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Awards & Book News

The March Read with Jenna pick is Laila Lalami’s The Dream Hotel (Pantheon), Kirkus reports.

The NYT Book Review Book Club selects Han Kang’s We Do Not Part, tr. by e. yaewon & Paige Aniyah Morris (Hogarth; LJ starred review), as its March read.

The shortlist has been selected for the Republic of Consciousness Prize, United States and Canada, for books from independent presses, Shelf Awareness reports.

Finalists for the Minnesota Book Awards are announced.

The Florida Book Awards winners are announced.

PEN America releases its report “Cover to Cover: An Analysis of Titles Banned in the 23–24 School Year.” People has coverage.

Doubleday launches Outsider Editions, an imprint for paperback reissues of all genres, Publishers Weekly reports.

Page to Screen

No new adaptations this week

Reviews

Washington Post reviews Death Is Our Business: Russian Mercenaries and the New Era of Private Warfare by John Lechner (Bloomsbury): “Among other things, John Lechner’s deeply researched [book] offers new insight into Wagner’s role in Africa, showing how the group’s growing influence there spooked the West and facilitated Prigozhin’s rise back in Russia. Lechner, a journalist and international-affairs expert, traveled to Libya, the Central African Republic and beyond to bring a wealth of new reporting to the subject, interviewing more than 30 Wagner members in the process.”

NYT reviews four “evocative” new works of historical fiction: The Cannibal Owl by Aaron Gwyn (Belle Point), Floreana by Midge Raymond (Little A), Boy by Nicole Galland (Morrow), and The Case of the Missing Maid by Rob Osler (Kensington).

LA Times reviews The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami (Pantheon): “Here, rendering this edge-of-nightmare world, Lalami skates along at the height of her powers as a writer of intelligent, complex characters…. Unlike those atmospheric novels in which the central authority in the bureaucracy remains inaccessible, Lalami not only renders Sara relatable through mentions of mundane things like hiking with her husband or caring for babies but also builds the perspectives of some of the villains of the piece with nuance.”

LitHub rounds up February’s best-reviewed fiction and nonfiction.

Briefly Noted

Lionel Richie’s memoir, Truly, will be published by HarperOne on Sept. 30, People reports.

Orbit will publish the English translation of Andrzej Sapkowski’s next “Witcher” novel, Crossroads of Ravens, which is due out Sept. 30, Publishers Weekly reports.

Paul McCartney is writing, with Ted Widmer, an account of his band Wings; Wings: The Story of a Band on the Run is due out from Liveright: Norton on Nov. 4, The Guardian reports. Kirkus also has coverage.

In CrimeReads, Clémence Michallon, author of Our Last Resort (Knopf), revisits Megan Abbott’s 2014 novel Die a Little (S. & S.).

Andrey Kurkov, author of The Stolen Heart, tr. by Boris Dralyuk (HarperVia), shares “The Books of My Life” with The Guardian.

NYT offers “9 New Books We Recommend This Week” and 21 books coming in March.

LA Times recommends 10 books to read in March.

Kirkus shares “5 Fiction Debuts That Have Early Readers Buzzing.”

LitHub recommends “Seven Memoirs That Show the Many Sides of Cuba,” the 18 best book covers of February, and the most-anticipated audiobooks of March.

Washington Post suggests “5 new mystery novels to lift those winter doldrums.”

EW gathers five recent romance novels with “fierce, lovable heroines.”

Actor Gene Hackman, who also authored five novels, has died at age 95; NYT has an obituary, and The Guardian recounts how Hackman became an author, as does People.

Peter Elbow, an English professor who revolutionized the college writing seminar, has died at age 89; NYT has an obituary.

Authors on Air

There’s a new episode of The LitHub Podcast, including an interview with Omar El Akkad, author of One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This (Knopf).

LitHub gathers “The Literary Film & TV You Need to Stream in March.”

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