Featuring Colson Whitehead, Michael Cunningham, Claire Vaye Watkins and others
Colson Whitehead’s great machineMichael Cunningham’s unsayableand Claire Vaye Watkins yellow pine All of these are among the best reviewed books of the week.
Article continues after ad
Brought to you by book marksLit Hub’s home for book reviews.
*
1. great machine by Colson Whitehead
(Doubleday)
14 rev • 3 positive
“A wonderfully brilliant measure of the versatility and depth of the acclaimed author’s literary talent… The depth with which Whitehead details the planning and execution of this caper marks him as a top-tier researcher – he has drawn on numerous primary sources to ground this work of fiction in historical fact… A modern masterpiece and an ode to New York, no matter whether rats scurry around and cockroaches scurry underfoot. Are.”
-Leigh Haber (Los Angeles Times)
2. Duneen by Keith Ridgway
(new Directions)
4 rev • 2 positive • 3 mixed
read an excerpt from Duneen Here
“Reproducing ambivalence on the page in this way can be a risky and potentially alienating strategy for the reader. But it’s thrilling to see Ridgway playing with clarity and certainty; the linguistic energy and diversity of the prose give us plenty of props to move through the shadows. And laughs come too… clear and effective.”
-Michael Donkor (Guardian)
3. new people by Andrea Uptmore
(Little Brown and Company)
3 rave • 2 positive
“(A) bold and twisting plot… Just as impressive as Uptmore’s authorial daring with the plot and characters is her rich setting, which deploys all the details of life as we knew it in the year 2008… Uptmore has pulled off quite a turn in her debut novel. In a word: sold out.”
-Marion Winick (boston globe)
4. yellow pine By Claire Way Watkins
(Riverhead)
2 rev • 3 positive • 1 pan
Read an interview with Claire Vaye Watkins here
“Yellow Pine is a controversial place: the phrase describes both an ill-conceived green energy project and the protest camp that springs up to protest its existence. The conflict between the two reflects on a couple caught in a midlife crisis in this smart, thorny novel…Watkins displays incredible grace and rich humor as she inhabits this harsh landscape with eccentric characters struggling with recovery, a society out of step with humanity, environmental destruction, and the boom and bust of tourism enterprises. Populates… You might not want to join their daily struggle, but you appreciate it – and enjoy their company deeply… Watkins skillfully describes a world of chosen families and iconoclastic women who can’t deny their passionate hearts.
-Lauren LeBlanc (boston globe)
5. mortons By Justin Larbalestier and Scott Westerfeld
(Pamela Dorman Books)
1 rev • 3 positive • 1 mixed
“The book swirls with creative enthusiasm, poignant humor and amusing twists on topics such as art, avant-garde fashion and mixology… At times the book feels like it is collapsing under the weight of its details. Its rules are not always consistent… whether mortons That’s because you may, at least partially, depend on your tolerance for violence… Yet, the writers mercifully give Jessica at least a fighting chance at redemption in the end (and maybe even a hint of a sequel). I’d like to see what she does with it.”
-Sarah Lyle (New York Times Book Review)
**
=1. The Frenchman: Or, My Life in Theory by Emily Akin
(penguin)
3 rave • 1 positive
“…an excellent blend of gossip, memoir, and philosophy, a history of human folly alongside recurring ideas explained with admirable clarity. And, despite his eventual disillusionment with theory, Eakin convincingly argues that what once appeared to be the most esoteric of intellectual pursuits has actually had a profound impact on American culture.”
-Laura Miller (slate)
=1. Country of Lords: Neo-Elites, Social Darwinists, Technological Utopians, and the Long Fight Against Equality in America By Kim Phillips-Finn
(WW Norton & Company)
3 rave • 1 positive
“Immaculately groomed…she keeps it.” country of lords Lean and delicate, allowing her characters and anecdotes to shine… Phillips-Finn is a beautiful writer and balletic thinker; Its opening paragraph grabbed me in the palm of its hand and kept me engaged till the end. His book is short, only 200 pages, but his argument has wide-ranging implications for the future of the nation-state.
-Hamilton Cain (on the sea wall)
3. Unsaid: A Life in Writing by Michael Cunningham
(random House)
2 rev • 3 positive • 1 mixed • 1 pan
“Beautiful…an essential resource for those who write, and a thought-provoking experience for all who love to read.”
-Peter Thornell (Library Journal)
4. Papa, love, I By Matthew Quick
(Avid Reader Press)
1 rave • 3 positive
“What begins as an excavation of childhood trauma gradually turns into something rarer and more enlightening: what happens when forgiveness comes only when parents need it most, who begin to lose the ability to understand it… The epistolary form is inherently uncertain, especially when addressed to parents. It can easily turn into sentimentality, a pitfall that Quick mostly avoids, even if there are some passages in that direction. grow.”
-Tas Tobe (New York Times Book Review)
5. Carousel: An Essay on Seeing By Sarah Miner
(Yale University Press)
2 rave • 1 positive
“Sarah Miner is a master weaver… Miner is a master of using form to create meaning, and vice versa; in her work, the medium is entirely the message that the literal shape of the work is its subject.”
-Melissa Holbrook Pearson (brooklyn rail)
