Lauren Groff’s Brawler, Namwali Serpell’s On Morrison, Tayari Jones’s Kin, and Gisèle Pelicot’s A Hymn to Life all feature among February’s best reviewed books.
1. Brawler: Stories by Lauren Groff
(Riverhead)
9 Rave • 1 Positive
Read a profile of Lauren Groff here
“Should come with a warning because anyone who picks up the book and idly starts reading the first story will be unable to stop without finishing it … Each of the nine rich tales has enough character detail and intrigue to fill a full-length novel … Groff also is hilarious…provocative and plenty of other adjectives. Long story short: Brawler is a knockout.”
–Chris Hewitt (The Star Tribune)
2. Kin by Tayari Jones
(Knopf)
8 Rave • 1 Positive
Read a Q&A with Tayari Jones here
“While some writers lead with a strong beginning only to grow slack as the novel wears on, struggling to land the ending, Jones is the opposite. Her momentum picks up steam as it goes … Confident … As the novel’s turbulent action finds an affecting and spectral finale, we’re left with an abiding undercurrent of platonic love as Jones forges a graceful dignity for Niecy and Annie.”
–Lauren LeBlanc (The Boston Globe)
3. Autobiography of Cotton by Cristina Rivera Garza
(Graywolf)
7 Rave
Read an interview with Cristina Rivera Garza here
“A fusion of fiction and nonfiction that excavates both national and family history. On a broad and somewhat scholarly level, Autobiography of Cotton details Mexico’s postindependence labor movements and land reforms … Gripping … This book is one of restless movement and passionate hope.”
–Sam Sacks (The Wall Street Journal)
4. Good People by Patmeena Sabit
(Crown)
5 Rave • 3 Positive
Read Patmeena Sabit’s “Five Essential Books for Understanding Afghanistan” here
“Gorgeous and powerful … They say reading is dying, and maybe it is. But works like this one will ensure there will always be a place for what novels alone can achieve.”
–Tommy Orange (The New York Times Book Review)
5. This is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman
(Dial Press)
6 Rave • 1 Positive
“Goodman has written many wonderful novels, but her 11th, This Is Not About Us, is her crowning glory. So far, anyway … No one does this shtick better than Goodman, always funny and moving, but sharp rather than sentimental, willing to leave matters as messy as they are in real life rather than tying heart-warming fictional bows … She’s the real thing.”
–Marion Winik (The Boston Globe)
**
1. On Morrison by Namwali Serpell
(Hogarth)
10 Rave
Read an interview with Namwali Serpell here
“Graceful, exhilarating … Serpell deserves consideration for a major prize. Mostly she deserves our gratitude and admiration: On Morrison gives us, in precise yet supple prose, a close reading in action and an exemplar of literary criticism (distinct from book criticism, a journalistic form). This book will spur you to pore overt the master’s achievements.”
–Hamilton Cain (On the Seawall)
2. A Hymn to Life by Gisèle Pelicot
(Penguin Press)
8 Rave • 1 Positive
“Unique … Alive with the kind of detail that wouldn’t look out of place in a good novel, but it’s the expression it gives to something glimpsed at during the trial that makes it so singular; namely, the transformation of Gisèle Pelicot from a self-avowedly ordinary woman, ‘content with my little life’, into a figure of astonishing power.”
–Emma Brockes (The Guardian)
3. The Last Kings of Hollywood: Coppola, Lucas, Spielberg—And the Battle for the Soul of American Cinema by Paul Fischer
(Celadon Books)
5 Rave • 4 Positive • 2 Mixed
“With the enthusiasm of an avid fan, the even hand of a journalist, and the narrative skills of a screenwriter, Fischer interleaves the biographies of three Hollywood titans. [An] in-depth, behind-the-scenes book … Rich in glitterati name-dropping and insight into the minutiae of movie creation, Fischer’s tell-all will cause film history buffs to swoon and will assuredly entertain any nostalgic moviegoer.”
–Joelle Egan (Booklist)
4. The Boundless Deep: Young Tennyson, Science and the Crisis of Belief by Richard Holmes
(Pantheon)
7 Rave • 1 Mixed
“Holmes, master biographer that he is, vividly conjures up this awkward, compelling figure. What gives his book its exceptional energy, though, is not what is happening on the surface of Tennyson’s life and Holmes’s narrative. It is the powerful undertow of threatened belief and existential anxiety tugging the reader down … This biography is a compelling story of an odd, brilliant, charismatic character, and a reappraisal of a man who had become so very established we could no longer see him.”
–Lucy Hughes-Hallett (The Guardian)
5. Leaving Home: A Memoir in Full Colour by Mark Haddon
(Doubleday)
5 Rave • 3 Positive • 1 Mixed
Read an excerpt from Leaving Home here
“Haddon…writes with uncanny humor and endearing candor as he leapfrogs from childhood incidents to more recent struggles and discoveries … As he reflects on his hard-tested loyalty to his parents and his love for his sister, wife, and children, Haddon is pithily hilarious, deeply insightful, and very moving.”
–Donna Seaman (Booklist)
If you buy books linked on our site, Lit Hub may earn a commission from Bookshop.org, whose fees support independent bookstores.
