I'm phoning it in this week. (Not really, I'm just vaguely paying attention to today's #AppleEvent in case they announce a new iPhone that will read and edit lit journal submissions for me.)
Three of the authors with new books out September 14th have been interviewed on our site in the past: T.C. Boyle, Mary Roach, and Yiyun Li. (Make it four if you include Elliott Holt's contribution to Li's book.)
Today's new literary products will add more value to your life than whatever Silicon Valley has in store for you. (Unless they release that Lit Journal Editor app!)
New Books Published September 14, 2021
Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law by Mary Roach
“Around the world, criminals run free in the forest. These villains can’t be arrested — because they’re not human. In her latest book, Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law, Mary Roach puts the spotlight on these miscreants….Bears break and enter, raiding the refrigerators of mountain homes. And deer do so much jaywalking. Nature’s perp list also includes camels, mountain lions, crows and many more. Through such examples, Roach tackles this question: What should we do when animals break laws intended for people?” (Science News)
Tolstoy Together with Yiyun Li
“When acclaimed author Yiyun Li and A Public Space invited people to read War and Peace together at the start of the pandemic, thousands around the globe joined for an 85-day journey through Tolstoy’s epic novel. They read together, debated favorite characters, discussed Tolstoy’s craft lessons and concealed structure, found resonances between the novel and our own world. Tolstoy Together, based on this experiment, is a book about the art of reading. It is a daily motivating companion for the solo reader, a distilling of Tolstoy’s masterful craft, and a template for the book club of the future.” (Lit Hub)
Inter State by Jose Vadi
“California has been advertised as a destiny manifested for those ready to pull up their bootstraps and head west across to find wealth on the other side of the Sierra Nevada since the 19th century. Across the seven essays in the debut collection by José Vadi, we hear from the descendants of those not promised that prize. INTER STATE explores California through many lenses: an aging obsessed skateboarder; a self-appointed dive bar DJ; a laid-off San Francisco tech worker turned rehired contractor; a grandson of Mexican farmworkers pursuing the crops they tilled.” (Soft Skull Press)
Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead
“Whitehead’s Harlem caper may seem a dramatic departure from its two sobering predecessors. Yet in their own way, The Underground Railroad and The Nickel Boys were also crime novels, devoted—much like Harlem Shuffle—to the odyssey of the fugitive. Whitehead’s latest features a young furniture dealer named Ray Carney who is caught up in a jewel heist that forces him to wrestle with the impossible terms confronting him as a Black man trying to get ahead in life. To escape his circumstances, will he fare best simply by following the straight and narrow? Is there such a thing when Black shopkeepers like him cannot secure bank loans? Or should he rely on the world of criminals to get what he wants, what he needs?” (The Atlantic)
Talk to Me by T.C. Boyle
"Boyle, 72, is sticking with a theme that has powered much of his fiction: rationality in collision with our feral side. The premises have changed…But explorations of good intentions pitted against human folly have been his M.O....Boyle set Talk to Me in the late 1970s, ‘when we were excited by this idea of communicating with other species — with dolphins, for instance, as well,’ he says. 'What we ignored was that other animals have their own language.’”(Los Angeles Times)
Links of the Week: Get Mary'd
Gonna skip this week's featured link because I don't have strong feelings about anything I read online the past few days. (Turns out I am phoning it in.)
Actually, hey, how about you read Mary Miller's new story "Outage" in Oxford American? (You did read my interview with her from a few days ago, didn't you?)
Anyway. Get to it. Read the new Mary Miller. Read the new Mary Roach. Get Mary'd.
(Ouch—these dad jokes have been flying out at a furious clip lately. Maybe they'll release a new app for that today...like an ad blocker but for dad jokes?)