The Best Reviewed Books of the Week

Maria Semple’s Go Gentle, Gwendoline Riley’s The Palm House, Antony Beevor’s Rasputin, and Lena Dunham’s Famesick all feature among the best reviewed books of the week.

Fiction

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

7 Rave • 4 Positive • 1 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)

2. The Palm House by Gwendoline Riley
(NYRB)

6 Rave • 2 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. Lázár by Nelio Bidermann, trans. by Jamie Bulloch
(Summit)

5 Rave • 2 Positive • 1 Mixed

“A gothic fable, rich with sensory description, gems of historical detail and surreal twists.”
–Elvia Wilk (The New York Times Book Review)

**

Nonfiction

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

6 Rave • 1 Positive • 1 Mixed

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

2. Where the Music Had to Go: How Bob Dylan and the Beatles Changed Each Other—and the World by Jim Windolf
(Scribner)

6 Rave • 1 Positive

“Lively, incisive, and deeply researched, Windolf’s account captures the specific, consequential moments in a creative dialogue.”
–Frieda Love Smith (Booklist)

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

4 Rave • 3 Positive • 1 Mixed 

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