Five cautionary tales about shopping

At Book Riot Liberty Hardy tagged five “buyer, beware” novels about the dangers of shopping. One entry on the list:

Wintersong by S. Jae-Jones

It’s only forever, not long at all…

Up next is a YA retelling of a mix of Labyrinth (but without the purple leggings) and Beauty and the Beast. It’s about a young woman looking to save her sister from the Goblin King. When Liesl’s younger sister Käthe eats magical fruit at the Goblin Market, she falls under the spell of the feared and mysterious Goblin King. To save her, Liesl must travel to the Underground to get her back.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Wintersong is among Darren Croucher's six top novels connected to the 1980s.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight notable books about libraries

Edwin B. Maxwell is the Chief Librarian of Brooklyn Public Library (BPL). A New York City native, born and raised in the Bronx, he began his career at BPL and worked his way through every level of the system, now leading public service across BPL’s central library and 60 neighborhood branches. Over nearly two decades, he has expanded access, supported youth programming, and helped shape libraries as spaces for connection, learning, and opportunity. He believes deeply that reading, in all its forms, belongs to everyone, and that libraries are essential community spaces that show up as real pillars in their communities, meeting people’s needs in whatever way is needed.

At Lit Hub Maxwell tagged eight favorite books about libraries, including:

Wayne A. Wiegand, Part of Our Lives

A history of public libraries that shifts the focus from institutions to the people who use them. Wiegand centers everyday readers and how they moved through libraries, what they chose, and why it mattered. It’s a reminder that libraries are not defined solely by what they offer, but by how communities shape, use, and make meaning from them.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Nine of the best climate and sustainability books

Vogue asked four climate activists to help "compile a reading list that offers context and perspective on issues of climate, sustainability, and resistance." One pick by Xiye Bastida, climate activist and Indigenous rights advocate:

Begin Again by Oliver Jeffers

This is the book I would’ve loved to write because it just makes sense, but it also makes us question everything we know about how to be human. Very few times have I come across something so grounding yet inspiring. Every time I read it, I feel the spark of my activist fire go bright.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven titles that let India’s smaller towns shine

Sneha Pathak is an independent writer and translator based in India. Her work has appeared in Business Standard, Scroll.in and Strange Horizons. She translates between Hindi and English.

At Electric Lit Pathak tagged seven novels that feature India’s smaller towns. One title on the list:

The Folded Earth by Anuradha Roy

Set in Ranikhet, a small town in the foothills of Northern Himalayas, The Folded Earth is the story of Maya, a young widow. She has come in search of sanctuary, and The Folded Earth shows a small town becoming a safe haven. At the same time, it reveals the fragility of such peace and tranquillity when faced with powerful local forces that thrive on conflict. Roy gives local color in descriptions of this charming town as well as through characters like the aristocratic Diwan Sahib and the young Charu—people who can only be found in India’s mofussils. Never in a hurry to reach its destination, The Folded Earth moves at a languid pace, capturing the feeling of strolling along winding, hilly roads of the town it describes.

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

--Marshal Zeringue

Twenty-eight top investigative journalism titles

At the Waterstones blog Anna Orhanen tagged twenty-eight "investigative journalism books as page-turning as any thriller," including:

Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe

The award-winning author of Say Nothing turns his penetrating gaze to the stupendously wealthy and influential Sackler family, probing the dark and murky methods they have employed to amass their fortune.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Empire of Pain is among Lit Hub's ten best books for understanding the opioid crisis.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten gripping western historical fiction titles

At Woman’s World Melissa D’Agnese and Carissa Mosness tagged ten of the best western historical fiction books. One title on the list:

Outlawed by Anna North

Set in 1894, this bestselling novel follows 17-year-old Ada, whose life is defined by society’s expectations. A year into her marriage, she still hasn’t gotten pregnant, and in her world, that’s not just disappointing. It’s dangerous. Women who can’t conceive are accused of witchcraft and hanged. Desperate to escape that horrifying fate, Ada decides to join the infamous Hole in the Wall outlaw gang. Suddenly, she’s living a life she never imagined and it’s one filled with freedom, danger and impossible choices. But when the stakes get higher, Ada must decide: Is she willing to risk everything for her freedom or will she go back to her old life filled with expectations and accusations? A fun western tale that is perfect for fans of The Handmaid’s Tale.

Read about the other entries on the list.

Outlawed is among Emily Burack's twenty-five top books like Yellowstone, Brittany Bunzey's thirteen top wilderness novels, Claudia Cravens's eleven westerns that break the genre's rules, Robin McLean's eight top books about surviving in the wilderness and Christina Sweeney-Baird's seven books that imagine a world without men.

The Page 69 Test: Outlawed.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six top horror titles featuring libraries or librarians

Lyndsie Manusos’s fiction has appeared in PANK, SmokeLong Quarterly, and other publications. She holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and has worked in web production and content management. When she’s not nesting among her books and rough drafts, she’s chasing the baby while the dog watches in confused amusement. She lives with her family in a suburb of Indianapolis.

At Book Riot she tagged "great stories that either take place in a library or involve a library or a librarian," including:

The Death of Jane Lawrence by Caitlin Starling

This is another example of a story where the library is a key location. Jane Shoringfield knows she must marry to continue her work. She chooses the reclusive doctor, Augustine Lawrence, who agrees to her proposal. He makes her promise one thing in return: never visit his ancestral home, Lindridge Hall.

Yet on their wedding night, she becomes stranded there, and her new husband now seems…different. Without spoiling anything–and this story has a lot of surprises–it’s safe to say a lot of key moments and epiphanies take place in Lindridge Hall’s library. Jane is a curious, competent, and clever heroine, yet even she cannot predict the shock and horror this story brings by the end.

Read about the other entries on the list.

The Death of Jane Lawrence is among Casper Orr's seven top novels that celebrate autistic voices.

The Page 69 Test: The Death of Jane Lawrence.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six literary mysteries set in the 1980s

T. Greenwood grew up in rural Vermont in the 1970s. She began writing stories at seven years old and wrote her first "novel" at nine on her dad's electric typewriter.

Since then, she has published sixteen novels. She has received grants from the Sherwood Anderson Foundation, the Christopher Isherwood Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Maryland State Arts Council. She has won three San Diego Book Awards. Five of her novels have been Indie Next picks. Bodies of Water was finalist for a Lambda Foundation award, and Keeping Lucy was a Target Book Club Pick.

[My Book, The Movie: Rust and Stardust; The Page 69 Test: Rust and Stardust; Writers Read: T. Greenwood (August 2019); The Page 69 Test: Keeping Lucy; My Book, The Movie: Keeping Lucy; Q&A with T. Greenwood; The Page 69 Test: Such a Pretty Girl; My Book, The Movie: The Still Point; My Book, The Movie: Everything Has Happened]

Greenwood's new novel is Everything Has Happened.

At CrimeReads the author tagged six favorite literary mysteries set in the 1980s, including:

Megan Abbott, The End of Everything

Megan Abbott has become known as the contemporary queen of noir, but The End of Everything, published in 2011, is the first novel of Abbott’s which explores the intensity of friendships between girls, a subject found in many of her subsequent novels. The End of Everything, set in a midwestern suburb in the mid-1980s, centers on thirteen-year-old Lizzy Hood, whose best friend, Evie, is kidnapped. The novel illuminates the complexity of this friendship, the girls’ burgeoning sexuality, and their respective attractions to older men.

Abbott has said that it was inspired by Lolita, drawing from the second half of the novel during which Humbert Humbert kidnaps the young Dolores Haze and takes her on the road. As with all of Abbott’s books, The End of Everything is atmospheric, and much of the suspense psychologically driven.

Read about the other titles on Greenwood's list.

The End of Everything is among Heather Levy's eight books about dark desires that will crush you, Lisa Levy's eight most toxic friendships in crime fiction and Hallie Ephron's top ten mysteries that harness unreliable narrators.

The Page 69 Test: The End of Everything.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten memoirs that explore the nuances of family estrangement

Jenny Bartoy is a French American writer, critic, and editor based in the Pacific Northwest.

Her new book, No Contact, is an anthology about family estrangement. Ocean Vuong called it "a landmark work."

Bartoy writes essays, author profiles and interviews, and book reviews. Her work appears in a variety of publications, including The Boston Globe, The Seattle Times, The Rumpus, CrimeReads, Chicago Review of Books, Under the Gum Tree, Room, and Hippocampus Magazine, and in literary anthologies such as Sharp Notions: Essays from the Stitching Life.

At Lit Hub Bartoy tagged ten great memoirs that explore "the realities of [family] estrangement with the vulnerability and nuance it deserves, providing a powerful counterpoint to pervasive and reductive sociocultural talking points." One title on the list:

Stephanie Foo, What My Bones Know

In this best-selling memoir, Foo investigates the repercussions of complex PTSD (C-PTSD) caused by her abusive parents and her subsequent estrangement from each of them in turn. The book describes both her research into C-PTSD and her extensive efforts to heal. This is a rich, complex memoir in which Foo explores her familial roots, the impact of intergenerational trauma in Asian-American immigrant communities, the failures of American healthcare, and the patriarchal erasure of women’s suffering. While trauma is its focus, at heart the book wrestles with the concept of parent-less identity and the question of deserving to be loved. “Trauma isn’t just the sadness that comes from being beaten, or neglected, or insulted. That’s just one layer of it. Trauma also is mourning the childhood you could have had,” Foo writes. “Trauma is mourning the fact that, as an adult, you have to parent yourself.” At times heartwrenching, at others darkly funny, this story provides a vivid and layered glimpse into the perspective of a no-contact adult child.

Read about the other entries on the list at Lit Hub.

--Marshal Zeringue