“Character — the willingness to accept responsibility for one’s own life — is the source from which self-respect springs.” – Joan Didion, On Self-Respect
Accidentally on Purpose: A Memoir by Kristen Kish
nonfiction / memoir / food / television.
Kristen Kish never could have imagined people on the street knowing her name—not when she was a carefree softball-tossing kid, in high school working at a pretzel stand, and not even when she finally found her true calling as a chef. In those early days, becoming a chef meant tethering oneself to a restaurant and working in the back of a kitchen, not a television set. But working in the spotlight happened naturally, even if the attention was totally unanticipated. And like most things in Kristen’s life, the road was so much more winding and complicated than it may have appeared from the outside.
From growing up as an adoptee in the Midwest, to trying to fit in with all the other girls who were busy dating boys, to coming out and finding love when she least expected it, Kristen learned that, unlike a map, no set of plans or definitions can dictate or explain a life. In fact, accidents happen. Curveballs will come. And even the full-circle moments—like winning Top Chef to becoming its Emmy-nominated host years later—could not have guaranteed these opportunities.
In Accidentally on Purpose, what defines Kristen’s story aren’t the missteps or even the pleasant surprises that crop up but how she learned to find her voice and use it. Because while accidents may be unexpected, they don’t have to be at odds with purpose. And as Kristen approaches life’s milestones, big and small, with intention, she realizes at those junctures—the ones beyond the borders of the map, behind-the-scenes, and off camera—are where the decisions and discoveries are made. Where the unexpected meets the intentional. And that’s where things get really interesting.
“Kish is an upbeat writer whose encouragement to be true to oneself will be appreciated by Top Chef fans.” – Lisa Henry, Library Journal
“…delightful… Self-assured yet down-to-earth, Kish’s account will resonate with aspiring chefs and Top Chef fans alike.” – Publishers Weekly
“[An] engaging memoir… Throughout her career, Kish pays her professional dues in full and then some, which makes her so relatable, particularly as she navigates a series of chaotic, misogynistic workplace cultures.” – Jane Harper, Booklist
Atavists: Stories by Lydia Millet ★
fiction / short stories.
The word atavism, coined by a botanist and popularized by a criminologist, refers to the resurfacing of a primitive evolutionary trait or urge in a modern being. This inventive collection from Lydia Millet offers overlapping tales of urges ranging from rage to jealousy to yearning—a fluent triumph of storytelling, rich in ideas and emotions both petty and grand.
The titular atavists include an underachieving, bewildered young bartender; a middle-aged mother convinced her gentle son-in-law is fixated on geriatric porn; a bodybuilder with an incel’s fantasy life; an arrogant academic accused of plagiarism; and an empty-nester dad determined to host refugees in a tiny house in his backyard.
As they pick away at the splitting seams in American culture, Millet’s characters shimmer with the sense of powerlessness we share in an era of mass overwhelm. A beautician in a waxing salon faces a sudden resurgence of grief in the midst of a bikini Brazilian; a couple sets up a camera to find out who’s been slipping homophobic letters into their mailbox; a jilted urban planner stalks a man she met on a dating app.
In its rich warp and weft of humiliations and human error, Atavists returns to the trenchant, playful social commentary that made A Children’s Bible a runaway hit. In these stories sharp observations of middle-class mores and sanctimony give way to moments of raw exposure and longing: Atavists performs an uncanny fictional magic, full of revelation but also hilarious, unpretentious, and warm.
“Sharply observed, beautifully rendered, and heartbreaking.” – Kirkus Reviews, STARRED REVIEW
“[A] deliciously digestible and of-the-moment read.” – Marion Winik, Minnesota Star Tribune
“…Millet’s deftly told tales — in Atavists, as in her other novels and collections — demonstrate how a narrative framework creates meaning for human life… Millet demonstrates both how the characters of our era are manifestations of older types, yet they’re also a springboard for how people will define themselves in the future. She revels in complication.” – Heather Scott Partington, Los Angeles Times
“With her sharply honed perspective on our digital bewitchment and destruction of nature, her shredding wit and depthless compassion, Millet deftly portrays individuals of different generations caught in tech-sparked predicaments absurd, heartbreaking, and enraging. These thought-provoking, surprising, charming, and deeply moving stories illuminate who we are at our core even as our lives are mediated by social media, dating apps, and surveillance cameras, even as the living world is being driven precipitously toward extinction.” – Donna Seaman, Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
The Bright Years by Sarah Damoff
fiction / historical fiction.
Ryan and Lillian Bright are deeply in love, recently married, and now parents to a baby girl, Georgette. But Lillian has a son she hasn’t told Ryan about, and Ryan has an alcohol addiction he hasn’t told Lillian about, so Georgette comes of age watching their marriage rise and fall.
When a shocking blow scatters their fragile trio, Georgette tries to distance herself from reminders of her parents. Years later, Lillian’s son comes searching for his birth family, so Georgette must return to her roots, unearth her family’s history, and decide whether she can open up to love for them—or herself—while there’s still time.
Told from three intimate points of view, The Bright Years is a tender, true-to-life novel that explores the impact of each generation in a family torn apart by tragedy but, over time, restored by the power of grace and love.
“This family drama rings true.” – Publishers Weekly
“Damoff’s debut is tender and heartbreaking, but ultimately hopeful… This novel moves through many themes, with grief, family, and forgiveness among them. Not only do the characters find family in unique places, but they contend with the pain that circulates through their blood relations… [it makes] the reader feel like they are actually living through it all alongside the characters.” – Cari Dubiel, Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
Exit Zero: Stories by Marie-Helene Bertino
fiction / short stories / horror / fantasy.
Death-shaped entities—with all of their humor and strangeness— haunt the twelve stories in Exit Zero. Vampires, ghost girls, fathers, blank spaces, day-old peaches, and famous paintings all pierce through their world into ours, reminding us to pay attention! and look alive! and offering many other flashes of wisdom from the oracle and author of Beautyland, Marie-Helene Bertino.
“With winsome wildness, capturing the uncapturable, Bertino offers up marvels on every page.” – Annie Bostrom, Booklist
“Odd and surreal circumstances shape this potent and darkly funny collection… Each story is driven by energetic pacing, quick wit, and surprising twists. Bertino once again displays her formidable talent for the uncanny.” – Publishers Weekly
“These stories frolic in the nether zone between fantasy and reality… Few writers can revolve your mind in the space of four words. Bertino is one of them.” – Molly Young, New York Times
Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry ★
fiction / romance.
Alice Scott is an eternal optimist still dreaming of her big writing break. Hayden Anderson is a Pulitzer-prize winning human thundercloud. And they’re both on balmy Little Crescent Island for the same reason: to write the biography of a woman no one has seen in years—or at least to meet with the octogenarian who claims to be the Margaret Ives. Tragic heiress, former tabloid princess, and daughter of one of the most storied (and scandalous) families of the twentieth century.
When Margaret invites them both for a one-month trial period, after which she’ll choose the person who’ll tell her story, there are three things keeping Alice’s head in the game.
One: Alice genuinely likes people, which means people usually like Alice—and she has a whole month to win the legendary woman over.
Two: She’s ready for this job and the chance to impress her perennially unimpressed family with a Serious Publication.
Three: Hayden Anderson, who should have no reason to be concerned about losing this book, is glowering at her in a shaken-to-the core way that suggests he sees her as competition.
But the problem is, Margaret is only giving each of them pieces of her story. Pieces they can’t swap to put together because of an ironclad NDA and an inconvenient yearning pulsing between them every time they’re in the same room.
And it’s becoming abundantly clear that their story—just like the tale Margaret’s spinning—could be a mystery, tragedy, or love ballad… depending on who’s telling it.
“…Great Big Beautiful Life is already shaping up to be one of the most talked-about romances of the season.” – Jen Lennon, AV Club
“Both longtime Henry fans and new romance readers will devour this rivals-to-lovers slow burn, one of Henry’s best to date.” – Whitney Kramer, Library Journal, STARRED REVIEW
“…enormously entertaining… unabashedly unfurls virtually every trope in the romance writer’s arsenal, aiming straight for the reader’s tender heart… Henry’s magic elixir, it seems, is to return again and again to a simple boy-meets-girl formula while writing textured novels populated with vivid characters that never feel formulaic: she takes us back to a time when we believed, with all our being, that love conquers all. She also reminds us that a good, old-fashioned cry can be very revitalizing. Bring on the tissues!” – Leigh Haber, Boston Globe
“Henry continues to burnish her reputation for fashioning sublimely satisfying love stories with another perfectly calibrated, delectably witty tale featuring endearingly quirky, thoughtfully nuanced characters, including the redoubtable Margaret, whose family’s history is deftly relayed in snippets stitched into the story line.” – John Charles, Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
The Hollow Half: A Memoir of Bodies and Borders by Sarah Aziza
nonfiction / memoir.
“You were dead, Sarah, you were dead.” In October 2019, Sarah Aziza, daughter and granddaughter of Gazan refugees, is narrowly saved after being hospitalized for an eating disorder. The doctors revive her body, but it is no simple thing to return to the land of the living. Aziza’s crisis is a rupture that brings both her ancestral and personal past into vivid presence. The hauntings begin in the hospital cafeteria, when a mysterious incident summons the familiar voice of her deceased Palestinian grandmother.
In the months following, as she responds to a series of ghostly dreams, Aziza unearths family secrets that reveal the ways her own trauma and anorexia echo generations of violent Palestinian displacement and erasure—and how her fight to recover builds on a century of defiant survival and love. As she moves towards this legacy, Aziza learns to resist the forces of colonization, denial, and patriarchy both within and outside her.
Weaving timelines, languages, geographies, and genres, The Hollow Half probes the contradictions and contingencies that create “nation” and “history.” Blazing with honesty, urgency, and poetry, this stunning debut memoir is a fearless call to imagine both the self and the world anew.
“Aziza took what a memoir can do and turned it on its head. She plays with style and genre, but also introduces the characters in her past and present with such originality. One of the best memoirs I’ve ever read.” – Adam Vitcavage, Debutiful
“A graceful memoir about anorexia, family, and displacement.” – Kirkus Reviews
“In breathtaking prose, Palestinian American journalist Sarah Aziza confronts the looming specter of death in various forms. She writes movingly about recovering from an eating disorder that nearly killed her and delves into her family’s history and what it means to be the descendant of refugees from Gaza.” – Hannah Bae, San Francisco Chronicle
Matriarch: A Memoir by Tina Knowles ★
nonfiction / memoir.
“You are Celestine,” she said. She squatted to push the hair off my face and pull leaves off my pajama legs. “Like my sister and my grandmother.” And there, under the pecan tree, as she did countless times, that day my mother told me stories of the mothers and daughters that went before me.
Tina Knowles, the mother of iconic singer-songwriters Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, Solange Knowles, and bonus daughter Kelly Rowland, is known the world over as a Matriarch with a capital M: a determined, self-possessed, self-aware, and wise woman who raised and inspired some of the great artists of our time. But this story is about so much more than that.
Matriarch begins with a precocious, if unruly, little girl growing up in 1950s Galveston, the youngest of seven. She is in love with her world, with extended family on every other porch and the sounds of Motown and the lapping beach always within earshot. But as the realities of race and the limitations of girlhood set in, she begins to dream of a more grandiose world. Her instincts and impulsive nature drive her far beyond the shores of Texas to discover the life awaiting her on the other side of childhood.
That life’s journey—through grief and tragedy, creative and romantic risks and turmoil, the nurturing of superstar offspring and of her own special gifts—is the remarkable story she shares with readers here. This is a page-turning chronicle of family love and heartbreak, of loss and perseverance, and of the kind of creativity, audacity, and will it takes for a girl from Galveston to change the world. It’s one brilliant woman’s intimate and revealing story, and a multigenerational family saga that carries within it the story of America—and the wisdom that women pass on to one another, mothers to daughters, across generations.
“[A] testament to Black motherhood…” – Clare Mulroy, USA Today
“[An] inspirational volume that remains loving, but discreet, about her megastar daughters.” – New York Times
“A remarkable family portrait beginning with one intrepid young girl and rippling out into the past and present. It’s the story of motherhood, of growing up in a changing America, and of blazing the trail for more to come.” – Isabelle McConville, B&N Reads
Notes to John by Joan Didion ★
nonfiction / memoir / essays / psychiatry.
In November 1999, Joan Didion began seeing a psychiatrist because, as she wrote to a friend, her family had had “a rough few years.” She described the sessions in a journal she created for her husband, John Gregory Dunne.
For several months, Didion recorded conversations with the psychiatrist in meticulous detail. The initial sessions focused on alcoholism, adoption, depression, anxiety, guilt, and the heartbreaking complexities of her relationship with her daughter, Quintana. The subjects evolved to include her work, which she was finding difficult to maintain for sustained periods. There were discussions about her own childhood—misunderstandings and lack of communication with her mother and father, her early tendency to anticipate catastrophe—and the question of legacy, or, as she put it, “what it’s been worth.” The analysis would continue for more than a decade.
Didion’s journal was crafted with the singular intelligence, precision, and elegance that characterize all of her writing. It is an unprecedently intimate account that reveals sides of her that were unknown, but the voice is unmistakably hers—questioning, courageous, and clear in the face of a wrenchingly painful journey.
“…undeniably stylish, haunting and instructive… what an experience it is, watching Didion beat back tragedy with her brilliant mind, as the hurricane hurtles her family’s way.” – Frances Wilson, The Telegraph
“Notes to John is rough, incomplete, raises more questions than it answers, slightly sordid and absolutely fascinating.” – Alexandra Jacobs, New York Times
“…Didion fans (we know who we are) will feel hypnotized by these pages, not quite sure they should exist as a book, but leveled by the writer who produced them, by her honesty and heartbreak.” – Taylor Antrim, Vogue
“It is the most direct book Didion wrote – or rather, pointedly didn’t write – on the ‘area’ about which she found it so difficult to be direct… undeniably interesting… The quantity of arresting and widely applicable insights makes Notes to John a profound, rich document.” – Lola Seaton, The New Statesman
The Project: How Project 2025 Is Reshaping America by David A. Graham
nonfiction / politics / current events.
When President Donald Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, news spread about his implementation of Project 2025, a nearly 1,000-page document published by the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation. The debates—and anxiety—surrounding this initiative have only increased as authors of the Project assume positions of power in the second Trump administration.
So, what is Project 2025, exactly? Who wrote it, and what does it mean for everyday Americans, across the political spectrum, now and in the years to come?
In The Project, award-winning journalist David A. Graham offers much-needed context and distills the essential elements of this sprawling document. Breaking down the Project’s strategy for transforming—and radically empowering—the executive branch, Graham then explains what the architects behind Project 2025 are doing with that power: enforcing traditional gender norms, decimating the civil service, performing mass deportations, reducing corporate regulation and worker protections, and more.
Project 2025 is the intellectual blueprint for the new administration, Graham argues, and its tenets should not be legible only to policy wonks. Authoritative yet highly accessible, The Project demystifies it for those whose lives it will affect most.
“Essential reading for anyone trying to make sense of the Trumpian maelstrom.” – Kirkus Reviews
“Concise and well-reasoned, Graham’s critical handbook uncovers the players and the plays orchestrating this revolutionary political movement that will impact the nation well beyond the four years of Trump’s second term.” – Carol Haggas, Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
Separate Rooms by Pier Vittorio Tondelli; translated by Simon Pleasance
fiction.
Thomas, a young German musician, is dying. His older boyfriend, a renowned Italian writer named Leo, finds it impossible to watch the slow and inevitable demise of his lover. So, he condemns himself to wandering the earth instead, moving cities every few weeks in the hope of finding the dividing line between the living and the dead.
He travels through Europe where past and present overlap, years merge and faces emerge, and reminders of the life he and Thomas shared are on every corner. From their meeting and nights spent in Paris to the drug-induced flight through the forests of northern France that spelled [GU1] the end, Leo’s memories become clearer with every road he takes—much as he wishes he could simply forget. While alive, and wanting to preserve the passion of their relationship, Leo had forced Thomas to live separately: in separate rooms, separate towns, with separate lives. But now, face to face with true solitude, Leo must finally reckon with the impossible striving of memory to recreate life and, ultimately, cross an ocean to find the strength to go on.
André Aciman’s Call Me by Your Name meets Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous in Pier Vittorio Tondelli’s Separate Rooms: a singular and unforgettable meditation on almost-ideal love, told in three musical movements, by a treasured literary talent never before published in the US.
“The success of Tondelli’s melancholy Italian novel relies almost solely on the narrator’s voice, which is steady, honest and believable.” – Publishers Weekly
“A sweet-natured swan song, and a notable addition to the gay- fiction bookshelf.” – Kirkus Reviews
“Don’t expect any happy endings, but lots of touching scenes of male vulnerability and grief, and a resolution that, while not exactly consoling, feels truthful to a book that manages to be beautiful and poignant without ever falling into the trap of sentimentality.” – Bartolomea Sala, The Times
When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy
fiction / horror / fantasy.
One night, Jess, a struggling actress, finds a five-year-old runaway hiding in the bushes outside her apartment. After a violent, bloody encounter with the boy’s father, she and the boy find themselves running for their lives.
As they attempt to evade the boy’s increasingly desperate father, Jess slowly comes to a horrifying understanding of the butchery that follows them—the boy can turn his every fear into reality.
And when the wolf finally comes home, no one will be spared.
“Cassidy balances gut-wrenching horror and jaw-dropping twists in this stellar outing… even as the threat level rises, Cassidy keeps Jess’s choices plausible and grounded, making the nightmare she’s found herself in all the scarier. This is a hair-raiser.” – Publishers Weekly, STARRED REVIEW
“Cassidy plays with and subverts readers’ expectations in delightful and surprising ways in this twisty, gory horror thriller that’s also a moving, insightful examination of grief and obligation and the nature of fear.” – Stephanie Klose, Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
“…not just his best book but a genuine horror classic. Hurricane Cassidy has landed, and the devastation it wreaks will leave you breathless… an insane, whirlwind, chaotic book of fever nightmares… Cassidy has brought life to an unspeakably effective stitchwork of relentless pace, twists and horrifical tableaus fused with some of the most satisfying thematic closure and poignant character work you’ll read for a while. It’s a nightmarish but meaningful existential creation you won’t see coming—this wolf will blow your house down.” – Ed Crocker, Grimdark Magazine
Zeal by Morgan Jerkins ★
fiction / historical fiction / romance.
Harlem, 2019. Ardelia and Oliver are hosting their engagement party. As the guests get ready to leave, he hands her a love letter on a yellowing, crumbling piece of paper…
Natchez, 1865. Discharged from the Union Army as a free man after the war’s end, Harrison returns to Mississippi to reunite with the woman he loves, Tirzah. Upon his arrival at the Freedmen’s Bureau, though, he catches the eye of a woman working there, who’s determined to thwart his efforts to find his beloved. After tragedy strikes, Harrison resigns himself to a life with her.
Meanwhile in Louisiana, the newly free Tirzah is teaching at a freedmen’s school and discovers an advertisement in the local paper looking for her. Though she knows Harrison must have placed it, and longs to find him, the risks of fleeing are too great, and Tirzah chooses the life of seeming security right in front of her.
Spanning over a hundred and fifty years, Morgan Jerkins’s extraordinary novel intertwines the stories of these star-crossed lovers and their descendants. As Tirzah’s family moves across the country during the Great Migration, they challenge authority with devastating consequences, while of the legacy of heartbreak and loss continues on in the lives of Harrison’s progeny.
When Ardelia meets Oliver, she finds his family’s history is as full of secrets and omissions as her own. Could their connection be a cosmic reconciliation satisfying the unfulfilled desires of their ancestors, or will the weight of the past, present and future tear them apart?
Sweeping, textured, and meticulously researched, Zeal is both a story of how one generation’s choices reverberate through the years and an indelible portrait of an enduring love.
“[A] memorable tale of love and legacy.” – Publishers Weekly
“Jerkins’ meticulous research brings to life the optimism of the free Black community of Nicodemus, Kansas, and the allure of Chicago for Black southerners.” – Lindsay Harmon, Booklist
“…Zeal never stops being compelling as the twists and turns of Tirzah’s and Harrison’s family stories illuminate lesser-known aspects of Black American history… If you believe in fated mates, Zeal is a page-turner that will teach readers a few things about our past.” – Leland Cheuk, Boston Globe
“This is a great, sweeping novel of love, loss and family and it’s one of those books you do not want to put down… one of the best books of the year so far…” – Red Carpet Crash
-
-
-
-
-