The Best Reviewed Books of the Month

Ben Lerner’s Transcription, Gwendoline Riley’s The Palm House, Patrick Radden Keefe’s London Falling, and Lena Dunham’s Famesick all number among the best reviewed books of the month.

Fiction

1. Transcription by Ben Lerner
(FSG)

26 Rave • 10 Positive • 2 Mixed • 1 Pan

“A chamber piece, more compressed and crystallized than any of its predecessors.”
–Giles Harvey (The New Yorker)

2. The Palm House by Gwendoline Riley
(NYRB)

10 Rave • 3 Positive

“Riley’s work recasts our relationship with the familiar, transforming ordinary, unremarkable lives of her characters into something startling and new.”
–Clare Clark (The Guardian)

3. Go Gentle by Maria Semple
(G. P. Putnam)

8 Rave • 4 Positive • 2 Mixed

“Semple frappes it all together into a wild ride of a book that’s delightful while you’re reading it and that lingers long after you’re done.”
–Chris Hewitt (The Star Tribune)

4. The Oyster Diaries by Nancy Lemann
(NYRB)

5 Rave • 5 Positive • 1 Mixed

“Like a warm summer night or a third cocktail, Lemann lulls and envelops you.”
–Brandy Jensen (The New Yorker)

5. Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke
(Knopf)

7 Rave • 1 Positive • 2 Mixed • 1 Pan

“An ingenious, exquisite, be-careful-what-you-wish-for.”
–Michelle Ruiz (The New York Times Book Review)

**

Nonfiction

1. London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family’s Search for Truth by Patrick Radden Keefe
(Doubleday)

20 Rave • 3 Positive • 1 Mixed • 1 Pan

“Like all of Keefe’s work, the book makes for propulsive reading.”
–Mia Levitin (The Irish Times)

2. Rasputin: The Downfall of the Romanovs by Antony Beevor
(Viking)

11 Rave • 1 Positive • 1 Mixed

“A meditation on history as well as a masterclass in smooth, judicious prose.”
–Dan Jones (The Sunday Times)

3. Famesick: A Memoir by Lena Dunham
(Random House)

8 Rave • 6 Positive • 2 Mixed • 1 Pan

“An ideal celebrity memoir with the added bonus of being written by someone who can actually write.”
–Scaachi Koul (Slate)

4. Muskism: A Guide for the Perplexed by Quinn Slobodian & Ben Tarnoff
(Harper)

6 Rave • 5 Positive • 3 Mixed

“A well-researched account of how we have arrived at a point where so many resources are concentrated in the hands of just one man, and how this fact alone will inevitably shape the future.”
–Christopher Webb (The Guardian)

=5. Small Town Girls: A Writer’s Memoir by Jayne Anne Phillips
(Knopf)

9 Rave

“Phillips brings to this memoir the kind of resonant details and sharp insights that have enriched her fiction.”
–Heller McAlpin (Christian Science Monitor)

=5. Attention: Writing on Life, Art, and the World by Anne Enright
(W. W. Norton)

9 Rave

“Enright’s exhilarating mixture of analysis and autobiography compels continuous assent.”
–Patricia Craig (Times Literary Supplement)