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Book Clubs

B&N selects Anthem by Noah Hawley (Grand Central) for its January Book Club. B&N talks with Hawley about the book on its Poured Over podcast. Esquire has an interview with Hawley about “the challenges facing today's teenagers and the prospect of sharing power with the next generation.”  The NYT reviews: “Hawley’s concerns as a father ground this plump, pyrotechnic novel, giving its dramatic violence and outcome more depth and meaning.” USA Today also reviews, giving it 2.5 out of 4 stars: “After its promising opening sequences, though, Anthem loses its considerable magnetism and fails to regain it.”

Good Morning America selects #1 LibraryReads pick, The Maid by Nita Prose (Ballantine; LJ starred review), for its January book club. 

Jenna Bush Hager selects The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan (S. & S.; LJ starred review) for the Read with Jenna Book Club. NYT’s group text also recommends Chan's novel  for book clubs an offers discussion questions. 

Reviews

NYT reviews Phenotypes by Paulo Scott, trans. by Daniel Hahn (And Other Stories): ““This longue durée of anti-Blackness plays out with a chaotic energy reflected both in the novel’s form and in the structure of its sentences.”  Also, Velorio by Xavier Navarro Aquino (HarperVia): “On every page we are confronted with the devastation left in Maria’s wake. The portrait Navarro Aquino paints is of a storm so violent it is almost incomprehensible.”  And, Bibliolepsy by Gina Apostol (Soho Press): “Apostol evokes ‘reading’s endlessly replenishable boon.’ She also wisely recognizes the limits of living for words alone.”  And, Dante: A Life by Alessandro Barbero, trans. by Allan Cameron (Pegasus): “More intellectual risk-taking of this nature, more willingness to infuse the sparseness of the historical record with the creative possibilities of literary analysis, would have augmented the energy and appeal of Barbero’s Dante.”  Plus, How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them by Barbara F. Walter (Crown): “Walter’s earnest advice about what to do comes across as well-meaning but insufficient — though I’m not sure how much of it is her fault, considering that the situation she has laid out looks too inflamed to be soothed by a few pointers in a book.” Lastly, Brown Girls by Daphne Palasi Andreades (Random; LJ starred review): “While there is much that many brown girls will relate to — including experiences that feel stolen straight from my memories — Andreades succeeds in making the stories feel specific beyond a singular experience.”

The Washington Post reviews Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez (Flatiron): “Rarely does a novel, particularly a debut novel, contend so powerfully and so delightfully with such a vast web of personal, cultural, political and even international imperatives. For fiction lovers, what an auspicious start to 2022. ¡Feliz año nuevo, indeed!”

NPR reviews Unthinkable: Trauma, Truth, and the Trials of American Democracy by Jamie Raskin (Harper): "In his writings about these dire concerns for democracy, Raskin weaves in and out of the grief of losing his son Tommy, who battled depression."

The Guardian reviews Tim—The Official Biography of Avicii by Måns Mosesson (Mobius): “the book’s slightly wide-eyed tone finds strait-laced grownups grappling with the extremes of youth, from World of Warcraft – an obsession of the younger Bergling – to the wild west of club culture, via the monomaniacal perfectionism of digital music-making.”

Briefly Noted

LA Times talks with Jean Chen Ho about friendship and debut novel, Fiona and Jane (Viking).

The Chicago Tribune has a Q&A with the 14th Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden.

ElectricLit talks with Daphne Palasi Andreades about the “small glories and pains of immigrant girlhood” in her new book, Brown Girls (Random; LJ starred review).

The Rumpus has an interview Sequoia Nagamatsu about his highly anticipated dystopian debut, How High We Go in the Dark (Morrow; LJ starred review), due out January 18th.

Vulture interviews Sean Thor Conroe about the evolution of his new book, Fuccboi (Little, Brown, & Co.). 

Gina Isabel Rodriguez pens an essay about the “the daily fires we observe and survive” in The Dangers of Smoking in Bed by Mariana Enriquez (Hogarth: Random House) for ElectricLit.

Colson Whitehead confirms on Twitter that his Harlem Shuffle (Doubleday; LJ starred review) character, Ray Carney, will return in 2023.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Lavie Tidhar discuss the best winter science fiction and fantasy at The Washington Post.

Entertainment Weekly recommends 5 books for the month.

CrimeReads suggests 10 books for January, getaway thrillers, and Arctic Circle crime fiction.

The Millions looks at notable titles publishing this week.

AV Club previews “The 15 most-anticipated books of 2022.”

Autostraddle lists “80 Queer and Feminist Books Coming Out Winter 2022.”

ElectricLit has “8 Genre-Bending Books by Asian American Women.”

Gizmodo has “47 New Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books to Start 2022 Off Right.” 

BookRiot has January horoscopes and book recommendations. 

LitHub writes about how the Libby app is becoming more accessible.

Authors On Air

NPR’s Morning Edition talks with Jonathan Greenblatt, It Could Happen Here: Why America Is Tipping from Hate to the Unthinkable—And How We Can Stop It (Mariner), about the growth of hate and systemic violence in the U.S.

NPR’s Book of the Day revisits an interview with bell hooks about her book, All About Love : New Visions (Morrow).

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