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Awards & Book Clubs

The 2021 Anthony Awards Winners are announced at Bouchercon, including S.A. Cosby for Blacktop Wasteland (Flatiron: Macmillan; LJ starred review). Locus has more.

Readings announces the 2021 New Australian Fiction Prize shortlist. Books+Publishing reports.

Good Morning America selects Several People Are Typing by Calvin Kasulke (Doubleday), for its September book club. 

Reviews

The NYT reviews The Magician by Colm Toibin (Scribner): “The great theme of Toibin’s novel, as in much of Mann’s fiction, is decline — of manners and morals, of families, of countries and institutions.”

Entertainment Weekly reviews 5 August romances including: Bombshell by Sarah MacLean (Avon; LJ starred review), giving it 5 flames and an A+: “she devours misogyny and sets fire to the patriarchy with her latest, the first in a new series, Hell's Belles, which focuses on a group of women dedicated to unmasking heinous men and protecting vulnerable women.” Also, The Dating Playbook by Farrah Rochon (Forever: Grand Central), earns 4 flames and an A: “readers get to both luxuriate in the warmth of Rochon's humor and steamy love scenes, while also seeing these characters lay themselves bare to probe what they can't face on their own.” And, Uncharted by Adriana Anders (Sourcebooks Casablanca), earns 5 flames and an A-: “Even if you're not a risk taker, Anders' books will raise your pulse and draw you into their starkly cold, but surprisingly sexy literal and emotional wilderness.” Plus, For the Love of April French by Penny Aimes (Carina Adores), earns 5 flames and an A-: “It's perhaps the fluffiest BDSM story you'll ever read.” Lastly, Battle Royal by Lucy Parker (Avon; LJ starred review), earns 4 flames and an A+: “Only an author as deft and gifted as Parker could seamlessly mix these things into one tale and have them come out as perfectly calibrated, delectably sweet, and emotionally layered as a masterful wedding cake.”

Tordotcom reviews My Heart Is a Chainsaw (Saga: S. & S.; LJ starred review): “Stephan Graham Jones’s simultaneous adoration for as well as critique of ‘the slasher’ shines through the whole book in well-balanced measure.”

Slate reviews  Beautiful World, Where Are You by Sally Rooney (Farrar; LJ starred review): "The contrast between the way these people talk about the world and their actual, lived concerns seems the point of Rooney’s fiction."

Briefly Noted

LibraryReads and Library Journal offer read-alikes for the buzziest book of the week, A Slow Fire Burning by Paula Hawkins (Riverhead). The buyer’s pick in the September Costco Connection is also A Slow Fire Burning and the assistant buyer’s pick is the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series by Jeff Kinney.

The September Loan Stars list is out with #1 pick Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr (Scribner; LJ starred review).

Vulture features a wide-ranging interview with Karl Ove Knausgaard, whose latest novel, The Morning Star (Penguin Pr.), departs from his previous work. 

NYT has a profile of Rabih Alameddine and his new book, The Wrong End of the Telescope (Grove; LJ starred review). 

Leslie Jordan, How Y’all Doing?: Misadventures and Mischief from a Life Well Lived (Morrow), talks to People about his love for books.

NYT talks with James Whiteside, Center Center: A Funny, Sexy, Sad Almost-Memoir of a Boy in Ballet (Viking), about the “beauty of anime soundtracks, the virtue of late ’90s music videos and playing video games backstage.”

The Atlantic talks with Karen Brown, author of the short story "Needs," about "why we need terrifying stories."

PopSugar has "A Running List of the Best Books of 2021", "16 Self-Help Books That'll Empower You", and more.  

Vogue has "The 5 Books That Changed Megan Rapinoe’s Life."

Bitch explores the new "canon of dark academia", while considering two YA novels.  

Oprahdaily has a piece about how reading Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell (Knopf), helped one writer grieve the loss of his son.

LitHub has a cover reveal of Sarah Manguso’s forthcoming book, Very Cold People (Hogarth), due out in February.

NPR offers “September Book-Ahead: What We're Excited To Read This Month.”

Bustle has "The Most Anticipated Books Of September 2021" and "9 Must-Read New Books Out This Week."

The Washington Post has “10 books to read in September.”

NYT suggests 4 newly published books and 4 graphic works.

CrimeReads has “12 Crime Novels You Should Read This September.”

"Prize-winning author Cathy MacPhail dies, aged 75."  The Bookseller has an obituary. 

Authors on Air

Rebecca Curtis reads and discusses the short story, Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey by Haruki Murakami on The New Yorker Fiction Podcast.

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