A fishing village plagued by ghosts and omens unites to protect a refugee girl in Justin Haynes’s potent novel "Ibis". The site of a vicious sugar plantation centuries ago, New Felicity, Trinidad, is a nexus for Venezuelan refugees.... Read More
Archaeology department graduate students encounter more than mere relics on an expedition gone wrong in Ella Alexander’s wry novel "The Sleeping Land". Kit, Val, and Mark exist in uneasy alliance under their department head, George, a... Read More
In David Wright Faladé’s immersive novel "The New Internationals", cross-cultural friendships and romances challenge racial barriers in post–World War II Paris. During the Nazi occupation, Cecile’s parents enrolled her in a... Read More
In Zeeva Bukai’s novel "The Anatomy of Exile", a Jewish Israeli mother struggles to reconcile herself to a tragedy from her past while watching a similar situation unfold for her own daughter. Tamar’s sister-in-law, Hadas, is killed... Read More
In a remote Italian town, an unassuming cobbler is drawn into helping partisans fight against fascists and Nazis in Sacha Naspini’s novel "The Bishop’s Villa". Despite missing several fingers, René is the cobbler of Le Case. He’s... Read More
"The Courage of Birds" is Pete Dunne’s enthusiastic, informative book about avian survival strategies. Loosely organized into three sections, the book summarizes Dunne’s observations of avian behaviors across decades of bird watching... Read More
An affecting bildungsroman, "The Summer Between" is about personal discovery in a period of historical tumult. In Robert Raasch’s novel "The Summer Between", a college-bound man navigates his gay identity amid the upheavals of the... Read More
In Minrose Gwin’s rich coming-of-age novel "Beautiful Dreamers", a precocious girl navigates the tense atmospheres of 1950s Mississippi. After her father abandons her family, Mem and her mother, Virginia, return to the small Gulf Coast... Read More