Seven intense titles about messy relationships

Anu Kandikuppa has worked as an engineer, a software developer, and an economics consultant, most recently as Principal. The social structures of Indian families among which she grew up inform the stories in her first book, The Confines. Kandikuppa’s fiction and essays have appeared in Colorado Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, New England Review, The Cincinnati Review, Story, and other journals. In 2024, Kandikuppa received a Massachusetts Cultural Council Grant for Creative Individuals. Her work has thrice received special mention in the Pushcart Prize anthologies and has also been recognized by fellowships and residencies by the Virginia Center for Creative Arts and The Ragdale Foundation. Kandikuppa holds a Ph.D. in Finance and an MFA in Writing from Warren Wilson College. She lives outside Boston.

At Electric Lit Kandikuppa tagged seven intense books featuring messy relationships. One entry on the list:

First Love by Gwendoline Riley

In Gwendoline Riley’s First Love, Neve is in a volatile, dysfunctional marriage with an older man, Edwyn. She has never lived with anyone before him and comes from an unstable family, particularly her mother. Edwyn, meanwhile, is needy, manipulative, and recovering from a serious illness. They stumble through their marriage, with Neve making excuses for him and wondering, whenever they find a pocket of calm, whether they are “coming to an accommodation, two people who’d always expected, planned, to live their lives alone.” Riley’s sparse, laser-sharp writing makes almost every line of this sad yet improbably funny novel feel underlineable.

Read about the other titles on the list at Electric Lit.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top preppy reads

Alyson Gerber is the bestselling author of The Liars Society, a middle grade mystery set at a New England prep school. The Liars Society is a USA Today bestseller, Barnes & Noble Bookseller Favorite, B&N Most Anticipated Book of the Month, and B&N Best Book of the Year (So Far), as well as an American Booksellers Association’s Best Books for Young Readers, Roku's Best Book of the Month, Bookshop's Favorite New Books. It's also a nominee for the Texas Bluebonnet Award and Indiana's Young Hoosier Award. The Liars Society #2: A Risky Game was published in April 2025.

At The Nerd Daily Gerber tagged five iconic preppy reads, including:

The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger

A few years after The Westing Game made me a reader—I was an angsty prep school teenager assigned to read The Catcher in the Rye. At the very first mention of phonies by Holden Caulfield, I was hooked. So much so that my daughter’s middle name is an ode to this book. To soak in all aspects of the boarding school experience, this story is a must.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Catcher In The Rye appears on John Patrick McHugh's top ten list of stories about bored teenagers, A.F. Brady's list of seven literary anti-heroes who expose the dark side of NYC, Liz Phair's ten desert island books list, Brian Boone's list of five great novels that will probably never be made into movies, Natalie Zutter's list of nine classic YA books ripe for some creative genderbending of the main characters, Lance Rubin's top ten list of books with a funny first-person narrator, Andy Griffiths's list of five books that changed him, Chris Pavone's list of five books that changed him, Gabe Habash's list of the 10 most notorious parts of famous books, Robert McCrum's list of the 10 best books with teenage narrators, Antoine Wilson's list of the 10 best narrators in literature, A.E. Hotchner's list of five favorite coming-of-age tales, Jay McInerney's list of five essential New York novels, Woody Allen's top five books list, Patrick Ness's top 10 list of "unsuitable" books for teenagers, David Ulin's six favorite books list, Nicholas Royle's list of the top ten writers on the telephone, TIME magazine's list of the top ten books you were forced to read in school, Tony Parsons' list of the top ten troubled males in fiction, Dan Rhodes' top ten list of short books, and Sarah Ebner's top 25 list of boarding school books; it is one of Sophie Thompson's six best books. Upon rereading, the novel disappointed Khaled Hosseini, Mary Gordon, and Laura Lippman.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five titles featuring reporter sleuths who dig too deep

Olesya Lyuzna is a historical fiction writer with a passion for queer noir.

Her debut novel Glitter in the Dark was selected for a 2020 Pitch Wars mentorship by Layne Fargo and Halley Sutton.

She lives in Toronto and spends her free time hosting murder mystery parties and scouring the archives for unsolved crimes.

At CrimeReads Lyuzna tagged five works featuring favorite reporter sleuths, including:

The Jasmine Trade by Denise Hamilton

The murder of Marina Lu looks like a robbery gone bad. A teenage girl found dead in her car, her bridal gowns still in the backseat, her diamond ring catching the last of the LA sun. But Los Angeles Times reporter Eve Diamond knows better.

She follows the story into the world of “parachute kids”—wealthy Asian teenagers sent to America for education and opportunity, left behind in mansions while their parents run businesses overseas. Money doesn’t keep them safe. Neither does privilege. Marina had both, and she still wound up dead.

Eve has a knack for spotting the cracks beneath the city’s surface. The deeper she digs, the darker the picture gets. What was Marina doing with a much older fiancé? Why won’t her father answer any questions? And why does the trail keep leading Eve into a far uglier subculture—where young women like Marina aren’t debutantes, but property?

This is Los Angeles noir at its sharpest—a world of power and isolation, a neon-lit dream that rots from the inside out. Hamilton writes LA like she owns it, laying bare the places most people don’t want to see: the empty mansions, the late-night diners where secrets trade hands, and the rooms where silence is bought and paid for.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven titles about women and food

Hannah Selinger is a James Beard Award-nominated lifestyle writer and mother of two based in Boxford, MA. Her print and digital work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the Boston Globe, the Washington Post, Travel + Leisure, Food & Wine, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and elsewhere. Her 2021 Bon Appétit essay, "In My Childhood Kitchen, I Learned Both Fear and Love," is anthologized in the 2022 Best American Food Writing collection.

Selinger's new book is Cellar Rat: My Life in the Restaurant Underbelly.

At Electric Lit she tagged seven books about women and food, including:

Margo’s Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe

Rufi Thorpe’s latest novel–juicy, relatable, and simultaneously over-the-top–follows financially strapped Margo, a young woman with (you guessed it) no cash but plenty of other problems. One such problem: she’s pregnant, unexpectedly, with a child from an ill-advised romance with her professor. Like many young women with diminished options and an overdrawn bank account, Margo ends up in restaurant work. The rest is a story of wit and whimsy and a bit of exaggeration. Restaurant work fails Margo, but there is more out there for her, an arc of redemption for both her and for the people who have caused her harm.

Read about the other books on Selinger's list at Electric Lit.

--Marshal Zeringue