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Award & Buzzy Book News

The 2021 Cundill History Prize Finalists are announced.

Henry Louis Gates Jr. to come out with a new book series from Penguin to “feature leading writers on the legacy of Black figures." 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

State of Terror by Louise Penny and Hillary Rodham Clinton (S. & S.: St. Martin’s) climbs to No. 1 on both the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list and the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

The Christmas Pig by J.K. Rowling (Scholastic) celebrates No. 6 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Silverview by John le Carré (Viking) appears at No. 6 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list and No. 8 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

The Book of Magic by Alice Hoffman (S. & S.) sparkles at No. 8 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

Nonfiction

To Rescue the Republic by Bret Baier with Catherine Whitney (Custom House: HarperCollins) debuts at No. 2 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list and No. 3 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

The Boys: A Memoir of Hollywood and Family by Ron Howard & Clint Howard (Morrow; LJ starred review) starts at No. 3 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list and No. 10 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Midnight in Washington: How We Almost Lost Our Democracy and Still Could by Adam Schiff (Random House) strikes at no. 5 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list and No. 6 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

The Beatles: Get Back edited by John Harris (Callaway Arts & Entertainment) rocks at No. 6 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

It's Better to be Feared by Seth Wickersham (Liveright: W. W. Norton) scores No. 10 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

E.R. Nurses by James Patterson and Matt Eversmann with Chris Mooney (Little, Brown, & Co.) begins at No. 11 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Where the Deer and the Antelope Play: The Pastoral Observations of One Ignorant American Who Loves To Walk Outside by Nick Offerman (Dutton) gallops to No. 13 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Rigged by Mollie Hemingway (Regnery) climbs to No. 13 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list and No. 14 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Reviews

The Washington Post reviews Music Is History by Questlove (Abrams): “For Questlove, music is a reflection of society. As with politics, religion, fashion, culinary preferences and even history itself, musical taste is mostly subjective, but the more we open ourselves to different opinions, beliefs and, of course, music, the better citizens we will become.” Also, From Warsaw With Love: Polish Spies, the CIA, and the Forging of an Unlikely Alliance by John Pomfret (Holt): “But Pomfret’s book is eye-opening in the best sense. We learn things we didn’t know. Pomfret, a former Beijing bureau chief of The Washington Post and the author of a history of the U.S.-China relationship, talked to a lot of people who had stories to tell — and, this being the secret world, they’re often colorful.”

NYT also reviews Music Is History by Questlove (Abrams): “One of the book’s strengths is the way in which Questlove tucks in subtle details about the lives of important artists, encouraging us to think more deeply about the songs we love and the people who made them."

NPR reviews Gentrifier by Anne Elizabeth Moore (Catapult): “Gentrifier's overarching structure is linear, chronicling Moore's residence in the house, her brief ownership of it (the contract stipulated that she would receive the deed after two years), and her decision to sell it after she sinks money she does not have into repairs and realizes that she cannot make a living as a writer in Detroit. Each chapter, though, unfolds in nonlinear fragments that combine jokes, facts, and reflections, all in the present tense.”

Tor.com reviews Femlandia by Christina Dalcher (Berkley): “It is a jittery thriller about how all and any extreme shifts of power result inevitably in human cruelty, regardless of who is in charge of whom. Power, the desperate need for survival, the evolutionary circles which human society seems to turn in—these are all valid and strong concerns for Dalcher in Fermlandia. Subtlety sadly, is not a strong suit here, not in the community, nor the book.”

Locus Magazine reviews Body Shocks edited by Ellen Datlow (Tachyon): “Body Shocks is a celebration of body horror that brings outstanding narratives about pain and transformation together to offer a great introduc­tion to a subgenre that’s here to stay. Hopefully this will become a series, but if not, then it should be more than enough to inspire readers to look deeper into body horror and inspire publishers, anthologists, and editors to create opportunities to offer more of it.”

Book Marks has "5 Reviews You Need to Review This Week."

Briefly Noted

Entertainment Weekly has a first look at Bonnie Garmus’s Lessons in Chemistry (Doubleday: Penguin Random House), which has already been optioned by Brie Larson. Meghan McCain “reveals why she quit The View” in an excerpt from her forthcoming book Bad Republican, to be released by Audible on Oct 21. Variety has more. Lit Hub shares an excerpt from Colorization: One Hundred Years of Black Films in a White World by Wil Haygood (Knopf).

Heather Gay of Real Housewives of Salt Lake City will come out with a book “about leaving the Mormon Church” titled Bad Mormon (Gallery: S. & S.). People has the story.

Steve Shirripa, co-author of Woke Up This Morning: The Definitive Oral History of The Sopranos (William Morrow: HarperCollins), talks with The Hollywood Reporter about his favorite unplanned moments from the television series.

Fox News reports that Jamie Lynn Spears was “blindsided” by This Is My Brave nonprofit organization declining donations from the sales of her book Things I Should Have Said: Family, Fame, and Figuring it Out (Worthy Books).

Chelsea G. Summers, author of A Certain Hunger (Unnamed Press: Ingram), answers the Book Marks Questionnaire.

The Millions lists “The Anti-Adventures of Gary Paulsen.”

Tor.com provides “Five SFF Books About Road Trips.”

CrimeReads shares “10 New Books Coming This Week,” “Five Great Novels Immersed in Music Scenes and the Lives of Musicians," “Mysteries That Take Place in Bookstores," and "A List of Crime Books Set on or Around Halloween."

The Washington Post provides “Halloween-perfect story collections.”

Authors on Air

Courtney Balestier, author of Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath (Knopf; LJ starred review), wants to make sure her subject’s name is not “synonymous with madness” in an interview with the WMFA podcast.

NPR's Fresh Air reissues an interview with Gary Paulsen and Terry Gross.

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