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Book Challenges & Fall Reads

NPR reports on how "local libraries have become a major political and cultural battleground."

Nora Roberts has donated $50,000 to the Patmos Library in Jamestown Township, Michigan after being defunded over books with LGBTQ themes, according to I Love Libraries.

Vulture lists 57 new books coming out this fall. 

NYT features "18 Books Coming in September."

New Title Bestsellers

Links for the week: NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers | NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers | USA Today Best-Selling Books

Fiction

Babel by R.F. Kuang (Harper Voyager) roars to No. 1 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

Girl, Forgotten (Andrea Oliver, Bk. 2) by Karin Slaughter (Morrow; LJ starred review) discovers No. 2 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list and No. 15 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Soul Taken by Patricia Briggs (Ace: Penguin Random House) grabs No. 4 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list and No. 5 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood (Berkley) courts No. 4 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Fox Creek by William Kent Krueger (Atria; LJ starred review) surges to No. 5 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

Ruby Fever: A Hidden Legacy Novel by Ilona Andrews (Avon) heats up to No. 10 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Lightlark by Alex Aster (Amulet: Abrams) shines at No. 14 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Nonfiction

Breaking History: A White House Memoir by Jared Kushner (Broadside) cuts to No. 1on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list and No. 6 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Scenes from My Life by Michael K. Williams (Crown) shines at No. 12 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

A Place in the World: Finding the Meaning of Home by Frances Mayes (Crown) discovers No. 13 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Reviews

The Washington Post reviews In the Black Fantastic by Ekow Eshun (MIT): "a primer on what the “Black fantastic” encompasses: works of art that incorporate myth, fantasy and science fiction to reimagine Black culture and identity." Also, Deer Creek Drive by Beverly Lowry (Knopf): “the significance of this story lies in its irresolution, in showing how, like bigotry, a violent crime will continue to cast a shadow over a community for generations, disturbing their sense of themselves as survivors.” 

NYT reviews The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Minds and Our World by Max Fisher (Little, Brown; LJ starred review): "details the evolution of behavioral technologies that belie the many denials by company representatives that their platforms are inherently or intentionally manipulative." Also, On the Rooftop by Margaret Wilkerson Sexton (Ecco: HarperCollins): "readers have a front-row seat to a timeless drama about a mother with dreams that don’t quite line up with her daughters’ realities." And, Fairy Tale by Stephen King (Scribner): "a multiverse-traversing, genre-hopping intertextual mash-up, with plenty of Easter eggs for regular King devotees. Thankfully, it’s also a solid episodic adventure, a page-turner driven by memorably strange encounters and well-rendered, often thrilling action." Plus, four reviews on "hand-me-downs and discards from design history's treasure chest."

Locus Magazine review Hidden Pictures by Jason Rekulak (Flatiron): “a horror novel that’s also a thriller, a mystery, and a story about overcoming the odds and surviving. Rekulak is a talented storyteller, and this one will be one of the biggest horror books of the summer. It deserves all the attention it gets.”

Tor.com reviews 40 by Alan Heathcock (MCD): “in trying to split the difference between a psychological study of the trappings of power and an almost allegorical account of where one nation might be headed, 40 doesn’t make as much of an impact as it could.”

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

Briefly Noted

The Los Angeles Times interviews Cai Emmons about the ALS diagnosis she received after completing Unleashed (Dutton).

Karen Cleveland talks to CrimeReads about the “suburban secrets and CIA analysts” in her newest book, The New Neighbor (Ballantine).

Vulture speaks to Gwendoline Riley, author of My Phantoms (New York Review), and explores her work.

The Washington Post highlights an exploration by contemporary writers of Agatha Christie's character Miss Marple, in a new book Marple: Twelve New Mysteries (Harper Audio).

NYT's Inside the Best-Seller List features Ashley Flowers and her experience signing copies of her book All Good People Here (Bantam) in an airport bookstore.

Mo Willems answers the NYT's By the Book questionnaire.

The Washington Post reports that a “publishing error” caused a delay in the release of Dinesh D’ Souza’s book, 2000 Mules (Regnery: S. & S.). 

Tor.com has “5 SFF Books About Deadly Magical Games.”

USA Today explores the best-sellers list this week.

Lit Hub recommends historical fiction that "lives in the space between history and myth."

CrimeReads provides a “list of gothic novels featuring non-human love interests.”

BookPage highlights 3 sci-fi and some fantasy romances for September.

Authors on Air

A.Natasha Joukovsky chats about “working in the corporate world” while writing her book, The Portrait of a Mirror (Abrams), and more on the I’m a Writer But podcast.

Book Pulse will not be published tomorrow, Friday, September 2 and Monday, September 5 in observance of Labor Day.

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