Alison, Jane. Villa E. Liveright: Norton. Aug. 2024. 160p. ISBN 9781324095057. $23.99. F

Fictionalizing the artistic battle between Irish designer Eileen Gray and Swiss architect Le Corbusier over the French villa E-1027 (which Gray built and Le Corbusier painted, against her wishes), Alison plumbs the characters of both creatives and explores questions of power, obsession, and control.

Campbell, Jane. Interpretations of Love. Grove Atlantic. Aug. 2024. 320p. ISBN 9780802162885. $28. F

The octogenarian author of the buzzy collection Cat Brushing returns with a debut novel that gathers a family together for a weekend wedding, including Dr. Agnes Stacey, mother of the bride. Surrounding her are her uncle, her old therapist, her ex-husband, and others. All of them can see deeply into each other’s lives but are unable to discern their own. Love and secrets simmer through isolation, aging, and attachment.

Hamya, Jo. The Hypocrite. Pantheon. Aug. 2024. 240p. ISBN 9780593701034. $26. F

It’s August 2020, and playwright Sophia is wondering what her father, a famous author, thinks of her newest show. He is in the audience, about to watch, unaware it is about him, and the vacation they took two years ago to Sicily. From the buzzy author of Three Rooms.

Herngren, Moa. The Divorce. HarperVia. Aug. 2024. 352p. tr. from Swedish by Alice Menzies. ISBN 9780063352391. $28.99. F

A huge hit in Sweden, Moa makes her English-language debut with this mix of domestic drama and mystery about why a seemingly solid marriage begins to fall apart, told through the dual perspectives of adoring wife Bea and her husband Niklas, who, after a low-stakes tiff, texts that he wants out.

Hughes, Siân. Pearl. Knopf. Aug. 2024. 224p. ISBN 9780593802564. $28. F

Marianne’s life has been haunted by the disappearance of her mother. Searching for something to hold on to, she finds a medieval poem in one of her mom’s books. As she tries to navigate her life, the poem and the loss of her mother shape her future. A debut longlisted for the Booker Prize.

Reyes Jr., Ruben. There Is a Rio Grande in Heaven: Stories. Mariner. Aug. 2024. 240p. ISBN 9780063336278. $28. F

A debut story collection that explores migration, newness, and injustice. A man wakes to find he is suddenly a reggaetón star. An older woman changes into a puppet. Other characters include farmers, soldiers, and cyborgs. Through dreamlike changes, the characters face unrecognizable lives and hard choices in worlds ruled by technology and bureaucracy.

Morris, Priscilla. Black Butterflies. Knopf. Aug. 2024. 288p. ISBN 9780593801857. $28. F

Shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, the RSL Ondaatje Prize, and several others, Morris’s debut is set in Sarajevo in the early ’90s. Having sent her family to England, teacher and artist Zora continues to live in the city, which soon is besieged. Somehow, she and her friends find the strength to endure.

Newman, Nathan. How To Leave the House. Viking. Aug. 2024. 288p. ISBN 9780593654903. $29. F

With TV rights already sold, Newman’s debut is being billed as funny, tender, and incisive. It’s about Natwest and his last day at home before he leaves for university, the embarrassing package he’s waiting for, and the residents of the small UK town he lives in across one 24-hour period.

Ogawa, Yoko. Mina’s Matchbox. Pantheon. Aug. 2024. 288p. tr. from Japanese by Stephen B. Snyder. ISBN 9780593316085. $28. F

From the award-winning author of The Memory Police comes a novel set in 1972, when 12-year-old Tomoko leaves her mom in Tokyo for a spring spent with her 13-year-old cousin Mina, a girl caught up in elaborate storytelling. What is happening in Mina’s house of relations, gardens, even a pygmy hippopotamus?

Phillips, Helen. Hum. S. & S./Marysue Rucci. Aug. 2024. 272p. ISBN 9781668008836. $27.99. F

Multi-award-winning Phillips (The Need) sets her newest in the near future, where intelligent robots, climate change, and surveillance have changed the world. A mother, made jobless by AI, undertakes desperate measures to keep her family whole, raising unsettling, tense questions about the contemporary world and its possibilities.

Porter, Regina. The Rich People Have Gone Away. Hogarth: Crown. Aug. 2024. 352p. ISBN 9780593241868. $29. F

Porter’s (The Travelers) second book is set during the start of the COVID pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement. Privileged Theo and Darla leave Brooklyn for their upstate cottage during quarantine. Then Darla goes missing, and Theo is the prime suspect. Family, friends, and those left in the city all have thoughts.

Prcic, Ismet. Unspeakable Home. Avid Reader/ S. & S. Aug. 2024. 320p. ISBN 9781668015339. $28. F

Award-winning Prcic (Shards) explores storytelling and identity in a novel with multiple narrators. The central narrator was forced to flee his home in Bosnia, a trauma that has led to divorce and addiction. He shares this in fan letters he writes to a comedian. Through fragments and voices, the destructive impact of exile and shame unfolds.

Strout, Elizabeth. Tell Me Everything. Random. Aug. 2024. 336p. ISBN 9780593446096. $29. F

Pulitzer Prize–winning Strout sets her newest in old surroundings, the beloved locale of Crosby, ME, populated by beloved characters—Lucy Barton, Olive Kitteridge, Bob Burgess, and others—as she has them ponder the meaning of stories and of life, of friendship and love, all while a murder investigation unfolds.

Tang, Kat. Five-Star Stranger. Scribner. Aug. 2024. 240p. ISBN 9781668050149. $27. F

A gig worker known only as Stranger is the top-rated man for hire on the Rental Stranger app in Tang’s debut. He also has a long-term job, as father to a young girl. What happens when fake and temporary relationships cross lines? Tang wonders in this story of isolation, hyperconnectivity, commodification, and authenticity

Weinberg, Kate. There’s Nothing Wrong with Her. Putnam. Aug. 2024. 224p. ISBN 9780593717363. $27. F

Weinberg (The Truants) takes a stylistic turn in this short, sharp read about friendship and recovery, inspired by her experience with long COVID. Vita Woods was living a good life, but now she cannot get out of bed, might be hallucinating, and no one can figure out what is wrong.