The 30 greatest dystopian books

One title on Forbes's list of the thirty greatest dystopian books of all time:

Exit West by Mohsin Hamid (2017)

A novel that marries the dystopian and Magical Realism genres, Exit West explores the lengths people will go through to escape political turmoil. The narrative unfurls as a couple meets and marries in the Middle East, and as their country descends into chaos, learn of a magical door that can transport them to a new territory—for a price. The couple discover the true cost of freedom as the new world becomes victim to many of the issues they thought they had escaped from in this moving political allegory. This book is recommended for readers of complex political thrillers, lovers of magical realism and slow burning dystopias.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Exit West is among Ore Agbaje-Williams's seven top books featuring very complicated friendships, Gian Sardar's eight of the best novels about war-torn love, C Pam Zhang's top ten novels about moving and Helen Phillips's six notable novels involving alternate realities.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top books about conspiracy theories

James Ball is the Global Editor at The Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Previously special projects editor at The Guardian and special projects editor at BuzzFeed UK, James played a key role in the Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the NSA leaks by Edward Snowden, as well as the offshore leaks, HSBC Files, Reading the Riots and Keep it in the Ground projects.

At WikiLeaks he was closely involved in Cablegate - the publication of 250,000 classified US embassy cables in 2010 - as well as working on two documentaries based on the Iraq War Logs.

Ball is the author of The Other Pandemic: How QAnon Contaminated the World.

At the Guardian he tagged five of the best books about conspiracy theories, including:

Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK by Gerald Posner

Most Americans believe that Lee Harvey Oswald didn’t act alone when he killed John F Kennedy – but this book should change their minds. It’s both meticulously reported and pacy as a thriller, and if it doesn’t convince you of the truth of the Kennedy assassination, nothing will.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Case Closed is among Allen Barra's five top JFK assassination books.

Also see Colin Dickey's ten brilliant books to understand conspiracy thinking and Anna Merlan's five of the best books on conspiracy theories in America.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven sport novels about more than athleticism

Adrian Markle is the author of the novel Bruise and many short stories. Originally from Canada, he now lives with his partner in Cornwall, UK, where he teaches English and Creative Writing at Falmouth University.

"[S]port novels are never only about sport," Markle claims.

As sport exists as a product of our political and politicized cultures, so then do explorations and depictions of it. Stories about sport are also stories about class, gender, race, identity, mental health, disability, or collective vs individual identity (though probably not all of them all at once).

At Electric Lit the author tagged seven contemporary novels about sport. One title on the list:

Breath by Tim Winton

Breath is a classic coming of age story. Pikelet is a loner. Too intellectual to fit in with the country kids, too low class to fit in with the city kids, he floats around alone until he meets another outcast, Loonie, the local wild boy, with whom he becomes best friends and surfing buddies. Eventually, the two of them fall in with Sando, an enigmatic and reclusive surfing guru, and his wife Eva, an angry and distant former athlete suffering from a chronic injury. Those relationships push the boys farther than they thought possible—no matter how dangerous that might be. Pikelet, Loonie, Sando, and Eva’s story is one of shifting loyalties and single-minded pursuits that have lifelong consequences. The descriptions of the surfing in particular paint it as something beautiful and powerful, terrible, and almost mystical.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Breath is among Renata Salecl's five top books on modern misery.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six iconic thrillers set in Italy

Tom Hindle hails from Leeds and lives in Oxfordshire with his wife, a cat and two surprisingly cunning tortoises.

He is the author of A Fatal Crossing, The Murder Game, and Murder on Lake Garda – which were inspired by masters of the crime genre such as Agatha Christie and Anthony Horowitz.

At the Waterstones blog Hindle tagged six favorite thrillers set in Italy, as is Murder on Lake Garda. One title on the list:

The Dark Angel by Elly Griffiths

The tenth mystery in Elly Griffiths's brilliant Dr Ruth Galloway series, this particular outing sees Ruth travel to Italy at the request of a local archaeologist, who is eager for her help with a collection of bones he’s discovered in a rural village. With her daughter and a friend in tow, Ruth finds herself investigating a mystery that stretches all the way back to the war years. But it seems there are secrets someone will kill to protect, and when a fresh murder is committed, it quickly becomes clear that this once-dormant mystery may yet prove deadly.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Also see John Hooper's top ten books about Italy.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the best feminist caper stories

Tess Amy was born in Johannesburg but now enjoys a nomadic lifestyle, living between Europe and South Africa. She holds a master’s degree from The Durban University of Technology, is an outdoor enthusiast, animal lover and unfaltering optimist.

The Confidence Games is her debut contemporary fiction novel. She also writes historical fiction as T.A. Willberg.

At CrimeReads Amy tagged five "favorite feisty feminist caper stories," including:

The Housekeepers by Alex Hay

Set in 1905, London, this is the only historical caper I’ve come across recently and its unique setting really gives it a stand-out edge. With humour, gutsy characters and twists galore, this book is a gem. Historical fiction has always been my favourite genre to read (followed closely by thrillers and contemporary crime), and when done well—as in The Housekeepers—these stories offer insight and perspective into the ways humanity has changed (for better or worse) over the past decades and centuries.

The Housekeepers tells the tale of Mrs King, who, after being fired from her position as head housekeeper at Mayfair’s finest home, recruits a ragtag group of women to help her pull off a grand heist in the name of revenge.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten books about women colliding with wild creatures

Julia Phillips is the author of the bestselling novels Bear and Disappearing Earth, which was a finalist for the National Book Award and one of The New York Times Book Review’s 10 Best Books of the Year. A 2024 Guggenheim fellow, she lives with her family in Brooklyn.

[Writers Read: Julia Phillips (June 2019)]

At Electric Lit Phillips tagged ten books in which

the women who meet wild creatures, both animal and mythical, are often trapped in their own lives. Domestic drudgery rules. They’re homemakers, caretakers, wives and mothers and daughters and sisters who are struggling against the limitations imposed on them. When they meet a beast, though, they are able to get to a previously inaccessible wildness. They break away from human rules, a strictly human world, and into something other—something extraordinary, something free. The beast outside provokes the transformation within.

One title on the list:

Chouette by Claire Oshetsky

This poetic and wonderfully odd story is about a woman who gives birth to an owl. Everyone around the main character, Tiny, is shocked, even repulsed, but Tiny adores her dear, bizarre little bird. And thanks to the strength of the writing, we readers completely understand why. Oshetsky’s artistic vision here is unparalleled. I could not get enough.

Read about the other books on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Fifteen books about Appalachia

In 2020 at Book Riot Kendra Winchester tagged fifteen books in "the rich tradition of Appalachian literature," including:

When These Mountains Burn by David Joy

When These Mountains Burn features two men deeply impacted by the opioid crisis in Appalachia. In this work of Appalachian Noir, Joy proves a master storyteller, and once you’ve finished this book, you’ll be heading to the bookstore to pick up his backlist.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Also see Kaytie Norman's seven eye-opening books about Appalachia and Katie Pickard Fawcett's five favorite books of Appalachia.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight thrillers & horror novels set at terrible summer camps

Molly Odintz is the managing editor for CrimeReads and the editor of Austin Noir, now available from Akashic Books. She grew up in Austin and worked as a bookseller before becoming a Very Professional Internet Person. She lives in central Texas with her cat, Fritz Lang.

At CrimeReads Odintz tagged eight top thrillers and horror novels set at terrible summer camps, including:

Liz Moore, The God of the Woods

Liz Moore’s Long Bright River was a spectacular pivot to crime for Liz Moore and her new one should cement her reputation. It’s a great summer read about missing children at a summer camp, with a tinge of “all of this has happened before” looming around the edges. Reading this felt like discovering Tana French’s In the Woods—and not just because of the “child disappeared in the woods” angle, but because it’s unputdownable and thrillingly constructed.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven novels about brilliant freaks

Jane Flett is a Scottish writer who lives in Berlin. Her debut novel is Freakslaw.

Flett's fiction has been commissioned for BBC Radio 4 and features in Electric Literature’s Recommended Reading. She is a recipient of the Scottish Book Trust New Writer Award, the New Orleans Writing Residency and the Berlin Senate Stipend for non-German literature. Her work has also been Highly Commended in the Bridport Prize and performed at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.

At Electric Lit Flett tagged seven favorite novels about brilliant freaks, including:

Lives of the Monster Dogs by Kirsten Bakis

It’s November 2008 when the monster dogs arrive in Manhattan by helicopter. Biomechanically engineered by a mad Prussian surgeon, these dogs walk upright, dine with silver cutlery balanced in their prosthetic hands, and talk intelligently through mechanical voice boxes. They are deeply uncanny, but New York has always been a city that embraces oddballs, and so the monster dogs quickly become reluctant celebrities, appearing on chat shows and hosting lavish balls. The story is told through various forms: newspaper articles, diary entries, even an opera libretto. I didn’t know I needed to read an opera written by a dog until I got my hands on this bizarre and brilliant novel, but I did, and so do you. It is perfect in every way.

Read about the other novels on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the best body horror novels

Monika Kim is a second-generation Korean-American living in Los Angeles’ Koreatown.

In her first novel, The Eyes are the Best Part, she writes:

Ji-won is a seemingly normal college student whose life unravels after her father’s departure and the arrival of her mother’s creepy new Caucasian boyfriend, George. After eating a fish eye for luck during a traditional Korean meal, Ji-won develops a morbid obsession with George’s blue eyes, culminating in acts of violence that confront the white male gaze in a very literal fashion.

At the Guardian Kim tagged five favorite titles for readers who "have the intestinal fortitude for body horror tales." One novel on the list:

The Vegetarian by Han Kang

Yeong-hye is stuck in a nightmare. Against her family’s wishes, she has become a vegetarian. When her family physically forces her to eat meat, they set in motion a series of events that will change her life for ever. Han Kang’s writing is beautiful and evocative, and her ambitious novel tackles mental illness, consent, misogyny and autonomy.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Vegetarian is among Adam Biles's top ten allegories, M. S. Coe's eleven titles about women on the brink, and Amy Sackville's ten top novels about painters.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six creepy novels about stalking & obsession

Born and raised in North London, S.B. Caves is the international bestselling author of A Killer Came Knocking and I Know Where She Is, which The Sun described as "sinister, unsettling and gripping."

His new high concept thriller is Honeycomb.

Caves now lives in South London with his wife and two sons.

At CrimeReads the author tagged six creepy novel about stalking and obsesson "with some of the most twisted plots and even more twisted antagonists." One titele on the list:

The Woman in the Purple Skirt by Natsuko Imamura

There is something oddly dreamy and effortlessly troubling about this short but memorable novel by Natsuko Imamura. The story is told from the perspective of our narrator, The Woman in the Yellow Cardigan, as she slips into a deep and seemingly motiveless infatuation with her new colleague, whom she refers to as The Woman in the Purple Skirt. What unravels is a subtle study of loneliness; our narrator is apparently unaware of how bizarre and downright creepy her spying becomes, as she shadows the subject of her curiosity through the mundane minutiae of their work as housekeepers at a hotel, before invading the most intimate aspects of her private life. The Woman in the Yellow Cardigan’s behavior, while never overtly threatening, is precisely unsettling because of how normal she makes her stalking seem. There is an unrelenting persistence to her observations that go mostly unnoticed throughout, yet the thought of someone dedicating all their energy and mental bandwidth to an unwitting participant is truly chilling.

Read about the other books on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

The best books with kickass women characters

James L’Etoile is a former associate warden in a maximum-security prison, hostage negotiator, facility captain, and director of California’s state parole system, and he uses his twenty-nine years “behind bars” as an influence in his award-winning novels, short stories, and screenplays. His novels include Dead Drop, Black Label, At What Cost, Bury the Past, and Little River.

Face of Greed is his latest novel and the first book in the Detective Emily Hunter Mystery Series.

At Shepherd L’Etoile five favorite books with kickass women characters, including:

Death in the Family by Tessa Wegert

Secrets always intrigue me. Shana Merchant has secrets, and she’s spent years running from them. Shana’s past writhes around her like a poisonous vine. She can’t break free from it, and if she’s not careful, it will suffocate everything around her.

The first book in this series establishes Shana as a smart, once-successful big-city cop, but this isn’t a simple redemption story. I found Shana’s path over the course of this series insightful as she tries to overcome PTSD after being held by a serial killer—not just any serial killer. The connection between the two blew me away and it threads through the series.

Fantastic characters, immersive settings, and tight plots drew me into this series, and I’m waiting for more.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Q&A with Tessa Wegert.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten titles about breakups, heartbreak, and moving on

Liz Riggs is a writer based in Nashville. She holds an MFA in Fiction from NYU and her work has been published in The Atlantic, Bon Appétit, American Songwriter, MTV and others.

Her debut novel is Lo Fi.

At Electric Lit Riggs tagged ten books that "explore the grief of loss, the things we’ll do (often stupidly) for love, and the ways we try to move on and fail. The people or exes that we keep coming back to." One title on the list:

Green Dot by Madeline Gray

I read this book earlier this spring in about 48 hours, immediately drawn in by the classic premise: a young woman gets involved in a tumultuous affair with an older, married man (who just so happens to be one of her coworkers.) The affair between Hera and Arthur is mildly predictable in its trajectory—how could it not be?— but what holds the reader close is Gray’s smart, hilarious and wholly commanding voice. While these types of relationship stories typically have the same arc, as there is mostly only one way for them to end, Gray’s storytelling is anything but. I do not say this lightly: this book is laugh out loud funny, and I almost never laugh out loud while reading. The humor and self-awareness will make you root for Hera, even as she makes objectively terrible decisions over and over again—and then makes some more. The sex is good, the consequences are bad, the ending you already know. You should read every word of it anyway.

Read about the other books on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six thrillers with a side of romance

Vi Keeland is a #1 New York Times, #1 Wall Street Journal, and USA TODAY bestselling author. With millions of books sold, her titles are currently translated in twenty-six languages and have appeared on bestseller lists in the US, Germany, Brazil, Bulgaria, Israel, and Hungary. Three of her short stories have been turned into films by Passionflix, and two of her books are currently optioned for movies. She resides in New York with her husband and their three children where she is living out her own happily ever after with the boy she met at age six.

Keeland's debut thriller is The Unraveling.

At CrimeReads she tagged six favorite thrillers with a side of romance, including:

First Lie Wins by Ashley Elston

Evie Porter has the perfect life—big house, handsome and successful boyfriend, evenings spent attending fancy parties. She’s finally settling into the life she’s always wanted. There’s just one problem—Evie Porter doesn’t actually exist, and it’s her job to con people into believing she’s who she says she is. First Lie Wins is a sublime game of cat and mouse, filled with morally gray characters, a smart female lead, twists that keep on coming, and the perfect sprinkle of romance.

Read about the other titles on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top historians of war

Max Hastings is an author, journalist and broadcaster whose work has appeared in every British national newspaper.

His newest book is Operation Biting: The 1942 Parachute Assault to Capture Hitler's Radar.

At the Waterstones blog he tagged five of his favorite historians of war, including:

Michael Howard

I guess it is sort of inevitable that almost all the writers whom I cite here should be, or have been, big figures in my own life, because I have taken care to get to know the historians whom I admire. Michael Howard was a towering figure in the lives of all of us who write about war, the wisest person I have ever met. Born in 1922, he had the most unusual distinction of having served as a wartime soldier, winning an MC at Salerno in 1943, then going on to a glittering academic career for which he was made a Companion of Honour and member of the Order of Merit. His early big book, published in 1961, The Franco-Prussian War still reads well. But I also recommend his 2003 short, succinct study of World War I, packed with terse, illuminating insights; also the several published collections of his lectures and essays. I am indebted to Michael for innumerable words of wisdom about conflict in general and twentieth-century warfare in particular, often deliberately designed to provoke. For instance, a year or two before his death in 2019 he suddenly said to me: ‘Such a pity we won the Falklands War!’ I asked, of course: why so? ‘Because just as Britain was getting over the trauma of Suez and starting to come to terms with our much diminished place in the world, along came victory in the South Atlantic, to revive all the old nationalistic delusions about our importance, which eventually led to Brexit.’ I loved and revered Howard, and hear his voice in everything he wrote.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight novels about toxic relationships

Lauren Kuhl is a writer and novelist based in New York.

Her debut novel is The Art of Pretend.

At Electric Lit Kuhl tagged eight of her "favorite novels that brilliantly memorialize the most toxic relationships we have with others, and occasionally, ourselves." One title on the list:

Heartburn by Nora Ephron

It wouldn’t be a list about toxic relationships without Heartburn. Ephron’s sole novel, Heartburn is a loosely fictionalized account of the writer’s own marriage, which dissolved due to her husband’s affair, while she was pregnant with their second child, no less. But this being a creation of Ephron, she will make you laugh with her one-of-kind wit, only to punch you in the gut with raw emotion when you least expect it.

Read about the other books on the list.

Heartburn is among Sylvie Bigar's five essential food memoirs, Elizabeth Lowry's top ten difficult marriages in fiction, Candice Carty-Williams's six heroic women in literature, Jeff Somers's ten books to read before getting divorced, Diana Secker Tesdell's top ten memorable meals in literature, and Anna Murphy's top ten lesser-known literary heroines.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten titles exploring secret ecosystems & shadow economies

Elizabeth Heider lived in Italy for several years, working as a research analyst for the U.S. Navy. She’s currently a scientist at the European Space Agency, and her short fiction has earned recognition from the Santa Fe Writer Awards and the New Century Writer Awards.

Heider's new novel is May the Wolf Die.

At CrimeReads she tagged ten books if "you’re compelled to peel away the secrecy, to unlock clandestine systems and see what makes them tick." One title on the list:

Smiley’s People by John le Carré

If you want to understand clandestine intelligence operations, the masterful canon of John le Carré is a must-have – your backstage pass into this ethically grey world. John le Carré (David Cornwell) famously launched his career as a writer after working for Britain’s clandestine service, M16. His first book in 1963, The Spy who Came in from the Cold made a splash for its stark depiction of the moral ambiguity of real spy work—a contrast to the glamorous and clearly-defined “us versus them” landscape Ian Fleming created for James Bond. In my opinion, le Carré’s writing evolves and improves over time—its apotheosis manifested in George Smiley, a character who contends for top-place as one of my all-time favorite protagonists. Unlike Bond, George is far from a physical specimen—and there’s nothing of the ladies man in him. Instead, he’s clever, perceptive, compassionate, and has few illusions. He’s also unassuming —a trait that makes for a good spy (“Smiley was the oddest. You thought, to look at him, that he couldn’t cross the road alone, but you might as well have offered protection to a hedgehog.”). I list Smiley’s People as the book to read, but I’m tricking you into reading multiple books here – because you really should read Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (and possibly the other Smiley books) first. In Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, we learn about the very personal nature of Karla, George’s enemy in the KGB’s Thirteenth Directorate. In Smiley’s People, to beat Karla, George must become him.

Le Carré’s prose is often breathtakingly poignant, because he was a master of both language and human nature. “There are moments that are made up of too much stuff for them to be lived at the time they occur,” he tells us in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. And, in Smiley’s People, he observes, “In the spy trade, we abandon first what we love the most.”

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five novels that examine celebrity culture

Olivia Petter is an award-winning journalist, author, and broadcaster based in London.

Petter's first book, Millennial Love, was published in July 2021. Described as “honest and funny” by Pandora Sykes, the book is based on Petter's podcast of the same name and blends social commentary with memoir and interviews.

Her debut novel, Gold Rush, will be published in July 2024.

At the Guardian Petter tagged "five novels that examine celebrity culture." One title on the list:

The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald

Jay Gatsby is an enigmatic loner renowned for throwing lavish parties for strangers. On the surface, he has everything: wealth, adulation, and a thriving social life. Yet he partakes in none of it, preoccupied instead by the more meaningful pursuit of love, something he slowly realises is never guaranteed, no matter how dazzling a life we purport to live.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Great Gatsby appears among Charlotte Vassell's five favorite books in which rich people (think they can) get away with murder, Charlotte Vassell's top ten cads in fiction, Sarah Blake's top ten tales about the rich, Lupita Nyong’o’s ten favorite books, Christian Blauvelt's five top NYC-set novels that became NYC-set films, Kate Williams's six best books, Jeff Somers's ten best book covers...ever and seven most disastrous parties in fiction, Brian Boone's six "beloved classic novels whose authors nearly cursed with a terrible title," four books that changed C.K. Stead, four books that changed Jodi Picoult, Joseph Connolly's top ten novels about style, Nick Lake’s ten favorite fictional tricksters and tellers of untruths in books, the Independent's list of the fifteen best opening lines in literature, Molly Schoemann-McCann's list of five of the lamest girlfriends in fiction, Honeysuckle Weeks's six best books, Elizabeth Wilhide's nine illustrious houses in fiction, Suzette Field's top ten literary party hosts, Robert McCrums's ten best closing lines in literature, Molly Driscoll's ten best literary lessons about love, Jim Lehrer's six favorite 20th century novels, John Mullan's lists of ten of the best clocks in literature and ten of the best misdirected messages, Tad Friend's seven best novels about WASPs, Kate Atkinson's top ten novels, Garrett Peck's best books about Prohibition, Robert McCrum's top ten books for Obama officials, Jackie Collins' six best books, and John Krasinski's six best books, and is on the American Book Review's list of the 100 best last lines from novels. Gatsby's Jordan Baker is Josh Sorokach's biggest fictional literary crush.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven novels about families surviving political unrest

Asha Thanki is an essayist and fiction writer. her work has appeared in The Southern Review, The Common, Catapult, Hyphen, and more. She is a Kundiman fellow and has received support through scholarships and grants from Sewanee Writers Conference, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Speculative Literature Foundation. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Minnesota.

A Thousand Times Before is Thanki's debut novel.

At Electric Lit she tagged seven books that demonstrate

the consequences of the world we live in, the ways that our political histories are inseparable from how we walk through the world. That the political and the personal are always, always, intertwined.

One title on the list:

Brotherless Night by V.V. Ganeshananthan

From the prologue of Brotherless Night and then all the way through, this novel puts forth an experience of conflict and history with the type of voice that makes you feel like the narrator is looking directly at you as she speaks. For Sashi, nearly 18 years old at the novel’s beginning, her four brothers and the neighbor boy, her parents and her grandmother—all fill her world with so much care, love, and joy. Their lane in Jaffna is a place of safety for so much of Sashi’s life, until the growing violence against Tamil people leads to the murder of her oldest brother, spurring both Sashi’s loved ones—and Sashi—to action.

Ganeshananthan writes in a way I can only dream of doing. Sashi’s voice engages the reader directly—indicts them. From the beginning, the novel asks, Who created the labels we use, and what happens when those labels serve to distance the observer so that empathy, humanity, and understanding are erased? And if it were you, what would you do, in order to protect the people you call home?

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight sketchy-spouse domestic thrillers

Andrew DeYoung is the author of The Temps, a speculative novel about the end of the world.

He works as an editor at a childrens book publishing company, and he lives with his wife and two children in the Twin Cities area in Minnesota.

The Day He Never Came Home is his first domestic thriller.

At CrimeReads DeYoung tagged eight

fantastic “Who the F did I marry?” books for you to enjoy, if you, like me, can’t look away from the slow-moving trainwreck of someone finding out the complicated, occasionally ugly truth about the person they married.

One novel on the list:

The Wife Before, by Shanora Williams

“He is not the man I assumed he was…”

A prolific writer of both thrillers and romance, Shanora Williams delivers the perfect “Who the F did I marry?” book in The Wife Before. She captures not just the fear of realizing your spouse might not be who you thought they were, but also the fairy tale romance that might lead a person to marry someone they don’t know very well in the first place. Here, it’s Samira falling quickly for Roland, a professional golfer who seems like the perfect man to help her get some direction in her life. But when she moves into his secluded home and discovers diary entries written by Roland’s previous wife, Samira realizes her husband might not be who she believes him to be—and that she might be in danger.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten of the best British political novels

At the Waterstones blog Mark Skinner tagged ten great Parliamentary page-turners. One title on the list:

The Line of Beauty
Alan Hollinghurst

A profound panorama of British politics, sex and society in the Thatcherite 1980s, Hollinghurst’s Booker Prize-winning novel sees naïve Nick Guest enter the orbit of a Tory MP and his glamorous family.

Read about the other titles on the list.

The Line of Beauty is among Deborah Parker and Mak Parker's ten biggest bootlickers from literature and history and Kwasi Kwarteng's top ten books about Thatcherism.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven top thrillers with shocking twists

Born in the Midwest, Jenna Satterthwaite grew up in Spain, lived briefly in France, and is now happily settled in Chicago with her husband and three kids. Satterthwaite studied classical guitar, English Lit and French, and once upon a time was a singer-songwriter in folk band Thornfield. She loves sushi, reading in her natural habitat (aka her bed), and women taking back their power.

Made For You is her debut novel.

At Electric Lit Satterthwaite tagged seven "novels with surprising plot turns that shatter expectations," including:

The Resort by Sarah Ochs

Welcome to paradise. We hope you survive your stay…

Who doesn’t want to escape regular life and jet off to an idyllic, remote island in Thailand?

Well, ‘escape’ is exactly what the members of the expat community known as “the Permanents” are doing at the Koh Sang Resort. Except, they’re not escaping for fun. Each of the Permanents has a secret to hide and a past to flee from, including Cass, a local dive instructor who has found her own perfect escape and fresh start, not to mention, an amazing boyfriend and the promise of love in paradise.

When a dive student is found dead, suddenly the secrets that everyone has buried are swimming to the top, and Cass can’t help but realize–someone has figured out who she really is.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Q&A with Sara Ochs.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five lightly surreal novels

Chandler Morrison is the author of eight books, including Dead Inside, #thighgap, and the recently released American Narcissus. His short fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies and literary journals. He lives in Los Angeles.

At CrimeReads Morrison tagged five lightly surreal novels.

No matter what forms of surrealism they weave into their narratives, the human element is always at the forefront. Each of them exposes some vital, incontrovertible aspect of existence, and whatever weirdness may be present only serves to accentuate that.

One title on the list:

Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh

Perhaps the most striking aspect of Ottessa Moshfegh’s work is her ability to craft weird, neurotic, and largely unlikable protagonists who feel intimately relatable. There’s often a sense when reading her novels that she has somehow manufactured a horrifying reflection of all the aspects of humanity that we thought no one knew about us. It’s the “she is just like me for real” effect. The narrator of Eileen is by and large an absolute freak, but there’s something so universal about the depiction of her consciousness that she could be anyone. This creates a haunting and extremely tense mood of anxiety and restlessness that permeates throughout the entire novel. There’s also a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it detail toward the end of the book that seemingly calls into question everything before it, or at least it did for me. I asked Ottessa about it the first time I met her, desperate to know I hadn’t imagined it. She stared at me blankly for a few moments and then said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Read about the other entries on the list.

Eileen is among Lila Savage's top ten caregivers in fiction.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight of the best microhistories

At B&N Reads Isabelle McConville tagged eight must-read microhistories, including:

Butts: A Backstory by Heather Radke

Everyone has thought about a butt at one point or another. Whether it’s your own or a crush’s, maybe you’re thinking it’s too big, too small, or just right. Have you ever wondered why we have such a fascination? No need to plug your nose — this cheeky account of the backstory of our butts is a great time.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the best titles about literary threesomes

Costanza Casati was born in Texas in 1995 and grew up in a village in Northern Italy, where she studied Ancient Greek, and Ancient Greek literature, under one of the country’s most rigorous academic programmes. She is a graduate of the prestigious Warwick Writing MA in the UK, and worked as a screenwriter and journalist.

Clytemnestra is her debut novel. It has sold into 18 territories worldwide, is a Saturday Times bestseller, and was shortlisted for the HWA Debut Crown Award.

Casati's new novel is Babylonia.

At the Guardian she tagged "five novels featuring some of my favourite literary threesomes." One title on the list:

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

In an alternate England where humans are cloned to become organ donors, Kathy H remembers her time at Hailsham boarding school, where she developed a close relationship with two other students: Ruth C and Tommy D. The novel is a heartbreaking exploration of lost chances in love, and how hard it is to let go of those we care for.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Never Let Me Go is on Sadi Muktadir's seven novels that give you hope before devastating you, Scott Alexander Howard's list of eight titles from across the world about isolation, Kat Sarfas's list of thirteen top dark academia titles, Raul Palma's list of seven stories about falling into debt, Akemi C. Brodsky's list of five academic novels that won’t make you want to return to school, Claire Fuller's list of seven top dystopian mysteries, Elizabeth Brooks's list of ten great novels with unreliable narrators, Lincoln Michel's top ten list of strange sci-fi dystopias, Amelia Morris's lits of ten of the most captivating fictional frenemies, Edward Ashton's eight titles about what it means to be human, Bethany Ball's list of the seven weirdest high schools in literature, Zak Salih's eight books about childhood pals—and the adults they become, Rachel Donohue's list of seven coming-of-age novels with elements of mystery or the supernatural, Chris Mooney's list of six top intelligent, page-turning, genre-bending classics, James Scudamore's top ten list of books about boarding school, Caroline Zancan's list of eight novels about students and teachers behaving badly, LitHub's list of the ten books that defined the 2000s, Meg Wolitzer's ten favorite books list, Jeff Somers's lists of nine science fiction novels that imagine the future of healthcare and "five pairs of books that have nothing to do with each other—and yet have everything to do with each other" and eight tales of technology run amok and top seven speculative works for those who think they hate speculative fiction, a list of five books that shaped Jason Gurley's Eleanor, Anne Charnock's list of five favorite books with fictitious works of art, Esther Inglis-Arkell's list of nine great science fiction books for people who don't like science fiction, Sabrina Rojas Weiss's list of ten favorite boarding school novels, Allegra Frazier's top four list of great dystopian novels that made it to the big screen, James Browning's top ten list of boarding school books, Jason Allen Ashlock and Mink Choi's top ten list of tragic love stories, Allegra Frazier's list of seven characters whose jobs are worse than yours, Shani Boianjiu's list of five top novels about coming of age, Karen Thompson Walker's list of five top "What If?" books, Lloyd Shepherd's top ten list of weird histories, and John Mullan's lists of ten of the best men writing as women in literature and ten of the best sentences as titles.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven novels about learning and mastering a new skill

Camille Bordas is a novelist and short story writer. She is the author of two novels in English, The Material (2024) and How to Behave in a Crowd (2017). Her earlier two books, Partie Commune and Les Treize Desserts, were written in her native French.

Her short stories have appeared in The New Yorker and The Paris Review.

Bordas has been named a Guggenheim Fellow. Born in France, raised in Mexico City and Paris, she currently lives in Chicago.

At Electric Lit the author tagged seven novels about learning and mastering a new skill, including:

The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt

This contemporary classic might not need introduction, but I’ll go for it anyway: narrated in turn by Sibylla and her young son Ludo (an absolute prodigy capable of reading ancient Greek and doing advanced calculus at age 5), it is perhaps the most fun novel ever written about the nature of intelligence. Sibylla is extremely smart herself, but can’t always keep up with her son, who’s constantly asking her to teach him something new. Yet her lessons are like magic tricks: when Sibylla teaches her son to read ancient Greek, we learn alongside him, and are entertained the whole way through. The book is smart and hilarious (Sibylla is very judgmental) without ever condescending to its reader. It assumes we are as smart as it is.

In its second half, Ludo goes on a quest to find a suitable father for himself, and the volume of lessons drops, but other types of learning come into play. Namely, he starts hearing a lot about games (chess, bridge), and there is this line that I find absolutely gorgeous in its simplicity when it comes to explaining what teaching is, and what its limits might be:

“When you play bridge with beginners—when you try to help them out—you give them some general rule to go by. Then they follow the rule and something goes wrong. But if you’d had their hand you wouldn’t have played the thing you told them to play, because you’d have seen all the reasons the rule did not apply.”

Read about the other titles on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven top toxic-wellness fiction titles

At B&N Reads Isabelle McConville tagged seven top "toxic-wellness fiction [titles] to keep you glowing from the inside," including:

Natural Beauty: A Novel by Ling Ling Huang

A musician’s life takes a sharp, devastating turn that leads her to a sales representative job at a luxury beauty and wellness store. Enter the world of creams, lotions, potions and more in Natural Beauty, a story that examines the dark underbelly of what it means to be beautiful and the steep price of aesthetics.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Natural Beauty is among Olivie Blake's five top titles about regretting that cult you joined.

Also see Jamie Lee Sogn's eight top mysteries & thrillers set in the wellness industry.

--Marshal Zeringue

Four top novels of subtle espionage

Flynn Berry is the New York Times bestselling author of Under the Harrow, winner of the 2017 Edgar Award for Best First Novel; A Double Life, a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice; and Northern Spy, a Reese’s Book Club pick that was named one of the ten best thrillers of 2021 by The New York Times and The Washington Post. Northern Spy is being adapted for film by Netflix.

Berry's new novel is Trust Her.

At CrimeReads she tagged four

favorite novels about amateur spies. These characters go undercover, without extensive training, an extraction team, expensive equipment, or any idea of what damage might lie ahead.

One title on the list:

The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid

Two men sit over cups of tea in Old Anarkali, a district in Lahore. They are, seemingly, strangers. One has the “short-cropped” hair and broad chest “typical of a certain type of American; but then again, sportsmen and soldiers of all nationalities tend to look alike.” The other man, Changez, has returned to Pakistan after studying at Princeton and working as an analyst in New York. Is one of the men a spy, or both? If so, what might they do to each other? I started reading this absorbing, brilliant novel on a train, and then sat on a bench at my station, reading until the last page.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Reluctant Fundamentalist is among Abir Mukherjee's five top thrillers about terrorism, Ryan Lee Wong's ten best novels about Asian American politics, Maris Kreizman's top twenty-three short books, Colleen Kinder's ten books about chance encounters with strangers, Maris Kreizman's nineteen top short books and stories, Ian MacKenzie's ten top books about Americans abroad, Emily Temple's ten top contemporary novels by and about Muslims, Laila Lalami's eight top books about Muslim life for a nation that knows little about Islam, Porochista Khakpour's top ten novels about 9/11, Jimmy So's five best 9/11 novels, and Ahmede Hussain's five top books in recent South Asian literature.

The Page 69 Test: The Reluctant Fundamentalist.

--Marshal Zeringue