Staff Picks: Audition by Katie Kitamura

Audition by Katie Kitamura

Fiction for Adults

In the opening scene of Audition, an actress meets a younger man for lunch in a trendy Manhattan restaurant and worries that their fellow diners will misconstrue their relationship. But what exactly is their relationship? And why is she so alarmed to see her husband enter the restaurant? 

An unwritten scene in the center of the novel alters the story’s direction and dynamics and redefines the relationship between the characters, essentially breaking the fourth wall of novel format. The effect is unique and disorienting. 

Audition explores the fluidity of human connection, family relationships, and power dynamics while blurring the line between reality and art. Fans of metafiction will love this trippy read that invites reflection and speculation.   

Staff Picks Vera, or Faith by Gary Shteyngart

 Vera, or Faith by Gary Shteyngart

One of my favorite recent reads describes a modern dystopia through the eyes of a young girl of Jewish and Korean descent. 

Intelligent and curious, ten-year-old Vera Bradford-Shmulkin’s observations about her father and stepmother raise concerns about her own family's stability and the state of the America in a post-democratic world. Struggling to form lasting friendships while striving for academic success, Vera questions what she's been told about her absent birth mother and forms a plan to locate her. 

Vera, or Faith is witty, insightful and equal parts charming and terrifying in its vision of a radically altered United States. 

Jewish Book Month November 24 - December 24

Jewish Book Month is November 24 thru December 24. Here are a few of my favorite literary fiction books by Jewish authors. 

Naamah by Sarah Blake

In this imaginative retelling, Noah's wife Naamah swims in the ocean while mourning the victims of the Great Flood, cares for the people and creatures on the ark, talks with angels, questions her own choices and God's, and even has visions of the distant future 

Staff Picks: The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill

 

The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill

The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill is a real treat for bibliophiles and mystery fans. This clever literary mystery revolves around four strangers who meet by chance in the Reading Room at the Boston Public Library. Friendships develop when a body is discovered at the library and the four new friends decide to investigate further. 

The novel’s first twist is that Cain, Marigold, Freddie, and Whit exist only as characters in an Australian author’s work in progress. Each chapter of Hannah Tigone’s story about the amateur sleuths is followed by a thoughtful response from an earnest beta reader living in Boston. Along with his personal observations about the emerging pandemic, fanboy Leo offers unique insights into American customs and Boston geography. As the story progresses, uncanny similarities begin to develop between Leo's correspondence with Hannah and the mystery within the story.

Just like her character Hannah, Sulari Gentil is an Australian author whose books are finding fans around the globe. The Woman in the Library is a masterfully crafted example of metafiction, a novel that emphasizes its narrative structure to remind readers they're reading a fictional work. 

Other works of metafiction include Slaughterhouse-five by Kurt Vonnegut, Hell of a Book by Jason Mott, Beatlebone by Kevin Barry, and Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth. 

Visit your local library to find your next read and maybe discover a mystery of your own. 

Alicia Cavitt

Information Specialist

Boston Public Libary Reading Room
Monica Volpin image via Canva

Staff Picks: You Dreamed of Empires by Álvaro Enrique - Adult Fiction

You Dreamed of Empires by Álvaro Enrigue

In 1519 two worlds collided when Spanish conquistadors led by Hernán Cortés entered the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan. Álvaro Enrique’s novel You Dreamed of Empires describes the encounter from both sides, interjecting humor, hindsight, and modern perspectives.   

Arriving at Tenochtitlan, the Spaniards are amazed to find towering step pyramids, painted stone pathways, ornate palaces, pools, and gardens. The Aztec city is the largest and most impressive city on Earth, and the Europeans are offered fine robes, unusual local delicacies, and a sweet drink that is as treasured as gold. 

While Cortés and his entourage make themselves at home in luxury palace suites, Montezuma spends his time napping, dosing with hallucinogenic mushrooms, ordering executions, and frustrating his inner circle. Tactically, the Europeans' only advantages are their obedient antlerless deer and firepower.

You Dreamed of Empires humanizes the story's central players, including Montezuma’s sister/wife Atotoxlit and Gerónimo de Aguilar, the Franciscan friar who serves as a translator for the Europeans. The novel also richly imagines the lives of prisoners, confidantes, advisors, servants, and priests. 

Enrigue’s vision of the epic culture clash, skillfully translated into English by Natasha Wimmer, is both illuminating and wildly entertaining. Álvaro Enrigue is a award-winning Mexican writer who has authored novels, short stories, and essays. Enrigue lives in New York and teaches Latin American literature. 

Alicia Cavitt

Information Specialist 

Aztec Step Pyramid
Image credit: Forsyth County Public Library created in Canva.com

Staff Picks: Again and Again by Jonathan Evison

 

Again and Again by Jonathan Evison

Eugene “Geno” Miles recalls past lives in vivid detail and claims to be 106 years old. The caregivers at his eldercare facility remain skeptical of both accounts, but Geno doesn't mind being left alone. 

With a little persuading, curmudgeonly Geno warms to his new nursing assistant, Angel, and reveals captivating tales of his life as a pickpocket in Medieval Spain, pursued by guards and rescued by a mysterious woman he longs to meet again in his next lifetime. Geno also describes his fascinating experiences as Oscar Wilde’s housecat, traveling with the Lewis and Clark expedition, and being an Incan princess and a beloved history professor. 

Staff Picks: The Vulnerables by Sigrid Nunez

 

The Vulnerables by Sigrid Nunez

In her latest novel, National Book Award winning author Sigrid Nunez hones in on one writer's experience living in New York City during the COVID-19 pandemic. Full of internal dialog, unanswered questions, and candid opinions, The Vulnerables is a difficult book to describe. It may best be read as reflections from your best friend on some of the unusual circumstances, inconveniences, and adjustments of recent years.   

Feeling socially isolated, Nunez’s unnamed narrator reluctantly agrees to care for a pet parrot whose pregnant owner is stranded on the West Coast, unable to fly home in the Spring of 2020, when her twenty-something bird sitter abandons his perch. But after the writer lends her own apartment to a doctor treating COVID patients, she finds herself stuck sharing her temporary living space with the original bird sitter who returns, having worn out his welcome at his parents' home. Though longing for human companionship, the housemates are so mismatched that they quietly adjust their schedules to limit interactions while they both vie for the limited attention of Eureka the parrot.

Staff Picks: How Can I Help You by Laura Sims

 

How Can I Help You by Laura Sims

A fugitive nurse with a history of hurrying patients to their deathbeds adopts a new identity as a librarian at the Carlyle Public Library. Margo keeps the patrons in line while keeping her dark secrets to herself—until a failed novelist becomes the new reference librarian and questions Margo about her abrupt career change. 

Staff Picks - That Time I Loved You: Stories by Carrianne Leung - Adult Fiction

 

That Time I Loved You: Stories by Carrianne Leung

Sandwiched between Baby Boomers and Millennials, Generation X–people born between 1965 and 1980–don’t seem to receive as much attention as the generations they follow and precede.  

What defines Generation X? 

Gen Xers came of age during a societal shift that included advances in computer technology, more women working outside of the home, and changing American demographics. Dubbed the latchkey generation, members of Generation X are considered the least parented generation in recent history. For better or for worse, adolescents and young children enjoying unstructured free time provides fertile ground for writers like Carrianne Leung to explore 1970s society in her short story collection, That Time I Loved You. 

In That Time I Loved You, families from China, Hong Kong, Portugal, Italy, Jamaica, and America pursue individual dreams and fight unique battles amid picturesque tree-lined streets as residents, both young and old, deal with hidden desires and difficulties 70s style -- behind closed doors. Each of the linked stories takes place within one Ontario neighborhood in 1979, a year marked by a rash of tragic deaths among adult neighbors in the diverse community. This insightful collection explores issues involving race, sexuality, class, and grief while painting a nostalgic (but never idealized) portrait of life before smartphones and social media. 

As a fan of literary fiction and a Gen Xer myself, I really enjoyed this thoughtful short story collection populated by memorable characters from across the globe. 

National Humor Month Staff Picks: Now is Not the Time to Panic by Kevin Wilson

Now is Not the Time to Panic by Kevin Wilson

In a creative burst of inspiration, two teenage misfits craft a cryptic phrase about gold seekers and fugitives and plaster it all over town, exciting residents of Coalfield, Tennessee and beyond. The Coalfield Panic of 1996, as it comes to be called, sparks rumors of a Satanic cult and kidnapping, as well as a real life tragedy that has lasting consequences for the creative duo.  

Readers who remember summer months before viral videos and 24 hour news channels will appreciate this nostalgic coming-of-age story about an artistic creation that spins wildly out of control.  

The edge is a shantytown filled with gold seekers.  We are fugitives, and the law is skinny with hunger for us.   

Kevin Wilson

Now is Not the Time to Panic

Staff Picks: Good Citizens Need Not Fear by Maria Reva

Good Citizens Need Not Fear by Maria Reva

Good Citizens Need Not Fear is a collection of linked short stories set in a housing complex in Ukraine in the years leading up to and following the fall of the Soviet Union. Residents of the 10-story housing complex, 1933 Ivansk Street, face struggles that US readers will be familiar with like poverty, health concerns, and government bureaucracy as well as uniquely Ukrainian threats like being spied on by neighbors and sent to Siberia. 

Staff Picks Cat Out of Hell by Lynne Truss

Cat Out of Hell by Lynne Truss 

For cat lovers, the prospect of communicating with our feline companions is an intriguing idea.  In the hands of author Lynne Truss, the premise takes a dark turn when a British librarian, grieving his wife and suddenly unemployed, discovers that his sister has gone missing.  An unusually perceptive cat seems to know something and reveals a mesmerizing story about a worldwide cat conspiracy. Fans of literary fiction, mysteries set in quaint British towns, Gothic tales, dark humor, and cat stories will love this grim, witty tale. 

Keep your friends close, your enemies closer, and never let your cats out of your sight because they are definitely plotting something.  

Alicia Cavitt
Information Specialist

#WeKnowBooks