And what a bold twist Lucas Schaefer deftly pulls off in his debut novel. Set in Austin, TX, in a gritty boxing gym, the novel's unifying theme is transformation, while the vehicle that delivers so many of the wondrous characters to that state is boxing. But I don't think you have to love or even know much about boxing to fall for this book, in which there are wild coincidences, rude jokes, a jumble of time frames, a gaggle of compelling personalities in varying states of flux, a mixture of third-, first-, and even second-person narrations, and sly commentary on race in America. All tossed in a splash of raunch. It worked, and I loved it. 

"There was a painting my family set on fire. It burned to ashes, and then it came back." The novel's opening line took my breath away, and that was before I had read any further and could be dazzled by how much of the novel is contained in that first sentence. This book reads like a classic, yet it is brand-new and lives up to its title, with a plot that is a twisty puzzle, revolving around the themes of forgery and identity, art, madness, and truth.

The characters are complicated and compelling, with the protagonist Grace brilliantly named. And the atmosphere reminds me of my favorite Daphne Du Maurier novels, which is to say, all of them. I'll repeat what I said about The Original in the BookBrowse community forum: The language and overall craft are staggering. I want to use certain passages as writing prompts. In other words, I want to copy the book about copying. 4.5 stars, worthy of rounding up

The gist, a foursome of half-siblings pile into a PT Cruiser on a road trip to find the father that abandoned each of them sequentially. They all thought they were only children until oldest brother Rueben pulls up to oldest sister Madeline's organic farm in Coalfield, Tennessee (the setting for Wilson's last novel, Now Is Not the Time to Panic).

Mad's mother convinces Mad to join Rube on his quest and they pick up their hoops-playing, college-aged sister Pep at OU (Boomer Sooners!) and their 10-year-old brother Tom in Salt Lake City before beelining to California, which Rube's PI has identified as the current home of their father, Charles Hill. Run for the Hills, get it? It's fun and clever like all of Wilson's novels, but this one feels a little safer, a little less weird. I love Ron Charles's take in the Washington Post: "Wilson writes that a quest 'is by nature fraught with peril,' but this antiseptic quest feels more fraught with Purell." Snap.

It's still a great read, especially if you are a Kevin Wilson fan. Thanks to Ecco and NetGalley for an opportunity to read and share my opinion of this book.

One family, three alternate versions of what 35 years in their lives might be like. Cora's newborn needs a name, and her husband expects (commands) her to stroller downtown to the registrar and register the baby as Gordon, which is his name and his father's name. But Cora likes the name Julien. And their 9-year-old daughter Maia prefers Bear.

So the novel narrates between the three possible timelines that result from the consequences of Cora's three different choices of name. And since Cora's husband is a respected local physician by day and a controlling, violent monster by night, the three choices have very different consequences.

Domestic abuse and other rough emotional terrain gave me pause, but the novel's sliding-doors structure and its rich, layered prose had me page-turning with few stops. Highly recommend.

Thanks to Pamela Dorman Books/Viking and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Louis Sachar's Holes introduced us to yellow-spotted lizards, a symbol of the dangers of Camp Green Lake. In The Magician of Tiger Castle, there's a captive tiger, symbol of royalty and power. In the decaying kingdom of Escaveta, where our narrator, the magician Anatole, plies his craft, it is fitting that those noble cats are confined in the castle moat. Because all the characters in this adult fairytale are captives in one sense or another.

Whether or not you've read any of Sachar's other books, you will likely be charmed by his distinct voice. This, his first adult novel, delves into themes of love, loyalty, and personal choice. His characters are funny, their drives and motives complex yet relatable. Blessed/cursed with magical longevity, Anatole the magician is a delightfully reflective narrator -- admittedly flawed, but impossible not to care for deeply as he relates his tale from the Renaissance era to present-day. Magicians, potions, princesses, court intrigue, tigers, moats, monks, mice, and cappuccino. This has so many expected ingredients of a classic fairytale. But it's the unexpected wit and wisdom of this tale that make it such a compulsively readable novel.

Thanks to Berkley Publishing Group and BookBrowse for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Set in a small town in Australia, and loosely inspired by the Heaven’s Gate cult and Comet Hale-Bopp in 1997, this debut novel is about a young woman still reeling from the hit-and-run death of her beloved husband. Written as a literary thriller, with a slower pace and more reflection, it’s about obsession in many facets, including how it can overtake a psyche in the wake of searing grief. Main character Sylvia Knight does a lot of mind- and soul-searching via astronomy, art, music, literature, tarot, geometry.
“My hope was that, if nothing else, the comet, like the celestial equivalent of a Rorschach inkblot, might cause me to face proof of a truth I had on some level long known, but been unable to see.”

The question, according to author Ruby Todd, becomes how to recover personal power, faith in life, and one’s place in the world.

I would recommend this to those who like slow-burn literary thrillers featuring astronomy, mystery, romance, and reflections on grief, humanity, and mortality.

"This was their story. Three people standing together against all the world could hurl at them."
Set in London in 1944, this historical fiction novel tells the story of a bereaved bookshop owner and two teenagers from very different backgrounds who have lost everything to the second world war.

"But if I hadn't happened upon Charlie, and we both hadn't found you, I'm not sure what would have become of us."
A character-driven story about found family and the spirit of family, it brims with historical detail seamlessly woven into the narrative. I was not at first convinced I'd like this book. It took 68 pages for Molly and Charlie to finally meet each other, but from there the connections gripped me.

Set in New England, and briefly France, Wilkerson's second novel explores more family secrets, trauma, and identity. With a timeline ranging from 1803 to 2021, Good Dirt is a multigenerational, historical epic told from multiple points of view. Because, "History is a collective phenomenon. It can only be told through a chorus of voices."

The novel's keystone is Old Mo, a 20-gallon stoneware jar crafted by an enslaved man in a South Carolina pottery. For six generations, Old Mo has been part of the Freeman family, an affluent Black family living in a well-to-do New England enclave. Wilkerson deftly ties together the family's and the novel's multiple threads. I'd argue that the threads set in France could have been nixed, but overall, I was drawn in by the characters, plot devices, and history lessons. An engrossing book -- emotional, reflective, medium-paced, informative, poignant, and hopeful -- it would make for excellent book club discussions.

Thanks to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for an opportunity to read and share my opinion of this book.

Zelu has always been a storyteller and she has always felt like an outsider in her Nigerian American family. A paraplegic since falling from a tree as a child, Zelu used to dream of flying among the stars, yet now she feels as if she's ever falling. When the novel she's been writing for 10 years gets its umpteenth rejection and she loses her adjunct professor job, she moves back in with her parents and lets herself fall under the thrall of a new inspiration.

A novel set in the future, wherein humanity is extinct and metal robots war with disembodied AI beings, Rusted Robots becomes a stratospheric success. Yet even as Zelu gains wealth and popularity, finally hitting her stride, she begins to lose control of the narrative. "I've been deleted from my own story," she thought. "They've just erased me."

Author Nnedi Okorafor has masterfully crafted a book within a book, interspersing chapters of Zelu's story with chapters of the postapocalyptic Rusted Robots. Both books explore what it means to be human, and together they revel in the power of storytelling. Death of the Author manages to be both timely and timeless, with themes that include family, living in the margins, the writer's life, race, culture, change, fame, shame, forgiveness, self-acceptance, and that "creation flows both ways." The book's title is genius.

Thanks to William Morrow and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Are we all just data resources to be farmed? This novel set in the near future poses thought-provoking questions as it makes you squirm in Kafkaesque terror, frustration, and discomfort for Sara and her sisters within the retention center. The premise feels gut-twistingly real, but is thankfully only compelling fiction. For now. This could happen, and seems especially plausible in the political atmosphere we're officially entering in just a few days.

In Paolo Bacigalupi's latest genre-twisting fantasy novel, the kind and sensitive scion of a mob-like banking family comes of age. Davico di Regulai is wide-eyed but not far-seeing. And that is a perilous fault in this fantasy world resembling 15th Century Florence, Italy, with its newfangled general ledger accounting, its political machinations, and ruthless dynasties. The novel's language is familiar, yet fantastical. It sounds like a story from Game of Thrones (including dragonlore) meets the Medicis' Florence mixed with The Godfather's Sicily and New York.

"You must be as sharp as a stilettotore's dagger and as subtle as a fish beneath the waters. This is what it is to be Navolese, this is what it is to be di Regulai."
The action and intrigue build incrementally. I have never been so glad to stick with a novel that I initially thought slow. It's my favorite book of 2024.

Thanks to Knopf and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

In the tradition of Elizabeth Strout's Olive Kitteridge and Daniel Mason's North Woods, Ben Shattuck's The History of Sound is its own resonant collection of interconnected stories. The pacing of each keeps you turning pages unlike any short story collection I've read. That's probably because, like with musical couplets, each story has a companion that elucidates or twists the previous story. Set in and with great reverence for New England, the literary couplets are written in very different voices and styles. One story, for example, is written in the style (with the audio version performed in the voices) of a Radiolab episode. Its companion, "The Auk," touches on natural history as its narrator speaks in first-person of the tender gifts exchanged with his wife as she slips into dementia. "The Auk" is one of my favorites in the collection; another being "The Journal of Thomas Thurber," an epistolary story read pitch-perfectly by Nick Offerman in the audio version. This is a breathtaking book that is worth listening to, reading and re-reading, and soon watching. I understand a movie version of the title story is due in 2025.

Thanks to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

An amnesiac unable to remember her childhood, Julia Lombardi is an artists' model in 1948 Italy. An artist herself, she jumps at the opportunity to model for the celebrated Salvador Dalí. The catch is that she must do so in the creepy Sacro Bosco, a garden full of giant mythological monsters. The place and its dark and enigmatic host, Ignazio, feel familiar, but in a way that terrifies her. Why does Ignazio seem so familiar, and why does Dalí ceaselessly insist that Julia consume pomegranate when she clearly dislikes the fruit? Many more surreal and Dalíesque questions ensue, as this twist on the Persephone myth plays out.
As somone who enjoys foodoir and vivid food writing, I was excited that food was such a prominent focus in the novel. And the food did sound delicious, but it was mostly listed as menu items. I would have liked the flavors, smells, and sensations of the foods to be described in more detail, but Julia kept bailing on meals because of the same fears and creepy feelings. I wanted "Like Water for Chocolate" and got characters who annoyed me rehashing the same conversations and repeating the same trepidations and confusions. That said, I was interested enough in the mystery to keep reading until the end.

Ethnographer/anthropologist Laurence Ralph tells the tragic story of Luis Alberto Quiñonez. Sito, as he was known, was the 19-year-old half-brother of Ralph's stepson. Ralph grapples with the backstory and aftermath of Sito's murder, recounting Sito's experiences with juvenile detention and the criminal justice system. In so doing, the author weaves in theories of justice and themes of masculinity, criminalization, violence, and mourning.

This is not just a riveting, nuanced account of murder, grief, and revenge. It reckons with "the spirit of revenge that's embedded in our legal system so that future generations don't repeat our mistakes." It imagines the possibility of restorative justice and the transformation of a legal system that is openly stacked against people of color and the impoverished. It imagines the possibility of healing.
I would recommend this to those looking for a gripping memoir combined with compelling sociological study.

Thanks to Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

It turns out there's no recipe for group living. While this memoir meanders, it lays out the possible ingredients. It provokes thought, suggesting a refreshed vision of home and family, posing questions about sustainable living, shared commitments, and the past and future of communal living. Questions such as, "How can we begin to experiment outside the status quo? How can we learn to see companionship itself as both home and wealth?"
I would recommend this to those who like their memoirs with a side of questioning the status quo. Recipes are included, which is always a bonus.

Thanks to Spiegel & Grau and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Margo's dad has retired from his WWE pro-wrestling career and endured another stint in rehab before he moves in with Margo, his bastard daughter, who's recently gotten pregnant by her married English professor and has decided to have the baby, despite living in a shared apartment with fellow college students, losing her job, getting less than no help from her mother, and having no idea what she herself is doing as a mother. So why not try her hand (and new mom body parts) as an OnlyFans creator? What could go wrong?
Themes: coming of age, new motherhood, controlling your own narrative, 
POV: we get the main character's POV from both first and third person -- "It's true that writing in third person helps me," Margo says. "It is so much easier to have sympathy for the Margo who existed back then than try to explain how and why I did all the things that I did."
Setting: mostly Margo's four-bedroom, one-bath apartment somewhere near the  Fullerton College campus in Fullerton, Calif. Margo lives geographically close to Disneyland, but her situation is emotionally distant from the Happiest Place on Earth
Timeline: present day, between now and when OnlyFans was created in 2016
I loved it. Why? Author Rufi Thorpe managed to successfully tie in pro wrestling, OnlyFans, and the Virgin Mary. Margo and her supporting characters were richly drawn. And as laugh-out-loud funny as this book was, there were also philosophically challenging questions posed. Margo grew to have empathy for others and what they'd created for themselves, but also for her past self and the choices she'd made.
"I like getting to be the me now watching the past me. It's almost a way of loving myself. Stroking the cheek of that girl with my understanding. Smoothing her hair with my mind's eye."
(The only thing I didn't like was that the douchey baby daddy wears a Duke sweatshirt in one scene where he's supposed to look extra-douchey and pathetic. Oof, that hurts a Blue Devil's heart.)
This is a five-star-plus read that I highly recommend
Thanks to William Morrow and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

The cover of God Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer shows a young Black man's face overlaying an institutional-looking building in the background. The lines of the drawing, specifically of the man's head, blur, as if his multicolored facets aren't yet able to sustain a stable image. It beautifully represents the gist of Joseph Earl Thomas's debut novel, which is told over the course of one hectic shift at a Philadelphia hospital. Joseph Thomas, who not coincidentally shares the author's name, is a med tech in the emergency department, where he knows every other patient, including his mother, presumed biological father, uncle, great-grandmother.

"A boy who used to beat me up is here for STD testing."

"In the trauma bay there's a lanky girl I knew from middle school named Diamond."

I say that the setting is the hospital, but really it's Joey's mind. He weaves narration of his daily ER routine with flashbacks from gaming with his kids the night before, from his own impoverished childhood, from his tour in Iraq as an army medic, and so on. Throughout his stream-of-consciousness narration, he speaks of hunger and trauma and when is his bff Ray gonna show up with Joey's hoagie and Otis Spunkmeyer muffin?
Therein lies the hook.

This book is phenomenal in how it captures the focus and distraction of both a mind and a trauma center in chaos. Its intense but intimate language is not easy to begin, but by about 15 percent in, I began to see the method in the seeming madness and I was drawn in, mesmerized by its genius. I was already a fan of Thomas's memoir Sink, but the two together make me an even more avid fan.

Thanks to Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Christina Lynch's latest novel is a love letter to the pony/human bond. It's a whodunnit murder mystery. And a tribute to fables. It's also a call to respect all creatures great and small. The main characters change and grow more empathetic as the truth emerges of what really happened that night twenty-some years ago when 12-year-old Penny and her beloved pony were torn from one another.
I'm a fan of Christina Lynch's. This is a very different book, way more fantastical than The Italian Party, which I prefer for its espionage thriller vibes and Italian setting. What I appreciate most about Pony Confidential are its revelations about all things pony. I will continue to seek out Lynch's books.

Tracy Chevalier writes a fascinating historical fiction novel digging deep into the traditions, family bonds, artistry, and commerce of Murano glassmakers through the ages. The speculative aspects of the novel, specifically the play with time, felt awkward, but it enabled the glassmaking trade to evolve and change while the cast of characters remained the same. Led by Orsola Rosso, the characters are vividly drawn, with the major focus on women's lives, constraints, and boundary-pushing in an ever-changing, ever-pivoting Venice.

Thanks to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.

Debut author Kaliane Bradley has splashed deep into the lore of a doomed polar explorer, Graham Gore. And she has surfaced with a time travel romance/spy thriller that deals with mixed-race identity, inherited trauma, and not just living in, but doggedly working for, a country whose imperial legacy controls history. Maybe dogged isn't the right word for this speculative fiction novel's protagoniste, whose name we never learn, though we understand that her "bizarre Eurasion double-barrelled surname" offers a clue to her family history. As a Ministry of Time employee, she is assigned the task of acting as historical bridge to Graham Gore, a kind and exceedingly charismatic Victorian naval officer who has been brought from his time to hers, somewhere in the near future. An expat from history, the polar explorer refers to his bridge as "little cat," a nickname which hints at his feelings for her. The ensuing intrigue and romance that spark from this pairing fuses genres and ideas. The result is humorous and thought-provoking and had me rapt. What does it really mean to make history, to alter the future?

Thanks to Avid Reader Press and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.