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Big Books of the Week

House of Sky and Breath by Sarah J. Maas (Bloomsbury) leads holds this week.

Other titles in demand include:

Diablo Mesa by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child (Grand Central)

Sierra Six (Gray Man, Bk. 11) by Mark Greaney (Berkley)

An Impossible Impostor (Veronica Speedwell, Bk. 7) by Deanna Raybourn (Berkley; LJ starred review)

One Night on the Island by Josie Silver (Ballantine)

These books and others publishing the week of Feb. 14th, 2022 are listed in a downloadable spreadsheet.

Librarians and Booksellers Suggest

One LibraryReads and three Indie Next picks publish this week:

An Impossible Impostor by Deanna Raybourn (Berkley; LJ starred review)

“In this 7th Victorian mystery, Veronica and Stoker investigate whether a missing-and-presumed-dead heir who has reappeared is the right person. Veronica does recognize him, but revealing his true identity could expose her own secrets. Amongst the heists and chases, this one deals with trust and how to move forward. For fans of Sherry Thomas and Anna Lee Huber.”—Lorena Neal, Evanston Public Library, Evanston, IL

Three Indie Next picks arrive this week:

New Animal by Ella Baxter (Two Dollar Radio: Ingram)

“Just when you think you’ve got the story, Ella Baxter dives deeper. New Animal is a dark, humorous take on grief and connection, centered on a cosmetic mortician and her eccentric family. A ‘grab more wine and keep reading’ kind of book.”—Kathy Baum, Tattered Cover Book Store, Denver, CO

The Boy with a Bird in His Chest by Emme Lund (Atria)

“My heart grew two sizes bigger reading this story of queer resilience and strength. Emme Lund's debut is a beautiful coming-of-age story full of magical realism and love. If you're a hugger, then you need this book.”—Kassie King, The Novel Neighbor, Webster Groves, MO

Pure Colour by Sheila Heti (FSG)

“Defying the novel, Sheila Heti proves her wisdom and imagination. The story begins innocently and then wonderfully morphs, ruminating on loss, companionship, religion, and the physical form. This book continues to echo in my brain.”—James Harrod, Malaprop's Bookstore/Café, Asheville, NC

In the Media

The People "Picks" book of the week is The Family Chao by Lan Samantha Chang (Norton). Also getting attention are In the Shadow of the Mountain: A Memoir of Courage by Silvia Vasquez-Lavado (Henry Holt & Co.), and Recitatif: A Story by Toni Morrison (Knopf). A “Kid Picks" section highlights titles exploring Black history and culture: Black Artists Shaping the World by Sharna Jackson and Zoé Whitley (Thames & Hudson), Unspeakable:The Tulsa Race Massacre by Carole Boston Weatherford (Carlorhoda Books: Lerner), and Who Are Your People? by Bakari Sellers (Quill Tree Books: HarperCollins). The “Picks” section spotlights Death on the Nile, based on the book by Agatha Christie. Plus, the cover feature celebrates Black excellence.

Reviews

NYT reviews Moon Witch, Spider King by Marlon James (Riverhead): “James’s imagination is vast and fiery, and his numerous fight scenes are heart-pumping and vivid. But what has stayed with me are his more subtle observations on the human condition, how people don’t run away from terrible situations only because they don’t know where else to go, how love is like fear, grief is like fury and revenge can never be as satisfying as you imagine.” And, Pure Colour by Sheila Heti (FSG): “Though Pure Colour is a slim volume, approximately the thickness of a nice slice of sourdough bread, it holds within it a taste of something that defies classification.” Also, A Very Nice Girl by Imogen Crimp (Henry Holt & Co.): “In some of these moments, A Very Nice Girl is an all-too-real reminder of what it is to be a woman in your 20s, searching for who you are, trying on identities or stuck in a complicated pseudo-relationship even when you know you shouldn’t be."  And, True Story: What Reality TV Says About Us by Danielle J. Lindemann, PhD (FSG): “Her enthusiasm tends to inflate her extrapolations but a drier accounting would have been dull sledding.” And, The Quiet Before: On the Unexpected Origins of Radical Ideas by Gal Beckerman (Crown): “As brilliant as Beckerman often is on the makers and sustainers of these networks, he is less satisfying on (or perhaps just less interested in) the eventual upshot of their efforts, doubtless because so many of them ended in frustration, co-optation or defeat.” Plus, Walking the Bowl: A True Story of Murder and Survival Among the Street Children of Lusaka by Chris Lockhart and Daniel Mulilo Chama (Hanover Square Pr.): “Most of all, it tells the story of children who, under impossible circumstances, manage to survive. Their voices are not always what we expect.” Lastly, The Urge: Our History of Addiction by Carl Erik Fisher (Penguin Pr.): “As it is, the situation the author describes looks irremediably bleak: One comes away with the overwhelming impression that the propensity for addiction is part of the human condition, ‘the blight man was born for’.”

NPR reviews Very Cold People by Sarah Manguso (Hogarth): “While not a book to brighten a winter day, Very Cold People does what we ask of good literature: It absorbs our attention and stirs empathy and reflection.” And, Fadeout by Joseph Hansen (Soho Syndicate; LJ starred review): “And in Brandstetter, Hansen has created a hero worthy of such predecessors as Chandler's Philip Marlowe and Macdonald's Lew Archer.”

The Washington Post reviews Gwendy's Final Task by Stephen King and Richard Chizmar (Gallery): “Like its predecessors, Gwendy’s Final Task is both a seamless act of collaboration and a deeply felt reflection on the perilous state of our fractured modern world.” Plus, there are paired reviews of Foreverland: On the Divine Tedium of Marriage by Heather Havrilesky (Ecco), and Love in the Time of Contagion: A Diagnosis by Laura Kipnis (Pantheon): "Havrilesky’s and Kipnis’s books confirm this much, at least: There’s nothing worse than losing your shared sense of plot. There’s nothing more excruciating, and worthwhile, than the struggle to recover it. And there’s always an outsider ready to eavesdrop."

USA Today reviews The Boy with a Bird in His Chest by Emme Lund (Atria), giving it 3 out of 4 stars: "this is a gentle, compassionate exploration of how we can learn to love the things that make us different." 

Briefly Noted

The Southern Book Prize winners are announced. 

The PROSE Award winners are announced. 

Thuy Linh Nguyen Tu wins R.R. Hawkins Award for Experiments in Skin: Race and Beauty in the Shadows of Vietnam (Duke Univ. Pr.). Publishing Perspectives has details.

NPR’s Goats and Soda interviews Vidya Krishnan about her new book, Phantom Plague: How Tuberculosis Shaped History (PublicAffairs: Hachette).

FoxNews talks with Matthew Perry about his forthcoming memoir, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing (Flatiron), due out November 1st.

Elle has an excerpt of the new memoir, Lift Your Voice: How My Nephew George Floyd's Murder Changed The World by Angela Harrelson, with Michael Levin (Post Hill Press).

Waterstones calls Maggie O'Farrell's forthcoming novel, The Marriage Portrait, the "most anticipated book of the year."  The Bookseller has details. 

Vox considers how The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin (Penguin Classics) shows us "that the greatest romances in life can be friendships," in time for Palantine's Day.

NYT writes about young Black authors who are shaking up Brazil’s literary scene.

Kathryn Schulz, Lost & Found (Random), shares secrets for making love last, at OprahDaily.

USA Today picks five books for the week.

CrimeReads suggests 10 books out this week. 

LitHub has 8 books for last chill of Winter and "5 fictional female friendships to revisit this Galentine’s Day."

NPR shares their favorite love stories to read, watch and hear. 

Romance novelists share new and forthcoming book recommendations for Entertainment Weekly, and EW recommends 8 winter romances.

Authors On Air

Kara Swisher talks to Patrick Radden Keefe, Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty (Doubleday; LJ starred review) about “why and how the Sacklers got off relatively scot-free” on the Sway podcast.

Vanity Fair gives a first look at Amazon's Rings of Power series, based on the books by J. R. R. Tolkien. 

Tom Lin's Carnegie Medal winning novel, The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu (Little, Brown), will be adapted for television. Deadline reports. 

LA Times says new adaptation of Death on the Nile, based on the book by Agatha Christie, “misses the boat”, in new, monthly, Page-to-Screen column. 

T&C writes about how Netflix paid Anna Delvey for her story for the new limited series, Inventing Anna.

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