“Some part of me found it pleasurable to be, at last, out of control.” Sara Levine’s The Hitch (Roxane Gay Books 2026) is hilarious, outrageous, mad, quirky, and positively bizarre. And I enjoyed every bit of it. Rose Cutler, a self-described antiracist, secular Jewish feminist eco-warrior, is a bit of a lonely, know-it-all neurotic dogContinue reading “THE HITCH – Sara Levine”
Tag Archives: Fiction
ERADICATION: A FABLE – Jonathan Miles
“The problem is that history leaves a slime trail, like a snail.” Jonathan Miles’s Eradication: A Fable (Doubleday 2026) is next up on my Booker eligible reads. Even before realizing Maria Reva had written one of the blurbs, I was calling it Endling meets Seascraper meets Stone Yard Devotional. Despite some pretty graphic scenes ofContinue reading “ERADICATION: A FABLE – Jonathan Miles”
VIGIL – George Saunders
Not long into George Saunders’s Vigil (Random House 2026), I remarked that it was a bit Charles Dickens meets Tom Stoppard – to be more exact, it’s A Christmas Carol meets Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, with a strong nod to the Stoppard play. You would think that those echoes would be enough to haveContinue reading “VIGIL – George Saunders”
THIS IS WHERE THE SERPENT LIVES – Daniyal Mueenuddin
Daniyal Mueenuddin’s This is Where the Serpent Lives (Knopf 2026) reads like Chekhov wrote a Dickens’s plot. This highly anticipated debut novel by Mueenuddin, whose short story collection was a finalist for the National Book Award and the Pulitzer (among others), is likely to be a strong contender come awards season. Will it make theContinue reading “THIS IS WHERE THE SERPENT LIVES – Daniyal Mueenuddin”
BURN DOWN MASTER’S HOUSE – Clay Cane
“Remembering is an act of brilliant opposition.” Clay Cane’s Burn Down Master’s House (Kensington Publishing Corp.) will make you extremely uncomfortable. Spoiler alert – it’s supposed to. No matter the attempts to erase the horrors of slavery from this country’s past, to whitewash the repeated crimes against black and brown bodies, the truth remains –Continue reading “BURN DOWN MASTER’S HOUSE – Clay Cane”
WESTWARD WOMEN – Alice Martin
“That’s how it goes, I guess. Sometimes you need to hurt first so you can finally go numb.” I went into Alice Martin’s Westward Women ( St. Martin’s Press 2026) entirely blind, and I can’t decide if that was a help or a hindrance to my reading experience. It’s a buzzy new release and MartinContinue reading “WESTWARD WOMEN – Alice Martin”
TANGERINN – Emanuela Anechoum (translated by Lucy Rand)
“You died on a random day and, like on any other random day, I wasn’t there. Between us there were two thousand kilometers and all the things left unsaid.” If you’re like me and a member of the Dead Dads Club, Emanuela Anechoum’s Tangerinn (translated from the Italian by Lucy Rand, translated copyright 2026 EuropaContinue reading “TANGERINN – Emanuela Anechoum (translated by Lucy Rand)”
A GOOD ANIMAL – Sara Maurer
“A strange grave, the lion and the lamb together. In the end, I thought, the dirt gets everything.” I read Sara Maurer’s debut novel, A Good Animal (St. Martin’s Press 2026) and I have “feelings” about it. If you don’t want it spoiled, stop now. Seriously. I’m going to spoil the stuffing out of thisContinue reading “A GOOD ANIMAL – Sara Maurer”
GUNK – Saba Sams
Gunk (Knopf 2026), Saba Sams’s debut novel, is the sort of novel that will likely win prizes. It is also the sort of novel that I don’t find enjoyable. There’s nothing “wrong” with the novel. It’s well-written. It has a beginning, middle, and end. Sams clearly has talent. But it just never “clicked” for me,Continue reading “GUNK – Saba Sams”
OUR NUMBERED BONES – Katya Balen
“I am failing. I want to go home. But not that home. Home to the past. I am so stupid that it burns. But not hot enough.” “stories and soil change and stay the same” Katya Balen’s first adult novel, Our Numbered Bones (HarperVia 2026), is a 237-page gut punch; the ache in the pagesContinue reading “OUR NUMBERED BONES – Katya Balen”
A Girl Named Tommi 