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Crummey, Michael. The Adversary. Doubleday. Feb. 2024. 336p. ISBN 9780385550321. $29. LITERARY

On Newfoundland’s remote northern shore, the Widow Caines rushes in to sabotage Abe Strapp’s plans to marry the daughter of a rival merchant, thus solidifying his power base. It’s just the beginning of a battle to dominate the dwindling resources of the North Atlantic fishery while delivering revenge for slights past. From Giller/Governor-General’s/IMPAC shortlisted Crummey.

Gallagher, Matt. Daybreak. Atria. Feb. 2024. 256p. ISBN 9781501177859. $26.99. LITERARY

U.S. army veteran Luke “Pax” Paxton has been stumbling along for a decade when an old army buddy suggests that they go to Ukraine to help counter the Russian invasion. His motives aren’t all humanitarian: he wants to find a Ukrainian woman named Svitlana he knew from his soldiering days and make amends. From U.S. veteran Gallagher (Youngblood), the 2022 Hemingway-Pfeiffer Museum writer-in-residence.

Hunt, Laird. Float Up, Sing Down: Stories. Bloomsbury. Feb. 2024. 224p. ISBN 9781639730100. $26.99. LITERARY

On a single midsummer day in 1982 rural Indiana, people go about their business, with older residents recalling the past joys and sorrows of lives shaped by the world wars and younger residents experiencing the first thrill of love or independence. Meanwhile, everyone is thinking about troubled but beloved outsider Irma Ray. As Hunt is a National Book Award and PEN/Faulkner Award finalist, plus a two-time Anisfield-Wolf Award winner, expect to be intrigued.

Johansson, Hanna. Antiquity. Catapult. Feb. 2024. NAp. tr. from Swedish by Kira Josefsson. ISBN 9781646221714. $26. LITERARY

A thirtyish unnamed narrator falls hard for a glamorous older artist she interviews for a magazine and is promptly invited to visit her on the Greek island where she summers. There, she finds herself more and more attracted to her host’s teenage daughter. Billed as a queer Lolita; Swedish author Johansson won the 2021 Katapultpris for this debut.

Kashiwai, Hisashi. The Kamogawa Food Detectives. Putnam. Feb. 2024. 240p. tr. from Japanese by Jesse Kirkwood. ISBN 9780593717714. $25. LITERARY

If you like Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s internationally best-selling “Before the Coffee Gets Cold,” you’ll likely be interested in this first in a best-selling Japanese series about a father-daughter cooking team. They don’t just make elegant meals, they act as food detectives, re-creating meals that their customers describe from long-ago memories.

Kumar, Amitava. My Beloved Life. Knopf. Feb. 2024. 352p. ISBN 9780593536063. $29. LITERARY

Born in an Indian village in 1935 after his mother survives a cobra bite while pregnant, Jadunath Kunwar goes on to lead what might be called an ordinary life. Yet he becomes a historian; meets poets, politicians, and even the sherpa who first summited Everest; and continues learning from a daughter who becomes a television journalist in the United States. The story of how each life can be luminous; from the author of Immigrant, Montana, a New Yorker Best Book.

McCorkle, Jill. Old Crimes. Algonquin: Workman: Hachette. Jan. 2024. 304p. ISBN 9781616209735. $27. Downloadable. LITERARY

Beloved author McCorkle, most recently of the multi-starred Hieroglyphics, returns with a collection of stories about characters dealing sometimes inventively with unexpected hardship. A woman finds comfort in her slow hearing loss because it means she can avoid listening to her husband’s caustic comments, while a telephone lineman feeling lost in the digital world turns to his family for support.

Murata, Kiyoko. A Woman of Pleasure. Counterpoint. Feb. 2024. 320p. tr. from Japanese by Juliet Winters Carpenter. ISBN 9781640095793. pap. $17.95. LITERARY

In the early 1900s, 15-year-old Aoi Ichi is sold to the most exclusive brothel in Kumamoto, Japan, and soon becomes a protégée of an oiran, the brothel’s highest-ranking courtesan. Meanwhile, she’s trained in writing and clear thinking by a diligent teacher, and eventually the women at the brothel go on strike. Drawing on real-life events, the multi-award-winning Murata (e.g., Akutagawa Prize) gets her first English-language translation.

Theroux, Paul. Burma Sahib. Mariner: HarperCollins. Feb. 2024. 352p. ISBN 9780063297548. $30. CD. LITERARY

In Theroux’s latest, 19-year-old Eton graduate Eric Blair sets sail in 1922 for India, where (much to his consternation) he must train for three years as a servant of the British Empire, eventually overseeing the local policemen in Burma. He steers his way through the empire’s class and racial strictures and returns home to become George Orwell. One celebrated author takes on another.

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