Engrossing novels, smart short stories and mind-expanding nonfiction
Not every book that deserves attention gets the attention it deserves. Here is a wide-ranging list of compelling books, fiction and nonfiction, that you might have missed amidst the hype and hysteria of 2018. They represent a range of voices — from an Iranian exile to a best-selling Japanese novelist — and topics — from German history to our genetic ancestry. All of them will open readers’ eyes to something new and different.
Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
In this vivid, original story collection, Adjei-Brenyah presents America in all its racism, weirdness and abject consumerism.
Buy now: Friday Black
Belonging: A German Reckons with History and Home by Nora Krug
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In this evocative graphic memoir, Krug wrestles with her family’s ties to Nazi Germany and the weight of that history.
Buy now: Belonging: A German Reckons with History and Home
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata
Murata’s affecting novel follows a misfit as she finds her place as the perfect employee in a Tokyo convenience store.
Buy now: Convenience Store Woman
Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America by Eliza Griswold
Griswold offers an intimate account of a Pennsylvania woman’s fight to protect her family against fracking — and the story of the poisoning of America.
Buy now: Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America
Disoriental by Négar Djavadi
This powerful, layered novel about a woman’s escape from revolutionary Iran weaves in tales of her family.
Buy now: Disoriental
Who We Are and How We Got Here: Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past by David Reich
A leading geneticist provides deep, provocative insights into the real story of humanity’s tangled roots.
Buy now: Who We Are and How We Got Here: Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past
The House of Broken Angels by Luis Alberto Urrea
A family gathers one weekend to celebrate and say goodbye in Urrea’s bighearted, sprawling novel on the Mexican-American experience.
Buy now: The House of Broken Angels
The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow’s World by Charles C. Mann
Will humans exhaust this planet? Mann explores how two 20th-century thinkers presented conflicting visions — innovation vs. conservation — of our future.