Ten essential African novels

Publishers Weekly asked five novelists, each from a different African country and with a new novel out this spring, to select two of their favorite African novels. One of Odafe Atogun's picks:

Season of Crimson Blossoms by Abubakar Adam Ibrahim

Season of Crimson Blossoms is a beautiful-sad story told with great artistry. Against a backdrop of tragic family histories brought about by ruthless politicking and religious extremism, Binta, a devout middle-aged Muslim widow, and Reza, a young weed-smoking gangster, begin an illicit affair.

Haunted by the painful memory of loss in a hypocritical society which uses religion to promote hatred and violence, Binta experiences a primal desire to save her lover from a life of crime. But is it love or the quest for redemption that emboldens her to listen to her heart for once? A combination of both, maybe?

Whatever, it is an affair that foretells grave danger, for Binta especially. But already held a prisoner by the hopeless yearnings of her own heart, she finds it impossible to apply the brakes. And as the affair festers and consumes her and her lover, Binta realizes that she is living in a society that will never allow her to find love, even if she chooses to steal it. As for Reza, he is confined by society never to find fulfillment, not even redemption.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top books about what was happening behind the scenes of famous novels

At B&N Reads Jeff Somers tagged "five absorbing investigations into what was happening behind the scenes of five famous novels," including:

Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind: A Bestseller’s Odyssey from Atlanta to Hollywood, by Ellen F. Brown and John Wiley, Jr.

More than 75 years after its publication, it can be difficult for modern readers to understand the phenomenon that was Gone With the Wind when it was first published in 1936. It won the Pulitzer Prize and was an instant bestseller, and was quickly adapted into the epic film many of us know better than the book. Brown and Wiley don’t waste time retreading the life of Mitchell, but rather focus on the mechanics of how a debut novel from an unknown writer became an instant pop culture smash that has maintained its grip on public consciousness ever since.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Four books that changed Mardi McConnochie

Mardi McConnochie is an Australian author and playwright. One of four books that changed her, as shared at the Sydney Morning Herald:

A WIZARD OF EARTHSEA
​Ursula K. Le Guin

This series exemplifies all the things I like about the best fantasy fiction for younger readers. Le Guin's prose is pared back but amazingly deep and supple, expressing very complex ideas and emotions in simple language. Her work is psychologically rich and satisfying, with characters caught in dilemmas that are profound and urgent. Earthsea is a diverse world that feels both deep and broad, vividly imagined, with a conception of magic at its centre that is utterly convincing and never generic.

Read about the other entries on the list.

A Wizard of Earthsea is among Maria Turtschaninoff's ten favorite feminist heroes in fiction, BBC.com Culture’s best children’s books ever published in English, five books that changed Gary Corby, and Lev Grossman's top five fantasy novels.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top standalone urban fantasy novels

At the B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog, Meghan Ball tagged ten of the best standalone urban fantasy novels, including:

War for the Oaks, by Emma Bull

This Locus Award-winning novel is a beautiful example of how powerful and wonderful urban fantasy can be, building a whole magical world beneath our own in just one book. Written in 1987, before the avalanche of fearie paranormal romance, it still feels fresh and special. Eddi McCandry is a musician who has just lost her band and her boyfriend. As if her luck couldn’t get worse, she’s shanghaied into a supernatural war involving the courts of Seelie and Unseelie, a war with personal stakes for Eddi, who must learn to navigate this new world, and fast. Emma Bull’s debut is infused with music and wonder, and should be considered a cornerstone of the genre.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Robert Newman's six best books

Robert Newman is a British comedian, political activist, and author. His new book on brain science is Neuropolis. One of his six best books, as shared at the Daily Express:

WAR AND PEACE by Leo Tolstoy

I’ve read this four times. As a student I got impatient and threw it into the neighbour’s garden. But I climbed over the fence and started it again. You feel totally immersed.

Read about the other books on the list.

War and Peace appears among John Cleese's six favorite books, Kate Kellaway's ten best Christmases in literature, the Telegraph's ten best historical novels, Simon Sebag Montefiore's five top books about Moscow, Oliver Ford Davies's six best books, Stella Tillyard's four favorite historical novels, Ann Shevchenko's top ten novels set in Moscow, Karl Marlantes' top ten war stories, Niall Ferguson's five most important books, Norman Mailer's top ten works of literature, and John Mullan's lists of ten of the best battles in literature, ten of the best floggings in fiction, and ten of the best literary explosions.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top ten terrible houses in fiction

Xan Brooks is an award-winning writer, editor and broadcaster. He spent his rude youth as part of the founding editorial team of the Big Issue magazine and his respectable middle period as an associate editor at the Guardian, specializing in film. The Clocks in This House All Tell Different Times is his first novel.

One of Brooks's ten top terrible houses in fiction, as shared at the Guardian:

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

Rebecca is the name of the first Mrs de Winter, dead in a boating accident but still haunting the wings of lavish Manderley, on the Cornish coast. The house remains much as she left it. Her housekeeper Mrs Danvers remains stubbornly in situ, like an emissary from the spirit world. The second Mrs de Winter knows she can never measure up. It is all she can do to totter out in one piece.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Rebecca appears on Tom Easton's top ten list of fictional "houses which themselves seem to have a personality which affects the story," Martine Bailey's list of six of the best marriage plots in novels, Stella Gonet's six best books list, John Mullan's list of ten of the best conflagrations in literature, Tess Gerritsen's list of five favorite thrillers, Mary Horlock's list of the five best psychos in literature, and Derwent May's critic's chart of top country house books.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six books that will ruin your childhood memories

At the B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog Jeff Somers tagged "six books turn comforting, innocent entertainments into something subversive and disturbing," including:

The Sleeping Beauty Trilogy, by Anne Rice

The fact that Anne Rice, whose work isn’t exactly shy and blushing, chose to publish the four novels in the Sleeping Beauty Quartet pseudonymously should tell you just how warped they are. If you ever once enjoyed the innocence of Disney version of Sleeping Beauty (though to be fair, “princess enchanted into sleep and woken by a kiss from a prince” has all kinds of implications to unpack even with the cute cartoon birds in tow), then you will be completely, totally, 100 percent squicked-out by what Rice does to the princess in this reimagining, set in a universe where minor royals are turned into sex slaves and playthings, brutally beaten, raped, and mentally broken. Beauty resists, despite the clear evidence of what that will earn her. By the time you’re done with the first book, the old fairy tale will forever be one of your triggers. Unless you’re into that, which is perfectly ok.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top war memoirs

One of Andrew Sharples' top ten war memoirs, as shared at the Guardian:

My War Gone By, I Miss It So by Anthony Loyd

For a certain kind of person war is a drug and nowhere is that more apparent than in Anthony Loyd’s account of his time as a correspondent in Bosnia. While immersed in the conflict, Loyd is high on adrenaline, but on returning home, the only way he can achieve that rush is through heroin, and he slips into addiction. The beauty of the prose urged me forward but every few pages the description of a fresh horror stopped me dead in my tracks.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Twenty top books for the new fantasy reader

At the B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy blog Nicole Hill tagged twenty top fantasies to introduce beginners to the genre, including:

The Magicians, by Lev Grossman

There’s a subversive side to magic, all those schools full of future witches and wizards, always on the lookout for some mysterious, powerful foe. That’s where Brakebills College for Magical Pedagogy comes in. Quentin Coldwater has never believed magic is real, until he passes the Brakebills entrance exam. The experience isn’t quite Hogwarts, and Quentin discovers magic alone might not be able to fill the emptiness inside of him.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Magicians is among Soman Chainani's five top SFF novels with perfect opening lines, Christian McKay Heidicker's six top read-aloud books for grown-ups, Diana Biller's five creepiest rabbits in fiction, Jenny Kawecki's seven fictional schools that couldn't pass a safety inspection, Entertainment Weekly's top ten wickedly great books about witches, Jason Diamond's top fifty books that define the past five years in literature, and Joel Cunningham's eight great books for fans of Donna Tartt's The Secret History.

The Page 69 Test: The Magicians.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six books for understanding how cities work

Richard Florida is one of the world’s leading urbanists. His latest book is The New Urban Crisis: How Our Cities Are Increasing Inequality, Deepening Segregation, and Failing the Middle Class-and What We Can Do About It. One of the author's six favorite books on urban capitalism, innovation, and inequality, as shared at The Week magazine:

The Coming of Post-Industrial Society by Daniel Bell

In 1973, Bell detailed the rise of a society no longer driven mainly by agriculture or manufacturing, but by technology, information, and knowledge. He also highlighted the growing importance of the new technocratic class of scientists, engineers, and knowledge workers in that society.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five kickass feminist YA books

At the BN Teen blog, Jenny Kawecki tagged "five feminist reads that’ll have you raising hell while you wait" for the release of Jennifer Mathieu’s upcoming novel, Moxie, including:

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, by E. Lockhart

Former good girl Frankie is no longer the quiet “bunny rabbit” she used to be. Tired of being thought of as her popular boyfriend’s arm candy, Frankie slowly decides it’s time to prove what she’s capable of—especially once she finds out said boyfriend is part of an all-male secret society. Infiltrating the society isn’t enough. Soon, Frankie has become the mastermind, orchestrating complicated pranks through her secret identity. But what will happen when the boys find out who’s behind their hijinks? Frankie, for one, might not care.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks is among Kayla Whaley's five best opening scenes in YA lit, Sona Charaipotra's five top YA books to read when you're burnt out on love, and Sabrina Rojas Weiss's ten favorite boarding school novels.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ian Ogilvy's six best books

Ian Ogilvy played Simon Templar in the 1970s TV series Return Of The Saint and has appeared in Upstairs, Downstairs and Murder, She Wrote. One of his six best books, as shared at the Daily Express:

SCOOP by Evelyn Waugh

I love his wry sense of humour. He doesn’t push the jokes at you. The main character writes a country column and is then given a journalistic assignment to a war-torn country. It’s very silly.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Scoop is among Hallie Ephron's top ten books to keep you laughing and Tom Rachman's top 10 journalist's tales.

--Marshal Zeringue