Want to get the latest book news delivered to your inbox each day? Sign up for our daily Book Pulse newsletter.

Awards & Buzzy Book News

2022 literary MacArthur fellows are announced. Lit Hub shares a list. The Washington Post features MacArthur recipient Robin Wall Kimmerer and her book, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants (Milkweed). 

Finalists for the 2022 Governor General’s Literary Awards are announced.

The science-fiction publisher Kensington Publishing has acquired Erewhon Books. Tor.com has more.

Hallmark Publishing will close, according to Publishers Lunch. 

The October EarlyWord GalleyChat is out, featuring titles that are receiving “much love."

Poets & Writers comes out with their October issue, which includes a reading list of 5 debut authors over 50, a profile about Freedom Reads, an organization that brings literature to incarcerated people, news about the forthcoming Oxford Dictionary of African American English, and coverage of literary journal Crazyhorse changing their name to swamp pink (after a Carolinian lily species), with discussion of appropriation of Indigenous tribal names. 

The New York Times Magazine explores how the “publishing industry is attempting to embrace diversity.”

French philosopher and writer Bruno Latour has died at 75. NYT reports.

New Title Bestsellers

Links for the week: NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers | NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers | USA Today Best-Selling Books

Fiction

Righteous Prey by John Sandford (Putnam) pounces on No. 1 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list and No. 2 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan (Ballantine) buzzes at No. 3 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list and No. 4 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng (Penguin Pr.; LJ starred review) finds No. 5 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list and No. 8 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Endless Summer: Stories by Elin Hilderbrand (Little, Brown) opens at No. 8 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

The Whalebone Theatre by Joanna Quinn (Knopf) debuts at No. 15 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

Nonfiction

Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America by Maggie Haberman (Penguin Pr.) begins at No. 1 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list and No. 2 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Lighter: Let Go of the Past, Connect with the Present, and Expand the Future by Yung Pueblo (Harmony: Penguin Random House) shines at No. 6 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

If You Want Something Done: Leadership Lessons from Bold Women by Nikki R. Haley (St. Martin’s) starts at No. 8 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Grace: President Obama and Ten Days in the Battle for America by Cody Keenan (Mariner: Houghton Harcourt; LJ starred review) engages at No. 13 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

When McKinsey Comes to Town: The Hidden Influence of the World’s Most Powerful Consulting Firm by Walt Bogdanich and Michael Forsythe (Doubleday) arrives at No. 14 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Reviews

NYT reviews The Persuaders: At the Front Lines of the Fight for Hearts, Minds, and Democracy by Anand Giridharadas (Knopf): “[Written] as a champion—not necessarily a bad mode, though much of the book consists of Giridharadas handing over the mike, allowing his subjects to describe their own philosophies of persuasion.” Also, Liberation Day: Stories by George Saunders (Random): “A spiky, at times difficult collection, seldom providing the reader with much in the way of catharsis. But these are stories worth reading, the best of them as thought-provoking and resonant as a fan of Saunders might expect.”

The Washington Post reviews The Last Chairlift by John Irving (S. & S.): “Ostensibly, this is the story of a writer’s development, but, like so many of Irving’s novels, its real impulse is a reconception of family.”

Book Marks shares “5 reviews you need to read this week.”

Briefly Noted

The Millions interviews Ramona Reeves about “searching for authenticity” in her story collection It Falls Gently All Around (Univ. of Pittsburgh). 

Orhan Pamuk talks about “authoritarianism, covid, and his new novel” Nights of Plague, tr. from Turkish by Ekin Oklap (Knopf; LJ starred review), in a conversation with The Washington Post. 

Nobel Prize winner Annie Ernaux, author of Getting Lost, tr. from French by Alison L. Strayer (Seven Stories Pr.), discusses “the Millennial sex novel” with Noor Qaim for The Drift.

Poets & Writers profiles Celeste Ng, author of Our Missing Hearts (Penguin Pr.; LJ starred review).

NYT highlights the work of Becky Kennedy, “the clinical psychologist, podcast host and Instagram parenting guru” and author of Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want To Be (Harper Wave).

People features revelations from Paul Newman’s upcoming posthumous memoir, The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man (Knopf; LJ starred review), including his desire for his wife Joanne Woodward and how he felt about his “famous baby-blue eyes.” 

Anand Giridharadas, author of The Persuaders: At the Front Lines of the Fight for Hearts, Minds, and Democracy (Knopf), answers NYT’s “By the Book” questionnaire.

Lit Hub has a cover reveal for Jai Chakrabarti’s book of short stories, A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness (Knopf).

NYT shares two excerpts from Chronicles: Volume One by Bob Dylan (S. & S.).

CrimeReads provides “18 new and recent novels perfect for spooky season” and “the best fiction about the theatre.”

Poets & Writers lists notable anthologies and an exploration of “where new and noteworthy books begin.”

Authors on Air

B.A. Parker, host of NPR’s Code Switch, talks to Tochi Onyebuchi, author of Goliath (Tor.com), and Leslye Penelope, author of The Monsters We Defy (Redhook: Orbit), about “black reality in a world of fantasy.”

Ling Ma, author of Bliss Montage (Farrar), explains “why every story comes from an entry point of wish fulfillment” on The Maris Review podcast.

Kay Harel chats about “examining Charles Darwin’s soul” for her book Darwin’s Love of Life: A Singular Case of Biophilia (Columbia Univ.) on the Keen On podcast.

Jacob Goldstein, author of Money: The True Story of a Made-Up Thing (Hachette), discusses inflation and the concept of money with NPR’s Dave Davis on Fresh Air.

Vulture shares a character guide for the House of the Dragons adaptation of George R. R. Martin’s work.

Want to get the latest book news delivered to your inbox each day? Sign up for our daily Book Pulse newsletter.