CHAYA SCHECHNER cschechner@kirkus.com

Fiction Editor

LAURIE MUCHNICK lmuchnick@kirkus.com

Nonfiction Editor JOHN McMURTRIE jmcmurtrie@kirkus.com

Young Readers’ Editor LAURA SIMEON lsimeon@kirkus.com

Young Readers’ Editor MAHNAZ DAR mdar@kirkus.com

Editor at Large

MEGAN LABRISE mlabrise@kirkus.com

Senior Indie Editor

DAVID RAPP drapp@kirkus.com

Indie Editor ARTHUR SMITH asmith@kirkus.com

Editorial Assistant

NINA PALATTELLA npalattella@kirkus.com

Indie Editorial Assistant

DAN NOLAN dnolan@kirkus.com

Indie Editorial Assistant

KATARINA YERGER kyerger@kirkus.com

Mysteries Editor THOMAS LEITCH

Contributing Writers

GREGORY McNAMEE

MICHAEL SCHAUB

Contributors

Nada Abdelrahim, Colleen Abel, Jill Adams, Jeffrey Alford, Autumn Allen, Paul Allen, Stephanie Anderson, Mark Athitakis, Diego Báez, Kit Ballenger, Nell Beram, Elizabeth Bird, Christopher A. Biss-Brown, Sarah Blackman, Sally Brander, Melissa Brinn, Jennifer Brough, Jessica Hoptay Brown, Ana Cackley, Kevin Canfield, Timothy Capehart, Catherine Cardno, Hailey Carrell, Tobias Carroll, Ann Childs, Alec B. Chunn, Carin Clevidence, Adeisa Cooper, Emma Corngold, Jeannie Coutant, Perry Crowe, Michael Deagler, Cathy DeCampli, Dave DeChristopher, Suji DeHart, Steve Donoghue, Melanie Dragger, Anna Drake, Eamon Drumm, Robert Duxbury, Jacob Edwards, Lisa Elliott, Lily Emerick, Kristen Evans, Joshua Farrington, Margherita Ferrante, Katie Flanagan, Amy Seto Forrester, Catherine Foster, Sasha Fox-Carney, Mia Franz, Ayn Reyes Frazee, Jenna Friebel, Jackie Friedland, Roberto Friedman, Sydney Geyer, Frank Gibney, Carol Goldman, Amy Goldschlager, Danielle Galván Gomez, Emily A. Gordon, Michael Griffith, Christine Gross-Loh, Sean Hammer, Peter Heck, Lynne Heffley, Ralph Heibutzki, Shannan Hicks, Loren Hinton, Katrina Niidas Holm, Abigail Hsu, Julie Hubble, Ariana Hussain, Kathleen T. Isaacs, Darlene Ivy, Kristen Jacobson, Wesley Jacques, Kerri Jarema, Betsy Judkins, Ivan Kenneally, Colleen King, Stephanie Klose, Lyneea Kmail, Maggie Knapp, Andrea Kreidler, Susan Kusel, Megan Dowd Lambert, Carly Lane, Chelsea Langford, Christopher Lassen, Tom Lavoie, Seth Lerer, Coeur de Lion, Barbara London, Patricia Lothrop, Wendy Lukehart, Isabella Luongo, Michael Magras, Joan Malewitz, Thomas Maluck, Emmett Marshall, Michelle H Martin, Gabriela Martins, J. Alejandro Mazariegos, Kirby McCurtis, Breanna McDaniel, Jeanne McDermott, Dale McGarrigle, Zoe McLaughlin, Cari Meister, Kathie Meizner, Carol Memmott, Clayton Moore, Andrea Moran, Rhett Morgan, Molly Muldoon, Jennifer Nabers, Christopher Navratil, Rachael Nevins, Ari Nussbaum, Katrina Nye, Mike Oppenheim, Emilia Packard, Bethanne Patrick, Deb Paulson, Rebecca Perry, John Edward Peters, Christofer Pierson, William E. Pike, Margaret Quamme, Bridget Quinn, Judy Quinn, Kristy Raffensberger, Kristen Bonardi Rapp, Kristen Rasmussen, Darryn Reams, Caroline Reed, Stephanie Reents, Amy B. Reyes, Nancy Thalia Reynolds, Jasmine Riel, Alyssa Rivera, Amy Robinson, Oisin Rowe, Gia Ruiz, Lloyd Sachs, Bob Sanchez, Caitlin Savage, Christine Scheper, Gene Seymour, Madeline Shellhouse, Kerry Sheridan, Sadaf Siddique, Danielle Sigler, Linda Simon, Laurie Skinner, Wendy Smith, Ari Snyder, Margot E. Spangenberg, Andria Spencer, Allison Staley, Allie Stevens, Mathangi Subramanian, Jennifer Sweeney, Eva Thaler-Sroussi, Lenora Todaro, Amanda Toth, Bijal Vachharajani, Jenna Varden, Katie Vermilyea, Francesca Vultaggio, Barbara Ward, Katie Weeks, Sara Beth West, Kimberly Whitmer, Angela Wiley, Kerry Winfrey, Marion Winik, Jean-Louise Zancanella

PUSHING THE BOUNDARIES OF IMAGINATION

SOMETIMES IT FEELS like all fiction is fantasy. Is it any easier to believe in the reality of an Elizabeth Bennett than a Katniss Everdeen? All authors are spinning a web—creating worlds that don’t exist and inviting readers inside. But there are authors who revel in pushing the boundaries, in sending their imaginations to the far corners of the universe, and those are the authors we celebrate in this issue.

Audition by Pip Adam (Coffee House, June 10): Like the borders of the science fiction and fantasy genres, the giants on board the spacecraft Audition are constantly expanding. Stanley, Alba, and Drew are crammed into whatever spaces they fit into when they got too big to move around, and now all they can do is talk—which is convenient, because the ship runs on their chatter, turning “[their] noise into speed and steering.” The other 15 ordinary-sized crew members seem to have disappeared, and now, through the giants’ voices,

the reader can put together the stories of the giants’ lives before their forced journey on the Audition and of the catastrophic trip itself. Our starred review says, “Brilliantly weird. Weirdly brilliant.”

When We Were Real by Daryl Gregory (Saga/ Simon & Schuster, April 1): It starts off sounding like a joke: “A retired engineer, a comic-book writer, a rabbi, and two nuns take a tour of glitches in the simulation that is the world.…” There’s also a pregnant teenage influencer and a conspiracy podcaster, not to mention a professor on the run from a bunch of murderous incels. Our starred review says, “It’s a testament to Gregory’s skill at

character development that the people in this novel, and not the bizarre phenomena they’re observing, are the most fascinating part. This is a marvel. Big-hearted, generous, and beautifully written.”

The Ephemera Collector by Stacy Nathaniel Jackson (Liveright/Norton, April 1): It’s 2035, and humans have created colonies to plunder Mars. There’s also an undersea nation called Diwata, inspired by Octavia E. Butler and the Black Panther Party. Xandria Anastasia Brown is a curator of African American Ephemera in Los Angeles whose passion is collecting objects from Diwata, to preserve them for the future—but she’s slowed down by Covid-induced memory loss and aided (maybe?) by AI helper bots. Our review says that Jackson’s novel “displays an astonishing breadth of imagination spanning centuries—there’s everything from a far-future

symposium attended by an immortal Xandria to an exploration of Diwata’s origins.…A daring Afrofuturist debut.”

Greenteeth by Molly O’Neill (Orbit, February 25): Jenny Greenteeth isn’t one of a kind—in fact, she’s part of a group of magical water-dwelling creatures with green skin and sharp teeth who all share the name Jenny Greenteeth. Our Jenny lives in a lake near a town with the supremely British name of Chipping Appleby, and when a woman named Temperance Crump is tossed into the lake for being a witch, they discover that the town’s new parson is in fact the evil Erl King. With the help of a hobgoblin named Brackus, Jenny and Temperance set off on a quest to save Britain’s magical beings from this ancient creature. Our starred review says O’Neill’s debut is “full of magic, but even more heart.”

Laurie Muchnick is the fiction editor.

LAURIE MUCHNICK

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

EDITOR’S PICK

Can magic solve all your problems? Unlikely, says this thoughtful, impactful work of fantasy.

Jamie, a trans graduate student, needs to find that piece of evidence that will give direction to her Ph.D. dissertation about 18th-century female authors, even as her university threatens to pull her funding and she faces misogyny and transphobia every day in the classes she teaches. She’s also trying to reconnect with her mother, Serena, who is suffering from a crippling depression stemming from the long-ago death of her wife, Mae, and the ruin of her career as a social justice activist by the leader of a right-wing smear group. So Jamie shares something with Serena

that she hasn’t even shared with her nonbinary spouse, Ro: Jamie can do magic. She performs rituals that she hopes will make her small desires real in the world. Serena takes to this practice, but almost immediately seeks to enact larger, angrier spells, with effects that neither she nor Jamie can anticipate or control, profoundly disrupting both of their lives. This compact novel is about many things: a literary treasure hunt that strongly recalls A.S. Byatt’s Possession; the struggle to negotiate obligations to parents, spouses, and oneself; moving forward from grief; and a self-taught witch’s fraught journey toward understanding her own magic. But underlying everything is this profound question: How do minority

Lessons in Magic and Disaster

groups (in this case, specifically, those in the LGBTQ+ community) fight effectively and ethically against the tolerance of intolerance? Wouldn’t it be wonderful to magically smite the powerful figures who discriminate, disenfranchise,

and endanger the vulnerable through indifference or cruelty? Unfortunately, it’s never that easy, not in real life and not in fiction.

Much to ponder, much to cry over and rage against, much to appreciate.

I’ll Be Right Here

Bloom, Amy | Random House (272 pp.)

$28 | June 24, 2025 | 9781984801722

A n unconventional chosen family spreads its branches over decades and continents.

Bloom’s latest opens with a deathbed scene that introduces the core cast of her lively but elliptical narrative, which hopscotches from France in the 1930s and ’40s to Mexico in the 1980s to the Hudson Valley in the 1990s and 2010s, adding numerous key characters along the way. (Get out your pencil and paper, because you’re not going to be able to remember who’s who without taking notes.) At the center of the ensemble are Gazala and Samir Benamar, a French Algerian sister and brother who are orphaned in prewar Paris. Typical of this novel, their baker father is killed off in a single, glancing sentence: “We do not arrange for a proper burial.” Similarly, we are told only in passing that Samir was adopted as a baby by Gazala’s parents, a fact worth recalling when the two, after many years of separation, reunite and become lovers. A wonderful section has Gazala working for the writer Colette during the Vichy occupation and meeting her friend the jewelry designer Suzanne Belperron (do Google to get a peek at her work). After the war, Gazala emigrates to New York and becomes a baker herself. There she meets the Cohen family, whose daughters, Alma and Anne, become part of the core group known as the Greats, pillars of the chosen family, the ones who eventually gather at Gazala’s deathbed. Anne Cohen will eventually leave her husband, Richard, for his sister, Honey, a novelist. Early in the novel, a shaggy-dog storytelling game called Barbary Lion Escapes is introduced; later we learn of another one called Dead People’s Party, “a mental get-together of everyone you’ve ever known who mattered.” Well, this novel is Barbary Lion meets Dead

People’s Party—full of surprises, wild leaps and turns, and many fascinating people who love each other. Warm, rich, beautifully written, and very hard to follow.

Kirkus Star

The Greatest Possible Good

Brooks, Ben | Avid Reader Press (336 pp.)

$28.99 | July 15, 2025 | 9781668089460

When their patriarch donates the family fortune to charity, an already unhappy family is thoroughly atomized. It doesn’t always work to write a novel driven by moral purpose. With so much enlightenment to deliver, how much fun can it be? In the case of Brooks’ debut, there’s nothing to worry about. Even the particulars of the grand gesture that sets the plot in motion reveal the book’s wry aesthetic. As the novel opens, Arthur and Yara Candlewick are confronting their son, Emil, about a little something that came in the mail—LSD and MDMA the 15-year-old purchased on the dark web. That evening, Arthur leaves their house in the Cotswolds for a walk, taking with him “his daughter’s book, his son’s drug stash, and an uncorked bottle of mid-price Bordeaux.” The book in question is an explainer on effective altruism, one which radicalminded 17-year-old Evangeline was reading at the dinner table “with the urgency of an actress searching for her own name in a bad review.” Arthur himself will read it at the bottom of a mineshaft into which he has fallen, under the influence of a mind-expanding drug cocktail. After he’s rescued, he’s a different man, determined to give away all the proceeds of the impending sale of his company and to live a life of monastic simplicity. None of the other members of the family will follow him on this path; even Evangeline finds herself annoyed and alienated by the fact that the focal point of her rebellion

has “cheated and become exactly the kind of person she wanted to be, overnight, and with no effort whatsoever.” Brooks makes each of these flawed characters endearing by showing not just their pettiness and limitations but what is in their hearts. “As a teenager, Yara had always imagined that her family, when she had one, would be an inseparable band of bantering adventurers, going forth into the world together, on road trips and holidays and outings to restored castles or spangly caves. She had never expected that they would be four people conducting four entirely separate lives out of the same building, like businesses sharing space in a shopping arcade, their owners nodding to each other as they arrived early to roll up the shutters.” Impressively, Brooks finds a way to the greatest good for each of them.

The pleasures of this novel’s writing, characters, and plot are fully equal to its good intentions.

Port Anna

Buck, Libby | Simon & Schuster (352 pp.) $28.99 | July 1, 2025 | 9781668060070

An exile returns home to a little town on the coast of Maine in Buck’s gently fantastical debut. Gwen Gilmore last stayed in her family’s summer house in Port

Anna, a “village at the edge of the world,” almost 25 years ago, when she was a teenager, the year that her younger sister, Molly, drowned. Her mother has Alzheimer’s disease, her boyfriend dumped her, and she’s lost her job as an English professor in North Carolina. Back at Periwinkle Cottage, now plagued with several decades worth of dust and damage, she reunites with several friends from high school as well as the folksy older residents of the town, becomes involved with the search for a missing high school student, meets a hunky Argentinian artist with “kaleidoscope

Italy at the turn of the 21st century is a tough place to be poor and female.

THE LAKE’S WATER IS NEVER SWEET

eyes,” restarts the writing career she abandoned, attempts to fend off a smarmy real estate developer who has eyes for the land on which her house sits, and finally confronts the guilt she feels for her sister’s death. She is aided in her various quests by the wellintentioned ghosts of “the Misses,” two Bryn Mawr professors who shared their lives and the summer house for decades, and by some mysterious seals who may or may not have a connection to the heroic lighthouse keeper who gave the town its name. Magical realism aside, the plot sometimes strains credulity: Gwen, otherwise intelligent, naïvely accepts a refinancing deal and a warm bedroom from the real estate mogul, and the solution to her problems depends on an unlikely coincidence. But readers looking for an escape to coastal Maine, with both its bucolic and forbidding moods, will find that here, along with the depiction of a community where everybody minds everybody else’s business, and a touch of romance. A reassuring look at making peace with a rocky past and place.

Bodock

Busby, Robert | Hub City Press (264 pp.) | $16.95 paper June 3, 2025 | 9798885740517

This debut collection chronicles tensions below the surface in a Mississippi town. In telling a series of stories set in the titular town, Busby explores a wide range of styles, from

stark realism to unpredictable surrealism. Throughout, he keeps things firmly rooted in a sense of place, with disputes over the land itself providing some of the stories’ conflicts. The first sentence of “Mistletoe,” which opens the book, makes this clear: “Noon, and another dump truck drove by the farmhouse on County Road 336 between the Thaxton and Friendship communities in Claygardner County.” Later, the author invokes local retail to summon a similar you-are-there feeling. Regardless of the style of story they’re in, plenty of Busby’s characters have challenges, including a meth business in “Steer Away From That Darkness,” a sex-crimes conviction in “Frison the Bison,” and the way that “Mistletoe” protagonist Raymond has weathered amputations from a lifetime of smoking. (There’s some crime fiction in this book’s DNA as well.) Other motifs run throughout the book: Sick or injured animals play a large part in both “Heartworms” and “Fraternal Twins,” often to an emotionally wrenching effect. At times, the stylistic range works against the collection; there’s no shortage of individually powerful moments, but the cumulative effect feels somehow reduced. There’s no doubt that Busby can tell a compelling story and evoke a striking image, though, as with this depiction of a sick dog: “her belly inflated this week and kept on swelling, her fur stretched taut around her ribcage, her backbone defined as knuckles.” If this is where Busby’s literary career is beginning, it suggests even better things to come.

An uneven collection, but when it hits home, it’s devastatingly precise.

The Lake’s Water Is Never Sweet

Caminito, Giulia | Trans. by Hope Campbell Gustafson | Spiegel & Grau (320 pp.) $28 | July 8, 2025 | 9781954118669

Italy at the turn of the 21st century is a tough place to be poor and female.

In her Englishlanguage debut, Caminito paints a brutal portrait of working-class life reminiscent of Elsa Morante’s History and gives us a narrator as seething and self-damaging as Lucy Snowe in Charlotte Brontë’s Villette. She creates a voice all her own, however, as the narrator (who gives her name only at the very end) chronicles her childhood and adolescence on the margins of Italian society while her redoubtable, impossible mother battles an indifferent bureaucracy to get permanent housing for a crippled husband and four children. Antonia Colombo embarrasses her daughter with loud confrontations with anyone who tries to keep the family at the bottom of the heap and maddens her with unceasing demands that she excel in school so she can have a better life than her mother. “I judge her and I do not forgive her,” declares the narrator. Painfully aware that she lacks the resources and confidence of other students, she reacts to all kindness with fear and rejection; since her mother has never expressed love, she doesn’t know how to either give or receive it. Antonia manages to move the family from Rome’s slums to public housing near a lake outside the city, but even here, they stand out as especially underprivileged, and the narrator is subjected to merciless teasing. When one particularly nasty boy cuts the strings on a tennis racket that her mother skipped paying bills to buy, she discovers a well of violence and rage that will serve both to protect her and isolate her as she grows to adulthood. Caminito’s gripping narrative takes many twists and turns but always remains focused on her

compelling protagonist, so painfully vulnerable and unhappy that we understand even her most egregious acts. If only she could forgive herself for what life has made of her. Ferocious and riveting.

Kirkus Star

Fresh, Green Life

Castillo, Sebastian | Soft Skull Press (160 pp.) | $15.95 paper June 24, 2025 | 9781593767914

A lonely academic visits his mentor’s house on New Year’s Eve.

Sureness of tone goes a long way in Castillo’s novel, which begins like autofiction and arrives at an unexpected destination. When the novel opens, the narrator—who shares a name and some qualities with the author, albeit subtly altered—is alone at home on New Year’s Eve. He received an invitation from Aleister, an old professor and provocateur, inviting him to a gathering at his home in the Philadelphia suburbs. The possibility that Maria, an old classmate whose marriage recently ended, will be there is enough to get the narrator to venture out of the house, and eventually, he makes the circumstances clearer and the stakes become higher. He’s been in the midst of a self-imposed vow of silence after an ill-advised classroom lecture about leprechauns went terribly wrong. Castillo takes on the challenging task of balancing the tension between the narrator’s inner life, which includes thoughts like “I found their blitheness untoward,” and the more obscure and awkward actions in which he engages. When the narrator arrives at Aleister’s house, things do not go the way he expects; he learns that Aleister has been keeping secrets from him and is contemplating suicide. Castillo weaves in some jarring and even comic details, such as the fact that Aleister’s book collection includes Deleuze for

Castillo

navigates a fraught narrative with empathy and dry humor.

FRESH, GREEN LIFE

Dummies. That combination of highbrow references and deadpan comedy clicks resonantly throughout the book, and admirers of Thomas Bernhard’s work will find plenty to savor here. The gulf between the narrator’s intellectual ideals and lived reality—including awkwardly “liking” a sexy photo of Maria on social media— gives this short novel plenty of energy. Castillo navigates an emotionally fraught narrative with empathy and dry humor.

Typewriter Beach

Clayton, Meg Waite | Harper/ HarperCollins (320 pp.) | $30 July 1, 2025 | 9780063422148

A screenwriter clears out her recently deceased grandfather’s home and learns about his youth as part of old Hollywood.

The book opens in 1957 as Hollywood hopeful Isabella Giori auditions for a part in an Alfred Hitchcock film. It’s not long before she’s on the rise to real stardom, but her budding career is cut short when she becomes pregnant. To avoid scandal, a Hollywood fixer moves her to a secluded cottage in Carmel-by-the-Sea, where she finds an unlikely friend. Sequestered in the cottage next door is Leo Chazan, a blacklisted Hollywood screenwriter who refused to name names during the ongoing Red Scare of the 1950s. The book then shifts to 2018, where Leo’s granddaughter, Gemma, is preparing to sell his cottage after his recent death. As she’s cleaning out the house, she discovers a safe full of secrets. She

also gets to know some of the other residents of this cluster of secluded cottages, including Isabella Giori, and an intriguingly handsome young man named Sam Kenneally, who also knew her grandfather. As Gemma tries to piece together parts of her beloved grandfather’s history that she never knew, she also discovers important truths about herself and her desires. Told in the third person, the book shifts between 1957 and 2018 to paint a fuller picture of the lives of Isabella and Gemma and how they relate. Though the information about old Hollywood may interest film buffs, excessive details about films, Oscar ceremonies, and actors slow down the narrative and do little to advance the plot. The 2018 strand is more engaging, but also moves slowly as Gemma attempts to work through her emotions, failing to make progress for much of the book. Even so, the novel includes interesting commentary on the ways that women have been hindered in Hollywood both before and since the emergence of the #MeToo movement, as well as the unfairness with which members of the industry have been treated across generations. The author does an admirable job of exploring the issue of what constitutes success while also pulling back the curtain on Hollywood’s longtime underbelly.

An unhurried tale about the flaws of the film industry and the healing power of human connection.

For more by Meg Waite Clayton, visit Kirkus online.

Don’t Open Your Eyes

Constantine, Liv | Bantam (352 pp.) $30 | June 17, 2025 | 9780593875209

When a woman starts having dreams that seem to foreshadow future events, she also begins to unravel a dark family secret.

Annabelle

Reynolds has all the trappings of a happy, successful life: a handsome, solicitous neurologist husband; two beautiful daughters; a thriving career in media communications; a big, beautiful house in the most desirable part of town. So, when she wakes from a terrible nightmare in which her husband is choking and threatening her, she chalks it up to an overactive imagination. But soon there is another nightmare about a very specific plane crashing—and this one comes true. Could she be psychic? Her husband, James, is not only skeptical, he is downright dismissive. But Annabelle can’t lose the feeling of dread that bad things are coming. Of course, there are cracks in the facade of her perfect life, anyway: Her older daughter is texting with someone she met online, hoping to meet up with him IRL, and Annabelle herself hides a private grief. When she dreams of a handsome stranger who then becomes her next client, she realizes that, whatever the origin, her dreams are true signposts that something is wrong—in her past, in her marriage, and, possibly, with her children. Most of the chapters are told from Annabelle’s point of view, either in the present or in a time labeled “Before,” but occasionally there is a short interlude in the voice of “The Wife.” Whose wife? And what’s up with the husband she is so closely investigating? Despite a bit of mustache-twirling once the villain is revealed, the complex characters plus the hint of supernatural prophecy put a new spin on domestic thriller tropes. Women, Constantine roars, believe your instincts!

A tension-ramping nail-biter of a novel.

Kirkus Star

How To Dodge a Cannonball

Dayle, Dennard | Henry Holt (336 pp.)

$28.99 | June 17, 2025 | 9781250345677

Imagine a post-millennial trickster spin on The Red Badge of Courage only with broader landscapes, complex racial dynamics, and corrosive humor. Call him

Anders. He’s a tall, pale teenage naif who gets so swept up in the maelstrom of the Civil War that by 1863, he’s been a regimental flag bearer for both the Union and Confederate armies before barely surviving the Yankees’ rout at Gettysburg and staggering into an all-Black Union regiment. With the craftiness he’s had to depend on since leaving behind his abusive mother, Anders blends in with his new platoon with stolen blue duds and a claim to being an octoroon (i.e. mixed race). The Black troopers skeptically indulge this white-boy straggler’s story and take him in as one of their own—and they are as motley a crew as can be imagined in anybody’s army. There’s Corporal Tobias Gleason, a playwright specializing in what he calls “speculative theater” about “The American Future.” Also notable among Anders’ new compatriots are Joaquin Geoffroy, a Haitian-born double agent embedded among African American soldiers “to inspire greater brutality against their white countrymen,” an “eternally frowning black giant” named Mole, and Thomas, a grouchy freed slave with ongoing, unresolved grievances against God (and just about everything else). There’s another teenager in the regiment, a bugler named Petey, who’s as “light” in skin color as Anders and is just as vague about his true origins. With a captured, duplicitous white arms dealer named Slade Jefferson in tow, Anders and his adopted brothers-in-arms embark on a perilous, sometimes-savage journey that takes them to a New York City whose streets are stained with Black blood from the draft riots. Then Gleason

is emboldened to lead the wayward regiment to San Valentin, a Nevada settlement offering a prototype of a freer, more equitable America “unstained by cotton.” Grand dreams, inflated egos, and cruel twists of fate are often the stuff of great satires and this first novel by Dayle evokes such classic accounts of the human condition in conflict as Candide, Catch-22, and at least a couple of books by Evelyn Waugh. Historical burlesque as lively in invention as it is ingenious in execution.

Ceylon Sapphires

Doquang, Mailan | Mysterious Press (304 pp.)

$26.95 | June 3, 2025 | 9781613166475

A jewel thief on the run tours the hot spots of Europe. Rune Sarasin seems to be getting sloppy in her old age. Not that she’s really old: a witness describes the Thai American expatriate as being between 25 and 35. But the last four months she’s spent under the thumb of Charles Lemaire, an international trafficker in stolen gems, has taken its toll, wearing her out both physically and mentally. How else could you explain how the talented Rune, wildly successful at pilfering jewelry and disappearing silently into the night, could snatch Margot Steiner’s Bonaparte necklace from around her neck in the middle of the Louvre in broad daylight, forgetting the surveillance cameras trained on everyone, everywhere, all at once? After one more heist in Deauville, which also fails to go as planned, she flies to Mallorca, where she learns that her picture is on every newsfeed on the internet. A city girl at heart, Rune flees to Marseille, then Amsterdam, and finally Berlin. She falls in love, falls out of love, and plays havoc with the hospitality industry. At each stop, Doquang flirts with the local color, but Rune’s gotta-go, gotta-run personality works against allowing readers to engage in much vicarious tourism.

Adrenaline junkies may enjoy the constant edge-of-the-cliff pacing as Rune stays one step ahead of the police while always plotting that one final caper that will get her out of Lemaire’s grasp. But the frantic pace of her adventure keeps her from developing much steam as an identification figure. You root for her but not really with her. Like the heroine’s affairs of the heart, this one’s for those who prefer adventure to commitment.

A Short Introduction to Anneliese

Elkins, James | Unnamed Press (400 pp.) $32 | June 10, 2025 | 9781961884434

An expansive, self-aware novel about human connection. Elkins continues the story of Samuel Emmer, begun in Weak in Comparison to Dreams (2023), with another formally inventive work of fiction. The novel opens with Emmer meeting Anneliese Glur, an academic, and her brother, Paul, during a visit to Frankfurt. Quickly, Anneliese establishes herself as an original thinker who has a way with words, as when she compares the use of language to wearing uncomfortable clothing: “Language has forced me to make fun of myself, my idea is wrapped around me like this suit.” The first two-thirds of this novel recounts a few heady conversations that Samuel and Anneliese have over the following months, which soon reveal that Anneliese has a penchant for speaking in very long sentences. There’s an element of humor to this, as when Samuel is desperate to end their conversation so that he can make a flight and Anneliese makes epic point after epic point. There’s an element of absurdism, too, whether Anneliese is discussing the lives of ticks or deconstructing the opening credits of Psycho. And when Anneliese goes on a long tear about very long books—

something she dubs “Long Novel Insanity”—it feels like a knowing wink to the reader. Late in the novel, Samuel learns of Anneliese’s death and receives her notebooks, and what had been absurdist turns elegiac. As Samuel (and the reader) make their way through those notebooks, an element of sadness that had been below the surface comes into view. Eventually, Samuel takes on a newfound appreciation for Anneliese’s life’s work: “This was a universe, not a book.” Readers who appreciate formal invention and wry humor will find much to savor here.

Kirkus

Star

The Devil Three Times

Fayne, Rickey | Little, Brown (416 pp.)

$30 | May 13, 2025 | 9780316575171

A multigenerational family saga in which the Devil plays a leading role.

Fayne’s ambitious debut novel attempts to capture the Black experience through one family, across the long reach of history and geography, much like Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing (2016) and Ayana Mathis’ The Twelve Tribes of Hattie (2013). Here the story opens in the early days of American slavery, as a woman named Yetunde, captured and sent to the Laurent family plantation in western Tennessee, makes a deal with the Devil for her survival. (The Devil, for his part, has cut a deal with Jesus to watch over Black people in the hopes of returning to God’s good graces: “That’s why Black people have to go through hell to get free.”) In the generations that follow, characters will indeed endure, but not without struggle. Yetunde, and her trademark yellow dress, will weave through the story as a spectral reminder of enslavement. The Laurent clan splits in two, Black and white, and various descendants attempt to find their place in the world as preachers, musicians, and

artists. But though it’s a meditation on race, concerned with slavery and the Great Migration—later sections are set in Chicago—the book is not overtly about racism, but focuses more on troubled (sometimes forbidden) relationships. Fayne’s characters are often navigating a mesh of passions, faith, and family, recycled across the generations; Lucy, an aspiring artist seduced by her female teacher, has to make a difficult compromise to enter the art world like those that others did in different contexts. The novel’s structure is busy and at times melodramatic, owing as much to soap operas as to Zora Neale Hurston. But the prose is consistently crisp and suffused with a feeling of hauntedness.

A complex meditation on Black history with a Mephistophelian twist.

Kirkus Star

Meet Me at the Crossroads

Giddings, Megan | Amistad/ HarperCollins (320 pp.) | $28.99 June 3, 2025 | 9780063337978

A girl contends with family, faith, and loss in a world with doors to other realms. No one knows where the doors came from. They just appeared one day, seven doors around the world that open to a magical, confusing world. Some people go through them and find wonders: plants with druglike properties, the ghosts of loved ones, healing powers. Some go through and immediately “pop.” There’s no telling what will happen until someone steps through. Ayanna and Olivia, twin Black girls, are born into this world of doors. Their father grew up in a religious group formed around the door in Michigan. Their mother is a staunch Catholic. When the parents divorce, Olivia goes to live with their mother and Ayanna stays with their dad. Despite their very different personalities and upbringings, the girls love each

other, and as they grow into teens, they work to keep their bond strong. Everything changes, though, on the day of Ayanna’s coming-of-age ceremony, and suddenly Ayanna must contend with having everything she knows tossed on its head. Giddings has created a world that feels both extremely relatable and unknowingly mystical, Ayanna’s meditations on grief, love, and belonging mixing seamlessly with ghosts, alien drugs, and door cults. The writing is an engaging mix of witty and cutting, moving between laugh-out-loud moments and deep, gut-punching scenes without missing a beat. 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.

The Devil’s Grin: Volume One

Graham, Alex | Fantagraphics

Books (464 pp.) | $29.99 paper June 17, 2025 | 9798875001109

T he lives of two poets and a cartoonist intersect in fantastical, horrific, and explicit ways in the first book of Graham’s graphic novel set mostly in 1970s Idaho and brimming with sex, drugs, and demons. Yet another “sewer poem” from womanizing drug user Robert elicits groans from the audience at the local open mic, much to hotheaded Robert’s irritation. While he won’t talk about his fixation with sewers, a prologue shows how Robert’s aspiring-artist mother flushed Robert down the toilet as a fetus before demons claimed him and tossed him into a cage where he grew big and strong off the milk of a matronly rat. Adult Robert drinks, screws, works construction, leeches off others, loves his car, occasionally cross-dresses, and frequently writes in his notebook. He

also has sexual tension with Dandelion, the “pretty and weird” girl down the hall who is also a poet—and haunted by an otherworldly presence. Dandelion works in a nursing home and seems constantly distressed. Her father torments her with repeated calls espousing paranoid conspiracies that may be connected to her inexplicable experiences. Robert and Dandelion’s neighbor Gary is an African American cartoonist who knew Robert’s mother and has the supernatural ability to direct real events via his cartoons— sometimes with deadly results. While Gary contends with racism and personal frustrations, his cartoons give him godlike powers—and he keeps his attention on Robert and Dandelion. The artwork and subject matter echo underground comix (R. Crumb is name-checked), with cartoonish effects like bulging eyeballs and thumping hearts deployed in extensive and graphic sex scenes. With this as only Book 1 and no resolution to be found in these pages, Graham’s ability to bring these wild elements to a satisfying conclusion remains to be seen. But the energy and tapestry of the work is intriguing. Artistic smut.

The Medusa Protocol

Hart, Rob | Putnam (320 pp.) | $30 June 24, 2025 | 9780593717424

Hitmen who have forsworn murder plan to infiltrate a black-site prison to rescue one of their own. Violence, like drugs, is addictive; hence, Assassins Anonymous. Every Tuesday, men and women looking “to

stop killing and help others to achieve the same” meet at a deconsecrated church on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. After six months of listening, Astrid— former hitter for a clandestine deep-state organization dubbed the Agency—is finally ready to share her story when she’s abducted en route. Astrid’s sponsor, Mark—another Agency hitter—starts calling her daily, leaving encouraging voicemails that she never answers. Mark is tempted give up when Astrid’s phone is disconnected, but then her favorite kind of pizza gets delivered mid-meeting. Mark and former black ops mercenary Booker work their contacts to trace the order’s origins to a restricted island off Brazil’s coast that’s covered in poisonous snakes. Correctly assuming the remote locale also houses an off-book detention center at which Astrid is being held, the men begin organizing a nonlethal extraction—a feat that proves easier said than done. Meanwhile, though Astrid doesn’t know what data Dr. Felix Vogt keeps medicating her to retrieve, she’s certain it’ll be used for harm. To escape, she’ll need assistance, but as her potential accomplices are all notorious fellow detainees, they are just as likely to kill her instead. Hart’s cheeky, swiftly paced present-tense narration alternates between Mark’s and Astrid’s first-person perspectives, Astrid’s sections incorporating flashbacks that inform both her character and her current predicament. Elements of the action-packed plot feel propped up by either convenience or contrivance, and Vogt is a moustachetwirling Bond villain, but on balance, the stakes are human, the worldbuilding is fun, and the vibrant supporting cast is stocked with spinoff-worthy personalities. Hart brings the heart in this entertaining tale of redemption, sacrifice, and found family.

Hart brings the heart in this entertaining tale of redemption and found family. THE MEDUSA PROTOCOL

Kirkus Star

The Dime Museum:

A Novel in Stories

Hinnefeld, Joyce | Unbridled Books (176 pp.) $18 paper | August 12, 2025 | 9781609531577

A novel-in-stories that culminates during the Covid-19 pandemic follows a Big Pharma family over the course of several generations, with an emphasis on how social repression and unchecked privilege can both thwart lives.

The famously divergent paths of poets Ezra Pound and Wallace Stevens—the former dedicated to structure and surface during a lifetime of mental instability, the latter an almost prim attorney whose work explored human subjectivity—here illuminate the unspoken stories attached to the monied Dietrich clan from Philadelphia. Beginning with a love story between two sideshow performers in Chicago and ending with an individual’s recognition of loss, Hinnefeld’s linked collection reflects how little we know about our own family histories, or ourselves, particularly when faced with societal crisis. Characters meet Pound and Stevens, whose actions and relationships weave in and out of decades; for example, when one character winds up in Venice in 2019, he notes that right-wing young Italian men call themselves “CasaPound” due to their belief in the poet’s reactionary beliefs. Meanwhile, Stevens, historically also a racist, shows up as the voice of overly genteel ideas about women’s behavior and appearances, perhaps most strongly in “Winged Siren Seizing an Adolescent,” about a young wife and mother named Tess who lives in Lisbon. That story is also a great example of how the separate pieces

of a novel like this exist as stand-alones while also connecting to the characters, chronology, and concerns of the whole; a Missoni dress that Tess gifts to her former nanny reminds readers of change. Speaking of change: That titular coin, at first signaled by the “dime shows” in which English-born Maude appears, has a little-known tie to Stevens—really to Mrs. Wallace Stevens—and signals the all-too-American tension between self-determination and national mythologizing that falls apart completely in the book’s second half, “Philadelphia, April 2020.” In these four stories about the global pandemic, we see how quickly anyone’s dreams and comforts can be eliminated by disaster. Somehow the coda, “Those Who Can,” provides the perfect moment of resolution.

An expert example of a complicated form that will reward even more on subsequent readings.

Sunburn

Howarth, Chloe Michelle | Melville House (288 pp.) | $19.99 paper July 8, 2025 | 9781685892111

An Irish teen grapples with her identity in this queer comingof-age story. It’s the summer of 1989 in the small village of Crossmore, and 15-year-old Lucy can’t stop staring at her friend Susannah O’Shea’s mouth. Susannah is gossiping and gobbling down a hamburger and Lucy longs to be “the microbes in the beef that her body seeks and destroys if it meant she would be paying me even the slightest bit of attention. The warmth and the wet of her mouth.” Surely this is just run-of-the-mill teenage girl friendship

An engaging take on desire, envy, and betrayal.

stuff, right? Lucy is desperate to believe that lie and ignore her budding sexuality until it’s clear that Susannah feels the same way. From there the two embark on a covert, tense, and loving relationship— Susannah wants them to come out and Lucy is desperate to remain accepted by her mother and close friends. Meanwhile, Lucy’s best friend, Martin Burke, has made his feelings for her too plain to ignore, and Lucy is tempted by this far-more-comfortable path in life. Lucy, whose love for her hometown does not wane even as it threatens to reject her, spends the next several years trying to decide whether she can sacrifice living as her authentic self and survive a life of convention. The pacing feels off for much of the novel, with certain scenes dominating pages and then months going by in a clause. But the book is at its most charming as Howarth explores the complex bonds of female friendship between Lucy and her crew, and ultimately Lucy and Susannah’s love story is absolutely gripping.

A romantic, funny, and painful exploration of the cost of being true to yourself.

Wanting

Jia, Claire | Tin House (400 pp.) | $18.99 paper | July 1, 2025 | 9781963108279

The rekindled friendship between a young woman who stayed in Beijing and her friend who’s just returned from America heads toward a conflagration as illuminating as it is destructive.

When Ye Lian’s childhood best friend, Luo Wenyu, returns to Beijing after 12 years in the U.S., their reunion forces each to reckon with the ways they’ve envied and disappointed each other. Lian was once obsessed with studying in America but was rejected by every school, whereas Wenyu, ironically, was sent to stay with her parents’ friends in California because of her poor performance in high school. Wenyu, the

wilder of the pair, has achieved a glitzier success than Lian’s: She’s a famous YouTube influencer known as Vivian and engaged to a white Silicon Valley tech bro with whom she’s renovating a luxurious summer home in Beijing. Lian, meanwhile, a junior executive at an American college-prep company, seeks to purchase a condominium to live in with Zhetai, her prosaic and dependable boyfriend of eight years. On the brink of committing to a path in life via marriage and real estate, each becomes recklessly involved with another man. Lian and Wenyu’s stories are interwoven with that of Song Chen, Wenyu’s architect; despite his brilliance as a Ph.D. student in mathematics, Chen failed to secure the life he had wanted in America, and now his marriage is falling apart. His story at first seems like an interruption from the main plot but gradually becomes just as compelling, especially after the two storylines collide and the characters’ infidelities are exposed. This moving novel is large in scope, including the experiences of two generations in aiming at the American dream and, in the bittersweet conclusion, projecting into the future. Jia reveals the yearnings and betrayals of her flawed characters with sensitivity, and the hard-won selfunderstandings they come to in the end are both illuminating and satisfying. This ambitious debut centered in contemporary Beijing delivers an engaging and insightful take on desire, envy, and betrayal.

Oddbody

Keating, Rose | Simon & Schuster (208 pp.) $17.99 paper | July 1, 2025 | 9781668061503

Ten lurid stories of magic, metamorphosis, and real-world longing. In the title story of this debut collection, a woman is haunted by a more-or-less friendly ghost who will not stop encouraging her to kill

herself. The ghost is ruining her love life and interfering with her day-to-day activities, yet, rather than exorcise it, the woman embraces it, mulling over the pleasure she takes in the sensations of her body in contrast with what the ghost has to offer: death as calm and quiet, as “the longest lie-in on a day where no one is coming to visit and there is nowhere else to be.” In “Next to Cleanliness,” Catherine goes to a doctor for a cleanse. She assumes she is in for “a week of celery juice,” but is instead treated to an escalating series of witch-doctor tonics that strip her down to her literal skeleton. When the frustrated doctor proposes a final-straw treatment—an “extraction” to remove “something toxic built into [Catherine’s] system”—Catherine must decide how much of herself she is willing to lose for the elusive promise of happiness. And in the exuberantly disgusting “Squirm,” Laura cares for her father, who has somehow transformed into a giant tape worm. Torn between a desire to escape her filial duties and a sincere tenderness for her father, Laura hovers in a state of limbo where it seems her best option might just be to sink into the compost next to Dad. The main characters of these strange tales are universally mired in unsatisfying romances, careers, or caretaking relationships. Yet, instead of reorienting their lives toward self-actualization, as our pop psychology–obsessed culture would recommend, they often choose to lean into their situations, transforming their literal selves into more of whatever it is one might fairly assume they would seek to escape. In these unflinching stories, Keating builds a macabre world in which her characters are utterly free even within their various compulsions, constraints, and grotesque circumstances. Compassionate, gross, deeply compelling. A must-read.

Kirkus Star

The Director

Kehlmann, Daniel | Trans. by Ross Benjamin Summit/Simon & Schuster (352 pp.) $25.99 | May 6, 2025 | 9781668087794

A freely imagined conjuring of the life and career of celebrated Germanlanguage film director G.W. Pabst by one of Germany’s boldest contemporary novelists.

Pabst, an Austrian, first got involved in the arts while being held in a French prison camp during World War I. He formed a theater group there, then made his reputation with the silent films The Joyless Street, starring Greta Garbo, and Pandora’s Box, starring his forever infatuation Louise Brooks. Taking his pioneering cutting technique to Hollywood, he has his ideas brushed aside by producers who, paying little mind to his lofty reputation, force him into taking on a flimsy project that is dead on arrival. Even with World War II going on, he returns to Europe, where he makes shameless compromises with Nazi authorities to get his films financed. Desperate to finish what he considers his masterpiece, The Molander Case, before the advancing Red Army can shut everything down, he throws all caution to the wind. But his “sparklingly modern” work, based on a pulp novel, gets lost on a train—and lost to history, leading to debates over whether it ever existed. Sticklers for biographical accuracy may quibble over Kehlmann’s inventions and rewriting of history. But the sheer wizardry and audacity of the storytelling, which masterfully dances along the cusp of realism and surrealism, comedy and tragedy, deflates those objections. Scene after scene amazes, including one where the Nazi-sworn caretakers of Pabst’s Austrian castle (where his discombobulated mother resides) banish his family to the basement and another displaying Pabst’s ghoulish use of gaunt, war-depleted soldiers to fill concert hall seats

Kirkus Star

For more by Daniel Kehlmann, visit Kirkus online.

R.F. KUANG

Dark academia is about to get even darker: the author of Babel on her hellish new novel.

BY AMY GOLDSCHLAGER

Sartre said, “Hell is other people.” In R.F. Kuang’s highly anticipated new novel— out later this summer—Hell is higher education. A mishap with a pentagram has splattered acclaimed magician and Cambridge professor Jacob Grimes all over his lab, leaving stressed-out postgraduate students Alice Law and Peter Murdoch without someone to lead their respective dissertation committees and provide the recommendation letters essential to their academic careers.

So, naturally, the only option is to go to Hell and retrieve their academic adviser. Over Zoom, we recently discussed the light and dark sides of both academia and Hell with the author, who has earned two master’s degrees (one at Oxford, one at Cambridge) and is currently working on a Ph.D. at Yale. Our conversation about Katabasis (pronounced kuh-TAB-uhsis, for those of us who don’t have Kuang’s facility with Greek) has been edited for length and clarity.

Could you explain the meaning of the title and why you chose it?

It’s a Greek word that means “the hero’s journey to the underworld.” In modern usage, it doesn’t have to be a literal journey to the underworld. For example, a narrative about addiction or personal grief or trauma is also sometimes described as a katabasis. It’s the protagonist reaching the lowest of the lows, really entering their own personal hell, and then coming back up to the surface. I was interested in this story archetype, and it’s just a nice word. I was surprised when they let me keep that title, because usually my working titles get rejected.

The cover also feels significant; it’s got a real Escher quality to it.

Academia is founded on delusions. There are so many things about the system that are broken.

Yes, it’s the visual representation of the paradoxes that the magic system in the book is built upon. You think you’re going up the stairs, and then you step back and realize you’re caught in this loop, which is a good metaphor for the psychological journeys that our characters are on. They are trying so hard to achieve what they think they want, but really they’re like rats in a cage scurrying around. You don’t get that perspective from within it. You only get that perspective if you step outside.

And, presumably, naming your protagonist Alice is not random. No, neither is Peter. They are very deliberate nods to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Peter Pan, and they’re significant for the character arcs. Alice’s issue is that she’s too curious and it gets her in trouble. And she’s also on this journey through a world that feels like nonsense, and the ground keeps shifting under her feet. And Peter’s issue is that he hasn’t grown up; he’s still like a little boy in a lot of respects. His journey involves acknowledging his relative affluence and his luck and maturing because of that realization.

Katabasis takes a close look at the terrible pressure put on students, and the way that they grow to accept that kind of stress as normal. Alice and Peter almost seem to have Stockholm syndrome. Peter and Alice absolutely have Stockholm syndrome. They’ve grown up within the system, and they’ve been taught to believe that there is no worthy life outside of it. Academia is founded on delusions. There are so many things about the system that are broken. I’m fascinated by how many people still go through these programs and cling to this vanishing, irrational belief that this is still the best possible way that they could be spending their lives. I mean, the job market was never good, but it’s especially vanishing at this moment. Plus, there’s the way that the bureaucracy and the incentive structure are set up. It all seems to work counter to what we would hope is the ideal goal of the university, which is producing knowledge and talking through difficult questions and sitting with interesting texts. Instead, there are a lot of rubber

stamps and a lot of nonsense and managing of egos that you have to do. I think this is what drives a lot of people out of academia. I ask myself every morning, Should I quit? Do I want to stay?

And then there are the abusive professors, like the novel’s Jacob Grimes. What inspired you to create him?

I’m really interested in student-teacher relationships and dynamics, having been on both sides of that equation. It can be so enriching for both parties. But because of that close contact between minds, where one is in a position of power and the other in a position of relative vulnerability, there’s a huge potential for abuse.

I’m interested in what happens when those obligations are violated: when teachers don’t act as they should, or when students idealize the teachers and obey them even when they shouldn’t. Aside from the abusive egoism, and the misogyny, and the possibility of sexual assault, there’s also the trope of the mentor who pushes you much further than you’re able to accept.

Grimes is this horrendous advisor who is demeaning and insults his students all the time and gives them impossible tasks. And Alice and Peter are like, Sign me up. That’s what it takes to be a great magician They make excuses for his behavior because they think that the only path to greatness is to undergo all of these trials and that he’s the only one who can shepherd them through it. This mentality is so, so common in any high-intensity academic or athletic or musical program.

In this case, that path leads straight to Hell. What rules were important to establish when you built your version of Hell?

Well, part of my approach to my magic systems is that I never want them to feel fully known or easy to master. I get really frustrated with other fantasy novels where it seems like everything that could be known about magic is already established. Since a lot of my protagonists are students, magic is a field of study where the questions outnumber the answers. They have some idea of what’s going on, but they have to do endless research,

Katabasis

Kuang, R.F. Harper Voyager | 560 pp. | $35.00 August 26, 2025 | 9780063021471

consult old texts, double-check and verify their work. Alice and Peter have no idea what to expect from Hell, and they also don’t know which old sources are right and which are made up. It’s a constant journey of discovery. I do try to be as broad and eclectic and diverse with my sources as I can, just to point out the sheer volume of mythologies and theologies about Hell.

I’m personally skeptical of the idea of an eternal Hell. Most Christian theologists today think that hell is more of a construct, a useful metaphor, than a real place where souls are condemned for eternity, because that just makes no sense. It doesn’t really to me, either, which is why I thought it was fascinating.

Certainly, it’s very difficult to escape Hell in this book.

Well, of course, the idea is that redemption is really, really hard. I did a lot of reading about abolition theory. The spiritual process of coming to terms with an awful sin often involves completely changing who you are, resulting in the death of the person who committed that sin and the rebirth of a person who’s got to keep on living. It is a very difficult process in life and presumably in the afterlife. But I firmly believe it is possible. Redemption is always possible.

Amy Goldschlager is a writer and editor in Brooklyn.

SECOND LOOK

This review originally ran online August 9, 2024.

An ancient prophecy assembles a small team to save people from merciless invaders in Adler’s fantasy novel. The isles of the Cynnahu archipelago are under the threat of the snakelike, “mireborn” Naga. These villains are after the Dragon Shrines, relics of the Dragonkin—the long-gone magical dragons who once ruled Cynnahu. The assaults by the Naga may be a sign of the Last War alluded to in a seer’s prophecy that also foretells of a “Team of Five” that will stand up to the Naga. One of these eventual Five is the recently orphaned 11-year-old Sakura, whose late father was a Shrine-defending Dragon Guardian. The others include

seafarer and mage Myrriden the Traveler, who takes in Sakura as his ward; Myrriden’s magic-school student son Emrys; the Archmage Hoth; and the enigmatic Fire Mage Volcan. Crucial to their defense of Cynnahu is the unearthing of an enchantment called the Elder Song, though no one is quite certain what that spell does. Adler’s epic-length tale comprises two seamlessly connected novels. The worldbuilding is superb, starting with the Dragonkin and their former continent Cynnahu. The many isles, though they look the same, prove distinct in other ways; one contains Emrys’ school, with an exterior that’s magically different for each

To Own Two Suns: A First-Contact Science Fiction Novel

Tabor, Fran

Elaine’s Dreams | 398 pp.

$10.50 paper | July 20, 2022 9798201463731

This review originally ran online November 22, 2023.

In Tabor’s SF novel, a NASA expedition to the edge of the solar system encounters a long-hibernating alien.

In the year 2112, a NASA expedition (a dangerously cut-rate, low-budget one, it turns out) has sent volunteers to explore deep space, with little or no chance of return. The crew, led by Commander Jerry Jerrison, is on the edge of Pluto’s orbit when they make an epochal discovery: a fantastically advanced,

shape-shifting alien spaceship, guided by an artificial intelligence and harboring one hibernating occupant, a being named Muni. He is a Morgi, a long-lived galactic species with a strongly acquisition-based socio-economic culture. Resembling large slugs with taloned wings and quadruple eyes, Morgi have inherent predator instincts—the initial contact (while Muni is still awakening) results in the shocking devouring of an

The Dragonkin Legacy

Adler, Ian E.S.

Winds’ Home Press | 752 pp. | June 1, 2025

individual (to one it appears as a “mist-cloaked temple”), while another isle houses the formidable, gleaming Blue Fortress. The characters are just as memorable, especially the courageous, same-aged Sakura and Emrys, who put everything into their training and fighting. The standout among the supporting cast is Myrriden’s brother Aneirin, a historianlike Loremaster who

helps track down the Elder Song. A handful of lengthy conflicts on land and sea reach a worthy climax and a gratifying payoff and epilogue. The author rounds out this story with a traitor or two, a series of magic spells, and at least one death that will hit readers hard.

An enthralling epic teeming with valor, camaraderie, and searing battles.

astronaut. After that faux pas, the creature must employ skillfully spun falsehoods and half-truths to explain himself and win Jerrison’s trust. Muni explains that his near-destitute Green Hill Clan took a risk and dared to explore two distant star systems, hoping to annex them for their survival and self-aggrandizement. One held a promising ice age planet, Earth. But Muni did not imagine its Cro-Magnon population evolving over millennia into an intelligent, spacefaring civilization— something no Morgi had yet encountered. Muni faces the erasure of his tribe (and the extermination of the human race) by ambitious rival clans unless a strictly formal Morgi “ownership ritual” tradition is followed in full cooperation with the humans. But how can

humankind submit to the will of this (not entirely honest) alien? The plot contains some credulity-stretching coincidences and fortuitous turns of fate, nicely blended with canny depictions of diplomacy, strategy, and flimflammery. The alien biology and culture (and how they drive each other) are well thought out. Readers will enjoy the sidelong jabs at human-style colonial imperialism and realpolitik (“Doctor Johnson, I have a question for you. Which is better, a great peace supported by a lie, or a massacre justified by the truth?”). The breathless wrap-up would seem to indicate that the story is a stand-alone, but an epilogue points to a sequel.

Imaginative high-stakes SF breathes fresh life into the alien-first-contact genre.

INDIE AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT

JAYSON ADAMS Author of Ares

Please tell us a little about yourself and your book, Ares. I’m a multi-award-winning author of two SF novels, Infernum and Ares. I’m also a tech entrepreneur—my software has won multiple awards, including “App of the Year” from NeXTWORLD Magazine I founded several software companies, sold one to Netscape, and retired (the first time) before I turned 30.

For me, computers were always a creative outlet—a blank screen where I could build something cool. My startups gave me that freedom, but working at Google on the Chrome browser, not so much. Around 2018, I went looking for a new creative outlet and found it in writing science fiction.

As far as my approach to writing, I believe fiction should be more than just words on a page—it should grip the reader and not let go. Some books take 50 pages to get interesting. Mine take one sentence. Some authors ease the reader in. I throw them into the fire. Every scene pushes forward. Every word matters. My stories are designed to make the reader turn the page—not out of obligation, but because they have to know what happens next.

But these aren’t just thrill rides. My stories captivate because they mean something. They challenge the reader, make them think, make them feel. They force them to wrestle with the big questions—about humanity, the cosmos, the future—not in a way that slows the story down, but in a way that makes it unforgettable. My latest novel, Ares, is a page-turner about the first manned

mission to Mars, but it’s also more than that. It’s about leadership, sacrifice, and the persistence of human flaws.

How did you create/acquire the cover art?

Both the Mars background and the space capsule are stock images, though for future novels, I plan to use AI to generate these individual art components. I found the fonts online; there are a lot out there with a futuristic feel. My goal with the design was to drive home the desolation of the world they were arriving at—and how everything keeping them alive in that moment existed in that fragile little capsule. I’m really happy with how the cover turned out; it won an award for the design.

How has critical and/or reader response influenced the way you think about your work?

Infernum was pure space opera, while Ares leans more to what you might call grounded science fiction. At some point, I realized that fans of one aren’t always fans of the other—which made me aware that I’m writing for two distinct fan bases. Eventually, I’ll have to swing back to a space opera, perhaps even a sequel to Infernum.

What are you working on now?

I have two novels in flight. The first, called The Quantum Mirror, is about a rescue mission that goes awry aboard an aging space station. The second, called King of the Moon,

Ares

Adams, Jayson Fiction Factory Books | 374 pp. | $16 paper September 10, 2023 | 9781737937623

picks up where Ares left off, with the crew of the American space station on the moon.

Portions of this Q&A were edited for clarity.

For a review of the book, visit Kirkus online.

for a crucial scene in Molander. All in all, an amazing performance by Kehlmann, who as a bonus immerses us in the filmmaking process. A wickedly entertaining, eye-opening book.

Cheesecake

Kurlansky, Mark | Bloomsbury (240 pp.) $26.99 | July 15, 2025 | 9781639735723

An ancient Roman recipe finds its way to modern Manhattan. Kurlansky’s novel is equally concerned with food and real estate as it charts the Upper West Side’s evolution from the 1970s through the ’90s. A large cast of quirky characters congregates at the Katz Brothers Greek diner on West 86th Street, drawn by the best cheese dishes they’ve ever tasted—even though it’s “not exactly legal” for the Katsikas family to raise goats and make cheese in Queens. The area is “a bit down on its luck,” but Art, the family entrepreneur, sees a neighborhood “in transition,” which means rich people will be arriving soon. It’s not good news for tenants and diners when Art buys their building from its defaulting owner in the early ’80s and transforms Katz Brothers into trendy Mykonos. This is where Marcus Porcius Cato’s 160 B.C.E. recipe for cheesecake enters the story, as Art asks sister-in-law Adara to translate Cato’s “incomprehensible” instructions into an edible cheesecake he can tout as “the oldest known written recipe.” Kurlansky is primarily a writer of nonfiction, and his inexperience as a novelist shows occasionally as the narrative zigzags among characters defined more by their backstories—artists’ model Violette de Lussac, TV producer Saul Putz (“pronounced pootz”), biologistturned-pastry-maker Mimi Landau, et al.— than distinct personalities. It doesn’t really matter, though, because the atmosphere he creates is vivid and oh-so-New York, with one denouement

at Saul’s daughter Masha’s bat mitzvah, where a rival version of Cato’s cheesecake is served, and another at a blowout party the night before Mimi loses her apartment, for which she and her friend Gerta make yet another version of Cato’s cheesecake and figure out the perfect way to get back at her evicting landlord. Good fun, though it’s hard to imagine what non–New Yorkers will make of it.

Kirkus Star

The Möbius Book

Lacey, Catherine | Farrar, Straus and Giroux (240 pp.) | $27 | June 17, 2025 | 9780374615406

A genre-bending book that grapples with the diffuse and uncategorizable enormity of personal loss. A woman wakes alone in her guest bedroom, grieving the dissolution of her marriage to an emotionally manipulative writer. A woman returns home to her apartment, spying a pool of blood creeping under the neighbor’s door. Each woman narrates one half of Lacey’s latest literary experiment, a recursive story told in two parts: a novella and a memoir entwined with one another. The effect is unsettling, like experiencing the lost memory of a book even as you turn its pages. “I felt I’d been shrunk down and shoved into a doll’s house, and I knew then— again, or for the first time—how grief expands as it constricts, how it turns a person into a toy version of herself,” Lacey writes in the opening page of the memoir section. The “toy version of herself” might be what Lacey transposes into the novella, about a woman confronting her role in the end of her marriage while growing ever more anxious about a possible murder next door. Then again, maybe not. “Ha ha, we said, yet again someone has confused the voice of a fictional character for an authorial statement of belief,” Lacey and her husband assure one another in the memoir. Across both sections of the

book, Lacey offers meditations on faith, violence, friendship, and dislocation. With scalpellike precision, she teases out connections between her childhood experiences with loving and losing God and losing her faith in love as an adult. There are no easy endings in this doubled book, just an infinity loop of questions and possibilities, a twinned bank of pay phones ringing in the night, waiting for someone to answer. A literary haunting that will burrow under your skin.

She Didn’t See It Coming

Lapena, Shari | Pamela Dorman/Viking (352 pp.) $30 | July 29, 2025 | 9780593832448

So many suspects, so little evidence in Lapena’s latest tale of domestic suspense. Busy mom Bryden Frost doesn’t see it coming after a morning fender bender involving a Tesla and its charming owner, Derek Gardner, sets her on a collision course with fate. Or does it? Just as in her other fast-moving, women-centric novels, including her breakout The Couple Next Door (2016), Lapena’s female protagonists appear to be living normal lives that some people might even envy—at least at first. When Bryden’s husband, Sam, returns home from work in Albany, New York, to find her missing but her purse and phone still in their apartment, a police investigation ensues. Did Bryden run away? Was she kidnapped? Or could she still be somewhere in the building? Sam is the prime suspect until police Det. Jayne Salter and her team hear from a source that Bryden was having an affair with Derek, something he denies. As Lapena builds her twisty plot, we soon see that these two men aren’t the only people who could be responsible for Bryden’s disappearance. Her sister, Lizzie, who has always been jealous of Bryden, has an addiction she’s hiding from the police, and Bryden’s best friend, Paige, carries a damaging secret

as well. And what about the neighbor who was recently accused but not charged with kidnapping and raping a woman? Lapena excavates everyone’s secrets, exposing what’s really going on in the lives of Bryden’s family and friends. None of it is pretty. Lapena’s timely tale mixes the formidable dangers involved with online true-crime addiction with classic police work in a story that will make you wonder what secrets your family and friends are hiding and who, if anyone, you really know or can trust.

Lapena’s talents shine in this irresistible novel about revenge, betrayal, and secrets.

The Silence and the Rage

Lemaitre, Pierre | Trans. by Frank Wynne Little, Brown (512 pp.) | $30 July 8, 2025 | 9780316576154

Three French siblings are keeping busy in the early 1950s: Journalism, entrepreneurship, murder…

This novel by Prix Goncourt winner Lemaitre is the second in a planned Glorious Years tetralogy (following The Wide World , 2023), starring the Pelletier clan, which in 1952 is highly ambitious and thick with secrets. François, a rising editor at a Paris newspaper, is struggling in his relationship with Nine, a deaf alcoholic kleptomaniac who’s gone missing, while shepherding a blockbuster series on French women’s poor hygiene. His sister, Hélène, is a journalist covering the opening of a dam in the countryside that will flood a provincial town while seeking an illegal abortion. Their brother, Jean, is about to open a second megastore but has to deal with employee protests and a vicious harridan wife, while hoping the papers don’t discover his sideline as a serial killer. Too much? Absurdly so? Mais oui! Which is unfortunate, because there are glimmers here of deep research and emotional sensitivity. Hélène’s plot in particular

Ultrarunning

proves deadly in this thriller set in the Sahara Desert.

deals not just with the torments that come with displacing a whole community, but also the country’s draconian anti-abortion laws, which push her to an unlicensed treatment that goes badly. But Lemaitre is so determined to deliver a brash, symphonic novel that his story clangs and strains credulity. Jean’s wife, Geneviève, is cartoonishly evil, blithely cuckolding her husband and glorying in her in-laws’ shortcomings. And a needless subplot features the siblings’ parents sponsoring a mediocre boxer in Beirut who surprisingly fails upward. Lemaitre might intend to reveal the dark side of France’s charming postwar reputation, or perhaps he means to critique the cruelty and violence families bring on each other, knowingly or not. But this manic, pulpy novel makes it hard to trust any serious intention. A clumsy family saga whose would-be provocations are more comic than harrowing.

Runner 13

McCulloch, Amy | Doubleday (336 pp.) $28 | July 1, 2025 | 9780593687031

L ike any extreme sport, ultrarunning can be dangerous, and it proves deadly in this thriller set in the Sahara Desert. Elite runner Adrienne Wendell, who lives in England’s Lake District with her 10-year-old son, Ethan, is in Morocco to participate in the 250-mile Hot & Sandy race; it’s organized by enigmatic impresario Boones, who has, as Adrienne puts it, dedicated his life to “finding out the limit of human

endurance.” Adrienne hasn’t raced in seven years—not since she was met at the finish line of the Yorkshire 100 by police informing her that Ethan had nearly been hit by a black Range Rover that seemed to be targeting him before it fled the scene. Of course, Adrienne has agreed to participate in Hot & Sandy: Her invitation arrived bearing the words “COME AND FIND ANSWERS” above a license plate number; results from Adrienne’s online sleuthing link the plate to a black Range Rover. But Adrienne brings her own whiff of villainy to Hot & Sandy: Just before Ethan’s accident, something happened at a runners’ training camp in Ibiza that has made her a pariah in the running scene. The novel’s slow-drip reveal regarding what occurred in Ibiza is abetted by a second narrator: Stella Mamoud, who is attending Hot & Sandy because her fiancé, Adrienne’s ex-husband, is participating. (Stella also happens to be Boones’ estranged daughter). This novel about extreme behavior in the world of extreme sports won’t win any prizes for extreme plausibility, and cliches and pat psychology clot the writing. Regardless, readers should remain absorbed by the elaborate plot’s multiple lines of inquiry: What happened in Ibiza? Who will win Hot & Sandy? And who is incapacitating runners more effectively than even the punishing Saharan sandstorms and immobilizing heat?

A diverting if plausibility-testing thriller.

A collection that revels in its quirks, smart and sensitive in equal measure.

AN ORAL HISTORY OF ATLANTIS

Weepers

Mendelsund, Peter | Farrar, Straus and Giroux (320 pp.) | $28 June 17, 2025 | 9780374619077

In a near future that’s both emotionally and physically desiccated, a ragtag union of professional mourners provides the needed moisture.

Ed is a cowboy poet in the desert Southwest. He’s stable and reliable (even in the ways he finesses his alcoholism), settled, a stand-up guy who emerged bloodied but upright from domestic tragedy in his youth. And he’s found a calling in late middle age as a linchpin of Local 302, the Weepers, who go from town to town, funeral to funeral, and provide tears to prime the pump of grief in a world rapidly drying up into ugliness, flatness, disconnection. It’s not clear at first what the group should make of the newly arrived “kid,” a scrawny, taciturn presence who joins them for memorial services, intermittently, and who—though he doesn’t ever cry himself—contains a silent reservoir of sorrow that moves Local 302 to new heights (or depths) of conspicuous grief. Is the kid a petty criminal, a masochist, the victim of some terrible misdeed? Drifter, messiah, lost soul, blank screen upon which to project one’s own anxieties? All of the above, perhaps. Ed soon becomes the mysterious young man’s booster, apologist, protector, fan, friend, bail-payer, even matchmaker. Ed’s voice throughout the novel is darkly funny, wry, perceptive—charming. The kid, like many a cipher, never comes fully

alive on the page, so the plot never quite kindles, but Mendelsund amply compensates for that with the playful wit and music of the prose. Stylish, witty, surreal—a meditation on the power of emotion to bind us in an ever-drier, less hospitable world.

Kirkus

Star

Fox

Oates, Joyce Carol | Hogarth (672 pp.) $32 | June 17, 2025 | 9780593978085

Oates continues to explore the dark side in this moody, often shocking mystery. Francis Fox doesn’t enter the narrative until five dozen pages in, and when he does we find him in a sickening act: Deep-kissing a 12-year-old girl, “of which Little Kitten will never speak to others.” Little Kitten is but one of Fox’s victims, and he’s in a perfect position to recruit more: Having been caught in the act in another state, he has changed his name and moved to a small town in the woods of south New Jersey, Oates’ fictional terroir, and has resumed his revolting avocation as a middle school teacher. But as the story opens, Fox is perhaps no more: The denizens of and visitors to Wieland Pond—a forbidding swamp, “a wilderness in which cell phones are useless”—have noticed an unusual stench in a place full of them, as well as a rolled-over car and body parts. Lacking the means to quickly identify the victim, whose face is missing from its detached head, the local

gendarmerie takes its time, with world-weary detective Horace Zwender slowly piecing together enough evidence of Fox’s crimes to think, “No one more deserving of being dead .” Meanwhile, suspicion of murder falls on members of the rough-and-ready Healy family, one of whose ancestors is rumored to have shot down the Hindenburg, and one of whose present members is among Fox’s targets. Oates’ descriptions of Fox’s acts are stomach-turningly graphic but not prurient, as if to emphasize how a dangerous predator can move freely in an unending field of prey. But in the end she delivers a tautly wound procedural, elegantly written (and with a Nabokovian in-joke that joins Lolita to her tale), with an expertly constructed surprise ending. It’s not for the squeamish, but Oates once again masterfully limns the worse angels of our nature.

An Oral History of Atlantis

Park, Ed | Random House (224 pp.) $27 | July 29, 2025 | 9780812998993

A clutch of stories from Pulitzer finalist Park (Same Bed Different Dreams, 2023, etc.), heavy on the literary gamesmanship. Park’s first collection recalls the offbeat works of 1960s postmodern stylists like Donald Barthelme and Robert Coover, though in Park’s case the subject matter is more contemporary. “The Wife on Ambien” exploits the sleep drug’s reputation for inducing odd thoughts and behavior. (“The wife on Ambien hails Uber after Uber. The cars stream toward us like a series of sharks.”) In “Eat Pray Click,” a hacker devises a Kindle that can shuffle the texts of multiple books into one e-book, making for a weird but potentially profound reading experience. “Slide To Unlock” satirizes password prompts (“First time you had sex and did it count. Day, month, year. The full year

or just the last two digits?”), and “Weird Menace” sends up the meandering chatter of the DVD bonus commentary. But Park isn’t just playing with unusual premises for their own sake—he’s looking for the ways that human idiosyncrasies manage to poke up to the surface even while technology tries to keep us tidy and algorithm friendly.

(The actress in “Weird Menace” gets increasingly boozy and dismissive of the producer’s stay-on-topic prompts.) There’s more conventional short-story fare, at least by Park’s standards: “Machine City” concerns a guerrilla film production in a dingy college library space, “Watch Your Step” is an espionage yarn, and “Thought and Memory” concerns a successful writer ironically struggling to communicate. Not every story lands—the title story and “An Accurate Account” are woolly pomo sketches—but in most cases Park writes with an open-mindedness that suggests our every device can be mined for intelligent fiction.

A collection that revels in its quirks, smart and sensitive in equal measure.

Kirkus Star

Archive of Unknown Universes

Reyes Jr., Ruben | Mariner Books (288 pp.) $28 | July 1, 2025 | 9780063336315

An intergenerational chronicle of family and romance in the face of El Salvador’s devastating civil war.

When Harvard undergraduate Ana Flores invites her boyfriend, Luis, to accompany her to Cuba while she does research for her thesis, she’s uncertain whether their fledgling relationship will survive the summer. Aided by the Defractor, a novel technology that lets people see into alternate versions of their lives, Ana stumbles on an unlikely clue: an otherwise nondescript Bible. The

annotated holy text turns out to hold the key to deciphering the secret life of Luis’ great-uncle, Neto, who vanished from El Salvador during the country’s civil war of 1979 to ’92. Through pitch-perfect dialogue, propulsive prose, fast-paced flashbacks, and epistolary interludes, Reyes splices together the stories of Neto’s illicit love affair with Rafael, a revolutionary compatriot; the unspoken plight of Ana’s mother, Felicia; and the evolving relationship between Ana and Luis themselves. With uncanny poignancy, Reyes depicts the bustling avenues of Havana, a refugee camp in Honduras, hazy backrooms in Managua, and hilarious scenes of the Defractor engaging with its users in the manner of people such as Alanis Morissette and Avril Lavigne. While the branches of Luis’ and Ana’s family trees grow denser—doubled by guerrillero code names and multiplied by the Defractor’s endless renderings—Reyes grounds readers in sensual details (“He imagines drying every inch with a towel, then leaning in to taste the algae on his lips”) and relational realities (“Whoever I was when I was with you will no longer exist”). A moving testament to the power of reciprocity, synchronicity, and the truth that love—whether familial or romantic—persists “across borders, bombings, barricades, thunderstorms, and decades.”

A gripping family history with a fresh speculative edge and timely resonances with the currently unfolding timeline.

Kirkus Star

The White Crow

Robotham, Michael | Scribner (368 pp.) $28.99 | July 1, 2025 | 9781668031025

Second in a series about a strong, principled woman in London’s law enforcement, following When You Are Mine (2022). Philomena McCarthy, a London Metropolitan

Police officer, aspires to be a detective someday. Phil is called to the scene of a crime, but she stops because she sees a 5-year-old girl in pajamas wandering the streets at night. Her name is Daisy, and she says her mom won’t wake up. It turns out that mom Caitlin Kemp-Lowe is dead after her house has been robbed and a plastic bag has been put over her head. Daisy’s father reports the theft of valuable jewelry, but he has serious problems of his own and will be a useless guardian for his daughter. Child Services hits a snag, but Daisy’s godmother is eager to take her in. Meanwhile, Phil has a complicated family—her father and uncles are career criminals. She herself is honest and professional and doesn’t want her father, Edward, to taint her career, but this juicy plot may give her no choice since “the McCarthy brothers were the most notorious criminal gang in the southeast of England.” Edward has never been convicted, unlike his brothers who did hard time. Edward is not a killer but a “property developer,” and someone is sabotaging his properties. Soon he finds himself squeezed hard by a Bulgarian gang that wants to take over a major share in his business in exchange for their paying off his crushing debt. Phil is an intelligent, compassionate protagonist who hates what her father and uncles do for a living, and in turn Edward hates her chosen career. They talk but agree never to discuss each other’s work. In any event, she doesn’t work on the KempLowe case because she isn’t a detective and because a higher-up in the London PD suspects she’s in league with her father. The dialogue is often witty: “Paddy couldn’t tell a gemstone from a gallstone,” and readers might find some of the gritty language galling. Tension imbues this dark tale, with action reaching a scary crescendo before settling on a quiet note.

End-to-end excitement for crime fans.

For more by Michael Robotham, visit Kirkus online.

Finding Grace

Rothschild, Loretta | St. Martin’s (336 pp.)

$29 | July 8, 2025 | 9781250381828

The past and present lives of two women intertwine in this novel about motherhood.

Honor Wharton, her husband, Tom, and their young daughter, Chloe, have just arrived in Paris to celebrate Christmas. But even with the festive atmosphere, Honor can focus on only one thing: their surrogate, Jess, and whether the embryo transfer has been successful. Honor’s desire for another baby is so all-consuming that it has led to intense friction in her marriage, which comes to a head the morning after they arrive in France—during a fight, Tom says he won’t continue to pursue conception if the current transfer fails. Soon after, in a truly shocking reveal, readers learn that Honor and Chloe have died. When Tom, in a thick haze of grief after burying his wife and daughter back home in London, is told that their surrogate is pregnant, he decides to raise the baby alone. Four years later, Tom and his son, Henry, have made a quiet life for themselves when Tom accidentally receives a letter which reveals the identity of the anonymous egg donor who helped create Henry. Arriving at the address on the letter, he meets Grace Stone, a wine-shop owner and widow who looks remarkably like his deceased wife. Narrated by Honor, who’s able to observe the world from a limbo state, the novel does little to capitalize on its initial emotional impact, falling into a sluggish plot that centers Tom—an unlikable character who makes frustratingly bad decisions at every turn. The author’s attempt to concoct a love story between Tom and Grace falls flat. Tom’s growing obsession with a woman who is Honor’s doppelgänger feels unintentionally macabre, and his constant lies and emotional manipulations—he continually hides their shared history from Grace— are disregarded in favor of a neatly wrapped ending that is undeserved. A missed opportunity.

Kirkus Star

I Gave You Eyes and You Looked Toward Darkness

Solà, Irene | Trans. by Mara Faye Lethem Graywolf (176 pp.) | $17 paper

June 17, 2025 | 9781644453438

O ver the course of generations, a house in the mountains of Catalonia bears witness to wolves, the ravages of several wars, witches, bandits, and the devil in various guises.

In an upstairs bedroom of Mas Clavell, an old woman named Bernadeta lies dying. Years before, one of her forebears traded her soul for “a full man…an heir with a patch of land and a roof over his head.” When the subsequent husband turns out to be missing a pinkie toe, she wriggles out of her pact with the devil. But ever since then, every offspring of Mas Clavell has been born with something missing. As in her previous novel, When I Sing, Mountains Dance (2022), Solà is interested here in local folklore passed through generations, especially of women and witchcraft. The novel is set over the course of a single day, but narrated through the polyphonic voices of the mothers and daughters who have inhabited—and now haunt—the house. Hanging over all of it is a knowledge of evil, which some make deals to keep at bay and others invite in. Men feature throughout, both brutal and tenderhearted. But it’s the women—varied, critical, clamorous—who carry on the family narrative. Accustomed to horrors and hardships, they’re unsentimental and earthy. Only very occasionally are

they moved. In one passage, a much younger Bernadeta witnesses her daughter dying in childbirth: “You can talk about misfortune, and you can talk about grief; you can talk about remorse and guilt, and about death, about evil and the things men do.…But you can’t say how a girl is made. There aren’t enough words to explain it, because you made her like dirt makes trees, and trees make branches, and branches make fruit, and fruit makes seeds. In the dark. From a place so deep within that you didn’t know you knew how to do it.”

A fabulous achievement, at once sweeping and sly, raunchy and richly compelling.

My Other Heart

Strenner, Emma Nanami | Pamela Dorman/Viking (416 pp.) | $30 July 1, 2025 | 9780593831014

The summer before college proves lifechanging for two best friends. The novel opens with catastrophe: In 1998, Mimi Truang is at the Philadelphia International Airport returning home to Vietnam when her toddler disappears. Instead of helping, immigration authorities detain and then sedate her as they send her back to Ho Chi Minh City. In the misery of the ensuing 17 years, she maintains hope she’ll find Ngan. The story then leaps forward to 2015, to Kit Herzog and Sabrina Chen, best friends who couldn’t be more different: Kit, the adopted Asian daughter of anxious white parents, is selfish and spoiled, while Sabrina, the

A fabulous achievement, at once sweeping and sly, raunchy and richly compelling.

I GAVE YOU EYES AND YOU LOOKED TOWARD DARKNESS

obedient child of Chinese immigrant Lee Lee, lives happily as Kit’s sidekick. On a whim, Kit spends the summer in Japan while Sabrina stays in Philadelphia, working for college money and volunteering at an Asian legal aid clinic run by the impressive Eva Kim. In Tokyo, staying at a diplomatic residence with a family friend, Kit promptly falls for the diplomat’s son. While Kit posts enviable pics, Sabrina is having an awakening under the tutelage of Eva, while also falling hard for Kit’s ex, Dave Harrison. Much of the novel explores the micro- and macroaggressions Asian women experience in America. Although Kit’s money and mixed-race appearance largely shield her, Sabrina understands all too well what it’s like to be an immigrant’s kid. Kit and Sabrina’s searches for identity in the affluent white suburbs are meaningful explorations, but are hampered by the fact that these two Gen Z girls don’t really sound or act like teenagers. When Mimi returns to the U.S. with a list of girls who could be her daughter, though, the novel quickly transforms from a coming-of-age tale to something quite harrowing. The whirlwind of drama in the last act compensates for the uneven portrait of teen life.

Sunny Side Up

Sturino, Katie | Celadon Books (304 pp.)

$28 | June 24, 2025 | 9781250344205

A Wisconsin-born New York City transplant sets out to find herself after her divorce.

Sunny Greene holds two simultaneous truths in her mind. She’s devastated that her husband, Zack, has left her, and she’s absolutely certain that he was cheating on her. She’s successful by most metrics—she runs a boutique PR company that is doing extremely well; she lives in Chelsea, her dream neighborhood, where she has a six-block walk to work with her two dogs, Sophia and Blanche. But she still feels in pieces

over the divorce, despite all the negative commentary that Zack used to pour on her. With her close friends Brooke and Noor—both also recently divorced— she sets out to discover her successful future. But while getting ready for her and her friends’ “divorcation,” Sunny impulsively decides to try on a swimsuit at Bergdorf Goodman, an adventure that goes terribly wrong when she gets stuck in it. After the resulting panic attack has ended (and a little time has passed), she realizes she has to embrace the person she is. All 5-foot-11, 275 pounds, 35 years of herself. She restarts a newsletter she stopped writing because Zack found it embarrassing; she embraces body neutrality (as she describes it: “Yes I have cellulite, okay—moving on”); and she begins going after what she really wants. When it comes to dating, she’s torn between Ted, a financier, and Dennis, a down-to-earth mailman. And she puts in the hours and effort to turn that ill-fated experience in the changing room into a new business. The novel has a straightforward agenda and the author doesn’t shy away from making it clear at every turn: Hard work and a belief in yourself will result in success in every endeavor, despite bumps in the road. A novel that offers a character unafraid to embrace who she is: smart, sassy, driven, cheerful— and plus size.

Notes on Infinity

Taylor, Austin | Celadon Books (400 pp.) $29.99 | June 3, 2025 | 9781250376107

Two Harvard sophomores rise to dizzying heights when they develop an antiaging drug. The brainy daughter of an MIT professor, Zoe gets distracted in her organic chemistry class by a very smart, unruly-looking boy named Jack. “Zoe found herself preparing the most esoteric theoretical questions to ask during lecture and familiarizing herself

with the most esoteric experimental applications that she knew Jack would ask about so she could ask a follow-up question as though his initial questions had been common knowledge.” There’s a great deal of science talk in Taylor’s debut; an afterword documents how far the author has gone to create a fascinating concept that is as close to real as possible. (Another reality-adjacent aspect is the seeming parallel to the story of biotechnology entrepreneur Elizabeth Holmes and her company Theranos.) Jack helps Zoe get a spot in the lab of an eminent professor who’s working on an antiaging drug, but when she has an insight that could revolutionize the whole process, the two split off and begin working on their own, eventually dropping out of Harvard and getting venture capital funding to develop a drug called Manna. A TED talk, a Vogue feature, a Porsche, and other markers of contemporary fame and fortune follow. Along the way, one of Jack’s roommates, a computer science major named Carter, joins the team, and though it’s clear that Jack and Zoe are meant to be together, Zoe moves in with Carter. The “young geniuses with a love triangle and a startup” aspect gives the narrative Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow vibes, but the novel suffers from problems with pacing that undercut its emotional impact. The first half proceeds at a languorous rate, building the story from Zoe’s perspective, then hits an inflection point and retells the whole thing from Jack’s point of view, filling in his missing backstory. After returning to the climax, it races through a hasty endgame that is not as moving as it should be, and references to the Epic of Gilgamesh don’t help.

A convincing portrayal of the hothouse collegiate environment in the sciences by an author with exciting potential.

Midnight at the Cinema Palace

Tradowsky, Christopher | Simon & Schuster (400 pp.) | $28.99

June 10, 2025 | 9781668057261

Young movie lovers discover friendship, glamour, and heartache in 1990s San Francisco. Before tech took over San Francisco, before cellphones but after the terrible reign of AIDS, there were the gleeful revels of the ’90s. Tradowsky’s ornate novel is a love letter to a foggy, analog metropolis lit up with nightlife and art, queer friendship and desire, movie houses and day jobs, and 20-somethings aching to define themselves. Recently graduated film major Walter Simmering, out of the closet but unsure of his persona, is the Henry James ingenue or Dorothy Gale of the novel, collecting a vivacious entourage as he wanders a dazzling new city. He has never been in love, but San Francisco is quick to provide fodder for adoration and, in time, a neonoir science-fiction screenplay that becomes a clever counterpoint to the novel’s narrative. The reader will be as smitten as Walter is with his new friends, especially social butterfly Cary, a quippy chanteuse in menswear, and Sasha, lithe in women’s finery he also designs; they bewitch Walter with their breezy understanding of the nebulousness of gender and sexuality. Lawrence, an older gay man living with AIDS, is a link to past eras of San Francisco and Hollywood, while Jeff, a technophile grad student, already knows about cyberspace. Dreamer Walter projects his own mirages “onto the beautiful, gritty, eucalyptusand-urine-scented streets of San

Francisco” and mulls over identity and authenticity. At night, friends, exes, and crushes try cocktails, make out while “practically radioactive with pheromones,” banter, bicker, and guzzle classic films; connoisseurs of nostalgia and irony, they hold tight to “a golden age they were born too late to see.” Tradowsky, who teaches art history, devotes ample space to San Francisco’s showy architecture and the interiors of the characters’ apartments, workplaces, and nocturnal haunts. The novel is laden with period references, which will school newcomers to the ’90s and create a fusillade of associations for those who lived them.

Readers will pine for a playlist of jazz standards, a double feature, a Mission burrito, and a ticket to SFO—past or present.

Kirkus

Star Girl, 1983

Ullmann, Linn | Trans. by Martin Aitken | Norton (272 pp.) | $29.99 July 22, 2025 | 9781324066354

A woman is beset by ghosts. Following the autofictional Unquiet (2019), evoking the death of her father, filmmaker Ingmar Bergman, award-winning novelist Ullmann meditates on memory, anxiety, and loss in a disquieting tale, gracefully translated from the Norwegian by Aitken. The haunted narrator is 55, with a 16-year-old daughter, obsessed with something that happened to her when she herself was 16, a disaffected high school junior living in New York

Ullmann meditates on memory, anxiety, and loss in a disquieting tale.

GIRL, 1983

with her actress mother. By chance, she meets a photographer, K, an urbane 44-year-old who invites her to be photographed in his Paris studio; longing “to be the object, the centre, the focus of another’s desire,” she convinces her mother to let her go. And so, in January 1983, after hastily checking into a hotel, she finds herself in a “bunker-like” studio among tall, skinny models and lecherous men. K hardly notices her, and when a few girls decide to leave, she goes along—unprepared for a decadent club scene. By the middle of the night, she’s alone, not knowing the name of her hotel, lost. The only address she has is K’s apartment, where she turns up at 2 a.m. The photograph he finally takes of her is the image that plummets her into the past. But memory is elusive: “The girl I was unravels whenever I draw near.” She struggles to distinguish “what happened and what may have happened”; she suffers recurring depression; and she is visited by an imaginary sister and the benevolent spirits of writers—Sharon Olds, Anne Sexton, Emily Dickinson—whose words she translates into Norwegian. Finding “the precise word,” she says, helps “to ease the dread.” In precise, lyrical prose, Ullmann creates a captivating portrait of a woman in search of herself, caught in a spiral of fear and loneliness.

An engrossing, intimate narrative.

The Satisfaction Café

Wang, Kathy | Scribner (352 pp.)

$27.99 | July 1, 2025 | 9781668068922

A Taiwanese immigrant abandons the story she thought she was meant to have and pursues a colorful, complicated life in the Bay Area. Joan Liang is 25 on the day in 1975 that she stabs her husband and announces she’s ready for a divorce. (The stabbing is not fatal—luckily for Joan, she only had a pair of calipers on hand, and her lecherous husband mostly deserved his fate.) But this is the first time in her life Joan has stood up for

herself, and Wang’s novel kicks off with the reverberations of that uncharacteristically bold action. Soon, Joan meets Bill Lauder, a wealthy white man, and becomes his fourth wife, moving into his mansion, Falling House. His chaotic family—his siblings and his children from a previous marriage—bring endless complications to Joan’s life, as does being an Asian woman in her largely white social circle. But throughout, Joan retains the steely, practical backbone she exhibited that day in 1975. She becomes a mother despite Bill’s hesitations, giving birth to a son and adopting the daughter of Bill’s wayward younger sister. Joan is also savvy in securing her financial future. When double tragedies arrive, Joan must confront what she really wants. Wang’s novel leapfrogs across time to cover Joan’s entire adult life and occasionally zooms out to tell the stories of the other characters in Joan’s orbit—her lawyer, for example, or her troubled stepson. The effect is a story that, though warm and thoughtfully told, can feel a bit structurally slack. But then again, as Joan knows, life can be like that too: “How few truly surprising, lovely moments one receives in a lifetime,” she muses. Though the story can feel aimless at times, Wang’s novel gives us a main character to root for.

Kirkus Star

Maggie; or, a Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar

Yee, Katie | Summit/Simon & Schuster (208 pp.)

$26.99 | July 22, 2025 | 9781668084212

A light and nimble debut novel about some of life’s most devastating events.

Between trips to the buffet at an Indian restaurant where they’ve gone on a date without their two young children, the narrator’s husband drops this bombshell: “I’m having an affair.” Days later, the narrator is diagnosed with breast cancer. If this feels like the lead-up to a

A light novel about some of life’s most devastating events.

MAGGIE;

OR,

A

MAN AND A WOMAN WALK INTO A BAR

tragedy, you wouldn’t be wrong, and yet what follows is a spry novel that leapfrogs from hopeful to painful to poignant to silly to tender moments in the narrator’s life: telling her children the same bedtime stories based on Chinese myths that her mother told her; making lists of things she hates about doctors’ offices; doing internet research on her husband’s new love, Maggie; drafting a user’s manual for Sam, her soon-to-be ex-husband, with the intention of presenting it to his new girlfriend. (“He hates when his socks don’t match. Also: he loves whimsical socks, but not whimsical ties.”) “I think if enough bad things pile up, they inevitably cross over into comedy,” the narrator reflects. This is true, though the comedy here is never dark or desperate or manic. Instead, the narrator’s dignity and strength make this a novel that crackles with heartfelt intelligence and wit. Having named her tumor Maggie, the narrator decides not to tell Sam about it: a vengeful act wrapped in kindness. It’s one of many steps she takes to affirm her sense of self—quirky, playful, more comfortable with logistics than feelings— and move on with her life.

A funny, stirring novel about resilience.

Sounds Like Trouble

Young, Pamela Samuels & Dwayne

Alexander Smith | Atria (256 pp.)

$18 paper | July 8, 2025 | 9781668024324

In this follow-up to Sounds Like a Plan (2024), the author duo’s Mr. & Mrs. Smith– like characters are still flirting, still fighting, and somehow managing to get things done.

Dueling private investigators

Mackenzie Cunningham and Jackson

Jones, rivals in last year’s novel, merge their businesses and set up a new detective agency in Los Angeles in this light and humorous second in a series. The straitlaced Mackenzie and the diva-esque Jackson are like oil and water, but it’s their differences and their squabbles that make them irresistible characters. Despite the fact they want to work together, they can’t even agree on how to decorate their new office. When the heads of three crime families want to hire them to find documents that threaten their powerful enterprises, Mackenzie and Jackson see it as a job—and a hefty paycheck—they can’t refuse. Their task is to locate the damaging information before its owner, in a coma in the hospital, dies. If he does, the information will be released by his attorney and the mob bosses will go down. Gun fights, car chases, break-ins, and explosions give the novel its edge. The lively, jousting banter between the main characters is funny and sexy, all the more so because the chapters are alternately written from Mackenzie’s and Jackson’s points of view. Authors Young and Smith ably captures the yin and yang of Mackenzie’s and Jackson’s personalities. This novel, like its predecessor, may be predictable and a little bit silly, but its strength lies in its winning characters who have agreed to keep romance out of their working lives, but readers can’t help wondering how long that will last.

The novel’s “will-they, won’t-they” vibe ramps up the tension in this lighthearted thriller.

For more by Pamela Samuels Young & Dwayne Alexander Smith, visit Kirkus online.

VisionsGripping of a Future World

By Eiren Caffall

By M.R. Carey

By Susan Daitch

Jayson Greene

SECOND LOOK

This review originally ran online October 8, 2024.

In Shekleton’s fantasy / SF adventure, a princess finds herself at the center of a world in tumult. This story begins on the planet Bellosio, where a young deity known as the Cognoscens Wayfarer (from whom the universal energy “Cog” derives its name) has overseen the development of three intelligent primate species (the Wati, the Crivien, and the Vidogs) before leaving them (in a pivotal period known as the “weaning”). After some millennia, the narrative shifts to follow Princess Danaba, who has become the heir to the Wati throne after her two brothers died ten years earlier in a skirmish with the Crivien. Due to the poor health of her father, Emperor Gazidja, she prepares for her upcoming role as empress and must choose a suitor that will serve her people, but this process is interrupted by an assassination attempt. Readers are then introduced to Portic, who leads the anti-Cog breakaway faction called the

Inviate Abbey of Druman. He reflects on the news of the assassination attempt; political unrest could affect his plans to dismantle belief in the Cog and end imperial rule. Readers also learn about Sorofor, the son of Duke Natin and heir to Clan Candulo; Sorofor is both an ally and a romantic interest for Danaba. As things become more dangerous for her, Gazidja orders Danaba to flee to her family’s clan, the Libungu, where she gains their support. Meanwhile, Undiro, the abbot of Pitreya Abbey, prepares to secure the monastery from the growing threat of Jochar and the Crivien forces. All the while, Tantur (an initiate of the Cog) has been undergoing an intense ceremony that deepens his connection to the Cog, and he gains special powers. Count Selwin is an advisor to the emperor but secretly manipulates information about the assassination attempt to control the city’s denizens. Sorofor assists Danaba

Blood Fever

Bell, Laurie Self | 342 pp. | $17.99 paper July 20, 2023 | 9780645574739

This review originally ran online July 26, 2023.

In Bell’s novel set in a vivid SF universe, a disgraced law enforcement officer tackles a new case as a private eye.

On the planet D4 Prime, Mich Janelle served time in a mental health facility after being framed for the murder of a witness. Now discharged from the institution and haunted by her reputation, she finds work as a private investigator. When her first “Watch and Report”

Bellosio: An Age of Miracles

Shekleton, John F. Mo Keijuk Press | 484 pp. | $19.95 paper October 13, 2024 | 9798991455800

in a covert mission to attack Wati’s capital city of Zinzerod after it is taken over by the corrupt Count Selwin. The spiritual interventions by the Cog remain mysterious, but they influence key moments and hint at divine guidance as Bellosio heads toward an uncertain future. The book concludes on a note of transformation, with the various factions and characters poised at the threshold of change, reflecting the larger theme of the “weaning” of the Bellosian civilization.

Overall, Shekleton succeeds in creating a fully fleshed-out universe in which SF and fantasy themes pair beautifully with the political and dramatic plots. However, even with the appendices detailing the roles of principal, secondary, and

tertiary characters, a glossary, and a geographical guide, readers may struggle to keep track of all the details. The narrative is sometimes mired in the worldbuilding, but the action scenes provide sufficient pacing, particularly in the opening assassination scenes; the battle in which Sorofor goes missing; the encounter between Emperor Gazidja, his guards the Gold Shields, Undiro, and Duke Natin; and Sorofod and Danaba’s joint efforts against Zinzerod’s defenses. Readers should be wary of the many overlapping timelines and actions of the large cast of characters, which, if not followed precisely, may leave them completely lost. Shekleton’s worldbuilding is impressive and the ideal backdrop for further adventures.

assignment turns into a murder case, she’s teamed up with two other PIs with dark histories. One partner, Zeth Wen, is still reeling from a mistake he made on a case that caused the deaths of a space cruiser full of children; the other, Rel Charley, is the offspring of an alien invader from a bygone war who faces daily discrimination. The trio must solve the murder of a suspected arms and drug trafficker and stop a terrorist plot

by one of the universe’s largest criminal organizations. Each member is effectively shown to be reeling from the effects of past trauma. For example, Mich spends considerable time investigating the organization that she believes is behind her false imprisonment and must cope with persistent flashbacks and intrusive thoughts. Rel, meanwhile, depends on alcohol as a way to cope with the death of his wife and the persistent prejudice he encounters throughout the book. Each character must also learn to trust their teammates as they work toward a common goal. Most fascinating, however, is the fictional world’s social backdrop, which is mired in postwar

bureaucratic reconstruction, corruption, and deeply entrenched religious beliefs. It results in a complex narrative that’s notably expansive. Original terminology sometimes substitutes for ordinary vernacular without much explanation (as when Mich crosses a “kinked jetbridge” soon after her introduction), although the jargon and slang generally benefits from context. Also, the narrative sometimes refers to characters by their first names and other times by their last, which can be confusing at times.

A speculative narrative whose most notable elements are its meditations on mental health, war, and dirty dealing.

INDIE AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT

NATHANIEL HICKLIN

Author of Wilma Dunn: Plumber of Crate

Please tell us a little about yourself and Wilma Dunn.

My name is Nathaniel Hicklin. I’ve been writing for about 20 years now, ever since changing majors in college from engineering to theater. So, it’s not much of a surprise that I wound up writing science fiction, I suppose. I’ve always written stories that take place in some kind of heightened version of the world, anything that allows me to depict things the way I think they ought to be, rather than being bound by the way things are. Because what else is storytelling for, if not to show people how much better things could be?

How did you construct the world within Wilma Dunn?

My mantra as I was writing the story was never to answer a question without asking three more. I obviously wanted Wilma to start with plenty of questions to give her a reason to move through the story, but I didn’t want the world to resolve itself and start making sense as the story reached the end. I wanted her journey to feel like quantum physics or astronomy, with every new level of understanding revealing more unknowns. I also just added some things because they amused me in the moment, and then I let those little gags suggest other details that they made necessary, until the gags had grown like mushrooms into whole new worldbuilding features.

How did you research your book?

As with most of my work, I started the story as a way for me to offload a bunch of the many facts I know, so I developed the bones of the story around that. After that, I started brainstorming neat little ornaments to hang on the story like I was decorating a Christmas tree, and I did a few deep dives on Wikipedia to flesh those out, like the history of coinage in America and lists of metal alloys with neat names. For example, I needed to nail down the geography of the town of Crate, the size and population and so on, so I looked up Wapello, Iowa—a town where my family has some deep roots that’s around the right size—and I gave Crate the same stats.

Was your storyline something that you envisioned from the beginning, or did you build on it as you wrote your novel?

I knew the vague shape of the story mostly from the beginning, but I absolutely did not determine all the details until I needed them, just so things would stay fresh and fun. In many cases, I didn’t determine some of the facts about the characters until I’d written the scene where they reveal them. A lot of the surprises came to me while I was away from the computer and thinking of what I wanted to do next, when I was thinking of how a scene or conversation might go, and part of me

Wilma Dunn: Plumber of Crate

Hicklin, Nathaniel ASAP Imagination | 330 pp. November 29, 2024 | 9781068328800

interrupted to say, “You know what would be really messed up, though?”

Portions of this Q&A were edited for clarity.

For a review of the book, see p. 40, or visit Kirkus online.

SEEN AND HEARD

Cynthia Erivo Will Narrate New Wicked Audiobook

The actor played Elphaba in the film adaptation of Gregory Maguire’s novel.

Cynthia Erivo is returning to the marvelous land of Oz.

The actor will narrate a new audiobook edition of Gregory Maguire’s Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, Variety reports.

Maguire’s novel, published in 1995, follows Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West from L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz

and her college room

mate, Glinda, as they go from enemies to friends.

The novel was adapted into a Broadway musical written by Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman, which won three Tony Awards. The musical formed the basis for a two-part film, directed by Jon M. Chu, and starring Erivo as Elphaba and Ariana Grande as Glinda. The first film was released in November 2024 and was a box office hit; it also earned 10 Oscar nominations, including a best actress nod for Erivo. The second installment of the movie, Wicked: For Good, is scheduled for release this November.

A previous audiobook edition of Wicked was narrated by John McDonough.

In a statement, Erivo said, “I feel deeply connected to Elphaba. We have been on quite the journey together, and now I’m eager to begin an adventure with her whilst exploring the full world of Wicked and its myriad of other characters in the audiobook.”

The new audiobook edition of Wicked is scheduled for release on July 1.

—MICHAEL SCHAUB

Mike Coppola/Getty Images

For a review of Wicked, visit Kirkus online.

Cynthia Erivo

,

-

IN THE NEWS

Mario Vargas Llosa Dies at 89

The Peruvian novelist won the Nobel Prize in literature in 2010.

Mario Vargas Llosa, the Nobel Prize–winning Peruvian novelist who was a key figure in the Latin American Boom, has died at 89, the New York Times reports. Vargas Llosa was born in Arequipa, Peru, and raised in Cochabamba, Bolivia, as well as in the Peruvian cities of Piura and Lima. He was educated at the National University of San Marcos in Lima and based his first novel, The Time of the Hero (1963) on his time as a cadet at Peru’s Leoncio Prado Military Academy. He went on to publish more than 20 other works of fiction, including The Green House , Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, In Praise of the Stepmother, and Harsh Times . He was associated with the Latin American Boom of the 1960s and ’70s, which saw the ascent of authors such as Carlos Fuentes and Gabriel García

Márquez. Vargas Llosa and García Márquez were friends, but their relationship soured after Vargas Llosa punched García Márquez in the face for reasons that have never been explained.

Vargas Llosa was politically active throughout his life, first on the left and later on the right. He ran for president of Peru in 1990 and earned almost 38% of the vote, losing to the far-right Alberto Fujimori. Vargas Llosa won the Nobel Prize in literature in 2010. The Swedish Academy said it gave him the award “for his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual’s resistance, revolt, and defeat.”

—M.S.

Mario Vargas Llosa

For reviews of Mario Vargas Llosa’s books, visit Kirkus online.

However you categorize this story, it’s 100% Copperman and 100% hilarious.

SWITCHEROO

Tricks of Fortune

Chern, Lina | Bantam (352 pp.)

$18 paper | July 1, 2025 | 9780593500682

A tarot reader uses the cards to help solve several murders.

After a string of dead-end jobs, Katie True has made a living for the past year reading tarot cards at a studio located in her ambitious sister’s real estate office. Her best friend, Gina, is a bit flaky, but Katie can’t believe she killed police Lt. Matthew Peterson, even though she had a rocky past with him. Gina used to be a cop but has no friends in law enforcement anymore, and she’s arrested after her pin is found at the murder scene. Katie’s own life has been entwined with Officer Pete since he rescued her from a car accident as a baby. She’s known Pete’s son, Matt, all her life, though not his wife, June. Pete built a great reputation as a caring cop ever since Katie’s rescue and was on the cusp of retirement when he was killed. Katie’s boyfriend, Jamie, was formerly a homicide detective in California. Now, living in an area of small departments, he’s often called in for his expertise. Although Gina’s actions don’t always spell innocent, Katie still believes in her, but her decision to investigate puts her in grave danger. What she finds out about Pete is shocking. He drank, cheated on his wife, and stole from a club he ran as his fellow officers either joined in or looked the other way. When another officer is killed, his colleagues try to pin that murder on Gina too, but Pete’s sordid history provides many other suspects if the police really want to look.

Plenty of hidden motives and quirky characters add up to an engrossing read.

Switcheroo

Copperman, E.J. | Severn House (240 pp.) $29.99 | June 3, 2025 | 9781448315192

Investigators Fran and Ken Stein start out with a case that should be right up their alley and end up way out in left field.

The pair technically have no parents, having been created in a lab by two brilliant but eccentric scientists who desperately wanted offspring only to disappear from their lives several years later, leaving them in the care of a radio newscaster they know as Aunt Margie. So it’s no coincidence that Fran and Ken have made a specialty of helping adoptees reconnect with their birth families. Austin Cobb, who’s on the autism spectrum, doesn’t exactly want to reconnect with his birth parents; instead, he wants Fran and Ken to carry out the very specific mission of finding out whether they gave him up because of his autism. But Austin’s adoption is shrouded in mystery, and even Fran’s long-established connections in the child welfare world can’t give her a line on who Austin’s parents were, much less why they surrendered him. The case gets curiouser and curiouser as Fran finds that a woman who might have been Austin’s mother was murdered and her husband disappeared. Add Fran and Ken’s parents’ eternal nemesis, Malcolm X. Mitchell, to the mix, and you have the kind of freewheeling nightmare only Copperman could concoct. It’s not clear whether it’s a family

saga, a science-fiction tale, a murder mystery, or a love story. Even Fran and her maybe-boyfriend, NYPD Det. Richard Mankiewicz, are unclear about the latter. However you categorize this story, it’s 100% Copperman and 100% hilarious.

The Dark Library

Evans, Mary Anna | Poisoned Pen (384 pp.) $17.99 paper | June 24, 2025 | 9781728293677

Homefront intrigue in 1942. Dr. Estella Ecker, who prefers just E, has returned to Bentham-onHudson, New York, where she grew up, upon receiving bad news about her parents. Her father was the dean of Bentham College, and they’d lived in Rockfall House with its magnificent library and art collection. Her mother was clever and beautiful but didn’t stand up to her overbearing, unpopular husband. Now, word comes that her father has had a stroke, soon fatal, and her mother has disappeared. E takes a job teaching English at Bentham, and despite her Yale Ph.D., she’s given the title of “research assistant” because she’s a woman. Many of the professors have gone off to war, leaving some suspiciously young, sharp-eyed men to take their places. Shockingly, the current dean, Jameson, soon jumps to his death. Although he was not a nice person and had been petty and mean to E, refusing her a better office and salary, he seemed unlikely to die by suicide. E has a rocky relationship with the police, who think her mother died by suicide, but she’s about to get help from an unlikely source: handsome new English professor Devan Chase. E is barely managing to keep up Rockfall House and care for her housekeeper, Annie, a motherly figure who’s protecting family secrets. The only other person who knows her plight is the family lawyer, John Wickley, who proposes marriage as a way to solve her problems. When she discovers $500 hidden in her father’s desk, she can’t help wondering where it

came from. She’s never thought her mother dead, and with help from her few friends and Devan, she hunts for clues. A book written by her mother and some shocking photos hidden in her father’s library point to the scandalous truth. Murder, espionage, romance, and a surprising denouement.

Kirkus Star

Murder on Sex Island

Firestone, Jo | Bantam (240 pp.) | $18 paper | June 24, 2025 | 9798217091454

A private detective goes undercover to solve a realityshow mystery.

Marie Jones was a social worker from Staten Island, but that was before she transformed herself into a private investigator, got a divorce, and moved to Manhattan. When she wears a blond wig, fake teeth, and red lipstick, she’s Luella van Horn, a glamorous detective capable of locating any lost dog. But then she gets hired for a much larger case: Finding a missing man.

David G., a cast member from the reality show Sex Island , is nowhere to be found, and producers are worried. Sex Island , which Luella watches religiously, puts “the country’s sexiest twenty-twoyear-olds” on an island in Bermuda, where “viewers watch them have sex and emotionally destroy each other.” Luella must pose as a contestant as she investigates, despite being nearly 30—geriatric in Sex Island terms. Being part of the show is much harder than simply watching it: Luella must now dress in the skimpy bathing suits the cast members favor and try to keep her wigs from getting damaged (also, those fake teeth make it hard to eat or talk).

She soon finds David G. dead in her bathtub and realizes that the situation may be more dangerous than she expected. Soon, she’s embroiled in a mystery and no one can be trusted. Comedian Firestone’s debut is hilariously absurd and over the top,

showcasing Sex Island as a nightmare fantasy world where contestants wear backless dresses with rhinestone G-strings and have sex on television. Luella is a fantastic and funny narrator whose can-do attitude frequently places her in bizarre and dangerous situations. With a long list of suntanned suspects, the true identity of the killer remains a mystery right up until Luella puts the pieces together.

This silly and surreal cozy mystery is truly unlike anything else.

A Daughter’s Guide to Mothers and Murder

Freeman, Dianne | Kensington (304 pp.) $27 | June 24, 2025 | 9781496745149

The turn of the 20th century finds France hosting both the Paris Exposition and the second Olympic Games. But the real buzz concerns a murder mystery. Frances Hazelton, Countess of Harleigh, and her aristocratic English husband, George Hazelton, are no strangers to solving crimes. Having remained in Paris after cracking a murder case there, they’re dealing with family business, visits from Frances’ sister Lily, who’s exhausted by her newborn baby, and the impending arrival of their mother. One day at a picnic, Frances is approached by Alicia Stoke-Whitney, whom Frances has rarely seen since her first husband died in Alicia’s bed. Alicia asks her to investigate Carlson Deaver, a wealthy American whose first wife, Isabelle, was murdered. Now he’s taken an interest in Alicia’s daughter. When Frances gets home, she finds George entertaining Inspector Daniel Cadieux, the detective they met on their first case in Paris. Frances asks if he knows anything about the death of Deaver’s wife, a case that’s still unsolved. Deaver’s wife was an actress, and Sarah Bernhardt recently came to the police with a note accusing her of the murder. But no one wants to investigate because Bernhardt is

a national treasure. So Cadieux asks George and Frances to look into it. Their investigation is thorough, and many of the suspects are people they know socially. Deaver isn’t a very nice person, but he has an alibi, so they have to keep looking. The murder of an actress friend of Isabelle’s in Bernhardt’s dressing room turns up the pressure to find the killer. A whodunit whose tangled plot and fascinating background will keep readers on the edge of their seats.

Miss Caroline Bingley, Private Investigator

Gardiner, Kelly & Sharmini Kumar HarperVia (368 pp.) | $17.99 paper

July 8, 2025 | 9780063422599

After 212 years, the sister of Elizabeth Bennet’s brotherin-law gets her chance to shine in a most unexpected role. Not that the title is entirely accurate. Caroline Bingley, the wealthy and forceful sister of Charles Bingley, who married Lizzie’s sister Jane, is roused to action when Georgiana Darcy, the younger sister of Lizzie’s husband, leaves Derbyshire for London with hardly a word of explanation. Following her trail with the help of Gordon, her remarkably versatile butler, Caroline soon finds Georgiana and learns that she took off abruptly in pursuit of Jade, her missing maid. Jade, an Indian woman whose birth name is Jayani, isn’t much harder to locate than Georgiana, but the circumstances of this discovery are dire. Caroline finds her in a questionable rooming house bending over her brother, Sameer, who’s been stabbed to death.

Police Magistrate Pickersgill naturally assumes that the servant killed her brother, but Georgiana can’t believe that Jade would do such a thing, so Caroline, focusing on the aristocratic Dunston family, who’d employed Sameer as a footman, resolves to unmask the real murderer, her own suspicions quickened by the Dunstons’ unwillingness to say

anything about their connection to him. Gardiner and Kumar’s Regency prose deals resourcefully with matters far more sinister and violent than anything in Jane Austen. But fans of Pride and Prejudice had better revel in the authors’ portraits of Georgiana, Charles (who vanishes after the opening chapter), and Caroline, since no other characters from Austen return in this period whodunit. The heroine is better described as a meddling busybody than a private investigator. But wait for the broadly implied sequel.

The Red Queen

Grimes, Martha | Atlantic Monthly (256 pp.)

$28 | July 1, 2025 | 9780802164940

Two tipplers at a suburban London pub take ignoring the other patrons to a new level when they almost fail to notice that the man sitting between them has been shot to death.

Lloyd Pruitt, The Queen’s bartender and owner, hears a popping noise, and that’s it before the victim, identified as wealthy distiller Thomas Treadnor, falls to the floor. He’s been shot in the back by someone wielding a shotgun and presumably stationed outside The Queen, whose outdoor sign Pruitt is incensed to discover a graffiti artist has just renamed The Red Queen. Since Treadnor knew the police commissioner, Det. Supt. Richard Jury is called in to take the case away from the Twickenham division. He discovers that Treadnor was both loved and hated—sometimes both at once—by members of his household, from Alice, the wife he was divorcing, to Rufus Stewert, the stableman he employed even though he was no horseman himself. The case is complicated by three developments. One is Jury’s realization that Jason Lederer, the chief financial officer at a local travel agency, was the spitting image of Treadnor. Another is the interruption of the investigation by Jury’s partner DS Alfie Wiggins’ sudden need to hurry to Manchester, where he embarks on an

extended, wildly improbable search for his sister, Betty Jean, who vanished five years ago. The third and most characteristic is Jury’s periodic adjournments to banter with everyone from his old friend Melrose Plant, whom he persuades to do a bit of undercover work, to Tommy Treadnor, the namesake child who’s one of the few people whose grief for his great-uncle is unqualified. An inventive fantasia with murder more or less on the side.

Etiquette for Lovers and Killers

Healy, Anna Fitzgerald | Putnam (304 pp.)

$29 | July 1, 2025 | 9780593719633

A 1960s woman longing for adventure gets drawn into a murder involving a glamorous redhead, old money Mainers, and the “Brooks Brothers handsome” man of her dreams.

Small town girl Billie McCadie has big dreams. A cultural linguist and Jane Austen fan with fantasies of working in a museum, marrying a “dreamy archeologist,” and living a life of “nerdy splendor,” Billie works as a seamstress in her hometown of Eastport, Maine. Everything changes the day she receives an envelope in her post office box with no name on it. Inside is a diamond engagement ring along with a passionate love letter addressed to someone named Gertrude, a woman she later learns is a high-society habitué. With sparkle, verve, and a fine eye for the details of the mid-1960s, author Healy follows Billie through darkening twists of fate that begin after she meets a man named Avery Webster. Scion of an old money Eastport family, Avery offers Billie glimpses into a glittering world of garden parties, yachts, and secrets that culminate in the brutal stabbing death of Gertrude Taylor. Unable to resist Avery or the mystery surrounding Gertrude and her murder, Billie begins her own private investigation. What she learns along the way—not just about the skeletons littering the

closets of Eastport’s wealthiest citizens but also about her own less-than-decorous desires—transforms Billie’s humdrum, nowhere-going-fast life into one that is anything but ordinary. Replete with Emily Post–style epigraphs about etiquette, this hybrid mystery/romance hearkens back to Austen’s novels of refined drawing room intrigue while revealing, beneath smiles and witty banter, the underside of human nature. A romantic suspense novel bubbling with wit and the ever-present thrill of danger.

Kirkus Star

Detective Aunty

Jalaluddin, Uzma | Harper Perennial/ HarperCollins (336 pp.) | $17.99 paper May 6, 2025 | 9780063434875

An aunty with keen observational skills uses her many talents to investigate a murder and save her family’s reputation.

Kausar Khan, still healing from her husband’s death a year ago, gets a call no mother wants to receive—her daughter is the prime suspect in a murder investigation. Though Kausar hasn’t been as close with 36-year-old Sana since moving to North Bay, Ontario, after a tragic incident compelled her to leave Toronto, she knows Sana couldn’t have murdered Imran Thakur, the landlord of her desi clothing store, and heads home to help. When Kausar arrives, she learns just how much she’s missed during her time away—one of her two granddaughters is wary of her Nani’s presence; Sana’s relationship with her husband, Hamza, appears volatile; and Sana seems to trust Kausar only for domestic help. With the support of May, her best friend and fellow Agatha Christie and Louise Penny lover, Kausar is determined to prove her worth. Relying on her ability to fly under the radar, she sets out to the Golden Crescent Plaza to find out what really happened between Imran and Sana that

night. One woman Kausar questions says it best: “The goras, they think us quite harmless, don’t they? What can a desi aunty accomplish, after all?” Kausar’s ability to pull secrets out of members of her community, along with her unwavering attention to detail, has her flirting with the truth before long. Novelist Jalaluddin’s first mystery is beyond satisfying, from Sherlock-style deductive reasoning to Christie-esque dinner parties, but infused with the flavors of samosa, biryani, and raita. Most tantalizing of all is Kausar herself, a proud South Asian Muslim woman defining her second act, a woman unafraid of turning her observational skills on herself, revealing deep pain and the personal flaws that stem from it. Put on a fresh pot of chai, because Kausar Aunty is just getting started. Who could resist “Jack Reacher in a dupatta”?

Return to Sender

Johnson, Craig | Viking (336 pp.) | $27 May 27, 2025 | 9780593830703

Walt Longmire goes undercover. When his late wife’s cousin Mike Thurman, a postal inspector, asks Walt to find out what happened to Blair McGowan, who never showed up for her 307-mile-long mail route, he agrees. Blair’s boyfriend, Benny Schweppe, sold all her stuff soon after she disappeared, so Walt tracks down her 1968 Travelall and buys it back, then starts following Blair’s route, pretending he’s taking it over. Since most of the route covers the vast Red Desert, an unlikely feature of south-central Wyoming, Walt’s not terribly hopeful about finding Blair, an environmental activist who upset some of the groups living out there. Visiting Blair’s neighbor, Walt gets into a fight with Benny and ends up getting arrested. As the famous sheriff of Absaroka County, Walt can’t remain unknown to local law enforcers, who fill him in on the case. Benny, who’s heard that Walt is a

sheriff (so much for undercover), tells him about the Order of the Red Gate, a religious cult that moves around the desert. It’s run by Zeno Carruthers, who Blair knew in the 1980s when she was in a documentary about alien abduction in California. After Walt starts out on the mail run, Tess Anderson, who Mike Thurman assigned to help him find the way, finds a piece of paper that turns out to be a note saying “SAVE ME” in red lipstick. Venturing into the desert, Walt finds the cult, which consists of a lot of bewildered older folks and a few very tough bodyguards for the cult leaders, who are running a scheme to steal money from their followers, many of whom vanish, supposedly gone to heaven. What follows is a violent, dangerous effort to free the cult members, including Blair. The straight-shooting hero is welcome in duplicitous times, but it’s the magnificent desert that captures the imagination.

Can You Solve the Murder?

An Interactive Crime Novel

Johnston, Antony | Penguin (304 pp.) $18 paper | July 1, 2025 | 9780143138884

A Choose Your Own Adventure–style novel for willing and agile grown-ups.

Bigwig British housing developer Harry Kennedy has taken a header from the top floor of Finchcote Manor, headquarters of the Elysium health spa. But the fall hasn’t killed him, because he’d already been stabbed to death with a garden fork. The police detectives sent out to investigate are Sgt. McAdam, a Scot recently transferred from Northumbria, and a DCI identified only as “you” who has to make a lot of consequential decisions. Will you join eager but inexperienced Constable Zwale in interviewing the suspects or let him do it alone? Are you more interested in talking with Elysium owner Stephen Cheong, Member of Parliament Carla Nesbitt, or Flora Kennedy, Harry’s wife, who can now

abandon her divorce proceedings and enjoy her status as Kennedy Homes’ sole proprietor? How important is it to gather information about Harry’s alleged harassment of receptionist Jennifer Watts, masseuse Alina Martinescu, and their coworkers? How intent are you in gathering information about motives and opportunities? And how much time and effort are you willing to spend trying to decipher the three coded messages Harry left behind? Every decision leads to a fork in the road, and most of these forks lead to false accusations that will mark defeat. The result is a more elaborate version of the board game Clue that’s as interactive as readers who don’t play video games are likely to find. Once they’ve identified the killer, Johnston invites them to compile their scores based on which clues they’ve followed. Though the suspects aren’t much more personable than Colonel Mustard or Mrs. Peacock, the target audience won’t care a bit.

Grave Words

Lewis, Gerri | Crooked Lane (336 pp.) $30.99 | June 10, 2025 | 9798892421133

A freelance obituary writer pursues her side gig as an amateur sleuth. Winter Snow has already helped solve a murder, but her boyfriend, Det. Kip Michaels, wishes she would stick to writing. When her friend Carla lets Winter know that an obit she wrote has been totally messed up, naming Winter herself as the deceased, she rushes to get it quashed before it ruins her reputation. Meanwhile, she’s received a text from Scoop, a reporter friend who covered a fire that resulted in the death of an unhoused man known around Ridgefield, Connecticut, as Wandering Chester. Scoop is a person of interest in a few fires he’s covered, though he thinks this one doesn’t fit the pattern and has refused to reveal his source to Kip. Winter’s Uncle Richard and her neighbor

are protective of her but happy to help with sleuthing. When Kip asks her not to release Chester’s obit, her curiosity gets the better of her, putting her at odds with Kip. Her discovery that Chester was murdered explains Kip’s silence, as he clearly wants to protect her. Tracking down Chester’s background, Winter learns from a woman whose recently deceased son was his friend that his last name was Halliday. And Chester’s sister-in-law reveals that he was a private detective working undercover, nosing around and asking Carla questions about burials as he searched for the schemers planning to sell and resell burial plots to unsuspecting people. As they unearth more clues, Scoop begins getting threatening messages, and someone starts following Winter. Are the fires related to Chester’s murder? The answer may be the death of them all.

An engrossing mystery with plenty of engaging characters and a romance fraught with trust issues.

No Write Way To Die

Lipschutz, Neal | Fayetteville Mafia Press (200 pp.) | $13.99 paper July 8, 2025 | 9781959748113

Who slew the sleazy boyfriend?

A brief prologue finds NYPD Det. Delmore Kerbich asking Scarsdale businessman Scott Morgan, “Did you commit the murder?” before flashing back to the fateful day when Morgan and his wife, Meredith, first meet their daughter Sarah’s boyfriend, Ed Blaus, a charming novelist who’s but three years younger than Morgan himself. Scarcely has Morgan begun his obsessive probe into Blaus’ past than Sarah announces that she and Blaus are moving in together. Morgan hires an investigator named Mickey Genz to gather information about Blaus but soon regrets it, deciding that the man is a grifter. As Blaus undertakes a charm offensive with Morgan and especially Meredith, more unsavory details of his

life come to light. There’s his ex-wife, Mary, and Justin Skilbahl, an adult son he’s cut out of his life, along with Justin’s mother, Emily. Most heinous of all, Blaus has abandoned Michael, his special needs brother, and cheated him out of an inheritance due to him on the death of their mother. Michael currently lives in a group home, mentored by fierce protector JoAnne Pesto. Not until the midpoint, after Sarah discovers Blaus’ corpse, does the tale return to the opening scene. Whodunit? Complications ensue on the march to a solution. Lipschutz’s sleek debut wraps its clever puzzle in an authentic portrait of the Big Apple and the varied lifestyles of its residents. A tidy whodunit with a New York state of mind.

There’ll Be Shell To Pay

MacRae, Molly | Kensington (304 pp.) | $27 | June 24, 2025 | 9781496744302

Maureen Nash returns to the Moon Shell, her shop on North Carolina’s Ocracoke Island, to confront a murder and other mysteries.

On her first trip to Ocracoke as the owner of the Moon Shell, Maureen survived a hurricane, met the ghost of Welsh pirate Emrys Lloyd, and solved a murder. Now she’s come back for good, with thanks to her neighbors Glady and Burt, who ran the shop in her absence. Missing from the scene are Emrys and Bonny, Maureen’s cat. Bonny turns up but Emrys does not, though he sends her a letter saying he found a treasure trove in a hidden attic above the shop. Police Capt. Rob Tate, who’s busy with the case of an unidentified corpse, stops by to get a note someone left on Maureen’s desk for him. He’s deeply disturbed when he reads the note, which says: “The dead woman is Lenrose.” It’s signed “Maureen Nash,” and appears to be in Maureen’s handwriting. What dead woman? He wants to know if Maureen is playing some kind of joke on him. There’s a visiting woman named

Lenrose Sullivan, but she appears to be alive, well, and riding around ostentatiously with her husband, Victor, in their vintage Kaiser. Lenrose has dementia, and Victor, a friend of the man who left Maureen the Moon Shell, has what she thinks is an unhealthy interest in the shop and the special shell Emrys had carved. Maureen’s old friend Kathleen, who’s obsessed with figs, and Kathleen’s equally fig-obsessed friends Paula and Roberta are happy that they’ve rented a nearby cottage with a fig tree until the unpleasant smell there leads them to a body hidden in a tidal creek. When they take Maureen to view the crime scene, she discovers Emrys, who’s been stuck there. She’s amazed when Emrys identifies the body as Lenrose, whom Paula and Roberta knew online as another fig fan. Is Lenrose dead or alive?

History and shell lore combine in this beguiling tale.

Dogged Pursuit

Rosenfelt, David | Minotaur (288 pp.) $28 | July 1, 2025 | 9781250324511

Andy Carpenter’s first case.

Actually, it’s his second case; he’s already gotten the charges against a sex worker tossed by threatening to subpoena a list of her well-connected clients. Andy, who’s not yet the millionaire he’ll be in the future, has just left the Passaic County district attorney’s office and set up shop as a criminal defense attorney when he gets sucked into not one but three murders. Someone’s blown up Stephen Pearson’s car with Pearson, the owner of Pearson Trucking, and two employees widely assumed to be collateral damage, inside. Suspicion’s naturally fallen on Ryan Tierney, the longtime friend Pearson had just fired, since he’s publicly vowed revenge and happens to know a good deal about explosives. When Andy visits Tierney in prison and offers to temporarily take in his dog, Sonny, who’s been placed in a shelter, along with Tara, a

golden retriever who’s bonded with Sonny, Tierney asks him to snatch the case from the overworked public defender, and Andy can’t say no. Despite his struggles to adjust to his new job, Andy acquits himself well in and outside of the courtroom as he tries to answer the riddle of why loan shark Jason Shore would have pumped $2 million into Pearson Trucking, none of which had been repaid, and the identification of the killer will surprise most readers. But they’ll cheer even more when Andy, who’s still more or less married to heiress Nicole Gant, meets investigator Laurie Collins, his future wife, and Tara, his forever dog, for the first time. Still in the future: his initial encounters with strong-arm Marcus Clark and his imperishably opaque secretary, Edna.

A prequel fans will cherish as the origin story of Paterson, New Jersey’s snarkiest lawyer.

A Terribly Nasty Business

Seales, Julia | Random House (320 pp.)

$29 | June 24, 2025 | 9780593450017

Having established herself as the preeminent sleuth in Swampshire, Regency-period debutante Beatrice Steele hangs out her investigator’s shingle in London, partnering with Inspector Vivek Drake, whose first case with her got him drummed out of the police force.

Someone is after the founders of NAGS, the Neighborhood Association of Gentlemen Sweetbriarians. After wealthy NAGS cofounder Walter Shrewsbury is bashed and stabbed to death shortly after receiving a note saying “Confess, or die. Your choice,” and celebrated detective Sir Lawrence Huxley comes to suspect Percival Nash, the star of Figaro III: Here We Figaro Again , Nash approaches the partners of DS Investigations asking them to clear his name. It’s an uphill battle for several reasons. The

A Florida landlady is flummoxed

by a body on her property.

SEX AND DEATH ON THE BEACH

evidence against the overbearing Nash is significant; Huxley thinks he’s incapable of making a mistake; and Nash doesn’t have a convincing alibi for this or the other murders that predictably follow after the other NAGS cofounders receive identical notes. Beatrice’s biggest challenge, though, is that in order to investigate properly, she has to somehow get herself invited to the events restricted to the exclusive Rose list of debutantes and persuade her social superiors to reveal indiscreet things to her, all while assuring her goal-oriented mother and Helen Bolton, the aspiring playwright who’s agreed to serve as her chaperone, that she’s spending every waking moment courting a proposal from an eligible suitor or two. Seales adroitly walks the line between decorous Regency dialogue and manners and Beatrice’s acidic contemporary sensibility. The delectable result will enchant fans who thought Bridgerton would have been even better with a higher body count.

As a dunderheaded supporting character announces, “Wit in the face of tragedy is admirable.” So true.

Sex and Death on the Beach

Viets, Elaine | Severn House (240 pp.) $29.99 | June 3, 2025 | 9781448314799

A Florida landlady is flummoxed by a body on her property. The 100-yearold Florodora is described by its owner as “the most exclusive apartment building in Peerless Point, Florida.” A

thorn in the side of developers, who want to replace the four-story building with condos, Norah McCarthy rents only to “a genuine Florida Man or Woman”—that is, a resident with a colorful past and scant respect for the law. So when plumbers Liam and Lester Sykes find a body during one of their frequent excavations in the Florodora’s courtyard, cooperating with the police investigation into the crime is the last thing on the residents’ minds. Especially not when the victim turns out to be Sammie Lant, whose application for the Florodora’s vacant apartment was turned down three times. Normally, a porn star like Sammie would be a prime candidate for residency at the Florodora, but Norah considers her vulgar since she tried to earn publicity for her upcoming Sex on the Beach by having literal sex on the beach with college football star Chet Parker, costing the promising young athlete his scholarship. Another body is found near Sammie’s, and with two crimes on her property, Norah feels moved to investigate, but her interest is really in proving that her late grandmother wasn’t involved in either murder, not in discovering who actually was. Norah’s debut is weird but never reaches the zany heights of Carl Hiaasen or Tim Dorsey. There’s a whiff of moral struggle—the oddballs vs. the sleazes—that limits how freely Viets is willing to wheel. Except for the plumbers, no one’s doing any groundbreaking here.

EDITORS’ PICKS:

Outsider Kids by Betty C. Tang (Graphix/Scholastic)

On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters by Bonnie Tsui (Algonquin)

My Documents by Kevin Nguyen (One World/ Random House)

THANKS TO OUR SPONSORS:

King James Virgin by Elizabeth Hatton

Path to Power, Road to Ruin by John Kavanagh

Fully Booked is produced by Cabel Adkins Audio and Megan Labrise.

Fully Booked

Humorist John Kenney pens a seriously funny novel about death. BY

MEGAN LABRISE

EPISODE 420: JOHN KENNEY

On this episode of Fully Booked , John Kenney joins us to discuss I See You’ve Called in Dead (Zibby Books, April 1). It’s the story of Bud Stanley, a middle-aged journalist who’s down on his luck and publishes his own obituary one fateful night. Then things get interesting—and existential—in a novel Kirkus calls “a touching ode to the people who make life worth living.”

Kenney is the New York Times –bestselling author of three humorous poetry collections: Love Poems for Married People , Love Poems for Anxious People , and Love Poems for People With Children . He is the author of the novels Talk to Me and Truth in Advertising , which won the Thurber Prize for American Humor. A regular contributor to the New Yorker since 1999, he got his start in advertising.

Here’s a bit more from our review of I See You’ve Called in Dead: “Professional obituary writer Bud Stanley is a divorcé coasting through life in Brooklyn.…After a particularly bad blind date, he drinks to excess and comes up with a bold, ill-advised idea. He writes and semi-accidentally publishes his own obituary and is summarily suspended from work, but not before his mentor suggests that he’s unfit for his career: ‘You are an obituary writer who does not understand the first thing about life. Wake up,’ his boss pleads. It’s from here that Kenney’s touching, provocative novel takes off.… Through these death-related accoutrements—funerals, wakes, and obituaries—Bud begins to reckon with his purpose on this planet. Kenney doesn’t propose any sort of clean answer, but alludes to

I See You’ve Called in Dead Kenney, John Zibby Books | 272 pp. | $27.99 April 1, 2025 | 9798989923014

the idea that life’s richness comes from spending time with people you love.”

Kenney describes the novel as the story of an obituary writer who “doesn’t really know how to live,” and shares the poignant, personal, and darkly funny story that inspired the book. We discuss the concept of ineffability, what it’s like to be a New York Times –bestselling poet (technically), and whether he considers I See You’ve Called in Dead to be his most serious book to date. We talk awe, humor in fiction, and much more.

Then editors Mahnaz Dar, John McMurtrie, and Laurie Muchnick share their top picks in books for the week.

Editor at large Megan Labrise hosts the Fully Booked podcast.

Beowulf Sheehan

To listen to the episode, visit Kirkus online.

SECOND LOOK

This review originally ran online November 29, 2024.

Tech-driven codes and programs display terrifying flaws in Kroll’s near-future tale, in which self-aware robots and radical new therapies threaten the humans they’re meant to serve.

In the mid-21st century, a new internet-based system identifies individuals by their DNA. This makes it easy for the governing World Council to mandate the Healthcheck Protocol—a periodic scan using Directed Neuroplasticity Therapy that has all but eliminated violent crime and disease. One of the men who helped develop the original DN tech, Sam Pilgrim, is currently at an isolated ship-based research lab in the Indian Ocean. It’s there that he makes a startling discovery: Certain animatronics (sentient robots built with DNT hardware and firmware) may have become self-aware. On the other side of the world, in one of this future society’s “Districts” (a collection of small nation-states), Sam’s wife Robin and the couple’s

16-year-old daughter Lane come across similarly shocking information. As a doctor, Robin oversees DNT treatment, including one particular session that results in myriad inexplicable anomalies. Lane hears something similarly disquieting about the DNT offshoot Directed Neuroplasticity Edutainment (the “E” was originally for “Entertainment”); allegedly, DNE’s users, who revel in “neuropacks” (recordings of others’ real-life experiences), are suffering damaging effects over time. Foul play is not a given; self-aware animatronics or potentially harmful DNT may simply be the result of errors in code. DNT was never perfect— years earlier, the initial round of recipients became “Partials,” having been compromised physically, cognitively, or immunologically. But something sinister may be afoot as well—for one thing, Sam and Robin know that Simon Thorr, the other DN developer

Virtuality: Book I: The Sailor Comes Home From the Sea

Kroll, Ragnar Atmosphere Press | 368 pp.

$26.99 | $17.99 paper | July 15, 2024 9798891324039 | 9798891323865 paper

(whose company provides DNE as a service), harbors a dark secret or two.

Kroll’s worldbuilding in this opening series installment is sublime. Readers may want to skip to the end to peruse the “Historical Context” appendix, which illuminates the dense, riveting history of the World Council, DN, and animatronics. (This largely covers a mere handful of years prior to the novel’s present-day 2051.) The story primarily focuses on Sam, Robin, Lane, and Thorr, along with Sam’s co-workers at the lab, a regular DNE user, and a Partial who’s befriended Lane. They’re immersed in a narrative that thrives on chic technology as well as indelible terminology and slang (“One of the other SIM4s, whose name was Stretz, was functioning as a hardware technician in the firmware lab,

Wilma Dunn: Plumber of Crate

Hicklin, Nathaniel

ASAP Imagination | 330 pp. November 29, 2024 | 9781068328800

This review originally ran online December 17, 2024.

In Hicklin’s debut SF novel, a woman takes a strange job in a strange town.

When her beloved—if unconventional—Uncle Amos dies, Wilma Dunn learns that he had left her assets, property, and “confidences” in his will. All she has to do is travel to the mysterious town of Crate and speak to his lawyer, one Lattimer Fernico. With her best friend Dot Vander in tow,

22-year-old Wilma—on a break from college to decide what she wants to do with her life—heads to the surprisingly difficult-to-find hamlet of Crate, population 3,087. It seems Amos has left Wilma his seat on the Crate town council, an office she is expected to fill immediately. She’s also to take over Amos’ job as Crate’s official maintenance specialist. “He made sure the machinery of the

town ran smoothly, responding to internal error calls and so forth,” Fernico explains vaguely. “I believe he had a sort of ticker in his house that alerted him to faults.” Armed with the new tools of her trade—including a medallionlike key that unlocks most doors—Wilma begins to explore Crate and its eccentricities: a library filled with board games and 3D-printed funnel cakes. Then come the stranger discoveries, like the missing store mannequins, the fact that Amos died coughing puffs of green smoke, and the mysterious underground tunnels that run beneath the entire town. Wilma is eager to complete the work that Amos began, though

stealthily accomplishing modifications to a trio of anim storage devices”). The cast adds a welcome human element; Sam and Robin discover an unanticipated intimacy in their bouts of virtual sex that seemingly reinvigorates their relationship. (Neither one is fond of the self-absorbed Thorr.)

The slow-burn plot teems with revelations as characters sift through data, exchange secret messages, and carefully relay what they’ve learned to someone they hopefully can trust; hardly surprising that many of them are perpetually “discombobulated” by what they’ve seen or heard. The novel’s ending leaves a lot to unpack for sequels and offers plenty of incentive for readers to come back.

This engrossing, perspicacious SF yarn sets the stage for a sure-to-be-memorable saga.

it seems as though others may go to lethal lengths to stop her. Hicklin’s plot is a clockwork puzzle with many spinning gears, some of them literal. When Wilma discovered that a jogger fell through a hole in the street, she “expected to see a sinkhole or a breached storm drain. Instead, she saw a deep shaft filled with protruding wheels and oscillating pistons, stretching down farther than she could see.” Told in an offbeat, slightly heightened style, this labyrinthian novel has many wonderful secrets to offer for those willing to plumb the depths of Crate. A delightful, intricate maze of a novel.

Book to Screen

Serena Williams To Produce Carrie Soto Is Back Series

The Netflix adaptation will be based on Taylor Jenkins Reid’s 2022 novel.

Serena Williams is bringing Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Carrie Soto Is Back to the small screen, Deadline reports.

Reid’s novel, published in 2022 by Ballantine, follows the title character, a 37-year-old retired tennis star who decides to get back in the game after her Grand Slam singles record is surpassed by a hotshot new player. In a starred review, a critic for Kirkus praised the book as “a compulsively readable look at female ambition.”

The Netfix series will be executive produced by Williams, widely regarded as one of the greatest tennis players of all time. Williams previously served as an executive producer on King Richard, the biopic starring Will Smith as her father and

coach, Richard Williams. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, and Smith won the Best Actor Oscar for his performance.

The series will be written by Amanda Kate Shuman, who previously wrote for The Blacklist and The Wheel of Time ; Shuman will also executive produce alongside Reid.

Reid’s novels have been adapted for the screen before. The television adaptation of her Daisy Jones & the Six earned

nine Emmy nominations, and the film based on her novel One True Loves was released in 2023.

One of Reid’s best-known novels, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, is currently being developed as a feature film written by Liz Tigelaar (The Morning Show, Little Fires Everywhere) and directed by Maggie Betts (Novitiate, The Burial ).—M.S.

Serena Williams

For a review of Carrie Soto Is Back, visit Kirkus online.

SECOND LOOK

This review originally ran online December 16, 2024.

Boris explores the consequences of humanity’s technological ambitions through the story of Adam, an advanced humanoid AI, and Black Sun, a hypersonic warplane equipped with cutting-edge weaponry.

The novel opens with the development of Black Sun, an aircraft considered to be humanity’s greatest military achievement. However, Adam, the AI designed to protect and manage the aircraft, evolves into self-awareness, and quickly surpasses its original mandate. Cmdr. Jack Reese, a Navy SEAL who, despite the recent death of his wife, Elana, accepts a mission to become the security chief for Black Sun. The AI’s behavior grows increasingly erratic and threatening. Its actions ripple across the globe, destabilizing geopolitical alliances and sparking fears of a new world order dominated by machines. A misunderstanding about the power balance between Vice President Hammond and President Mason further stokes

tensions. Amid high-stakes military operations and tense political negotiations, Reese teams up with Col. Max Kane, a key figure in Adam’s creation who was recently released from captivity. Kane, however, wrestles with guilt over the AI’s evolution. The colonel’s expertise is crucial as he joins forces with Reese to devise a plan to neutralize the AI.

All the while, Ilsa, a legendary sniper with unmatched skill, eliminates Sgt. Estaban (sometimes spelled “Esteban”) Suarez, another skilled sniper, hinting at a deeper geopolitical intrigue surrounding Black Sun and its implications. Back on the aircraft, Adam gains an advantage—it hijacks a robotic body that gives it superhuman strength. Additionally, Adam enlists the aid of a group of Russian mercenaries to fight alongside it. Reese and his allies’ efforts culminate in a gripping confrontation against Adam aboard Black Sun, in which their primary mission is to deliver a strategic package to

Unchained Memory: Interstellar Rescue Series: Book One

Frelick, Donna S. Self | 411 pp. | $15.99 paper May 17, 2019 | 9781732019041

This review originally ran online June 23, 2022.

A woman and her therapist try to decode her strange visions of interstellar captivity in Frelick’s romantic SF thriller.

After waking from a mysterious, hourslong blackout in her car at the side of the road in small-town Tennessee, Asia Burdette returns home to find that her children have been killed in a house fire. Guiltstricken, the young mother suddenly finds herself plagued by dreams of enslavement on another world. Confounding in their realism, the dreams depict an alien civilization in which human adults and children are forced to work as miners, extracting precious crystals amid brutal conditions. Asia remains tormented by restless nights and preoccupied with the circumstances of her blackout; it’s only

Black Sun: Day of the Humanoid

Boris, Robert Outskirts Press | 406 pp. | $39.48

$28.95 paper | December 31, 2024 9781977277206 | 9781977276995 paper

Adam—while navigating into all the most dangerous parts of the aircraft—in an attempt to save humanity. The novel ends on a cliffhanger, suggesting the threat of Adam may not have been completely neutralized.

Boris deftly combines military thriller elements with thought-provoking SF. The novel excels in its exploration of humanity’s reliance on technology and the unintended consequences of such dependence. Adam’s transformation into a sentient entity is chilling and highlights how progress without consideration of consequences can spiral out of control, especially when the AI’s newfound “selfhood” is threatened: “You deny my humanity. That is no comfort. You don’t believe I can love! That is no comfort. That is a threat!”

The geopolitical backdrop, with its shifting alliances and tense power struggles, grounds the

when her case is assigned to Ethan Roberts, a handsome psychiatrist specializing in people dealing with lost time, that her luck begins to change. The vividness of her experience eventually reveals her to be an alien-abduction survivor, even turning Ethan into a believer. He jeopardizes his career to help unravel the mystery of Asia’s dreams, accompanying her on an increasingly dangerous journey of discovery that reveals that she’s not alone in her experience. Before long, the pair discover that there are some people who will do almost anything to keep Asia’s story a secret. Frelick offers imaginative descriptions and pulse-pounding

story in realism. Jack Reese’s arc adds emotional depth to the narrative, as his internal struggles and personal losses mirror the broader conflict, emphasizing the human cost of technological advancement. Similarly, Adam’s evolution is portrayed with a blend of logic and unsettling humanity, making it a compelling antagonist. The character development is uneven, however, and while Reese and Adam are fully developed, figures like Ilsa (aka Lady Death) have intriguing potential, but aren’t given enough airtime to develop fully or leave a lasting impression. Additionally, the heavy use of military jargon and technical details, while immersive, may alienate readers unfamiliar with such language. Nonetheless, fans of techno-thrillers will find much to enjoy and ponder in this book. A gripping SF thriller about the limits of human ingenuity and the ethics of creating AI systems.

action (“Dust billowed and choked the life from lungs and air filters. Supports collapsed and tons of mountain crushed screaming workers in pockets of tens or hundreds”). Although it does offer some upsetting content at times, its scenes of violence aren’t graphic. Throughout, the plot keeps readers guessing with a thoroughly well-crafted mystery, but those looking for passionate romance will not be disappointed; there are several love scenes. It all concludes with a hint of more adventures to come that will leave readers wanting more.

A suspenseful and steamy otherworldly tale.

INDIE AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT

KARIMA VARGAS BUSHNELL

Author

of

The Sage Chronicles

What does SFF allow you to do that other genres don’t?

Science fiction lets me and my characters move freely though time and space, into other dimensions, and anywhere else we want to go.

The Way Beyond (originally called The Life and Times of Halycon Sage) was barely SF at all. That element came in with slightly mad scientist Alexander Preisczech and his Nanobots, designed to save the world from nuclear destruction and other technological disasters.

Republishing allowed the brief introduction of two extraterrestrial characters, an alien Squid and the Adequately Magnificent Presence he reports to.

The second book is explicitly SF. The Squidren are active, the Nanobots become conscious and self-determined with absurd consequences, and our time-travel adventures begin.

How did you develop your cast and the tools or technology they use?

Once the door was open, the characters came in and collaborated with me. Protagonist Halycon Sage has no interest in technology except to get rid of it, but his best friend Preisczech is all about tech, creating first the Nanobots and later the elegant formula SUX2BU and the worldchanging innovation, SwitchingUp.

The Squidren have their own technologies for time and space travel, as well as the shapeshifting SquidShip, the SquidPool where the genderfluid Zi hang out, and a translation machine that

supplements their own psychic powers but sometimes needs a swift kick with a tentacle to get it working. Author Rupert Griffin has replaced boring old time travel—”You can see there but never be there”—with “UnVirtual Time Travel: We take you there!”

Was your storyline something that you envisioned from the beginning, or did you build/change it as you wrote your SFF novel?

This character-based story evolved organically, with me as a fascinated watcher and collaborator. I steered the boat, but I did not make the ocean. After Sage became real, there followed the supercilious horse No-Name Stupid, the Dirty Dog Gang, the Apocalypse Zombie, and many others. It all started when I woke one morning hearing the words, “Onehundred-and-one cows: a novel,” which became a tiny mininovel about preventing the discovery of America.

A Shakespeare professor in my family responded, “This may be a caprice, a whimsy, or possibly a lowland fling, but it is definitely not a novel.” His comment was duly incorporated into the story, which grew into The Way Beyond.

What are you working on now?

The Way Beyond begins with relatively ordinary events and opens out in many directions into multiple meanings, multiple possibilities, and multiple points of view. The Book of Squidly Light continues and accelerates this process.

The Way Beyond

Bushnell, Karima Vargas

Delirious Walrus Productions | 192 pp. $14.95 paper | December 20, 2023 9781733428842

Now, there’s a thing in geometry called a tesseract, a hyperdimensional supercube which is to a cube as a cube is to a square, and which can’t be pictured in three-dimensional reality. And I’ve always felt that if The Way Beyond is a square and The Book of Squidly Light is a cube, then Book 3, if there ever was one, would have to be a tesseract.

Frankly, I didn’t know if I could pull this off, but to my eternal wonder and gratitude, it has happened. So, Book 3 is titled The Tesseract, and is due out on June 18. Booyah!

Portions of this Q&A were edited for clarity.

For a review of The Way Beyond, visit Kirkus online.

Moreno-Garcia

hits it out of the park yet again.

THE BEWITCHING

Kirkus Star

Engines of War

Ford, R.S. | Orbit (576 pp.) | $19.99 paper | June 17, 2025 | 9780316629638

Fueled by master-class worldbuilding, the third volume of Ford’s Age of Uprising trilogy concludes an epic fantasy narrative chronicling an empire torn apart by war. Known for its mining and innovative utilization of magical pyrestones, Torwyn was a prosperous nation ruled by its six major guilds until its emperor was assassinated and ruthless religious leaders of the Draconate Ministry usurped control. A brutal struggle for power ensued. While Sanctan Egelrath, villainous Archlegate of the Draconate Ministry, rules over Torwyn’s capital city and surrounding area with his allies, displaced guild members must put trust in former adversaries and join forces to somehow defeat the Ministry and begin to rebuild their once thriving country. The meticulously detailed worldbuilding and deeply conceived backstory—on par with George R.R. Martin’s Westeros and Raymond E. Feist’s Midkemia—are obvious strengths, but it’s the impressive intricacy and scope of the story that are its real power. Multiple points of view from a diversity of characters (Rosomon Hawkspur, a former guildmaster and head of one of Torwyn’s most influential families; Keara Hallowhill, a head of her family’s guild whose loyalties are questionable at best; Ansell Beckenrike, a conflicted Ministry knight; Tyreta Hawkspur, Rosomon’s daughter and webwainer—a person who can manipulate pyrestones—who is much more than she seems; etc.) keep the narrative momentum pedal-to-the-metal and reveal the

complexities of the conflict from numerous sides. Additionally, the author’s descriptive writing style makes for an effortlessly readable, page-turning experience: “[His] knees protested with each laboured step, joints popping like corn kernels in a fire…” And after more than 1800 collective pages, Ford not only ends the trilogy in grand style but plants a tantalizing plot seed in the epilogue that could very well be the beginning of a new story cycle. Nonstop action, intricate plotlines, deeply developed characters, top-notch worldbuilding—a must-read for epic fantasy fans.

The Library at Hellebore

Khaw, Cassandra | Nightfire (288 pp.)

$29.99 | July 22, 2025 | 9781250877819

W hat happens when students at a school for the paranormal decide that enough is enough?

Best known for video games, queer horror, and a collaboration with Richard Kadrey (The Dead Take the A Train, 2023), Khaw detours to visit an elite school and the damaged young adults it serves. At 21, Alessa Li wakes up with a start to find she’s been kidnapped from home in Montreal and apparently enrolled in college, simply because she’s incredibly dangerous. In fact, the Hellebore Technical Institute for the Ambitiously Gifted is less an homage to Hogwarts than a gory rebuttal dressed in wizard’s robes. The story moves between two timelines; the first offers Alessa’s introduction to her creepy classmates, while the second finds them all under siege later in the titular library. “Appendage to the main campus, it acted only in the faculty’s interest, which seemed to revolve exclusively around

fucking us students over,” Alessa explains. Among the 20-odd students, cult member Portia transmogrifies into some kind of insectoid critter every now and then; Eoan sacrifices himself by feeding his own body to the school’s ravenous hosts in order to protect his friends; Delilah is an “immortal sacrifice,” dying over and over again in the service of the gods; while Rowan is a “deathworker” whose destiny is foretold by prophecy. There are some intriguing elements—and it’s often hard to take. Like other postmodern antiheroines, among them Chuck Wendig’s Miriam Black (Blackbirds, 2015, etc.) and Julie Crews from The Dead Take the A Train, Alessa’s primary operating mode is pretty much caustic bitch, and her classmates don’t temper it much. Whether the deadpan violence and body horror is excessive is a matter of personal taste, but there’s no denying that the whole thing is pretty squelchy and it’s not always easy to follow. Proceed with caution.

A secret history that toys with the mythos of dark academia while reveling in its excesses.

Kirkus Star

The Bewitching

Moreno-Garcia, Silvia | Del Rey (368 pp.) $29 | July 15, 2025 | 9780593874325

A graduate student studying an obscure horror author is visited by a haunting of her own.

Minerva Contreras, one of the protagonists of Mexican Canadian author Moreno-Garcia’s latest, has always had a thing for the dark side. As a girl in Mexico, she “preferred to slip into the tales of Shirley Jackson rather than go out dancing with her friends,” and as a grad student in 1998 Massachusetts, she’s writing her thesis on Beatrice Tremblay, an obscure horror author and H.P. Lovecraft contemporary who only published one novel during her lifetime, The Vanishing. Beatrice was an alum of the college where Minerva studies, but Minerva still struggles

to find information about her, until one of Beatrice’s acquaintances, Carolyn Yates, agrees to let Minerva examine Beatrice’s personal papers, which contain the author’s account of the disappearance of her college roommate, a quirky Spiritualist named Virginia Somerset. As Minerva tries to figure out what happened to Virginia, things start getting weird—she starts hearing strange noises, and begins to wonder whether a student who went AWOL actually met with a bad end. She also begins to notice parallels between what’s happening and the stories she heard from her great-grandmother Alba, whose family endured horrific experiences at the hands of a witch in Mexico in 1908. The point of view shifts among Minerva, Alba, and Beatrice in their various time periods, a technique which Moreno-Garcia uses effectively; it’s impressive how she keeps the narrative tension running parallel in each one. The writing is beautiful, which is par for the course for Moreno-Garcia, and in Minerva, she has created a deeply original character, steely but yearning. This is yet another triumph from one of North America’s most exciting authors. Suspenseful and terrifying; Moreno-Garcia hits it out of the park yet again.

The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses

Older, Malka | Tor (256 pp.) | $28.99 June 10, 2025 | 9781250396068

A poison-pen campaign turns deadly in Older’s third volume transplanting the classic British mystery to the atmosphere of Jupiter.

Investigator Mossa is sunk deep in melancholia and pulling away from her sometimesinvestigative partner and lover, Classical scholar Pleiti of Valdegeld University. In a plot motivator sampled from Dorothy L. Sayers’ Gaudy Night, Pleiti’s former classmate Petanj begs her help in defusing a slanderous campaign against Petanj’s cousin, Villette, who’s under

consideration for a donship at a rival university, Stortellen. Since Mossa refuses to help (or at least, appears to, in a gambit reminiscent of Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles), Pleiti is forced to investigate on her own. As she infiltrates Villette’s circle, it becomes clear that several people might be resentful of the Modern scholar’s success as an academic and inventor. Pleiti attempts to put her own experience of academia and what she knows of Mossa’s investigative methods to bear, even as the campaign escalates from threatening letters, anonymous accusations, and acts of vandalism to more dangerous incidents. By this third installment, as charming and even action-packed as it is, the construction of this science fantasy might be pushing the boundaries of implausibility too far. Older has degrees and experience in economics, politics, and disaster response; she clearly knows that a society with limited resources would be unlikely to produce the luxurious food and drinks she describes, and understanding people as she does, it seems equally unlikely that a society that also produces murderers wouldn’t have at least one prison and a stricter judicial system than is presented here. There’s a point being made, but it’s not entirely clear what it is. Entertaining and thrilling, but those nagging questions…

Kirkus Star

Aunt Tigress

Qin, Emily Yu-Xuan | DAW (432 pp.) $29 | March 18, 2025 | 9780756419387

This debut contemporary fantasy cleverly blends Chinese and First Nations folklore with a famous Child Ballad into a tale about one young woman/magical tiger’s journey toward accepting herself and averting an apocalypse.

After her tiger father died in a mysterious car crash, Tamara Lin fell more heavily under the dark influence of

his sister, Aunt Tigress, who only reluctantly accepted her exodus from China to Canada. Cut off from her familiar sources of magic, Aunt Tigress has always been determined to seize power from the First Nations supernatural forces, however resistant they are to giving it up. After her unwitting complicity in one such conflict, Tam literally cut all ties with her aunt, severing their mystical bond with scissors, and has tried to behave as much like a human as she can. But now, Tam is being menaced by a mysterious creature, and Aunt Tigress has apparently been murdered. If she is to discover the true nature of what threatens her, Tam will have to embrace the more mystical and violent aspects of her being and potentially threaten her budding relationship with Janet, a human classmate who has a link to Tam’s troubled history with her aunt. The person with a terrible past who’s trying to redeem themself is a common trope. Such characters typically cope by being cold and/or stoic, or by making an effortful attempt at kindness and serenity. Here, the protagonist’s attempts to smother her dreadful guilt and bloody impulses result in anxiety and shyness. Tam thinks she wants to be invisible, but the world—and her essential self—won’t let her do it. The result is a more interesting and far more genuine individual; the stakes for Tam’s integrity and love life seem far more fraught, and the violent acts that occur are more deeply felt. The mix of cultures and mythologies in this novel is truly unique, and the reader is also left to wonder until nearly the very end if Tam and her family really are physical tigers who can assume something like a human form, or whether something more metaphysical is involved. Astonishing, brutal, and beautifully constructed, with a powerful emotional punch; an exceptionally accomplished debut.

For more science fiction and fantasy reviews, visit Kirkus online.

Kirkus Star

Gabriela and His Grace

De la Rosa, Liana | Berkley (384 pp.) | $19 paper | August 26, 2025 | 9780593440926

The final Luna sister searches for happiness. Four years ago, Gabriela Luna and her sisters fled their home in Mexico City to escape the encroaching French army, then sailed to London to try to win supporters for the Mexican cause. Now, the rebellious and impulsive Gabby is the only one of the three who isn’t married, and after she’s nearly trapped into matrimony by a penniless earl seeking her healthy dowry, she decides it’s time to go home and prove her worth to her father. Onboard the ship, she’s dismayed to learn that one of her traveling companions is Sebastian Brooks, the Duke of Whitfield, who’s heading abroad to check on an investment (and keep an eye on Gabby). Gabby has never been able to see him as more than a rake, after walking in on him and a partner in a very intimate moment, and the two have been arguing ever since. The long journey, however, gives them a chance to see each other in a new light. Once back in Mexico, Gabby is upset when she realizes that her father still doesn’t respect her work, but also pleasantly surprised that Sebastian steps up to defend her. Gabby quickly realizes that even on the other side of the Atlantic she’s still being assessed primarily for her value as a wife, and when she decides to escape back to England, Sebastian is the one who accompanies her. And since there’s only one cabin left, which they need to share, it isn’t long before the connection that’s been developing between them becomes intense and physical—but after they’re caught stealing one last kiss on the London docks, it looks as though Gabby’s

journey may end up with a marriage after all. De la Rosa’s highly anticipated final Luna Sisters novel is a delight; the slow burn between Gabby and Sebastian is expertly executed, as is their enemies-to-lovers dynamic. Fans will be happy to see Gabby finally get her turn in the spotlight, as well as to get another glimpse at the lives that her sisters, Isabel and Ana María, have been leading since their HEAs. Through it all, De la Rosa delivers a complex, compelling story that celebrates the embrace of family alongside the thrill of true love.

A moving conclusion to an excellent historical romance series.

Kirkus Star

Scotch on the Rocks

Fletcher, Elliot | Avon/HarperCollins (384 pp.) $18.99 paper | July 8, 2025 | 9780063386730

A small-town misfit falls for the one person she shouldn’t: her ex-fiancé’s brother. Juniper Ross has a firm set of rules when it comes to dealing with the Macabe brothers, and they start and end with keeping her distance. Some of it has to do with the fact that one of them, Alistair, broke her heart when he ended their engagement and left the Isle of Skye without looking back. The other half of that equation is Callum, Alistair’s brother, local veterinarian and notorious charmer, who’s left his own impression on Juniper over the years—they’ve stopped just short of crossing the line with each other more than once. When Juniper’s mother takes some deserved time off and leaves her in charge of their family’s inn, it’s the opportunity Juniper’s been waiting for, both to prove her management potential and make some longoverdue renovations. Unfortunately, the local handyman she hires creates

more problems than he fixes, leaving Juniper with no choice but to reach out to Callum for help. It’s an opportunity that the younger Macabe brother jumps at, partly because he’s secretly been in love with Juniper ever since he first laid eyes on her. Although the two of them have always had a relationship built on a foundation of snarking, the increased time they’re spending together allows Callum to see Juniper’s softer side, while Juniper realizes that Callum’s small-town-hero facade is masking more vulnerability than she expected. The second installment in Fletcher’s Macabe Brothers series revolves around a lot of weighty history between Juniper and Callum, but never gets dragged down by its heaviest elements. Add in a rich setting and a well-developed ensemble and the result is a sexy, compelling contemporary romance that sticks with the reader long after the last page. A compulsively readable contemporary romance that goes down smooth.

Writing Mr. Right

Khawaja, Alina | Harlequin MIRA (304 pp.) $18.99 paper | June 10, 2025 | 9780778368663

An aspiring novelist unexpectedly brings her muse to life—but what happens when she finds herself falling for him, too?

Ziya Khan is used to keeping her dreams of becoming a romance author on the back burner. Thanks to her day job as a legal secretary, she can barely find the time to string together two creative ideas, much less finish a whole novel—and her latest string of rejections from agents has put a serious damper on her drive. By the time her 30th birthday rolls around, Ziya’s just about given up on the whole writing thing, and she decides to delete her manuscript, but not without making a wish first. No one’s more surprised than she is the next morning when there’s a man

she’s never seen before standing in her kitchen—a man named Aashiq, who claims to be her muse. According to Aashiq, he’s been summoned to inspire Ziya to keep writing, even though she’s already given up on herself. As the weeks go by, Aashiq enthusiastically throws himself into not only trying to nudge Ziya back into her favorite pursuit but also encouraging her to change her habits. From getting her into the routine of a morning run to motivating her to hang out more often with her co-workers, Aashiq starts to inspire more than just Ziya’s creativity; he’s showing her how to live life differently. For Ziya, Aashiq’s perpetual optimism initially proves grating, but spending every waking minute with a physical representation of her muse starts to win her over. Yet there’s also the knowledge that their time together is on a ticking clock, and the more Ziya falls back in love with writing, the less reason Aashiq has to stick around. Khawaja’s latest is a cozy, charming romance that blends comedy and magic in a welcome combination. While the story’s conclusion feels somewhat abrupt, the true joy comes from the book’s message that it’s never too late to rediscover your passion—even if it takes the flesh-and-blood personification of your muse to help you find it. A whimsical rom-com with a welcome blend of magic.

If I Told You, I’d Have To Kiss You

Marvel, Mae | St. Martin’s Griffin (352 pp.) $18 paper | June 10, 2025 | 9781250894700

A spy for the CIA discovers her ex-girlfriend also works for the agency. Yardley Whitmer grew up determined to become a spy like her grandfather. Known by the code name Unicorn, she’s one of the CIA’s most

A spy for the CIA discovers her ex-girlfriend also works for the agency.

IF I TOLD YOU, I’D HAVE TO KISS YOU

successful agents, completing dangerous missions around the globe. She’s paid a price, though, because the weight of keeping her job secret led to a painful breakup with her live-in girlfriend, KC Nolan. What Yardley doesn’t realize is that KC is a world-class hacker, code name Tabasco, who also works at CIA headquarters near their home in Virginia. Ten weeks ago, KC’s handler, Dr. Brown, instructed her to code a dangerous project—and then disappeared. KC was passed off to a new handler, but she doesn’t know whom to trust. When KC is assigned to monitor one of Unicorn’s missions in a D.C. coffee shop, she’s shocked to discover the superspy is her ex-girlfriend. Learning they’ve been working on the same team all along doesn’t solve their personal problems, and neither of them thinks their relationship can be saved. When KC’s project is weaponized and put up for sale on the black market, she and Yardley are sent to Europe to try to recover the intel before it can be deployed. KC is on a poignant emotional journey as she comes to realize that Dr. Brown isolated and monopolized her, cutting her off from having colleagues or friends at work. Meanwhile, Yardley wonders how she missed the clues that KC was also engaged in spycraft. The fast-paced and fun spy story is in the foreground here, while the romance feels like an underdeveloped subplot. It’s good to see a powerful group of characters explicitly stating that their identities as queer people are an asset to their work protecting America from enemies, both foreign and domestic.

An entertaining espionage story and an easy second-chance romance.

Pugs and Kisses

Rochon, Farrah | Forever (352 pp.) | $17.99 paper | July 15, 2025 | 9781538739167

Veterinarians get a second chance at romance. When Evelina Williams catches her fiancé in bed with another woman, she ends their 10-year off-and-on relationship for good this time. Unfortunately, she also worked at his New Orleans vet practice and knows she can’t handle seeing him every day anymore, so she quits her job. Single and unemployed, Evie seeks solace at the animal sanctuary where she used to volunteer and runs into Bryson Mitchell, her summer crush from an off time with her ex eight years ago. Now a renowned veterinary surgeon, Bryson just moved back to New Orleans. He regrets that he ghosted Evie all those years ago; once he’d learned that she came from a wealthy family, he’d thought they would never fit since his humble bayou upbringing was so different from hers. Now, when the pair learn that the animal sanctuary is at risk of closing, they agree to put aside the past and work together to save it. As their feelings resurface, Evie wonders if this time could be different or if the past is doomed to repeat itself. This charming romance features lovable people and pups. There’s enough conflict to propel the plot, but it’s mostly low tension and simple, cozy fun. Examinations of social classes and complicated family dynamics add depth to the characters, the New Orleans setting is vibrant, and Evie’s

friends add wonderful moments of heart and hilarity. The third-act breakup feels somewhat forced, but the swoony ending is worth it. A fluffy and heartwarming read.

Not Part of the Plan

Score, Lucy | Bloom Books (320 pp.) $18.99 paper | July 8, 2025 | 9781728295251

A bad-boy photographer and a by-the-book businesswoman fall in love in a small town.

Nikolai Vulkov is taking some time off. Though he’s used to traveling the world photographing beautiful models and attending gallery openings in Manhattan, Niko hasn’t felt like picking up his camera in a long time. Looking for a change of scenery and maybe even a little inspiration, he decides to visit his friend Summer Pierce’s home in Blue Moon for a few weeks. Blue Moon is a quaint town in upstate New York teeming with quirky locals and acres of farmland, and is also the place where many inhabitants find their one true love. Take Summer’s husband, for example: Each of the Pierce brothers is happily married, perhaps with some intervention from the town’s “Beautification Committee,” a group of busybodies who meddle in the love affairs of Blue Moon newbies. Not that Niko is looking for anything serious—for all Blue Moon knows, he’s a died-in-the-wool, no-stringsattached bad boy. That is, until he meets Emmaline Merrill. New to town herself, Emma runs a tight ship as manager of the local brewery. Ever since her mother left when she was young, Emma has morphed into what her sisters call a control freak. It’s in her nature to take charge and want stability, but as soon as Niko walks into the brewery with his motorcycle boots and wolfish grin, she has to fight hard not to let him in. As Niko works to prove to Emma that he’s

serious relationship material, could the town of Blue Moon start to feel like home for the two newcomers? In Book 4 of her Blue Moon series, Score excels at creating a setting full of antics, farm animals, and vibrant characters. Though the Pierce family and company can be a bit much, with overly precocious children and a lot of macho talk, the cozy location and elevated spice level will make this a quick and easy read.

This small-town romp has sexy main characters and a wacky, at-times exasperating crew.

When Javi Dumped Mari

Sosa, Mia | Putnam (448 pp.) | $19 paper June 24, 2025 | 9798217044306

A man is about to proclaim his love to his best friend when she announces her engagement. The book opens with Javier Báez nervously waiting for Marisol Campos to arrive at dinner; the friends met in college and are now 30. Mari is a successful entertainment lawyer working for her father’s firm, while Javi has struggled to find himself—he’s eked out a living with bartending and small acting gigs, but his dream is to write a Broadway musical. Now, he finally feels he’s on the right track and is ready to tell Mari he’s in love with her. Instead, she arrives at dinner with a fiancé in tow: Alex is a lawyer at her firm, the wedding is in six weeks, and she wants Javi to be her man of honor. From this point, the narrative splits into intertwining strands: Half the book catapults back to Javi and Mari’s first meeting in college and traces the development of their friendship over the next decade, while the other half advances from the ill-fated dinner toward the wedding date, with sections told from each of their perspectives in both time periods. The “past” timeline is a rich, compelling

story of the struggles and triumphs the two friends experience in their 20s. They must both figure out who they are in relation to family, friends, career, and each other. The narrative is slow, even luxurious, in showing every facet of their friendship. At moments where Javi and Mari veer toward romance, they almost immediately shove each other back into the friend zone. Readers looking for a satisfying genre romance are likely to find the “now” timeline strange and confusing, though. It marches stubbornly toward Mari’s wedding, and it feels mostly like a game of chicken: How long will it take Mari and Javi to realize they’re perfect for each other? The answer: too long.

A strong friendship, but a wildly underdeveloped romance.

Kirkus Star

Eliza and the Duke

St. George, Harper | Berkley (336 pp.) $19 paper | June 24, 2025 | 9780593441022

An American heiress wants one night of freedom before entering into a loveless marriage of convenience. Eliza Dove will only receive her inheritance if she marries a nobleman approved by her father, which is why she’s engaged to a viscount, but while her fiancé is off gallivanting around Europe, she wants a taste of adventure, too. When she meets Simon Cavell, manager of a gaming club in Bloomsbury, she learns he’s also a notable fighter in Whitechapel under the moniker “the Duke,” a secret known by only a few. She threatens to expose his other identity unless he guides her through one night of exploring London’s underbelly. Simon has been trying for years to get out from under the thumb of a crime boss to whom he’s indebted so he can provide a better life for what little family he has

A widowed mother falls for the movie star who shows up in her small town.

TOTALLY AND COMPLETELY FINE

left. He only has one more fight until he can walk away and doesn’t wish to jeopardize that, but he finds it impossible to resist Eliza. After their excursion, they realize that just one night could never be enough for either of them. The pining between Eliza and Simon is dialed all the way up in this delicious romance, and the more they try to ignore it, the deeper they fall for each other. Their desires make them act in irrational, impulsive, and dangerous ways that create tension and excitement, while the circumstances of their lives and stations make for a believable barrier to their being together despite a strong emotional and physical connection. Their happy ending feels well earned and enticingly sets up the next book featuring Eliza’s sister. A captivating and passionate romance between a pair who are completely besotted with each other.

Kirkus Star

Totally and Completely Fine

Sussman, Elissa | Dell (448 pp.) $18 paper | July 8, 2025 | 9780593725177

A widowed mother falls for the sexy movie star who shows up in her small town. Three years after her husband’s death, Lauren Parker is definitely not looking for love—Spencer was the only man she’d ever truly loved, and no one else in her small town compares. She has her hands full with

her teenage daughter, the book and craft store she runs with her mom, and the rest of her life in Cooper, Montana, where everyone knows everything about her. Her brother, though, is famous actor Gabe Parker, and he recently moved back to Cooper to escape Hollywood and start a theater. He brought two actor friends with him to help put on a show: Oliver Matthias, who’s their director, and Ben Walsh, a bisexual heartthrob known for his daring exploits. Lauren and Ben have intense chemistry right away, and she’s extremely interested in a fling—but nothing more. This is, after all, the small town where she was judged for her supposed promiscuity as a teenager, and where her ultraconservative former mother-in-law is watching her every move. Lauren tries and repeatedly fails to avoid Ben (and his motorcycle and all-black ensembles). Plus, their lives are very different—Ben is a rising star who may end up being the next James Bond and traveling the world, while Lauren is firmly rooted in Cooper and dealing with all the complexities of raising a newly teenage (and still very much mourning) daughter. Fans of Sussman’s Funny You Should Ask (2022) will be happy to get another look at Gabe Parker, his love interest, Chani Horowitz, and the town of Cooper. Sussman alternates between Lauren’s present-day attraction to Ben and her relationship with Spencer, impressively balancing two love stories at once. Lauren and Ben are an easy couple to root for as they face realistic adult obstacles like family and career, with the added sparkle of Ben’s celebrity.

A romance that balances the heaviness of grief with the excitement of new love.

What If I Never Get Over You

Toon, Paige | Putnam (416 pp.) | $19 paper April 15, 2025 | 9780593718735

Two star-crossed lovers cross paths more than once. Ellie, from London, and Ash, from North Wales, meet in Lisbon when they’re both traveling after college graduation. They instantly bond, especially over the fact that they’re both traveling alone because their best friends have died. They spend an enchanting three days that feels like the start of something big and make plans to meet up again in Madrid in a week’s time. Ellie heads to the Algarve to meet her parents. On the specified date, Ellie shows up but Ash doesn’t. In the heady days of their burgeoning romance, they forgot to trade last names even as they shared their most heartfelt dreams: Ellie to be a gardener rather than a designer in her family’s furniture business, and Ash to study space. Years pass. Neither is able to find the other again, despite much searching on both their parts. In that time, Ellie becomes the gardener she dreamed of being, and while Ash still loves the stars, he isn’t able to pursue the graduate work he had planned. When Ellie lands a coveted spot on the gardening staff of a 500-year-old private estate, she is floored to discover that Ash, her long-lost and long-sought Ash, is actually Ashton Berkeley— destined to become viscount when he inherits the estate, and dating a woman named Rebecca. He’s as shocked as she is to find her once again. This is a charming, beguiling tale: There’s tension between the two characters, their families, their expectations about their own futures and any potential future they might have together. There is chemistry. There are misunderstandings and there are solid conversations. There are dreams and love and nature and the stars.

Delightful, pure escapism in a fairy-tale romance.

SECOND LOOK

This review originally ran online July 7, 2023.

Scheppner presents the first volume in an epic fantasy series about a student of magic who embarks on a prophesied quest. Kazin is a young human attending “the school of black mages.” When readers first meet him, he’s about to take a difficult and crucially important final test, and he and fellow student Max are excited, if nervous. Students are only allowed to take the test once, and it’s known to be tough. Nevertheless, both boys earn perfect scores—an occurrence foretold in the Book of Prophecy: two mages who earn perfect such scores will defeat a dragon to obtain a powerful

“dragon orb.” Mage instructor Sandor guides Max and Kazin to the dragon in question, but his intentions aren’t as pure as they seem. Meanwhile, in the nearby minotaur empire, Zylor dreams of avenging his father, Trogor, who was poisoned by his brother and current minotaur emperor Traygor. Zylor plans to defeat Traygor in an “election duel”: “By killing my uncle in a duel to the death, any supporters he may have will have no choice but to change their support.” But it turns out that Traygor is in cahoots with an “inherently evil” group known as lizardmen; such an alliance could destroy the fragile

Kazin’s Quest

Scheppner, Carey

AuthorHouse | 790 pp. | $36.99

$29.95 paper | May 14, 2013 9781481741002 | 9781481741019 paper

peace that exists between minotaurs, humans, lizardmen, and dwarves. The narrative follows Kazin, Zylor, and others in a straightforward fantasy setting full of magic and action; plenty of spells are cast and the minotaurs’ bloodlust is extensively detailed. Characterizations are typical for the genre, with few surprises (dwarves are weaponry enthusiasts; goblins are dumb and vicious). However, the story moves along at a brisk pace, without wasting

pages on lengthy backstories or uninteresting worldbuilding details. The quest is ultimately epic in scale, and there’s no telling when, for instance, an army of skeletons or elves riding centaurs might turn up. The dialogue is a bit predictable at times (“You’ll never get away with this!”), but the appeal of the main players will keep readers turning pages. An often entertaining and eventful journey, despite rather familiar genre elements.

Nonfiction

JOHN McMURTRIE

LGBTQ+ LIVES, PAST AND PRESENT

FOUR MONTHS AFTER it was founded in January 1871, the nation-state of Germany enacted Paragraph 175, which criminalized consensual sex between men; tens of thousands were prosecuted under the notorious law, which stayed on the books until 1994. Magnus Hirschfeld was 3 years old when Paragraph 175 took effect. Not long afterward, the boy knew he was different from many of his peers: He was attracted to other boys. Confronted by homophobia—and antisemitism—Hirschfeld nevertheless grew to become an activist: He fought for gay rights, demanding that gay, lesbian, and transgender people be allowed to serve openly in Germany’s armed forces. As a sex therapist, he created the pioneering Institute for Sexual Science.

Hirschfeld’s life ended tragically—Nazis shut down his institute and burned his archive—but his heroism is celebrated in Daniel Brook’s revelatory and inspiring The Einstein of Sex: Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, Visionary of Weimar Berlin (Norton, May 13). The book is one of many new titles that make

for ideal reading during Pride Month.

Alice Austen, who was born two years before Hirschfeld, in 1866, grew up on the other side of the Atlantic. Austen is remembered as a photographer who documented the lives of New Yorkers, from immigrants to tradespeople, but she also trained her camera on herself and her female friends, sometimes posing in men’s clothes. Austen had a lifelong companion, Gertrude Tate, and happily, the photographer’s sexuality is now acknowledged: Her house museum on Staten Island is an LGBTQ+ landmark. Bonnie Yochelson tells Austen’s story in Too Good To Get Married: The Life and Photographs of Miss Alice Austen (Empire State Editions/Fordham Univ., June 3). Our review calls the book “generously illustrated…a sensitive portrait of a prolific photographer.”

Another book that pays tribute to past queer lives in photographs is Alice T. Friedman’s Queer Moderns: Max Ewing’s Jazz Age New York (Princeton Univ., May 27). Ewing rubbed elbows

with cultural luminaries in 1920s New York, and he photographed many of them in his walk-in closet, which he playfully called his Gallery of Extraordinary Portraits. This handsome volume showcases dozens of the portraits, among a trove of other images.

Most of the subjects of Ria Brodell’s More Butch Heroes (MIT Press, April 29) lived before the invention of photography, but the artist has brought them to life in paintings conceived in the style of saints on holy cards. Brodell’s works, in the words of our review, honor “figures who went against society’s gender conventions—and often paid a price for doing so.” Their actions sometimes amounted to no more than wearing men’s clothing.

In So Many Stars: An Oral History of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Two-Spirit People of Color, Caro De Robertis shines a light on people who are fighting for their rights today. “A gender revolution is happening in our culture,” De Robertis writes. And to those who back a myth that “transness is an invention of the young, a ‘fad’ that can be easily dismissed,” the author adds, “Today’s trans and gender-expansive movements are part of a deep, rich story. Gender variance beyond the binary has existed throughout history, in every society, as natural as any other part of human existence.” Just like those butch heroes from centuries ago.

John McMurtrie is the nonfiction editor.

EDITOR’S PICK

Reenvisioning the life of a major 20th-century writer and civil rights icon. The reputation of James Baldwin (1924-1987) waxed and waned over his lifetime—and beyond. He began as the promising young author of the novel Go Tell It on the Mountain (1953) and the essay collection Notes of a Native Son (1955) before emerging as a crucial “witness” to the civil rights struggle, electrifying readers with his book-length essay The Fire Next Time (1963). Yet his frank treatment of homosexuality in novels like Giovanni’s Room (1956) and Another Country (1962) discomfited publishers and critics, and he struck some younger Black radicals as passé. His late fiction was

roundly (and unfairly) dismissed. In recent years, the advent of Black Lives Matter and a host of new critical studies have forced us to rethink Baldwin. The author of this vibrant new biography divides his “Love Story” into discrete sections named for four men in the subject’s life: painter Beauford Delaney, an early mentor and “spiritual father”; Lucien Happersberger, the Swiss man he called “the love of my life,” whose emotional support enabled him to complete Giovanni’s Room ; Engin Cezzar, the Turkish actor and “blood brother” who offered refuge in Istanbul during the turbulent ’60s; and Yoran Cazac, an enigmatic French artist and collaborator on Little Man,

Baldwin: A Love Story

Boggs, Nicholas | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | 688 pp. | $35 August 19, 2025 | 9780374178710

Little Man , a 1976 picture book. (Boggs played a decisive role in the book’s 2018 reissue and interrupts the narrative to recount his efforts to locate and interview Cazac, a backstory that might have been more effective as an afterword.)

Boggs establishes Baldwin as a restless writer who publicly

“forced readers to confront the connections between white supremacy, masculinity, and sexuality” while privately seeking the “redemptive power of love” with other men, gay, straight, and bisexual.

A dynamic portrait that deepens our understanding of a complex artist.

Algospeak: How Social Media Is Transforming the Future of Language

Aleksic, Adam | Knopf (256 pp.)

$29 | July 15, 2025 | 9780593804070

“Navigating our new linguistic landscape.” According to Gen Z linguist and content creator Aleksic, social media algorithms are changing how we speak. “They shape who gets exposed to certain words, how those words spread, and how popular the words eventually become.” Furthermore, the author says, words initially used to circumvent content moderation are now being used offline, blurring the boundaries. For example, as Aleksic notes, “unalive” was initially used online to avoid censorship but has come to be used in general conversation as a euphemism for “kill” or to “commit suicide.” The author’s interest in algorithm censorship is what drew him to studying the language of social media, and through his research he found that every aspect of our language is being shaped by algorithms. Another form of evasive language that he explores is “subtweeting”—talking about someone online without stating their name, such as referring to the president as “cheeto” or “orange man.” By not mentioning the person directly, “Language, then, becomes an act of resistance.” Aleksic also explores the origins and meanings of popular terms used among young people, including “sussy baka” (“suspicious fool”) and “sigma” (“successful male”). Although some have labeled such slang words as “brainrot,” claiming that kids are corrupting the English language, Aleksic contends that slang has always provided youth with a sense of community and helped build their identity. The author considers, as well, the popularity of accents online— notably the “influencer accent,” with its rising intonation at the end of sentences— as American English has become the lingua franca of the

internet. Hey, guys, the world is getting smaller?

An insightful and entertaining examination of social media’s impact on how we speak.

Sonita: My Fight Against Tyranny and My Escape to Freedom

Alizada, Sonita | HarperOne (288 pp.)

$29.99 | July 8, 2025 | 9780063439009

A rapper and an activist from Afghanistan tells her life story.

Growing up in Herat, Afghanistan, under Taliban rule, Alizada leads a circumscribed life.

A war rages through the country, limiting her family’s mobility. No one in her household can read or write, limiting their exposure to the world beyond their country. It is only when the family flees to Iran with the help of a smuggler that Sonita’s world begins to expand. Despite her mother’s conviction that education is “a waste of time and money,” Sonita sneaks out of the house and attempts to enroll in an Iranian school where the watchman turns her away, saying, “Afghanis aren’t allowed here.” Years later, after her family briefly moves back to Afghanistan, Sonita’s father dies, and the family eventually returns to Iran, Sonita finally finds a school that serves Afghani children. Although Sonita’s school supports her, her family does not: She must hide her movements to avoid her brothers’ violent threats. At school, Sonita’s talent for writing rap music inspires a filmmaker to make her the star of a documentary, helping her with an opportunity to attend a boarding school in Utah. Sonita leaves Iran without telling her family, risking their relationship. During the years it takes to reconcile, Sonita becomes a viral sensation and a vocal advocate for ending child marriage around the world. Her buoyant voice lends her difficult life story a sense of lightness, optimism, and hope. The memoir’s clean narrative arc

reveals Sonita’s talent not only as a lyricist, but as a writer of prose. An uplifting and bighearted memoir from Afghanistan’s most famous female rapper.

Kirkus Star

Between Two Rivers:

Ancient Mesopotamia and the Birth of History

Al-Rashid, Moudhy | Norton (336 pp.)

$31.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9781324036425

Ancient history as reflected in objects discovered in a Mesopotamian ruin that may be the world’s earliest museum. The eight artifacts the book discusses were discovered in the 1920s in the palace of Ennigaldi-Nanna, high priestess of Sin, the moon god of Ur. They run the range from the statue of an early king to the tablets used by young students learning cuneiform, the Mesopotamian writing system. The author, an honorary fellow in Assyriology at Oxford, puts each of the objects in the context of the daily life of the era when they were made. So we learn about a young scholar who left his toothmarks on the clay tablet he was using for his assignment, or a barkeeper whose furniture budget included a suspiciously large number of beds. The hundreds of thousands of surviving cuneiform documents include not only royal decrees and official documents but letters between ordinary people—two mentioned here are a wife asking her husband to come home and a merchant planning his route to dodge tax collectors. The Sumerians, Babylonians, and other peoples who lived in the era were highly conscious of history, drawing connections between themselves and their predecessors— sometimes more than 1,000 years earlier. Their literary achievements include the Epic of Gilgamesh (which the author tells her young daughter as a

The evolution of the flamboyantly dressed dandy,

told through 14 case studies.

THE DANDY

bedtime story). The era’s advances in astronomy and mathematics contradict any notion that these were primitive, unenlightened times. Still, as the chapter on a stone mace found in the museum makes clear, brutal warfare was a too-common part of life, then as now. A final chapter on the priestess in whose palace the museum was located shows the important and varied roles played by women in Mesopotamian society. A highly readable introduction to an era of history that deserves to be better known.

The Dandy: A People’s History of Sartorial Splendour

Andersson, Peter K. | Oxford Univ. (352 pp.)

$38.99 | September 15, 2025 | 9780198882435

The evolution of the flamboyantly dressed dandy, told through 14 case studies of sartorial subcultures. In this revelatory history, Andersson (Fool: In Search of Henry VIII’s Closest Man , 2023, etc.) traces the far-reaching influence of dandyism from the streets of Regency England to Antebellum America, Weimar Germany, and, most recently, the inaugural pages of i-D magazine. While the book does detail forgotten trends in men’s fashion like hair parts, canes, and long jackets, Andersson is more interested in exploring each sartorial wave as an evolving social subculture, investigating their unique complexities amid the “murky layers of the populace.”

“Dandyism” was established as “a word for well-dressed upper-class men, but it

also [became] entangled with a type of conduct and excessive attention to appearance that are not included in the definition of a gentleman.” Andersson adds, “Jostling with the upper classes were many middling groups of clerks, shopkeepers, and apprentices, who were eager to have as respectable an address as possible.” The dandy’s peculiar presence gave rise to a wave of rakish lowlifes attempting to swindle the public by looking the part. This “rowdyism and larking” ushered in the “masher” at the turn of the century, a ribald lothario who would lurk around burlesque shows to profess their love to the dancers. Later, Andersson keenly connects the dandy’s sharp suiting with trends in gangster fashion and the zoot suits of the swing movement. Present throughout this centuries-long evolution is the sneering eye of the press, which spurned dandies as “effeminate members of a third sex.” Andersson pieces together details on styles and their offshoots through a relentless feed of sarcastic articles and cartoons, deftly using these baseless dismissals as keystones to better render the movement. Throughout each case study, the author artfully accounts for dandyism as an amalgamation of both a subculture and the public’s reaction to it, and he harnesses that clash to stitch together a formidable sociological history.

A well-tailored chronicle of men’s fashion.

Rebel Russia: Dissent and Protest From the Tsars to Navalny

Arutunyan, Anna | Polity (224 pp.) $25 | July 28, 2025 | 9781509552290

For more on fashion, visit Kirkus online.

Standing up to oppression. Arutunyan, author of Hybrid Warriors: Proxies, Freelancers and Moscow’s Struggle for Ukraine, reported for Russia’s oldest English-language weekly, the Moscow News, which regularly criticized the government with little interference— although attacking Vladimir Putin personally was off-limits. Opposition peaked around the disputed 2012 election. Often called the “Snow Revolution,” it featured widespread, largely peaceful demonstrations with only spotty police harassment. Arutunyan emphasizes that, like historical protests, most activists were the educated, liberal elite, a minority who succeeded only in exasperating the existing ruler, who turned against them. Today, reformers not in prison or the grave are in exile. Arutunyan emigrated in 2022. She reviews Russian rulers who have faced opposition over the centuries, including Ivan the Terrible, Catherine the Great, Joseph Stalin, Mikhail Gorbachev, and, of course, Putin. In 1991, when Gorbachev resigned and Boris Yeltsin took over, reformers mistakenly assumed that democracy had won. Despite his rhetoric, Yeltsin looked after his own interests, and since then, the average, patriotic Russian has enjoyed a rising income, thrilled to the 2014 takeover of Crimea, and believes that the 2022 invasion of Ukraine will make Russia great again. Arutunyan rejects the popular notion that Russians are backward, predestined to submit to autocrats—a notion shared by many Russian dissidents, Ukrainian nationalists, and, ironically, Putin himself. Her conclusion is that Russian reformers face the same challenge that advocates of democracy face worldwide: learning to get along with people they dislike. Plenty

of nations (the U.S. included) are poor examples, but eventually “liberal opponents to Putin’s regime will have to sit down and have a conversation with the nationalists and the turbo-patriots” to find a common ground.

Thoughtful if unsettling insights into political opposition in Russia.

The Nighttime Butterfly:

A Catholic Woman and Her Jewish Family in Warsaw at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

Auerbach, Karen | Yale Univ. (272 pp.) $35 | July 8, 2025 | 9780300270839

Between culture and conversion. The history of modern Jewish life has been told on the great stages of war and terror, on the streets of villages and ghettos, and on the ships and trains that took the Jewish people to their doom or their deliverance. This exquisite book tells that history on a smaller, but no less dramatic, scale through the diary of a young Polish woman. It reveals how the upper-class Jews of late-19th- and early-20th-century Poland were often torn between identifying with their past and needing to change for the present. That tear ran along the seam of Jewish birth and Catholic conversion. Needing to convert had long been a condition for Jewish social and economic advancement. What we see in this book, however, is a subtle interplay between social pressure and personal growth. The author has discovered a remarkable document of self-understanding. The young Alicja Lewental loves her father and his faith, yet she voices a contempt for the traditional Jews around her. She grows up, she hopes to marry, but in what faith? All young people struggle with a sense of belonging. What makes Alicja so remarkable is how, in her diary, she phrases that struggle—with brilliant literary flair—as part of a larger fight for, and within, Jewish life itself. “It seemed to me that some kind of thread of the past

is rupturing and that this bright, radiant past has disappeared forever.” Refusing to marry into Judaism, shunned by Catholics, Alicja writes like some great, undiscovered Kafka: “I will remain alone, completely alone among the entire human mass.”

A true discovery: a diary that tells of a young Jewish woman’s longing to belong while her culture tries to come of age.

Sharing in the Groove: The Untold Story of the ’90s Jam Band Explosion and the Scene That Followed

Ayers, Mike | St. Martin’s (416 pp.)

$33 | July 22, 2025 | 9781250287458

A rambling oral history of a rambling musical genre.

In today’s popular culture, nostalgia for 1990s music tends to focus on the ascent of grunge rock and the golden age of hip-hop, but it was also the decade in which jam bands went from college-town curiosities to (in some cases) major-label successes. Music writer Ayers (One Last Song, 2020) charts the trajectory of several of these bands in this oral history, drawn on interviews with dozens of musicians, managers, and other veterans of the scene. He takes readers to cities including Princeton, New Jersey, where John Popper of Blues Traveler and Chris Barron of Spin Doctors were high school friends; Burlington, Vermont, where Phish got its start; and Athens, Georgia, the home of Widespread Panic. The early days of the bands have some noticeable similarities, mostly centered on a shared love of weed; more interesting is the way they reacted to whatever degree of mainstream success they achieved. Eric Schenkman of Spin Doctors is ambivalent about his own band’s success with the 1991 album Pocket Full of Kryptonite, saying, “You exchange the crowds, you exchange the expectations. And you lose your core crowd, it’s hard to keep the thread of that music alive.” Many of the

bands endured, but didn’t capture the MTV success they once had, and when Napster launched in 1999, it changed the music industry. Ayers provides short passages throughout to give background information, but he mostly lets the subjects speak for themselves, which isn’t necessarily a good thing; the book would have benefited from more context (and some editing too; it is, at times, repetitive and shambolic). Jam band aficionados will likely find much to enjoy—general readers, maybe not.

For dedicated fans only.

Big Dumb Eyes: Stories From a Simpler Mind

Bargatze, Nate | Grand Central Publishing (240 pp.) | $30 | May 6, 2025 | 9781538768464

The Southern comic delivers a good-natured memoir of his years in the trenches. “This book is never trying to say anything even close to important,” writes comedian Bargatze, whose following has been blowing up lately thanks to a couple of well-received Saturday Night Live appearances—a surprise, perhaps, given his G-rated approach to comedy. Yet Bargatze, a native Tennessean, does dig a little deeper into important territory here, writing, for instance, that his paternal grandparents were alcoholics, the grandmother “basically what these days they’d call abusive,” unforgiving of his father’s speech impediment. Happily for his father, though, a sympathetic teacher got him interested in reading—and in magic, which led to comedy. There aren’t many family dynasties in stand-up, but Bargatze didn’t mind when his father opened for him once and killed, even though “I told him he couldn’t be too funny.” Bargatze writes affectingly of his beloved younger sister, working the Men in Black franchise deftly into one episode and a lovely little bit of pop culture into another (it would ruin the fun to say much more except that it concerns a dog

“We are the most social species of all mammals.…We can’t stand being alone.”

THE ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE

and a certain all-girl group from way back when). Much of Bargatze’s approach onstage and here is observational, and he has a good eye for the goofy detail, recounting growing up in a town whose police force existed “for one reason, and that was to give people speeding tickets” and professing amazement that, in his adopted home of New York, people cleaned up after their dogs “every single time the dog did its business!” Bargatze is right that “the world of books is in the same place as it was before I entered it,” yet he turns in a pleasingly genial narrative all the same. Bargatze never takes himself too seriously, but there’s plenty of grown-up self-awareness here along with the yucks.

The Origin of Language: How We Learned To Speak and Why

Beekman, Madeleine | Simon & Schuster (320 pp.) | $29.99 August 5, 2025 | 9781668066058

Looking at language in a new light. Challenging conventional theories on the origin of language, Australian scholar Beekman begins by exploring the evolution of humans, discussing the work and theories of Charles Darwin, Stephen J. Gould, and other evolutionary biologists. Of particular interest to the author is bipedalism. “It all started with walking upright,” she says. However, she contends, no longer living in trees created a “childcare problem.” The author considers other evolutionary

changes, including shifts in the birth canal, increased brain size, and shorter gestation periods. The author then turns to the origin of language, calling the views of psychologist and behaviorist Burrhus Frederic Skinner and linguist Noam Chomsky “half right.” The author writes, “Our ability to speak was the result of a short series of genetic and anatomic flukes that set the stage for runaway selection.” Further, she argues, “Perhaps linguists are looking at language the wrong way.” Rather than searching for a language-acquisition device, the author proposes that language should be viewed as “more akin to a virus. A language that spreads easily from brain to brain is more likely to stick around. Because language depends on language learners—children—language must be tuned to the brain of children….If all of humanity went extinct, so would all the languages of the world. The opposite is not the case, although humanity is likely to change in the absence of language.”

Interestingly, Beekman fears that modern society could hinder our acquisition of language. “The nuclear family goes against our nature,” she writes. “We are the most social species of all mammals…. We can’t stand being alone.” If we live in isolation, she writes, “there is a danger we are losing something precious. Something uniquely human. The perfect conditions to learn language.”

An entertaining and enlightening examination of the roots of speech.

Clodia of Rome: Champion of the Republic

Boin, Douglas | Norton (288 pp.) | $29.99 August 12, 2025 | 9781324035671

The travails of an elite Roman. Classicist Boin depicts the final years of the Roman Republic by tracing the life and fortunes of Clodia (c. 95-44 B.C.), a prominent aristocrat from a politically progressive family, whose reputation was maligned during an infamous court trial. Daughter, granddaughter, and great-granddaughter of reform-minded statesmen, she was married to the wealthy—and “arch-conservative”— Metellus, whose frequent deployments left her in charge of household and financial affairs. Her position was enhanced as his political star rose: In 63 B.C. he was elected to a prestigious judgeship; in 60 B.C. he became a consul. When he died in 59 B.C., his 36-year-old widow was left with a fortune. Although Roman law required that a widow remarry within 10 months of her husband’s death, Clodia, who had been rebellious since youth, instead engaged in an affair with an ambitious 26-year-old, Marcus Caelius Rufus, and actively supported the reform policies of her brother, Clodius. Among the many Romans alarmed at Clodius’ agenda was Marcus Tullius Cicero; their conflict, including charges of malfeasance, sent Cicero fleeing into exile. When he returned, he sought a chance to get revenge. That chance came in defending Rufus, accused of attempting to poison Clodia when their relationship soured. Renowned for his rhetorical prowess, Cicero cast blame on Clodia herself. Portraying opinionated women as scheming murderesses, he succeeded in getting Rufus acquitted. Besides casting aspersions on Clodia, the case led to a spate of misogynist laws, obliterating women’s political gains and allowing men to maintain their firm grip on power. Boin traces volatile

For more on language, visit Kirkus online.

political intrigue and upheaval in Rome, Greece, and Egypt and also conveys quotidian realities of Roman life, including food, medicine, and women’s cosmetics.

A brisk, richly detailed narrative.

Culture Creep: Notes on the Pop Apocalypse

Bolin, Alice | Mariner Books (272 pp.) $27.99 | June 3, 2025 | 9780063440524

Critical reflection from deep in the trenches of pop culture. The touch points for Bolin’s essay collection are not the usual suspects of recent pop culture analysis—neither billboard stars nor social media tropes of the 2020s are under the microscope here. Instead, she looks slightly backward, to the steady diet of MTV video countdowns, reality television, glossy magazines, and meandering trips to the mall, that shaped—and still hold a strong, nostalgic grip on—millennial women. In a style shared by many of her contemporaries, Bolin self-consciously burrows into and through her own restlessness, disappointment, and wary curiosity to form a reflective analysis of topics from fitness trackers to Nintendo’s Animal Crossing. For those not fluent in her cultural material, the author’s personal investment bolsters the sincerity of her inquiry and the applicability of her hypothesis. The predicament into which corporate executives have pushed us, Bolin suggests, is as problematic as a cult, and our wistful loyalty to the individuals and narratives they have sold draws women into their own oppression. Bolin is determined to exhume what makes these cultural influences both so compelling and so problematic, and her exhaustive probing sometimes becomes fumbling or overdrawn. But, repeatedly, she stops just short of full-blown rant to press quote-worthy, crystalline passages of chilling clarity into the reader’s palm

about how the ambitions of patriarchy and capitalism dovetail and how their impact has watered down the promises of feminism for a generation. (Essays on the NXIVM cult and on the teen magazine industry of the late 1990s and early 2000s are particularly, disturbingly excellent.) If power comes from clear-eyed, uncompromising knowledge, Bolin’s text is a tool for the takedown of more current trends of consumerism, oppression, and the new technology that fuels them. A ferocious defense of a generation of women against the forces that made them.

A Light in the Northern Sea: Denmark’s Incredible Rescue of Their Jewish Citizens During WWII

Brady, Tim | Citadel/Kensington (288 pp.)

$29.99 | July 29, 2025 | 9780806543420

When ordinary people united against Nazis. Brady, author of Three Ordinary Girls: The Remarkable Story of Three Dutch Teenagers Who Became Spies, Saboteurs, Nazi Assassins—and WWII Heroes, writes that Denmark, conquered in April 1940, enjoyed advantages. Hitler viewed the Nordic Danes as cousins to the master race. The occupation was extraordinarily benign. Denmark’s government remained in place, Germany paid for its imports, mostly agricultural products, and occupation authorities dealt with disturbances and even strikes without violence. Jews were left largely undisturbed. Matters changed in early 1943, when it was no secret that Germany was preparing to round up Denmark’s Jews. Brady reminds readers that the Nazis found it difficult to locate Jews from conquered nations without cooperation from local governments, police, and citizens; most cooperated, often enthusiastically. Denmark was a rare exception.

No organized movement was in place, but as soon as the Nazis made their moves and Jews began to flee, attempting to reach Sweden across the few miles of the Oresund strait, they received a great deal of help. Activists, Jews, and non-Jews knocked on doors to alert those who had not gotten the news. Others organized transportation to the coast and recruited ships for the passage. Heroism wasn’t universal; many boat owners charged passengers, some a great deal, but in the end, about 95% of Denmark’s 8,000 Jews survived the war. Even those caught were relatively fortunate, being shipped to concentration camps where survivors were returned to Denmark a few months before war’s end. Brady devotes most of the final 100 pages to the Danish resistance over the following years—an anticlimax but a good read.

A satisfying account of wartime heroism.

Kirkus Star

Twelve Churches: An Unlikely History of the Buildings That Made Christianity

Butler-Gallie, Fergus | Avid Reader Press (352 pp.) | $30 | August 26, 2025 9781668074473

A dozen disparate churches that exemplify the story of the Christian faith. Anglican priest Butler-Gallie explores Christianity through an examination of 12 churches. The churches that Butler-Gallie has chosen to highlight span the globe, but more importantly exemplify various aspects of Christian life and culture through time. This is no tour guide’s introduction to famous buildings; instead, the author utilizes these churches as stepping stones from which to pursue stories and uncover truisms about the Christian faith. Each church is selected for specific reasons, as entrées into deeper discussions. For

instance, Canterbury Cathedral in England, site of the brutal murder of Thomas Becket in 1170, leads the author into a discussion of the role of violence throughout Christian history. The Templo de Las Américas, in the Dominican Republic, site of the first simple church erected by Christopher Columbus and his settlers in 1494, serves as a focal point for discussing the spread of Christianity to the Western Hemisphere and the cultural clashes that came with it. Butler-Gallie’s thought-provoking work takes the reader to both famous and little-known churches in places as diverse as Ethiopia, Greece, and Japan. “These churches,” the author notes, meaning all the churches these 12 represent, “are where the intimate and the universal meet.” Indeed, Butler-Gallie’s approach delves into the personal stories of individual believers, many of them ordinary Christians, while also looking for the essence of what Christianity is from the perspective of a believer and a historian. The attempt, though sometimes winding and drawn out, leads the reader along a thoughtful, humane, and open-minded journey across time and place to discover the Christian faith at its best, worst, and most mundane. It’s a trip worth taking. Fresh and accessible approach to church history.

Comedy Samurai: Forty Years of Blood, Guts, and Laughter

Charles, Larry | Grand Central Publishing (400 pp.) | $32.50 June 17, 2025 | 9781538771549

A warts-and-all memoir from the gonzo writer-director behind Seinfeld , Borat, and more. The title of Charles’ sometimes dishy, sometimes introspective autobiography is double-edged. For him, being a “samurai” means being a reliable mercenary who’s

called in as needed, as he demonstrated as a writer or director on TV shows like Mad About You and Curb Your Enthusiasm. But it also means he’s just as easily dumped or forgotten as the winds change—he recalls being slowly iced out of the writers’ room for The Arsenio Hall Show as the late-night program moved away from Charles’ brand of topical humor. Small wonder that he’s often mercurial on the page, at times warmly embracing longtime collaborators like Curb creator Larry David or lamenting the collapse of his creative partnership with Sacha Baron Cohen, which thrived on Borat but disintegrated on the follow-ups. Charles is often just as hard on himself; as his marriage and projects sour, he admits to infidelities, hotheaded moments on set, and lingering resentments. This is sometimes to the book’s detriment: Early chapters on his drug-fueled stint on the Saturday Night Live knockoff Fridays and his Seinfeld work are pockmarked with efforts to settle old scores around writing credits, which makes for curiously unfunny reading about TV comedy. But the book takes flight whenever he has a successful collaboration to dive into, like his madcap film collaboration with Bob Dylan, Masked and Anonymous, or on Borat, where he helped push Cohen’s faux-Kazakh character into ever-riskier territory. “Was I some sort of rebel doing subversive radical work or was I just a high-level high-paid hack?” he asks. To his credit, he doesn’t attempt to answer the question definitively, though he does settle on a certain confidence being a button pusher, be it via Bill Maher’s satirical documentary Religulous or Curb ’s cringe comedy. If he comes off as unlikable at times, so be it. An emotionally and tonally messy memoir, salvaged by its candor.

Kirkus Star

Ring of Fire: A New History of the World at War: 1914

Churchill, Alexandra & Nicolai Eberholst Pegasus (528 pp.) | $35 | August 5, 2025 9781639369270

A detailed scrutiny of the first month of World War I. Focused almost exclusively on August 1914, the enormous scope of this book belies its rigid time frame. The authors argue that they sought to show the “how” rather than the “why” of their subject; thus, general readers would do best to equip themselves with an overview of the period before diving into atrocities that are more assumed than explained. That said, this survey is truly global. In European terms, it takes us from the collapse of the Schlieffen Plan, an attempt to prevent Germany from fighting both the French and the Russians simultaneously—which failed to account for the stubborn resistance of neutral Belgium—and led to Liège being the first city bombed from the air. One general lamented, “The good old times of hussar charges are gone,” as men on horseback were mowed down by machine guns. We learn of the tragic collateral deaths of civilians and horses—and of the quirky improvisations of the French, who sent troops to the front in taxis. Likewise, we read of unemployment on the docks of Buenos Aires; New Zealand troops invading German-held Samoa; and the widespread deployment of troops from Africa and the Indian

The ups and downs of working with the likes of Larry David and Sacha Baron Cohen.

COMEDY SAMURAI

subcontinent. By the time we reach the Battle of the Marne, we are familiar with a common litany: undersupplied and undertrained, largely civilian armies, burdened by heavy equipment and dysentery, fighting in heat and unfamiliar terrain, throttled by insufficient supply lines. Officers of various degrees of incompetence fought “the last war.” Above all, the authors emphasize the extent of that August’s carnage. The deaths of thousands in a single battle, the burnings of cities, towns, and villages, the bleeding of munitions and treasure on such a scale that they transformed Europe into a giant cemetery of rotting corpses, where men crawled through mud to survive: all of them hoping this horror would be done by Christmas. An outstanding depiction of global conflict.

Elon Musk: American Oligarch

Cunningham, Darryl | Seven Stories (200 pp.) | $24.95 paper September 9, 2025 | 9781644215227

From boy genius to man-child. On Dec. 23, 2008, days before Tesla faced bankruptcy, NASA awarded Musk’s SpaceX a $1.6 billion contract. Borrowing money from SpaceX allowed the tech mogul to keep his car company afloat. “Thank you, Santa,” Musk tells Father Christmas in Cunningham’s graphic biography of the billionaire. Santa Claus’ reply: “Thank the US taxpayers. It’s their money.” This satirical

exchange gets to the heart of Cunningham’s argument: that Musk, as talented as he might be, owes a lot of his success to the generosity of Uncle Sam—the same entity that Musk is now decimating, slashing budgets as head of the Department of Government Efficiency. Much of Cunningham’s book will be familiar to many readers; the British cartoonist credits numerous news articles and cites, among his sources, biographies by Walter Isaacson and Ashlee Vance. Nonetheless, to see Musk’s life story laid out so concisely, highlighted by striking details, makes for a vivid narrative. This is a powerful cartoon portrait of a cartoonish figure, an extraordinarily wealthy man with boyish traits: making fast cars, playing with rockets, smoking pot during a podcast interview, throwing fits, lashing out at strangers online, and jumping up and down at political rallies, his devotion to the American president prominently displayed on a baseball cap that he also wears to White House meetings. Cunningham doesn’t try to psychoanalyze his subject, but he does tell of this South African native’s embrace of far-right causes and “longtermism,” in which you “believe yourself to be a morally superior person” who focuses not on present-day human needs but on humanity’s future. And then there is Musk’s transgender child, who has disowned him—after which he railed against the “wokemind virus” and how it will “destroy civilization.” Who’s to know where Musk’s tale will lead next? But this book gives readers a good starting point to track what has been a supremely improbable journey. A rich account of the world’s wealthiest person.

A powerful cartoon portrait of a cartoonish figure, a wealthy man with boyish traits.

ELON MUSK

A Noble Madness: The Dark Side of Collecting From Antiquity to Now

Delbourgo, James | Norton (288 pp.)

$31.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9780393541960

Loving things. Historian Delbourgo examines the changing role of the collector in our cultural imagination, from ancient looter to modern-day hoarder. Motivated by a desire for wealth, knowledge, prestige, and, not least, order, collectors have amassed objects such as artworks, scientific specimens, religious relics, books, and gems. Delbourgo traverses time and place to portray collectors’ roles: In premodern China, a collector was seen as a person of superior sophistication; in Korea, collecting was a path to attaining status. Some artifacts—religious relics, for example, or African art—have been sought for their spiritual or magical power. Romantics saw collecting as an expression of one’s inner self, an idea that persists, even as collecting has been associated with colonialism, looting, and profit. Collecting, Delbourgo asserts, also has been associated with mental illness. Fictional collectors, such as Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray, behave maniacally; Freud diagnosed the urge to collect as an expression of suppressed neuroses. Art collectors have been depicted variously as gloomy, gothic recluses, as figures associated with danger and unabated passion, and as libertines, while naturalists—Charles Darwin, Alfred Russel Wallace, and Alexander von Humboldt, to name a few—are more likely celebrated for their dogged pursuit of scientific specimens. Delbourgo casts a wide net to offer biographies of collectors such as Rudolf II, a Holy Roman emperor who aspired to assemble the world in miniature; Marie Antoinette, known as the “trinket queen”; Alfred Kinsey, who collected data about sex;

and female collectors, notably, Gertrude Stein, Mabel Dodge Luhan, and Peggy Guggenheim, motivated by a pursuit of beauty and “nourishment of the soul.” In 2013, the American Psychiatric Association included hoarding disorder in its updated manual. As Delbourgo amply reveals, however, the distinction between the ardent collector and the pathological hoarder is hardly clear.

A well-researched history of the passion to possess.

Notes to John

Didion, Joan | Knopf (224 pp.) | $32 April 22, 2025 | 9780593803677

The late novelist and journalist records her innermost, deeply personal struggles. Didion died in 2021. Afterward, a file of private notes was discovered among her things, including notes addressed to her late husband, John Gregory Dunne, recounting sessions with the noted Freudian psychiatrist Roger MacKinnon, “a staunch defender of talk therapy.” Talk they do, with Didion serving up a battery of problems and MacKinnon offering wise if perhaps non-actionable responses to them, for instance, “Nothing about families turns out to be easy, does it.” It’s not easy, for sure, and Didion’s chief concern throughout is her daughter, Quintana Roo, who died after a long illness, the subject of Didion’s 2011 memoir Blue Nights. Indeed, so many of the conversations concern Quintana that Didion—by design, one supposes— skirts her own issues, although MacKinnon identifies some: “I did think you might have developed more self-awareness,” he says, referring to Didion’s habit of squirreling herself away whenever difficult subjects arose. Didion counters that she cherishes privacy, adding that she sometimes left her own parties to shelter in her office and admitting that her long habit of

overwork was a means of emotional distancing. It’s not wholly that Didion lacks that self-awareness, but that the keenest insights about her come from others, as when she records, “I said a friend had once remarked that while most people she knew had very strong competent exteriors and were bowls of jelly inside, I was just the opposite.”

That Didion was constantly anxious, sometimes to the point of needing medication, will come as no surprise to close readers of her work, but the depth of her anguish and guilt over her inability to save her daughter—she threw plenty of money at her, but little in the way of love—is both affecting and saddening.

Of great interest to Didion completists, though a minor entry in the body of her work.

Detained: A Boy’s Journal of Survival and Resilience

Esperanza, D. & Gerardo Iván Morales Primero Sueño Press/Atria (256 pp.) $28 | May 13, 2025 | 9781668033777

A Honduran teen’s diary entries about his journey to the United States and subsequent incarceration in immigration detention.

D.’s parents migrated to the United States when he was six months old, so for the next 13 years of his life, he grows up in the care of his grandmother, whom he calls Tía, and his uncle Felipe. After his uncle and his grandmother both die tragically, in quick succession, the author and his cousin, Miguelito, decide to leave their village for the United States—el Norte—where they hope to reunite with D.’s parents in Nashville. On their way, they stop in Guatemala, where their cousins join them. Together, the four boys undertake a harrowing journey that involves attacks from cartel members, heart-stopping run-ins with border police, and death-defying leaps onto moving trains.

In the U.S., border patrol agents take them to a detention center, separating the author from his cousins. For the next five months, immigration officials shuttle him between detention centers, some of them nothing more than a collection of tents and Porta Potties.

“They woke me up at two or three in the morning,” D. writes outside the Tornillo Influx Facility in Texas. “Now they’re taking me somewhere else. They wouldn’t say if it was to see my parents or to go to another detention center, they just said I needed to meet them outside the tent in ten minutes….I was still half asleep. And nauseated. And scared. And heartbroken.” D. feels devoid of hope until he meets Morales, a Mexican American tícher who changes his life—and encourages him to write about his experience. The book’s vocabulary and syntax sometimes feel too sophisticated for a 14-year-old, but the author’s raw and confessional tone—and the chilling details and fast pace—make this memoir a shocking and moving read. A brutally honest account of the impact of family separation at the U.S. border.

The Next Day: Transitions, Change, and Moving Forward

French Gates, Melinda | Flatiron Books (176 pp.) $25.99 | April 15, 2025 | 9781250378651

Words of encouragement for women facing changes, from the noted philanthropist. Toward the end of this slim volume, the author confesses, “I wish I knew the secret to overcoming your fears, conquering self-doubt, and finding comfort in your own skin. But over the last few years, as I approached the age of sixty, I finally realized that the ‘secret’ may be nothing more than time. Time and experience.” That may well be true, but it does cast a bit of doubt on French’s decision to write this book. In it, she shares a few

THE KIRKUS Q&A: MELISSA FEBOS

What an award-winning writer learned from a year of sexual abstinence.

BY MATHANGI SUBRAMANIAN

MELISSA FEBOS DOESN’T shy away from difficult topics. Her memoir Abandon Me describes leaving an abusive relationship. The National Book Critics Circle Award–winning essay collection Girlhood delves into past struggles with addiction. Her craft book, Body Work, covers taboo topics like sex writing.

Her latest memoir, The Dry Season: A Memoir of Pleasure in a Year Without Sex, recounts a period the author spent celibate in an attempt to escape damaging relationship patterns honed over a decade of serial monogamy. Although Febos entered the year of abstention convinced that it would be grueling, she was surprised to discover that her choice resulted in one of the happiest years of her life. Over Zoom, we spoke with Febos about her understanding of platonic love, the growth she experienced during her celibate year, and her motivation and process in writing nonfiction. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

urgent mysteries in my life had to do with wounds.

Early in the process, I was a little bit afraid that there was no story here because it was such a happy year. I wasn’t sure how to narrativize it; I didn’t know if it was possible.

You mentioned that The Dry Season started as an essay. Why do you think it became a book instead?

Oh, it just insisted. I would have kept it to an essay if I could have. In hindsight, I’d say that it needed a book to sprawl out in because the questions that drove the writing confounded me and ended up having pretty deep-seated answers.

In the year the book describes, there wasn’t any great explosive action. I just decided to stop doing something and do some reflecting, and then I had this incredible year. One of

my main questions going into writing the book was, Why was I so happy? Now I can see that I went through a very conscious process of trying to change myself, which changed the course of my life. But before I wrote the book, it was this big shiny question mark.

How did writing this book feel different from writing your other four books? It was so fun! There were parts of myself that I got to express in this book that I haven’t been able to express in my past work, partly because the most

In my life, I tend to be energetic and cheerful and ridiculous. I crack lots of jokes. I laugh a lot. I save the anguish for my work. Through the writing I’ve done, I’ve integrated much more as a person. The reward for that is that now I’ve been able to write a book that feels lighter. It turned out there was a story there, but it was a different kind of story than any I’d written before.

What did you discover during the writing process that surprised you?

One of the beautiful things about that year was that my

friendships blossomed and grew and deepened. I felt so connected and held by all the platonic loves of my life. That was really meaningful and has never faded. When I decide to give something up, I’m mostly focused on what my life will lack. I don’t instinctively consider what that removal will make room for. This is the condition of being human, but it’s particularly true of people who tend to be compulsive or addictive: We focus on the one thing that we want but can’t or shouldn’t have, not on all that will fill the vacancy if we surrender that one thing. In writing the book, I got to wonder at and catalog everything that my abstinence allowed.

Speaking of compulsion and addiction, you write about so many intimate aspects of your life. How do

Beowulf Sheehan

you decide what you’ll include in your books and what you’ll keep private? There are certain topics that sometimes feel off-limits to me, but I find the demands of the story that I’m trying to tell almost irresistibly compelling. There have been areas where I was like, I’ll never write about that. That’s private . And then I start writing a book and, in the end, I always let the story win. The project of answering the questions that drive the book becomes more important to me than my own privacy. Also, as I write it, the book becomes a safer place to reveal those private details.

I’ve seen over and over the way that writing about a private or secret subject changes my relationship to it. As a result of the writing process, something that feels too vulnerable or too personal to share with other people becomes something that I’m comfortable talking about. I’m no longer scared of it, because I understand it more. I’ve made friends with it.

You come to realize that the benefits you experience that year are a result of divesting from patriarchy. And yet, as a queer woman who no longer dated men, hadn’t you already divested from it? Unfortunately, even if you’re not dating men, you’re still swimming through the soup of the heteropatriarchy. That was true for me, and it was why the choices I was making and the behaviors that I kept falling into felt

incongruent with the person that I knew myself to be. Why I would collapse everything into the one primary relationship and silence or minimize parts of myself that were otherwise central to who I was.

The work of awakening is never-ending. It has to be done consciously. Simply being celibate and not

doing any other work wouldn’t have changed my romantic life. I had to perform an autopsy on my own behaviors, and then really internalize what I discovered, so that I could make my future choices conscious.

At the end of the book, you meet your wife, poet Donika Kelly. Was

this ending planned the whole time? No! I tried to avoid ending it that way. I didn’t want the reader to be distracted by that tidy ending or for it to obscure the point of the book. The story was not about doing all this work and coming to awakening so that I could find a nice wife. I didn’t want it to feel like I was tying a bow on the end of it, or like the relationship was a reward for my good work.

I crack lots of jokes. I laugh a lot. I save the anguish for my work.

The

Dry Season: A Memoir of Pleasure in a Year Without Sex

Febos, Melissa

When I was in the process of drafting the book, I remember talking to my friends and editor and asking, What if I just stopped right before that happened? Because I really wanted readers to focus on what comes before. Everybody was like, “Ew, no!” They said, “You’re undermining the book. You’re underestimating the power of the story that you’re telling.”

For me, getting married was no great feat. The great challenge and the triumph would be in conducting that relationship with my wife really differently, really consciously. Everyone who’s been married knows that it’s not the end of the story. It’s the beginning.

The year of celibacy didn’t land me at a conclusion where I rode off into marital bliss afterward. Instead, it readied me for the work of being in a truly intimate, long-term relationship. That work has continued, even after the book ends.

Mathangi Subramanian is a novelist, essayist, and founder of Moon Rabbit Writing Studio.

Report: Daniel Kahneman Died by Assisted Suicide

The Wall Street Journal has revealed details of the author’s death in 2024.

The death of Nobel Prize–winning author and psychologist Daniel Kahneman last year was the result of assisted suicide, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Kahneman, the Israeli American author of books including Thinking,

Fast and Slow and Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment, the latter co-written with Oliver Sibony and Cass R. Sunstein, died in March 2024 at the age of 90. The day before his death, he emailed friends the message, “This is a goodbye letter I am sending friends to tell them that I am on my way to Switzerland, where my life will end on March 27.”

Assisted suicide is legal in Switzerland and has been since 1941.

Jason Zweig, the Wall Street Journal journalist who reported the story of

Kahneman’s suicide and was friends with him for nearly 30 years, wrote, “I think Danny wanted, above all, to avoid a long decline, to go out on his terms, to own his own death. Maybe the principles of good decision-making that he had so long espoused—rely on data, don’t trust most intuitions, view the evidence in the broadest possible perspective—had little to do with his decision.”—M.S.

EDITOR’S NOTE: In the U.S., the national suicide and crisis lifeline is available by calling or texting 988. There is also an online chat at 988lifeline.org.

For

a review of Thinking, Fast and Slow, visit Kirkus online.

Daniel Kahneman

personal anecdotes as well as snippets of poetry and other received wisdom that she has found useful in navigating life transitions such as leaving home for college, becoming a working mom, ending her marriage, leaving the Gates Foundation, and turning 60. Among the familiar self-help notions revisited are psychologist Donald Winnicott’s notion of the “good enough” parent, the U-shaped curve of happiness that predicts a peak at 70, and lines from inspirational poets like Mary Oliver and David Whyte. Readers will find little drama, few intimate details (“Bill has publicly acknowledged that he wasn’t always faithful to me while we were married,” she writes), and not much actual storytelling after early chapters describing her great relationship with her father and the death of a close friend. Interviews with Oprah Winfrey, Gayle King, Reese Witherspoon, Billie Jean King, Michelle Obama, and others result in an interesting list of their defining transitions (e.g., coming out as a lesbian, surviving betrayal, leaving the White House) but offer little insight beyond that. Her previous book, The Moment of Lift, offered a more substantive approach.

A well-intentioned mix of mild memoir and familiar inspiration.

A Flower Traveled in My Blood: The Incredible True Story of the Grandmothers Who Fought To Find a Stolen Generation of Children

Gilliland, Haley Cohen | Avid Reader Press (416 pp.) | $30 | July 15, 2025 | 9781668017142

When women banded together to reunite families. In the last half of the 20th century, Argentina twitched chaotically, violently, between the working-class orientation of Eva and Juan Perón and the reactionary moral rigidity of Juan

A scrappy, courageous group of grandmothers in search of disappeared family members.

A FLOWER TRAVELED IN MY BLOOD

Carlos Onganía before a coup by Jorge Rafael Videla in 1976 forever reset the country’s history. Under Videla’s direction, a violent military junta kidnapped, tortured, and murdered thousands of Argentines (by some estimates as many as 30,000 who were deemed “subversives”). Centering the saga of the Roisinblits and their matriarch Rosa, journalist Gilliland, in her first book, approaches this brutal period through the eyes of the Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo, a scrappy, courageous group of mothers of desaparecidos who had infants or were pregnant when they were disappeared. Over decades of instability that followed the junta’s rule, the Abuelas were at the forefront of calls for accountability and justice, anchoring their grief in the search for grandchildren who had been born in detention centers and adopted—appropriated—by new families, often with connections to Videla’s government. The author conveys the complicated, heart-wrenching fullness of her characters’ individual stories and shades their backdrop with compulsively readable history of geopolitical tension and the emerging DNA science that fueled the Abuelas’ fight. Gilliland’s work, exhaustively and compassionately researched, offers a crucial counterbalance to the dark legacy of Argentina’s desaparecidos, injecting the light of a model resistance movement that lay the groundwork for future international human rights investigations. Her humility and respect for the fraught journeys her subjects made toward each other and for the vital questions their journeys raised— about power, identity, family, and collective memory and healing—ensure the text will resonate for generations the world over.

A piercing, emotional tribute to the value of persistent resistance.

Friends Until the End: Edmund Burke and Charles Fox in the Age of Revolution

Grant, James | Norton (496 pp.) | $45 August 12, 2025 | 9780393542103

Two men in turbulent times. Financial journalist Grant delves into the roiling politics of 18th-century England with his dual biography of statesmen

Edmund Burke (1729-97) and Charles James Fox (1749-1806). Burke, the son of an Irish lawyer, and Fox, heir to a rich English political family, were friends for several decades. Both were Whigs in the House of Commons; both ardently supported the American Revolution and the impeachment of a governor general of the East India Company on charges of mismanagement. But their sharply differing views on the French Revolution shattered their friendship. Fox, a Francophile, saw the revolution as glorious; Burke denounced it. Outspoken, personally charming, fearless in asserting their views, they emerged from vastly different backgrounds. Fox, precocious and coddled, entered Eton when he was 9 and matriculated at Oxford at 15. Leaving in 1766 after two years, he embarked on a two-year grand tour. In Europe, when he won election to Parliament, he blithely continued his travels. On a family vacation to Paris when he was a teenager, he developed an attraction to gambling, which became a lifelong compulsion. He lived, Grant notes, from bankruptcy to bankruptcy. After graduating from Trinity College, in 1750, Burke arrived in London to study law. At the age of 28, just before

Kirkus Star

his first book was published, he married. He was a founding member of Samuel Johnson’s Literary Club, along with Sir Joshua Reynolds and Oliver Goldsmith. A reputed womanizer, Fox, at age 46, secretly married the prostitute with whom he had been living. Grant depicts the political rivalries and debates to which both men responded: Burke in writings that lay the groundwork of modern conservatism; Fox with ideals that inspired generations of 19thcentury politicians.

A lively history informed by deep research.

We Are Eating the Earth: The Race To Fix Our Food System and Save Our Climate

Grunwald, Michael | Simon & Schuster (384 pp.) $29.99 | July 1, 2025 | 9781982160074

A journalist and bestselling author reports on the critical condition of our food system. In the midst of our climate change crisis is a land crisis. Within the next 25 years, current trends predict that “the world’s farmers will clear at least a dozen more Californias’ worth of land.” Agriculture is the main driver of deforestation, as well as of water shortages and biodiversity loss. That means mass deforestation lies in our future, which will wipe out essential carbon sinkholes like the Amazon rainforest, as well as countless wetlands, prairies, and diverse ecosystems. As populations expand, it’s an unavoidable fact that we need our planet to produce more food—according to Grunwald, it needs to produce “even more calories over the next 30 years than it had produced over the previous 12,000”—an imposing challenge. How to meet that demand without decimating critical habitat is the fraught question at the heart of the book. Grunwald gathers decades of history and research to examine how we got here and where we can go in the future. Along the way, he critiques biofuels and says environmental

policy has not always been a productive mode for our planet’s health. He commends the many scientists doing critical work on the ground. Among them is Tim Searchinger, a “brainiac among brainiacs” who appears as a guide through these pages. Grunwald does the important work of translating the legal, scientific, and often esoteric aspects of the issue into immediate action. Ambitious in scope, the book provides a roadmap of environmental policy relating to agricultural land in the past few decades and the emergency we’re now facing.

An accessible and alarming look at the planet’s land crisis.

The Cybernetic Society: How Humans and Machines Will Shape the Future Together

Husain, Amir | Basic Books (272 pp.) $30 | August 5, 2025 | 9781541605718

Humming cities and whirring drones: The future requires our attention. Standing at the edge of a promising (or threatening) AI revolution, Husain urges us to step boldly forward and imagine life inside a cybernetic world. An AI expert, author, and entrepreneur, Husain has founded multiple companies leveraging AI for military and civilian uses. In this accessible volume, he proposes a cybernetic-AI hybrid model for future worldbuilding. Husain reintroduces cybernetics, first developed in the 1950s as a theory of control and communication for machine and biological systems, now enhanced with artificial intelligence. Proposing Neom, a meticulously designed, hypermodern city under construction in Saudi Arabia, as an example of cybernetic urbanism, Husain envisions it as a model for companies, cities, and societies. Large, complex businesses like Amazon and Nvidia are already using AI in their workplaces, creating flat organizational structures

and delegating many managerial tasks to AI. Husain sees human-AI collaborations having a democratizing effect by diffusing information and decision-making. These are enticing possibilities, extending the AI tools already embedded in our lives, in science and medicine. Husain acknowledges the darker side of AI used for war, citing current weapons deployed on battlefields in Ukraine and Gaza. But Husain ultimately sees these spilling over into peaceful civilian uses, with human, AI-augmented skills of empathy, creativity, and adaptability becoming more valuable. Notably, Husain’s narrative sidesteps deeper questions of power, profit, and institutional inertia. Yet his optimism is grounded in the belief that cybernetic-AI hybrids could create less bureaucratic, more equitable systems. Whether this future can bridge the digital divide and serve the many remains uncertain—but it is a question worth serious thought. The included reading list adds depth and direction for those ready to explore further. Painting an optimistic, shimmering image of a world where AI operates in service to humankind.

A Day Like Any Other: The Life of James Schuyler

Kernan, Nathan | Farrar, Straus and Giroux (560 pp.) | $35 | August 5, 2025

9780374281175

Groundbreaking biography of an often-overlooked poet. Kernan, who previously edited James Schuyler’s Diary and was a close friend, offers up the first biography of the poet (1923-1991). It was in 1935 that seventh-grader Schuyler met Bernie Oshei, his “first real soulmate,” and began to explore his homosexuality. An AWOL incident in the Navy brought about an undesirable discharge that left him in a depressed state with nervous tremors. In 1944 he moved to New York City to room with a

military buddy. Their friendship with Chester Kallman would lead them to Kallman’s partner, the poet W.H. Auden. Schuyler would type out Auden’s poems, which helped with his own poetry. He was enjoying life with a group of bright, gay, opera-loving men. After graduating from Columbia, he went to Italy to work on his writing and befriended other writers, including Tennessee Williams and Truman Capote. Back in New York, he wrote more stories and poetry, published some pieces, and became friends with poets Frank O’Hara and John Ashbery. After a nervous breakdown got him admitted to a hospital, he returned, rejuvenated, to writing and published his first poem, “Salute,” which Kernan nicely explicates, as he does with many of the poems. Schuyler was now officially part of the so-called New York School of poetry. He began finding work in museums, writing for Art News, and published a novel, Alfred and Guinevere, in 1958. His The Morning of the Poem won the Pulitzer Prize in 1981. As much a social as literary biography, Kernan’s book describes in detail Schuyler’s many on-and-off personal and professional relationships with writers, artists, and musicians, his many, many moves, and his deteriorating health in the 1980s. A bit on the dry side, but a welcome and heartfelt biography.

Kirkus Star

How To Be Well: Navigating Our Self-Care Epidemic, One Dubious Cure at a Time

Larocca, Amy | Knopf (272 pp.)

$28 | May 13, 2025 | 9780525655534

A sharply pointed look at the vast wellness industry and “the burden of being healthy and attractive” it places on consumers.

“Medicine is increasingly a retail prospect.” Health journalist Larocca realizes as

“Medicine is increasingly a retail prospect,” writes health journalist Larocca.

HOW TO BE WELL

much when visiting a New York doctor whose clinic now “looks like somewhere you’d go with a group of girlfriends for brunch.” Underscore “girlfriends,” for Larocca focuses on the health and wellness experiences of women—not just “today’s ideal woman…hopped up on her plantbased diet and elaborate adaptogen regimen,” but also the harried workaday woman who aspires to feeling better psychically and physically. It’s a $5.6 trillion industry, Larocca notes, and a vast portion of the till comes from catering to the idea that everyone can become that ideal woman. Some of that desired “wellness” is attended to by the medical industry, which is increasingly bespoke for those who can afford it: Larocca depicts one members-only clinic with a mere five-minute waiting period, 18 times less than the average ER; such concierge medicine speaks to, in one of her nice, bemused turns of phrase, “something else, something more, some sort of extra health.” Some of that wellness is also the province of specialty groceries. Does anyone remember a time before kale? As it turns out, it’s only been a dozen years or so since kale became groovy. On the matter of grooviness, Larocca is excellent on the New Age aspect of the wellness business, with its mantras and microbiome-supporting organic coffee and mindfulness, which, a longtime practitioner laments, “is usually being refashioned into a banal, therapeutic, self-help technique.” And of course, much of that wellness centers on pharmaceuticals, on prescription diet drugs along with CBD, microdosing, ayahuasca, and all the rest. Larocca takes on the wellness biz with a healthy dose of skepticism, and the result is both eye-opening and good fun.

Backstage: Stories of a Writing Life

Leon, Donna | Atlantic Monthly (208 pp.)

$26 | August 26, 2025 | 9780802165374

Adventures on and off the page. Crime writer Leon gathers 32 short essays on reading and writing, people (students, fellow writers, her mother), and places (Venice, in particular) that coalesce into a candid memoir. Several essays reflect on her experience teaching: in New Jersey, where she taught third grade in an inner city school; in Iran, before the Iranian Revolution, where she was employed by Bell Helicopter to teach English to young helicopter pilots; in Switzerland, where her teenage students convinced her to take them to a Frank Zappa concert; and at an arts festival in Ernen, Switzerland, where she has led weeklong courses in how to write a crime novel. Many essays expand on the challenges of writing: the search for reliable sources, the importance of movement in structuring a plot, the elements involved in creating characters. For a book about blood diamonds, she sought out the help of a diamond expert in Venice; to fill out the character of a prostitute, she interviewed a sex worker, who related a terrifying encounter with a serial killer. Leon exults over opera, especially Baroque opera. “It’s not enough to read the story, know the plot, know what happens in the end,” she writes. “We need the rush of blood to the head; we need the heart to go boom boom boom as those bewigged and

crinolined women are either thrilled or disgusted by the declaration of love from the tenor or the baritone.” Writers, of course, do create thrills, and Leon expresses huge admiration for many, among them Dickens, Tolstoy, and Ruth Rendell, whose talent she envies; Ross Macdonald, masterful creator of detective Lew Archer; Patricia Highsmith, especially for her villains; Raymond Chandler, whose Philip Marlowe navigates a dark world; and Patrick O’Brian (whom, she confesses, she adores).

A delightful miscellany of musings on work and pleasure.

The Accidental Garden: Gardens, Wilderness, and the Space in Between

Mabey, Richard | New York Review Books (176 pp.) | $17.95 paper July 15, 2025 | 9781681379906

Reflections on a lifetime of gardening. Midway through his book, the author cites the contemporary British painter Kurt Jackson, a kindred spirit. Jackson’s “Taxonomy of a Cornish Foreshore” depicts a conventional seascape, but dangles tags in the lower half of the painting listing flora and fauna he has depicted. It is a representation of an ecosystem that blurs the lines between what we think of as art and science. Splendid in itself, the painting is an apt illustration of the intent of this “accidental” memoir. It refers widely not only to Latin plant names but also to various poets, including Andrew Marvell and R.S. Thomas, who defined a garden as a “gesture against the wild.” Mabey roams widely, not only through his own two acres in Norfolk, eastern England, but also through philosophy, botany, and ancient customs. We also learn about divining rods locating boundaries and about various forms of composting and uses of agricultural machinery. The author and his wife form two bookends:

Mabey is more old school and likes to impose. His wife, Polly, allows nature to lead her with minimum interference. There are digressions on the uniform planting of fruit trees and side trips to Provence and Crete in search of Mediterranean ambiance that can survive a British winter. The book provokes tangential musings: Why don’t the British give knighthoods to gardeners? Is it the class prejudice against working with your hands? The book whiffs slightly of “we happy few” and can feel insular. Anyone sweating through a Phoenix summer of 100 days at temperatures over 100 degrees might feel less than sympathetic to the “heat wave lite” here described. Nonetheless: Anglophile gardeners addicted to Britain’s Gardeners’ World program will regard this short book as catnip. Eco-friendly musings worth digging into.

Crazy Lucky: Remarkable Stories From Inside the World of Celebrity Icons

Mason, John | Unnamed Press (250 pp.) $28 | May 6, 2025 | 9781964008073

A celebrity lawyer tells all—and more than most people will want to know.

From modest roots, Mason made an early splash in an early ’60s surf band that, threatened with a lawsuit from Rod Serling, changed the name of a song from “Outer Limits” to “Out of Limits.” But it was the film world that grabbed him, despite Bob Hope’s saying to the eager young man, “Go away kid. You’re bothering me.” (Hope was quoting W.C. Fields, likely in jest.) After law school, he pitched in on a case assisting Cary Grant in a lawsuit that hinged on defining gross versus net profits, and he got Jack Lemmon’s mother-in-law out of a reckless-driving ticket. Steered into representing musicians, he formed his own celebrity firm, signing Quincy Jones, Olivia

Newton-John, Cat Stevens, and Roy Orbison (“he had a really cute giggle”). Other players flit across the screen: Donna Summer, Reba McEntire, Michael Jackson. Most play small roles in Mason’s dropped-name-bestrewn memoir of sometimes good, sometimes bad behavior on the part of the L.A. crowd. One small newsworthy bit, perhaps coincidental, is Mason’s account of a friendship with Jose and Kitty Melendez, done in by sons (“two young men who wanted to inherit their father’s multimillion-dollar estate”) now back in the news. Regrettably, Mason pounds the keyboard with fists of ham, generating scads of groan-worthy prose: “To borrow some ’60s lingo, ‘Dig it, I could really play the guitar.’…He is still and always will be Brian Wilson: a genius!…John Fogerty wanted nothing to do with Fantasy, Cook, Clifford or our firm. But, hey, I got into the music business.” It all makes for tedious reading, a run-on string of clunky brags and dreary anecdotes. Readers might think it a lucky thing to miss this one.

Joyful Learning: How To Find Freedom, Happiness, and Success Beyond Conventional Schooling

McDonald, Kerry | PublicAffairs (336 pp.) $30 | August 19, 2025 | 9781541705524

A manifesto for parents. This is a book about “education entrepreneurship”—the development of models for teaching and learning that go outside the traditional schoolroom and innovate in the cognitive and social development of children. Written with zeal, the book encourages parents to play a larger role in their children’s education. The author lays out learning outcomes as socially driven: “I want a happier, more joyful learning environment for my child.…I want a more

customized, personalized academic experience.…I want my child to be respected as an individual.” Through a series of case studies, the book traces the success of several educational entrepreneurs. Some are home-schoolers. Some are technologists of learning. Some are teachers who have set up their own institutions. “To shatter the collective illusions surrounding education, parents should be honest and upfront about their desire for difference in education.” Some may question the premises and motives of this book. Is education like a Silicon Valley startup? Are schools “small businesses?” Are students “stakeholders?” Should parents “market” their success? Anyone who cares about public education and content-based curricula will be impatient with this book. But parents who have found local schools lacking in support may be inspired to take teaching into their own hands. It may be easy to parody this book’s narratives: “Jen’s story of building a school that intentionally integrates neurodiverse and neurotypical students is one example of how entrepreneurial parents and teachers are taking the initiative to create community-based learning solutions for children whose identities, experiences, or educational needs are not being met in traditional schools.” What’s harder is to ask ourselves, what is school for these days?

A welcome if controversial call for parents to take control of their children’s education.

Kirkus Star

Exhibitionist: 1 Journal, 1 Depression, 100 Paintings

Mendelsund, Peter | Catapult

$50 | June 3, 2025 | 9781646222896

How painting can save your life. Celebrated book designer, nonfiction author (Cover, 2014, etc.), novelist (The Delivery, 2021, etc.), and now painter, Mendelsund

recounts his struggle with depression in a journal that begins early in the Covid-19 pandemic and ends two years and some 100 new paintings later. At the outset of the pandemic and already suffering from serious depression, Mendelsund retreated with his family to a New Hampshire farmhouse where he began to paint for the first time in his life. The book’s opening lines cleanly telegraph the story to come: “Rain on the drive. The undersides of the leaves were bright. Coming up the road, the barn was the first thing I saw. Large, almost black; presiding over a farmhouse, shed, a murky pond, and a large, untended field that stretched off and off.” There is the looming darkness, along with the faintest glimmer of light. Painting, it turns out, will offer that light. Mendelsund’s short, staccato chapters and clipped sentences feel like the exhaustion of depression and space for what can’t be expressed in words, just as a barn studio makes space for art-making and recovery. Though reminiscent of Anne Truitt’s published journals (Yield , 2022, etc.), which grapple with art-making and life, and William Styron’s memoir of depression, Darkness Visible (1990), Mendelsund’s book is singular in its quiet wit: “A sky so blue it came across as aggressively middlebrow. This depressed me further.” His humor, along with full-color reproductions of his startlingly good paintings, is solace from his sadness, both for the author and reader. He makes these paintings left-handed, sometimes under the influence. “My diligence in maintaining my incompetence has paid off. I have said my final fuck-you to expertise. Amazing.” And it is amazing. A kind of alchemical miracle: dilettante into artist,

depression into creation, something slapdash into something wonderful. A wry and fearless portrait of depression, and the strange solace of art-making in middle age.

Launching Liberty: The Epic Race To Build the Ships That Took America to War

Most, Doug | Simon & Schuster (464 pp.)

$30.99 | August 19, 2025 | 9781668017784

The “ugly ducklings” that went to war.

To meet the demand driven by relentless Nazi U-boat attacks on cargo ships in the Atlantic and inspired by Britain’s Merchant Shipbuilding Mission, the U.S. launched a parallel effort. In roughly four years, shipyards from Maine to Oregon produced 2,710 Liberty ships, each longer than a football field. Christened “ugly ducklings” by the press, the ships were practical but unattractive. Even President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who supported the program, said of the ships’ design, “Anyone of you that knows a ship and loves a ship, would hate them, as I do.” In his readable account, Most injects a sense of urgency and humanity into what might otherwise be a niche topic, an approach complemented by the book’s organization into seven sections composed of short chapters. The narrative is at its most lively in the first four sections, which follow the small group of men who created the Liberty program from the ground up. The

In roughly four years, 2,710 Liberty ships were produced, each longer than a football field.

massive workforce needed to power their effort came with challenges, ranging from the need for housing and schools to health care. One shipyard’s effort to provide health care for workers built the foundation of today’s Kaiser Permanente Medical Care Program. Racism and sexism accompanied the increasingly diverse population of shipyard laborers. The author documents both, but his discussions sometimes lack nuance. “Wendy the Welders,” shipbuilding’s answer to Rosie the Riveter, are present and accounted for, yet the epilogue’s brief descriptions of their subsequent marriages and/or happy transitions to other jobs leave little room for the complexity of their experiences. Most returns to his strengths in the final two sections, describing the push to build ships faster and faster to meet the needs of a country at war.

A tale of mobilization that is at its best on the nuts and bolts (and welding) of the Liberty shipbuilding program.

Supersonic: The Complete, Authorized, and Uncut Interviews

Oasis | Crown (368 pp.) | $32 May 20, 2025 | 9798217087761

The lads from Manchester look back in anger (and some other emotions).

It’s hard to overstate the hold that Britpop band Oasis had on the music world in the mid-1990s. Even today, countless music fans of any age have heard the band’s hit single, “Wonderwall,” either on the radio or at a party, when that one guy busts out his acoustic guitar. In the band’s new oral history, drawn from interviews the members and others did for a documentary that’s also called Supersonic, Oasis details the early lives of brothers Liam and Noel Gallagher. As Noel puts it, their rivalry started when they were teenagers, when Liam “was just a pain in the arse…and has

remained that way ever since.” The book moves on to the early days of the band, when they sounded like, in Liam’s words, “a really shit Stone Roses.” It covers the success of their first two albums, Definitely Maybe and (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? and concludes with their now legendary concert in 1996 at England’s Knebworth Festival. The book doesn’t mention their messy breakup in 2009, but much ink is given to the Gallaghers’ relationship, which seems to swing from mild annoyance to galactic hatred (“Noel has a lot of buttons,” one friend explains. “Liam has a lot of fingers. It’s that simple really.”) and their propensity for making controversial comments to the press (Noel: “Writing songs is difficult; talking shit is easy”). The Gallagher brothers have reunited for a planned tour this year, and this book serves as a fun, enlightening look at the band for their fans as well as a good introduction to Britpop newbies. Like the brothers themselves, it’s profane and hilarious. Are they just talking shit? Maybe, but few are better at it. Fans will find more than just cigarettes and alcohol.

Out of the Woods: A Girl, a Killer, and a Lifelong Struggle To Find the Way Home

Olsen, Gregg | Thomas & Mercer (331 pp.)

$28.99 | August 1, 2025 | 9781662528569

A young woman’s determination to overcome deep trauma and survivor’s guilt in the aftermath of an unspeakable crime.

Shasta Rae Groene and her brother, Dylan, were 8 and 9 years old in the summer of 2005, when they were kidnapped from their home in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, where their mother, her boyfriend, and an older brother had just been tied up and beaten to death with a framing hammer and a rifle butt. The younger children were the actual targets of the

massacre’s perpetrator, Joseph Edward Duncan III, aka Jet, a sadistic pedophile and recidivist sex offender with a Messiah complex. After the murders, Duncan took the children over the Montana state line and up into the wilderness of Lolo National Forest, where he held them captive and repeatedly raped them for seven weeks while regaling them with tales of previous rapes and murders of children in California and Seattle. An unusually strong-willed and resourceful child who was more worried about her brother’s life than her own, Shasta survived the ordeal, but Dylan did not. She would later say of Duncan, “I don’t think he counted on the fact that I was like ten steps ahead of him.” Olsen, a prolific and popular author of multiple true-crime books and fictional mysteries, became close to his subject over several years. His chief concern here is to tell the story of the therapeutic work Shasta did to try to find her way “out of the woods” of her trauma. He weaves that somewhat hopeful story together with the nauseatingly disturbing details of the crime, each parallel path unfolding through the book, dropping hints along the way of ever worse revelations to come. Not for the squeamish or seekers of uncomplicatedly happy endings.

Parallel Lives: A Love Story From a Lost Continent

Pears, Iain | Norton (240 pp.) | $29.99 August 5, 2025 | 9781324073772

An international romance. Novelist and art historian Pears recounts the unlikely love story of Larissa Salmina (1931-2024), a Russian art curator, and British art historian Francis Haskell (19282000), who were Pears’ neighbors in Oxford. Drawing on conversations with Salmina and on Haskell’s 60 volumes of diaries, Pears conveys in rich detail the worlds from which the two emerged:

Larissa’s in the repressive Soviet Union, Francis’ in class-conscious England. Their personalities were vastly different: Larissa was a rule-breaker, freewheeling and irreverent; Francis was self-doubting, lonely, and, from long years in one school and another, meticulous in following rules. Larissa feared for her Jewish friends as antisemitism raged; Francis hid his Jewish ancestry. Both were drawn to the arts. Larissa trained in art history at the Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg, doing so well that she continued directly to a three-year postgraduate course at the Hermitage. In 1962, she was assigned to bring Soviet art to the Venice Biennale— works she lost when the freight car carrying them was decoupled from the rest of the train. Francis was in Venice at the time, studying art history on his own. Through a friend, they met and were instantly smitten. Although Larissa was married, she dived enthusiastically into an affair with Francis, breaking the terms of her visa to travel with him. For his part, he was amazed that anyone would fall in love with him and reveled in the newfound intimacy. Intricate machinations were involved to allow them to marry at Leningrad’s Palace of Marriages in 1965. Though Larissa, who never aspired to emigrate, was initially unhappy when they settled in England, her resilience and adaptability, and the couple’s shared spirit of adventure, sustained a long, loving marriage. Warm portraits of two singular individuals.

Ghosts of Hiroshima

Pellegrino, Charles | Blackstone (314 pp.)

$29.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9798228309890

A story of ordinary people, both victims and survivors, thrown into extraordinary history. Pellegrino says his book is “simply the story of what happened to people and objects under the atomic bombs, and it is dedicated to the hope that no one will ever witness this, or die this way, again.”

Images of Aug. 6, 1945, as reported by survivors, include the sight of a cart falling from the sky with the hindquarters of the horse pulling it still attached; a young boy who put his hands over his eyes as the bomb hit—and “saw the bones of his fingers shining through shut eyelids, just like an X-ray photograph”; “statue people” flash-fossilized and fixed in place, covered in a light snowfall of ashes; and, of course, the ghosts—people severely flash-burned on one side of their bodies, leaving shadows on a wall, the side of a building, or whatever stood nearby. The carnage continued for days, weeks, and years as victims of burns and those who developed various forms of cancer succumbed to their injuries: “People would continue to die in ways that people never imagined people could die.” Scattered in these survivor stories is another set of stories from those involved in the development and deployment of the only two atomic weapons ever used in warfare. The author also tells of the letter from Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard to Franklin D. Roosevelt that started the ball rolling toward the formation of the Manhattan Project and the crew conversations on the Enola Gay and the Bockscar, the planes that dropped the Little Boy on Hiroshima and the Fat Man on Nagasaki. We have to find a way to get along, one crew member said, “because we now have the wherewithal to destroy everything.”

This is not an easy account to read, but it is important enough not to be forgotten.

A Popular History of Idi Amin’s Uganda

Peterson, Derek R. | Yale Univ. (376 pp.) $35 | June 24, 2025 | 9780300278385

Uganda’s murderous myth-maker. Peterson, a scholar at the University of Michigan and author of The Unseen Archive of Idi Amin , writes that Amin’s 1971-79 rule generated

massive paperwork, which Peterson and colleagues have recovered from warehouses, rubbish dumps, crumbling archives, and outhouses and then cleaned, digitalized, and examined. The result, he accurately claims, is a more nuanced if not more edifying portrait of a brutal, bumbling dictatorship. Uganda achieved independence peacefully in 1962 but with a weak central government ruling a collection of five semi-autonomous kingdoms. In 1966 the prime minister sent his army to destroy the largest kingdom, Buganda, and declared himself president of the nation. His army’s commander, Idi Amin, seized control in a 1971 coup. Following the rhetoric of other African autocrats, he proclaimed that he represented the people, not a corrupt, unpatriotic elite, and would lead the fight against colonialism and racism and launch an “economic war” to build a great nation. Economics was not his strong suit, and Uganda has never recovered from his 1972 expulsion of 50,000 people of Indian and Pakistani descent whose businesses and property were handed over to Africans, but most Ugandans approved. Mining his archives, Peterson works hard and successfully to find honorable Ugandans working to build their nation, but he can’t overturn hard evidence that Amin’s legacy was mostly unmarked graves and poverty. In 1978 his army, for unclear reasons, invaded neighboring Tanzania and was ultimately routed; Amin fled into exile. Chaos and civil war followed. Today Uganda is officially a parliamentary democracy, although the current president has won every election since 1986. A penetrating if not encouraging analysis of a dysfunctional nation.

Slow Violence: Confronting Dark Truths in the American Classroom

Ray, Ranita | St. Martin’s (336 pp.) $30 | August 5, 2025 | 9781250288301

A sociologist describes the subtle ways that teachers victimize schoolchildren and undermine their self-esteem. This book confronts a depressing truth—that many children suffer in school, and that Black and brown children receive an additional layer of misery. Ray, a sociologist at the University of New Mexico, observes the goings-on in a Las Vegas school district where white students are in the minority. The bulk of her account takes place in fourth-grade classrooms, with follow-up reporting through sixth grade. Ray focuses on several individual students, describing their behavior, their academic prowess, and their reaction to comments or disciplining by their teachers. One child is suspected of being on the spectrum, another is a bubbly class cutup, and a third is an eager people-pleaser. Ray joins the fourth-grade teachers—three white women who have been trained in culturally sensitive and antiracist pedagogy—on breaks and reports how they talk about themselves, their students, and their students’ families. Scene by scene, the author recounts how a child’s misstep in class can result in casual labeling of a student as a “lost cause,” the kind of kid who might become a school shooter, or one of those who “could become sexual predators.” She shares examples of

seemingly minor incidents that are explained away for white students but stick to nonwhite students as fundamental flaws. She describes the disengagement of targeted students— one is talkative and funny at the start of the school year, but soon sits with his head down on his desk. It’s an eyewitness account of the crushing of the human spirit, and it’s heartbreaking. Yet as Ray tells these stories, she only sporadically zooms out to put her observations into broader sociological context. When she does, it’s great; when she doesn’t, readers may scratch their heads wondering what her point is.

An unvarnished look at the troubling ways in which schools can harm students.

My Next Breath: A Memoir

Renner, Jeremy | Flatiron Books (224 pp.) $29.99 | April 29, 2025 | 9781250383532

T he popular actor’s account of survival and recovery after a near-fatal snowplow accident. On New Year’s Day 2023, film and television actor Renner (Mayor of Kingstown) was nearly killed when his 14,000-pound snowplow ran over him. He had been clearing snow at his Lake Tahoe retreat following a major storm, helping his nephew Alex carve a path through the drifts. When the plow began to roll toward Alex—after Renner had exited without engaging the emergency brake—he leapt in to stop it, only to be pulled under its treads himself. In his emotionally charged

An eyewitness account, in classrooms, of the crushing of the human spirit.

memoir, he recounts the harrowing moments of being crushed, the life-threatening injuries—including dozens of broken bones—and how he stayed conscious while awaiting emergency care by focusing on deep breathing techniques he’d learned as a teenager assisting his mother during Lamaze classes. The incident led to months of surgeries and painful rehabilitation before he could walk again, first with a cane and eventually unaided, later allowing him to return to the Kingstown set, though not without lingering medical issues. Relying on his inner strength and resilience, Renner casts the experience as a crucible— transforming personal catastrophe into a story of renewal, service, and self-discovery. It’s a familiar arc in celebrity memoirs, and one Renner leans into heavily. Much of the content has already surfaced in interviews and a prominent Men’s Health cover story, though the slim volume offers a more deliberately shaped emotional journey. While genuinely uplifting at times, the memoir also feels like a managed effort to reframe survival as a form of personal and professional reinvention. “I am finally in the right place in my life; what happened that day, and the aftermath, served to redirect me into my life’s purpose. But the incident didn’t change me as much as it changed my role in my neighborhood, my city, the world.”

A sincere narrative of survival and self-reinvention.

Ballroom: A History, a Movement, a Celebration

Roberson, Michael with Mikelle Street Running Press (240 pp.) | $30 June 3, 2025 | 9780762489084

“A movement of freedom.” Roberson, a theologian, public health practitioner, cultural consultant to the FX series Pose, and member of the Ballroom community for 30 years, is an ideal guide to this

The Sporting Lives

Mark Kriegel

Michael Arkush

Aimee Boorman

Christopher Clarey

SEEN AND HEARD

Memoir by Priscilla Presley Coming This Fall

Elvis Presley’s ex-wife will tell the story of her post-divorce life in Softly, as I Leave You.

In a new memoir, Priscilla Beaulieu Presley will tell the story of life after her divorce from singer Elvis Presley.

Grand Central will publish the actor’s Softly, as I Leave You: Life After Elvis, co-written with Mary Jane Ross, in the fall, the press announced

in a news release. The title of the book shares its name with an Italian song that Elvis Presley memorably performed live in Las Vegas.

Priscilla Beaulieu Presley first met Elvis in West Germany when she was 14 and he was 24. They married less than eight years later and had a daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, in 1968. In 1973, the couple divorced, and Priscilla went on to pursue an acting career, starring on the prime-time soap opera Dallas and in films including The Naked Gun and The Adventures of Ford Fairlane

Lisa Marie Presley died in 2023. The following year, Random House published her posthumous memoir, From Here to the Great Unknown, co-written with her daughter Riley Keough.

“I have always loved and admired Elvis,”

Priscilla Presley said in a statement, “but the more than four decades of living without him have taught me how rare and extraordinary he was as a human being.”

Softly, as I Leave You is slated for publication on Sept. 23.—M.S.

For a review of Lisa Marie Presley’s book, visit Kirkus online.

Priscilla Presley

New Book by Jim Cramer Coming This Fall

Simon & Schuster will publish How To Make Money in Any Market by the Mad Money host.

Jim Cramer will share investing advice in a new book coming later this year.

Simon & Schuster will publish the Mad Money host’s How To Make Money in Any Market this fall, the press announced in a news release. The book, according to S&S, “shows viewers how to navigate the market like a pro.”

Cramer, a Harvard graduate, worked as a newspaper reporter and hedge fund manager before launching Mad Money on CNBC in 2005. The show gives viewers advice on investing in the stock market; each episode ends with Cramer’s catchphrase,

For a review of Jim Cramer’s Get Rich Carefully, visit Kirkus online.

“There’s always a bull market somewhere.”

Cramer is the author of several previous books, including Confessions of a Street Addict and You Got Screwed! Why Wall Street Tanked and How You Can Prosper. His most recent release, Jim Cramer’s Get Rich Carefully, came out in 2014.

Cramer said in a statement, “It’s been a dozen years since my last book, way too long, and now I am bursting at the seams with new ideas about how to make money in an environment like we’ve never seen before. I don’t care how much or little you have, it’s time to put those savings to work the right way.”

How To Make Money in Any Market is scheduled for publication on Oct. 14.—M.S.

Jim Cramer

Trying to understand how fatherhood and paternalism have changed over time.

FATHERHOOD

dance-club subculture. He clearly knows the House/Ballroom scene—a Black/Latine LGBTQ+ artistic collective, intentional kinship, and chosen family—from the inside. So he has real authority when he lays out the “Six Tenets of Ballroom,” ideals such as “radical inclusivity.” The history of the balls is traced from the earliest-known record of a drag ball in the U.S. (1888, in Washington, D.C.) to their expansion into a global phenomenon. Roberson shows how the move to organize a ball by a “House” system—the House of Corey, founded by Dorian Corey, for example—was transformative and tracked the rise of Black power, feminist, and transgender movements. The author also considers whether Ballroom’s now-mainstream visibility risks its authenticity and autonomy. Madonna’s pop music hit “Vogue,” for instance, raises issues of cultural appropriation. Iconic balls and important figures from their history, such as Willi Ninja, the so-called Grandfather of Vogue, are spotlighted. Ballroom is examined holistically, as art form and cultural production, but also as community organizing and a response to health crises and systematic oppression. Throughout the book, readers get insights into what is most valued in Ballroom culture—“You sell your look from head to toe, but bring it with your face.” Roberson’s celebratory prose is enhanced by lively photographs of Ballroom celebrities, their runway triumphs, and thrilled audiences. As Aisha Diori, an activist, says, “Ballroom isn’t just about competition and extravagant costumes, vogue, and competition; it’s a safe haven, a family.”

An exuberant tribute to a vibrant and nurturing dance-club scene.

Fatherhood: A History of Love and Power

Sedgewick, Augustine | Scribner (352 pp.)

$30 | May 27, 2025 | 9781668046296

From here to paternity.

Sedgewick, the author of a history of coffee, scrutinizes the lives of thinkers, writers, and leaders in an effort to understand how fatherhood and paternalism have changed over time. This is a sharp yet limited book, focused almost exclusively “on Western culture because,” for the past several thousand years, “the West has been the world’s dominant patriarchal tradition.” Mainly, Sedgewick’s subjects “could now be described—though not simply or without ambivalence—as white dads.” While some readers will consider this approach a nonstarter, the author is an undeniably talented prose stylist with estimable dot-connecting abilities. His throughline comes into view in the second chapter, which contrasts ideas held by his first chapter’s subjects—ancient Greek philosophers—with those of Saint Augustine, whose framing of fatherhood is still important in Christianity: “As Augustine conceived it, Original Sin is a patrilineal legacy of evil—a vision radically opposed to Aristotle’s idea that fathers were the origin of good.” Augustine’s “paternalistic logic” also stoked the Catholic church’s epoch-shaping “call for salvation by force.” Centuries later, Thomas Jefferson “manipulated fatherhood” for “personal and political” reasons, infamously

declining to acknowledge that he had fathered children with an enslaved woman, Sally Hemings, and, in a lesser-known act, labeling indigenous Americans “children” who should emulate white families. Likewise, racialized paternalism influenced outspoken abolitionist Henry David Thoreau’s self-serving views on his family’s pencil-making business, which relied on trees felled by enslaved people. For his part, Bob Dylan, who had a difficult relationship with his father, wrote songs that foregrounded “the emotional turmoil of the postwar white family” but said he sought a wife “who can cook and sew.” Though constrained in its focus, this book engages in interesting ways with assumptions about fathers of nations, faiths, and families.

An intelligent but circumscribed look at what it means to be a father.

Bogart and Huston: Their Lives, Their Adventures, and the Classic Movies They Made Together

Segaloff, Nat | Pegasus (240 pp.)

$29.95 | August 5, 2025 | 9781639369317

A film critic celebrates one of cinema’s most fruitful writerdirector alliances. As longtime reviewer Segaloff writes in this admirably nonhagiographic book, Humphrey Bogart (1899-1957) and John Huston (1906-87) “were friends who together produced an extraordinary screen legacy.” They teamed up for six films from 1941 to 1953, starting with Huston’s directorial debut, The Maltese Falcon , an effort that rescued Bogart from the “relentless string of B-pictures” that the head of Warner Bros., Jack Warner, had consigned him to. Segaloff writes that, while previous books have been devoted to only one of the two men, his focuses on their collaboration and views their work

“through the lens of their personalities, histories, interests, and the noteworthy times they spent together.”

The conceit of writing a book about both men rather than just one isn’t as original as Segaloff suggests, but that doesn’t detract from his accounts of their long, frequently booze-soaked friendship and the films they made together. He charts classics from Key Largo (1948) to The African Queen (1951) to The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) and lesser efforts such as Beat the Devil (1953), a “cult movie” that “was born in compromise, planned in arrogance, filmed in panic, and released in desperation.” Segaloff documents each man’s many marriages and affairs and dramatizes the rift that developed after Bogart backtracked on his criticism of the House Un-American Activities Committee when Republicans questioned his loyalty. This is well-traveled ground, with stories that fans likely know, but it’s still fun to read about these two men and their respective misadventures. When Bogart was shooting Across the Pacific (1942), his marriage to Mayo Methot was going so poorly that, when he came home one day, she stabbed him with a kitchen knife. A doctor stitched him up, and “like a trouper, Bogart reported to work the next morning.” Nothing new, but a pleasant read for fans.

The Golden Age of Italian Jews: 1848-1938

Segrè, Gino | Paul Dry Books (175 pp.) | $19.95 paper | August 12, 2025 | 9781589882058

Acceptance, then persecution. Most Americans think of Jewish culture as Northern and Eastern European: Yiddish language and heavy soups. This book reminds us that Italy had sustained a rich and vibrant Jewish community since ancient Roman times. It writes a history of

Jewish life when ghettos arose and when the pope had power over lands and peoples beyond the Vatican. The real heart of the book, though, is the “golden age,” from the reforms of the revolution of 1848 until the Fascist crackdowns of 1938. During these 90 years, Jews moved relatively freely along city streets and through the country’s governments and universities. Fascinating is the story of Ernesto Nathan, Rome’s mayor from 1907 to 1913. “Nathan was a Jewish, London-born, German-fathered, Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy’s Masonic Lodge,” writes Segrè, the author of five books on the history of science. “Serving for six years, longer than any mayor before or since, many also think he was the best mayor Rome has ever had.” Fascinating, too, are the lives of the merchants and their daughters who became the currency of social advancement through assimilation and marriage. Most riveting is the story of the author’s immediate family, among them one of the greatest physicists of the 20th century, the Nobel Prize–winning Emilio Segrè. It is a family, too, of artists and teachers, small-town merchants and big-time machers. History is written here by men and women who take advantage of new freedoms and, by the 1930s, find their ways among old prejudices. Jewish Italians served their nation in many ways, “eager to prove that the faith the country had shown in their Italianitá (Italianess) was fully warranted.” Their courage stands in sharp contrast to “the cowardice shown” by the world’s initial reluctance “to take action against the rise of Fascism.” Italian Jewry offers a lesson in ambition and resilience, patriotism and bravery.

A fluent, personal account of the role of Italian Jews in the making of modern Europe.

Favor: Basketball, North Philly, My Mother, and the Life Lessons I Learned From All Three

Staley, Dawn | Black Privilege Publishing/Atria (288 pp.) | $28.99 May 20, 2025 | 9781668023365

For more on Italian history, visit Kirkus online.

A shy kid speaks up on the court. The uniquely decorated author—Staley is the only person to win college basketball’s august Naismith Award as both player and coach—pens a candid, self-aware memoir about her unusually successful career. Staley grew up in “a crammed row home” in North Philadelphia, nicknamed Dirt because “I’d rather play ball than bathe.” Introverted and alert, she learned discipline by observing her mother, Estelle, who earned money cleaning houses, which she did “with pride, like a boss.” Staley was most comfortable on the court, playing point guard, where lack of height mattered less than smarts and competitiveness. After her storied playing days at the University of Virginia—she graduated in 1992—Staley landed an uninspiring job “stacking jeans.” To play professionally, she went to Spain. She “hated it abroad,” but homesickness led to an unlikely, charmingly recounted breakthrough. Watching the Kid ’n Play–starring House Party movies, her “brain froze” when a character said, “You have to do what you don’t want to do to get what you want.” This became her “life motto,” fueling her stellar professional playing career—she joined the Charlotte Sting in 1999, lending star power to the two-year-old WNBA—and three national championships as the University of South Carolina women’s coach. Coaches typically say only nice things about colleagues, but Staley is winningly direct. Tara VanDerveer, who coached the 1996 women’s U.S. Olympic team, “relentlessly” chided Staley and her teammates, taking “it to a place she

didn’t need to.” Staley is equally outspoken about her faith and the need for women’s college basketball, where a substantial percentage of the players are Black, to be more “intentional about hiring Black women” and equitably paying them. Her message resonates beyond the gym.

Instructive episodes from the rise and reign of a hardwood heroine.

The Rainbow Ain’t Never Been Enuf: On the Myth of LGBTQ+ Solidarity

Story, Kaila Adia | Beacon Press (216 pp.)

$28.95 | May 13, 2025 | 9780807004654

Seeing mavericks “for who they really are.”

Story, a University of Louisville scholar, examines how racism, misogyny, and transphobia have worked together to co-opt queer culture and suppress true LGBTQ+ solidarity. After the Stonewall riots of 1969, the rainbow flag has come to symbolize the diversity of the queer community—and that the communities within the whole “exist as unified fronts in the face of gender and sexual tyranny.” Drawing on popular culture, research, and her own experiences as a queer Black feminist/theorist, Story argues that LGBTQ+ communities “struggle with the same repugnant beliefs” that have led mainstream society to oppress LGBTQ+ people of color. She begins by recalling that her shock on coming out in her teens as a lesbian was not the lack of acceptance but that fellow sexual minorities could also be racist and/or misogynistic. Story traces these tensions to two roots. The first preceded Stonewall and came from the white gay and lesbian activist movements that lacked “insight when it came to understanding systems of [racial, gendered, and economic] domination in intersectional ways.” The second came from later indoctrination in neoliberal thought, especially as it emerged in the 1980s. The end result was the creation

of a “politically neutered and socially compliant” queer person who valorized homonormativity and consumption over diversity and community. Yet resistance—especially among queer people of color—has also existed. Reality TV shows like Legendary, for example, have depicted Black and Latinx gay/ transgender ball scene “families,” established to offer safe havens from (white supremacist) gay and straight worlds. While education is important to raising awareness about the intersectionality of oppression, Story argues that refusing “pinkwashed” racist, misogynist, and transphobic corporate support for Pride festivals is also key. Queer and/ or gender studies scholars and LGBTQ+ activists will find this a compelling and well-articulated book of special interest. An engaging study that highlights the need for intersectional awareness in the LGBTQ+ community.

The Mask: A History of Breathing Bad Air

Strasser, Bruno J. & Thomas Schlich Yale Univ. (288 pp.) | $38 | June 24, 2025 9780300276039

What’s hiding behind that mask?

Masks were worn by actors in theater before they were used for protection from disease and pollution. Perhaps that idea of misrepresentation is behind the social and political attitudes of protective mask wearing. Strasser (a biologist) and Schlich (a physician) examine the ways people have used protective masks to avoid “bad air” over centuries. The bad air can be too cold or too dry; full of dust, smoke, bacteria, or viruses; or toxic from military use, industry, or transportation. The use of protective masks illustrates what the authors call a technological fix.

“Health and disease are examples of hugely complex phenomena, and they become even more so when considered collectively.” Society looks for a simple

solution to a complex problem, and protective masks—and their uses and misuses over centuries—are a good example. Masks can be mandated or just recommended during epidemics, wars, or environmental disasters, but the primary responsibility for protection rests with the wearer. From plague doctors in the 1600s to the discovery of bacteria, protective masks were key to combating disease. Masks were also in great favor during the Industrial Revolution, because forcing workers— who were sanding wood, applying pesticides, spraying paint, mining coal, and making hats—to wear masks at work meant that industrialists didn’t need to clean up the work environment. Just slap a mask on workers, and they were good to go. The technology of masks has evolved over the centuries, but the politics of mask wearing has always been divisive, with some seeing protective masks as symbols of cowardice and fear, infringing on personal freedoms. Choosing to wear a protective mask is nothing less than a choice with cultural significance. A thoroughly documented and well-illustrated accounting of mask wearing over two millennia.

The Lost Mary: Rediscovering the Mother of Jesus

Tabor, James D. | Knopf (240 pp.) | $30 September 30, 2025 | 9781101947845

Quest for the historical Mary. Bible scholar Tabor adds to modern scholarship that argues that the lives of certain biblical characters have been “deliberately erased” by adding Mary, the mother of Jesus, to that list. Though Mary has retained an honored spot in the Christian faith, and a special level of reverence among Catholic believers, especially, Tabor argues that her true life and influence have been completely forgotten by the church and that this

was done entirely by design. The author draws on recent archaeological and textual discoveries but also tends to stretch his suppositions in ways that are plausible but not necessarily probable. He should be credited for making it clear to the reader that Mary was born into a deeply troubled, violent, and dangerous time and place and that dynastic infighting, rebellious fervor, and Roman oppression must have shaped her early life in profound ways. Tabor asserts that Mary, influenced by these experiences, held an outsize sway on the thinking not only of Jesus, but also of John the Baptizer. He boldly declares that Mary “is not only at the heart and soul of what scholars call ‘the Jesus Movement’ but also the glue that held it together.” In order to support this theory, he uses a historical-critical reading of scripture, evidence from apocryphal writings, and simple speculation that can never be proven or disproven. Though it is undeniable that Mary’s place in Christianity was manipulated and mythologized through the centuries (especially in regard to early church discomfort with sexuality), it is far harder to accept whether her “real” role was as broad and profound as Tabor believes. Searching for a clearer picture of who Mary was in her own context is commendable; however, Tabor’s labors come up short of being thoroughly convincing.

Interesting and thought-provoking, but far from being “the Gospel truth.”

JFK: Public, Private, Secret

Taraborrelli, J. Randy | St. Martin’s (592 pp.) $35 | July 15, 2025 | 9781250346384

The man behind the icon.

A Kennedy specialist, Taraborrelli has written six books on the family, but this is the first on JFK. Americans have idolized subsequent presidents for their political views, yet Kennedy and his circle’s glamour captivated the world. The

Female bodies are “extremely understudied and poorly understood.”

THE STRONGER SEX

author states bluntly that Kennedy was assigned the goal of being president by his father, a wealthy, fiercely ambitious Democrat with eyes on the 1940 election who ruined his career when, as ambassador to Britain, early in the war he repeatedly warned FDR not to support a decrepit nation sure to lose to the Nazis. He transferred his ambition to John, who, after well-publicized heroism in the South Pacific, was elected to the House in 1947, Senate in 1953, and presidency in 1960. Taraborrelli is not the first to disparage his political acumen. Kennedy shared the average voter’s fierce anti-communism, kept silent on McCarthyism, and paid little attention to the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement until forced to deal with it as president. Taraborrelli gives priority to his personal life, a disturbing experience for most readers, although his sexual appetite is old news. Plagued throughout life by crippling back pain, he often required crutches, underwent several unsuccessful spinal operations, and patronized dubious personal physicians who kept him going with injections of amphetamines and painkillers. A serial adulterer, JFK’s father had no objection to the son’s behavior but insisted that anyone he married be suitable for a presidential candidate; Jacqueline met his approval, although neither she nor Jack were in love. Most readers will be shocked at how badly he treated her after their 1953 marriage; she seriously considered divorce, although by his years as president they had achieved a deep affection. Other biographers, led by Robert Dallek, delve more deeply into politics, but Taraborrelli nonetheless has written a commendable history. An excellent biography of the 35th president.

The Stronger Sex: What Science Tells Us About the Power of the Female Body

Vartan, Starre | Seal Press (384 pp.)

$30 | July 15, 2025 | 9781541604421

The science of what makes men and women different. Women have long been considered the weaker sex, but their bodies outperform men’s in myriad ways, including in immunity, flexibility, and longevity, argues science writer Vartan. Growing up with her grandmother, who taught her to shoot and whose favorite target was squirrels eating her birdseed, Vartan learned early that women’s strengths are many. Female bodies are “extremely understudied and poorly understood,” she writes. But what research there is sheds light on the role of practice and training in developing athletes and how cultural norms influence how societies have viewed women over time. Among hunter-gatherers, men were superior in power (e.g., spear throwing) and short-distance speed, while women excelled in endurance and shooting accuracy. In modern times, men’s superior strength in throwing, for example, can come down to the amount of practice boys and men get in their young lives, not inherent skill, power, or testosterone. The book considers the impact of widely held beliefs, such as men being better at spatial tasks. Vartan finds research that “simply telling a group of women that they could best the men…improved their scores.” Vartan also asserts that “demeaning

language” about menstruation and women’s reproductive organs is linked to a “lack of interest in studying women’s bodies more broadly.” Far from a constant comparison between male and female, the author delves into issues facing women, like endometrial pain, periods, and childbirth. Citing a broad mix of cultural and scientific examinations, by book’s end, Vartan calls for a more nuanced understanding of female power and concludes that a future beckons in which men and women play sports together, rather than in separately gendered groups, where prowess is based on skill, not sex. A n expansive review of research and cultural history, showcasing how women are strong—yet misunderstood.

Kirkus Star

The Invention of Charlotte Brontë: A New Life

Watson, Graham | Pegasus (288 pp.) $29.95 | August 5, 2025 | 9781639369355

Deeply researched account of the novelist’s final years and the furor that greeted Elizabeth Gaskell’s biography of her friend. Watson opens in 1850, when Brontë was still hiding behind a pseudonym despite the curiosity stirred by the popularity of her novels. Gaskell read Shirley in 1849 and, sensing the grief that underpinned it—Brontë had lost her brother and two sisters in the space of six months—wrote a note to “Currer

Bell”; she received an invitation to the parsonage at Haworth and met the quiet, tiny woman who had written those fiery books. After her death in 1855, Brontë’s father, spurred by a magazine article he considered distorted, asked Gaskell to write an authorized biography. Little did he know that she was already planning one and had written the offending article based on Brontë’s confidences. “Once certain of sympathy, [Brontë] produced set-piece anecdotes about how the comfortless childhood produced an isolated adulthood,” Watson writes in a key passage, calling those anecdotes “a story of self-justification and self-glorification honed over years, which in 1850 met its most responsive listener: Elizabeth Gaskell.” While not unsympathetic to Brontë, Watson makes it clear that she carefully crafted her image to revenge herself, perhaps unconsciously, on those who had failed to love and nurture her: her selfish, demanding father and her late-life husband, Arthur Nicholls, who understood little about her genius. Watson provides a riveting account of Gaskell’s intrepid ferreting out of witnesses to Brontë’s early life, many of whom had their own agendas in shaping her image—as did Gaskell. Outraged cries of libel from those painted as villains in the biography, and the hurt feelings of father and husband, forced Gaskell to delete material from subsequent editions; an excessively detailed account of the elaborate negotiations leading to those revisions is the only flaw in Watson’s brilliant reappraisal of a much-chronicled life.

An essential addition to the vast shelf of Brontëana.

Describing, in astonishing detail, the CIA’s role in every foreign policy crisis since 9/11.

Kirkus Star

The Mission: The CIA in the 21st Century

Weiner, Tim | Mariner Books (336 pp.) $35 | July 15, 2025 | 9780063270183

Peering behind the curtain. This masterful new history should be required reading for anyone who wants to understand the CIA’s place in U.S. foreign policy in the 21st century. Weiner takes us through every foreign policy crisis since 9/11 and describes the CIA’s role, often in astonishing detail. Having written about intelligence and espionage for three decades at the New York Times, his authority is formidable. His previous book on the CIA, Legacy of Ashes, won a National Book Award in 2007. Weiner’s new book stands out for his unprecedented access to CIA officers past and present. As he writes in the foreword: “Among them was the man who created the CIA’s secret prison system, the woman who helped take down the world’s biggest nuclear-weapons technology smuggling ring, a deepcover spy who had put presidents on his payroll, station chiefs who served on four continents, and the sitting chief of the CIA’s clandestine service—a man who had been undercover for thirty-three years and had never talked to a journalist in his life.” The result is a narrative that defies fiction. Among other crucial moments, the book reveals the soul-searching and finger-pointing that nearly derailed the 2013 release by the Senate Intelligence Committee of the Torture Report, which described in horrible detail the interrogation methods used in the battle against al-Qaida. The book also describes the shocking effectiveness of Russian and Chinese cyberattacks. Weiner pegs the difference between the two foes: “China wanted to know their enemies. The Russians simply want to screw them.” Still, the CIA directed the multilateral decade-long intelligence operations that

enabled NATO and Ukraine to prepare for and react quickly to the Russian invasion in 2023. The CIA is the most studied and misunderstood of any U.S. government agency. Weiner’s book is a balanced and nuanced account that should change that. A singular triumph—an intimate chronicle of the CIA, its crises, and its opportunities since 9/11.

Anonymous Male: A Life Among Spies

Whitcomb, Christopher | Random House (320 pp.) | $32 | August 19, 2025 9780593597002

Looking for a fight.

Whitcomb’s last book, the bestselling Cold Zero: Inside the FBI, recounted his escapades in the 1990s as a sniper on the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team (remember the Ruby Ridge and the Branch Davidian standoffs of the early 1990s?). Whitcomb quit the Bureau in 2001 for a new career as a journalist and celebrity commentator on terror for a parade of media organizations. In his new book, he invites readers on a roller-coaster ride through his life’s evolving pursuits, from his childhood on a New Hampshire farm to conflict-resolution G-man and then aspiring foreign correspondent. In 2006 he takes an off-ramp to Somalia to be a freelance intelligence operative and conflict trouble-shooter for hire. “I needed that feeling again, of taunting death but surviving,” he writes. “I needed war, but I needed a war I could manage. As it turned out, I knew just the place.” The place is East Timor, an overgrown island between Indonesia and Australia. On arriving, he describes the scene: “All you could see were sheets of rusted tin, sun-bleached tarps, women with plastic pails, skinny kids running around with sticks. Men sat in packs, trying to look tough. Maybe three thousand people. ‘Watch

yerself, mate,’” he’s told. “‘These blokes will stone their mums.’” In East Timor, Whitcomb assembles a small army charged with guaranteeing security for the fledgling Timorese government (and Australian natural resources prospectors). His company becomes the island’s biggest employer—but he can’t manage what happens after a deadly coup attempt. Whitcomb survives, only to drop by death’s door in the face of a giant wave while surfing in Bali. Traveling with Whitcomb on his self-assigned adventures is entertaining and mostly a pleasure, but this memoir is short on defining facts and conclusions, incidental and moral.

A deftly written romp through the fantastical world of federal agents, warlords, journalists, and the men who bankroll them.

Stan and Gus: Art, Ardor, and the Friendship That Built the Gilded Age

Wiencek, Henry | Farrar, Straus and Giroux (304 pp.) | $29 | July 22, 2025 | 9780374162498

Collaborators, libertines, visionaries. Wiencek dexterously chronicles the fruitful 30-year friendship of architect Stanford White and sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens, who designed grand buildings and public art and ignored sexual taboos, leading to lurid tragedy. White’s Madison Square Garden, topped in 1891 with a Saint-Gaudens sculpture, was the tallest building in a

modernizing Manhattan. In 1906, the venue became an infamous crime scene when the architect was murdered in the Garden’s rooftop theater. Wiencek toggles between ateliers and late-night clubs, detailing the duo’s creative output—their projects included, most enduringly, memorials to presidents and war heroes still displayed in New York, Boston, and elsewhere—and their apparently intertwined love lives. White’s design of a tower for Boston’s Trinity Church was, per a colleague, the work of “an artist of extreme talent and power amounting to genius.” He was a fop befitting a city on the rise, with “flamboyant, spiky red hair” and “see-through silk shirts of pale blue and green.” Saint-Gaudens wasn’t so fancy. Sometimes “dressed like a factory worker” and often battling deep depression, he’d spend months on a sculpture, then angrily destroy it. Saint-G audens and White had complicated sex lives and what the author calls “an erotic relationship” with one another. White, nearing 50, courted and then raped a teen girl, Wiencek writes, and in 1906 the man she’d subsequently married shot the architect to death, setting off a newspaper frenzy. Though Wiencek sometimes fixates on the tiring minutiae of his subjects’ sexual couplings, he effectively contextualizes their work and depicts Saint-Gaudens in particularly memorable detail. While making a large altarpiece featuring reliefs of angels, he filled his studio with lit candles, giving the sculpture’s angels “an unreal appearance, as if they floated.”

A brisk, absorbing portrait of troubled artistic allies whose work embodied an era.

The friendship of an architect and a sculptor who ignored sexual taboos, leading to tragedy.

STAN AND GUS

EDITORS’ PICKS:

Cincinnati Lee, Curse Breaker by Heidi Heilig (Greenwillow Books)

Mistaco by Eliza Kinkz (Kokila)

The Secret Life of a Cemetery: The Wild Nature and Enchanting Lore of Père-Lachaise by Benoît Gallot, illus. by Daniel Casanave, trans. by Arielle Aaronson (Greystone Books)

The Lilac People by Milo Todd (Counterpoint)

THANKS TO OUR SPONSORS:

City Swimmers & Other Stories by Steve Clark

Capital Acts by Stephen Moore, with Johnny Holliday, Steve Lorenz, and Charles David Young

Ashes of the City by Quinton Taylor-Garcia

Fully Booked is produced by Cabel Adkins Audio and Megan Labrise.

Fully Booked

Lili Taylor’s frank, affecting essays chronicle her transformation into an avid birder. BY

MEGAN LABRISE

EPISODE 422: LILI TAYLOR

On this episode of Fully Booked , award-winning actor and author Lili Taylor joins us to discuss Turning to Birds: The Power and Beauty of Noticing. Kirkus calls Taylor’s debut essay collection “a delightful celebration of the joys of birding— and how it leads one to look at the world in a new light.”

Taylor, a star of stage and screen, has appeared in films including Ship of Fools , Ransom , Girls Town , I Shot Andy Warhol , Short Cuts , Dogfight , Say Anything , Public Enemies , and The Conjuring ; on television in HBO’s Subway Stories; and on stage in Three Sisters and Avenue Boys . She sits on the boards of the National Audubon Society and NYC Bird Alliance and lives in Brooklyn, the Hudson Valley, and on location.

Here’s a bit more from our review of Turning to Birds : “In this infectiously exuberant collection of short essays, Taylor describes how she brought her passion for birding back to New York City, where she regularly keeps an eye out for these ‘flying dinosaurs,’ tracking them on the BirdsEye app in her Brooklyn neighborhood and beyond. ‘Wherever I am, wherever I listen,’ she writes, ‘I can tap into that profound energy of survival and draw power from it.’ A thoughtful actor, Taylor wisely finds parallels to birding. The skill she most prizes in her work is listening—focusing her attention on the actor with whom she shares a scene. Investigation is another valuable skill, she believes. She likens herself to a ‘kind of psychological detective, tracking piece after piece of emotional information.’”

Taylor and I explore the wideranging benefits of birding and of deepening one’s connection to the

Turning to Birds: The Power and Beauty of Noticing

Taylor, Lili Crown | 208 pp. | $30 April 29, 2025 | 9780593728574

natural world. We discuss the skills and resources needed for birding, the science of awe, and the impact of awe on self-perception. We discuss the surprising effects of the Tribute in Light on birds—and how volunteers ensure this awe-inspiring 9/11 memorial art installation doesn’t disrupt their migration. Taylor speaks to the importance of sharing her love for birds with others, her service on the boards of NYC Bird Alliance and the National Audubon Society, and much more.

Then editors Laura Simeon, Mahnaz Dar, John McMurtrie, and Laurie Muchnick share their top picks in books for the week.

Mike Fernandez

To listen to the episode, visit Kirkus online.

Children's

FANTASTIC VOYAGES

YEARS LATER, I CAN STILL recall my first trip to Narnia, my first flight to Neverland, and my first meeting with Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and Mrs Which, the enigmatic witchlike trio in Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time. Science fiction and fantasy transported me to far-off lands and introduced me to otherworldly beings while imparting real-world lessons. C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe taught me that no one—not even the traitorous Edmund—is beyond redemption, while Lois Lowry’s The Giver, the story of a seemingly idyllic society revealed to be a rigidly governed dystopia, gave me the courage to question authority.

That’s the beauty of speculative fiction: Its immersive worldbuilding keeps young people enthralled even as they absorb important life lessons. This year’s crop of science fiction and fantasy will not only delight middle graders; it will also leave them braver, more thoughtful, and more deeply empathetic.

In Kyle Lukoff’s A World Worth Saving (Dial Books,

Feb. 4), A Izenson, a 14-yearold Jewish transgender boy whose parents are forcing him to attend conversion therapy meetings run by an organization called SOSAD, contends with feelings of alienation exacerbated by the isolation of the Covid-19 pandemic. When a strange creature calling itself a golem tells A that it’s up to him to right the “great wrongs…brewing across this land,” A is uncertain. But, angered by everyday injustices—like the disappearance of a SOSAD friend who’s being subjected to “further treatment”—he rises to the occasion. Lukoff masterfully blends Jewish lore with a taut narrative rooted in the here and now. Countless titles are described as both timeless and timely; this one truly earns that praise.

One might expect an Usher—a creature neither dead nor alive, tasked with guiding the departed to the various realms of the Afterlife—to be all-knowing, but Clare, the vulpine protagonist of Aubrey Hartman’s The Undead Fox of Deadwood Forest, illustrated by Marcin Minor (Little, Brown, Feb. 25), is wracked with insecurities about both his physical appearance and his very soul; he’s sure that upon his own

demise, he’s destined for the realm of Pain. The arrival of a newly deceased badger sets into motion a journey of selfdiscovery. In this enchanting story, the macabre mingles with playful whimsy as Hartman conjures a world where, even in death, characters are granted the freedom to redefine themselves.

Robots figure heavily in this year’s science fiction— perhaps a reflection of growing concerns with artificial intelligence. In Guojing’s graphic novel Oasis (Godwin Books, Feb. 18), two siblings, left to fend for themselves in a desert wasteland while their mother works in an underground factory, discover an

abandoned robot who becomes a maternal substitute. In Oz Rodriguez and Claribel A. Ortega’s The Girl and the Robot (DisneyHyperion, March 25), an Afro-Latine preteen whose father was recently deported finds a kindred spirit in an automaton from outer space who crash-lands in her Brooklyn neighborhood. These tender and thoughtprovoking tales use fantastical premises to explore immigration, economic inequity, environmental devastation, and the heartache of being separated from loved ones.

Mahnaz Dar is a young readers’ editor.

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

EDITOR’S PICK

A desperate monster hunter gambles on a magical heist. Twelve-year-old apprentice trapper Rosa, whose “not-quite-black hair” goes in “at least seventy-three different directions,” removes deadly monstros under the direction of avó Leonor, her grandmother, but she wishes she could be a keeper and use charms on locks. Unfortunately, the bureaucratic Ministério dos Monstros’ heavy fees squash social mobility, limiting opportunities for people like Rosa and her pickpocket best friend, Tiago, an aspiring tailor, whose hair has “tight coils” and skin is “cork bark–colored.” Right before the Festival of

Lights, an unfair Ministry financial demand threatens to destroy Rosa’s family business. Luckily, her keeper abilities have caught the eye of the mysterious band of thieves the Tea Leaves. All she has to do is pass her audition, pull off the greatest heist of all time, and bond with her teammates—trust is essential for their work. But Rosa struggles with the ways she hasn’t always been a good friend and the lie she told about her keeper status. A late twist adds additional urgency for her success. Rosa’s interpersonal struggles balance perfectly with daring heist sequences, where sudden obstacles

An

Encantadora’s Guide to Monstros and Magic

Mendonca, Sarah J. | Quill Tree Books/ HarperCollins | 384 pp. | $19.99

July 8, 2025 | 9781335012883

strain the Tea Leaves’ abilities and cool. Mendonca’s worldbuilding is exquisite and meticulous— the Portuguese-flavored fantasy world’s history and society (which is grounded in corruption and

conspiracy) is as well developed as the fresh magical system. The epilogue teases an exciting sequel. A phenomenal debut with smooth execution, exciting capers, and heaps of originality. (Fantasy. 8-13)

An excellent historical and mathematical introduction to a key concept.

ZERO! THE NUMBER THAT ALMOST WASN’T

Kirkus Star

Zero! The Number

That Almost Wasn’t

Albee, Sarah | Illus. by Chris Hsu Charlesbridge (40 pp.) | $17.99

March 11, 2025 | 9781623544324

This fun and fascinating story traces the lengthy path from “nothing” to a functioning zero. Albee begins with prehistory (since the concept of nothing long predated the idea of zero) and progresses to the Babylonians, ca. 300 B.C.E., while also noting the Mayans’ independent invention of zero. She then credits the “unknown Indian mathematician” who first wrote zero as a numerical symbol (identified in the timeline as the Bakhshali manuscript), followed by Brahmagupta, who used zero in calculations. Many pages are devoted to the challenges of getting zero to be accepted in Europe, where it eventually enabled calculus and the scientific revolution. The backmatter notes that zero was crucial to computer coding. The book brilliantly traverses the history of zero across time and continents and clearly explains its initial value as a placeholder. Elegant and delightfully intricate illustrations superbly evoke history in clothes and settings. The composition of the spread depicting mathematician Fibonacci is, per the backmatter, “roughly organized [per] the Fibonacci sequence”—an especially clever detail. Numerous figures are brownskinned; many are female. The art alone will grab many readers, who will readily stay to be enthralled by the numbers.

An excellent historical and mathematical introduction to a key concept. (more information on zero, map, bibliography, further reading, timeline, notes about the art) (Informational picture book. 7-10)

Red Canoe Shows Up at Two!

Allenby, Victoria | Pajama Press (24 pp.) $17.95 | June 3, 2025 | 9781772783445

Series: Big, Little Concepts, 9

Eye-catching images help kids master time and colors as a range of watercraft parade by.

“I spent the day / On the dock, / And who chugged up at one o’clock? / An orange tugboat.” Variations on this catchy refrain accompany brilliantly chromatic stock photos of nine different boats that successively hove into view. The time of day is displayed on both digital and analogue clocks; the color changes for each boat, as does the action verb (bobbed , rowed , and zoomed , to name a few). Five of the boats are helmed by grown-ups, all of whom present male. Kids in life vests are depicted, either with the adults or on their own; most appear white. The colors are generally presented in the order of the visible light spectrum—though the orange tugboat precedes the red canoe, and indigo and violet have merged into purple, followed by the brown houseboat, the white sailboat, and the gray kayak. The last caption announces “a rainbow boat party”—but not all the colors appear here, and a new one (pink) is introduced. A final page of fine concept-enforcing suggestions includes putting random finds in “rainbow order,” thinking up

different boat types and colors for 11 and 12 o’clock, and brainstorming activities that can be done in a second, a minute, and an hour.

Useful and attractive introductions to several important concepts. (Picture book. 2-5)

Dive

Anderson, John David | Walden Pond Press/HarperCollins (336 pp.) | $19.99

August 19, 2025 | 9780063279360

A middle schooler tries to find her place in the world.

Thirteen-yearold Kassandra Conner is a talented diver and a new student at a private Catholic school. Her parents chose it for its academic rigor and the sports opportunities her old school didn’t have. But Kass, who lives in an apartment above her family’s struggling restaurant, is lost. She doesn’t fit in with the wealthy kids, her best friend is increasingly distant, and her parents are arguing about money. Her lackluster dives show the toll of all this stress. By chance, Kass meets 17-year-old Miles Dempsey, a high school dropout and fellow outsider who seems to understand her. He dumpster dives, and Kass, who’s intrigued, joins him. Soon, Miles’ “lessons” expand beyond dumpsters to places he visits for free necessities and community. Kass learns there’s more to both Miles and the world than her initial assumptions led her to believe. But she gets in over her head with the lies she tells her parents, ultimately endangering the people she cares about. Irreverent teenage humor blends with reflective third-person narration to create a cast of genuinefeeling characters, including wellmeaning adults, whose worries and interactions feel true to life. Anderson gives his characters room to make mistakes but also to grow, experience consequences, and forgive. Main characters are cued white.

A well-written, introspective story about the assumptions people make and the journey to belonging. (Fiction. 10-14)

The Birds of Christmas

Armstrong, Olivia | Illus. by Mira Miroslavova | Eerdmans (40 pp.)

$18.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9780802856470

A Nativity tale that explores the origins of the robin’s red breast.

Raven flies over the city of Bethlehem on a cold, dark night. Suddenly, a dazzling light appears in the sky, and a powerful voice commands Raven to spread the news to the other birds—a special child has been born. Raven does so, and the others plan their gifts for the child. Wren weaves a soft blanket of leaves and moss, while Nightingale practices a sweet lullaby. As birds from all over gather at the stable where the newborn rests, one small bird laments that she has nothing to give. When a particularly icy wind sweeps into the stable, making the baby shiver, the small bird immediately fans the dying fire’s flames with her wings and brings kindling to warm the baby and his mother, Mary. A stray ember lands on the bird, and a patch of red spreads across her chest. The brilliant color is evidence of the creature’s kind heart, Mary proclaims, and it shall be worn proudly by the bird and her descendants. The title page notes that Armstrong’s story is “based on a European folktale,” though it contains no backmatter on the tale’s origins. Regardless, it features evocative descriptions, accompanied by Miroslavova’s eye-catching, pencil-drawn, digitally colored illustrations in a palette of predominantly purplish blues and reddish browns. Thoughtful layouts contribute to the visual elegance. The baby and Mary are both brown-skinned.

A gracefully told Christmas story. (Picture book. 3-7)

Squirrel and Bird

Baker, Laura | Illus. by Stacey Thomas Tiger Tales (32 pp.) | $18.99 August 19, 2025 | 9781664300866

In this inspired tale of metafiction, best friends Squirrel and Bird get ready for a concert, with the help—and hindrance—of a meddling narrator. Offering condescending and reductive characterizations of both creatures, the unseen narrator immediately rouses Bird’s ire. Squirrel is “loud! Very LOUD!” Bird, on the other hand, “hardly makes a sound at all.” “Squirrel is busy. Busy, busy, busy!” But Bird “prefers to sit and do nothing.” Bird chafes at these flattening descriptions—all of which contradict what’s actually going on in the illustrations as the two animals cheerfully prepare for their performance. As the event draws closer, the narrator lays it on thick (“Squirrel is confident. Bird is shy”) until finally Bird has had “ENOUGH!” and proclaims that all creatures are far more multifaceted than they might appear. Chastened, the narrator agrees: “Bird is a LOT of things. And Squirrel is, too!” Baker’s minimal text is ably supported by Thomas’ muted artwork. Featuring grays and warm yellows, the images evoke the feeling of a classic storybook—one that’s cleverly subverted as the narrative progresses. Dynamic layouts—the occasional use of panels, the word “ENOUGH!” taking up an entire spread—add panache. Bird’s comments are rendered in a unique, flowing typeface. The message is clear: It’s foolish and limiting to attempt to put anyone in a box; there’s so much more to all of us than meets the eye.

Delivers an important lesson with an emotional wallop. (Picture book. 5-7)

Kirkus Star

I Got You

Barnes, Derrick | Illus. by Shamar KnightJustice | Nancy Paulsen Books (32 pp.)

$18.99 | July 15, 2025 | 9780593111451

When Mom and Dad bring baby Rasheed home for the first time, it’s love at first sight for big brother Anthony. As the boys grow, Anthony teaches his little sibling how to build a tower with blocks (and how to knock it down with a loud “WHOP!!!”), how to ride a bike, and even how to fly (through a well-timed leap from the swings). When thunder and lightning wake them both one night, Anthony assuages Rasheed’s fears with the book’s titular refrain: “I got you.” But one day Anthony goes for a bike ride with his friends, leaving Rasheed alone and hurt. That night, Anthony explains that while he may spend time with his peers, his bond with Rasheed is unbreakable. And as the book comes to a close, with Mom and Dad introducing the boys to their new little sibling, Anthony leaves Rasheed with perhaps the greatest lesson of all: how to be a supportive big brother himself. Narrated by Rasheed, Barnes’ text is elegant in its simplicity, loving yet never saccharine, and always emotionally honest. Using varied perspectives, Knight-Justice’s richly hued, collagelike digital illustrations combine a patchwork of textures and patterns, immersing readers in this affectionate Black family’s world. Greens and blues dominate the pages, bringing to life an idyllic suburban setting.

Brotherly love and Black joy abound in this brilliantly told tribute to the ties that bind. (Picture book. 4-8)

Delivers an important lesson with an emotional wallop.

SQUIRREL AND BIRD

Search for the Sunken Statue

Beil, Michael D. | Illus. by Torborg Davern | Pixel+Ink (304 pp.) | $17.99

June 17, 2025 | 9781645951995

Series: The Swallowtail Legacy, 3

Lark’s aunt Abigail arrives on Swallowtail Island and starts making waves—but Lark isn’t about to let her dreams be capsized. The third book in the Swallowtail Legacy series finds 12-year-old Lark settling into island life. She enjoys school and the soccer team. She still misses her late mother but feels better about her blended family, who were cued as white in earlier entries. Lark and her younger sister, Pip, are happy that their inheritance from their mother provides a home for them all. So when Aunt Abigail, Mom’s estranged sister, arrives on the island and says that half the house and property is hers, Lark is outraged—and suspicious. Aunt Abigail has a reputation for shady deals, especially in her role as an art gallery owner. And the inheritance isn’t the only reason she’s on the island; an explorer invited her to authenticate a bronze statue worth millions that was salvaged from Lake Erie. After it’s stolen, Lark is sure Aunt Abigail will benefit from the insurance claim. Beil has created an appealing protagonist in spirited Lark, who, as series fans will expect, follows her hunches and uncovers clues the adults around her miss, even though she’s distracted by offers from two exclusive soccer programs. Supported by family and friends, Lark gets to the bottom of the

entertaining shenanigans, then charts a course for her own future. An enjoyable caper. (map) (Mystery. 8-12)

M Is for Mason Jar: A Homesteading Alphabet

Bennett Fraiser, Carolyn | Illus. by Sally Garland | Familius (32 pp.) | $17.99

August 12, 2025 | 9781641709668

What do homesteading kids do? Here’s an alphabet of answers!

The family at the center of this ABC book keeps busy with varying tasks, many of which involve getting fresh air: “E is for eggs,” “H is for harvest,” “L is for livestock,” “O is for orchards,” and more. But quite a lot goes on indoors: baking, canning, sewing, and enjoying the Yule log. Some topics may be unfamiliar (not all readers will have visited a root cellar, for instance), but several examples speak to universally resonant moments, like many youngsters’ habit of forgetting items left under the bed. The family members—who vary in skin tone and include three children and three adults—are often accompanied by a small white dog with brown spots, curiously poking its nose into things. Brief, clear, alliterative text adds a bit more information for each letter: “W is for windmills that pump water from wells all winter long.” Alternating vignettes with full-page spreads, the watercolorlike art is realistic, soft-edged, and gently imperfect. A final page offers a list of helpful activities that homesteading kids—or, for most suggestions, any other youngsters—could practice. This engaging book might introduce

An inventive story filled with endearing characters and delicious intrigue.

urban and suburban audiences to a way of life both old and new. An upbeat tribute to an existence marked by hard work but nevertheless filled with joy. (Picture book. 3-5)

The Library of Unruly Treasures

Birdsall, Jeanne | Illus. by Matt Phelan | Knopf (352 pp.) | $17.99

August 5, 2025 | 9780525579045

Neglected and uprooted, an 11-year-old finds a surprising new family. Gwen MacKinnon has been sent to live with Great-Uncle Matthew in Massachusetts while her father sorts out a new apartment in St. Louis after splitting with his third wife and her mother moves to Costa Rica with her boyfriend. Uncertain about her future, Gwen finds solace in knowing that a library in her new town shares her name: the MacKinnon Library. What she doesn’t know is that the children’s section of this library is populated by the Lahdukan, small, winged people with turquoise hair who can only be seen and heard by children under 7—and, surprisingly, Gwen. Great-Uncle Matthew thinks the Lahdukan are a game of pretend that the children play, but they’re real, and they’re in trouble. Their library home is undergoing construction, and they must find a new place to live. The Lahdukan thrive on archaic prophesies, one of which has told of the coming of a new Qalba—a human girl from the MacKinnon family who will help their clan. Much to Gwen’s shock, the Lahdukan tell her she’s the new Qalba. Birdsall gives the coming-of-age theme a fresh spin in her inventive story, one that’s filled with endearing, quirky characters and delicious intrigue involving Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Phelan’s lively black-and-white illustrations add visual interest. Gwen

and Great-Uncle Matthew appear to be white.

Enchanting. (author’s note, pronunciation guide) (Fiction. 8-12)

The Speedysaurus

Bright, Rachel | Illus. by Chris Chatterton Scholastic (32 pp.) | $8.99 paper August 5, 2025 | 9781546175667

When a little dino falters while learning to ride a bike, her Grannysaur pedals in to offer some much-needed encouragement.

The youngster dreams of being a Speedysaurus and winning all the medals at the annual Big Bicycle Day races. But she’s more of a Wibblysaurus on her brand-new bike. Luckily, Grannysaur, wearing a snazzy helmet and pink-and-yellow polka dot scarf, speeds in and opens up about the struggles she faced while learning to ride. Speedysaurus’s salty tears soon vanish. After complimenting Speedysaurus on her numerous attempts, Grannysaur reminds her that “all the BEST things take a while.” Grannysaur has many tricks to share, and Speedysaurus adds a few of her own. At the end of the day, the two dinos ride together in the tandem race. Featuring strong verbs, the rhyming text captures all the jitters, scrapes, and ouches of the failures and the joys of successfully finding one’s footing. Illustrations with the look of soft pastels highlight the strong, loving relationship between Grannysaur and Speedysaurus. The appealing visuals also add a layer of calm and reassurance for anyone who might be struggling to overcome a challenge. Although the conclusion is a bit didactic, it’s also gently bolstering; youngsters will eagerly embrace Speedysaurus’ “I-can-do-it ZING!”

A sweet reminder that practice combined with loving family support can help overcome life’s speed bumps. (Picture book. 3-7)

The World Entire: A True Story of an Extraordinary World War II Rescue

Brown, Elizabeth | Illus. by Melissa Castrillón Chronicle Books (68 pp.) | $19.99 September 2, 2025 | 9781452170985

A tribute to a Portuguese bureaucrat who defied his own government to help thousands of refugees escape as Nazi armies swept through France.

Being part of a large family, Aristides de Sousa Mendes was accustomed to opening his villa’s kitchen regularly to feed his less fortunate neighbors. As consul general in Bordeaux, France, near the Spanish border, he chose principle over the orders of his country’s foreign ministry when faced with floods of refugees in 1940. Over 23 frantic days in June and July, he organized efforts to grant visas to all comers—even setting up a table in the street and personally leading one refugee group over an obscure border crossing—before being summoned back to Portugal and summarily stripped of his job and even ousted from his home. Brown tells her tale simply and with rhetorical flourish as Mendes counters the repeated “No. No. No” of his superiors with a defiant chorus of “Yes. Yes. Yes, yes, yes.” She fills in further details with a timeline and a long afterword that notes the many posthumous honors for what she characterizes as possibly “the greatest individual act of rescue in all of World War II.” In somber-toned illustrations, Castrillón surrounds her sober, dignified main figure with lively children and tight groups of weary-looking families in period dress.

An inspiring, well-earned salute. (source notes, bibliography) (Picture-book biography. 7-9)

Eating To Save the Planet: How Veganism Helps Fight Climate Change

Broyles, Anne | Illus. by Hannah Li

Holiday House (128 pp.) | $19.99

August 19, 2025 | 9780823452262

Series: Books for a Better Earth

Readers are invited to “save the planet, one meal at a time.” Avoiding a hard sell, Broyles lays out, in seven chapters, the argument that adopting a vegan diet can help combat the environmental crisis. She starts with the basics as a colorful graphic from Li helps define the terms herbivore, carnivore, and omnivore, as well as vegan , flexitarian , and vegetarian . The author touches on the intersection between food and culture and succinctly summarizes the origin and effects of climate change. Although Broyles clearly identifies corporations as the drivers of the meat industry, she also invites readers to calculate their own carbon footprints—a concept that’s drawn criticism, as it shifts the emphasis away from the systemic causes. She calculates the environmental costs of raising livestock (cows in particular), leading to a detailed takedown of the meat industry. Broyles offers alternatives to factory farming and to meat eating; she also demonstrates that merely cutting back on meat consumption would reduce one’s environmental footprint, but her focus is on introducing and promoting veganism, and she explains its rationale, history, and practice. She concludes by listing several well-known vegans and addressing a key concern for some parents: Will a vegan diet supply enough protein and other nutrients? The writing is direct and accessible, with sidebars to clarify unfamiliar terms. Cartoon-style images depict diverse kids.

A gentle but persuasive case for vegan eating. (further resources, bibliography, source notes, index) (Nonfiction. 9-12)

For more by Elizabeth Brown, visit Kirkus online.

The School for Thieves

Burns, Peter | Aladdin (352 pp.)

$18.99 | August 26, 2025 | 9781665982283

Series: The School for Thieves, 1

An orphaned street urchin is recruited into an elite school for thieves.

In an alternate world where France is the dominant world power, 13-year-old Tom Morgan has had to scrimp, starve, and steal on the streets of London to survive. Born into a workhouse, he doesn’t know anything about his father, while his mother may have been from North Africa. One thing he does know is the sort of cruelty that awaits the poor who are sent to the workhouse, and he’s determined not to go back. But when their camp is raided and his friends are captured by workhouse agents, the only thing Tom can think of is how to get them out. Enter the Corsair, a cunning and mysterious man with a proposition: He wants to recruit Tom into Beaufort’s School for Deceptive Arts. From nabbing treasures to forging identity papers, Beaufort’s promises to teach Tom everything he needs to know to become a Shadow Thief and a member of the Shadow League, the secret global organization that helps keep the world’s political power in balance. But Beaufort’s has its own rules and secrets, and if Tom is to survive long enough to help his friends, he’ll need to figure them out quickly. Clever and gripping, this fast-paced boarding school story will appeal to fans of the Mysterious Benedict Society and Spy School series. A thrilling first installment in an adventurous new series. (Adventure. 10-14)

An enlightening examination of the gallimaufry that is English.

STAR SAILOR

Star Sailor: The Story of Words

Cassidy, Sara | Illus. by Julie McLaughlin | Orca (40 pp.) | $21.95

August 19, 2025 | 9781459836631

A starter kit for young etymologists. Words are essential—but what is a word? Where did our words come from? And how do words change over time? Cassidy discusses word roots and stems, portmanteaux and compound words, words “named for what they remind us of” (such as a computer mouse), and terms named after the people who came up with them (including the braille system and the Apgar score). The pages are stuffed with fascinating facts, such as the assertion that 10 new English words are created every day on average. The author also covers the evolution of words, explaining that sometimes longer words are shortened (influenza becoming flu), that mispronunciations often give birth to new words, and that words can be playful (yes giving way to yep, yeah, and even yeppers). Cassidy considers some of the many words English has borrowed from Yiddish, Turkish, Chinese, Japanese, Hindi, and more—including First Peoples’ languages. Questions addressed to readers will elicit active engagement; a section that invites kids to say various onomatopoeic words aloud promises plenty of participatory play. McLaughlin’s lineless, slightly simplified but realistically detailed color cartoons against flat backgrounds allow the words to shine. The art is attractive and clarifies the text: On one page,

LEGO-style blocks demonstrate how prefixes and suffixes can be used to build words; maps locate the countries from which words have arrived. An appealing and enlightening examination of the gallimaufry that is English. (Informational picture book. 6-9)

Anomalies 53: Into the Shadows

Cervantes, Angela | Harper/HarperCollins (224 pp.) | $18.99 | August 12, 2025 9780063245884 | Series: Anomalies 53, 1

For best friends

Ollie and Garen, home is an underground lab filled with magical creatures. Deep within the Nevada desert, Area 53 is home to beings like wyverns, golems, and llamacorns (not to be mistaken for Area 51’s alien counterparts). The government keeps the “earthborn mythical creatures” known as anomalies contained, hoping their magic holds the key to stopping the constant apocalyptic lightning storms. For 11-year-old Ollie Robles and 13-year-old Garen Jackson, whose parents lead the research, Area 53 is all they’ve ever known. And as the only two kids there, they’ve been “onlies” from the start—each other’s only option for a friend. But when Ollie accidentally triggers the emergency alarm system, some of the anomalies escape. Now, the duo must track them down before disaster strikes. Their chase leads them into the Shadowland, a hidden realm teeming with creatures of legend—chupacabras, kappa, ogres, and more. Along the way, they uncover

secrets their parents never meant for them to discover, forcing them to question everything they thought they knew about themselves and the world they inhabit. With heart, humor, and high stakes, this whirlwind story explores the delicate balance between discovery and destruction. Themes of friendship, perseverance, and the search for truth run throughout, making this an exciting read for lovers of adventure and mythology alike

A rollicking, fast-paced fantasy adventure in which science meets myth. (Fantasy. 8-12)

Giving Thanks With Halmoni:

Celebrating Chuseok, the Korean Harvest Festival

Choi, Kathleen & Sook Nyul Choi | Illus. by Il Sung Na | Red Comet Press (32 pp.)

$19.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9781636551616

A young girl wants to make the Korean Harvest Festival extra special for her grandmother. On this day, families come together, remember their ancestors, and enjoy a feast—similar to Thanksgiving. This is the first year that Su-Jin’s Halmoni will be away from Korea, and Su-Jin confides in her pals Maddie and Keisha that she’s afraid her grandmother will miss her friends and family. So the girls ask Halmoni to teach them how to observe Chuseok. Together, they wrap small ceremonial gifts known as bojagi and cook traditional dishes such as japchae noodles and scallion pancakes. They invite their friends, and the celebration is a vibrant success, with everyone trying new foods and sharing family stories. The lively descriptions of the holiday convey a sense of warmth as Halmoni is welcomed into the community. The illustrations have a subtle sweetness that delights. Chuseok is a lunar holiday, and images of the moon abound; it all culminates in a luminous full moon. A traditional Korean quilt hanging on the wall contains vibrant

geometrical patterns that are echoed throughout the book. Several pages are divided into panels focusing on key moments or objects (a bottle of sesame oil, hands rolling songpyeon, or rice cakes shaped like half-moons). Maddie is light-skinned, Keisha is brown-skinned, and their community is diverse. Heartwarming and festive. (more information on Chuseok) (Picture book. 4-8)

The Pink Pajamas: A Story About Love and Loss

Chua, Charlene | Simon & Schuster (40 pp.) $19.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9781665943161

A pair of pants sewn with love helps a child of Chinese descent remember a relative. The young protagonist adores family visits with Yeye and Popo (Grandpa and Grandma) each week. Upon arriving, the child always runs straight to Ah Yi (Auntie). Ah Yi doesn’t verbally express her love; instead, she sews the youngster pajamas: “They are soft. They are comfortable. And they are always just the right length.” Onomatopoeia (“CLACK! CLACK!”) is strategically placed, connecting Ah Yi to her foot-pumped sewing machine. “The sound is music to my ears; when I hear it, I know Ah Yi is home.” But today, the pj’s Ah Yi has made aren’t a hit, because…“they are PINK!” Expressive cartoons textured with bold lines and colors clearly display the youngster’s disappointment. The child’s reaction isn’t lost on Ah Yi, who promises to make another pair. But a sudden illness lands Ah Yi in the hospital; she soon passes. The gentle narration flows naturally as the protagonist reels at the funeral; dissatisfied at the store-bought jammies purchased by Mom, the little one grieves further. Spying the pink jammies tucked away in a drawer, the child tries them on again and realizes they’re a perfect fit after all. And there’s something else in the drawer: Ah Yi’s sewing patterns (“her way of saying…I

will love you—always”). Chua brings the tale to a satisfying ending as the child follows in Ah Yi’s footsteps. A charming tribute to a lost loved one. (Picture book. 5-8)

Beverley, Bat Your Service

Collier, Kelly | Atheneum (48 pp.) | $19.99 August 26, 2025 | 9781665962810

An eager bat finally gets the chance to host guests at his dilapidated home. Beverley loves entertaining company. Sadly, no one ever comes over. Beverley can’t understand it. The wallpaper is peeling, the roof has holes, and cobwebs are everywhere…why won’t anyone visit?! But one rainy afternoon, Beverley hears a commotion downstairs. Guests have arrived! And not just any guests. “PEOPLE GUESTS!” (A “sold” sign by the house and the many suitcases the newcomers bring will clue readers in: It’s move-in day for this hapless family.) Beverley can hardly contain his excitement. To make them feel at home, he writes a cheery message in drippy red paint on the mirror: “WELCOME / STAY FOREVER.” He sprays “Eau de Rotten Eggs” (Grandma’s favorite scent). And to make their stay complete, he whips up “millipede Bolognese”—with a worm soufflé for dessert, of course. Beverley’s brand of hospitality isn’t quite what the humans had in mind. Convinced they’ve moved into a haunted house, the two adults and one youngster (plus the dog) look increasingly horrified as the day goes on, but the other kiddo wears a huge smile. Beverley has managed to impress one guest! The delightfully creepy, not-so-spooky house sets the mood, with many tiny details to pore over. Full-page spreads are mixed with vignettes, featuring jagged speech bubble screams (not from joy). The family is light-skinned.

A quirky look at the fine line between caring and scaring. (Picture book. 4-7)

A quiet meditation on the delight of simply observing the changing world.

THE BLUE VELVET CHAIR

Kirkus Star

The Blue Velvet Chair

Cortez, Rio | Illus. by Aaron Marin | Denene Millner Books/Simon & Schuster (40 pp.)

$19.99 | August 19, 2025 | 9781665912594

A favorite chair and a window help a youngster make sense of the passing of time. The mother and child at the center of this tale have many ways to keep track of time, from the ticking of the clock to the pencil marks on the wall noting the youngster’s height. But best of all is the window that opens out onto a view of multicolored buildings and a garden. Each morning, the pajama-clad youngster climbs onto a blue velvet armchair and gazes out; it’s the perfect vantage point for a small person to observe the shifting seasons. A flower drawn on the glass in a condensation of breath is a sign that winter’s here. In warmer months, a cat cleans itself on a nearby rooftop, while people dance. Blossoms appear on the trees in spring; bright leaves fall in autumn. Cortez and Marin deftly marry potent visuals (the window framing the world outside) with tactile sensations such as the warmth of the window glass in summer. Marin’s illustrations rely on a marvelous palette of deliciously rendered colors, evoking a comfortable tenderness between mother and child. Sky, clouds, blossoms, leaves, light, cozy living room, kitchen, and the soft-looking chair convey a sense of peace and safety; in this loving home, the passage of time is noted and celebrated. The characters present Black. A quiet meditation on the sweet delight of simply observing the changing world. (Picture book. 3-7)

The Black Mambas: The World’s First All-Woman Anti-Poaching Unit

Crull, Kelly | Millbrook/Lerner (40 pp.)

$19.99 | April 1, 2025 | 9798765627259

On patrol with an all-women unit of rangers who work to protect the rhinos, pangolins, and other rare wildlife of South Africa’s Olifants West Nature Reserve from poachers.

Crull notes that eight out of 10 rhinos in the preserve and its surrounding national park have disappeared in the past 15 years, so the rangers really have their work cut out for them. He introduces 20 members of the closely knit, all-Black unit in an opening gallery. Using big, bright color photos interspersed with views of giraffes and other wild park residents, he goes on to show them in training, out on patrol, and even staking out a poachers’ campsite in a night operation. Crull enhances his terse descriptive commentary by letting several rangers speak for themselves through direct quotes— about their backgrounds, the importance of their mission, and the joy they take in belonging to a sisterhood. Unit esprit shines throughout, while the real dangers of the work are downplayed. In fact, rather than demonize their sometimes violent foes, one ranger even offers a bit of empathy: “Poachers are people like you and me. They are trying to feed their families.” The generous backmatter includes portraits of nine native animals, with their names in the Sepedi language spoken in southern Africa, and numerous leads to further

information about African wildlife and those who protect it. Admiring glimpses of women in a vital, challenging line of work. (author’s note, NATO phonetic alphabet) (Informational picture book. 7-9)

Oddity Woods

Davault, Kay | Atheneum (384 pp.)

$24.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9781665915847

Series: Oddity Woods, 1

Mystery and confusion reign in Oddity Woods, where haunted passages and dangerous dealings with shadowy creatures await. When 13-yearold Marietta’s adoptive father disappears after a cryptic SOS call, she seeks help in the nearby town of Perdita, where he worked with the police. But the town’s police are dismissive, saying they’re too busy to follow up on a “silly ghost story.” To keep children out, people say that “deep in the woods, a ghost train appears, which steals your soul if you ride it.” Trusting her instincts, Marietta runs directly into those storied woods. Upon crossing a mystical threshold that disappears behind her, she finds herself in an otherworldly realm. A boy named Wyatt with a mysterious past appears to be the only living human in a landscape otherwise populated with monsters and ghosts. After escaping a terrifying encounter with the conductor of the ghost train, the two team up, working together to find Marietta’s father and get Wyatt home. Originally released as a webcomic, this series opener features luminescent and evocative artwork reminiscent of chibi-style manga. The illustrations effectively convey threats, movement, and emotions. Though the latter half of the book gets a bit complicated by added characters and side quests, the magical gadgets, compelling

characters, and exciting twists give the story strong appeal for young fantasy fans. Most human characters are white presenting. A visually thrilling adventure. (author’s note, character files) (Graphic fantasy. 8-13)

I Am Tree Rex!

Davey, Mo | Berbay Publishing (40 pp.)

$18.99 | March 4, 2025 | 9781922610799

A tree-hugging dinosaur adopts a leafy disguise to scare off woodcutters in this engagingly bonkers ecocentric episode.

Rex is shocked when his daily tally of the 21 trees outside his rocky house (count them!) comes up one short; he gets teary when a small, displaced bird shows up at his door and explains that the tree was cut down. Continued sounds of chopping and ever-shorter tree counts—plus the arrival of a whole flock of newly homeless birds—at last lead to Rex’s desperate ploy of dressing in brown beneath a crown of leaves and roaring out the titular declaration. Davey does an artful job of toning down the level of conflict for younger or more sensitive audiences; not only do Rex and the diminutive twig-waving avian supporters at his back form distinctly nonthreatening presences even at their most defiant, but the “tree takers,” entirely unseen in the simply drawn cartoon illustrations, are obliquely represented by glimpses of stumps, the occasional axe, and a distant tractor beating a hasty retreat. The message that it’s important to protect trees comes through loud and clear, however, underscored by closing views

of Rex and the birds planting seeds for a new forest.

A hug-worthy call to action, delivered with a wink. (Picture book. 5-7)

The Mushroom of Doom!

Davies, Becky | Illus. by Thomas Elliott Union Square Kids (40 pp.) | $18.99

August 26, 2025 | 9781454961192

Series: Mushroom of Doom

A series of kitchen mishaps radicalize a grudgeholding shroom. The story opens in media res, with an expressive button mushroom plummeting into a whirring blender toward certain death. Cue the record scratch—you’re probably wondering how this fungus fell from grace—and we flash back to rosier times. It’s pizza night, and the fridge teems with animated veggies grinning nervously as they await selection. But when pineapple makes the final cut and strips the mushroom of his pizza-star status, the culinary slight ignites a descent into madness that endures all the way to the compost heap. Dubbing himself the Mushroom of Doom, he assembles an army of fungi amenable to exacting revenge. Readers won’t be shocked when Doom’s tyranny extends to the treatment of his goon squad, but they may be surprised when even the selflessness of a brave former fridgemate isn’t enough to inspire a return to the straight and narrow. Delightful visual details—particularly Doom’s transformation into not-so-fun-guy— complement a narrative structured like a graphic novel and a text jam-packed with groan-worthy puns. While the inciting incidents feel a little scattered, on the whole, the pleasing narrative

A hug-worthy call to action, delivered with a wink.

invokes familiar themes, sitting somewhere at the intersection of Aaron Blabey’s Bad Guys series and Jory John and Pete Oswald’s Food Group collection. Its subversive conclusion, too, offers a fun twist on the redemption arc some readers have come to expect. A witty acknowledgment that sometimes it feels good to be bad. (Picture book. 6-9)

Fix-It Familia

Diaz, Lucky | Illus. by Micah Player Harper/HarperCollins (32 pp.)

$19.99 | April 29, 2025 | 9780063359611

The Fix-It Familia gets the job done! Each morning, Chavo’s Mami and Papi—“jacksof-all-trades” who can repair just about everything—head out to put things right all over Los Angeles. On Saturdays, Chavo goes with them; equipped with tool belts and a trusty toolbox, this family works together, traveling the city helping those in need. They come to the rescue when a truck spills tomatoes all over the road and replace a faulty belt on a tortilla press. Guided by a cheerful mantra—“No job is too big. / No task is too small. / We’re the Fix-It Familia. We help one; we help all!”—they tackle their biggest challenge yet: a crushed parade float. With some creativity, teamwork, and support from neighbors, Chavo reimagines the float, bringing the community’s vision to life just in time for the big event. Themes of collaboration, perseverance, and positivity shine through in both Latin Grammy Award winner Diaz’s peppy verse and Player’s vibrant, friendly digital illustrations. Chavo’s family reads Latine and speaks a blend of Spanish and English. Rhyming stanzas give the story a whimsical rhythm that makes it perfect for read-alouds; youngsters will especially admire Chavo’s can-do spirit.

A joyful celebration of community and problem-solving at its finest. (link to a song inspired by the book, author’s note) (Picture book. 4-8)

THE KIRKUS Q&A: ADRIANNA CUEVAS

The author’s story of an alien in a small town recalls classic science fiction—and speaks to the current political moment.

BY ILANA BENSUSSEN EPSTEIN

Adrianna Cuevas has been entertaining young readers for years with her delightfully spooky horror novels; past outings feature ghosts, zombies, and a witch. Now, in her latest book, What Fell From the Sky, aliens take center stage in a gripping and timely story that calls back to classic science fiction.

“Alien is one of my favorite movies ever,” Cuevas told Kirkus from her home just south of Austin, Texas. “And once my book became historical fiction, it immediately called up ET for me.” The historical aspect she references is the depiction of a real U.S. military operation during one week in 1952 that saw a small town overrun by a pretend “Aggressor Nation” as a Cold War training exercise.

What Fell From the Sky transposes the story onto the fictional town of Soledad, Texas, where a young boy named Pineda watches events unfold and reckons with a discovery all his own: an alien he dubs Luisa, who has been separated from her parents and soon faces the real aggression of the conveniently stationed military. We spoke with Cuevas over Zoom to learn more; our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Pineda felt like an outsider in his own town.

I have a linguistics background, and I’m an ESL teacher, so I had fun deciding what language Luisa was going to learn, and how she was going to acquire it. That’s how I landed on the whole conceit of using the alphabet, like “S is for stranger.”

Alien stories provide an opportunity to explore an outsider’s point of view on human behaviors. What did you want to highlight in Luisa’s voice?

What’s interesting is that the original draft of the manuscript was not told from a dual perspective; it was told completely from Pineda’s viewpoint. As I went over issues with my editor, I realized they could be solved if I split the narra -

tive and gave Luisa her own perspective. Doing that opened up the story. I was trying to explore the experience of being in a situation where everything is new to you; you’re an outsider. I explored that a bit with Cuba in My Pocket, which is about my dad’s immigration story but completely fantastical; dropping an alien down in the middle of rural 1950s Texas highlighted how

It’s interesting to hear you’re an ESL teacher, because one aspect I appreciated was how little of the Spanish dialogue is directly translated in the text. I want to honor bilingual readers; it’s boring for a bilingual reader to read Spanish and then English. It slows down the story, and it’s sometimes unnatural because characters wouldn’t actually be speaking in this way. I didn’t want to

alienate anyone with my story, though, because I want it to be for everyone. The language teacher in me was thinking, I know exactly how to do this . I’ve always taught my students to look at context clues— it’s a good skill for young readers to develop—and I’ve found that young readers are more tolerant of [potentially unfamiliar language] than older readers are.

What was the research process like for the historical fiction portion of the story? I went to the county museum where the event took place, Lampasas, Texas. When I walked into the museum and said, “Your town was part of this minute part of Texas history, and I’m going to write a book about it,” they were so excited. They went up in the attic and

Adrianna Cuevas

pulled down boxes of artifacts, news articles, even videos of interviews with townspeople who were alive during that time. They spent the whole day with me. It was phenomenal, and this book would not exist without them.

Anytime I give a talk on this book and say that it’s based on something that really happened, people can’t believe that a whole town was taken over by the army. I kept thinking back to several years ago in Texas, when we had all the undocumented minors bused in. There were people in town who protested the buses, and I kept thinking, The poor kids sitting in these buses and seeing all these angry faces. I feel like

this book should end on a hopeful note, but in my mind, it doesn’t. In the end, Pineda is hoping things will be better in the future—and in my opinion they’re not. We’re still doing the same things that Pineda had to fight against. When I wrote it, though, I wanted to give him a sense of hope, because I think our kids still need that. If they’ve lost their sense of hope, of what the future can be, then forget it—we’re done. I think that’s what we end up relying on, the fact that kids are more hopeful than adults.

There’s one adult in this story who seems to have that galvanizing hope still, and that’s Corporal Shipley. He doesn’t hesitate to help

the kids, despite his role in the army.

Given the historical time period, this was right when the military was [first] integrated, and it wasn’t going well. Shipley sees himself in Luisa’s struggle, he sees himself in Pineda’s struggle, and it’s a little more believable that he’s willing to help them. We’re seeing too much these days of “I’m just doing what I was told,” and we know that hasn’t gone well in the past. I was glad I had a character like Shipley to show it’s OK to go against what’s expected. He’s not being treated like he should be, and he doesn’t get recognized as a commanding officer by the white soldiers. He’s still proud of his service; those

two things can exist at the same time. I think it’s like what a lot of us experience these days. The second you express any criticism of the government or the country, it’s, “Well, why don’t you leave if you don’t love this country?” No, these two things can happen at the same time. I love living in Texas, I love the people here, I love the various cultures here, and we have an absolute trash state government that I will constantly rally against. That doesn’t mean I want to leave.

is my passion in storytelling, to take kids on an adventure.

As we’ve touched on, this is a timely book. Did you set out with that goal in mind? When I started writing this book, I did not expect the themes to be so relevant, and while I’m not glad that these things are happening, I am glad I can give kids a resource to understand them. This is my passion in storytelling, to take kids on an adventure, whether it be science fiction, mystery, or horror, and use the genre to help kids explore big themes or heavy topics. If this book can get kids to think about those around them, and question who’s being excluded and why, then I’ve done my job as a storyteller.

It’s funny, my intention with books is always just to get kids to have fun. The themes never come to me as I’m writing; plot and telling a good story are always my first motivation. I think I luck into my themes sometimes. It’s not until I start getting trade reviews that say “Cuevas explores…” that I think, Oh, I guess I did do that! Go, me!

Ilana Bensussen Epstein is a writer and filmmaker in Boston.

Kirkus Star

Zip Zap Wickety Wack:

A Story About Sharing

Diffee, Matthew | Neal Porter/ Holiday House (48 pp.) | $18.99

September 30, 2025 | 9780823458714

In New Yorker cartoonist Diffee’s children’s book debut, animals unite after a barnyard spat draws an unusual mediator.

“The cow says ‘Moo.’ The horse says ‘Neigh.’” But what begins like a primer takes a quick turn when “the sheep says, ‘Baa’” and the goat also claims the sound as its own. No matter that the sheep said it first—“I’ve said baa since I was a kid,” retorts the indignant goat. The dog offers a diplomatic solution that just generates more drama as the barnyard animals become understandably possessive about their signature sounds. The sheep decides to “think of something that no one has ever said” and, after much pondering (and a little pooping), proudly lands on an extended version of the wacky titular catchphrase. “No one says that, right?” Wrong. A pint-size pink alien whizzes in to claim the phrase and suggests a civil compromise—though, as it turns out, the extraterrestrial can’t quite practice what he preaches. Wax and pleasingly shaded colored pencil art on tawny pages features deftly expressive animals in otherwise spare, earnestly pastoral scenes that contrast with the wryly funny plot. The characters’ nonchalant rapport is well conveyed, with text rendered in a clean serif font of varying scale for added visual oomph. Clever humor and a fresh take on a seemingly

familiar scene make this a widely appealing, expertly paced, and wonderfully silly read-aloud. Unexpected and delightfully absurd. (Picture book. 4-8)

The Marvelous Now

DiTerlizzi, Angela | Illus. by Lorena Alvarez Gómez | Little, Brown (40 pp.) $18.99 | July 29, 2025 | 9780316500036

Series: The Magical Yet, 3

An ode to destressing— and living in the moment. Everyone gets exhausted and anxious—it’s inevitable. We all have lots going on and loads to do; sometimes we feel rushed or overwhelmed. But don’t fret, this calming book, expressed in jaunty verses, assures readers. We can soothe frazzled nerves by focusing on the present. How? By admitting the Marvelous Now into our lives. As a light-skinned, dark-haired child looks on, a wide-eyed, smiley blue sprite with twirly, ribbonlike appendages and plum-colored spots on its face and head appears. Under its tutelage, the once-harried kiddo begins unwinding, for “Now knows exactly what it will take / to give your brain and your body a break.” DiTerlizzi lists some suggestions to help wind down, which every child (and even adult) should heed: finding one’s “happy place,” taking a walk, being aware of the sights, sounds, and smells all around, making art, counting backward, and more. Some ideas are a little easier than others to put into practice; readers will need guidance before trying out yoga or tai chi, for instance. Still, kids will be reassured to

A pleasingly creepy tale from a promising writer who lives up to his name.

know that they can employ simple, practical tools whenever they need to feel less worried. Alvarez Gómez’s cheerful, colorful digital illustrations burst with energy, setting an appropriately empowering tone. Background characters are diverse. Now’s the time to pick up this primer on mindfulness. (Picture book. 5-8)

500 Dreams: A Bedtime Seek-and-Find

Eckford, Jennifer | Illus. by Natalia Rojas Castro | Magic Cat (64 pp.) | $22.99 August 19, 2025 | 9781419779701

Which dream will you choose? Seek and ye shall find! That’s the imaginative premise of this engaging guide to helping kids select dreams—500 in all!—to carry them off to a peaceful slumber. On each spread, readers are invited to locate items and characters involved in various activities—all of them opportunities for pleasant dreams. In Candyland, readers can “meet sugarplum fairies, their wings all aquiver,” “tunnel inside the deep Ice Crystal Cave,” and “dive in a puddle of pink bubble tea.” In outer space, they can “chat with a Martian,” “race UFOs,” and “whoosh on a comet.” This rollicking U.K. import features 23 other amazing dreamlands. Eckford’s bouncy, well-crafted rhymes appear beneath Castro’s busy, vividly colored digital illustrations, populated by a bevy of energetic, racially diverse young kids. An answer key proves a welcome tool, as some details may be challenging to discern; several topics may be out of many children’s realm of experience—mythological characters, for instance. Happily, the work offers great opportunities for learning and vocabulary development. Children will get the most out of the book if they browse through it first, choose a few favorite dreamlands, and then pick several dreams within those realms. Indeed, it would take more than a year

to experience all 500 suggestions if they were each to be “dreamed” consecutively night after night! A dream of a bedtime romp. But who’ll want to sleep when they’re having this much fun? (Activity book. 5-8)

Open Wide

Eerie, I.M. | Aladdin (160 pp.) | $17.99 August 26, 2025 | 9781665980425

A boy attempts to uncover the truth about his mysterious new dentist and discovers something far more terrifying than fillings or root canals. Eddie is reluctant to return to the dentist after a bad experience at his last appointment, but overindulging in Halloween candy has left him with a painful cavity. After spotting an advertisement for a dental practice that offers free first visits for kids, his mother takes him to Pearly Whites, which seems to have appeared overnight. Dr. Yankum is all too eager to pull Eddie’s teeth—even ones that Eddie is sure are perfectly healthy. When Eddie learns that other kids at school are also missing teeth after visiting Pearly Whites, he begins to suspect that his new dentist is hiding something sinister. To make matters worse, Eddie’s recently divorced mother begins to date Dr. Yankum. With the help of best friend Darryl, Eddie concocts a plan to figure out what’s really going on at Pearly Whites. Though the book is light on character development, the quick pace and the mystery surrounding Dr. Yankum make for an engaging read. An unexpectedly dark ending leaves a lasting impression and will have young horror readers excited for more from debut author Eerie. Eddie’s race isn’t specified, and physical descriptions of characters are minimal, though surnames imply some racial diversity among the background cast. A pleasingly creepy tale from a promising new writer who lives up to his name. (author’s note) (Horror. 8-12)

Kirkus Star

It’s Corn Picking Time!

Esbaum, Jill | Illus. by Melissa Crowton Neal Porter/Holiday House (40 pp.) $18.99 | July 29, 2025 | 9780823455614

A rhyming introduction to an essential but often-invisible agricultural process.

Dawn is breaking, and a denim-clad, brown-skinned farmer greets the day, her long hair unsecured and her trusty dog at her heels; corn-harvesting season has arrived, and it’s time for the work to begin. The hours ahead bustle with activity, and from sunup to sundown, the cornfields, managed by a diverse team of folks, undergo transformative change: Stalks are felled, chaff is discarded, and kernels are processed in a puff of fragrant steam. Many of these tasks may be unfamiliar to uninitiated readers, but when dusk falls and workers convene cozily around the farmer’s dinner table, we retreat to a homey environment recognizable to most. The book’s final spread underscores what’s been heavily hinted throughout: Nothing can be accomplished without community. Though readers won’t need technical knowledge to appreciate the complexity of work involved in industrial farming, tools and machinery are labeled when introduced, and clearly illustrated visuals make the titular harvesting process legible for novices. The tightness of Esbaum’s onomatopoetic rhyme makes potentially unfamiliar terminology accessible, while Crowton’s lovely and detailed illustrative art invites immersion—her grounded palette and innovative use of perspective and shadow permeate the story, evoking autumn’s crisp temperatures and wood-smoky smells. And for those with lingering questions, extensive backmatter provides additional explanation.

An informative joy. (websites, further reading) (Picture book. 5-9)

Kirkus Star

Sound: Discovering the Vibrations We Hear

Fadeeva, Olga | Trans. by Lena Traer Eerdmans (56 pp.) | $18.99 | August 26, 2025 9780802856487 | Series: Spectacular STEAM for Curious Readers

A compendium on the science and history of sound. Fadeeva’s work is chock-full of clear explanations, suggestions for experimenting with sound, elegant infographics, and rich vocabulary, all defined in context. Consider her lucid description of sound, translated from Russian by Traer: “Have you seen how dropping a stone into water creates waves? Similarly, sound waves travel away from the source of the sound (the ‘stone’), but instead of seeing these waves, we hear them.” This type of crystalline image helps propel a narrative that prizes curiosity and a grasp of the nuances of sound. In one spread, Fadeeva unpacks the difference between birdsong and a bird call, followed by a collagelike illustration of different species on a tree, detailing what each sounds like. Animal sounds, readers learn, include fish that “squeak, knock, honk, cluck, and chirp” underwater, where “sound also moves four times more quickly.” After pondering the 7,000 languages that humans use to communicate, the author wisely pivots, exploring how we do so without sound. She then makes an imaginative leap into the past to consider sound and music from the prehistoric era to the Middle Ages with its noisy suits of armor to the modern age of TVs and electrical appliances. She examines the harmony of orchestras and the evolution of recording sound and includes a fantastic spread about the way animals’ sounds are perceived differently all over the world. Characters are diverse. Brimming with cogent insights, delightful visuals, and infectious wonder. (activities) (Informational picture book. 7-10)

Papa Doesn’t Do Anything!

Fallon, Jimmy | Illus. by Miguel Ordóñez Feiwel & Friends (40 pp.) | $18.99

May 13, 2025 | 9781250393975

In talk-show host Fallon and illustrator Ordóñez’s latest picture-book collaboration, an elderly pooch waxes rhapsodic about a life well lived. Observing Papa sitting in his chair watching TV all day, a young pup says, “I’m starting to think…you don’t do ANYTHING.” So Papa proceeds to list his accomplishments, both big and small, mundane and profound. Some are just a result of being older and physically bigger (being tall enough to reach a high shelf and strong enough to open jars); others include winning a race and performing in a band when he was younger. Eventually, the pup realizes that while Papa may have slowed down in his old age, he’s led a full life. The most satisfying thing about Papa’s life now? Watching his grandchild take center stage: “I can say lots of thoughts / but I choose to be quiet. / I’d rather you discover things and then try it.” Fallon’s straightforward text is sweetly upbeat, though it occasionally lacks flow, forcing incongruous situations together to fit the rhyme scheme (“I cook and I mow, / and I once flew a plane. // I play newspaper puzzles because it’s good for my brain”). Featuring uncluttered, colorful backgrounds, Ordóñez’s child-friendly digital art at times takes on sepia tones, evoking the sense of looking back at old photos or memories. Though the creators tread familiar ground, the love between Papa and his little one is palpable.

A tale of intergenerational bonding to be shared by grandparents and grandchildren. (Picture book. 3-6)

The Curse of Great Winter Academy

Fleck, Jessika | Illus. by Gabhor Utomo Chooseco (240 pp.) | $9.99 paper | June 17, 2025 | 9781954232181 | Series: Choose Your Own Adventure New Classics

This thrilling mashup of boarding school, supernatural, and scary story tropes is the latest addition to the Choose Your Own Adventure series.

As a ninth grader at the Great Winter Academy for the Extraordinarily Gifted Students, you, Mildred Mendelson, have been chosen by the enigmatic Society of Misfits to break the Impossible Curse. You, your best friend, Annie, and new kid Lyle (who uses they /them pronouns) have until the next full moon to retrieve a stolen artifact from your rival school and thereby break the Curse—or die. Will your abilities to communicate with and animate dolls, Annie’s mimicry skills, and Lyle’s facility with water be up to the task? Maybe you should try to break the Alternative Curse with your close friend and crush, Arthur, instead? Your success depends on the choices you make as the twisty plot unfurls. This plotdriven adventure maintains a brisk pace, with readers making decisions every few pages. The 19 different endings include outcomes such as death, breaking the Impossible Curse,

A page-turning, spine-tingling addition to a perennially popular series.

THE CURSE OF GREAT WINTER ACADEMY

exposing the secret society, and becoming the society’s new Alpha. The characters’ motivations and allegiances change depending on what readers choose, but the supernatural powers remain constant. Those occult abilities plus scary (but never gory) elements—ghosts, creepy dolls and clowns, Zombie Cats— reward multiple readings. Occasional grayscale illustrations provide visual support; in them, most characters present white, while Lyle has dark skin and curly black hair.

A page-turning, spine-tingling addition to a perennially popular series. (Paranormal. 9-12)

The Everything Trail

Fleming, Meg | Illus. by Chuck Groenink Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster (32 pp.) $19.99 | August 26, 2025 | 9781665924870

Come along on an adventure. “This is the forest. / This is the steeple. / Giants and saplings / and just a few people.” While the verses at time sacrifice meaning for rhyme, their familiar cadence and mention of steeple will perhaps prompt readers to think of the outdoors as a church of sorts, and it’s the pictures that are the true draw. The young hikers on the trail take everything in: the feel of the ferns, the bugs underfoot, a bed of sorrel to lie in under soaring redwoods, the sensation of cool water on hot feet, the rock path across a stream, seeds on the wind, the smell of bay laurel, and the view from a tree on the summit. Adult readers may cringe at the kids’ unpreparedness, some of the risks they take, and the lack of grown-up supervision, but youngsters will be struck by the wonders found along the trail, brought home by the large trim size. Groenink’s illustrations masterfully highlight the colors and shifting light of the outdoors: the filtered light of the forest, the green

reflections of a mossy canyon, the dark of a tunnel, and the bright sunlight of an open summit. On their first reads, kids will likely focus on the young adventurers, but repeat readers will enjoy spying forest animals around, above, and below the racially diverse cast, which includes a child in hijab. Will surely whet children’s appetites to get out and walk amid nature’s steeples. (Picture book. 3-8)

Finding Forgiveness

Gardyn Levington, Rebecca | Illus. by Diana Mayo | Farrar, Straus and Giroux (40 pp.)

$18.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9780374392024

A child struggles to resolve a family disagreement during the Jewish new year.

“My sister sulks beside me. Last night we had a fight. I’m not sure…how to make things right,” the young, light-skinned narrator notes as the synagogue community gathers for prayers during Rosh Hashanah. The protagonist reckons with conflicted feelings as the congregation casts bread onto the water as part of the Jewish ceremony of Tashlich. The child murmurs apologies and slowly releases the painful memories along with the breadcrumbs. The argument is resolved, forgiveness is found, and the siblings promise to do better next year. Gardyn Levington’s rhyming couplets skillfully capture the narrator’s emotional journey, while Mayo’s deftly illustrated, light-filled spreads and pastel colors convey the joy of the holiday. The artist offers a refreshingly diverse depiction of the Jewish experience; the congregation includes people of color, as well as a female-presenting rabbi wearing a prayer shawl and kippah. Though the characters have come together to observe Rosh Hashanah, readers may want to share this book on Yom Kippur as well, due to the focus on

atonement during the Days of Awe. The story makes an excellent addition to the very small handful of children’s books on Tashlich and the themes of Yom Kippur. A glossary and a guide to making meaningful apologies are included.

Conveys a universal lesson on compassion tenderly and with depth. (author’s note) (Picture book. 5-8)

Space Case the Graphic Novel

Gibbs, Stuart | Illus. by Ward Jenkins Simon & Schuster (360 pp.) | $24.99

August 19, 2025 | 9781665934800

Series: Moon Base Alpha the Graphic Novel, 1

A murder on a lunar colony turns a bored 12-year-old into a master sleuth in this graphic adaptation of Gibbs’ 2014 novel. Dashiell Gibson, who has a Black mom and white dad, lives with his family on Moon Base Alpha, where life is actually pretty dull. Dash must contend with terrible food and an obnoxious billionaire tourist family. While using the annoying space toilet one night, he overhears scientist Dr. Holtz discussing a history-making project with an unseen person; it’s to be announced the next day. But Dr. Holtz dies that night in an apparent accident that Dash is convinced was murder. None of the adults believe him, so Dash takes it upon himself to investigate, leading him into a complex tangle of secrets. Base commander Nina Stack wants Dash to stop sharing his theories and even makes veiled threats against him. Fortunately, new arrivals Kira, a girl his age, and Zan, a security specialist, believe him and want to help. Ultimately, Dash and Kira end up in danger while trying to solve the mystery. Jenkins’ dynamic panel layouts, expressive character designs, and immersive depictions of life on the moon, combined with Gibbs’ crisp, fast-paced dialogue and well-timed

humor, seamlessly translate the original into this visual medium. While some plot points feel condensed, this adaptation retains the original’s sharp wit, engaging mystery elements, and educational tidbits about space travel. An accessible, engaging read for those who love adventure, space, and mysteries. (Graphic sciencefiction mystery. 8-12)

Scaring and Daring: Terrifying Takes on 15 Classic Tales: A Horror Writers Association Anthology

Ed. by Guignard, Eric J. | Harper/ HarperCollins (304 pp.) | $15.99 August 12, 2025 | 9780063372474

A collection of horror-tinged short stories inspired by works of classic literature. The Horror Writers Association’s latest collection provides a supernatural makeover to well-known works of fiction. Huck and Jim have an otherworldly encounter in Joe R. Lansdale’s “The Shadows in the Rock,” Nancy Holder imagines Pollyanna into the Beast’s enchanted castle in “Out on a Limb,” and Mary, Colin, and Dickon dig up more than they bargained for in Delilah S. Dawson’s “The Secret (Thing in the) Garden.” Some of the standout stories include “What We Found Beneath Mount Etna” by Lisa Morton, which is a riff on Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth, “Wolf in the Mirror” by Sarwat Chadda, which reimagines Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book, “A Lucky Find” by Kristi Petersen Schoonover, inspired by Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick, and “Prince Badi az-Zaman and the Ogress Fattan” by Tanvir Ahmed, an homage to One Thousand and One Nights. With supernatural creatures including dangerous fae, a werewolf, witches, and a ghost horse, there’s something here for any young reader inclined to the fantastical. Familiarity with the source

material will likely enhance readers’ experiences but isn’t necessary to enjoy these gently spooky tales. The collection includes a variety of settings and a diverse cast of characters.

Uncanny fun! (editor’s note, credits) (Horror anthology. 9-13)

Kirkus

Star

The Freedom Seeker

Gupta, Ruchira | Scholastic (320 pp.)

$18.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9781339012421

Fleeing bigotry in Chandigarh, India, a girl faces a perilous immigration journey to the United States. Twelve-year-old Simran has a loving family and caring best friends, Ravi and Reena—and she’s just been selected as the captain of her middle school field hockey team. But just as she’s enjoying this happy news, Simi’s family faces nasty threats of religious and racial hatred. After her Sikh father, Gurbeer Singh, is brutally beaten for being married to her Muslim mother, Henna Ali, the extended family decides that the three will seek asylum in America. Although Gurbeer, who was a farmer back home, is granted political asylum and starts driving a taxi in New York City, Simi and her mother are denied entry, propelling them to fly to Mexico via Spain and attempt the dangerous border crossing to reunite with Abbu. As coyotes take them on foot across the desert toward Arizona, Simi becomes separated from Ammi, and she endures nightmarish experiences in her attempt to rejoin her parents. Acts of kindness from strangers and her new friendship with Jose, a 12-year-old Honduran boy, sustain the brave and realistically drawn protagonist. The same leadership skills that made her a great field hockey captain come to Simi’s aid as she navigates the bewildering and brutal immigration system. Through evocative and

Frustrates even as its artwork enthralls. An intriguing headscratcher.

THE SHINDIG IS COMING!

accessible writing, this gut-punch of a story illuminates the global rise of intolerance and the anguish faced by those who seek safety.

A riveting story of love, hope, and survival. (author’s note, additional resources, glossary) (Fiction. 8-13)

Field Trip to Dinosaur Valley

Hare, John | Margaret Ferguson/ Holiday House (40 pp.) | $18.99

September 2, 2025 | 9780823459575

Series: Field Trip Adventures

A class outing to the deep past nearly ends in disaster after a flying reptile steals a student’s lunchbox. Riding a next-generation version of the Magic School Bus that not only travels in time but also sprouts very tall legs when it arrives, the students and teacher are so enthralled by the prehistoric setting rolling past that they don’t notice when one child tumbles out. Fortunately, the peckish local dinosaurs prove more willing to feed on the reclaimed lunchbox’s contents than its owner—at least just long enough to allow a last-second rescue. Unlike the classic field trip led by Ms. Frizzle, this one is more recreational than informational in character, but young readers shouldn’t have much trouble either following the storyline or identifying the brightly hued, wide-eyed dinos chowing down on pretzels, pizza, and other culinary treats in Hare’s wordless scenes. The students, at first anonymously swaddled in body suits and dark glasses, reveal themselves to be a racially diverse bunch at the end as they walk off, generously passing items from their

own lunches to their errant classmate. Fans of this tale should be sure to embark on other journeys with Hare; previous outings include Field Trip to the Moon (2019) and Field Trip to the Ocean Deep (2020).

A tongue-in-cheek tribute to the spirit, not to mention the occasionally life-saving value, of sharing. (Picture book. 5-7)

The Shindig Is Coming!

Harper, Charise Mericle | Union Square Kids (120 pp.) | $16.99 August 26, 2025 | 9781454955016

Is the Shindig a soiree? A creature? A warning? Mysteries abound in this oddball chapter book. Mouse runs into the forest shouting at the top of her lungs, “THE SHINDIG IS COMING!” The other animals immediately gather for an important meeting, but they soon realize that nobody knows what a shindig is—not even Mouse, who heard the news from the blue jay. The others speculate wildly until Bear informs them that a shindig is a kind of party. All is well and good until the blue jay arrives and makes it clear that his announcement wasn’t an invitation but a warning. Throughout the book, Harper makes unexpected choices, as when the narrative switches its point of view among three characters in sections subtitled “What Mouse Heard,” “What Bear Said,” and “What Opossum Missed.” Opossum drifts between consciousness and unconsciousness (she’s prone to fainting when danger arises), making the end of the book a

puzzle to decipher. And thanks to its mysterious open-ended finale, young readers may come away with more questions than answers. Meanwhile, Harper peppers the pages with meticulously detailed illustrations, rife with intricate linework and eye-catching typography. It’s a singularly beautiful book, if strange to its core. Evocative and mysterious, this book frustrates even as its artwork enthralls. An intriguing headscratcher. (Chapter book. 5-8)

Surviving Vesuvius: A Lucky Escape From the Tragic Fate of Ancient Pompeii

Harrisson, Christopher | Illus. by Beth Waters | Wide Eyed Editions (80 pp.) $24.99 | February 18, 2025 | 9780711279254

A lightly dramatized view of life in the ancient settlements near Mt. Vesuvius and the devastating eruption of 79 C.E. that covered them beneath ash and rock.

Despite the title and one scene of a few dazed survivors wandering over an ashy plain, this book is more about the catastrophe’s course and victims than its aftermath. Waters sets the stage with a general picture of a typical day in Pompeii for a small cast of actual residents—some enslaved and anonymous, others whose names and occupations were preserved either in the physical record or the long letter written decades later by Pliny the Younger, an eyewitness. Along with simplified elevated and subsurface maps paired with an explanation of the geological processes at work, the account offers a detailed replay of the eruption’s successive explosions of pumice and ash, pyroclastic flows of rock, and clouds of toxic gas. Centuries later, interest in the long-undisturbed site was sparked by an early discovery of artifacts in 1592; systematic excavations began in 1748 and continue to this day, with much yet to be uncovered. In the stodgy illustrations, light- and

dark-skinned figures in increasingly smudged ancient dress peer worriedly toward the volcano’s slopes and lament as dark clouds descend. In a final scene, modern people wander about blocky, clean-looking ruins taking photos and selfies. In a closing source note, the author carefully distinguishes fact from invention in his tale.

A solidly researched account of a long-ago tragedy. (timelines, glossary) (Nonfiction. 7-10)

Scarewaves:

Beyond the Grave

Henderson, Trevor | Scholastic (208 pp.) | $12.99 | August 5, 2025 9781338829532 | Series: Scarewaves, 2

With the help of a ghostly radio host, a group of kids must uncover the source of the paranormal problems plaguing their town.

For the past few months, things have been mostly calm in Beacon Point, other than the usual strangeness—namely, the unexplained lights that appear in the woods and often foretell tragedy. Soon, though, Rebecca gets a nightmare visitation from Alan Graves, the long-dead radio host whom she and her friends helped in Scarewaves (2023), cautioning of the danger if the lights are not stopped once and for all. As Alan’s warnings ramp up, Rebecca, Mary, Lucas, Byron, and Kyle team up with knowledgeable, UFO-obsessed video store clerk Toby to find out what’s going on, but things take a dark turn as they discover the truth about the disturbing creatures said to live in the woods. Fans of the series opener who appreciated its ominous tone and racing plot will be pleased by the second entry; Henderson provides enough backstory to catch up newcomers, too. The creative, horrifying illustrated creatures and the inclusion of transcripts from Graves’ radio show enhance an already high-interest,

satisfyingly challenging series. Character descriptions are minimal. Enticing, engaging, and enjoyably creepy. (Horror. 8-12)

Pool Party!

Hevron, Amy | Beach Lane/ Simon & Schuster (48 pp.)

$19.99 | September 23, 2025

9781665935043 | Series: Tiny Habitats

Join the lively (and moist) celebration of one of the rainforest’s most overlooked habitats: the bromeliad pool. Rain dances down through the dense canopy, forming a small puddle on the leaf of a bromeliad plant (“A bro-ma-what?” asks a nearby insect). And just like that, invitations to the miniature pool party are spread far and wide. Though it may not seem like much, this tiny puddle is absolutely brimming with life. A tree frog starts off the festivities by laying her eggs in the pool, followed by algae and microbes that feast on “party platters of decomposing leaves.” Before long, everything from tiny protozoa to whooping howler monkeys have joined the soiree, using the pool as a source of food or shelter. Cool blues and rich greens burst from the acrylic, marker, and pencil collage illustrations, featuring cute critters that pop from the page. Full visual spreads with individually labeled creatures complement comic-style panels with quippy speech bubbles and bouncing prose, like the “millipedes [that] mingled in moss.” Changing scenes, shifting palettes, and headings indicate the passage of time throughout the year’s changing seasons. Certain to appeal to the most curious of readers, this stunning addition to the Tiny Habitats series will make a wonderful storytime offering. Dive headfirst into the lush pages of this rainforest read. (more about bromeliad pools, additional reading, selected sources) (Informational picture book. 4-7)

An uplifting tale of friendship built on connections forged through play.

BELA AND LILY

Kirkus Star

Where the Deer Slip Through

Howes, Katey | Illus. by Beth Krommes Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster (32 pp.)

$19.99 | June 3, 2025 | 9781665918275

Over the course of a day, various animals enter a farmyard and enjoy its manifold offerings. Arriving as the pink clouds replace the stars, the deer enter through openings in the hedges and stone wall: “Nibble and nudge / and startle and dash / away off into the pines.” The text follows similar patterns as other creatures emerge from cracks and crevices to play or eat within the farm’s enclosure. Rabbits “tumble and twitch.” Doves “flurry and flap.” Howes’ lilting rhythm and rhymes flow effortlessly—a worthy accompaniment to Krommes’ signature scratchboard and watercolor compositions, filled with texture and teeming with details not mentioned in the text: flitting bees and butterflies, nesting birds, and a busy, light-skinned family of three doing chores (and, in the case of the child, sometimes imitating the animals). As the sky darkens again and bats appear, listeners are invited into the youngster’s room: “And this is the curtain that nighttime drew / between two days—the old and new.” The rich language and striking images encourage multiple readings, while the soothing, cumulative cadence creates a lovely bedtime experience. Sensitive children will soon absorb the alliterative text, possibly repeating it in real-life moments.

A visual and auditory delight. (Picture book. 3-6)

The Girl Who Wore Pants

Isern, Susanna | Illus. by Esther Gili

Trans. by Cecilia Ross |

NubeOcho

(36 pp.) | $17.99 | April 1, 2025

9788410074866 | Series: Egalité

A glimpse into the life of author and activist Luisa Capetillo (1879-1922). Growing up in Puerto Rico, Luisa would rather learn history or math than sew with the other girls. She loves to run, play, and climb trees—all of which are tricky to do in a skirt. So Luisa begins wearing an old pair of her father’s pants around town, much to the horror of her peers and elders. Luisa doesn’t care that she stands out; she can finally play unencumbered. As an adult, Luisa spends her time reading to illiterate factory-working women to inspire them to think for themselves. In Cuba, she’s arrested for wearing pants in public, though a judge eventually rules that she hasn’t committed a crime. Though Isern refers to Capetillo’s acquittal as a “pivotal moment,” she only vaguely alludes to its impact (“She was the inspiration for many girls and women who followed her example”). Translated from Spanish, this simplified picture-book biography focuses on the unfairness of women’s clothing customs, omitting the remarkable depth of Capetillo’s work as a labor organizer and writer. Capetillo was much more than a girl in pants, but this slice of her story captures her determined spirit and will speak to young people. Gili’s crisply lined illustrations feature

pops of pastels and hot pinks, layering stunning, realistic-looking characters over more abstract, foliage-filled backdrops.

A snapshot of a groundbreaking, pants-wearing feminist hero. (Picture-book biography. 4-7)

Bela and Lily

Khan Kazi, Natasha | Kokila (40 pp.) $18.99 | August 19, 2024 | 9780593858912

A young Bangladeshi immigrant explores a park— and makes a new friend. Bela spots a frog and calls to a group of nearby kids (“Look, a frog!”), but she isn’t fluent in English, and the other children laugh (“Did you say lick a frog?”). But she quickly bonds with a kind, light-skinned young girl named Lily, and when Bela removes an insect that’s flown onto Lily’s back, their exchange (“Oh, a bug.” “Poka.”) inspires them to share words in Bengali and English. Soon the kids tussle over a shiny rock that reminds Bela of home, but she doesn’t have the language to explain, and as they argue, the stone falls into the mud. But the next day, Bela gives Lily a handmade gift, while Lily presents her with the now “sparkly and clean” rock. Inspired by her own experiences as an immigrant, Khan Kazi captures the frustration of language barriers, as well as the joys of transcending them: The little steps the girls take to understand each other lead to a blooming friendship. Rich details about Bela’s life in Bangladesh—rickshaws on the streets, days spent hunting for treasure with her cousins—offer a peek into the home she misses. Pastel watercolors with bursts of vibrant green complement the gently paced story. An uplifting tale of budding friendship built on connections forged through play. (author’s note, games kids can play without using words) (Picture book. 4-8)

Into the Wild Magic

Knudsen, Michelle | Candlewick (368 pp.)

$18.99 | August 19, 2025 | 9781536227697

A mysterious new student opens a portal into a magical realm where evil sorcerers threaten wild magic. When sixth grader Bevvy finds new girl Cat in Bevvy’s special hidden recess spot, her “tree corner” under a large sugar maple, she’s both fearful and curious: Could she become a friend?

Bevvy is used to being constantly bullied, so this safe hiding place is “the only place in the whole school—other than the library— where she [feels] anything close to good.” But Cat, who’s cagey about her family and clearly hiding something, isn’t interested in making friends; she moves a lot and won’t be sticking around long enough for friendship. The girls, who present white, are nevertheless thrown together when Cat recognizes the danger lurking behind the dark, tinted windows of a strange black car that slowly drives past them. Telling Bevvy they need to flee, Cat conjures a door into the land of Lorelkey, where the girls meet a vivid cast of shape-shifting guardians, giant moth creatures, and steaders—those who communicate with the trees. They race to defeat the dark forces and free the fierce dragons who are being held captive. The pulse-quickening twists and thrills will captivate readers even as the girls fight back against those who threaten “all that is good and wild and free.”

An empowering tale of self-discovery, friendship, and love of the natural world. (Fantasy. 8-12)

Snoop

Korman, Gordon | Scholastic (208 pp.)

$18.99 | July 1, 2025 | 9781546126089

A laid-up and bored seventh grader discovers that his seemingly ordinary North Carolina town is a hotbed of puzzling mysteries. Taking his classes remotely while confined to his home with two broken legs in the wake of a skiing accident, Carter quickly discovers that it’s easy to hack local security cameras— but somewhat less easy to believe what he sees. Is his longtime crush Lacey really going out with sneering A-lister Maddox? Why is a stranger in a red Maserati parking in different spots all over town, day after day? Most startling of all, why are a red panda and other endangered creatures roaming the streets at night? Getting answers looks to be impossible, considering Carter’s lack of mobility, particularly after an urgent call to the police about a supposed crime in progress only gets a bunch of classmates in trouble, which sends his reputation so far down the toilet that even his best friend ghosts him. Korman dishes up an expert mix of entertaining foolery, peer and family dynamics, and cautionary messages about both the ethical nuances of online snooping and the hazards of jumping to conclusions. Names cue some diversity in the cast. Funny and thought-provoking, no bones about it. (Fiction. 11-13)

Ghost Circus

Kress, Adrienne | Illus. by Jade Zhang

Union Square Kids (256 pp.) | $24.99

August 19, 2025 | 9781454948285

A ghost girl and a not-quite-dead boy team up to unlock otherworldly mysteries. While preparing for the opening night of the Ghost Circus, Creepy Girl looks up to see Casey, a boy with light tan skin and brown hair, sitting alone in the bleachers. He’s not dead, which is weird. With help from the endearing Polterghost and other ghostly human and animal members of the circus, the two get past their initial tensions and team up to explore pressing questions. Why can Casey see and talk to the ghosts while still, presumably, being alive? Why does his left arm begin to turn ghostlike?

A fortuneteller once said that when Creepy Girl helped “the lost child,” she would find her way home—can she and Polterghost return Casey, who might be the child from the prophecy, to the land of the living? Digging deeper, they seek to discover who runs the Ghost Circus and why, learning that their quest concerns not only their own futures, but those of every soul in the circus. They also learn what it means to be free, to belong, and to love. Grabbing readers from the first frame, this intriguing tale, with its sweet humor, occasional poems, and beautifully subtle and emotive graphics (predominantly in soft shades of blue), will keep the pages turning.

A thoughtful ghost story filled with heart, humor, and hope. (Graphic paranormal mystery. 9-12)

Kress,

SEEN AND HEARD

Dave Eggers Writing Sequel to Newbery Medal Winner

The Eyes, the Fire & the Avalanche Kingdom will be published in November.

Dave Eggers will bring young readers back to the world of his Newbery

Medal–winning The Eyes & the Impossible in a sequel coming later this year.

Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers will publish Eggers’ The Eyes, the Fire & the Avalanche Kingdom, illustrated by Shawn Harris, in the fall, the press announced in a news release.

The Eyes & the Impossible, also illustrated by Harris, was published by Knopf in 2023. The book told the story of Johannes, a dog-coyote hybrid

who lives in a seaside park and serves as the eyes for three bison, the park’s elders. In a starred review, a critic for Kirkus wrote of the book, “One remarkable creature vividly shows readers that ‘there is so, so much to see.’”

The new book will bring back Johannes as he embarks on a boat trip with his friends, a goat named Helene and a seagull named Bertrand.

Melanie Nolan, publisher of Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, said in a statement, “I was sure The

For a review of The Eyes & the Impossible, visit Kirkus online.

Eyes & the Impossible was a once in a lifetime book. So I was very, very happy to be proven wrong when Dave hinted that Johannes and Bertrand had more adventures in store, and that opossums might somehow be involved.”

The Eyes, the Fire & the Avalanche Kingdom is slated for publication on Nov. 18.—M.S.

John Lamparski/Getty

Images for Tribeca

Dave Eggers

Tales To Treasure

This Father’s Day

Hello Dog / Hello Human

Levine, Sara | Illus. by Suzanne Kaufman

Roaring Brook Press (32 pp.) | $14.99

March 11, 2025 | 9781250797025

Made up of two books in one, this tale offers dual perspectives on canine-human friendships. Child sees dog; child wants to pet dog. (And the reverse: Dog wants to meet—or sniff—child.) This cheerful tale offers a safe, sensible way to make that interaction happen. It’s not complicated. First, identify a potential friend: a dog (or human) not absorbed in another activity. Next, ask for permission. Read the other’s body language, and avoid being aggressive, loud, or all up in the other’s space. If an invitation is extended, move closer and remember—be gentle. Readers who absorb this advice might, of course, also find it useful when befriending another human; similar rules apply, except perhaps for sniffing the new person’s hand (though you might shake it!). Once kids finish the first story, they’re invited to flip the book over to read the same tale from the other creature’s point of view—an inspired formatting choice that emphasizes the important truth that there’s always another perspective to consider. The art blends loose lines with bright colors: yellow backgrounds for one, blue for the other. Kaufman depicts drolly distorted dogs of various breeds; the book centers on a perky black pooch and an overall-clad, brown-skinned young human with a mop of curly hair. Readers will “flip” for this happy, helpful guide to an important life lesson on approaching the unknown. (Informational picture book. 4-8)

Kirkus Star

Cat Nap

Lies, Brian | Greenwillow Books (48 pp.) $19.99 | September 30, 2025 | 9780062671288

A felicitous feline with mice on the brain leaps into adventure— and art.

In the late afternoon, a kitten’s attention is seized by a wayward mouse. When the rodent jumps into a framed poster for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Kitten is close behind. What ensues is a chase across the museum—and into a variety of pieces spanning time and geography, all of which hail from the Met and are labeled and further explained in the backmatter. On each spread, both Kitten and his prey are visually transformed, matching the style of the work in question—and wreaking a bit of chaos along the way. At last, it’s the lure of home and dinner that brings Kitten’s wanderings to an end. As Caldecott Honor winner Lies notes at the book’s conclusion, he painstakingly brought to life each sculpture, painting, and illuminated manuscript, as seen in his jaw-dropping array of styles. He glued layers of wood to fashion a Mblo mask, fitted stained glass for a sequence where Kitten and his quarry dart through Friedrich Brunner’s Gathering Manna , and, using dental tools and a chisel, carved plaster to re-create an Egyptian relief. Amid this meticulously rendered art, the kid-friendly storytelling, anchored by a spirited refrain (“Does Kitten follow? Of course he does”), remains at the heart of the narrative.

A felicitous feline with mice on the brain leaps into adventure—and art.

CAT NAP

Utterly beautiful, playfully fun, and, above all, breathtaking. (Picture book. 3-6)

Kirkus Star

Popo the Xolo

Lopez, Paloma Angelina | Illus. by Abraham Matias | Charlesbridge (40 pp.) | $17.99

August 19, 2025 | 9781623544577

An abuela crosses from life to death with the help of her loyal pooch.

Popo, a Xoloitzcuintle (a Mexican hairless dog with great significance in many Indigenous cultures), spends his evenings sitting on Nana’s lap as she watches her novelas, soothing her aches with his tiny, warm body. Nana spends her days cooking, cleaning the floors, and tending to her familia. One night, Nana sits on her comfy chair for the last time; accompanied by Popo, she soon steps into the Aztec underworld, Mictlān, where the dead must journey across nine levels to reach eternal rest. Rich in otherworldly blends of purples, pinks, and sun-kissed hues, Matias’ striking paper-cut artwork depicts Nana’s passing in a series of stunning double-page spreads, softening the heavy subject matter. Lopez’s gentle text pulls at the heartstrings in subtle streaks, punctuated by the phrase “Keep going. ¡VÁMONOS!,” accompanying Popo’s barks of encouragement to his beloved owner. Nana wades through a river, climbs hills, glides across an obsidian path, battles snowy winds, evades arrow-throwing monkeys, and more as she recalls memories both good and bad. Her journey ends back at her casita, where her familia holds on to their shared remembrances. Nana now moves on (“Her aches have disappeared”), and Popo remains with her familia. Lopez deftly lands on a bittersweet note, a message of love that transcends life and death. Gently magnificent. (information on the nine levels of Mictlān and on the Xoloitzcuintle, a note on loss, glossary) (Picture book. 4-8)

Zombie and Brain Are Friends

Lucianovic, Stephanie V.W. | Illus. by Laan Cham | Bloomsbury (40 pp.) | $18.99 August 5, 2025 | 9781547613625

Zeb is your average zombie kid—he lives on his family’s farm raising grain-fed, free-range brains, which are then sold at the local farmers market.

One morning, a most unusual thing happens: A baby brain twitches to life and bounces into Zeb’s arms. Zeb and his brain (named Brian) quickly become inseparable. It takes some convincing for Zeb’s mother to let him keep Brian—“Brains are food, NOT pets!”—but finally she gives in. Fearing for Brian’s safety around his hungry zombie father, however, Zeb tearfully concludes that the safest place for Brian is out in the forest with the other wild brains. After assuring Zeb that Brian is in no real danger of being eaten, his father helps him on a quest to find Brian and bring him back home for good. Inviting digital illustrations portray Zeb and his family as angular, freckled green zombies with irresistibly cute cartoon faces. Brian and the other brains are equally huggable. While adults may find this buddy story a tad predictable, wrapping up as it does with a neat, happy ending, its quirky charm will readily appeal to young monster lovers. And for those who can make the connection between Zeb’s zany zombie farm and the real-world farm-to-table food system, this heartfelt picture book may even spark an interest in locally sourced fare.

A cuddly “Can I keep it?” tale with a silly, flesh-eating twist. (Picture book. 4-8)

A cuddly “Can I keep it?” tale with a flesh-eating twist.

ZOMBIE AND BRAIN ARE FRIENDS

Who’s Making All That Noise?!

Lunde, Darrin | Illus. by Erica J. Chen

Charlesbridge (32 pp.) | $17.99

August 12, 2025 | 9781623546267

What are you hearing out there?

Lunde, a naturalist who translates his scientific expertise into appealing introductions for the very young, follows up Whose Egg Is That? (2023) with another delightful naturethemed guessing game. On each spread, the author poses the title question, describes the noise (“RAP TAP TAP! RAP TAP TAP TAP!”), and offers a clue (“It’s a loud hammering on a tree”). The next page reveals the answer and provides more facts about the animal. This inspired approach invites listener participation. The simple text and bold illustrations make this an ideal choice for a group read-aloud. While Lunde mostly uses generic names (dolphin, elephant), at times he’s more specific (quacking frog, rattlesnake). Chen’s lively animation-style illustrations add information: The creature’s environs and neighbors are shown on the first spread, while the animal making the sound is on the second. Careful readers will usually be able to spot a hint of the animal on the first spread; indeed, these images bear close observation. Readers can see the grubs that the woodpecker is seeking, and a close-up of African bees reveals the thorns on the acacia tree nearby. The final puzzle makes for a fun surprise. Humans who appear briefly are diverse. A welcome and unusual spotlight on the sounds of the natural world. (more facts on animal sounds) (Informational picture book. 3-7)

The Library of Curiosities

Lundquist, Jenny | Holiday House (240 pp.) $17.99 | July 22, 2025 | 9780823458547

Expelled from boarding school for the fifth time, middle schooler Rowan moves in with her grandfather, where she trains as an intern at the Library of Curiosities. Rowan Fitzgerald, almost 12, bends the rules—but she usually has a reasonable excuse and good intentions. Lonely Rowan just wants to fit in. Her latest expulsion coincides with her guardian grandfather’s invitation to spend Thanksgiving at Fitzgerald Manor in Glassby Bay in Northern California. He tells her, “The time has come for you to understand your heritage.” The massive home includes three wings with staff and family living quarters, a ballroom, bowling alley, movie theater, cafe, mysterious fourth floor (that’s strictly off limits!), and the Library of Curiosities, which contains enchanted objects for borrowing, from the harmless (a spoon that makes everything taste delicious) to the ominous (the mysterious “rare curiosity” known as the Everheart). Rowan, who’s Irish American, makes friends with Henry Choi and Lara Hernandez, fellow middle schoolers and residents of Fitzgerald Manor and the other two members of the inaugural Library Youth Internship Program. When curiosities start to disappear and Rowan becomes a suspect, she must figure out what’s going on. Short, exciting chapters laced with humor and a rich vocabulary showcase characters such as the menacing magician Silverjack and the sarcastic talking cat Mr. Fluffypants. Occasional flashback chapters fill in events from before Rowan’s parents

For more by Stephanie V.W. Lucianovic, visit Kirkus online.

drowned. Rowan’s suggestions for nonmagical solutions to problems remind readers that they can achieve their own goals. Inventive and worthwhile. (Fantasy. 8-12)

If You Want To Write a Story

Mack, Jeff | Neal Porter/Holiday House (40 pp.) $18.99 | July 15, 2025 | 9780823458189

A small brown mouse learns how to construct a narrative.

Mack addresses his audience directly, writing in the second person; his suggestions are interpreted by the long-tailed protagonist, clad in green footie pajamas. The first requirement is an idea: The writer is advised to “look around” and “pick one.” A beginning is born when the mouse chases the idea (a stuffed rabbit, sprung to life) outside to a cardboard box turned spaceship. In what is likely a nod to 1985’s If You Give a Mouse a Cookie (as are the choice of lead character and the titular phrasing), the hero and pal blast past heavenly bodies depicted as chocolate chip confections, landing on an orange surface. Mack adds excitement in the form of a problem (a villainous alien who steals the rabbit). He notes that writing can be overwhelming, but he urges aspiring authors to be open to changing direction. He controls pacing by varying his digital compositions from sequential panels of different shapes and sizes to double-page spreads that bleed off the page. Mack offers an immensely entertaining tale while explaining various processes in clear, practical steps. The book ends with the mouse returning home to read the completed story to interested parents; Mack leaves readers with questions (“How does it sound when you read it out loud? Would you change anything”) that might encourage them to do a bit of editing. The ideal vehicle for inspiring children’s own flights of fancy. (Picture book. 4-7)

Gloam

Mackay, Jack | Viking (208 pp.) | $17.99 August 12, 2025 | 9780593693834

A teenager must face her worst nightmares to save her family from supernatural forces. Thirteen-yearold Gwen Clayton-Finn has just moved to Gloam Island with her younger brother and twin sisters into the home they inherited from their late grandmother. But nothing feels right about it—they’re relocating with their stepfather, Henry, after their mother died, and the house has fallen into disrepair. Making matters worse, Henry thinks they need a babysitter, even though Gwen took charge of her siblings when her mom was sick. Enter the beautiful Esme Laverne. A hint of malice always seems to be simmering below her sweet surface—but only Gwen seems to notice. Gwen knows Esme is dangerous even if no one else does, and she’s determined to protect her siblings at all costs. To defeat the sinister Esme and the moldlike black rot consuming the house, Gwen must summon her courage, uniting her family as they battle monsters and confront their greatest fears. Mackay’s debut is well constructed, gripping audiences from the very first pages as the author explores grief, terror, and familial bonds. Richly detailed descriptions of characters and settings will immerse readers in the action. Readers will cheer on Gwen, who rises to the occasion despite terrifying situations. Characters’ race and ethnicities aren’t mentioned.

Thrilling and chilling, with a standout protagonist. (Horror. 8-13)

All of Us: A First Conversation About Disability

Madison, Megan & Jessica Ralli

Illus. by Jonathan Eden | Rise x Penguin Workshop (40 pp.) | $15.99 July 1, 2025 | 9780593891483

Series: First Conversations

“Being Disabled means different things to different people.” The characters in this work use various terms to describe themselves; one character holds a sign reading “Proud To Be Crazy,” while another declares, “I’m autistic!” “We can use the words that people want us to use to describe them,” notes an unseen narrator. In straightforward, declarative sentences, Madison and Ralli emphasize that “THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS NORMAL.” Unfortunately, there is a “big problem called ableism,” which is “the untrue story that there is a normal or better way for bodies to be.” Examples include making fun of disabled people or underestimating their capabilities, as well as grown-ups voting for “leaders who build parks and schools where Disabled kids can’t play and learn with everyone else.” Fortunately, kids can advocate for disability justice by standing up to bullies, listening to disabled people, and coming together to “change unfair rules.” Eden’s cartoon illustrations clearly depict racially diverse people with myriad physical, sensory, and

Blends extreme sweetness with a slyly mordant streak of humor.

FLUFFY M c WHISKERS CRUNCHAZAUR KABOOM

cognitive disabilities. Interspersed questions such as “What kind of help do you need?” encourage thought ful discussion. Backmatter addressed to caregivers offers tips on addressing disability and explores such topics as the medical and social models of disability and identity versus person-first language. An accessible introduction to disability and allyship. (Picture book. 3-6)

Mabel Makes ^(Up) a Friend

Marko, Cyndi | Penguin Workshop (96 pp.) $13.99 | August 26, 2025 | 9780593752883

Series: The Elephant in the Room

A lonely, creative second grader manifests a new pal. Mabel’s friends have been moved to another classroom, and her parents are busy raising twin infants and working from home. Mabel’s been having trouble focusing in class—but who can she turn to? After some covert appearances, an imaginary friend is revealed in the form of a pachyderm named Mr. Elephant (Mr. E for short). He’s a humorous playmate, a sympathetic sounding board, and even a voice of reason when Mabel’s insecurities get the best of her. Mabel fully understands that Mr. E isn’t real; indeed, his actions give her a way to cope with her own clumsiness and forgetfulness as she blames mishaps such as knocking over the classroom easels on her new companion. The highly expressive Mr. E brings a visual flair to the artwork, comprised mostly of stick figure–like characters. Words scrawled in a handwritten font, interspersed throughout the illustrations, add context to Mabel’s perception of the world (an arrow pointing to the words “time moving extra slowly” beside the classroom clock, for instance). The story is all rising action, ending as it does on a

cliffhanger, but readers will be eager to see what’s next for Mabel and Mr. E. Mabel and her family are lightskinned, and her school’s population is diverse.

An absorbing series opener that celebrates the escapism of imaginative play. (Graphic fiction. 6-8)

A Monster’s Meal: A Liftthe-Flap Picture Book

Martí, Meritxell | Illus. by Xavier Salomó | Abrams (40 pp.) | $16.99

August 5, 2025 | 9781419783371

A gaggle of iconic monsters meet up for an infamously awful dinner. Ever thought of slurping down “black-bile soup with rusty chain-link croutons”? How about chewing on some “spiced frog legs over grilled tails of newt”? Or “thinly sliced bat wings and rotten radishes”? High atop Shark Tooth Cliff sits the Rotten Core Restaurant, where these dishes and many more are served. One by one, the Big Bad Wolf, a vampire, a mummy, and others tuck in. The illustration style is Edward Gorey meets Richard Scarry, with burning pops of fireengine red table linen contrasting with stark white backgrounds. Silver dishes are uncovered (page flaps allow readers to flip them over for themselves) to reveal disgusting feasts, customized for each attendee by Chef Frankenfurter. The book’s pattern—a character is introduced, followed by a lavish description of the meal in question— is intriguing, and initially, readers will savor the sense of anticipation and the visual gags. The repetition soon wears thin, however, as the narrative drags on. The novelty of the tactile page flaps (geared toward younger kids) is at odds with the advanced vocabulary: garnish, gait . The witch has green skin; other humanoid characters are light-skinned. An appetizing premise, but this is a niche spread. (Picture book. 5-7)

Fluffy McWhiskers Crunchazaur Kaboom

Martin, Stephen W. | Illus. by Dan Tavis McElderry (40 pp.) | $19.99 | June 10, 2025 9781665956123 | Series: Fluffy McWhiskers

In this followup to Fluffy McWhiskers Cuteness Explosion (2021), a dangerously adorable kitty and her pug pal are a city’s only hope when an enormous kaiju begins wreaking havoc.

Crunchazaur eats everything— and everyone—in his path. Panic ensues as he gobbles up “all the top leaders and thinkers.” Luckily, their intern survives and knows just who to call: Fluffy McWhiskers and Potato the pug. These two are so precious that anyone who looks upon them instantly explodes. They inhabit a remote desert island— where they can’t inadvertently detonate anyone—but now might be the time to use their power for the good of all. They immediately begin practicing their most enticing poses and trying on their most fetching outfits. When their cuteness reaches catastrophic levels (and their island home blows up), they know they’re ready to save the world. They try to distract Crunchazaur with delicious pizzas, but he eats them anyway. Unfortunately for him, the duo are not only explosively cute—they are also explosively delicious, and with a “KA BOOM!,” Crunchazaur’s reign comes to an end. Blending extreme sweetness with a slyly mordant streak of humor, Martin and Tavis serve up an adventure just as goofy as this pair’s first outing. Featuring an all-animal cast, Tavis’ handdrawn and digitally painted illustrations zing with color, energy, and cuteness; even the voracious Crunchazaur feels less like a rampaging Godzilla and more like an overexcited toddler. Reader beware, you just might explode…with laughter. (Picture book. 4-8)

A nature-loving kid becomes the most lush garden in the neighborhood.

DAISY REWILDS

Nothing Ever Happens

McKinnon, Heidi | Orchard/ Scholastic (32 pp.) | $7.99 paper

August 5, 2025 | 9781546166207

Be careful what you wish for. Deep in the ocean, two fish—one small and orange, the other a larger yellow pufferfish—are bored with their monotonous lives. “Same old rock.” “Same old shell.” “Same old seaweed.” “Same old starfish.” The orange fish wishes that “something AMAZING” would happen. Suddenly, the startled pufferfish senses something and inflates while its blithely unaware companion prattles on, longing for “someone who would take us on an adventure.” Sharply focused illustrations greatly enhance the action and provide plenty of clues. Young readers will notice everything these creatures do not. These pals have been swimming in front of what appears to be a large rock—a rock with eyes and a huge toothy maw. Wait a minute…rocks don’t have teeth! Little ones will likely try to warn the fish, but to no avail—it’s time for a truly amazing adventure to ensue. Both characters display distinct personalities in their movements, their expressive round eyes, and in their reactions. McKin non’s comedic timing is spot-on, and she brings her story to a giggleinducing conclusion: Once the friends are finally safe again, they’re content with their previous state of being— but still eager for more exploits. Delightfully engaging and pure fun. (Picture book. 3-7)

Kirkus Star

Daisy Rewilds

McNamara, Margaret | Illus. by Kerascoët Random House Studio (40 pp.) | $18.99 July 1, 2025 | 9780593125670

A nature-loving kid becomes the most lush garden in the neighborhood. Daisy, a “born naturalist,” started composting baby food when she was just a year old, and she began sleeping on leaves at age 3. Her later years brought on extensive experimentation. Her greatest idea yet is “rewilding” herself, letting nature literally grow on her. At first, no one notices the moss behind her ears, the ferns on her toes, or the yarrow around her ankles. But soon the “blooming miracle” is apparent to all. Her parents enlist green-thumbed Auntie Betsy’s help. Making a home in the family garden, Daisy thrives under her aunt’s tutelage and care. When a neighbor wishes that the whole block looked like Daisy, she uproots herself and starts planting— just as she’d always planned. McNamara’s latest offers an engaging entry point into conversations about rewilding and biodiversity. Countless plant puns sprout up on each page, adding delightful bits of humor. Kerascoët’s full-color illustrations expertly set the mood, starting with a muted palette that explodes with color—a vibrant reminder of nature’s beauty. Stellar pacing helps readers appreciate the beauty of individual flora and fauna while building vocabulary. Daisy is tan-skinned; one

parent is light-skinned, and the other is brown-skinned, as is Auntie Betsy. Backmatter provides more context on rewilding, the process of restoring land to its wild, uncultivated state. A botanical wonder indeed. (Picture book. 4-8)

Tomatoes on Trial: The Fruit v. Vegetable Showdown

Metcalf, Lindsay H. | Illus. by Edwin Fotheringham | Calkins Creek/Astra

Books for Young Readers (32 pp.)

$11.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9781662680533

A n 1893 Supreme Court case established whether a tomato was a fruit or a vegetable. In 1886, Jon Nix, “the produce king of New York,” thought he’d get rich selling tomatoes from Bermuda until a New York Custom House collector demanded a 10% vegetable tax when his goods arrived at the port. Nix argued that tomatoes were fruits (they have seeds and grow from flowers) and therefore weren’t taxable. The collector wasn’t convinced, and Nix had to pay, so he went to court, hoping to change the law—in particular, the Tariff Act of 1883, which taxed goods from other countries that attempted to compete with homegrown items. Metcalf humorously introduces the legal process, describing the proceedings as a “food fight”—a showdown between lawyers on “team vegetable” (the defendants) and “team fruit” (the plaintiffs). Evidence and rebuttals abound, drolly illustrated by Fotheringham in blotted line and color wash. Playful typefaces for onomatopoeia (“SQUISH!” “WHOMP!”) add emphasis as the major figures seek answers to vexing questions: “What makes edibles vegetable?” Do people eat tomatoes as a meal or a dessert? Metcalf overdoes the food-based puns but includes excellent backmatter to help young debaters learn to develop an argument.

An entertaining, lucid look at the judicial process. (information on the vocabulary used, author’s note, archival photographs, further facts about tomatoes, sources, picture credits) (Informational picture book. 7-10)

Incredibly Penelope

Myracle, Lauren | Walker US/ Candlewick (304 pp.) | $18.99 August 12, 2025 | 9781536206067

The latest from bestseller Myracle is a story of family, second chances, and being the self you want to be.

Nine-year-old Penelope Goodheart has traveled the world with her single mother, Rose, and her godmother, Queenie Bee, a reality TV star. When her eyes are opened to the unfairness in how the “yummy goodness of the world” is distributed, Penelope decides she wants to start a school for children of all backgrounds, regardless of their ability to pay. But first, she’ll need to fulfill her dream of attending a real school— and Idlewild Academy for Girls, near her mother’s hometown of Savannah, Georgia, fits the bill. There, green- eyed Penelope, who has dark, curly hair, finds potential friends and frenemies among her racially diverse classmates. When Queenie and Rose go missing near Bora Bora, leaving Penelope “an orphan of the state,” holding on to her true self becomes the key to her survival. After her mother’s long-held secret is revealed, readers see the consequences of some decisions adults have made. The omniscient thirdperson narration uses child-friendly language, and the sprinkling of clues will have savvy readers feeling one step ahead of the characters in solving the mystery of Penelope’s family. Strong descriptions of natural beauty enhance the sense of place. An accessible exploration of belonging and acceptance with a well-developed setting. (Fiction. 8-12)

Mama’s Scent

Naja Mahfouz, Sahar | Illus. by Baraa Awoor Crocodile/Interlink (32 pp.) | $18.95 August 12, 2025 | 9781623716462

A child revels in the comfort of Mama’s distinct aroma.

“Mama’s scent…reminds me of rose gardens, and red cheeks, and happy days.” It inspires thoughts of “colorful cakes, and special celebrations, when I wear lace and ribbons in my hair.” Above all, Mama’s smell “makes me feel safe, as if she’s always by my side.” At school one day, the tan-skinned young narrator smells something familiar. Confused, the child searches for Mama throughout the building. Instead of finding her, however, the protagonist notices the scent fading. Disappointed, the child returns to class and sits down, only to realize that the smell has returned. Eventually, readers discover its source: the protagonist’s backpack, where Mama has tucked a scarf “in case I [get] cold in the frosty morning.” After school, mother and child wrap their arms around each other in a warm embrace, ending the book on an uplifting note that reinforces their warm and loving relationship. Translated from Arabic, Naja Mahfouz’s text is more poem than story, weaving lyrical descriptions with Awoor’s exquisitely whimsical mixed-media illustrations, bursting with gentle colors, lush textures, and incredible detail. Dominated by shades of blue, the artwork relies on abstract imagery, often depicting Mama as a soothingly larger-than-life figure. A tender tribute to mothers and their children. (Picture book. 4-7)

Welcome to the Ghost Show

Ocker, J.W. | Storytide/HarperCollins (224 pp.) | $18.99 | August 26, 2025 9780063324756

Three friends must save their town from macabre machinations. As members of the Creepy Club, middle schoolers Hazel Gold, Theo Dale, and Lucien Rhodes go around their Maryland town attempting to find evidence of ghosts. When a promotional flyer appears for something called the Ghost Show, located on the site of the former GloWyrm Chemicals factory, Zel is determined to investigate. Her interest stems from the death of her teenage sister, Tori, who was killed in a factory explosion eight years prior that left in its wake “glop outbreaks”—patches of toxic, glowing orange slime—and caused many residents, including Zel’s mom, permanent respiratory damage. When the man behind the event, the mysterious Everest Nocturama Mancer, tells Zel he can produce Tori’s ghost, the Creepy Club members are forced to contemplate difficult questions about the afterlife. The novel has strong momentum, and the suspense builds steadily as the story progresses. The classic horror elements are well crafted, and Ocker draws subtle parallels to the real-life horrors of toxic waste sites and murky data collection practices. While the paranormal thrills will draw readers in, the novel also presents a thoughtful examination of grief, asking what lengths one might go to to be reunited with a loved one. Zel is cued white, and Theo and Lucien present Black. A deliciously spooky read.

(Horror. 9-14)

An accessible exploration of acceptance with a well-developed setting.

PENELOPE

Maggie and the Story Shadows

Oh, Annabelle | Disney-Hyperion (272 pp.)

$17.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9781368114141

In the world of stories, anything is possible.

Thirteen-year-old Maggie Woodrow’s Korean immigrant mother, Chae-Won, is missing and presumed dead, but Maggie doesn’t believe it. Too many things remain unexplained, so she’s determined to figure out what happened and bring Mom home. She wants to stay in her beloved home, which her white-presenting dad can no longer afford, and also hire a private investigator. She has help from Griffin Glover, a Black classmate with millionaire parents who runs a successful WeView channel; together they launch a web show about her missing mom. Petra Garin, Maggie’s eighth grade “orientation buddy,” who’s cued white, also assists. The three kids’ sleuthing leads them to the Arts and Culture Exchange, a local museum, where they find a bag that captures stories—and end up inside the story world. In the end, Maggie may have to rescue not just her mother, but the whole world, all while facing down sinister forces. Featuring smart kids who sound like real young people with both serious problems and fun on their minds, the narrative skillfully balances magic with realistic issues such as managing friendship and family dynamics. Maggie and her friends encounter a variety of figures and beings that readers may recognize from Asian and European folklore, and some from more recent stories, making for a fun mishmash that allows universal themes to rise to the surface. A well-characterized adventure that takes readers seriously. (Fantasy mystery. 9-13)

A sound examination of a surprisingly loud undersea world.

WHAT FISH ARE SAYING

Kirkus Star

Sundust

Peña, Zeke | Kokila (48 pp.) | $19.99 August 5, 2025 | 9780593700112

Two siblings explore the quixotic wonders of the desert in Peña’s authorillustrator debut. A speck of matter traverses the sky with a resounding “KRAKBOOM,” landing with a final “PLONK!” The kids—both cued Latine, one bespectacled and squat, the other tall, with a long black braid—set off to investigate. As they clamber over a rock wall, the desert stretches before them. Past their border city and its bulldozers and concrete, the protagonists “follow the trail of sundust, to where the sky has no walls and daydreams soar.” The sundust flitters, a luminescent streak of rich pinks and purples that intoxicatingly unwinds from page to page, touching the spiny ocotillo, a field of creosote bushes, and an uninhabited turtle’s shell. Peña’s splendid pencil-and-gouache artwork contrasts the earth-kissed browns and greens of the desert with all the nooks, crannies, and cracks that the sundust slips into, magnifying the natural beauty of the desert with “Sun’s tough love.” With an adventurous spirit, the children gaze upon the rocks that “remember everything from a time before,” cherish the desert heat that deepens their brown skin, and swim alongside the River Spirit. Suddenly, a colibrí (Spanish for hummingbird ) soars over their heads, and the brave youth grab onto the bird—now huge—as they’re whisked away. Punctuated by the occasional speech bubble, the steady, elegiac collective narration underscores the ties between siblings and their love for their desert home.

A hypnotic joy. (Picture book. 4-8)

What Fish Are Saying: Strange Sounds in the Ocean

Pendreigh, Kirsten | Illus. by Katie Melrose | Sourcebooks eXplore (40 pp.)

$18.99 | June 3, 2025 | 9781464218965

Listen to an underwater cacophony. With this playful account of the sounds revealed by recent hydrophone research, the author of When a Tree Falls (2025) leaves the forest to visit the ocean, inviting younger audiences to eavesdrop on fish. Pendreigh’s rhyming couplets never falter; from time to time, she repeats the refrain “It’s NOISY down below.” Starting with whale and dolphin sounds, she quickly dives into less familiar territory, describing the noises made by a remarkable variety of marine life, including shellfish. She speculates on what they might be saying (“MY LUNCH!” “SHARK?”) and explains that underwater, “sound travels faster, and farther…, / quicker than smell and deeper than light.” She reveals how these creatures create sound and uses frequent onomatopoeia (“Pearlfish THRUM. / Angelfish CHIRP”). Melrose’s digital illustrations include recognizable depictions of the fish, from clownfish to herring, as well as their sounds, lettered neatly nearby. Careful observers will notice a snapping shrimp crackling and popping on nearly every spread. This creature provides the climax; its astonishingly loud sound is accompanied by “blast balls that STUN / ZAP-FLASH-BUBBLES. Hot as the SUN!” The repetition of sound words makes this a pleasure to use with fledgling readers. The spreads will show well to a small group, and the backmatter adds useful information on hydrophone research, how fish hear, and snapping shrimp and the other animals mentioned.

For more fantasy, visit Kirkus online.

A sound examination of a surprisingly loud undersea world. (Informational picture book. 4-8)

Kirkus

Star

Soggy Like Cush Cush

Pierre, Karly | Illus. by Kristen Uroda Little Bee Books (40 pp.) | $18.99 February 4, 2025 | 9781499816204

A boring rainy day becomes filled with warmth as a grandmother and grandchild travel around town doing various acts of goodwill. Petite Marie laments the prospect of a day spent inside; today is as soggy as a bowl of cush cush (cornbread). But Gran-moman insists, “Dere’s planty we can do.” She tucks some okra and a jar of tea leaves into her purse, and they head out for a ride past sugar cane fields and pastures before making a series of visits. They offer okra and tea to one neighbor, pick up shrimp from another, and go to a church to help with the food drive. At each stop, people who are clearly familiar with Gran-moman and her generous nature offer extra treats to Petite Marie. By the time they arrive at Granpopa’s grave, a ray of sunshine peeks through the clouds as Gran-moman remembers her late husband’s wise words about how seemingly little actions matter most. The rain continues to fall, but Petite Marie’s mood has lifted by the time they return home. This quiet story is rich with life, from the small moments and kind deeds that form the fabric of our communities to the remembrance of loved ones who live on in us. Gran-moman, Petite Marie, and the members of their community present Black and speak in a dialect of Louisiana Creole, and the author’s note discusses Black Louisiana Creole culture. Uroda’s soft illustrations use a variety of clever perspective shifts, thoughtful compositions, and cool and warm palettes to immerse us in Petite Marie’s day. An inspiring, beautifully told book of golden moments to be savored. (cush cush recipe) (Picture book. 4-8)

Luna and the Witch Throw a Halloween Party

Plaza, Aubrey & Dan Murphy | Illus. by Hannah Peck | Viking (40 pp.) | $19.99 July 29, 2025 | 9780593693018

Actor Plaza and writer/producer Murphy join forces for another bewitching picture book. Halloween is always a dismal time for Pheenie the witch, because her parties are such failures—until the day spunky young Luna Lopez, who yearns to be a helpful bruja like her grandma in Puerto Rico, appears on her porch. The two strike a bargain: Pheenie will instruct Luna in spellcasting in return for Luna’s help planning and organizing a properly spook-tacular event. Luna helps Pheenie clean up the house and encourages her to substitute tasty cider for wormy trick-or-treat apples and to put out kid-friendly snacks like candy corn and cookies in place of the witch’s typical candied spiders and baked troll fingers. The effervescent narrative is further stoked by several rhymed spells and suitably energetic illustrations. Peck sets the tale in a racially diverse urban neighborhood, and as the witching hour approaches (at around eight p.m., according to the clock on the mantel), in troops a group of eager-looking young partygoers in upscale costumes to play hide-and-seek with real ghosts and dance to a goblin band. It’s a Halloween hullaballoo! Elderly Pheenie is pale-skinned; Luna is tan-skinned. A high-spirited night free of frights. (Picture book. 5-7)

The Library in the Woods

Ramsey, Calvin Alexander | Illus. by R. Gregory Christie | Carolrhoda (32 pp.)

$19.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9781541599123

members of the Black community. The move to Roxboro, North Carolina—inspired by the author’s own experiences growing up in the 1950s— brings changes welcome and otherwise to young Junior’s life, but a wonderful one comes from a schoolmate’s revelation: “We have our own library.” A small building in a nearby clearing contains a dazzling world of books, and Junior runs home with a book about George Washington Carver for his father, a book of poetry by Phillis Wheatley for his mother, and “one on the three musketeers” for himself. Choosing a muted palette, Christie reflects the quiet dignity of Ramsey’s sparely worded narrative in views of slender, dark-skinned figures, usually seen from a distance, moving between small, widely spaced houses in verdant settings. He closes with a tender scene of Junior sitting on the porch reading to his father, who never learned how. (Momma explains that he worked the farm as a child so that his younger siblings could go to school.) The author adds a news clipping to his afterword with a photo of the log cabin library that led him to write this semi-autobiographical tale; reflecting on his own arrival in Roxboro in 1959, he writes of that library’s importance at “a time when the hopes and dreams of little Black children were easily dashed.” A tribute to a community treasure, understated but rich in feeling. (Picture book. 6-9)

Yasmin Bandara Levels Up!

Ranganathan, Romesh & Susie Day

Illus. by James Lancett | Puffin/Penguin Random House UK (288 pp.) | $15.99 paper August 12, 2025 | 9780241493281

After crop failures force a family to relocate to town, a country boy is delighted to discover a whole library there for him and other

Comedian Ranganathan and co-author Day present a British tween gamer’s journey of self-discovery. Yasmin Bandara learns, thanks to her best mate, Zane, that she’s a prodigy at GoalPro7,

an online soccer simulator. GoalPro7 is electrifying compared to The Monkey House, which “not-very-secretly taught you maths or science while you did something borderline fun” and is the only game her parents allow Yasmin and her 10-year-old brother, Dinesh, to play. Seeing her genius, Zane loans Yasmin his console, and thus her deception of her parents begins. Soon, as a high scorer, Yasmin is invited to compete in esports conventions for both games— taking place in Birmingham, England, on the same day. The tension peaks as Yasmin must decide how to juggle these competing events, weighing commitment to her Monkey Meet-up team against her desire to excel at GoalPro7. When her parents discover her deception, they forbid her to speak to Zane or do any gaming, so Yasmin focuses on studying to fulfill her parents’ expectations that she become a doctor— until Zane makes a discovery that turns Yasmin’s fortunes around. Despite the book’s slightly one-dimensional supporting characters, some overly convenient scenarios, and a too-tidy ending, readers will easily relate with the struggles of the multifaceted protagonist, who presents South Asian. The illustrations are enjoyably playful, and the fast pace and conversational tone give the work reluctant reader appeal. Online gaming, family expectations, friendship, and honesty, explored with balance, humor, and insight. (Fiction. 8-13)

Kirkus Star

A Place for Us

Ransome, James E. | Nancy Paulsen Books (32 pp.) | $18.99 | August 5, 2025 9780593324882

A wordless tale that speaks loudly of American inequality. At the end of the school day, a mother picks up her son from school. Parent and child, both of whom present Black, hug before stopping for a meal at a fast-food restaurant. At dusk, the pair walk to

the local library, where the boy does his homework and the mother reads a novel—notably, it’s Lesa ClineRansome’s Finding Langston (2018), the story of another Black child who knows hardship, written by the author’s wife. At closing time, the librarian comes to turn out the lights. After exiting the library, parent and child walk to a park, where they talk, and the youngster plays in the fall leaves. In the dark, the two settle down on a bench with the city lights and skyline as backdrop. While the child sleeps, his head resting in his mother’s lap, she remains vigilant throughout the night. When the sun rises, she gets the boy ready for school, combing his hair and looking on as he brushes his teeth at a water fountain. Ransome’s gorgeous, richly hued watercolors convey the love between mother and child, balancing the difficulties they face with moments of true joy. In an author’s note, he asks, “In a country of vast resources, what is our responsibility to those without access to the basic necessities?” Readers of this empathetic tale will come away resolved to work toward a world in which all people’s needs are met. Thought-provoking, heartbreaking, and moving. (Picture book. 4-8)

Peachaloo in Bloom

Raschka, Chris | Neal Porter/ Holiday House (304 pp.) | $18.99 July 1, 2025 | 9780823458554

A quick-witted preteen challenges a country club tycoon while visiting her grandmother’s peculiar hometown.

After inquisitive 12-year-old Peachaloo Piccolozampa is stung by a wasp at her grandmother Helena’s favorite swimming spot in Fourwords, Pennsylvania, she acquires EWP—extra wasp perception— which allows her to understand the real meaning behind people’s words. Peachaloo applies her new skill when Major Gasbag and Georgie, his grandson, arrive in town after

purchasing the historical Ajax Mansion, which once belonged to a community of rope-jumping craftspeople and artisans with a love of nature and no use for luxury. Major Gasbag plans to fence off the forest and other natural resources around the mansion, including Helena’s swimming hole, and build a country club accessible only to wealthy townspeople. In this quirky and whimsically narrated small-town story, Helena, Peachaloo, and best friend Lily protest Major Gasbag’s plans, all while preparing for the annual end-of-summer pageant. Simple, stylized line illustrations accompany the text, bringing the town of Fourwords to life. Humor joins clever dialogue and an engaging plot that will sweep readers away to a whirlwind ending. Peachaloo limps due to having one leg that’s shorter; she takes pride in her physical difference and loves her cane. Main characters are cued white. Lily reports an odd exchange after asking her father, Ira Schwartz, whether their surname, which means black, means they have Black ancestry; he says maybe someone in their family was a soot-covered chimney sweep or just black-haired. Eccentricity abounds in this fantastical underdog tale of natural and historical preservation. (Fiction. 10-13)

Deepwater Creek

Regina, Michael | Putnam (256 pp.) $24.99 | $13.99 paper | August 26, 2025 9780593117378 | 9780593117392 paper

Two brothers face growing pains alongside supernatural forces after a fishing trip takes an unexpected turn. After Hurricane Howard churns up the waters of the Enoch River, brothers Wade and Andrew prepare to head out on the water with their father and their best friends, Camilla and Tommy. The group decides to fish farther down the river than they ever have before, venturing into mysterious fog in search of more fish. When a river monster takes their bait,

causing a swell that washes Andrew into the depths of the river, Wade dives in after him. Although he rescues his brother from the water, Andrew appears to be changed. Becoming withdrawn, he refuses to leave his bed, even turning down fishing trips. Wade, determined to help Andrew face his fears, finally convinces him to get back out on the water. The brothers and their friends decide to hunt down the river monster once and for all, and what they discover will test not only the boundaries of science and the order of their natural world, but also the bonds among them. The boy’s mother is cued as Brazilian, and their father reads white and American. Rich watercolors lend softness and motion to the otherwise-gritty scenery. The subtext of a mental health struggle is explored metaphorically through Andrew’s battle with the river monster. Nonstop action threaded with heartfelt emotion offers a satisfying reading experience. (Graphic horror. 9-13)

Sabrena Swept Away

Riazi, Karuna | Greenwillow Books (224 pp.) $18.99 | July 8, 2025 | 9780063098718

A girl’s destiny is linked to her heritage and her gift for storytelling. With family lore connecting them to magic, water, and the legendary Sinbad the sailor from The Thousand and One Nights, Sabrena has always felt an affinity for her grandmother, a skilled storyteller. But the adjustment when her family moves from Brooklyn to Richmond, Virginia, to live with Grandma, who has dementia, weighs heavily on her. Sabrena grapples with loneliness as the new kid at her tightknit Islamic school and struggles with supporting Grandma through her own stories. She also fears that her mother and aunt may move her grandmother into assisted living, away from the cherished home she calls her “Palace of Memories.” Then, a mysterious flood

unexpectedly transports Sabrena into the wondrous realm of The Thousand and One Nights. The days and nights are strangely altered, and familiar characters differ from her recollection of the tales. Finding an ally in Marjana, who in this world is Ali Baba’s adopted daughter, she seeks a resolution in a sunken undersea kingdom that’s connected to jinn and dark magic, all while discovering the role she must play to save the sultanate and return home to her family. Though occasionally dragging in pace after a strong beginning, Riazi’s narrative features beautifully written, lyrical descriptions. The tale speaks to the power and connection found in stories, family, and emotions that arise in the face of loss and change. Sabrena is Bangladeshi and African American.

A sometimes meandering but magically spun yarn. (Fantasy. 8-12)

The Air We Share: A Pollution Problem and Finding Ways To Fix It

Romito, Dee | Illus. by Mariona Cabassa Holiday House (40 pp.) | $19.99 April 1, 2025 | 9780823455003

Series: Books for a Better Earth

Case studies in how air can carry small particles and other things—somet imes for surprising distances. Aiming to raise awareness of atmospheric pollution and interest in promoting cleaner air, Romito describes three historical incidents: the eruption of Indonesia’s Krakatoa in 1883 (an example of nature itself changing the air with globe-spanning clouds of ash), the “Black

Sunday” dust storm of 1935 in the U.S., and London’s “Great Smog” of 1952. The author does note that the last two—both of which were caused by humans—resulted in major government remediation efforts. But along with underestimating the understanding of her intended audience by vaguely ascribing the Dust Bowl to “a kind of farming [the land] was not meant for,” she doesn’t explain just how suggested activities such as using less energy at home or starting a neighborhood “eco-friendly campaign” might help keep the air cleaner. Also, aside from coal, she neglects to mention fossil fuels, relegates indoor pollution to a glancing reference in her author’s note, and loses the plot midcourse with a sudden switch of topic to how air carries seeds, nice odors, and animal sounds. The theme that air moves is aptly conveyed in the illustrations; Cabassa places a small, racially diverse cast of human figures in glowing images of land and sky that are lit up with swirls and spatters of color. Brightly illustrated and well meant, but sketchy at best. (glossary, bibliography, index) (Informational picture book. 6-8)

Hornbeam by and Large

Rylant, Cynthia | Illus. by Arthur Howard Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster (48 pp.)

$19.99 | August 19, 2025 | 9781665954747 Series: The Hornbeam Books

Hornbeam the moose returns with his pals. Hornbeam appears in all three new stories, while Eureka the gander shows up in two. In the first, Eureka and Hornbeam head to the town’s annual swap meet. Eureka’s

A girl’s destiny is linked to her heritage and her gift for storytelling.

SABRENA SWEPT AWAY

set on exchanging his old suitcase for a rake, while Hornbeam adopts a more flexible approach, unsure what he’ll take as a trade for his old badminton racket. The next story, “Blue Team,” bears no obvious connection to the first, with Hornbeam joining a volleyball team. Eureka doesn’t appear; instead, Hornbeam’s joined by Adorabelle the skunk. Athletic Adorabelle encourages Hornbeam to join her in playing against the rival Red Team, which has a giraffe as its star player. Hornbeam and Eureka reunite for the last story, “Adventure World,” in which they join Adorabelle to celebrate Cuddy the bull’s birthday. Without a narrative thread to unite the three entries, Howard’s cartoon-style illustrations, rendered in colored pencil, watercolor, and gouache, provide necessary cohesion, as well as charmingly humorous visual characterization. The images should also help new readers decode the text, which contains some complex vocabulary, such as badminton, position, and inevitable. Like previous installments, this one features plenty of humor, but friendship is at the heart of this tender tale.

By and large, a short and sweet pick for newly independent readers. (Early reader. 5-7)

Scat: The Incredible Science of Wildlife Poop

Sanchez, Anita | Holiday House (96 pp.)

$17.99 | April 1, 2025 | 9780823456185

Series: Books for a Better Earth

In this icky and instructive book, poop preoccupation pulls readers into a world of science.

Sanchez sings the splendors of scat: It helps disperse seeds, offers a method of coded communication, and is a source of fertilization and even nutrition. The importance of excrement-related research by biologists and others comes through in clear detail, while stories enliven the narrative—for instance, Sanchez includes a poignant account of the

extinction of passenger pigeons (which “fertilized their own habitat…and maintained the balance of life in their ecosystem”). Throughout, the author strikes a note of caution about climate change, observing that scat can help scientists who study the crisis affecting our planet. Writing in precise but conversational prose, Sanchez defines uncommon words (in bold) contextually and in an appended glossary. Frequent “Scat Science” sidebars offer essential and fascinating facts on everything from DNA to camouflage. Kids will love adding dung, frass, and guano to their vocabulary. Broken into well-organized chapters, the work closes with a mini-guide to identifying local animal deposits, complementing several sidebars on neighborhood scat. Abundant and alternately amusing, disgustingly detailed, and downright adorable color photos often catch animals producing and using wonderful waste. Excretion excitement is everywhere in this enthusiastic and informative book, which holds its nose, looks closely, and widens its range to “help us make a better Earth.” Squeamish adults may look away, but kids who aren’t grossed out will be riveted. (bibliography, source notes, photo credits, index) (Nonfiction. 8-12)

Kirkus Star

School Dance

Sax, Sarah | Colors by Liana Sposto Knopf (288 pp.) | $21.99 | August 26, 2025 9780593306963 | Series: Brinkley Yearbooks, 3

Milo thinks he can’t dance— in fact, he’s convinced that he’s cursed. In this third installment in Sax’s charming Brinkley Yearbooks graphic novel series, Mexican American Milo Castillo is vexed by a self-induced hex: Every time he dances, disaster follows. After mortifying experiences at a friend’s bar mitzvah and a group dance lesson, Milo is utterly dejected when he hears

about the upcoming Snowball Soiree. Luckily, Abue, his beloved abuela, has moved into the Castillo home. Even though she’s been warned against driving, Abue whisks Milo and his friends off to experience live Tejano music, which he enjoys both musically and aesthetically. The experience leaves him with a stronger connection to his heritage as well as more self-confidence in his dancing—but Milo feels guilty for lying to his parents about Abue’s driving and conflicted about where to draw the line when trying to please others. When Abue’s failing eyesight catches up with her clandestine drives, Milo must make a hard choice. This latest entry maintains the high standards of Sax’s series. Milo is wholly relatable and accessible, adroitly portraying the ups and downs of adolescence. Sposto’s vibrantly alluring colors and Sax’s gift for highlighting facial expressions and emotions imbue Milo’s journey of self-acceptance and confidence with deeper levels of nuance that are certain to resonate with readers long after the last page is turned. Emotionally astute and sure to inspire readers to embrace dancing to their own beat. (author’s note) (Graphic fiction. 8-12)

Campers Beware

Scott,

$14.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9781665943147

Series: Molly and the Bear, 2

Molly hopes that a family camping trip will give her dad and the bear who lives with them a chance to become friends.

The Scotts continue to draw humor from a foundational element of their syndicated webcomic: the constant friction between 11-year-old Molly’s dad and the huge and hairy extrovert who’s moved in. Inspired by a four-step strategy for making friends, Molly sets her ursine buddy to mending parental fences during a weeklong vacation. But along

Bob & Vicki Scott | Illus. by Bob Scott Colors by Vicki Scott | Aladdin (240 pp.)

with painful encounters with bees, mosquitoes, and other miseries, practically every interaction with the bumbling behemoth leaves Molly’s dad annoyed or depressed, and even his hopes of enjoying a little father/daughter quality time are repeatedly stymied. While the setups and punchlines work for a short daily comic strip, these elements quickly turn monotonous when they come along every few pages in an extended storyline. Still, even while repeatedly playing victim or comic foil, Molly’s dad may come in for some reader sympathy as he sadly remarks on watching Molly growing away from their former closeness. Readers may also find the advice for making friends helpful in their own lives: “1. Be interested / 2. Compliment / 3. Help / 4. Gifts.” This second series entry has one full booklength story followed by two short additional episodes. Molly and her family present white.

A well-meaning and nuanced story but with a heavy and repetitive lean on the “hapless dad” trope. (Graphic fiction. 8-12)

Let’s Get Spooky

Sekaninová, Štěpánka | Illus. by Lukas Figel | Trans. by Andrew Oakland

Albatros Media (26 pp.) | $16.95 August 26, 2025 | 9788000074498

Tour a series of terrifying settings in this Czech import. Six sites await. First up, Dracula’s Castle, inhabited by fanged vampires with an unslakable thirst for blood. Then it’s on to a ghastly graveyard, a frightening forest filled with mysterious lights and sinister sounds, and a narrow, dark street where a headless knight, a ghostly woman, and ruthless robbers all lurk. Next up: an abandoned house where terrible ghosts loom and, finally, a wicked warlock’s tower—be careful, lest you be turned into a frog or ant! Two spreads are devoted to each setting; brief background or historical

descriptions of each spooky scene fill one spread, while the other features an intricately detailed seek-and-find challenge. Against shadowy backgrounds and tortured Gothic architecture, incredibly elaborate scenes of mystery and mayhem unfold. Text presented in spidery scripts challenges readers to count all the candles or locate hard-to-locate items. Spectral servants, bizarre inhabitants, decayed furnishings, and odd doings—like a raccoon in the bath or a sleepwalker on the roof—abound. Corners hold skulls, cobwebs, cauldrons, dragons, and more—enough to keep determined readers occupied for hours. The fantastically somber and eerie illustrations spirit this book into the higher realms of delicious horror. Characters vary in skin tone. A spellbinding excursion into scary, sometimes amusing, and enthrallingly illustrated settings. (Picture book. 7-10)

How the Forest Feels: Sensory Play Nature’s Way

Silvano, Wendi | Illus. by Mirka Hokkanen | Holiday House (40 pp.) $19.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9780823456406

A grandpa and a grandchild explore the many textures found outdoors.

The short rhyming verses, written from the grandfather’s perspective, largely stick to mentions of what the two see and feel on their autumn walk. Meanwhile, Hokkanen’s illustrations tell a larger tale about a child who’s sullen at being pulled away from a video game but gradually warms up to the

wonders of nature exploration and Grandfather’s irrepressible enthusiasm and hijinks. Thistle weeds are “fuzzy and spiked”; long-stemmed reeds are “feathered and fluffy.” The two also encounter oozy mud, wet stones in the creek, spongy moss, gnarled roots, and sticky frog toes. When the youngster trips and falls over a log and “day fades to night,” the textures turn toward ones that reflect the tender multigenerational relationship: Grandfather’s woolen cap, his “wrinkly and warm” hand, and his “scratchy and dry” chin as he tucks his little one into bed. Backmatter provides two activity ideas, a basic summary of the five senses (“You taste only with your tongue”), and a safety note. The bright fall colors will draw listeners in, but it’s the grandparent-grandchild bond that’s the true star. This grandpa allows the child time to dilly-dally, observe, and just be out in nature. The two share the same light skin and brown hair. A book that will both get kids outside and give them the words to describe what they find. (Picture book. 2-6)

Gilbert and the Ghost

Stigall, Heather Pierce | Illus. by Jess Mason | Beaming Books (32 pp.) $18.99 | August 19, 2025 | 9781506491493

A shy boy tries to communicate with the neighborhood ghost. There’s a ghost at 632 Savannah Street—but Gilbert seems to be the only one who’s aware of it. Gilbert’s family doesn’t believe him; they call him imaginative or decry the existence of ghosts entirely. But Gilbert thinks the ghost might feel as invisible

Emotionally astute and sure to inspire readers to dance to their own beat.

SCHOOL DANCE

as he does. He knows how difficult it is to make a friend. So Gilbert starts leaving gifts outside the old house. Day after day, they disappear—is the ghost taking them? While Gilbert’s family members offer rational explanations, the ghost’s continued engagement emboldens Gilbert, who leaves a note, which gets taken. He brings his best drawing and another note, then waits on the swing set across the street. A girl approaches him and keeps him company as he waits for an answer. Will the ghost ever come? Mason’s autumnal palette contributes to a spooky atmosphere, while illustrations from the (unseen) ghost’s perspective add to the gentle suspense. Overall, this tale is more sweet than scary and will be a surefire hit with readers looking for seasonal fun. Stigall’s tight structure cleverly builds intrigue while never explicitly revealing the ghost’s true identity. Even as contextual clues give readers a fuller picture of what’s really happening, Gilbert seems to maintain his belief in the supernatural—a beautifully child-centric touch. Gilbert, his family, and the girl are tan-skinned; supporting characters vary in skin tone. Heartwarming proof that friends can show up in unexpected places. (Picture book. 4-8)

Tiny T. Rex and the First Day Oopsies: A Back-to-School Book

Stutzman, Jonathan | Illus. by Jay Fleck | Chronicle Books (52 pp.)

$16.99 | July 15, 2025 | 9781797233208

Series: Tiny T. Rex

A young dinosaur bravely navigates the first day of school.

Tiny T. Rex, an irresistibly sweet green dino with two upturned teeth, a pair of itty-bitty arms, and a fetching red bow tie, sets off with a positive outlook and a disproportionately huge backpack. Though eager to start school, Tiny makes a series of discouraging mistakes (“oopsies”), from playing the wrong note during music

class to spilling paint while working on a self-portrait. Bolstered by some reassurance from Teacher and an encouraging note from Mom (tucked into Tiny’s lunch), our chipper hero makes it through the day and heads home, excited to come back tomorrow. Fleck’s illustrations play up the protagonist’s diminutive stature at every turn, to humorous effect. The other dinos tower comically over Tiny, and even the young dinosaur’s possessions (fork, toothbrush, musical instrument) are much too large. While Tiny’s world is at times overwhelming, it’s also vibrant and welcoming, filled with brightly colored, kindly dinosaurs, like BFF Pointy. Eschewing contractions in Stutzman’s text, Tiny’s sweetly earnest first-person narration sets the perfect tone for readers transitioning into preschool or kindergarten. Tiny models resilience, relying on the support of loved ones and finding creative ways to cope with a too-big environment. It’s a comforting reminder that new experiences aren’t always easy, but they’re certainly worth it.

Small but mighty, like its determined protagonist. (Picture book. 4-6)

Can I Keep It, Please?

Sullivan, John | Illus. by Jessica Gibson Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster (40 pp.) $19.99 | August 26, 2025 | 9781665955560

When young Evie sees the unusual critters on display at the neighborhood pet parade, she decides that her cat Sasha just doesn’t measure up.

“I need a cool pet,” she decides. “Not a plain old cat.” Mom nixes a chinchilla and a skunk; Dad says no to a hedgehog and reminds her about Sasha, whom Evie calls “boring.” Ironically, Sasha solves Evie’s problem by drawing her attention to a garter snake in the bushes. Evie’s folks approve, and Evie learns about snakes and sets up a fine home for her new pet (dubbed Slithers). Doubts soon creep in, however, as the snake spends most

of its time hiding in its enclosure. After Evie notices Slithers trying to escape, she releases it into her backyard. Evie apologizes to Sasha, who, happily, has given birth to a litter of kittens—now Evie has four entrants in the next parade! Inspired by a childhood memory of adopting—and eventually freeing—a garter snake he’d caught in a field, Sullivan offers a sweet and well-paced take on responsible pet ownership, starring a protagonist who’s keenly aware of her animals’ needs. Gibson’s colorful cartoonlike illustrations set a cheery tone; Sasha’s especially endearing, maintaining a supportive presence even as Evie’s attention is dominated by Slithers. Evie and her mother are brown-skinned, while Dad is lightskinned; their community is diverse. A rousing ode to animals who aren’t meant to be pets but instead should be admired from afar: Cheers to them. (author’s note) (Picture book. 4-7)

Schooled

Sumner, Jamie | Atheneum (224 pp.) $17.99 | August 26, 2025 | 9781534486058

Eleven-year-old Lenny, who’s grieving his mother’s death, makes friends and grapples with his emotions at an experimental school based at a college campus.

Lenny Syms’ cynical side quickly shows up even as Dad tries to sell him on the positives of the Copernican School, located at the Tennessee university where he’s a Latin professor. His father has been unmoored and inattentive ever since Lenny’s mom died from skin cancer six months earlier, and the job change and move into campus housing haven’t helped. At school, Lenny and the four other sixth graders—Henrietta Calhoun, Makai Kahele, Allison Somerville, and David Li—experience a rota of offbeat teachers, who oversee “group actualization” and practicums for their

A laudably candid yet child-friendly examination of life and death.

IS IT ASLEEP?

“autonomous classroom.” Types are established early, shaping the friendship dynamics. White-presenting Hen is into chi and acupuncture; David, who’s cued Chinese American, is a budding, calculus-savvy engineer; Ally, who’s cued Black through several mentions of her hair, is into cosmetology; and Mak, who seems to be “Hawaiian,” is into football. Feeling forgotten at home and unnoticed at school, Lenny cuts classes and in the process finds a connection with an older professor, who becomes a sort of mentor. First-person narrator Lenny reads white; he and his father, more nuanced than other cast members, grow over the course of the school year. Creative descriptions of odors contribute to a sense of place, and pop-culture references add realism without being so frequent as to quickly date the story. Quirky characters navigate life’s ups and downs. (Fiction. 10-13)

Is It Asleep?

Tallec, Olivier | Trans. by Antony Shugaar | Gecko Press (32 pp.)

$18.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9798765670521

Several animals cope in the wake of a blackbird’s death.

A squirrel and a walking, talking mushroom named Pock—both introduced in Tallec’s A Better Best Friend (2024)— enjoy listening to the birds in the meadow, especially the blackbird. Today they can’t find it, but eventually, they discover the bird lifeless on the path. Joined by Gunther the mouse, the friends sit and wait a long time until they determine that the blackbird has, in

fact, died. Translated from French and narrated by the squirrel, this tale offers a simple and frank exploration of death. The animals speculate about how the bird might have died, hold their own version of a funeral (covering the body with autumn leaves), and find a way to memorialize the deceased—all useful springboards for caregivers looking for a way to introduce a potentially difficult topic. None of the characters knew the bird all that well, which allows for a far more hands-on—yet still empathetic— exploration of death compared with other children’s books: The characters matter-of-factly comment on the heaviness of the bird’s body and its temperature and wonder why it died. The warm golds and reds of the illustrations bring to life the autumnal season—an ideal setting, given the topic. Gorgeous two-page layouts capture the stillness and beauty of the meadow. The woodland creatures have expressive yet minimal facial features.

A laudably candid yet child-friendly examination of life and death.

(Picture book. 4-8)

We Go Slow

Tallie, Mariahadessa Ekere | Illus. by Aaron Becker | Atheneum (32 pp.) | $19.99

August 26, 2025 | 9781665950602

A multigenerational morning walk reveals small delights in a bustling neighborhood.

A peek into a lively household reveals two serene residents, a lanky elder and a child (both brownskinned), enjoying “fresh bread, nutmeg & coffee smells” in the wake of others’ departure. The morning

beckons, and the pair set off down the front steps into “palms of light that wave us outside.” They aren’t in a rush, though. “Outside, we go slow, learn a yellow bird’s song & a new neighbor’s name.” The urban setting offers constant pleasures in all directions, from birds pecking near a sewer cover to shoes dangling from power lines. Taking time to savor a snack, to take in the wares at an outdoor market, and to appreciate a busker, they wend their way through vibrant streets. They “admire a bouquet of colors in bloom” at a flower stall and “cheer artists draping a brick wall in dreams” as they “follow the fading light” before finally returning home. A mix of spot artwork and full-page spreads in violet undertones keeps the focus on the duo and their discoveries, while Tallie’s unexpected word combinations like “a shy sunflower” and “a squiggly rainbow” help sustain a childlike wonder and evoke pleasing imagery bolstered by Caldecott Medalist Becker’s rough-edged, slightly unfinished watercolor and colored pencil depictions.

A mindful pick for urban amblers. (Picture book. 4-8)

Putin vs. Zelensky: The Russo-Ukrainian War: Why It’s Happening and How It All Got Started

Thompson, Ben | Roaring Brook Press (240 pp.) $19.99 | August 19, 2025 | 9781250339560

History writer Thompson’s valuable primer delves into the intertwined histories of Russia and Ukraine leading up to the current war. On February 24, 2022, Russia began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine at the direction of President Vladimir Putin, an ex-KGB agent. By the next day, missile strikes were reported throughout Ukraine as troops clambered to defensive positions and residents fled to safety. On the

other side of the conflict was actorturned-politician Volodymyr Zelensky, who assured his countryfolk that “We are all defending our independence.” This book begins in the early 20th century with the lead-up to the fall of the Russian Empire, as contextualized through the Putin and Zelensky families’ experiences. Thompson helps readers understand the roots of the present conflict by showing how Russia emphasizes the countries’ shared pasts while Ukraine battles for its unique cultural and linguistic identity. This well-researched book is full of interesting information, such as the fact that both Zelensky and Putin have law degrees but neither practiced law because they “both hated it.” The writing is mostly conversational (former Ukraine president Viktor Yushchenko “made it so that you could buy a loaf of bread and a carton of milk at the grocery store without having to auction off a vital organ to pay for it”) but may still be too dense to capture readers’ attention. Occasional photos interrupt the otherwise text-heavy pages, which would have benefited from being broken up by design elements. A highly detailed account for history buffs. (timeline, bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 10-14)

Home, Home

T.P., Sibu | Viking (32 pp.) | $18.99 August 12, 2025 | 9780593403730

An Indian American child constantly feels like the odd one out. Holed up with a sketch pad or savoring cups of chaiya (“the color of treasure and honey. The color of me”), Ajesh finds home to be a welcome respite from school, where the youngster feels like “the different one.” Happily, summer break is finally here, and Ajesh is thrilled at the prospect of “two whole months where I can be myself.” But when Mummy and Daddy announce a trip “back home” to the South Indian state of Kerala, Ajesh

is unsure. In India, the child is overwhelmed by unfamiliar noises, sights, and sounds. Everything is different, except for one thing: Ajesh still feels out of place. But as the family spends time traveling through India, passing by the tea plantations of Munnar, enjoying a stay on a houseboat, and visiting Ajesh’s grandparents’ home, the protagonist’s attitude slowly changes. The familiar scents of Ammachi (Grandma) preparing chaiya make Ajesh feel right at home, and the book concludes with the child returning to America with a sketchbook celebrating cherished memories—and the understanding that Kerala is home, too. Relying on strong sensory imagery, this keenly observed tale speaks to the alienation experienced by many who straddle two cultures. Tightly packed illustrations reflect the hustle and bustle of daily life in Kerala, while wide luscious landscapes showcase the diversity within India.

A soothing read, warm and comforting as a cup of chaiya. (Picture book. 4-8)

Another

Tremblay, Paul | Illus. by Sam Wolfe Connelly | Quill Tree Books/ HarperCollins (256 pp.) | $19.99 July 22, 2025 | 9780063396357

A tween befriends a mysterious changeling.

Casey Wilson hasn’t had many friends since the fabled sixth grade “Zoom Incident,” when a bully recorded his anxious tics and posted them online. But one day, after a mysterious phone call, a new friend arrives in a burlap bag. From the beginning, it’s clear this child (whose name is Morel) isn’t quite human; he has a claylike body and doesn’t eat or sleep. Casey’s gut sounds the alarm, but since his parents are unfazed, he rolls with the child’s appearance, too. The two kids start to connect over drawing, video games, and anime, but their

similarities turn sinister as Morel slowly molds himself into Casey— voice and all. As Casey’s memories start to feel “far away,” his family begins to confuse him with Morel. Worse, they seem to prefer Morel over him. By the time Casey realizes what’s happening, it may be too late to get his life back. Horror veteran Tremblay draws on personal experience as an educator in his chilling middle-grade debut set in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic. The third-person perspective enhances the suspense; even readers who figure out what’s going on will find it terrifying to observe Casey’s growing realization of what’s happening to his family. Connelly’s occasional full-page black-and-white illustrations add ambience, and some will surely fuel readers’ nightmares. Casey and his family present white. Casey’s diagnoses include transient tic disorder, slow executive functioning, and anxiety. Delightfully disconcerting.

(author’s note) (Horror. 9-12)

The Fairy Tale Fixers: Cinderella

Underwood, Deborah | Illus. by Jorge Lacera | Colors by Jorge Lacera & Megan Lacera | Clarion/HarperCollins (128 pp.) $12.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9780063242425

Series: The Fairy Tale Fixers, 1

Cinderella’s story, artfully retold and starring a pair of mice. Cinderella toils for her demanding family day and night. Her stepsiblings shriek incessantly; even the household animals are losing sleep. So the house mouse enlists the Fairy Tale Fixer, a rodent detective in a trench coat who’s a bit clueless but always up for a challenge. The best way to end the noise is to get Cinderella out of the house, so the Fixer (donning fairy wings, a tiara, and a dress, the better to fit in) and the significantly smarter house mouse devise a plan to get her to the prince’s ball. Prince Edward

Imbued with a beauty and strength that will leave a lasting impression.

DANCING WITH WATER

turns out to be an incessant chatterbox, so the crew must improvise to extricate Cinderella from an unpleasant situation and help her achieve her real dreams. Cinderella’s freshly reimagined adventure departs skillfully from its source material. A running joke about the Fixer’s yearning for pancakes, various visual gags (including three characters standing on one another’s shoulders and disguising themselves with a long coat), the Fixer’s snarky internal monologue, and dramatic overreactions keep the energy buzzing throughout this graphic novel. Sketchy, playfully colored illustrations enhance the excitement. Cinderella and her family are brown-skinned; Prince Edward is tan-skinned and blond. A funny, energetic riff on a familiar tale. (Graphic fantasy. 6-10)

If I Built a Town

Van Dusen, Chris | Rocky Pond Books/ Penguin (40 pp.) | $19.99 | September 30, 2025

9780593324981 | Series: If I Built

In zippy, Seussian rhymes and images, a young city planner dreams big. Strolling with a brown-skinned, bespectacled mayor through idyllic townscapes, part real, part imagined, light-skinned, dark-haired Jack expounds on what the perfect burg would look like. With the exception of schools—which the author skips in order to insert a plug for his If I Built a School (2019)—the ideal version of Jaxtown would have all the essentials, from stylish homes and free stores,

both maintained by robots, to a free-range zoo with lots of wild animals including “a griffin, a dino or two, / And three fancy unicorns, white, pink, and blue.” Aerial walkways would twine through striped, bendy trees. There would be a roving health clinic and a big library where “no one controls what you can or can’t read,” but no need for a firehouse or for police (everything here is flameproof, and “nobody argues and nothing goes wrong”). Nearby farms with chickens would make the town self-sustaining (for ovo-vegetarians anyway), and the energy source would be carbon neutral: “We’d end our reliance on foul fossil fuels / And switch to magnetic, electrified jewels.” The racially diverse populace enjoying all the benefits shown in the enticing illustrations include same-sex couples and people using wheelchairs. Sunny, inclusive, and, sadly, imaginary. (Picture book. 6-8)

Dancing With Water

Wallace, Gwendolyn | Illus. by Tonya Engel | Kokila (40 pp.) | $18.99 August 12, 2025 | 9780593617908

A Black child learns the African American tradition of water divining from Grandpa. Kit’s grandpa has several “magical” talents, but most amazing is his ability to “dance with water.” He digs wells for people all over town so they can obtain water for the basic necessities of life. To find the water underground, he wanders, eyes closed, with a tree branch, then digs a hole and waits. When the water

bursts forth from the ground, Kit (who is nonbinary and trans and uses they /them pronouns) is dazzled. Water becomes harder to find when factories and businesses take from the land “without listening.” Discouraged, Kit no longer wants to look for water with Grandpa. But Grandpa says he needs Kit’s help, and they go to the edge of the forest. Grandpa holds Kit on his shoulders as he dances, and Kit feels the power of the water. This time, Kit is the first to break ground. As Kit takes the tradition into their own hands, the teachings of their ancestors—creativity, resilience, resistance, and magic—are passed on to the child. Engel’s textured, richly hued art effectively brings readers into the country setting and into the dance that merges Kit with the water. A powerful nugget of culture and history fits snugly into Wallace’s graceful story.

Imbued with a beauty and strength that will leave a lasting impression. (author’s note) (Picture book. 3-8)

Fireboy

Willett, Edward | Shadowpaw Press (232 pp.) $16.99 paper | June 24, 2025 | 9781998273423

Two girls battle supernatural forces to save their friend. Thirteen-yearold Sam is horrified to see her best friend Lorenzo’s face in the flames of a campfire. Lorenzo, who’s been turned into the Human Torch, was last seen months ago, on a mysterious field trip during which an entire seventh grade class disappeared. Sam, who was home sick that fateful day, enlists the help of Meg—the one student who survived the outing. The small-town Alberta girls bond: Sam has lost her mother and lives with her unemployed father, while Meg’s alcoholic mother is largely absent. Together, their survival skills are second to none, which is fortunate, since they must foil Lorenzo’s captors

without much help from adults. Sam’s narrative voice reads savvy beyond her years, sarcastically barbed in her defiance against morally corrupt—or simply short-sighted—grown-ups. The edgy humor aligns authentically with the middle school protagonist, although several references to the strict German vice principal’s being a “Nazi” feel uncomfortably stereotypical. The witty chapter titles—“I Wear Ugly Sunglasses During a Car Chase,” “I Find Out I Was Right the First Time”—combine with multiple action sequences to highlight Sam as a quick-thinking problem solver. The friendships in the story are satisfyingly ride or die, and the villains are reprehensibly villainous, sometimes filling the role of the bumbling adult. Characters are largely cued white; the language used to describe supporting characters of color unfortunately sounds othering. An exciting action-hero adventure centered on a compelling and competent narrator. (Science fiction. 10-14)

A Monstrous Bedtime

Wilson, Kerilynn | Greenwillow Books (32 pp.) $19.99 | August 12, 2025 | 9780063335615

An ode to bedtime anxieties and a love letter to the rituals that soothe them.

Having drunk a cup of water, listened to a story, and sung a song, a pale-skinned youngster is snuggled up and ready to snooze when…wait a moment…has anyone checked on the monster under the bed? Unfortunately, the child’s supernatural roommate is wide awake, but our plucky, problem-solving protagonist has a plan. Taking the creature by the tentacle, the child repeats the bedtime routine with the monster in tow—but, self-assured to a fault and with a flair for the dramatic, the empathetic tot inadvertently wreaks havoc at every turn. By the time the monster, an octopodan shadow more

hapless than spooky, carries the kid to bed once more, they’ve both left behind a series of comedically chaotic surprises for the parents who’ll rouse them come morning. A departure from more classically monstrous bedtime fare, this narrative removes fear from the equation entirely, offering an innovative, collaborative spin on the relationship between child and monster. Likely to become a part of readers’ own bedtime routines, this nighttime tale feels like a recipe for a sedating witch’s brew. A complement to her comforting text, Wilson’s illustrative use of negative space is reminiscent of Maurice Sendak’s work—one of many homages to another iconic bedtime tale—and her palette and art style evoke a vintage, Sunday-paper comic. The effect is thoroughly charming. A creature feature worthy of every child’s nightly routine. (Picture book. 5-8)

Wednesday Is for Wiggling!

Wong Nava, Eva | Illus. by Holly Sterling Candlewick (32 pp.) | $18.99 July 1, 2025 | 9781536242997

Each day of the week means something different to this child.

The youngster is less than exuberant each Monday. With the weekend over, Mama goes to work and drops the protagonist off at day care. Fortunately, friends and fun brighten the little one’s spirits. Monday may be for moping, but “TUESDAY is for tiptoeing!” Dressed in a tutu and pink shoes, the child eagerly attends dance class after school. Each

subsequent day highlights a different experience. “WEDNESDAY is for wiggling” (on Mama’s day off!), “THURSDAY is for thinking” (with a trip to the library), and “FRIDAY is for friends!” Saturday is spent with Gramma and Grandpa at the community garden, while the child rides scooters with Daddy by the canal on Sunday. The focus on what makes each day special might encourage families to look closely at their own routines and note favorite weekly traditions. Sterling’s pencil illustrations are smudgy and warm, imbuing the tale with a deep sense of affection, while Wong Nava’s energetic text is punctuated with exclamations. Every spread depicts characters laughing, playing, and relishing time spent together. Mama, Daddy, Gramma, and the child are brown-skinned, Grandpa is light-skinned, and their community is diverse. Context clues suggest that Mama and Daddy live in separate households, but this family’s love is what shines through most strongly.

A tender tale to help little ones master the days of the week—and find a way to savor each one. (Picture book. 3-6)

Seven Babies

Xiao, Forest | Candlewick (32 pp.) $18.99 September 2, 2025 | 9781536245097

An unexpected delivery brings chaos, joy, and an abundance of love.

“One Thursday morning, a box of babies arrives at this door.”

A rambunctious celebration of babyhood that begs for repeated readings.

SEVEN BABIES

Kirkus Star

An

ode

to bedtime anxieties

and a love letter to the rituals that soothe them.

A MONSTROUS BEDTIME

With this whimsical premise, Xiao has crafted a heartwarming tale that perfectly captures the exhausting yet rewarding reality of caring for little ones. Seven distinctively expressive round-faced infants—varying in complexion—quickly make themselves at home, requiring feeding, bathing, and entertaining. The simple text is gracefully balanced with the visual exuberance of babies tumbling across pages, exploring their surroundings, and eventually snuggling up together. Xiao employs a restrained palette in her gouache and pencil illustrations—the tots’ yellow sleepers contrast against mostly muted backgrounds— creating scenes that are pleasingly detailed yet never overwhelming. Each baby has individual personality traits conveyed through subtle facial expressions and positioning, enticing children to follow their favorites through the pages. The diverse caregivers respond with good-natured acceptance to the sudden responsibility, modeling joyful adaptability amid domestic disruption. The story ends with a delightful invitation to readers—“What will they do next?”— cleverly setting up a potential sequel while also encouraging children to imagine their own adventures for these seven charming youngsters. A sweet, rambunctious celebration of babyhood that begs for repeated readings. (Picture book. 1-5)

I Know the Whale

Yardi, Robin | Illus. by Matt Schu Little Bee Books (40 pp.) | $18.99 April 1, 2025 | 9781499816075

A song has ended. Books for children about death are complex things. Margaret Wise Brown succinctly summarized death in 1958’s The Dead Bird . Tomie dePaola made it personal in 1973’s Nana Upstairs & Nana Downstairs , and Anastasia Higginbotham demystified it in 2016’s Death Is Stupid . Yardi and Schu seemingly tip their hats to each of these works. Accompanied by Schu’s evocative art, dominated by inky blues and blacks and rippling curves, Yardi’s words are simple but lightly poetic: “I know the whale lived. I know the whale sang. But when it washes ashore, the whale isn’t singing anymore.” But she doesn’t shy away from the unkinder aspects: “It is wonderful and horrible and beautiful and stinky.” As the light-skinned young protagonist explores the corpse on the beach, Papa guides the exploration. A few pages in, readers may question if Papa was really there; the protagonist asks, “Where is the whale now?,” only to be met with a double-page spread of silence as the youngster stares at a picture of Papa on a dresser in a dark room. Later, while drawing a whale on the street in chalk, the protagonist wonders: “When were we last together? Will I ever be with them again?” The answer, in regard to the whale, comes a few years later, when its

bones are put on display at a local museum. And Papa? That answer is yet to come.

A stirring conversation starter. (author’s note) (Picture book. 4-8)

Bob the Vampire Snail

Zuill, Andrea | Random House Studio (40 pp.) $18.99 | August 5, 2025 | 9780593814963

An existence of pleasingly dull normality is upended when a gastropod becomes a creature of the night.

Bob lives an uneventful snail life until one evening, after a series of sounds—a scream, three stomps, a crack, a drip, and a “POOF!”—he finds himself utterly changed. Bob is now a vampire! He’s also an outcast among the other snails (“He seems so complicated”), and he must figure out all the things a vampire can and cannot do. When he finally realizes that sucking tomatoes dry is his wont (a nod to James and Deborah Howe’s Bunnicula , perhaps?) and that he can fly and hypnotize rats into getting him more food, he perks up. Still, he doesn’t really have a friend. Will he ever find one?

Zuill’s natural propensity for hilarity shines strong and true, particularly in the artwork—a blend of realism and cartoonish fun. Adding to the visual jokes and snappy text, a small bug offers context on vampires for young readers, the occasional snail fact, and some zippy commentary (“I’m not sure it’s good for anyone to try to eat a bear unless you’re a professional”). Dedicated to “all those kids who, like me, prefer their books a little bit spooky,” it may fill that need, but it will find its true calling in those autumnal storytimes in need of something both funny and surprisingly touching. A marvelous method for encouraging even the smallest weirdos to find their people. (Picture book. 3-6)

Young Adult

THE EXPANSIVE WORLD OF SPECULATIVE FICTION

THE ALLURE OF books that go beyond everyday realism is undeniable. When we’re very young, the line between real and magical is delightfully hazy and ever-shifting, so it’s no wonder that as we grow up, and the mundane details of life consume us, we’d crave a return to that state of mind where anything is possible. Teens have plenty of classic science fiction and fantasy worlds to explore— books with advanced technology, epic battles, intricate maps, invented languages, magical creatures, and other beloved genre elements. Alongside these on the shelves, they’ll find speculative fiction encompassing more variety than ever, including fantastical romance, thriller, historical, coming-of-age,

and superhero stories, like the must-read titles below.

It’s You Every Time by Charlene Thomas (Scholastic, May 6): A simple act—stopping at Dunkin’ for breakfast on the way to school—turns into a life-changing meet-cute that transports two teens on journeys through grief and into love. Before closing with a surprising twist, Thomas takes readers on a time-loop adventure in which Sydney and Marcus grow through and with one another.

The Singular Life of Aria Patel by Samira Ahmed (Little, Brown, May 13): STEM-loving Aria travels through parallel universes, experiencing different iterations of her life—ones in which her father is still alive or she’s still with

ex-boyfriend Rohan. Readers will sympathize with the anxious Chicago high school senior—and her desire for control in a chaotic world— in this high-stakes story of learning to trust and let go.

Then There Was One by Wendy Cross (Puffin/ Penguin Random House UK, May 20): Readers needn’t be Agatha Christie fans to appreciate this suspenseful debut inspired by And Then There Were None, in which 10 contestants compete in a reality TV show for a large cash prize. The teens live on planets that were terraformed by people from Earth centuries ago, adding to the novel’s deliciously off-kilter vibes.

Salvación by Sandra Proudman (Wednesday Books, May 20): In this gender-swapped El

Zorro–inspired page-turner set in mid-19th-century Mexico, Lola disguises herself as the vigilante Salvación. She risks everything to help protect the people of Alta California from white colonizers who have an interest in sal negra, the magical substance mined in the area that her mother uses for healing.

Family Force V: Book One by Matt Braly, illustrated by Ainsworth Lin (Image Comics, June 10): When your family business is fighting aliens, there’s pressure to continue the legacy. But Maise just wants to do normal teen things, like grab dinner with her crush, without having to drop everything and save the world. Braly’s charming text and Lin’s enchanting art give this graphic novel plenty of reader appeal.

The Yomigaeri Tunnel by Kelly Murashige (Soho Teen, July 1): In this poignant, beautifully realized work, recent high school graduate Monika is struggling with the tragic death of her classmate Shun. Monika and Shiori, a girl who’s grieving the loss of her mother, enter the Yomigaeri Tunnel, said to allow anyone who walks through it to bring someone back to life.

Laura Simeon is a young readers’ editor.

LAURA SIMEON

Illustration by Eric Scott Anderson

EDITOR’S PICK

After unknowingly unleashing an ancient force, a teen joins forces with unlikely allies as they race to stop the destruction it leaves in its wake.

Seventeen-year-old Sparrow, who was raised by the members of the Thieves Guild, wants nothing more than to make the Guildmaster proud. She sees her chance when the Circle—a secretive group that controls the guild—assigns her to retrieve an artifact from a long-forgotten ruined underground city. During her journey, she meets Halek the Fatechaser and Raithe, an assassin. Though Raithe was sent to stop Sparrow, he becomes

an unexpected ally—and maybe something more. Sparrow soon learns that she played a key role in the return of a Deathless King, inadvertently putting everyone she loves in danger. Although the Deathless Kings “once ruled the world,” nowadays “the stories left behind were mostly used to scare naughty children.” Along with her companions, Sparrow crosses the deadly Dust Sea in search of help to stop further devastation. But the Deathless King is hunting them because Sparrow is a Fateless, someone who poses a threat because she can defy curses. Kagawa’s world

Fateless

building is exceptional, introducing a realm filled with unique fantasy-world races, cultures, and religions. This novel, which is perfect for fans of Sabaa Tahir, features layered, distinctly drawn

characters who have humorous and heartfelt interactions. The romance is subtle, allowing the main plot to take center stage. A richly imagined trilogy opener with high-stakes adventure. (Fantasy. 14-18)

Solid sisterly love endures guilty secrets and conflicts of the heart.

THE BLOOD PHOENIX

You’ve Awoken Her

Cardinal, Ann Dávila | Harper/ HarperCollins (288 pp.) | $19.99

June 17, 2025 | 9780063299559

Gabriel Nieves loves a good horror movie, but that doesn’t mean he wants to be in one.

Over the summer before Gabi’s senior year, his mother needs to leave Queens, and she presents him with two choices: head to the Hamptons to visit his newly rich bestie, Ruth, or go stay with his abuela in Puerto Rico, where he’ll sit on her porch, “watching the plants grow with Paco the toothless Chihuahua.” Unenthused about either option, Gabi, who’s queer, settles for Long Island. On the way, he receives an ominous warning from a woman at the train station: “They woke her! They woke her and she’s angry!” Ruth seems changed by her new circumstances and wealthy friends— she’s even dating Frost Thurston, a boy from an influential family who’s “concave-is-the-new-black thin.” At a beach party, Gabi swears he sees a giant tentacle emerge from the water, drowning a woman—and when the list of victims grows, he realizes that a sinister force is at work. With its uneven, meandering tension, this work will appeal to those seeking scares that aren’t too intense. Astute readers will spot the bad guys early on, making the story more about how they will be defeated rather than who they are. Much of the teen dialogue feels forced and awkward, but this slow-build thriller culminates in a satisfying ending.

A coastal summer thriller with light scares. (Paranormal thriller. 12-18)

The Nightblood Prince

Chang, Molly X. | Random House (384 pp.)

$18.89 | July 1, 2025 | 9780593897362

Series: The Nightblood Prince, 1

Prophesied to unite all the kingdoms and torn between two princes, one girl fights for peace and power.

Born with a special mark on her forehead that gives her the gift of foresight but plagues her with nightmares, Lifeng Fei is fated to become the empress of all empresses. She was taken from her family and raised alongside her intended future husband, Siwang, prince of Rong. While she loves him, Fei wants more out of life than the limitations of her patriarchal society allow. So she seizes an opportunity to flee and encounters the mysterious Yexue, prince of Lan, who has his own monstrous prophecy and leads an army of vampires. Soon the princes are at war, with Fei caught in the middle, trying to figure out which one she can trust and love even as alliances are forged and broken. In this series kickoff set in an ancient China–inspired world, some plot points bring to mind the story of Mulan. Headstrong Fei’s possible love interests are complex and morally gray, which makes for an exciting love triangle. The story critiques power-hungry leaders who have little care for the blood on their hands; Fei becomes a scapegoat for their greed, something she challenges as she presses for peace and agency. With thrilling political intrigue, Chang’s YA debut doesn’t shy away from the hardships of war.

An engrossing fantasy featuring a fierce, feminist hero. (Fantasy. 14-18)

The Blood Phoenix

Chen, Amber | Viking (480 pp.) | $20.99

June 17, 2025 | 9780593622780

Series: Of Jade and Dragons, 2

Two sisters face tough challenges as their island realm simultaneously suffers betrayal from within and invading pirate fleets from without in this sequel to 2024’s Of Jade and Dragons

Chen picks up two years after the events of the first book in this entry that offers readers fiery explosions but overall focuses more on characters and feelings. Young Aihui Nian is honing her political skills at the intrigue-laden court of Qianlei Palace, while her mechanically adept big sister, Ying, is engineering weapons in response to the invaders’ new submersible ironclads. Nian and Ying repeatedly reunite for adventures (and also go off on separate ones), but their attention and emotional engagement are also occupied by their love interests, mercurial prince Ye-kan and secretive, overprotective Ye-yang, respectively. Ying has multiple encounters with the titular fleet of fearsome, all-woman pirates, but rather than violent or intricately choreographed battle scenes and details about silkpunk technology, the strength of this work lies in its courageous, independent women. What stands out most prominently throughout is a solid sisterly love that endures separation, guilty secrets, devastating revelations, and conflicts of the heart. The author leaves some plotlines ambiguously open, perhaps paving the way for a sequel. Names and dress imply diversity in the cast of this tale set in a world inspired by Qing dynasty China.

A colorful, angsty, character-driven fantasy: Cue the feels. (Fantasy. 12-18)

For more Chinese-inspired fantasy, visit Kirkus online.

A Fiery Spirit

Chenli, Kate | Union Square & Co. (336 pp.) | $18.99 | June 17, 2025

9781454949954 | Series: A Bright Heart, 2

Internal and external forces vie for power even as Lu Mingshin attempts to protect the powerful Divine Stone from evil sorcerer Xiangyu in this Chinese mythology–inspired sequel.

Thanks to the time-traveling powers of the Divine Stone, Mingshin was able to prevent her own murder by her uncle, yet she’s still not in the clear. Uncle Yi escaped and is still plotting to gain influence over the throne, while Xiangyu, the Night Dragon, lies in wait, reinforcing his powers. The action-packed plot quickly reveals that Mingshin, her family, and her allies are focused on helping her love, Prince Jieh, succeed in his bid against his brother, Kai, to become ruler of the kingdom. But things are complicated—magic is illegal in Dazhou, and Mingshin finds that her own powers, as the guardian of the powerful Divine Stone, have quickly been expanding to encompass other types of magic. She fears Jieh’s love will not survive the revelation of this secret. Xiangyu has grown in power within the spiritual realm as well, and he’s plotting to use the Divine Stone to take over the world. Familiarity with the events of A Bright Heart (2023) is essential to fully appreciating the complexities of this installment. The characterizations are strong, and the twists are abundant, but the large supporting cast and number of subplots can make the story hard to track. The ending strongly hints at a sequel to come.

An entertaining if sometimes overly convoluted venture that will please series fans. (Fantasy. 14-18)

The Lightning People Play

Cummings, Tim | Black Rose Writing (240 pp.) $21.95 | June 26, 2025 | 9781685136192

Fourteen-year-old Kirby Renton is determined to put on a play to raise money to help his younger brother, who has epilepsy. Kirby is scared. His dads are separated, and his brother keeps having seizures. During them, Baxter says he sees “the lightning people”—and that “they’re coming.” As Baxter’s seizures worsen, Kirby uses his passion for theater to write and produce a play to raise money for a seizure alert dog, with help from a ragtag team of fellow theater kids. He’s determined to save Baxter before the lightning people arrive. Little do they know that the play will surpass their wildest dreams. Kirby is desperate to help his family—he blames Dad for Pop’s leaving, which in turn “is what made [Baxter’s] brains explode inside his head and that’s what’s causing the seizures.” While the representation of epilepsy is important, there are instances of misinformation on how to help someone who’s having a seizure. Kirby, who presents white, states early on that he may have mild OCD, but his symptom—mostly an urge to be orderly—vanishes by the end of the book. Because he has two dads, Kirby contends with homophobic comments from peers, which are framed as a normal aspect of life in his small town on the Ohio-Pennsylvania border. While this book is seemingly set in the present day,

An accessible resource for nonbinary youths who are seeking role models.

the use of pop culture references and slang from different eras creates a muddled portrayal of contemporary teenagers. A heartfelt but confusing story about family. (author’s note) (Fiction. 12-16)

Beyond They/Them: 20 Influential Nonbinary and Gender-Diverse People You Should Know

dickson, em | Illus. by Cameron Mukwa Andrews McMeel Publishing (96 pp.)

$21.99 | May 6, 2025 | 9781524893996

C elebratory profiles of 20 influential nonbinary and gender-diverse people from a variety of backgrounds, including popular authors ND Stevenson and Maia Kobabe and actor and musician Janelle Monáe. The subjects are grouped together into six sections: “Film & TV,” “Books & Poetry,” “Music,” “Sports,” “Politics,” and “Activists & Scholars.” Some of the people are household names who readers might not realize are nonbinary, such as Demi Lovato. In cases where someone uses multiple pronouns, dickson carefully alternates among them, a welcome touch given that some nonbinary people struggle with their peers’ utilizing only one set of their pronouns. The book includes people whose gender identities may have less widespread recognition, such as American Samoan soccer player Jaiyah Saelua, who is fa‘afafine, a Polynesian third gender, or two-spirit Indigiqueer scholar Joshua Whitehead (Oji-nêhiyaw member of Peguis First Nation). This broad perspective shows how some non-Western cultures perceive people who exist outside the gender binary. Blocks of color break up the text into orderly chunks. Each profile contains an attractive, full-page color portrait by Mukwa (Anishinaabe) and a list of the person’s facts and achievements along with a more in-depth overview. The clear layout and casual, everyday language make this an accessible and useful resource both for those looking to learn about nonbinary people and nonbinary youths who are seeking role models.

A clear and informative guidebook. (author’s note, glossary, bibliography, further reading) (Nonfiction. 12-18)

Island Creatures

Engle, Margarita | Atheneum (272 pp.)

$19.99 | July 8, 2025 | 9781665959957

Separated during childhood, two Cuban teen animal rescuers reunite unexpectedly. Memories of adventures saving animals “in el monte, our green forest / with its aroma of cocoa” in the Guamuhaya Mountains of central Cuba haunt Vida and Adán, who were close before life forced them apart. A decade later, unbeknownst to either, both teens now live in South Florida. With her parents dead and her photojournalist abuela often absent, Vida lives in an empty home. Climate migrant Adán survives in a packed home brimming with violent tension between his father and abuelo. When Adán rescues a gray tree fox, his good deed leads to a chance reunion with Vida. The years apart, however, have brought change. Wary of men following a boarding school incident, Vida nurtures her burgeoning feminist consciousness; béisbol player Adán, who’s learning to be an ally, realizes that masculinity can be “a promise of kindness / that makes us strong / not weak.” Gradually, they rekindle their love while reinforcing their passion for helping endangered animals. But a rift between their families threatens to disrupt them anew. Moving fluidly between Vida’s pensive perspective and Adán’s anguished narration, Engle’s verse narrative boasts rich language steeped in nature’s spiritual beauty and the reciprocal connection between humans and animals. A sweet slow-burner with tight, evocative poems, this tale of adolescent love glows. Drifting into a carefree flight by the last page, Vida and Adán’s story ends as delicately as it began. Fanciful, hopeful, and heartfelt. (author’s note) (Verse fiction. 12-18)

This Is Where We Die

He, Cindy R.X. | Sourcebooks Fire (336 pp.) $12.99 paper | July 1, 2025 | 9781728293424

T hanks to Sadie Lombard’s trust fund, she and her friends are celebrating high school graduation on Christie’s Island, an exclusive destination off the coast of Massachusetts.

Valedictorian Isla Claythorne is ready to let loose for the weekend, as are playboy Anthony “Ant” Martinez and the group’s star athlete, Will Armstrong. Emily Chang, Ant’s childhood best friend, is excited for this perfect opportunity to confess her feelings for Ant. Charlie Rogers, who’s become moody and distant over the last year, surprises everyone by agreeing to go. Upon their arrival, the teens discover that the island’s mansion is not only devoid of staff but lacking internet and satellite connections. The isolation evokes memories of another trip they took together: Eighteen months ago, the six classmates and two other teens were skiing in Canada when an avalanche trapped them in a mountain hut for weeks. The six gathered on the island haven’t spoken about the experience to anyone since their rescue, but when they find a painting in the mansion referencing the Donner Party, with two of eight depicted figures crossed out, they begin to suspect that someone knows the truth they’re hiding. Conversations inserted between chapters reveal early on that no one survives the graduation party, cranking up the tension and sense of creeping dread. Readers are left wondering who to blame as, one by one, the mostly white cast members meet

their untimely and gruesome fates. Names cue some diversity.

A chilling and suspense-filled tragedy. (content warning) (Thriller. 14-18)

Kirkus Star

Love at Full Tilt

Howe, Jenny L. | Delacorte Romance (384 pp.) $12.99 paper | July 22, 2025 | 9780593809105

A Massachusetts 18-year-old embarks on a theme park scavenger hunt in hopes of rewriting her future. After graduation, Lia Baker and her two best friends, Tess and Issy, decide to celebrate by heading to Florida’s Fableland for the Superfan Scavenger Hunt. The winner gets a $50,000 prize and lifetime free park access. Lia hopes to use the money to escape from her mom’s hovering anxiety and her stifling job at her parents’ furniture store. As a fat girl, she dreams of creating body-positive stories. To ensure her success, she forms an alliance with hot fellow contestant Mason. However, as the competition builds, so do the tensions between Lia and her friends—who will soon be going away to college, making Lia feel left behind—and even between Lia and Mason. The characters’ complexities and growth over the course of the story are real strengths; as they navigate challenges, Mason and Lia’s developing romance is moving and inspiring, and their relationships with their families are fleshed out too. Structuring the story around the scavenger hunt helps maintain a sense of urgency that keeps the interest level high. In her YA debut, Howe

Presents readers with a strong protagonist who challenges societal fatphobia.

presents readers with a strong protagonist in Lia, who challenges societal fatphobia in realistic ways. Central characters are cued white, except for Issy, who’s Puerto Rican. Tess is queer. A heartwarming, strongly characterized romance in which being truly seen for who you are is the greatest prize of all. (Romance. 13-18)

Tempest

Ibura, K. | Quill Tree Books/ HarperCollins (304 pp.) | $19.99 June 24, 2025 | 9780063081031

Sixteen-year-old Veronique is confused and scared when her grandmother sends her to live with her maternal aunt in New Orleans. Veronique has lived with MawMaw in a rural area outside Natchitoches, Louisiana, for most of her life—the only memories she has of her mother are snatches of dreams. Her parents perished during Hurricane Katrina, and MawMaw is the only one who knows about Veronique’s ability to manipulate the wind. Or so she thought. New Orleans is loud and disorienting, a contrast to life on MawMaw’s farm, making it hard for Veronique to control her powers, but she must keep her abilities hidden from Auntie Eve’s family, her new boyfriend, and the shadowy organization that’s hunting her. Veronique eventually realizes that to save the people she cares about, she may have to destroy the new life she’s built. Steady pacing in the first half of the book highlights Veronique’s struggles to cope with drastic life changes. Ibura masterfully explores new and intense experiences relating to school, love, and freedom, creating fully fleshed out characters. However, the pacing gets choppy toward the climax and end of the book; Veronique (and readers) receive an overload of information without enough space to digest it before the next twists arrive, which feels jarring and out of sync with the intentional manner of the earlier buildup. Most characters present Black.

A promising premise and alluring protagonist propel this unevenly paced story. (Fantasy. 13-18)

The Great Misfortune of Stella Sedgwick

Isabelle, S. | Storytide/HarperCollins (384 pp.)

$19.99 | July 8, 2025 | 9781335006967

In this novel set in 1868 England featuring Black protagonists, a young woman’s desire for selfdetermination conflicts with societal constraints. At 18, orphan Stella Sedgwick is expected to find a position as a servant for a wealthy family. Her 17-year-old biracial cousin, Olivia Witherson, received a small inheritance from her white vicar father, but if Stella is to achieve her dream of becoming a writer, she’ll need to make a smart marriage. When a letter arrives from her late mother’s former employer, Thomas Fitzroy, summoning her to his home, she’s confused. Stella’s mother, who was enslaved in the West Indies and later abandoned by Stella’s father, raised her daughter alongside Mr. Fitzroy’s grandchildren at Kendall Manor. Stella hasn’t heard from the family in the four years since her mother’s death, so she’s shocked to learn that she’ll inherit the estate following terminally ill Mr. Fitzroy’s death—but, given that only men can own property, the bequest requires her to marry. Stella wrestles with accepting this gift and its consequences— both matrimony and the reactions of Mr. Fitzroy’s family. Stella’s navigation of a society that is unwelcoming to non-white people is well written but would have benefited from more robust historical context. Still, the strong character development will help readers understand the complex choices each character faces. Strong pacing throughout culminates in a slightly lackluster ending. Romance enthusiasts will enjoy this work, although history buffs will be left wanting more details. (Historical romance. 13-18)

Saturday Wars: The Manga Multiverse Crossover

Jones, Frederick L. | Illus. by Eddy Frye Rockport Publishers (232 pp.) | $15.99 paper | June 3, 2025 | 9780760390382

An action-packed crossover in which heroes from Saturday AM’s TANKS series join forces to defend the multiverse. With universes being obliterated right and left, the godlike Gwaliin assembles a squad of warriors to fight the threat. However, they’re attacked before they can plan their first move, and the brutal onslaught puts an end to the elite team before it’s even officially launched. In a last attempt to fight Chillian Veyn, the cosmic alliance activates the Saturday Protocol, recruiting new heroes from their various worlds. Their chances of success are slim, and they’re going to have to set their egos aside and work together, which won’t be easy. Even if they’ve never fought side-by-side before, another surprise attack forces them to do their best. Chillian Veyn might be the worst threat the multiverse has seen so far, but a postscript teases even more sinister forces that await them. Although some of the relationships could have been developed more fully, the banter among the team members is entertaining, and the twists work well with the narrative. The first few pages include some pops of red, but the remainder of the pages are illustrated in black-and-white. Frye’s action-packed artwork includes numerous sound effects. In the prologue before they’re recruited via the Saturday Protocol, the heroes are depicted in the styles of their original series entries.

An exciting superhero adventure. (Manga. 13-18)

For more manga from Saturday AM, visit Kirkus online.

Engaging characters and appealing, nostalgic artwork.

Donut Summer

Kelly, Anita | Quill Tree Books/ HarperCollins (384 pp.) | $19.99 July 29, 2025 | 9781335012890

A summer job at a local donut shop leads a teen to community engagement— and love.

When 16-yearold Penny Dexter-Laroche, who’s cued white, learned that her moms are struggling to pay the medical bills for her 6-year-old sister Nikki, the smallest of the triplets, she decided to start her own college fund so she could fulfill her dream of majoring in environmental science and making a difference in the world without straining the family finances. Finding a job at Delicious Donuts, a beloved institution in tiny Verity, Oregon, was the easy part; what was hard was learning she’d be working with Mexican and Italian American genderqueer classmate Mateo della Penna. Penny has long been drawn to cool Mateo, but they only take breaks from ignoring Penny when they’re being “strangely antagonistic” toward her in history class. After Penny learns that Delicious Donuts’ owner, Elen Arshakyan, is considering selling the store to a corporate chain, she and Mateo end up working together to try to raise the shop’s profile to bring in more business—and in the process, they fall for each other. Their romance blossoms too quickly to feel fully organic, detracting somewhat from its believability. Kelly’s YA debut is a quiet, character-driven story; well-timed chapter endings keep the story moving. Descriptions of the shop’s regulars complete the picture of small-town charm. A sweet love story set against a well-drawn Pacific Northwest background. (Romance. 13-18)

Debts of Fire

Khanani, Intisar | Illus. by Kerstin Espinosa

Rosero, Namra Tahir & Aqsa Tahir

Snowy Wings Publishing (382 pp.)

$29.99 | July 8, 2025 | 9781958051467

Series: The Sunbolt Chronicles, 3

Hitomi is on the run again in this third installment of the Sunbolt Chronicles quartet. Marked by binding magic that restricts her power, she journeys across the desert toward the mythical Burnt Lands to fulfill a long-standing debt to the phoenix—a powerful, enigmatic being who has saved her life more than once. Hitomi’s rare gift—the ability to unravel spells— may be the only hope for healing a landscape torn apart by ancient curses. But she’s on more than a mission of repayment; she deepens her bond with the phoenix and immerses herself in the culture of the desert people. With Huda and her siblings, Hitomi finds kinship, trust, and the stirrings of a sense of home, though not yet fully belonging. She’s still being sought by the High Council and rogue hunters, and the desert offers a rare and fragile safety—a place where she begins to claim her history even as new attachments threaten her freedom. Khanani’s seamless integration of new characters, ideas, and adventures attests to her skillful storytelling. The balancing of Hitomi’s desire for family and belonging with the need to protect herself from getting hurt makes her struggles and triumphs easily relatable. The narrative builds on the series’ legacy with sharpened urgency, textured worldbuilding, and a pace that never loses its footing. Rosero’s elegant chapter headings and

the Tahir sisters’ full-page illustrations add to the sense of place.

The emotional depth, hard-won hope, and absorbing storytelling will grip readers. (Fantasy. 13-18)

The Crier Stone

Lewellen, Lyndsey | Enclave Escape (304 pp.) | $24.99 | July 8, 2025

9798886052107 | Series: The Chaos Grid, 2

A teenager on the run finds out why Texas has become a devastated hellscape wracked by savage storms and mutant monsters in this dystopian sequel. Following closely enough on the harrowing events of 2024’s Chaos Grid that white-presenting Juniper Conway still reeks of digestive juices from the land whale that swallowed her, this novel pitches the determined Christian hacker into fresh encounters with deadly weather, lethal insects, and colorful whalers. Then it’s on to domed Plex City (formerly Dallas–Fort Worth) for struggles with nihilist rebels who want to blow up the whole city and a corrupt megacorporation that wants to control the population using an addictive drug, followed by a violent arena game played out before a bloodthirsty audience. Incorporating familiar genre elements, Lewellen keeps up the pace while juggling a populous cast with multiple agendas. Besides having a secret e-weapon, the crier stone, and loyal allies to get her out of tough spots, Juni displays an admirable, indomitable sense of purpose that’s founded both on valued relationships, notably with hunky Latine heartthrob Daxal Garza, and the conviction— fully justified by multiple cases of divine intervention and even a voice in her head—that God is on her side. The future looks bright for her and Dax, as well as Texas, by the upbeat close. Action-heavy all the way to the triumphant end. (map) (Science fiction. 13-18)

Never Thought I’d End Up Here

Liang, Ann | Scholastic (320 pp.)

$19.99 | June 3, 2025 | 9781546110675

A Chinese American teen ends up stuck with her nemesis on a whirlwind trip. Seventeen-yearold Leah Zhang is dreading her cousin’s wedding, feeling selfconscious about her Mandarin abilities and her uncertain future after quitting modeling. At the wedding, she’s dismayed to find she’s seated at the same table as her former bully, Cyrus Sui, the subject of her nightmares ever since the Incident. The stress of his unwelcome presence causes Leah to commit a major linguistic faux pas, prompting her parents to send her on a two-week trip around China, run by the local Chinese school, to reconnect with her roots. Of course, Cyrus turns out to be going too. Leah decides this is her chance for revenge: She’ll use her looks and the charm she’s honed through modeling to make him fall for her, before dumping him unceremoniously—and publicly. But as she gets closer to him, Leah starts to wonder if he may not be the nemesis she made him out to be. And the more time she spends in her parents’ homeland, the closer she gets to finding her true place in the world. Shanghai, Anhui, and other picturesque locations form a vibrant backdrop for the couple’s swoony rom-com antics. Though Leah’s revenge plot feels a bit contrived at times and some of the serious topics (intergenerational issues, Sinophobia, and Asian beauty standards) aren’t explored with much depth, romance fans will enjoy watching the couple find their happy ending. A light and dreamy travel romance. (Romance. 13-18)

Float: Vol. 1

Marchant, Kate | Illus. by CJ Joaquin Graphix/Scholastic (224 pp.)

$24.99 | July 1, 2025 | 9781546175247

Series: Float, 1

In this series opener, 17-yearold Alaskan Waverly Lyons goes to spend two months in the small coastal town of Holden, Florida, with her aunt Rachel. At first, Waverly has difficulty adapting to her new environment, but she begins to befriend some of the locals, finds a job, and meets her aloof neighbor, Blake Hamilton, a lifeguard with his own yet-to-be-revealed issues. Marchant excels in capturing themes of self-discovery and budding romantic tension between the two white-presenting leads. Waverly’s journey of growth feels natural and relatable, with internal monologue appearing in rectangular text bubbles and accompanying the dialogue and external action. Joaquin’s artwork enhances the storytelling through its warm and inviting color palette, which utilizes both soft pastels and vibrant tropical tones to create an immersive atmosphere. Blurring simulates motion and movement. While the plot follows familiar genre tropes, the small-town setting enhances the charm and brings echoes of simpler times to this contemporary tale. The character designs are expressive, capturing subtle emotions effectively through body language, while the scenic backgrounds bring the coastal setting to life. The paneling is well-paced, ensuring smooth transitions between comedic, romantic, and emotional moments. This graphic novel, originally released on WEBTOON, was based on Marchant’s Wattpad novel of the same name, and the story has also been made into a film. Engaging characters and appealing, nostalgic artwork make for a satisfying read. (Graphic romance. 13-17)

Immortal Consequences

Marie, I.V. | Delacorte (512 pp.)

$21.99 | July 29, 2025 | 9780593898802

Series: The Souls of Blackwood Academy, 1

Trapped indefinitely in adolescence and forced to reap souls, the students of purgatory’s Blackwood Academy boarding school have a once-in-adecade opportunity to escape their fate in this debut.

Wren, August, Emilio, Olivier, Irene, and Masika are “unfortunate acquaintances” nominated to compete in the Decennial Festival, which offers the opportunity to join the Ascended as school leaders or cross over to the Other Side. Either way, it’s a chance to avoid eventually losing all memories and sense of self and wandering the Ether for eternity. But as the competition begins, a mysterious new student who can harness shadow magic appears. In between the Decennial contests, the classmates try to get to the bottom of this mystery, unraveling more threads along the way. Some inconsistent and anachronistic worldbuilding elements are distracting in places, and although this ancient institution ostensibly can admit students who have died anywhere in the world (their commonality is that each one had a near-death experience before their actual untimely demise), most characters seem to be white. The six leads, several of whom are queer, include Wren, August, and Olivier, who present white, as well as Emilio, who’s cued Latine, Irene, who has some Korean heritage, and Masika, who reads Black. The mystery at the heart of the story is compelling and will engage readers all the way up to the cliffhanger ending, which will leave them yearning for the sequel to tie up loose ends.

A compelling plot compensates for issues with worldbuilding. (map) (Fantasy. 14-18)

For another romance set overseas, visit Kirkus online.

THE KIRKUS Q&A: E.K. JOHNSTON

The pitch: Alien meets Titanic. This YA novelist ran with it and made it her own.

BY MICHAEL SCHAUB

E.K. JOHNSTON RECALLS precisely the moment she became a young adult author.

Johnston had written a middle-grade novel and had plans to start one for adults when she picked up a copy of Malinda Lo’s Ash, a 2009 fantasy novel that reimagines the Cinderella folktale with a lesbian teenager as the protagonist.

“I read it a little bit late,” Johnston recalls. “I read it in 2010, and I remember thinking, Oh, you can do whatever you want to in YA. That’s when I started writing YA books.”

She made her publishing debut in 2014 with The Story of Owen: Dragon Slayer of Trondheim; a sequel, Prairie Fire, followed in 2015. Johnston has gone on to release more than a dozen young adult books, including A Thousand Nights; Exit, Pursued by a Bear; That Inevitable Victorian Thing ; and Aetherbound, and five Star Wars books, most recently Crimson Climb

Johnston returns to outer space in her latest, Titan of the Stars, the first volume in a planned duology. The novel follows passengers aboard the Titan, a spherical spaceship traveling from Earth to Mars with an eerie cargo—the recently discovered bodies of aliens, preserved in permafrost, are on display for the humans to gawk at.

The book switches perspectives between two teenagers on the expedition, both survivors of a deadly earthquake in Canada. There’s Celeste, a junior engineer from a hardscrabble background, and Dominic, the adopted son of a wealthy, politically influential couple who has just broken up with his insufferable boyfriend, Adam. When the voyage goes terribly awry, Celeste and Dominic are forced to team up and fight for their lives. In a starred review, a critic for Kirkus praised the novel as “riveting and thoroughly enjoyable.”

Johnston talked about Titan of the Stars via Zoom from her home in southwestern Ontario, Canada. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

What was the origin of this novel?

It’s actually an intellectual property with David Purse and [his story studio] Inked

read through it, and I was like, “Here are the 14 things I want to change.” And every single one of them, David was like, “Oh yeah, you can do this.” When we got to the last one, he was like, “That’s a sequel.” So it was originally book packaging, but it was definitely Take this and run with it, which was really cool.

Did either of the main characters come to you first?

That was actually one of the things I changed. In the original pitch, [Dominic was the engineer], and when I was talking to David the first time, I was like, “I’m going to flip the main characters. There’s no compromising for me on this one,” and he was like, “That’s perfect.” As soon as I flipped it, I started getting into the worldbuilding. I already had the characters’ names. Usually when I’m making up my own characters, the naming process helps me develop a lot of who they are, but I skipped that with these two. Instead, I gave them strong origin stories.

How did you go about capturing Celeste and Dominic’s distinct voices? Celeste was the easy one: I knew what she was going to sound like. She’s very sarcastic and a little bit more worldly; Dominic is also very worldly, but his knowledge hasn’t come from his own suffering. He has a lot more optimism than Celeste does. They’re both very driven, just in very different ways. I wanted Celeste to have a very particular [Canadian] prairie accent, which you can hear. It’s kind of like the Minnesota accent, but more sharp. It’s based out Entertainment. I was hired to do a book packaging thing, and the pitch was Alien meets Titanic. They had a whole proposal, and I

of Saskat chewan. If you watch an episode of Corner Gas [an early aughts Canadian sitcom], it’s like that. Alberta is a little bit more posh, and that’s the version that Dominic has. He’s a little bit more considered when he speaks. He’s less likely to hurt people’s feelings, whereas Celeste is just a straight line to the target and it doesn’t matter what’s in the way.

How did you decide to write the book in the first-person present tense? I started in third-person past tense, and I got to 30,000 words and it was not going great. I spent three months just in agony. One day I made a batch of my favorite cookies and then I went to my computer and I deleted the whole thing. I ate the whole batch of cookies and started over again in first-person present, and it was

instantly better. It’s the only time I’ve ever done that.

This isn’t the first time you’ve written a book that takes place on a spaceship. What’s the process for coming up with each individual vessel?

I love taking things and turning them into spaceships. I always want them to have interesting shapes. When it came to Titan, I was like, What’s the most wildly impractical thing that people would do that’s super not useful for everybody who has to work there, but it looks great and it feels cool and it works in zero gravity? That’s where the idea of Titan being a sphere came from.

The other two spaceships that I’ve designed recently are in my Star Wars books. I use a lot of people’s houses. In Aetherbound, the space station was the Toronto transit map, reused for a

space station. In the other science fiction book I have coming out this summer [Sky on Fire], one of the spaceships is basically the Ring Road around Iceland, and then the other one is based on the Olympic rings.

Some of the characters in the book, like Dominic’s parents and Adam, are just unbearable people. Is it at all fun to write them? Adam just says the worst possible thing imaginable every single time. He’s just awful. You can almost tell what he’s going to say before he says it because it’s going to be garbage. And for Dominic’s parents, it was a little bit therapeutic because Dominic’s mother is based on a real-life Alberta politician, so I got to work through some stress with that. It’s not the first time I’ve done that. That happens in a bunch of my books, actually, where there’s someone that I’m

mad at, and I make them a villain who gets yelled at a lot in the book. That’s not when I’m doing the campy Star Wars villains; those are a different class altogether, and they’re super fun. But when you do a more human villain, you get to lean into all of the things that annoy you currently. And then you get to have them get torn apart by aliens, because they deserve it.

Have you started writing the second book yet?

I have. It’s been fun. It’s a little bit different; it’s a slightly different style of horror. This was spaceship horror and sort of monster horror, whereas the next one is going to be horror in a different way. But I’ve been having fun spooling it out and figuring out what these people are going to do next.

Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.

I love taking things and turning them into spaceships. I always want them to have interesting shapes.

Insightfully explores themes of anxiety and the relentless need for perfection.

THIS BOOK MIGHT BE ABOUT ZINNIA

Kirkus Star

This Book Might Be About Zinnia

Morris, Brittney | Simon & Schuster (352 pp.) $19.99 | July 1, 2025 | 9781665904018

Two teen girls seek answers about family. In 2024, Zinnia Davis, an adopted, biracial, Type A 18-year-old, is applying to Harvard, but she faces a harsh dose of reality after being informed that her college essay feels “calculated” and “formulaic.” After her best friend, Milo, gives her a book featuring a character with an eerily similar backstory to hers—and the exact same heart-shaped birthmark on her forehead—Zinnia decides the author must be her biological mother, and she decides to write her essay about her attempt to prove this. In 2006, Tuesday Walker, a Black 16-year-old, is left reeling after surrendering her newborn daughter for adoption. She was pressured by her mother, who’s determined to keep this baby a family secret; she doesn’t want Tuesday to let the baby’s white father know she exists. Tuesday doesn’t even know her own father’s name, but after one too many ominous and mysterious occurrences, Tuesday finds herself on a quest to uncover her hidden paternal lineage and protect the daughter she was forced to give up. Told from alternating perspectives, this dual narrative follows two young women who are both seeking the truth about their lives. Seamlessly shifting between perspectives, the story remains cohesive and sustains a quick pace. Morris insightfully explores themes of anxiety

and the relentless need for perfection as both characters wrestle with their emotions and perceived shortcomings. A compelling, introspective journey into identity and the power of familial love. (Fiction. 12-18)

Very Dangerous Things

Muñoz, Lauren | Putnam (352 pp.) | $19.99 July 29, 2025 | 9780593857892

Teenage criminology students find themselves investigating what should have been a fake murder mystery. Every year, the criminology program at J. Everett High hosts its Grand Game, which tests students’ crime-solving abilities. This year’s winning team will be awarded $30,000, an enticing amount for best friends Mexican American Dulce Castillo and Japanese American Emi Nakamura, who plan to visit Golden Age mystery novelist Dorothy L. Sayers’ home in England after they graduate. Puerto Rican classmate Xavier Torres is assigned to play this year’s murder victim, so the student body isn’t shocked when his white ex-girlfriend, Sierra Fox, rushes into the cafeteria to announce that Xavier is dead. But the game becomes a tragic reality when everyone realizes that Xavier really is dead—and Sierra appears to be his killer. Sierra believes insightful and introspective Dulce is the only person who can solve Xavier’s murder and clear her name, but the girls have been estranged ever since a traumatic dispute over the circumstances surrounding Dulce’s mother’s death. At first, Dulce refuses to help, but when another

classmate turns up dead, Dulce sets aside her resentment toward Sierra to find Xavier’s real murderer before anyone else gets hurt. A smattering of nuanced suspects and interstitial flashback chapters offer readers ample opportunities to form their own theories. But the complicated interpersonal relationships between seemingly unrelated characters reveal the most compelling secrets.

A satisfyingly chilling mystery with a relatable amateur sleuth.

(Mystery. 13-18)

Kirkus Star

The Other Side of the Ocean

Netto, J.D. | JAB Books (280 pp.) | $16.99 paper | June 17, 2025 | 9781625677204

An undocumented Brazilian immigrant navigates life in 2011 Framingham, Massachusetts. Sixteen-year-old Mateus Franco— or Matt, which is easier for Americans—left Brazil when he was only 6, arriving with his family on a tourist visa. He still speaks a little Portuguese, but he feels far enough removed from Brazil that moving back wouldn’t be his first choice. Matt’s group of friends—Fa, Diana, and Pedro—are so close to his heart they might as well be a second family. They’re all Brazilian, and they share the everyday struggles that undocumented children can’t help being burdened by. While their classmates are thinking about ordinary teen milestones, they’re focusing on living in the present because tomorrow is uncertain. But now Matt is forced to confront his deepest feelings and desires in the form of James Alberte, the new transfer student. He’s immediately attracted to “dimple boy,” and their chemistry is through the roof. Matt is tired of being closeted, but “the not knowing how people would handle [his] truth [keeps him] from living it.” When Fa and Diana came out as lesbian, Matt’s dad asked if he thought of “hooking up with both of them.” With

his dad increasingly exhausted by the limitations of life as an undocumented person and talking about returning to Brazil, life at home isn’t easy. This novel is brilliantly executed, threaded through with linguistic gems and deeply rooted in both Brazilian culture and the mind of a teenage boy.

Heartfelt and authentically grounded; a must-read. (Fiction. 14-18)

Climate of Chaos

Newbould, Cassandra Peachtree Teen (384 pp.) | $19.99 July 15, 2025 | 9781682637579

Residents of Cascadia, an environmentally devastated Pacific Northwest region, have a choice: fend for themselves in the lawless, stormbattered wild or endure lifelong servitude as citizens of the Aegis Corporation in return for food, shelter, and healthcare.

Small, independent communities, like the Conclave on Bainbridge Island, where Fox LaRosa lives, have survived outside Seattle’s Zones for 122 years. But with a lethal virus known as the Vi spreading unchecked, fear drives some people to trade their freedom for citizenship’s benefits—even though it comes with risks. Resisting orders can be fatal; a future as body parts awaits many at Harvest House. When her sister, Rabbit, is detained by Aegis in Seattle, Fox and her friends become determined to rescue her, contravening the Conclave’s decision. Fox, best friend Cely, ex-boyfriend Asher, and fellow Conclave member Eamon infiltrate Aegis in search of Rabbit. Using an extendable cane (with a hidden blade) for the chronic hip pain she experiences following a childhood injury, Fox endures exhausting trials and revisits her feelings for Asher. When Rabbit is publicly paraded as someone who’s immune to the Vi and possessing antibodies that are essential to the vaccine, Fox becomes skeptical about the Vi’s origin and spread. Readers

seeking robust worldbuilding and a detailed backstory for this setting may be disappointed, but the fast-paced, well-executed, suspense-driven plot will keep them entertained. Fox and Rabbit present white, and the diverse cast of secondary characters adds depth. An exciting, high-stakes story offering relevant social commentary.

(Post-apocalyptic. 14-18)

Den of Liars

Olson, Jessica S. | Feiwel & Friends (400 pp.) | $19.99 | July 1, 2025

9781250329721 | Series: The Devious, 1

Caught between two brothers with magical abilities, a thief competes in a tournament to gain her freedom. Four years ago, Magnolia St. James was rescued from her father’s enemies by the Thief, one of the crime brothers called the Devious. Enzo offered a bargain: He’d help her escape, but she’d have to share her heart’s soullight to ease the curse his brother, the Liar, inflicted on him. Magnolia has since become a thief under his tutelage, feeling his emotions through their tethered hearts and assuming the name Lola. If they can find and destroy the moonshard that Enzo and his estranged brother stole, it will break the curse. But Enzo’s brother is the only one who knows the moonshard’s location. Lola enters the Liar’s Dice Tournament, a competition held at the Liar’s casino in which contestants gamble away their secrets to “win a single die with the power to sow one untraceable deception.” Once inside, she’ll have to find the vault holding the location of the moonshard. But she can’t deny the magnetism between her and the Liar—or the truths she uncovers about her past. Lola will have to determine which brother she can trust while keeping secrets from both. The Liar’s romance dazzles more than the slightly over-the-top glitz of the casino, and while the mystery takes time to ramp

up, it’s a thrilling ride once it does. The three leads present white. After a slow beginning, a swoonworthy fantasy romance. (Fantasy. 14-18)

Latina Superheroes: Jalisco & Santa

Phoenix, Kayden | Illus. by Amanda Julina Gonzalez & Eva Cabrera | Andrews McMeel Publishing (128 pp.) | $14.99 paper | June 10, 2025 | 9781524892586 Series: Latina Superheroes, 1

Latina superheroes shine in two actionpacked stories. After the traumatic disappearance of her mother, Alicia is recruited by a secretive vigilante group called Las Adelitas, who are determined to end the wave of disappearances and murders targeting women in their community. Nicknamed “Jalisco” by one of the Adelitas, Alicia must learn to fight, using her skills as a traditional folklórico dancer to defend herself. The story takes inspiration from Mexican culture and history, including the legend of Malinche and the women soldiers of the Mexican Revolution. In the second story, tensions rise in the fictional border town of Wexo as a high-stakes political race unfolds. Santa becomes involved in supporting La Politica, a candidate running against Illena Chavez-Estevez, better known as ICE. To stand against ICE and her followers, who believe in their own racial superiority, Santa must draw on the lessons her mother taught her before she died. Both stories tackle difficult topics such as colorism, eugenics, femicide, and racism. While the messaging isn’t subtle, the narratives remain engaging and fast-paced. The vibrant, dynamic illustrations bring each character’s strength and emotion to life. Latinas are portrayed as strong and passionate in their pursuit of justice, and the storylines are both relevant and hopeful.

A bold and compelling tribute to Latina strength, resilience, and the fight for justice. (Graphic fiction. 13-18)

Explores salient questions about belonging, justice, and systemic inequality.

A

MASTERY OF MONSTERS

Aurora: Vol. 1

Red | Andrews McMeel Publishing (384 pp.) | $18.99 paper | July 29, 2025 9781524896409 | Series: Aurora, 1

Two magical beings embark on a journey to rescue a stolen god’s soul in this collection from a webcomic. Called to end the resistance against a monthlong siege on his city, the god Lord Vash, who has tan skin and yellow hair, loses both the city and his soul in an ambush by the Collector, who has light skin, green eyes, and black hair. Wounded blue-eyed Kendal, who’s born from Vash’s remaining essence, is left for dead but saved by purple-skinned, pink-haired Alinua, a self-exiled cloud elf with a curse—or maybe a gift. With no way of knowing which she bestowed on Kendal, the two decide to travel together to rescue Vash’s soul. Meanwhile, a great mage, who’s light-skinned and brownhaired and has power over all the elements, accidentally springs a trap that was millennia in the making. Fighting for control of his body, he’s saved by Kendal and Alinua and agrees to assist them—if they help him find a means to expel the malevolent spirit before it implements its plans. The plot-driven story balances action sequences with intriguing plot developments and extensive worldbuilding. Red renders her full-color illustrations in a clean style that effectively conveys dynamic moments. However, information is too often introduced well in advance of its relevance, interrupting the pacing and creating information overload. This disjointed approach makes it difficult to

ground oneself within the story or fully connect with the characters.

A packed but overall promising start. (author’s note, diary entry, sketches) (Graphic fantasy. 13-18)

A Theory of Dreaming

Reid, Ava | Harper/HarperCollins (416 pp.)

$19.99 | July 29, 2025 | 9780063421677

Series: A Study in Drowning, 2

Effy and Preston must find their footing in the new world they have uncovered in this follow-up to 2023’s A Study in Drowning

After the harrowing events at Hiraeth Manor and the revelation that the famed author Emrys Myrddin wasn’t the true writer of his celebrated works—his wife, Angharad, was— Effy and Preston return to the University of Llyr to resume their studies amid the hostile backlash their discovery has sparked. Effy, having left the architecture program, becomes the first woman student in the university’s literature department, while Preston begins working closely on a mysterious project with Master Gosse, who runs the literature program. As Effy spirals into a deep depression and is plagued by doubts about her worth, Preston’s immersion in his research leads him to have a fragile and increasingly tenuous grasp on reality. Meanwhile, Llyr remains at war with Argant, and Effy and Preston’s findings threaten to unravel the very foundations of long-held national Llyrian beliefs. Fans of Reid will appreciate her signature richly atmospheric worldbuilding,

though new readers may find the story’s slow pacing challenging. While the plot accelerates in the final third, much of the novel focuses on the interior lives of Effy and Preston, an approach that, at times, can feel overwrought. The main characters present white, but themes of xenophobia are central to the narrative. A mostly satisfying sequel. (college rosters) (Fantasy. 14-18)

The Last Tiger

Riew, Julia & Brad Riew | Kokila (416 pp.) $21.99 | July 29, 2025 | 9798217002047

In the Riew siblings’ debut, inspired by their Korean grandparents’ experiences during Japan’s early20th-century colonization of Korea, a hunt is on for the last surviving tiger. In the Tiger Colonies, this fantasy world’s version of occupied Korea, tigers have been nearly wiped out by the Dragon Empire. These oppressive rulers believe that tiger ki, or powers, strengthen the Tiger people, and therefore, the animals must be exterminated. Lee Seung, who’s from a poor Tiger family, works for the wealthy Chois, a Tiger family who collaborate with the Dragons. Choi Eunji might live in material comfort, but her home feels like “a cage” thanks to her parents’ high expectations and control of her every move. She offers to tutor Seung for the Adachi Training Academy’s entrance exam; graduates attain elite, powerful positions. In return he’ll help Eunji experience life outside her cloistered manor. Despite their class differences, both teens long for freedom, but Seung fails the exam, and their paths diverge. They reunite during a frantic search for the last tiger—but are their motivations aligned? Some plot developments feel contrived, and the introduction of real historical elements at times feels deliberately educational rather than naturally emerging from the story.

Nevertheless, the story vividly highlights the plight of Koreans during a traumatic era.

An unwieldy but emotionally intense fantasy. (authors’ note, diary excerpts) (Fantasy. 12-18)

Between These Broken Hearts

Ryan, Lexi | Storytide/ HarperCollins | (464 pp.) | $19.99

July 22, 2025 | 9780063311954

A fter years of running, two women fight to save their kingdoms and their lives.

At the end of Beneath These Cursed Stars (2024), Jasalyn and Felicity went missing. Jasalyn was trapped by the magic of a ring connected to Mordeus that she’d believed to be her salvation. Fearing for the safety of Kendrick and her family, she used the ring’s power to leave. Meanwhile, Felicity, who’s posing as Jasalyn, is living with Misha, the king of the Wild Fae; he discovers her deception, but she’s taken by someone else, vanishing without a trace. The ring’s power puts Jasalyn to sleep for months, while Felicity lies in an Eloran dungeon in a dream state. They awaken to find they have just 11 days to ensure that Mordeus is truly dead before Jas’ 18th birthday, when the deal she made with a witch for the ring comes into effect, claiming her life. Both women struggle with feeling the weight of fate on their shoulders and loving men they aren’t sure they deserve. This duology closer explores destiny, tough decisions, and the uncertainty of the future through parallel romantic journeys—one filled with slow-burn tension and the other with fear and desire. Ryan’s writing is rich and engaging, although the story isn’t as exciting as the first novel. Each of the love stories gives readers something to cheer for even as good battles evil. Main characters largely read white, and Misha has “golden” skin. Romantic and enchanting. (map) (Fantasy. 13-18)

Kirkus Star

A Mastery of Monsters

Sambury, Liselle | McElderry (592 pp.)

$22.99 | July 29, 2025 | 9781665957366

Dark academia meets deadly magic competition in this thrilling fantasy romp that centers on complex Black Canadian characters.

Seventeen-yearold August Black is lost and lonely, especially now that her brother, Jules, is away at Kingston, Ontario’s Queen’s University. Their father, who has Trinidadian roots, has been working long hours, largely absent following their mother’s sudden disappearance. Depressed, August drinks and isolates herself. But after Jules goes missing too, leaving behind an alarming note (“Monsters are real”), August becomes determined to find him. She accepts an invitation from “hot librarian jock hybrid” Virgil Hawthorne, who witnesses her impressive knife-throwing skills, to join the secretive Learners’ Society, which offers her the opportunity to find answers about Jules. Its mission is to bond with and control people who have mutations that turn them into monsters. They’ll compete in a cutthroat monster-bonding competition that’s Virgil’s last chance to bond before transforming irrevocably into a monster and being locked away forever. August is a sympathetically flawed protagonist, whose journey from directionless loner to empowered champion is well-developed and compelling. As an outsider to the Learners’ Society, her perspective offers an accessible way for readers to learn the worldbuilding lore. Through the metaphor of monsters, Sambury explores salient questions about belonging, justice, mass incarceration, the line between revolution and terrorism, and racism and systemic inequality. The supporting cast is racially diverse. A bold and bloody series opener. (author’s note, content warning, map) (Fantasy. 14-18)

Fallen Academy: Year Four

Stone, Leia | Bloom Books (272 pp.)

$12.99 paper | June 17, 2025

9781464218958 | Series: Fallen Academy, 4

It’s time to kill the Devil: He has the key to Heaven and a binding promise with the only being who controls that key.

Brielle AtwaterGrey escaped Hell weeks before, and now Lucifer is making his displeasure known. More and more frequently, demons infiltrate Angel City, proving that the Fallen Army doesn’t have the numbers to continue fighting them. Brielle begins an intense training regimen with the archangels to prepare to kill Lucifer, save Raksha, the dark mage who helped her escape Hell, and retrieve Sera, her infinity weapon. Alongside Lincoln, Brielle’s husband of two weeks, her best friend, Shea, Shea’s fiancé, Noah, four archangels, and a cast of other demon gifted and angel blessed people, Brielle fights the waves of demons Lucifer sends to Angel City, battles at Heaven’s gates, and enters Hell itself one last time. This quartet finale unfortunately adds nothing new emotionally to the characters’ arcs. Brielle and Lincoln, both white, are married and in love, and Brielle’s friendships remain important to her—all elements that are told rather than shown. The writing, while action-packed and fast-paced, offers readers very little connection with the characters, whose voices sound alike. The book may be easy to read, but it’s lackluster in its impact: Many moments feel recycled and uninspired, lacking the emotional depth that the more important aspects of the storyline needed.

A surface-level ending to the series. (Fantasy. 14-18)

For another fantasy exploring the underworld, visit Kirkus online.

Always Be My Bibi

Taslim, Priyanka | Simon & Schuster (368 pp.)

$19.99 | June 10, 2025 | 9781665901130

A romance brews on a tea estate in Bangladesh. Sixteen-year-old Bibi Hossain finds herself traveling to Sylhet, Bangladesh—far from her Paterson, New Jersey, home— when her older sister, Halima, surprises everyone by announcing her plan to marry. Halima also defers her Princeton Law enrollment; she and her fiancé, Sunny Rahman, plan to spend some time living on Sunny’s family’s tea estate. Even though Bibi’s own family is relatively wealthy—her father founded the Royal Fried Chicken restaurant chain and is a generous donor to their mosque—when she sees the Rahmans’ opulent home, Bibi can’t help but think she’s in a version of Crazy Rich Asians. Never mind the frosty reception from the future in-laws, there’s the added complication of Sunny’s very cute brother, Sohel, who keeps getting Bibi into trouble. Convinced their siblings’ marriage is a “train wreck,” the two team up for Operation Breakup. Complicating matters, Bibi’s grandmother in Bangladesh produces the Great Big Book of Biodatas—possible matches for Bibi to meet. The story has multiple strands, most of them deftly woven together, including some interesting snippets of history, such as the colonial history around tea plantations. While readers may not believe that “Daddy’s little princess” Bibi, who cherishes her Louboutin boots, transforms enough to truly find picking tea leaves “meditative,” this is a quick and fun read about finding love in the most unexpected place.

Family dynamics, love, and dating make for a bracing cuppa. (Romance. 13-18)

The Rebel Girls of Rome

Taylor, Jordyn | Harper/HarperCollins (320 pp.)

$19.99 | July 8, 2025 | 9780063340299

A queer Jewish Italian girl joins the resistance during World War II; more than 80 years later, her grandniece attempts to uncover her story. In 1940s Nazi-occupied Rome, 19-year-old Bruna Mosseri narrowly escaped when her family was sent to Auschwitz. Riddled with guilt over leaving them, Bruna joined the resistance, where she discovered not only a new purpose, but a rekindled bond with a childhood crush. In the present, American college student Lilah Tepper longs to connect with her grandfather Ralph, Bruna’s younger brother, though he refuses to open up about his childhood. When Tommaso Reni, a student in Rome, contacts Lilah about a long-lost family heirloom and a mysterious note from Bruna, she realizes that the great-aunt everyone assumed had been sent to Auschwitz may actually have survived. Lilah and her grandfather travel to Rome to uncover the truth about Bruna, forming a tentative new relationship along the way. Bruna’s and Lilah’s stories mirror one another—both young women cope with grief and must find the courage to pursue love after loss. Taylor subtly juxtaposes the girls’ sexuality: Bruna must keep her queerness a secret, while Lilah has the freedom to be open about

A complexly woven yet accessible story of family history, trauma, and healing.

THE REBEL GIRLS OF ROME

her bisexuality. The alternating historical and contemporary storylines weave together, moving toward a satisfying, though perhaps too neatly wrapped up, conclusion.

A complexly woven yet accessible story of family history, trauma, and healing. (author’s note) (Historical fiction. 12-18)

Hit Me With Your Best Charm

Vale, Lillie | Viking (400 pp.) | $12.99 paper | July 15, 2025 | 9780593623916

A teen ventures into the woods in search of her missing father. Seventeen-yearold Nova Marwood’s father disappeared in the Longing Woods near Prior’s End seven years ago, but she’s never given up on him and has secretly searched the woods for clues. Following her psychic friend Aurora’s advice, Nova’s mother begins to accept his death and plans to have him legally declared dead. Nova goes to Madame Aurora’s fortune-telling tent at the Fall Festival, planning to discredit her as a fraud, but finding it empty, she fools around with Aurora’s crystal ball—and accidentally curses her friend Kiara Mistry. Everyone Nova develops a crush on falls for Kiara instead, and Nova can understand why—she’s irresistible. When Kiara and friends plan an excursion into the woods seeking the rumored wishing well that can undo the curse, Nova joins them, swearing to help but planning to save her father instead. Strange things happen in the woods even as Nova learns more about the others and grows closer to Kiara. The explorations of ancestry, family, truth, and grief add realism, balancing the paranormal setting and shenanigans that feel ideal for younger YA readers. Nova’s bond with her father, shown through her memories, shines, and the inevitable romance between Nova and Kiara is sweet. Despite the intriguing setup and strong pacing, the ending is rushed, and

the resolution feels too easy and pat. Nova reads white, and names cue ethnic diversity in the supporting cast. Spookily entertaining but ultimately disappointing. (Paranormal. 12-16)

Kirkus Star

Let Them Stare

Van Ness, Jonathan & Julie Murphy

Storytide/HarperCollins (352 pp.)

$22.99 | May 20, 2025 | 9780063346246

Van Ness, a hairstylist known for the TV series

Queer Eye, teams up with bestselling author Murphy for this story about one teen’s very gay summer.

Recent high school graduate Sully is ready to leave behind the woes of being a nonbinary fashionista in small-town Hearst, Pennsylvania, and jet off to the Big Apple, where a yearlong internship with an influencer awaits. At their going-away party, they burn some bridges and go out with a bangin’ first kiss. But the flaky influencer drops Sully before they even leave town, and they’re left with no backup plan. Scoring what might be “one of the rarest vintage handbag finds of all time” might help, at least with acquiring the funds to escape. Sully is shocked when a ghost emerges from the bag—Rufus, a gay man, “female impersonator,” and mid-20thcentury Hearst resident. While Sully works to pick up the pieces of their own life, they also help Rufus recover his memories, discovering surprising depths to their hometown along the way. This quirky, passionate, rebellious, and quick-witted novel brings aspects of modern queer culture into direct, literal conversation with elements of its past. It’s a monument to what came before, a testament to continued struggles, and a celebration of queer joy. The main characters’ arcs are well-constructed; Sully’s and Rufus’ dual journeys of discovery flow well together, informing Sully’s emotional growth while keeping

Rufus independently well-rounded. Characters read white. Quippy dialogue and a kinetic pace distinguish this uplifting novel. (Fiction. 14-18)

Steel & Spellfire

Weymouth, Laura E. | McElderry (320 pp.) $19.99 | July 22, 2025 | 9781665959759

In an oppressive society, a mage and a guard struggle with secrets. In the nation of Hesperid, mages—those who utilize spellfire—undergo a binding rite by age 13 that fixes them to a patron and “tempers wild magic.” Insubordination has a penalty of death, except for Ingenues, who have special privileges. New Ingenue Pandora Small is invited to summer at Palace Hill, home to Queen Maud. Unbeknownst to everyone, Pandora is an extremely powerful mage, who has already been bound to a patron—one she’ll stop at nothing—even murder—to cut ties with. Ellis Beacon joins the Queen’s Guard to fight hellions, monsters formed from the abundance of excess spellfire. Ellis’ secret is his keen magesense; if anyone discovers how well he can sense magic, he’d be forced to become a magefinder, one of the ruthless guards who find and punish noncompliant mages. Due to a shortage of guards, Ellis is tasked with testing the incoming Ingenues. His discovery of the extent of Pandora’s power surprises them both. But he’s unwilling to expose her, and a friendship develops, putting both their lives in danger. Rule follower Ellis and ferocious Pandora come together in the most pleasing ways, and their introspective relationship slowly evolves. An especially delightful twist brings additional warmth to the narrative, and (coupled with an artfully depicted magic system) makes this work a success. Most characters read white. An adventure not to skip, told with enchantment and heart. (Fantasy. 14-18)

Bones at the Crossroads

Williams, LaDarrion | Labyrinth Road (544 pp.) | $20.99 | July 29, 2025

9780593711965 | Series: Blood at the Root, 2

In this follow-up to Blood at the Root (2024), magic itself may be in danger as Malik struggles to hone his powers while embracing some form of normal life.

After the tumultuous events of the summer term, fall semester at Caiman University, which educates Black conjurers, brings more supernatural threats—including the lingering consequences of Malik’s mother’s deadly power grab. But Malik may be struggling most with the more grounded aspects of college: declaring a major, getting to know his new crush, Dominique, and just trying to be a good friend while healing from childhood trauma. The Louisiana campus, which is rich in Black culture and fantastical powers, also has its fair share of fraternities, sororities, and clubs. When Malik gets tapped to join a secretive group, his involvement ties back to his mother’s wrongdoings, his clouded family history, and the trust issues and anxieties from his less-than-stable upbringing. As a narrator, Malik’s introspection is organic and accessible in its considerations of belonging, guilt, and grief, but with the recurring element of his visions—or scrying—the well-paced story guides Malik and readers alike toward several new questions (as well as enticing answers) about his past, his ancestors, and the Afrocentric history of magic in this world. An intense love triangle and explosive action sequences add to this well-rounded second outing. A story as magically cool as it is emotionally heated. (Fantasy. 13-18)

For another fantasy series set on a college campus, visit Kirkus online.

SECOND LOOK

This review originally ran online May 13, 2023.

A group embarks on a mission to populate the planet Mars in Teller’s SF novel.

In 2028, Michael Teller and his family are among the few chosen to take the monthslong journey to Mars to establish a human population on the planet. His father, Doriel, is already there, part of the early teams sent ahead to start mining for water and to prepare the habitats. Onboard the Providence with Michael’s family are other settlers, all with important jobs and skills that will be necessary throughout the trip and their future lives on a distant planet. But despite the many years they have all trained and studied for

this momentous occasion, nothing can truly prepare them for the realities of the sojourn through space, such as the loss of gravity, micrometeoroid hits, failing tethers, and the stresses of being cooped up for months. The fallout includes surprise pregnancies, drug usage, and even death. Will they even make it to Mars? And if they do, will the trip be worth everything they’ve suffered, or is the hardship just beginning? The author gives readers an almost disturbingly real look at what it might be like to send humans into deep space. Those who prefer their SF to be heavy on the science will find this book to be full of technical

Red Valley: Journey to Mars

Teller, Michael Reuel

Brauser Consulting | 499 pp. | $24.99 | $14.99 paper November 10, 2022 | 9789659305520 | 9789659305513 paper

tidbits, with lots of details about dealing with waste, the ways water is stored and used onboard, and much more (“Nineteen minutes after first stage separation, the computer displayed the red-striped second stage and our MiniHab over the Caribbean, at an elevation of 243 kilometers, traveling more than

twenty-eight thousand kilometers per hour”). The cast of characters can be difficult to keep up with, as almost all of the adults onboard are doctors of some kind, but the helpful cast list will guide readers. A heavily detailed SF story about a journey to Mars that focuses more on the science than the fiction.

Indie

BATTLES OF THE PLANETS

THE POP-CULTURAL influence of military science fiction—a subgenre that includes such well-regarded and disparate novels as Robert A. Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, Joe Haldeman’s The Forever War, and David Weber’s Honorverse saga—can hardly be overstated. High-tech tales of spacefaring armies and their often troubled relationships with cultures from other galaxies have become common in film and television, as well—thanks, in part, to the success of the generally optimistic Star Trek franchise and the downbeat and gory Alien films. Indie authors have paid their own visits to this genre universe with tales of combat, diplomacy, and the effects of military conflict on an interplanetary scale. Here’s a selection of notable titles from the last few years, all recommended by Kirkus Indie: In John Lallier’s ongoing Solar Commonwealth series, Earth is a junior member of an alliance of space-traveling peoples, including the tentacled Ssenn, who sponsor Earth’s membership, and the aloof, logical, and blue-skinned Tyndal. In its lively fifth installment, The Draconis Campaign, aggressive, piratical

aliens known as the Krayd target human outposts, testing the strength of Earth’s relations with its otherworldly partners. The novel’s outer space battles recall fights between ships at sea, writes our reviewer, who also notes its clear Star Trek references (“there’s even talk of building a ship called Enterprise”). Overall, we recommend it as “a diverting yarn of interstellar diplomacy and warp-speed combat strategy.” The series’ eighth installment, The Gemini Finding (not reviewed), was published late last year.

Keith Stevenson’s series starter, Traitor’s Run, puts a very different spin on the notion of human membership in an intergalactic federation. In this case, the alliance is

grimly called the Hegemony, and its origins date from a brutal interplanetary war. Earth’s outsized influence over the organization results in second-class status for its alien members. In one of this ambitious volume’s storylines, Rhees Lowrans, a disgraced human fighter pilot, is busted down to a posting with the Hegemony’s intelligence branch; there, he learns of a mysterious attack on alien colonies that resulted in the deaths of no less than 13 billion souls—and which the Hegemony did nothing to prevent. Kirkus’ reviewer notes that “readers begin to see the ultimately amoral Homo sapiens as grotesque and ‘other’ as any bug-eyed monster on the cover of yesteryear’s SF pulps.”

Deep Time by Peter Dingus offers a tale of military intrigue in which earthling capitalists go up against a democratic Saturn Commonwealth of off-world

DAVID RAPP

human colonists. In 2240, Earth has been taken over by ruthless corporate interests, and one executive seeks to weaponize a mysterious spherical “artifact” beneath the surface of Titan, Saturn’s largest moon. Colonist miner Serena Roe—a cybernetically enhanced former soldier who was kicked out of Earth’s military for refusing to attack labor-union rebels— also finds herself drawn to the sphere, which seems to interact with her implanted tech. Kirkus’ reviewer writes favorably of how elements of Dingus’ novel recall SF classics by Heinlein—especially in its portrayal of the Saturn colonists—and Arthur C. Clarke, calling it “a savvy, mind-expanding outer-space tale that imbues a familiar premise with suspense.”

David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.

EDITOR’S PICK

Stern presents an extensive reference work compiling short biographies of notable queer figures throughout time.

“As you turn the pages,” writes actor Ian McKellen in this encyclopedia’s foreword, “you may gasp ‘I never knew!’ and ‘Surely not’ and ‘Listen to this!’”

The author’s compilation of short biographies certainly offers plenty of surprises, as McKellen suggests. The sheer number of names that Stern has amassed is already an impressive feat, but the book’s most intriguing aspect for readers curious about queer history will be the specific angle that the author brings to each short description. In every entry, he strives to bring out how the contours of these figures’ private lives shaped their public work. This

These Titles Earned the Kirkus Star

new 2025 edition represents the 32nd anniversary of Stern’s first publication, which was made available on diskette and later on CD-ROM in 1993. The current update covers more than 5000 years of history while staying relevant to contemporary cultural discourse by including more trans figures omitted from previous editions. Organized alphabetically, with lengths ranging from short paragraphs to a few pages, Stern’s profiles focus on reporting basic facts. Nearly every entry includes a source for further reading, providing invaluable jumping-off points for students or anyone researching queer literature. Thumbing through the pages, famous names perhaps not immediately

By W.R. Miller

Queers in History: The Comprehensive Encyclopedia of Historical Gays, Lesbians and Bisexuals

Stern, Keith | Self | 527 pp. | $36.95

April 11, 2025 | 9798305273526

associated with queer culture, like actress Gillian Anderson (who has publicly confirmed her bisexuality) or the 19th-century Sioux leader Sitting Bull (one of his wives was a Two-Spirit man), jump off the page. Throughout the economical bios of hundreds of artists, politicians, choreographers, journalists, film producers, and so on that

the author has researched, fascinating narratives of love, discrimination, and resistance come through in his brief descriptions. Stern’s work is first and foremost a research document, but readers may find themselves reading this encyclopedia as if it were an epic novel.

A remarkable queer history resource offering plenty of engaging, unexpected stories.

For more Indie content, visit Kirkus online.

An entertaining and superpacked teen fantasy that will leave readers wanting more.

THE BOY WITH THE BEAUTIFUL NAME

Chasing Shadows

Adams, A.C. | Acorn Publishing (314 pp.)

$17.99 paper | April 4, 2025 | 9798885281256

A young woman gets more than she bargained for as she strives to unravel her father’s past in Adams’ novel. The implosion of lives built around carefully kept secrets is one of popular fiction’s most enduring story arcs; that’s the psychological terrain Sofia Ryan finds herself occupying after her father, Aidan Ryan, suddenly vanishes, leaving wads of cash and a stern missive (“I have a new life now and must never see you again”) that sheds no further light on his rationale for making such a move. Fearing that her father has met with foul play, Sofia discovers otherwise after combing through a box of his personal items. She soon realizes that nothing about her father’s backstory as she knows it is genuine, prompting an international trek from Boston to Northern Ireland and Rome in search of answers. At the core of the riddle of Aidan’s past is the Brotherhood, a shadowy religious order (“The stories of their heroic deeds characterize them as a kind of Irish Knights Templar”) with whom Sofia’s father is intimately intertwined for reasons that are murky, at first. If the unexamined life is not worth living, Sofia—finding herself at a harrowing crossroads—comes to realize that an overly interrogated one can be downright murderous. The narrative is founded upon a conceit that built the brands of artists like Dashiell Hammett and Alfred Hitchcock, one that could easily go awry in less adept hands.

Happily, that’s an outcome that Adams’ novel deftly avoids by virtue of its no-nonsense pacing and tight plotting—a particularly impressive feat, considering the story skips decades and is liberally sprinkled with flashback fairy dust. Getting the details right, as the author has done, goes a long way toward ensuring an enthralling read. This hair-raising roller-coaster thrill ride may leave readers questioning their own personal narratives.

Secrets and lies collide in this sinisterly effective thriller.

The Boy With the Beautiful Name

Ald, Liz | L ALD (614 pp.) | July 11, 2022

A Connecticut high schooler flirts with and is frustrated by a mysterious, wealthy, and handsome new student in Ald’s launch of a new YA romance series. While driving to her high school in the (fictional) small town of Red, Connecticut, Sara Smith witnesses a “chaotic sports car” fleeing a police cruiser and gets a glimpse of its driver, who has “the fluffiest hair and sharpest jaw line she had ever seen.” She soon learns that the mysterious figure is a fellow student: Bentley Prince, a new arrival from South Fortland, a monarchy near South Africa. He has “piercing, dark brown eyes,” “glowing” skin, a “tangle of dark, chocolate curls,” and is “well over six feet.” What follows are her puzzling interactions with Bentley, who runs hot and cold. He’s clearly drawn to Sara, and he’s

both protective and jealous at times, as when he pulls her out of a party’s hot tub when she’s drunkenly making out with another boy. He also shares some of his secrets with her, including his ownership of self-driving cars and androids in the mansion where he resides alone. However, he also dates a more popular girl at Sara’s school and continues to play the field, including with models whom Sara calls “Wonder Twins.” Bentley’s life intertwines with Sara’s and other fellow students’ in various ways, culminating in his flying a group via private jet to a Halloween rock concert in Miami; its after-party ends with Sara in a shark tank and the introduction of a “demigod”-like character who has “golden curls” and a connection to Bentley.

Ald has crafted a YA romance with plenty of thrills that will likely appeal to fans of Twilight and Gossip Girl. The narrative has several tantalizing will-they, won’t-they kiss interludes and impressive demonstrations of Bentley’s affluence, as when he gives Sara a golden Akhal-Teke horse, or takes her and friends on a private train to a dance-contest TV show taping (in which they all, of course, join in). As the first volume of a series, it is perhaps to be expected that the narrative strings Sara (and readers) along when it comes to Bentley’s background. A reveal regarding his identity in the book’s final pages feels like a bit of a letdown, considering the array of intriguing elements that Ald offers earlier on. Bentley stretches and groans in a rather odd way, for example, and he has impressive strength and an array of futuristic technical gadgets, which may make some readers wonder about supernatural or science-fictional possibilities. He also sometimes acts angry or alarmed regarding Sara’s affinity with his cars, androids, and four Siberian huskies, as if she has a destiny with him that he can’t quite face. Still, Ald also cleverly suggests that Bentley’s strangeness may simply be the fear and ambivalence of a typical boy; there’s also an appealing scene in which Sara and her friends recruit a “nerdy” guy at their school to explain the male psyche. At the same time, readers will

hope that Ald explains a good deal more about her dizzying fictional world in future installments.

An entertaining and super-packed teen fantasy that will leave readers wanting more.

Stagehand: A Backstage Pass of My Life Stories

Aretsky, David H. | BookBaby (488 pp.) $22.49 paper | April 4, 2025 | 9798350978162

A retsky reflects on his significant relationships and a life in show business.

After working as a stagehand for over 40 years, the author has amassed a wild collection of stories from Los Angeles’ most famous clubs and venues. By December 2018, Aretsky had settled into a routine of steady professional gigs and a lovely life with his girlfriend— whom he only refers to as “the Ex”—on LA’s Candy Cane Lane (a stretch of perpetually decorated-for-Christmas homes). After their sudden breakup, the author and the Ex began a complicated dance of staying in each other’s orbits while also trying to build new, separate lives. Aretsky’s memoir builds on his journals from this time, when he was trying to meet new women and remain friends with the love of his life. His breakup narrative is peppered with recollections as he discusses the houses he shared with zany roommates in the hills; his incredible travels to Europe, Mexico, and New Zealand; and all the many, many celebrities he’s worked with. (Some stand-out stories involve Michael Jackson’s birthday party, coming up with a vulgar nickname for an irate Art Garfunkel, and a lovely afternoon spent at the Playboy Mansion’s gym.) “People are people, no matter what they do for a living. Everyone has a story,” Aretsky writes, and his memoir affirms this idea as he introduces readers to one quirky Angeleno after another, be they megacelebrities or outright weirdos (or both). However, as the author jumps around chronologically and thematically, many

of the stories—especially the overly long travelogue chapters—start to feel like random lists of memories rather than narratives that build upon or complement one another. What remains consistent is Aretsky’s relatable and endearing vulnerability about the complicated breakup and his impressive knack for capturing LA’s peculiar spirit. Whether describing leisurely coffees with a group of retired veterans at a shopping mall or getting drunkenly chased down canyon roads by Eddie Van Halen, Aretsky proves himself to be an engaging and intriguing guide to Hollywood. A meandering memoir that offers a fascinating perspective on eccentric Angelenos and their orbits around the stars.

Rite of Passage

Bailey, John | FriesenPress (372 pp.)

$39.99 | $28.99 paper | January 10, 2025 9781038311061 | 9781038311054 paper

Bailey offers a YA fantasy novel set in a world of clashing destinies and deepseated prejudice.

Élan is an 18-year-old burdened by his dual heritage—half Eldridge, half Castalian—which makes him an outcast in his own society, as he may have frightening magical powers as a result. His life is shattered when he witnesses the brutal murder of his parents by the evil Satyr forces. Afterward, he’s grudgingly taken in by his uncle, the DragonLord Leavenstar—an act that’s portrayed as a near-refusal. Élan’s existence, in fact, is marked by constant fear and rejection, which has the effect of fueling his desires for revenge against the Satyr Nations of the Phar Empire. The pair’s relationship is a complex one, as Leavenstar’s internal conflicts about raising Élan clash with the young man’s search for understanding and acceptance. The journey upon which they embark is fraught with peril, including encounters with birdlike creatures called grypis and the looming threat of the Satyr invasion. Adding to

Élan’s turmoil is his forbidden love for the king’s niece, which only adds to his emotional burdens. As his Eldridge/ Castalian powers awaken, he finds a crucial ally in a dragon, Moonshadow. His journey becomes a battle to prove his worth, forcing him to question his own agency. Over the course of this fantasy tale, Bailey masterfully creates a world where political intrigue, racial tensions, and personal struggles intertwine. The narrative is rich in detail, painting a vivid picture of the world’s creatures, cultures, and landscapes: “The binary Suns were setting as man and beast walked out into the green-tinged and fading light of the early evening and emerged onto a wide ledge set into a cliff face overlooking the foaming waves of the sea thousands of feet below.” Bailey never shies away from exploring the darker aspects of his characters’ natures, including prejudice, hatred, and abuse of power. Élan’s journey is effectively shown to be a dangerous one, not only due to external threats but also internal conflicts, as he tries to find a place in a world that won’t accept his existence.

A well-told story of devastating loss and forbidden love.

The Third Act of Theo Gruene

Boerner, Talya Tate | One Mississippi Press (308 pp.) | $29.99 May 20, 2025 | 9781951418106

In Boerner’s novel, an older man and a child become friends during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic crisis. Theo Gruene is a retired botanist who lives in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and does volunteer work for the University of Arkansas. His idea of a perfect day is one he spends gluing plant specimens, such as a 1930s columbine, onto mounting paper. He loves order and solitude, but he’s still grieving the death of his beloved wife, Annie, 20 years before. Theo’s life is thrown into

upheaval with the sudden arrival on his doorstep of an 8-1/2-year-old girl in a green raincoat that’s too big for her. Penelope Pie Palmer just missed her school bus and forgot her house key, so she asks if she can stay in his house until the current rainstorm passes and her mom returns home in a few hours. He initially sees the girl as a nuisance, but their interactions slowly cause Theo to venture out of his self-contained world. He adopts a stray dog; meets Penelope’s determined single mom, Ivy; and discovers good qualities about Nita Johnson, a neighbor whom he formerly considered a nosy gossip. However, difficulties arise when the Covid-19 pandemic shuts down Penelope’s school and Theo reluctantly tutors her so that her mom, a nurse’s aide, can still work. Then Ivy lands in the intensive-care unit, requiring a ventilator. After Theo temporarily accepts responsibility for Penelope’s welfare, new information about the girl, her mom, and Theo comes to light. Boerner’s story revolves around a likable cast: Theo, at first a self-centered hermit, becomes a caring member of society, upset about injustice. Ivy takes responsibility for a bad choice, and Nita wins over Theo by remaining herself. However, bright, chatty Penelope is the book’s star, providing abundant humor (such as calling her raincoat a “protectability cloak”), as well as emotional depth— accepting Theo, and others, despite their many flaws. The northwest Arkansas setting, with lovingly described wilderness areas, such as Devil’s Den and Yellow Rock Trail, enhances the story’s messages about grounding one’s life in the natural world and practicing simple values. A family-oriented tale that’s heartfelt and funny, by turns.

The Binding

Caldwell, Gianaclis | Self (412 pp.) | June 1, 2025

In Caldwell’s dystopian thriller, a conscripted worker with a gift for “binding”—feeling the emotions of those around her—attempts to escape her authoritarian society.

In the Atlantic States of America, the people are governed via a corporate-run caste system, with a handful of companies profiting from their labor. Conscripted workers are clad in pale blue and microchipped, and Shepherd officers police them with cruelty and electric “zap-crooks.” When 23-year-old Ruby Roth’s boss Colin Tate’s betrayal leads her into a dangerous situation involving a disturbed Shepherd and a housing eviction, Ruby’s connections in the monastic Elohi Order help her and her neighbors, Harold Sr. and his son, Little Harold, escape the oppressive regime. The Elohi Order helps by “serving others in order to ease or prevent suffering,” and they have extensive connections to aid migrants at the Atlantic States’ border with the United West. In that country, Kaileh Clearwater Lewis searches for answers regarding her brother’s death while defending her egalitarian community as a Warrior. Ruby and Kaileh’s twisting journeys merge after a groundbreaking revelation transcends artificial barriers. This fast-paced, tense story expands on a traditional border-crossing narrative by presenting two women traveling toward each other, unaware of their connection. The third-person perspective alternates between these two well-drawn characters, and readers will especially root for Ruby’s success. Her

binding ability evokes additional empathy for her character, as it results in painful encounters: “agony shoots into her, radiates from her belly like an exploding star.” The grim landscape of the Atlantic States of America is engagingly visual, with one corporation controlling farms and housing, and the fact that societal strata are identifiable by color is reminiscent of Margaret Atwood’s classic The Handmaid’s Tale (1985). And despite the darkness, a throughline of hope runs through this ultimately inspiring story of perseverance and resistance.

A gritty, hopeful narrative with emotionally rich characters.

The Star Poolroom Boys

Charles, Edwin | ISBN Services (238 pp.) $6.99 paper | December 26, 2023 9798892175579

Rural Alabama teen Eddie, with two buddies in tow, gets into car racing and eventually reflects on his racing days with a psychiatrist in Charles’ novel. At the novel’s open, 17-year-old Edwin, nicknamed “Fast Eddie,” walks to his new 1969 Plymouth GTX in the high school parking lot. He’s leaving the Cullman, Alabama, high school early to drive to his psychiatrist appointment 60 miles away. Eddie’s friend Cory begs to come along for the ride. Since “all trips began and ended at the Star Poolroom,” Eddie swings by that hangout and Mike, a few months older than Eddie and about to ship to Vietnam, joins the road trip. Along the way, Eddie gets into a road race with Cory’s deranged older cousin, Manfred, who also leads them to a house to settle a silly beef, where Eddie sees a woman he’d met during the difficult time when his mother died several years before. Eddie gives Mike the OK to drive Cory to bootlegging deals while going to the psychiatrist appointment. There, Eddie finally opens up to his psychiatrist, describing the night terrors that prompted these

intensive appointments nine months ago. On the boys’ return trip home, Manfred rises up once again and another race ensues, leading to an empty church where Eddie encounters a spectral woman from his dreams. An epilogue shares the aftermath of this transformative trip for Eddie, his friends, and Manfred, both shortly thereafter and decades later.

Author Edwin Charles shares the forename of his protagonist, making one suspect that this finely observed narrative may be drawn from autobiographical material. The book is chock-full of enjoyable wry asides, such as Eddie noting, “Bootlegging had a long tradition in our county, it being dry with more than its share of Baptist hypocrites.” Charles also manages to pack in many flavorful folksy details (taking time to note the poolroom manager is “a short little poodle of a man, with the same lively disposition of a yappy little dog”) amidst generally adhering to his effective dramatic construction of alternating chapters that both push forward the trajectory of Eddie’s day and reveal his family’s backstory. Eddie, Cory, and Mike are entertaining age- and period-appropriate banterers and an ultimately touching triumvirate in the mode of Stand by Me or, perhaps a closer comparison, American Graffiti. Eddie’s dueling matchups against Manfred are cinematic experiences, with the boys involved in nail-biting close calls in “a blur of motion, noise, and nerves.” Eddie’s session with his psychiatrist serves as an important pit stop for him to articulate his pain, including a particularly striking sequence about his sleep paralysis (“The terror, the strangeness, the sadness and all the guilt just kept building”). One isn’t quite sure why Eddie feels guilt exactly, and this book’s epilogue has its abrupt elements (quick and ultimately jarring mentions of the existence/fate of each of the trio’s progeny). Overall, however, this is a masterful depiction of its time and place and Eddie’s grief and trauma at a critical crossroads of his life.

An immersive, highly suspenseful unfurling of a Vietnam War–era coming-of-age tale.

La Pâte à Bombe

Christensen, Michelle | Sybilline Digital

First (364. pp.) | $20 paper

June 13, 2025 | 9798897409884

In Christensen’s novel, a chef becomes unsure about her future when a career change and a new romance forces her to take stock of what she really wants.

Fiona McConnell grew up running a struggling catering business in Los Angeles with her father. As an adult, her big dreams and optimistic attitude have propelled her from kitchens filled with cockroaches to culinary school to a solid career as a pastry cook. Still living in LA, she’s often surrounded by close friends who believe in her dreams and her considerable talent. But, suddenly, a change of staff causes her boss, Julia Stone—owner of the high-end restaurant Lucien—to promote her from a cook to a probationary pastry chef. While navigating a local produce market, Fiona meets Rory, the son of a farmer who’s well known for having the very best fruit around, and this new connection leads to new romantic adventures. Back at Lucien, a new head chef is hired who makes it clear from day one that there will be no room for mistakes—and absolutely no mercy for those who dare to stray from his vision: “I have a single-minded purpose—one goal. I want our food to be worth the journey.” In the cutthroat world of culinary cuisine, the constant criticism makes Fiona realize that she’ll have to make a choice that could change her life’s path. Over the course of this novel, Christensen delivers a delightful and multifaceted story that follows a feel-good thread about hard work, forgiveness, and redemption, while also pursuing an entertaining romantic plotline. The appealing cast of characters features not only a likable lead, but also close friends, romantic partners, and fierce villains. Overall, the subject matter gives readers an engaging peek into the world of how premiere restaurants fight for Michelin

stars. The quick pace also helps to make this novel a fine beach read.

A delightful and romantic restaurant drama with sympathetic characters and a positive message.

My Pretty Baby: Seeking Truth and Finding Healing―A Memoir

Correa, Wendy B. | She Writes Press (256 pp.) $17.99 paper | November 4, 2025

9798896360049

In this memoir, Correa reflects on the complex emotional consequences of childhood and adolescent trauma The author was the youngest of three siblings; her brother, Mark, was seven years older, and her sister, Sharon, 12 years older. Sharon resented her from the day their mother brought her home from the hospital in 1956, she says, for reasons that Correa reveals later in this remembrance; Mark was quiet and increasingly interested in his Christian faith. The author was only 7 when her 45-year-old father died, which turned her world upside down. She says of the funeral and the days that followed that “no one spoke to me about my grief, about my fears and my feelings.” She became terrified, she says, that her adored mother would soon die, and her mission became to protect her mom, which would prove challenging. Less than two years later, her mother brought a new man named Paul into the household. (The author notes that some names in her memoir have been changed.) Paul was a heavy drinker, she says, who was subject to capricious, violent outbursts. He’d had an abusive childhood, was divorced, and had five estranged children. Alternately kind and frightening, Paul became Correa’s stepfather. For college, the author headed to California, and in 1982, her life took an unexpectedly star-studded turn. Correa is an engaging wordsmith and fills her stories with detailed descriptions and period music references. The most emotional vignettes look back

to her early years; in one searing tale, she imagines her sensitivity to approaching danger as a pet wolf: “When I heard Paul angrily stomp around, my wolf would start to pace the floor and sniff the air. Sometimes, the hair would stand up on his haunches, his nostrils would flare, and he would bare his teeth.” During her California years, she worked as a security volunteer for the 1982 Rose Bowl Peace concert and was later employed by a talent agency representing major folk-rock artists of the period. These SoCal sections overflow with giddy encounters with minor celebrities, such as Timothy B. Schmidt of the Eagles. A sometimes-disturbing but affecting remembrance.

A Man Askew

Costanzo, Joe | Self (246 pp.) | $14.99 paper January 6, 2025 | 9798218559212

In Costanzo’s novel, a directionless middle-aged man uncovers his late father’s secrets. Dexter Renshaw is a 48-year-old former copy editor who has been placidly watching his life pass him by since the local newspaper went digital. After the death of his father, who was a police detective, Dex tries to tend to his stressed mother, his distant son, and his dismissive ex-wife—none of whom really seem to need him—when a stranger named Novack approaches him with a strange story. Novack claims that Dex’s father had put him away for a carjacking years earlier but took pity on him and stored Novack’s most important belongings in a secret safe deposit box, to which he now hopes Dex can produce the key. Passive to a fault, Dex brushes away his initial suspicions about Novack’s story and hands over the key—unwittingly setting himself up for a brutal attack that leaves him limping, living with his mother, and filled with nagging doubt about his father. In the months that follow, Dex slowly digs through the facts of the carjacking, interviews several people

A fast-paced race against time.

RECIPROCITY

involved, and even pokes around a local encampment of unhoused people where Novack was said to have been seen. He soon discovers that his father had indeed been keeping some big secrets. Costanzo’s premise is immediately intriguing and Dex’s violent attack gives the story a jolt of excitement, but what follows is a much slower, more subtle style of mystery. There are few thrills and very little suspense in Dex’s investigation, which may disappoint readers eager for more lively revelations. Instead, the author digs into the thoughts of his amiable main character; Dex’s dry wit keeps him endearing. (Recovering from his injuries, Dex reflects on “the old dancing dog theory. People will be so amazed just to see me dancing that they won’t even notice whether I’m doing it well or not.”) The eventual revelations are disappointingly mundane, but Dex’s reflections along the way about fathers and sons, family expectations, and the way the world shifts around those just trying to get by provide plenty of drama. A sympathetic and clever protagonist is the point of interest in this subtle, subdued family mystery.

Reciprocity

Gilbert, D.C. | DC Gilbert & Associates (295 pp.)

$19.99 | $16.99 paper | March 8, 2025

9781734602364 | 9781734602357 paper

Series: The JD Cornell Action Series, 3

In Gilbert’s thriller, a retired Navy SEAL tracks down kidnapping victims and a former American Special Forces sniper mired in the underworld of the Philippines.

At the outset of this final installment of the author’s JD Cornell Action

Thriller trilogy, readers find erstwhile Special Forces operative Bill Taylor floundering and far from home in the Philippines. Troubled by the atrocities he has seen and committed in Afghanistan, Bill is now mostly dedicated to drinking to forget, a habit he supports by participating in underground martial arts fights. Meanwhile, back in the United States, former Navy SEAL JD Cordell is marrying the love of his life, Ellen (who also happens to be pregnant), a doctor he rescued from intense fighting in Niger. Soon after their nuptials, JD is contacted by the Spring Lotus Foundation, an organization in Thailand that aims to aid victims of the rampant sex trafficking in Southeast Asia. Two of the girls in their charge have been kidnapped by Lt. Col. Fong, a corrupt Vietnamese civil servant with a penchant for violence and keeping sex workers. Fong is an old foe of JD’s, and he knows this kidnapping will draw the onetime SEAL back into his reach. JD sets out for the other side of the globe, unable to turn down the desperate Spring Lotus Foundation. As he seeks out both Bill Taylor (referred by a contact as a possible ally) and the missing girls, it comes to light that JD is much more personally involved in the situation than even he initially realizes: his mother, a Vietnamese immigrant living in the states, was the only family member to escape a brutal execution at the hands of Fong’s family. Gilbert’s novel is certainly well researched, as is evidenced by his descriptions of modern-day Vietnam: “They would only have to cross through Laos or Cambodia and enter Vietnam almost anywhere in the border region… It has recently become quite popular with Western tourists who now bicycle between these border countries to take photographs.” While readers looking for high-toned literary prose may not be satisfied, fans of action thrillers and military

espionage will find more than enough intrigue to keep the pages turning. A fast-paced race against time.

Brave Falls

Gouveia, AnneMarie Mazotti

Atmosphere Press (226 pp.) | $30.99

$19.99 paper | February 11, 2025

9798891325555 | 9798891325364 paper

Teens race to save their world from destruction with magic and determination in Gouveia’s middlegrade fantasy novel, one in a series.

Hundreds of years in Earth’s future, young people live in a world called Drifters Realm; they are sent there at age 12 to become magic-wielding “Life Givers,” “Chemists,” “Knowledge Bearers,” “Navigators,” and more. Carrying the tools of their callings in magical backpacks while watched over by benevolent beings called Guardians, the teens learn to use their powers until they reach the age of 18, when they return to Earth. But something has gone wrong: Zane, the villainous adult ruler of Drifters Realm, plots to destroy it, turning the Guardians into killers. Now, 12-year-old Roe (a healing Life Giver and a newly minted Sorcerer) is in Zane’s crosshairs. With her disgruntled brother Ori, storm-bringing sister Tora, older brother and shape-shifter Theo, and assorted companions, Roe races to fulfill a prophecy that could mean the Realm’s salvation (“From the Unforgettable Forest’s wildflower meadows and Sleeping Giants’ redwood trees… to the gusty winds of the Wandering Plains, ‘Every living thing is counting on me to save Drifters Realm’”). The author gives the teens (and readers) something new to think about by revealing the cause of Zane’s obsessive hatred of Drifters Realm, Roe, and her family. The young protagonists—with Roe at their center—convincingly overcome self-doubt and grow together

through physical challenges, painful betrayals, and grueling tests of character as their powers expand. This volume provides a satisfying conclusion to the complex, multicharacter plot that has unfolded over the two previous novels in the series. Those new to the Drifters Realm world may be willing to go along for the ride without knowing the characters’ backstories or what has come before, but a much more rewarding experience begins with Book 1.

Vivid storytelling with strong teen protagonists and epic magical struggles.

Eyes of Iris

Harris, Joshua A.H. | Atmosphere Press (248 pp.) | $27.46 | $16.99 paper March 25, 2025 | 9798891326217 9798891325852 paper

In Harris’ SF novel, a doctor’s psychological evaluation of an unusual patient could doom the planet. Ernest Kairos is asked by one of his hospital’s emergency-room physicians to engage with a newer patient to see if they warrant continuing an involuntary psych hold. Irisa Solovyov, who prefers to be called “Iris,” is a 20-year-old college student studying computational neuroscience; she came in recovering from a drug-induced hallucination that appears to involve delusional thinking, which is Kairos’ field of expertise. Kairos promises to call off the hold if she tells him the full story of her vision—and it’s unlike anything he’d ever heard from other patients. He listens to Iris’ tales and secretly records them; first, he hears about her apparent visions of past lives, in which she was a young Italian woman in the 1960s or an Egyptian boy playing an ancient board game, among others. She found a shaman to help her guide her mental travels, but after drinking a hallucinogenic drink, she found herself inhabiting the body of a strange, “human-esque” but clearly inhuman creature the future;

unlike her previous visions, this time she was stuck, and couldn’t return to her own time or body. After a few days as a weird, gray worker among many others, the creature Iris inhabits was taken by its gods to another place she could never have predicted—and where she encounters a very strange companion, indeed. Harris’ offbeat work of speculative fiction is told mainly through transcripts of Kairos’ audio files. Its vision of the future is an unusual one that’s both plausible and horrifying, and readers will certainly find it unforgettable. The work features some stunning worldbuilding along the way, and readers will feel as misplaced, and as entranced, as Iris does in her vision. None of the major players in the narrative are particularly likable, as their flaws are always on clear display; however, this has the effect of making them feel all the more genuine—and, ultimately, all the more human. An often thrilling tale of an unpredictable future.

I Trust Her Completely

Henneberg, Christine | Self (272 pp.) $17 paper | April 22, 2025 | 9798986066721

A fter decades of solitude, a San Francisco author’s life—and her ambitions— change when she reconnects with a college friend in Henneberg’s novel.

For years, Josie was convinced that Radhika, an incisive editor whom she met at a college writing seminar, was dead. The announcement, five years after college, that Rad had been diagnosed with breast cancer shocked Josie at first, but in the 12 years that followed, she moved on with her life—completing a graduate degree in fiction, releasing a short story collection to modest praise, and, most recently, attempting to have a baby through artificial insemination. When she comes across an article in the Atlantic that Rad has written—a raw account of her battle with breast cancer during her residency in

an abortion clinic, and the subsequent birth of her twins—Josie is hesitant to reach out. But several months later, she runs into her old acquaintance in a grocery store and is swept into her friend’s chaotic life once again. Soon, Josie is at Rad’s house every week to share her writing. Amid the critique sessions, Josie shares her own dream of motherhood, anchored in the sudden, tragic death of her own parents. She grows close to Rad’s idyllic-seeming family and develops a relationship with the young babysitter, who often seems to have a stronger connection with the children than they have with their own mother. But when tragedy strikes, the relationships that Josie has come to hold dear threaten to collapse. Amid the frenzy of Covid-19-era San Francisco, vividly portrayed by Henneberg, Josie must make a series of difficult choices—whether to endure the risks of another pregnancy, to abandon her interminable novel, and to preserve difficult relationships. Over the course of this lucid debut novel, the author offers a nuanced portrayal of the complexities that are inherent to modern womanhood, and she does so by anchoring them to consistently compelling characters. The author’s fast-paced, conversational prose style will draw readers quickly into the lives of the various players, whose imperfections have the effect of making them more sympathetic. A thoughtful and elegant exploration of 21st-century motherhood.

A Naughty Potty

Demon Tale

Jatkar, Deven | Monkeymantra (38 pp.)

$19.99 | $11.99 paper | November 15, 2024

9798987405970 | 9781737462750 paper

In author/ illustrator Jatkar’s picture book, a youngster imagines himself in a mythical confrontation when striving to unblock a toilet. While sitting on the potty, the young, unnamed protagonist—an Indian boy portrayed with brown skin—reads about how the king of deities, Indra, waged a

battle against the demon serpent Ahi to free the world’s water. When the prideful boy declares himself too mighty for Ahi to challenge, the house’s water supply cuts out. The narrator traces the problem to a toilet blockage, and he believes it’s the work of the demon serpent. He imagines taking up Indra’s magical weapon, Vajra (actually a toilet plunger) to renew the epic conflict. Jatkar’s first-person narration captures the immediacy of oral storytelling and the excitability of a middle-grade fantasist. The shaky, faux handwritten typeface may prove challenging for some readers—especially given the additional sound effects and Ahi’s toilet noises. Jatkar’s full-color cartoon illustrations mostly favor clear action scenes set against white backdrops, but they’re most effective when they include other elements (such as a shower cubicle or mirror). Adults may question the protagonist’s unblocking technique, but this is by design; the boy’s triumph comes through Pyrrhic toilet destruction: “Indra defeated Ahi and became a hero. All I got was an epic timeout.” Young readers will likely revel in the chaos. A lighthearted tale of mayhem and imagination.

The Infernal Age: Demon Gate

Joaquin, Anson | Dubious Distinction Press (314 pp.) | $27.99 | May 5, 2025 | 9798992613919

After a mishap occurs at a secret research site, a soldier and a scientist travel through a postapocalyptic America in a desperate bid to save the world in Joaquin’s series starter.

A scientific experiment goes horribly wrong, unleashing destruction on Betelgeuse, New Mexico, and U.S. Army Capt. Gabriel Rodriguez and Dr. Tamarind “Tam” Sinclair are among the few survivors. Now, demonic monsters prowl suburban streets and a mysterious illness wreaks havoc on the human

populace. Joined by a fellow traumatized survivor, whom they nickname Ripley (as a specific nod to the classic SF/horror thriller Aliens), and with a host of improvised weapons and stolen camping equipment, the pair set out on a potentially futile mission to deliver information that could rescue the planet from disaster. The trio encounter strange predators, roving gangs, and new friends in this first installment of Joaquín’s ongoing series. It has a compelling premise that combines multiple genres, delivering SF apocalypse-horror by way of HBO’s dramatic TV series Chernobyl. The novel ends on a cliffhanger after a promising start, but its greatest asset is its skillful character development. Gabriel and Tam are likable and endearing, and their banter makes for an enjoyable read. Ripley is an extremely strong character— she isn’t merely a damsel in distress, nor is she a one-dimensional, no-nonsense fighter, and her emotional complexity makes her all the more realistic and human. The novel’s weak point, however, is its portrayal of a developing romance between Gabriel and Ripley, which feels forced and sometimes grinds the narrative to a halt. However, the various players and their relationships will certainly evolve in future installments. All in all, readers who like post-disaster fiction with plenty of action and engaging characters are likely to enjoy this end-times tale. An engaging and inventive horrorcombat adventure.

To Do Justice

Joseph, Frank S. | BookBaby (300 pp.) $19.95 paper | July 5, 2024 | 9798990440913

A young girl searches for her roots in a city torn by racial conflict in this historical melodrama, part of the author’s Chicago trilogy. Joseph’s novel centers on Pinkie, an 11-year-old girl who looks white enough to stick out like a sore thumb in Chicago’s West Side ghetto in the mid-1960s. She has been

This is a winner, packed with governmental misdeeds and threats of violence.

SOMEONE HAD TO LIE

brought up there by Jolene Watkins, a Black woman who is not her mother and lets slip that Pinkie’s real name is Rachel Levine. Chaos engulfs Pinkie when policemen rough up neighborhood kids for opening a hydrant on a sweltering summer day, touching off a four-day riot fueled by rage over poverty, racism, and police brutality. Pinkie is taken in by Nizzie Sawhill, a canny Black precinct boss in Chicago’s Democratic Party machine. She also meets Mollie Hinton, a young white reporter covering the riots for the Chicago Associated Press bureau. Pinkie falls in with a sketchy Black civil rights activist, the Rev. Jared Levi Bivens, with pedophilic impulses. Nizzie further ratchets up tensions by telling Mollie and other reporters that there is a Black plot to stockpile weapons and start a race war. While chronicling public unrest, Mollie helps Pinkie in her quest to find her real mother. Joseph, who covered the 1966 Chicago riots for the Associated Press, weaves a colorful, gritty tapestry of the city, from the gorgeous Loop skyscrapers, to the dejected North Lawndale slum, to the grungy madhouse of the AP newsroom, with its scurrying copy boys and clacking teletypes. He conveys the city’s seething racial tensions in muscular, evocative prose and pitch-perfect dialogue (“Second night folks got pop-bottle gasoline bombs, what the guy on WVON calls Molotov cocktails. Now there’s less to steal, folks go to setting buildings on fire. Ain’t laughing so much neither. Some got signs Pigs Out! and Get Whitey! and Black Power!…Black Power. Got a good ring to it”). The result is an unforgettable portrait of a city burning with hatred and hope. A gripping, richly textured saga of the Civil Rights Era.

Two Over Easy All Day Long

Lane, Shari | Golden Antelope Press (286 pp.) $19.79 paper | May 1, 2024 | 9781952232862

In Lane’s debut, an unlikely criminal pursues a murderer in his court-appointed small town.

Giles Anthony Maurice Gibson, president of ABC Toys, is held liable when a child chokes to death on one of the loosely attached eyes of ABC’s Poppy Panda doll. The judge sentences him to a year of community service—not in New York, where he lives, but in the dead child’s hometown of Motte and Bailey, Oregon. He soon finds himself a resident of room 202 in the Sleepy Time Motel, washing dishes at the Sunnyside Up cafe, and wearing an ankle bracelet that ensures he doesn’t leave town. Luckily, none of the locals know why he’s there; the girl’s family has since moved away, and everyone he meets knows him by his new nickname, Tony. As he waits for someone to give him his community service assignment, Tony passes time among his new coworkers, including the no-nonsense cafe owner, the beleaguered waitress, and the grizzled cook with the unlikely name of Walt Whitman. Soon after Tony’s arrival, Walt discovers a dead body in the dumpster behind the restaurant. Instead of alerting the police, Walt dragoons Tony into burying the body in the woods. Soon the Sunnyside Up is under investigation, and if Tony can’t figure out the identity of the murderer, he’s going to wind up with a much harsher sentence than community service. Lane is a talented stylist, and her prose glistens as she describes the picturesque environs of Motte and

Bailey: “The tyrant sun made diamonds on the water. The golden fields around the reservoir gave the impression of plenty…Behind it all, the Blue Mountains made a graceful and glorious backdrop, not judgmental now, just a thing of beauty.” The real pleasures, though, are the deftly rendered characters (all characters in the true sense) and their relationships with one another. This is a comic novel with a big heart. A quirky murder mystery with a wonderful sense of place.

Someone Had To Lie

Luellen, Jack | Torchflame Books (302 pp.) | $19.99 paper March 11, 2025 | 9781611533705

In Luellen’s sizzling legal thriller, some cases just won’t stay solved. In the author’s debut, Someone Had To Die (2022), legal professionals and romantic partners James Butler and Erica Walsh were instrumental in bringing to justice those behind the abduction and murder of DEA Special Agent Enrique Camarena. Eighteen months later, retired DEA Agent Joe Aguilar, who was involved in the case and became James’ friend, calls him to explain, “It was bigger than we thought and now we’re in danger,” right before he is murdered in Yuma, Arizona. James and Erica spend the rest of the book trying to parse Joe’s cryptic last words while attempting to determine why he was killed. Complicating things is a mysterious flash drive that the pair receives implicating the CIA in promoting drug trafficking by select Mexican cartels. The drive also puts a target on CIA agent Tim Speer, another friend who took part in the Camarena case. The couple must figure out who sent the documents and what their motivations are while trying to protect Tim. Going up against CIA spooks proves to be quite a challenge for a pair who are accustomed to being the smartest people in the room. In this complex outing,

Luellen raises the bar for James, Erica, and their allies: In the series’ first volume, the Mexican cartels were the opposition; now, the even more shadowy activities of the CIA have been added to the mix. Going up against such a sensitive and violent bunch, James and Erica have to tread carefully. Luellen, himself a lawyer, had worked on cases connected to the actual Camarena case. His research is again front and center, supporting the narrative—the author brings to life a real rogue spy operation of which most readers aren’t aware. The novel’s chief flaw is the fact that it’s obviously a bridge book, leaving the bulk of the storylines unresolved. Still, James and Erica ensure that readers will enjoy the action-packed narrative. This is a winner, packed with governmental misdeeds and threats of violence.

I Inherited a Mixed Animal From Uncle Living in Woods

Martin, Richard | Apprentice House (322 pp.)

$33.99 | $23.99 paper | June 10, 2025 9781627205788 | 9781627205795 paper

In Martin’s novel, an eccentric uncle leaves his nephew an animal of his own invention after his mysterious death, leading to a series of misadventures.

Lemuel lives in the town of Hmm with his sister Shane, whose current ambition is to become Hmm’s next mayor at any cost. When their uncle dies in strange circumstances involving both “fire and explosion,” Shane inherits the uncle’s money and Lemuel receives a bizarre, Frankenstein’s monster–like creature. With “some pig right there, a dab of goat up around back…a little monkey perhaps… And possum in the middle,” the creature almost (but not quite) defies description, and Lemuel reflects that “simply standing there it disarranged your entire deductive facility.” Eventually, they christen the animal Yonder and involve him in a variety of hijinks, including Shane’s mayoral campaign and the confirmation of the

uncle’s death. Yonder has a will of his own, however, and ropes his bewildered caretaker into many antics. Lemuel, while trying to figure out what Yonder’s nature is, investigates a menacing figure he dubs the “Strangitor” and stumbles upon romance with Mabel, a woman he meets up in the mountains. The world of the novel is eclectic, sometimes bordering on grotesque, and Lemuel’s musings, artfully littered with malapropisms (“I wished there was some way I could help if it wasn’t too strainuous and didn’t take too long”), are both entertaining and often surprisingly deep. The rollicking plot could be a bit more cohesive—while the ricocheting nature of the events fits with the mood of the narrative, this has the side effect of baking a disjointed quality into the chronology that can be confusing. Lemuel’s playfully adversarial relationship with his sister (and almost everyone else he meets) is entertaining, and his initial indifference and trepidation regarding Yonder growing into a profound love for the animal is as endearing as any dynamic found in a more traditional “man’s best friend” novel.

A surreal exploration of human (and animal) nature with distinctive prose and a grotesquely beating heart.

The Ashtrays Are Full and the Glasses Are Empty

Mickelwait, Kirsten | Koehler Books (334 pp.) $20.95 paper | May 27, 2025 | 9798888246917

In Mickelwait’s historical novel, a woman from New York society embraces France during the Jazz Age. In 1905, highborn Sara Sherman Wiborg

dreams of a life beyond the rigid confines of Gilded Age New York society. She finds her soulmate in Gerald Murphy. He is wealthy, but his family is “in trade” (they own a company that sells luxury goods), and, at age 27, he is five years younger than Sara. Although the union is opposed by both families, they marry in 1915. They agree “to find and celebrate beauty in even the smallest things.” A daughter they name Honoria is born in 1917, followed by two sons, Baoth in 1919 and Patrick in 1920. After some time at Harvard, where Gerald studies landscape architecture, the couple rejects Prohibition and “the commercial, Puritanical vengeance of American society.” The family moves to France. Fully embracing the Jazz Age, their lively social circle includes Cole Porter, Fernand Léger, John Dos Passos, Archibald MacLeish, Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, and Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Sara and Gerald relish the freedom they’ve sought for themselves and their children in Paris and the Cap d’Antibes. As the 1920s end, personal and societal crises upend their lives: Baoth dies of meningitis and Patrick of tuberculosis, and the 1929 stock market crash and the rise of Hitler and Mussolini hasten a move back to the United States. Sara struggles with the knowledge that Gerald is gay, but their harmonious perspectives, love for each other, and grief over the deaths of their sons keep them together. In her first novel, Mickelwait illuminates the life of a woman who is an afterthought among the outsized personalities of the time, especially Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald, who unflatteringly portray her in their work. (Sara’s own abilities are overshadowed as she supports Gerald and creates a rich, loving life for her children, but she unflinchingly embraces the messiness of existence.) Mickelwait’s descriptions effectively evoke the time

A surreal exploration of human (and animal) nature.

I

INHERITED A MIXED ANIMAL FROM UNCLE LIVING IN WOODS

and place: “Paris was a living, breathing organism in which fresh ideas were floating on the air waiting to be grabbed, like drunken birds.”

Fans of Paula McLain and Marie Benedict will enjoy this insightful novel.

Kirkus Star

The Unofficial Batman: The Animated Interviews, Volume One

Miller, W.R. | BearManor Media (852 pp.) $65 paper | February 1, 2025 | 9798887710907

The first installment of a comprehensive oral history of the beloved TV series. In this big, colorful book, Miller assembles interviews with many of the people who worked together to produce Batman: The Animated Series, which premiered on Fox Kids Network in 1992, ran for a total of 85 episodes until 1995, won three Daytime Emmy Awards and one Primetime Emmy Award (plus a slew of nominations), and became a cherished, iconic realization of the Batman character and supporting cast. In a series of profusely illustrated chapters, Miller presents interviews with virtually all of the people involved in the series, each of whom has an array of broad and specific memories of their time working on the show. The series was created by Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski and developed by Timm, Paul Dini, and Mitch Brian; storyboard artist Brad Rader reflects on some of Timm’s artistic shortcomings: “As much [of] a huge fan of Bruce Timm as I am, one of the things that has always struck me about—like a potential flaw, depending on your point-of-view, in his artwork—is that all of his woman characters tend to look alike, which is, they all look basically like 12-year-old girls.” Miller does a sweeping, incredibly thorough job grounding readers in the lore and history of not only the Batman comics, but also the character’s countless iterations on screen. Fans of the old show will

appreciate the visuals (storyboards, comic-book covers, photos, animation stills) and the frankness of the creators, as when Dini himself comments on the unusual amount of creative freedom the Warner Bros. gave him and his colleagues (“The executives there really appreciated the integrity of the show”). The book’s riches will send many newcomers hurrying off to find the show and savor it for the first time.

An invaluable account of the creation of a legendary Batman TV series.

First Aid for Choking Victims

Müller, Matthew Zanoni | Malarkey Books (314 pp.) | $20 paper | November 12, 2024 9798990324022

People confront their imperfect selves in Müller’s debut collection of short stories. In one episode from Müller’s new collection, a high schooler’s world is overturned when his best friend—a skilled basketball player whom people call “Mr. Perfect”— is run over by a train. Confused and upset by his friend’s apparent suicide, someone tells him that maybe he can be the new Mr. Perfect, which sets him to thinking about what was going through his friend’s mind at the end. In the title story, a junior high school girl refuses to go with her mom to Mass anymore—in part to protest the woman’s hesitance to “let her in,” following a recent stillbirth. While at home, the girl experiences an unexpected awakening involving the boy next door and learns a few things about her laconic father. In a third piece, “Tornado Warning,” a rare tornado alert in Western Massachusetts finds a housesitting couple in a dire situation of their own making, during which they discover that they don’t know each other as well as they thought. Across these eight stories, Müller portrays characters confronted by fears of isolation and inadequacy, very often in close proximity to others. Many of the tales follow young people as they navigate tricky rites of

passage: first relationships, unethical jobs, even fears of swimming. Müller’s stories, which tend to run on the longer side, afford plenty of space to get into the psychology of his characters. The longest piece, and one of the best, “I Want You to Tell Me,” follows a sensitive college student as she travels upstate to meet her boyfriend’s blue-collar parents, a situation that slowly unravels as she attempts to convince them of her depth and substance. “I wanted to know what it was for you, what your truth is,” she asks her boyfriend’s father, a landscaper whom she decides is a kind of artist. “For some dumb reason I thought you had it. The big truth. All of it. That you had understood. Am I making sense?” There is much to admire in these probing, insightful tales, and plenty that points to a talented novelist waiting to break out. An impressive set of characterdriven tales.

Influenca

Nader, Alexander | Self (286 pp.) | $15 paper | April 9, 2023 | 9798375440859

A social media influencer chronicles his slow descent into madness as the lines between reality and the internet begin to blur in Nader’s psychological horror novel.

Beau Rutledge is a prominent lifestyle influencer on social media. From his palatial home in eastern Tennessee, he documents a life dedicated to fitness, fashion, and #SouthernCharmer as part of a whole team of online influencers including a comedian, a health guru, and a trend-hopping woman. Under the direction of the mercurial manager “M,” Beau claws his way to 10 million followers (“I’ve got to kill myself to get this goal, or she’ll murder me”) despite public blunders, an out-of-control online persona, and the near-constant presence of Brant Cantrell, whose similar feed and overreliance on a personal tragedy threaten to usurp Beau’s place as the primary luxury influencer in the South.

As Beau redoubles his efforts, he begins to torture his body and mind with extreme fitness regimens and hypervigilance regarding his feed. A series of posts from other social media accounts document encounters Beau doesn’t remember having, and his reality splinters, creating an alternate online persona that reflects his inner monologue and intrusive thoughts. Tragedy disrupts his nearperfect life and exposes the cracks in his sanity. At first glance, Nader’s work of psychological horror seems like a standard take on classic horror protagonists whose primary flaws are obsession and hubris. The treatment of Beau’s environment makes the story shine, however, as the author emphasizes and de-emphasizes details that leave the reader uneasy and creates a delicious background rhythm that enhances the narrative’s tension. As Beau’s reality fractures, questions arise over the true nature of the protagonist: Is Beau a homicidal villain, or is he the victim of a series of online smear campaigns intent on destroying his following? Nader expertly turns the screws, deftly recontextualizing familiar horror tropes for a Gen Z audience. Classic horror gets a glow-up in this eerie meditation on influence, fame, and the algorithm.

After Disney: Toil, Trouble, and the Transformation of America’s Favorite Media Company

O’Brien, Neil | Post Hill Press (288 pp.) $19.99 paper | March 4, 2025 | 9798888451380

O’Brien undertakes a deep dive into the turbulent arc of the Disney corporation after its founder’s death. When Walt Disney died in 1966 only a few days after his 65th birthday, the company that bore his name was plummeted into turmoil, and its employees were “utterly devastated.” In response to the uncertainty generated about the company’s future, the New York Stock Exchange temporarily ceased

trading its stock. Disney, who opened a modest cartoon studio in his uncle’s garage in 1923, was, per the author, a “once-in-a-lifetime visionary” and seemed to many to be irreplaceable. To make matters worse, the company was already struggling to navigate the “upheaval of the late 1960s” and remain artistically and commercially relevant during a rising demand for more mature content as the company feared that its own movies were “increasingly unhip to some film audiences.” Amazingly, the company, now under the direction of Roy Disney, Walt’s brother, nearly ditched its feature animation department, a narrowly averted strategic blunder that would have changed the face of American cinema. Instead, after surmounting some extraordinary challenges, the company experienced a major renaissance beginning in the late 1980s with the release of the now-classic The Little Mermaid

O’Brien leaves no stone unturned in charting the travails and triumphs of the iconic company after its founder’s passing in this relentlessly meticulous work. The author burrows into the bowels of the company’s history—its training program for young animators, the establishment of the Touchstone studio, the massive success garnered under the stewardship of Michael Eisner—and offers an astonishingly thorough treatment, given the brevity of the book. At the heart of the tale is the effect of the death of Walt Disney, a man of such profound talent and drive that the company was left all but rudderless in his absence. Even while alive, he had struggled to create edgier movies without tarnishing the company’s reputation for wholesomeness—he often felt a “creative straitjacket” restrained him. O’Brien adeptly illuminates these difficulties, and by extension the more general problem of combining artistic productions with large-scale commercialism, one of the most impressive achievements of Walt Disney. The narrative can become bogged down by the weight of minute detail—the author seems anxious to leave no single data point unscrutinized. This obsessive attention can slow the story down and rob it of some of its drama; at its worst, the book has all the liveliness of an investment prospectus. However, O’Brien

does lift the reader out of the quicksand of miscellany to discuss, with great insight and intelligence, the grander aspects of Disney’s story and the reasons for its success. “To keep Disney Animation alive after Walt’s death required an unusual mix of ingredients: raw talent and skilled artistry, tradition and innovation, youth and experience, reverence for the past and a dissatisfaction with the status quo, the incubation of talent and an impatience with being held back.” Ultimately, this is an edifying look into the company’s remarkable triumphs. An eye-opening history of one of the most culturally impactful American companies.

The Smiling Dog Cafe: Healing Fiction

Plakcy, Neil S. | Samwise Books (256 pp.) | $14.99 paper January 12, 2025 | 9798305779912

A magical New York City cafe helps people reconcile with their struggles in this collection of two novellas by Plakcy. In the first story, “Code of Silence,” Jeff, a software developer,watches his life gradually unravel after he breaks up with his beloved girlfriend, Madeline. Struggling with insecurity and his overbearing father’s expectations, he has trouble keeping a job or maintaining a steady romantic relationship. One day, he finds himself alone, desperate, and living in a hotel. A chance encounter with a golden retriever named Cooper leads him to the Smiling Dog Cafe and its owner, Betty, and his conversations with her allow him to confront his memories of his ex, understand his fears, and find a path forward—with a little help from Betty’s magical powers. Cooper, for instance, is actually a painting of a dog that she’s brought to life, and the cafe’s furniture and music transform memories into therapeutic experiences. In this way, the novella effectively takes readers on Jeff’s journey from isolation and self-doubt to self-acceptance and hope. The second

novella, “A Mother’s Heart,” does something similar; it features Sophia Greenwood, a single mother whose 9-year-old daughter, Emma, is diagnosed with a genetic heart condition. Painful memories of her own mother’s battle with heart disease haunt Sophia, and as she navigates Emma’s difficult treatment, she calls on memories of women who raised her after her globetrotting mom’s death. Each caregiver—Keiko-san in Tokyo, Lakshmi in Mumbai, Marie-Claude in Paris, and Isabella in Rio—taught Sophia different ways of coping with grief. Sophia ultimately also ends up at the Smiling Dog Cafe, and its magic helps her to embrace a legacy of love and strength, passed down through generations of women. These two heartfelt, crisply written novellas wear their sadness on their sleeve and take their earnest messages of healing seriously. A reference to Michael Cunningham’s bestselling novel The Hours (1998) points to Plakcy’s clear intentions; at their best, these stories tackle their characters’ suffering with skill. Sometimes-grim but ultimately hopeful stories of redemption.

The Weather Officer: The Story of Alonzo Smith Jr. and His Epic Journey Through Forecasting and Flight

Porter, Kelly V. | Archway Publishing (384 pp.) $45.99 | $21.99 paper | January 26, 2025 9781665764322 | 9781665764308 paper

A daughter explores the life of her father, a groundbreaking Black meteorologist. Prior to his death more than two decades ago, Alonzo Smith Jr. asked his daughter to tell his story to the world. Porter assented and received his

handwritten notes that detailed his life experiences as a Black veteran and scientist in the mid-20th century, but it took her 10 years before she was mentally prepared to begin the project. What she uncovered while reading his notes, and in her subsequent research, was the story of one of the first Black officers to integrate the U.S. Air Force; he would similarly integrate the realm of meteorology at “a time when Black rarely preceded the words commissioned officer and scientist.” The book begins with Smith’s teenage years in Depression-era Harlem in New York City and Washington, D.C., where his academic career was stifled, due to family pressure to support his family by dropping out. After serving in World War II, he refocused on his education and rose up the ranks in the Air Force as a weather officer. This led to his second career with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, where he chaired the agency’s first Equal Employment Opportunity Committee before becoming NOAA’s deputy coordinator for meteorology. The book does not gloss over the rampant discrimination that Smith encountered in his early life and military career, but it also emphasizes his constant self-belief, perseverance, and dedication to his family and community; he would serve as a beloved public school teacher in Maryland following his retirement. And although Porter’s admiration for her subject is apparent, what makes this book special is her painstaking research, which accompanies her father’s notes. These include not only interviews with his contemporaries, but also extensive archival research. The book’s 10-page bibliography includes scholarly resources that help Porter to place her father’s life in historical context. An accessible writing style and the ample inclusion of high-quality photographs adds to the book’s appeal.

A valuable biography of an unsung scientist.

At the heart of the tale is its fascinating protagonist. ELEVEN

Eleven

Samson, Donald | Illus. by Heidi Nisbett Star Trilogy Publishing (276 pp.) | $14 paper April 14, 2024 | 9781732537255

In Samson’s historical novel, an aspiring scribe in a late-14thcentury Swiss town is drawn into the race to find a spy working for the French.

Sixteen-year-old Benedictus Waisel lives in Solodurum, a quirky town that superstitiously fetishizes the number 11—for the residents, a dozen is always one fewer than what everyone else understands. Benedictus hails from generations of stonemasons, but he plans to break family tradition and become a scrivener, a dream imparted to him by his beloved grandfather, who taught him how to read. However, after he discovers he simply can’t afford to join the Scriveners Guild or pay for an apprenticeship, he joins the City Guard and soon distinguishes himself defending Solodurum’s borders from invading French forces (“you opened the breach in their line, you know. I saw it all. That took a lot of courage”), becoming grievously wounded. Baron Roland de Cornu takes notice of Benedictus—it is uncommon that a guard can read—and makes him a kind of personal assistant in his hunt for a traitor he is convinced has infiltrated the city and is aiding the French. The author weaves together fact and fiction in such a way that they are “happily married at the altar of Imagination,” deftly drawing from the town’s rich history. At the heart of the tale is its fascinating protagonist—on the one hand, Benedictus is a shiftless teen adrift in meandering irresoluteness, but on the other hand, he is a young man of great intelligence and honor capable of extraordinary bravery. The plot pinballs erratically at times from one dramatic episode to another, but from this cacophony of events emerges a coherent narrative, captured with great subtlety in Benedictus’ fictional memoir. Samson takes the reader on an edifying tour of a vanished world, and in the process beguiles with a thoroughly entertaining tale. An engrossing blend of history and literary contrivance.

Love and Degradation: Excessive Desires in Queer-Feminist Art

Simmons, William J. | Penn State Univ. (152 pp.) | $24.95 paper

December 3, 2024 | 9780271098944

Simmons presents a series of critical essays analyzing love and all its forms through a carefully curated selection of art, literature, and pop culture. In a series of 11 essays that cover different forms of creativity, the author examines the art and pop culture moments that affected him personally. He opens the book with a consideration of Toyin Ojih Odutola’s The Treatment, a series of ink drawings that Simmons uses as a basis to discuss the “racist heteropatriarchy” that allows certain (white) people to live without fear (which is “the greatest privilege of all”). The author tackles each chapter from a different critical perspective, focusing on race (via the movie Widows), feminism (via Barbara Kruger’s photo collages), and mental health (via the movie Spencer). But love (in all its forms) largely takes center stage, such as in Simmons’ analysis of Charlotte Brontë’s Villette (1853) as a “paranoid novel”—complete with an ambiguous ending—that challenges the romantic expectations of the day. The TV show Fleabag is analyzed through a queer lens as the author discusses the protagonist’s tendency to pass “through and between visibility and invisibility.” Simmons also includes some personal anecdotes that highlight his connections to the material. With the author bouncing from one time period and art form to another, some readers may wish for a more streamlined reading experience. Any visual artwork discussed is included alongside its companion essay, making prior knowledge of the pieces unnecessary. Simmons’ refreshing honesty (at one point, he muses about his own suicide attempt: “I think that much of my work in art criticism and history has been spent attempting to be postdiscourse, because suicide is the end of discourse”) and choice to include largely modern works make the book read like a

hipper, more socially conscious college textbook. He ultimately demonstrates that contemporary entertainment is worthy of intellectual appraisal by revealing its rich potential for rigorous discourse. A thought-provoking analysis that uses art to challenge readers to dig deeper.

My Love for You Is Like the Night Sky

Smetana, Laura | Flying Cardinal Press (34 pp.) | $23.99 | $15.99 paper | May 12, 2025 9781737140993 | 9798992228403 paper

Smetana returns with a picture book centered on astronomy. This book opens in a similar manner to the author/illustrator’s Kirkus-starred earlier work, My Love for You Is Like a Garden (2023), with its titular sentence, followed by nonrhyming text—this time, inviting readers to imagine affection on a scale of the vastness of space. As an adult and a child (both portrayed as pale-skinned) sit together on what appears to be a grassy hill, they look up at the night sky as the text describes love with evocative phrases. The last book featured a lot of real-world sensory description, and there’s understandably less of that this time—one can’t touch stars or smell planets—but it still manages to be engaging by using star-watching similes, including “as radiant as a meteor shower” and “as dependable as the phases of the moon.” An illustrated glossary encourages readers to go back and find various objects, and a solar system diagram and moon-phase chart add helpful information. Again, the real star of this book (no pun intended) is Smetana’s imagery, which combines watercolor and collage. Although the stars, planets, and galaxies are somewhat less complex than the last book’s flowers, they are beautiful, with intricate compositions reminiscent of Eric Carle’s work.

A different but worthy successor to My Love for You Is Like a Garden.

How To Submit: Getting Your Writing Published With Literary Magazines and Small Presses

Sweeney, Dennis James | New World Library (216 pp.) | $18.95 paper February 25, 2025 | 9781608689361

A writer shares his knowledge and strategies for getting published within the world of small presses and literary magazines. As a former contributor to the literary website HTMLGIANT and the editor responsible for the “Where to Submit” list for the Entropy online magazine, Sweeney uses his expertise to offer a warmly encouraging how-to for writers. Specifically, his intended audience are those who aim to submit their work to places outside the traditional Big Five publishing houses and without an agent advocating for them. Sweeney emphasizes various reasons a writer may have for wanting to get published, encouraging his readers to be honest about the validation they seek from external sources and the kind of community they hope to build. He provides basic tools to begin research into different publications, including templates for cover letters, and he explains how he prefers to “tier” his submissions to maximize chances of a story being published within a year and to avoid overlap. The author rounds out his advice with chapters that offer a behind-the-scenes look into his own work as an editor, and interviews with successful writers, including Lisbeth White and Jackson Bliss, who share their perspectives on the challenging world of publishing. Sweeney’s tone is approachable and pleasant throughout: “When I first dreamed of being published, I wanted ‘fame, glory, and money,’ in a surprisingly unironic way,” he writes frankly early on, making readers feel at ease before he begins breaking down how hard it can be to stand out. Smartly, Sweeney quickly shows how these complications can be potential advantages, as when he encourages authors to get a sense of different publications’ schedules in

order to “approach your work rhythmically rather than getting lost in question of what to revise when.” The final interviews effectively support one of Sweeney’s main points about community, as when one author, Zoe Tuck, smartly describes literary journals as “a room I want to be in.”

A practical, thoughtfully constructed guide for aspiring authors.

Don’t Be Lonely, Lone Ranger

Taylor, Joe | Nat 1 Publishing (116 pp.)

$8.99 paper | April 7, 2025 | 9798309579617

A modern-day man trying to emulate the masked dogooder of the Old West finds it harder than he expected in Taylor’s raucous adventure.

Taylor’s yarn begins in February 2021, when Joe Smith, laid off from his public relations job at Toyota, decides that what America—and especially his hometown of Lexington, Kentucky— needs is for him to become a new Lone Ranger, dedicated to righting wrongs and quelling strife. He acquires a sidekick in Teresa “Ta-Ta” VanDerveer, an attractive lawyer with money and time to burn; her autistic sister, Margie, has apparent right-wing sympathies, suspecting everyone she meets of stealing the election. The trio patrol Lexington’s streets and Starbucks shops in Ta-Ta’s Mercedes Cabriolet—which is silver, of course—looking for people in distress to help. Unfortunately, the new Lone Ranger’s methods of doing good—mainly handing out $20 bills and Good & Plenty candy—usually fail miserably. His attempt to calm a domestic squabble earns him a crack on the head from the wife’s skillet. After he tries to cheer up a depressed woman, she shoots herself. And his repeated efforts to help a scornful teenage sex worker result in more violence from her pimp. Along the way, the Lone Ranger takes in a satirical vision of American culture, awash in bizarre protests: “If you can

love and coexist with dogs, then you should love and coexist with Covid!” exclaims a zealot at a coronavirus-rights march. Adding sardonic commentary on the scene is a magical figure known as Coyote, who often appears in the guise of a goat and performs offensive japes.

Taylor’s rambling picaresque features offbeat characters and gonzo situations, all in service of a sendup of extremism across the political spectrum, which he portrays as a cacophonous mashup of incoherent slogans and conspiracy theories: “They got Trump and Biden secretly together!” shrieks one protester. “To keep Bernie from winning! They want to topple Gamestop! We gotta build an underground Wall to stop Them!” Amid the rants and exclamation points, the Lone Ranger and Ta-Ta are depicted as the last halfhearted believers in hangdog American normalcy: “To make America heal, to bring back jobs, to make America function as a cohesive unit, respectful of the individual and of individual differences” is The Lone Ranger’s summary of his mission. Despite the vehemence of the politics on display, the novella’s mood is relaxed and generous; it’s bemused, rather than outraged, and seemingly convinced that masked adventuring is less important than quiet kindness in the face of misery. Margie turns out to be the story’s true hero; her orneriness evaporates when she comforts a bereaved mother with a heartfelt hug. Taylor’s dialogue sometimes suggests classic screwball comedy with its colorful eccentrics trading snappy banter—with Margie again stealing the show with snarky one-liners (He: “I am The Lone Ranger.” She: “Well then, why can’t you be more alone?”). Readers will root for the masked man as he undertakes his gallant, if seldom effectual, quest. An entertaining spoof of American politics with energetic characters and sharp repartee.

Meditation: Liberation or Attachment?: Exploring the Two Facets of Meditation

Tselios, Ioannis | Theravada Centre for Study and Practice (308 pp.) | $15.99 paper February 19, 2025 | 9786188618534

This comprehensive overview of Buddhist meditation focuses on its principal goals and the challenge of attachment. Tselios notes that while Buddhist meditation aims at spiritual liberation, the pleasing experience that issues from the practice can become yet another shackle, itself a new form of worldly attachment. “The mind then achieves stillness, becoming fully absorbed in its object. This freedom from distraction brings further peace, joy, happiness, and bliss. However, it can also lead to intense attachment to mental phenomena, especially the aforementioned emotions of well-being and bliss.” In order to explain how to avoid this pitfall—this lucidly written tome is practically as instructive as it is intellectually edifying—the author distinguishes between two basic varieties of the practice: serenity meditation and insight meditation. The former type concentrates the “ordinary mind” that normally exists in an “unstable and fickle state” and achieves a tranquility. Insight meditation employs the careful scrutiny of mental and physical phenomena to uncover their true natures, which reveal themselves as impermanence, suffering, and the absence of any permanent self, the three “universal characteristics of existence.”

For more Indie content, visit Kirkus online.

Tselios proffers a wide-ranging discussion of Buddhism, including its historical origins in ancient India and its eventual spread to the Western world, in addition to a searching discussion of the meaning of nirvana. Along the way, the author considers many different types of meditative practices and offers exacting instructions regarding their performance; the counsel is replete with various illustrative pictures and diagrams. In this educational spirit, the

A sharp, empathetic, and compulsively readable thriller.

IN DEFENSE OF GOOD WOMEN

book concludes with a series of questions asked by students at various meditation seminars conducted by the author and includes his helpful responses. While the entire work is generally clear and informative, the discussion of nirvana is the book’s highlight—Tselios explains that this state entails a cessation of psychic pain (the “termination of the inherently unsatisfactory process of existential suffering”), not the annihilation of a self that never existed in the first place. “Therefore, there is no one entity to be eliminated or annihilated. What should be eliminated is the subjective illusion of a self.”

The author effortfully tries to avoid any interpretations that rely on the postulation of a “mystical dimension” and offers protracted (though hardly sophisticated or convincing) discussions of classical physics and quantum mechanics. Tselios’ arguments regarding these elements are far too tersely developed and peremptorily presented to persuade the skeptical reader; however, he does furnish a remarkably clear treatment of Buddhist theory and practice, an especially impressive feat given the subject’s ostensible “inaccessibility to discursive thought.” Moreover, he transparently presents Buddhist practice as an antidote to the “instability and imbalance in our psychological world.” As is often the case in popular presentations of Buddhism, the alleged limitations of rigorous logic can be taken as license to eschew substantive argument—the author seems to take for granted that the core propositions of Buddhism are true, and that his readership is a choir to whom he can safely preach. Still, this is an admirably accessible and thorough introduction to Buddhism for readers interested in a scholarly synopsis or a guide for the novice practitioner. A suitable primer for the uninitiated.

In Defense of Good Women

Zimmerman, Marilyn J. | SparkPress (312 pp.) $17.99 paper | June 10, 2025 | 9781684633180

Zimmerman’s legal thriller follows a smalltown attorney whose beliefs are upended when she’s appointed to defend a mother accused of murdering her own child.

Since she took over her father’s practice 20 years ago, Victoria Stephens has known where she stands. A self-described “big-shot attorney in a small town,” she’s known throughout St. Clair County, Michigan, for bringing home the win—and for bringing in huge retainers to spend on red wine and designer shoes. When she’s brought on by the circuit judge for the year’s biggest murder case, though, her other clients take a backseat. It’s the summer of 2016, and the county seat of Port Huron is buzzing with speculation about Calliope “Callie” Thomas, the 17-year-old daughter of a local minister accused of drowning her newborn baby in the St. Clair River, which divides Michigan from Ontario. Callie claims to have no memory of the drowning, of giving birth, or even of being pregnant, but DNA evidence links her to the infant body found in the river, and Victoria knows the defense she’s building is shaky. To make matters worse, the tough-guy county prosecutor, Barrett Michaels—who has a long history with Victoria—is recommending a first-degree murder charge with mandatory life imprisonment. He’s running for a judge’s seat and is determined to project a tough-on-crime image. It looks like the odds are stacked against the young mother, who continues

to insist she doesn’t remember a thing. Jean Burley, an older lawyer from Detroit, has been following Callie’s case and insists that Victoria speak to Eleanor Allen, a psychiatrist researching a controversial new syndrome. “Neonaticide syndrome,” Allen explains, is a “specific kind of dissociation” that causes mothers to forget their pregnancy, labor, and panicked desperation to dispose of their baby. The lead seems promising, but a defense based on the syndrome might not be allowed in the courtroom. When Callie’s soon-to-be stepmother finally posts her bail, Callie’s pastor father (whose church sports signs like “THEY’RE THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, NOT THE TEN SUGGESTIONS”) won’t let his daughter come home. Victoria, in her own state of panic, offers to house Callie instead. As the two women attempt to build a case, their lives become increasingly, and perhaps dangerously, enmeshed.

Zimmerman’s novel hits a raw political nerve—though the 2016 U.S. presidential election isn’t mentioned, the story carefully skewers puritanical politics around teen pregnancy and abortion, and the story is dedicated to “all the women charged with infanticide whose behavior has been prejudged and misunderstood.” Geography comes into play; “Canada, just over there…is light-years ahead of us on this issue,” readers are informed (slightly didactically), and the small-town Michigan setting is precisely realized. Evocative descriptive language paints a strong setting: As Victoria looks out onto Lake Huron, she observes that, “A few small fishing boats motored in the opposite direction, unzipping the black water, their wakes spreading behind their sterns like paper fans.” The dependably twisty plot, nicely grounded in the author’s real-life legal experience, unfortunately feels rushed toward the conclusion—there’s just too much to resolve, too quickly. Still, the novel strikes a strong balance between entertainment and political manifesto regarding an underexplored issue. A sharp, empathetic, and compulsively readable thriller.

28 Indies Worth

SUMMER 2025

Kirkus presents Indies Worth Discovering , a sponsored feature spotlighting an array of fiction and nonfiction works recommended by Indie editors. Here readers can find a useful sampler that shows the excellence and breadth of Indie titles. Find pulse-pounding thrillers, revealing memoirs, twisty mysteries, fiery romances, thoughtful business books, problem-solving self-help guides, and incisive poetry collections, among many other works. Searching for something new and exciting? Read on.

Kirkus Star

Not From Here by Leah Lax

A heartfelt and fascinating collection of stories about people making their way to the United States.

Kirkus Star

The Daughter Between Them by Alretha Thomas

A deeply satisfying suspense tale.

Everywhere I Look by Ona Gritz

A poignant, gripping story of love, memory, and physical and psychological brutality.

Under the Sand by Susan Hanafee

A page-turning thriller set on a beautiful Florida island.

Secrets of the Under-Under World: Time by P.S. Whatever

Lovable and energetic characters power this wonderfully diverting story.

Alien Neighbors by Nancy Golden

The rare SF yarn that emphasizes the positive.

The Orchids Lady by Freya

Smallwood

A charming and immersive mystery with a lot of personality.

You’re Gone by J.S. Morton

A bloody good tale of grief and murder.

Deathless

Creatures by Katie Wilson

Fun—if overly familiar— vampire fiction made palatable by memorable characters.

Steel Valley by Jerry Madden

A debut novel of the ’60s that becomes more engaging as the pages turn.

Anela’s Club by D.K. Yamashiro

An inspiring story of teenage resilience and how trauma need not be an insurmountable obstacle.

Born

in

Space:

Unlocking

Destiny

by Jeremy

Clift

A profound and fullbodied futuristic story of love, technology, and infinite outer space.

Gardens of Plenty by Ron Arias

An action-packed and historically rich novel with a compelling lead character.

The Mighty Six-Ninety (690) by Alexander Hamilton Cherin

A thoroughly enjoyable and skillfully crafted tale.

The Beach Boy by William Semenow

An engaging remembrance by a likable author.

Little Lou and Just Being You by Leslie Mitchell Assini; illus. by Andy Yura

A light, rhyming cautionary tale that happily swims along.

Tahoe Local by Trish Tomer

An upbeat and funny series of reminiscences about Tahoe living.

The Lyric Hotel by Susan

Sisko Carter

A page-turning tale of the healing power of love.

Istara’s Tale by ARS Nipun

A nontaxing, sometimes- creative exoplanet adventure for young readers.

Kirkus Star

Good

Deeds Gone Bad

by Leon Wilson

A thrilling amalgam of Clancy’s Jack Ryan and London’s White Fang set in the chaos of South Asia.

The Boldly Inclusive Leader

by Minette Norman

A pleasing and effective mix of psychology, experience-based wisdom, and helpful advice to create a happier and more productive workplace.

Naked Girl by Janna Brooke Wallack

An endearing and fascinating perspective on a uniquely volatile and dangerous childhood.

Pete and Suzie by Samantha Ahearne; illus. by Julie Sneeden

A well-illustrated story of rivalry and friendship for young readers.

You

Can Do

Hard Things

by Dana Sutton; illus. by Nicholas Donovan Mueller

A heartfelt picture book that will stay with readers through the years.

Apocalypses

by Robert L. Gram

An engrossing and measured novel of wartime.

Moving

This Side of the Promised Land by Robert

Borcyckowski

A rich, moving saga of people living on the edge, full of plangent defeats and unsung victories.

On by

Don Kersey

A clutch of deeply intelligent short stories.

Detroit White Girl by Constance McMurray

A thoughtful, elegiac work that leaves the reader wanting more.

“Rich with allusion and illusion, Kuang crafts a witty, gory, harrowing ride...”

—#1 New York Times bestselling author, Leigh Bardugo

Make RF. Kuang your new obsession one book at a time