Fiction

Sitting in a French clinic waiting for her future, Kimia Sadr unravels layers of history: her own, her family’s, and Iran’s. History, culture, exile and immigration, oppression and free speech, love and sexuality, family and motherhood, Kimia’s story dances between the personal and the global and the epic. Stories beget memories beget stories, landing in a true, magical journey that I loved, that I want to put in everyone’s hands and minds now. - Jocelyn

Told in pieces of the past, present, and future, The History of Bees is is a beautifully written story about our relationships with each other and with the world we share. I will never again see a bee and have it not remind me of our responsibility to respect the balance of power in nature. Lunde’s novel has illuminated the path of the bees and in turn has given us a beacon of hope for our future. - Jenny

Griffith’s newest novel explores the experience of sudden Otherness with searing intensity when her young, successful, self-assured protagonist Mara is diagnosed with multiple sclerosis right after her wife of 14 years has left her. Feeling betrayed by her body and alienated by her friends, she must come to terms with her new reality and forge a new path. Griffith’s sharp writing is emotional, truthful, powerful, and makes for a compelling, heart-baring, important read. - Melinda

Reading this novel is truly a visceral experience. The story is about (of course) loss—of a parent, of a cultural identity, of innocence, of love—but even though it focuses on such palpable grief, you are never left hopeless. Each vignette of our narrator Thandi’s life is so raw and so real that I initially assumed it was a memoir! This debut is surely just the beginning of Clemmons’ literary stardom. - Kelly

Reading this book was like listening to a beautiful, heartbreaking piece of music. Prepare yourself for a full sensory experience as Jesmyn Ward pulls you into the lives of 13-year-old JoJo and his family in rural Mississippi. The reality of their struggle is palpable. This is a story of contradictions; we hit when we mean to hug, the hurts in our past have a place in our healing, a daughter’s best moment in her life is when she is present for her mother’s death. Despite the profound sadness, the last pages leave you with a lyrical sense of hope. - Jenny

Arthur Less is an aging, near-famous author who tries to escape the fact that his boyfriend is getting married by accepting half-baked literary invitations to conferences and teaching engagements around the world. Full of hilarity and also replete with gems of understanding of love, heartbreak, and human connection. Part David Sedaris, part Where’d You Go, Bernadette, part Man Called Ove, but completely and utterly original, this book is a perfect summer read and the newly announced winner of the Pultizer Prize for Fiction. - Casey

Don’t miss our free in-store event with Andrew Sean Greer on May 24th, 2018.

With Isadora, Amelia Gray takes the life of a great modern artist and turns it into breathing poetry. A novelized version of a key moment in Isadora Duncan’s tragic life, Isadora is a meditation on humanity, grief, and family. Gray is at her career best here, stringing a tightrope attached at one end to consuming sadness and another to irreverent vitality. In honor of her subject, perhaps, she doesn’t just walk it, she dances. - Jessica

In this tender and uplifting novel, set in a suburb outside Cleveland, a community of Indian immigrants are trying to find their place and identity in American culture. “No One Can Pronounce My Name is a warm, life-affirming story of reckoning with past secrets, forging unexpected bonds, and finding the strength to be yourself. This bighearted, utterly charming novel explores immigrant experience and family life with humor and compassion.” —Celeste Ng

There is nothing quite so satisfying as a beautifully written, impeccably researched historical novel, especially in the capable hands of someone like Pulitzer Prize–winner Jennifer Egan. That is why Manhattan Beach ended up on almost every 2017 best of the year list. Now in paperback, even more readers will be mesmerized by the secretive underworld that Egan creates among the World War II era of mafia deals, nightclubs, and the New York City docks. But it is the protagonist Anna—the first female diver to repair ships in New York’s harbor—who blends that underworld with her own journey through a complex family life that gives this book its deep emotional heart. - Casey

Meet Jennifer Egan at our off-site book talk & signing for the paperback release of Manhattan Beach on June 7th, 2018.

Waxman returns with a delightful, witty story of people simply trying to make it through another chaotic day of family life. Frances walks in on her neighbor Anne in the midst of a deceitful act, and the entire neighborhood is thrown for a loop as Anne’s family comes unraveled. Allegiances are formed, gossip abounds, and Frances begins to learn that not everything is black and white. A fun, rollicking read threaded with drama (and some familiar characters), Other People’s Houses is full of charm, laughs and insight. - Sara