Books

With the fervor over AI and how ChatGPT will inevitable change English classes — and nary a word from said author of that piece on the scores of books being removed from those classes — it seemed only right to experiment with the tool. How easily could it parrot the talking points of “parental rights”

Hamra and the Jungle of Memories is a stunning retelling of “Little Red Riding Hood” that brims with big emotions, big adventure and very big teeth. Hamra knows the rules about the Langkawi jungle behind her island home in Malaysia: Never enter without asking the jungle’s permission, never use her real name and never take

The United States Postal Service unveiled the new Toni Morrison forever stamp last Tuesday at a ceremony held at Princeton University. Morrison, one of the most influential modern American writers, was a professor at Princeton for almost 20 years, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and the Nobel Prize in Literature before she passed away

Historical fiction is the star of our April issue (11 of our favorites!), but we’ve also got the first memoir from Big Fish author Daniel Wallace, Victor LaValle’s highly anticipated new horror novel and exceptional Earth Day books for kids. Upcoming issues of BookPage will bring special books for Mother’s Day and new releases from Hector Tobar,

If you’ve been paying attention to the news lately, you know there’s been a flood of anti-trans legislation, bans of trans books, and a disturbing increase in anti-trans rhetoric recently. In response, Sim Kern, author of Depart, Depart! and Seeds for the Swarm, is hosting a Trans Rights Readathon next week!  This is a decentralized fundraiser, which means you can

In A Tempest at Sea, a twisty and turbulent installment of Sherry Thomas’ perennially entertaining Lady Sherlock mystery series, a glamorous Christie-esque cast sails into danger on the open seas. A Tempest at Sea is the seventh adventure of Charlotte Holmes, a brilliant detective who solves mysteries while pretending to be the assistant of her

The 2023 Women’s Prize longlist has been announced! After the 1991 Booker Prize shortlist was announced, then called the Man Booker Prize, and no women authors appeared on it, a group of journalists met and wanted more. Together, they founded the Women’s Committee and began the quest for starting a literary prize of their own,

Dr. Alexa Hagerty, an associate fellow at the University of Cambridge and an anthropologist with a Ph.D. from Stanford, can read bones. In Still Life With Bones: Genocide, Forensics, and What Remains, Hagerty explores the close connection between bones and words. Like words, bones can be articulated (arranged into a coherent form, such as a

Gardening isn’t just for the countryside! This exuberant picture book celebrates the joys of community gardening and sharing food with neighbors and friends in the city. Red gingham patterned endpapers set the table for City Beet, a reimagining of a Russian folktale commonly known as “The Gigantic Turnip.” The story begins when young Victoria and

The 2023 PEN/Faulkner finalists were announced Tuesday. The award has been granted for over 40 years to American authors, and is judged by writers who see a peer’s work as being the “first among equals.” The author who wins first place will win $15,000, and each finalist $5,000. This year’s judges were R.O. Kwon, Tiphanie Yanique, and

Color: We can’t not see it, and yet we’re frequently unaware of the power of its strategic use, even as we feel the effects. But you’ll never take color for granted again after perusing Charles Bramesco’s Colors of Film, which explores the palettes used in 50 iconic films through four eras of cinema. Bramesco’s discussion

The acclaimed author of the “sweeping and beautifully written novel” (Woman’s World) The Light Over London weaves an epic saga of love, motherhood, and betrayal set against World War II. Liverpool, 1935: Raised in a strict Catholic family, Viv Byrne knows what’s expected of her: marry a Catholic man from her working-class neighborhood and have his children.

It’s only 239 more days until Halloween — who’s ready??? Okay, maybe it’s a little early to start celebrating the biggest night of scares, but you can treat your brain to a happily horrifying time with books every day of the year! That’s why we present a monthly round-up of amazing upcoming horror books, including

Second-generation Syrian American Khadija Shaami lives to buck the expectations of others, especially her overbearing mother. She loves driving her huge, luxurious Mercedes-Benz G-wagon, has decked out her bedroom with Syrian flags and artwork and is the only Muslim girl who boxes at her gym. Leene Taher, a refugee from Syria, seems to embody all

The 2023 PEN American Literary Award Winners have been announced! This year’s awards conferred $350,000 to writers and translators in eleven different categories that include fiction, nonfiction, poetry, biography, essay, science writing, literature in translation, and more. The winners were announced live at the PEN America Literary Awards Ceremony on March 2, at The Town

Journalism professor Michelle Dowd was raised in California’s Angeles National Forest as part of an ultrareligious cult known as the Field, which was begun by her grandfather. She grew up fearing the apocalypse might arrive at any moment, and public education was shunned and largely avoided. “Outsiders” were never to be trusted. As Dowd writes

At a heated school board meeting this week in Volusia County, Florida, two books under fire were retained. Both Ellen Hopkins’s Glass and Erika L. Sanchez’s I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter will stay on shelves. This is a sign of the process working, as books like these (and nearly every other book being

During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Cathleen Schine sat lounging in her glorious, sweet-smelling Los Angeles garden, feeling miserably stuck. She knew she wanted to write about Jewish German exiles in Hollywood during World War II but feared that a strictly historical novel might become “a pit of phony insertions of detail,” a

Green Hill School in Chehalis, Washington is, as described on its website, a “medium/maximum security fenced facility that provides older males sentenced to Juvenile Rehabilitation treatment with education and vocational training.” Graduate students in University of Washington’s Information School are holding a book drive to upgrade the books available in the Green Hill School library. Grad

Pakistani American author Reem Faruqi tells the fascinating story of her late grandmother’s life in Milloo’s Mind: The Story of Maryam Faruqi, Trailblazer for Women’s Education.  Faruqi, who was born in 1920 in Poona, India, was given the nickname “Milloo” by her father. Milloo loved learning from an early age: “When she read, her thoughts

In 1999, author Kate Zernike, then a reporter for The Boston Globe, broke an enormous story: The Massachusetts Institute of Technology had admitted to a long-standing pattern of discrimination against women on its faculty. Zernike, now a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for the New York Times, tells the full inspiring story in The Exceptions: Nancy Hopkins,

Last week, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker delivered his State of the State address. It is the first time a governor in the country has directly spoken about the wave of censorship, book banning, and harassment being seen by schools and libraries. While some legislators in other arenas have addressed the topic — Jamie Raskin, a

★ The Bullet Garden After writing a trio of books about ex-Marine sniper Bob Lee Swagger, author Stephen Hunter launched a second series featuring Bob Lee’s father, Earl Swagger, who is also a Marine and a Medal of Honor recipient to boot. It’s been 20 years since Hunter’s last installment in the senior Swagger series,

The Audie Awards, presented annually by the Audio Publishers Association, described itself as the “premier awards program in the United States recognizing distinction in audiobooks and spoken-word entertainment.” Each year, they recognize audiobooks in several categories, and they’ve just released their list of finalists. Here are the finalists in just a few of the Audie

Licensed therapist and author Nedra Glover Tawwab offers readers practical guidance on breaking the cycle of family dysfunction in Drama Free: A Guide to Managing Unhealthy Family Relationships. In the introduction, Tawwab writes, “How people engage in the family is usually how they engage in the world.” This might be a relief for the lucky

You might be a sci-fi connoisseur, but can you identify science fiction books from the descriptions of people who truly hated them? See if you can guess the sci-fi book based on its 1-star reviews below! Bad reviews can be a bit of a sticking point for authors, and understandably so. No one likes to

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,” wrote Henry David Thoreau in Walden. If you’re looking for quiet desperation in modern-day America, you’d be hard-pressed for a better place to find it than the “dubiously named” Oasis Mobile Estates in Riverside County, California, the setting of Asale Angel-Ajani’s debut novel, A Country You

Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway call their deeply researched new book, The Big Myth, “the true history of a false idea.” The false idea in question is not really a single idea but rather many connected assertions, promoted throughout the 20th century, that have gelled into the “quasi-religious belief that the best way to

The highly successful Netflix show Bridgerton is based off theromance novel series of the same name, but now the show is inspiring a new novel in the series! Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story is a spin-off series that will air on Netflix May 4, 2023. To coincide with the new show, Shonda Rhimes — the

In what ways is writing like drumming? Like a drummer, the writer lays down a pattern of rhythm that keeps the plot of a story moving, propelling it with a steady beat through various twists and turns. Novelist Nic Brown’s peripatetic memoir, Bang Bang Crash, examines his past life as a drummer and the ways