Trip: A Novel by Amie Barrodale follows a woman who embarks on a journey to the afterlife to help her son, who is lost at sea. Her voyage begins on a limbo-drifting ghost ship, blending humor and emotion as she explores the body and mind. Barrodale skillfully combines humor with poignant moments, making the supernatural feel personal. The book moved me, reflecting the emotional tides between mother and son.
by Amie Barrodale
Trip: A Novel by Amie Barrodale follows a woman who embarks on a journey to the afterlife to help her son, who is lost at sea. Her voyage begins on a limbo-drifting ghost ship, blending humor and emotion as she explores the body and mind. Barrodale skillfully combines humor with poignant moments, making the supernatural feel personal. The book moved me, reflecting the emotional tides between mother and son.
Sandra dies suddenly at a death conference in Nepal. Days later in America, her son, Trip, runs away with a man. Sandra tries to send a message to Trip through the mystics, but they are distracted while her son and the man set out to sea.
Amie Barrodale‘s first novel follows the unpredictable journey of Sandra and her son, Trip, as they navigate the realms of restless souls and Buddhist deities. As they move between life and death, Sandra’s unwavering devotion to saving her child and striving to be a good mother anchors the narrative, propelling it forward with emotional depth and urgency. This book will particularly resonate with fans of literary fiction, magical realism, and those intrigued by philosophical explorations of life and death. Readers who appreciate stories rich in emotional complexity and spiritual themes will find themselves eagerly immersed in this enthralling tale.
Wide-eyed with wonder, hilariously funny and painfully moving, Trip: A Novel reveals the deeper meaning of The Tibetan Book of the Dead: the past is a memory, the future is a projection, the present disappears before we can see it.
Amie Barrodale’s stories and essays have appeared in The Paris Review, Harper’s Magazine, and other publications. In 2012, she was awarded The Paris Review’s Plimpton Prize for Fiction for her story “William Wei.” She is the author of You Are Having a Good Time: Stories.
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by Tash Aw
Tash Aw‘s novel, The South, longlisted for the 2025 Booker Prize, is both expansive and concise, capturing the dynamics of a family navigating change and desire. It explores the intersection of public and private lives with remarkable grace and beauty. This intimate and radiant story follows the deepening relationship between two boys throughout a summer, delving into themes of family, desire, and the legacies we inherit.
When his grandfather passes away, Jay travels south with his family to the property they have inherited—a once-thriving farm that has now fallen into disrepair. The trees are diseased, and the fields have been dry due to months of drought.
Jay’s father, Jack, sends him out to work the land, or what remains of it. During these hot, oppressive days, Jay finds himself increasingly drawn to Chuan, the son of the farm’s manager. The boys are different in almost every way, except for one crucial connection.
As they work in the fields and venture into town, the tension between the boys intensifies. Meanwhile, within the house, the other family members begin to confront their secrets and regrets. Jack, a professor at a struggling local college, reflects on his failures, many of which may have started when he married his student, Sui Ching. Sui Ching strives to keep the family together, though she, too, contemplates what her life could have been. Fong, the farm manager, chooses to ignore the reality of the situation—about Chuan, the deteriorating land, and the global forces that threaten to render their entire way of life obsolete.
Tash Aw is the author of four novels, including We, the Survivors, as well as a memoir about a Chinese-Malaysian family titled Strangers on a Pier. These remarkable works earned their place as finalists for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, showcasing the incredible talent behind them!
The author has also been honored with several esteemed awards, including the Whitbread, Commonwealth, and O. Henry Awards. Plus, being longlisted for the MAN Booker Prize twice speaks volumes about his skill. It’s exciting to see his fiction translated into 23 languages, sharing his stories with the world!
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by Michelle Huneven
“Bug Hollow” by Michelle Huneven is a decades-spanning family saga that follows the messy yet loving Samuelson clan as they navigate life after the loss of their son, Ellis. When Sally Samuelson was eight years old, her golden boy brother, Ellis, went missing the summer after he graduated from high school. He eventually reappeared at the picturesque Bug Hollow, a final remnant of the beautiful Northern California counterculture of the seventies.
Although he found joy in communal life, his life was tragically cut short in a freak accident just weeks later, leaving the Samuelson family to grapple with their grief. From that point on, the world of the Samuelsons never spun on the same axis, especially after Julia, Ellis’s girlfriend from Bug Hollow, showed up pregnant on their doorstep.
Each member of the Samuelson family has sought their form of solace: Sybil Samuelson pours herself into teaching to numb her pain after losing her beloved son; her husband, Phil, found comfort in a new love that developed while he was working as an engineer in Saudi Arabia; Katie, the high-achieving middle child, comes home to try to make peace with her mother following a cancer diagnosis. Meanwhile, Sally has become the de facto caretaker of Eva, the child Ellis never had the chance to know.
Michelle Huneven is known for her five enthralling novels, which chronicle the lives of middle-class Americans in her vividly portrayed native California. Her characters struggle with addiction, painful romances, and profound losses as they continue to seek meaning and strive to be good. She captures the Samuelson family with remarkable precision and deep empathy as they fracture and rebuild time and again.
Michelle Huneven is the author of Round Rock, Jamesland, Blame, Off Course, and Search. Her books have been New York Times Notable Books and finalists for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. She is the recipient of a Whiting Award for Fiction, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a James Beard Award, and a Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She received her Master of Fine Arts degree from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and teaches creative writing at the University of California, Los Angeles.
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by Kate Riley
“Ruth” by Kate Riley is a captivating and thought-provoking exploration of a woman’s journey through the complexities of life within a tightly-knit and devout community. The narrative intricately weaves together the nuances of faith, tradition, and individual desire, encouraging readers to confront their own deeply held beliefs about the nature of fulfillment and purpose.
Ruth was raised in a snow globe of Christian communism, a world without private property, television, or tolerance for idle questions. Every morning, she braids her hair and wears the same costume, sings the same breakfast song in a family room identical to every other family room in the community; every one of these moments is meant to be a prayer, but to Ruth, they remain puzzles.
Her life is seen in glimpses through childhood, marriage, and motherhood, as she tries to manage her own perilous curiosity in a community built on holy mystery. Is she happy? Is this happiness?
Kate Riley was raised in New York City, and this book is her final work.
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by Ta-Nehisi Coates
We Were Eight Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates is a collection featuring the landmark essay The Case for Reparations he wrote for The Atlantic. Even though I am a subscriber to The Atlantic and have read many of the pieces, this is a must-read book as it reflects on race, Barack Obama’s presidency, and its jarring aftermath, including the election of Donald Trump.
We were eight years in power as the lament of Reconstruction-era black politicians as the American experiment in multiracial democracy ended with the return of white supremacist rule in the South. In this sweeping collection of new and selected essays, Ta-Nehisi Coates explores the tragic echoes of that history in our own time: the unprecedented election of a black president followed by a vicious backlash that fueled the election of the man Coates argues is America’s first white president.
But the story of these present-day eight years is not just about presidential politics. This book also examines the new voices, ideas, and movements for justice that emerged over this period and the effects of the persistent, haunting shadow of our nation’s old and unreconciled history. Coates powerfully examines the events of the Obama era from his intimate and revealing perspective:” the point of view of a young writer who begins the journey in an unemployment office in Harlem and ends it in the Oval Office, interviewing a president.
We Were Eight Years in Power features Coatesa’s iconic essays first published in The Atlantic, including Fear of a Black President, The Case for Reparations, and The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration, along with eight fresh essays that revisit each year of the Obama administration through Coate’s own experiences, observations, and intellectual development, capped by a bracingly original assessment of the election that fully illuminated the tragedy of the Obama era. We Were Eight Years in Power is a vital account of modern America, from one of the definitive voices of this historic moment.
I recommend this book to all readers.
by Giovana Madalosso
I recently dove into The Tokyo Suite by Giovana Madalosso, expertly translated by Bruna Dantas Lobato. This captivating book represents the English-language debut of one of Brazil’s most thrilling contemporary voices. It intricately unravels the complexities of modern family dynamics, diving deep into the hidden tensions that simmer just beneath the surface of everyday life. Each page draws you in, inviting you to explore the rich tapestry of emotions and experiences that define our relationships.
It’s a seemingly ordinary morning when Maju, a nanny, boards a bus with Cora, the young girl she’s been caring for and disappears. The abduction, an act as impulsive as it is extreme, sets off a series of events that will force each character to confront their deepest fears and desires.
Cora’s mother, Fernanda, is a successful executive who is so engulfed in her crisis that she initially fails to notice her daughter’s disappearance. Her marriage is strained, and she finds solace in an affair, distancing herself further from her family. Meanwhile, her husband, overwhelmed by the complexities of their domestic life, remains emotionally detached. As Maju navigates the streets of São Paulo with Cora, the “white army” of nannies, a term coined by Fernanda, seems to watch her every move, heightening her sense of paranoia and urgency.
Madalosso’s narrative delves deep into the human psyche, examining themes of maternal guilt, societal expectations, and the search for personal identity. Rich and multi-layered, The Tokyo Suite is a poignant and gripping tale that captures the essence of modern urban life and the lengths people will go to reclaim a sense of control and meaning.
Giovana Madalosso is a Brazilian writer and screenwriter born in Curitiba in 1975. She has been a finalist for the Biblioteca Nacional Award and the São Paulo Prize of Literature. The Tokyo Suite is her English-language debut.
Bruna Dantas Lobato is a fiction writer and translator. Her translation of Stênio Gardel‘s The Words That Remain won the 2023 National Book Award for Translated Literature. Her fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Guernica, A Public Space, and The Common. Raised in Natal, Brazil, she is an incoming Assistant Professor of English and Creative Writing at Grinnell College.
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by Eiren Caffall
Today, I began reading “All the Water in the World” by Eiren Caffall. Like Station Eleven, this novel is a literary thriller set partly in New York’s American Museum of Natural History in a flooded future. In the spirit of “From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler” and “Parable of the Sower,” this adventurous journey offers hope that the most important things—love, work, community, and knowledge—will endure.
“All the Water in the World” is narrated by a girl who profoundly appreciates water. In the years following the melting of the glaciers, Nonie, along with her older sister, parents, and their researcher friends, remains in a nearly deserted New York City. They have established a settlement on the roof of the American Museum of Natural History with a strict rule: they may only take from the exhibits in cases of dire need. They hunt and grow their food in Central Park while also working to preserve the collections of human history and science.
When a superstorm breaches the city’s flood walls, Nonie and her family must escape northward along the Hudson River. They carry a book containing records of the lost collections. As they race down the swollen river for safety, they encounter communities that have adapted in various, sometimes frightening, ways to the new reality. Despite the challenges, they are determined to create a new world that honors everything they have saved.
Inspired by the stories of curators in Iraq and Leningrad who worked to protect their collections during wartime, “All the Water in the World” mediates what we strive to preserve from collapse and an adventure filled with danger, storms, and a fight for survival.
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