onsalmallane

On Sal Mal Lane

by Ru Freeman

(Graywolf Press)

“Ru Freeman has written the masterwork of Sri Lanka’s bellum civile…It distills one of the last century’s most complicated wars into what it really was on the ground—the everyday reality of that timeless threat, the neighbor turned killer.”— Lorraine Adams, Pullitzer Prize Winner and author of The Room and the Chair 

“Sustaining adult interest in young protagonists is Harper Lee–hard, and had this saga—which is three-quarters foreboding, one-quarter violent, heartbreaking denouement—been more concise, it could almost have been called a masterpiece.”— Publishers Weekly

final Movement of Stars

The Movement of Stars

by Amy Brill

(Riverhead)

“This book sings with insights about love, work and how we create our own families.”— Oprah.com

“Though the setting and subject may brand this a historical novel, the conflicts ring sharply
contemporary—career vs. family, racial tension vs. love.”— The Village Voice

“Amy Brill shines in her sparkling debut novel, The Movement of Stars (Riverhead), inspired by the work of a 19th-century female astronomer.”— Vanity Fair

aklc

Little Century

by Anna Keesey

(Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

“Fluid and restrained prose, solid plotting, and a keen eye for detail… Keesey is a sentence writer in control of her craft.” —The New York Times Book Review

“Anna Keesey’s debut novel hums with raw energy: its youthful heroine’s, the small town around which the ranches lie, and the new century that’s just unfolding when Esther arrives in 1900.”— The Boston Globe


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The Unfinished Work of Elizabeth D.

by Nichole Bernier

(Crown)

“Why do we keep secrets from those we love most? Is it possible for mothers and fathers to have it all — work and family? Bernier’s excellent storytelling skills will keep you pondering long after the final page.”—The Washington Post

“Bernier masterfully eases open the doors that guard our deepest fears and sweeps in fresh air and hope.” —Parade

When Captain Flint Was Still a Good Man

When Captain Flint Was Still a Good Man

by Nick Dybek

(Riverhead)

“Practically from the outset [Dybek] immerses us in a complex and riveting tale about deception and betrayal, asking us how far we would go to preserve what we hold dearest….. In this magnificent debut Dybek’s incommunicable thrills shock us and disturb us and make him one to watch.”—The Daily Beast

“When Captain Flint Was a Good Man is as much an atmospheric novel of morality and ambiguity as it is a sharply observed and plotted mystery–a novel for a new generation searching for understanding and adventure in the enigma of the sea.” —Shelf Awareness

birds of a lesser paradise - megan mayhew bergman

Birds of a Lesser Paradise

by Megan Mayhew Bergman

(Scribner)

“Portrays in fine realistic prose female characters balancing relationships with their fathers, mothers, and partners, as they fight their own foibles and insecurities… Bergman possesses a crisp and often poetic voice and wily, intelligent humor.”—The Boston Globe

“[Bergman] draws scenes and characters with a quick, incisive touch…This is a poignant prose menagerie.”—Associated Press

“Bergman provides alluring glimpses into the strangeness, the ruthlessness, of the animal kingdom.”—The New York Times Book Review


song-of-achilles

The Song of Achilles

by Madeline Miller

(Ecco )

“In prose as clean and spare as the driving poetry of Homer, Miller captures the intensity and devotion of adolescent friendship… enriching a tale that has been told for 3,000 years.”—Washington Post

“Spellbinding… While classics scholar Miller meticulously follows Greek mythology, her explorations of ego, grief and love’s many permutations are both familiar and new. In this fictional retelling of the Trojan War, military heroics are subsumed into a timeless love story.”—O: The Oprah Magazine

Friends Like Us Cover

Friends Like Us

by Lauren Fox

(Knopf)

“A strikingly wise exploration of the bonds people forge and break. Fox delivers on plot, but it’s her insight, emotion, and eye for universal truths that make Friends Like Us memorable.”—People

“Two best friends in their 20s wrestle with love and jealousy in Lauren Fox’s hilarious, heartbreaking novel.”—Marie Claire

“Captures, with delicacy and humor, the ambiguities of attraction in an ironic age.”—Vogue

Man from Primrose Lane cover

The Man From Primrose Lane

by James Renner

(FSG / Sarah Crichton Books)

“Punctuated by moments of desperate tenderness, this unusually demanding and grim tale provokes troubling reflections on guilt and innocence, good and evil, revenge and redemption.” —Publisher’s Weekly

The Man From Primrose Lane…shows an extreme literary ambition in the complex temporal structure that helps bare the minds of its major characters, whether innocent, angst-ridden or totally unhinged. But James Renner aims beyond all this to more Phil-Dickian realms of paradox where a familiar part of America interacts with Other…” —Locus Magazine


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Monstress

by Lysley Tenorio

(Ecco)

“A bold collection of stories of the rejected, the helpless and the lost. Monstress is the debut of a singular talent.”—NPR

“A wondrous clutch of stories.”—Elle Magazine

“Tenorio’s first collection of stories takes a refreshingly off-kilter approach to the lives of Filipinos in America…. his stories are impeccably constructed, leading us calmly but insistently through the characters’ external and internal landscapes.”—The New York Times Book Review

queen

Queen of America

by Luis Urrea

(Little, Brown)

“Urrea has given us that rare breed of literary sequel, a story that will satisfy fans of the original while standing solidly on its own… At once magical and corporeal, grounding and transporting.” —San Francisco Chronicle

“Queen of America reads like a thrill, and in its conclusion feels like a blessing. —Cleveland Plain Dealer

The Family Fang

The Family Fang

by Kevin Wilson

(Ecco)

“Totally weird, and pretty wonderful… manages to be brainy without sacrificing heart.” —O: The Oprah Magazine

“This is complex psychological ground, and the 32-year-old Mr. Wilson navigates it with a calm experience that his tender age shouldn’t allow.”—The Wall Street Journal


Precious Objects

Precious Objects

by Alicia Oltuski

(Scribner)

“I am unaware of a book that so intimately captures the strange and strangely beguiling place in which [diamonds] are bought and sold.” —The Washington Post

“[Alicia Oltuski] writes most fascinatingly about the strange characters that clutter the streets.” —The New York Post

A Good Hard Look

A Good Hard Look

by Ann Napolitano

(Penguin Press)

“An absorbing, old-fashioned tale about how, as in Flannery O’Connor’s stories, ‘Grace changes a person… And change is painful.”—The Washington Post

“Using O’Connor as a central character in this novel is a stroke of genius.” —NPR

America Pacifica

America Pacifica

by Anna North

(Little, Brown & Co.)

“Darcy is a hero in the true sense of the word, and this is a story about her heroics, a plot propelled almost entirely by her courageousness, her persistence – an adventure story with a literary personality.” —The Rumpus


Long Drive Home

Long Drive Home

by Will Allison

(Free Press)

“A gripping morality tale that raises questions about race, conscience and the responsibilities of parenthood.” —People Magazine

“Allison’s eye for the details of marriage and fatherhood, and his deconstruction of what can happen when a good guy makes one false move, are what will break your heart.” —O: The Oprah Magazine

The Paris Wife

The Paris Wife

by Paula McLain

(Ballantine)

“By making the ordinary come to life, McLain has written a beautiful portrait of being in Paris in the glittering 1920s — as a wife and one’s own woman.” —Entertainment Weekly

“A novel that’s impossible to resist. It’s all here, and it all feels real…” —People Magazine

 

The Boy Who Loved Tornadoes

The Boy Who Loved Tornadoes

by Randi Davenport

(Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill)

“[An] unforgettable memoir of a shattered family, a mother’s abiding love, and the frightening permutations of the human mind. —Elle Magazine


Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand

by Helen Simonson

(Random House)

“A beautiful little love story…Deserves all available prizes.” —The New York Times Book Review

The House of Tomorrow

The House of Tomorrow

by Peter Bognanni

(Amy Einhorn Books)

“Delightful…Bognanni captures that breath we take before we jump out into our life, the moment when, as he puts it, we ‘brace for the noise.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune

“I adore this book…it makes dividing questions about whether good literature comes from the heart or the mind seem like nonsense.” —Rivka Galchen, author of Atmospheric Disturbances

The Russian Dreambook

The Russian Dreambook of Color and Flight

by Gina Ochsner

(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

“[Ochsner] manages…to capture our sundry human moments and make raw and unforgettable music of them” —Colum McCann, National Book Award winning author of Let the Great World Spin

It’s the unremarkable tremors of daily life that gradually shake off the mud to reveal something infinite and hopeful… Ochsner is a true artist. —The Times (UK)


The Unnamed

The Unnamed

by Joshua Ferris

(Reagan Arthur Books/Little, Brown & Co.)

“The Unnamed is an accomplished and daring work by a writer just now realizing what he is capable of creating…The Unnamed lays bare the fabric of families, the lengths people will go for the ones they love and the lack of value we place on the simple ability to pause, to stop and to reconsider all the steps we’ve made.” —The LA Times

“At once riveting, horrifying and deeply sad, “The Unnamed,” like Tim’s feet, moves with a propulsion all its own. This is fiction with the force of an avalanche, snowballing unstoppably until it finally comes to rest…” —San Francisco Chronicle

A Friend of the Family

A Friend of the Family

by Lauren Grodstein

(Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill)

“…such an incisive diagnosis of aspirational America that someone should hand out copies at Little League games and ballet recitals.” —The Washington Post

“Unfolds with suspense worthy of Hitchcock…[Grodstein] is a terrific storyteller and an even better ventriloquist. She beautifully captures Pete’s sly self-deceptions…Ultimately, though, this is less a novel about one imperfect citizen than a sharp account of the status-driven suburban culture that turned him into a monster of conformity.” —The New York Times Book Review

The Heretic's Daughter

The Heretic’s Daughter

by Kathleen Kent

(Little, Brown & Co.)

“Kent excels at showing both the horrors and petty injustices the imprisoned endured…an eminently readable novel, and a tribute to a woman who held steadfastly to the courage of her convictions.” —Christian Science Monitor

“It is the fundamental outrageousness of these tragic events that Kathleen Kent portrays to great effect in her debut novel, The Heretic’s Daughter…Kent tells a heart-wrenching story of family love and sacrifice. Its warnings about the dire consequences of intolerance and fundamentalism still have meaning in the modern world.” —USA Today


Finding Nouf

Finding Nouf

by Zoë Ferraris

(Houghton Mifflin)

“[An] imaginative and closely observed murder mystery set in the Saudi port town of Jeddah … a literary detective novel that balances the pleasure of plot with finely milled prose.” —San Francisco Chronicle

“What’s remarkable about this debut is that its mystery takes place within a culture that has itself largely been under wraps….it’s the individual journeys of Nayir and Katya, who abide by their society’s strictures even as they are frustrated by them, that elevate Finding Nouf to a larger human drama.” —Entertainment Weekly

then_we_came_to_the_end

Then We Came to the End

by Joshua Ferris

(Little, Brown)

“What looks at first glance like a sweet-tempered satire of workplace culture is revealed upon closer inspection to be a very serious novel about, well, America. It may even be, in its own modest way, a great American novel.”— The LA Times

Then We Came to the End, it turns out, is neither small nor angry, but expansive, great-hearted and acidly funny…. [A] perceptive and darkly entertaining novel.” — The New York Times Book Review

“Engrossing.”— ESquire