Hanif, Booker-longlisted for A Case of Exploding Mangoes, dives headfirst into an unnamed desert in the present day and the disparate characters stuck in it. Ellie, an American bomber pilot who’s crash-landed, struggles through the desert half-hallucinating until he comes upon a dog. The do... Continue reading »

An original premise, relentless pacing, and strong female characters lift this nail-biter from Edgar winner McKinty (the Sean Duffy series), which takes a no-holds-barred look at how far a parent will go to protect her child. Divorced teacher Rachel Klein, a cancer survivor, lives on Massachusetts’s... Continue reading »

Equal parts surreal and wickedly droll, Campbell’s collection of 12 stories traverses reality in a way that highlights the extraordinary within everyday life. The menagerie of tales taps into an array of offbeat topics. In “Death Sure Changes a Person,” a man’s jealous wife keeps returning from the ... Continue reading »

A forbidden relationship fuels lust and love in the stellar first Uptown Girls historical by Shupe (the Four Hundred series). In 1890s Manhattan, 23-year-old-socialite Marion “Mamie” Greene worries that she’ll be miserable in an arranged marriage, especially given her growing affection for handsome ... Continue reading »

Hernandez explores the tensions between idealized young love and comfy mature reality in this powerful follow-up to The Love Bunglers. The saga of punk lesbian lovers Maggie and Hopey has been unfolding for more than 30 years in the Love and Rockets series, and this masterful episode gives ... Continue reading »

The searing third collection from Brown (The New Testament) begins with the luminous “Ganymede,” in which Heaven is described as “that far terrain/ between Promise and Apology.” Brown inextricably weaves exploration of race, religion, and social burden: “I am a they in most of America./ Som... Continue reading »

In this finely wrought story, Vogel Sawyer (Waiting for Summer’s Return) takes reader to the 1895 Cotton Exposition in Atlanta. Willie Sharp takes a job at the Expo to pay for his father’s medical treatment after he suffers a stroke. Laurel Millard, meanwhile, is expected by her older sibli... Continue reading »

A fitting sequel to 2011’s Scent of the Missing, about training dogs to search for humans, this moving memoir from Charleston (The Possibility of Dogs) focuses on another aspect of canine search and rescue: finding other dogs who run or wander off. It turns out that her golden retr... Continue reading »

Manilla Spoon blogger Raines delivers on her promise of flavorful dishes built around noodles and rice. Raines offers such popular standbys as pad Thai, pad see ew, pho, and fresh spring rolls, but offers plenty of surprises. There’s moo sarong, a visually impressive dish of fried pork meat... Continue reading »

Barton (The Bible: The Basics), editor-in-chief of the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Religion, provides a clear, comprehensive look at “the story of the Bible from its remote beginnings in folklore and myth to its reception and interpretation in the present day.” Barton writes wi... Continue reading »

Passionately and fearlessly, Ribay (After the Shot Drops) delves into matters of justice, grief, and identity in this glimpse into the life and death of a fictional victim of President Duterte’s war on drugs in the Philippines. In Michigan, Filipino-American high school senior Jay Reguero i... Continue reading »