In Kristen Witucki’s emotionally gripping novel, young Tallie struggles for self-acceptance against other people’s expectations and beliefs, particularly around her blindness. Meanwhile, Benjamin, who works in reader services at the... Read More

With a fast pace and concise, humorous writing, "Hug Chickenpenny" is a unique and playful tale. S. Craig Zahler’s "Hug Chickenpenny" is curiously fun. An asymmetrically deformed baby boy is born one night in the huge, terrifying, and... Read More

Woefully unfair. Dedicated to a deceased father, this collection is so powerful and precious, it’s heartbreaking to realize how meaningful it would have been for the old man, if he had the chance to read it. Oh, James Crews, your dad... Read More

Jacqueline Waters is practiced at the velvet glove-iron fist approach to poetry, at times finessing or obscuring the poem’s impact so that when it lands, the force is staggering. Her poetry has appeared in Harper’s, Chicago Review,... Read More

The novel emphasizes how, no matter the circumstances, there’s room for belief in a future. Niccolò Ammaniti imagines the fallout of an epidemic fever in his gripping, post-apocalyptic "Anna". "Anna" will inspire comparison with The... Read More

With Christmas right around the corner, Georgie is disheartened to learn that rough times mean Santa may not be able to deliver the ice skates he has been wishing for, in "The Santa Thief". Set in small-town Pennsylvania circa 1920, the... Read More

"Full Service Blonde" is a fantastic read—light on mystery, and heavy on romance and drama. "Full Service Blonde" is a breezy, entertaining mystery dealing with prostitutes, thieving cats, and the bustling Vegas strip. Christmastime in... Read More

Family shapes us; "Parsimony" exposes this truth with effortlessly elegant prose and characters who linger. With eloquent language worthy of literary recognition, Peter Nash’s "Parsimony" offers wisdom fraught with interpersonal and... Read More