Strike up the band: there's a new R.L. Maizes (We Love Anderson Cooper; Other People's Pets) book, and it's breakout-novel time--or at least it should be. As a funny-pitiless look at the lengths writers will go to get published, A Complete Fiction deserves shelf space alongside Percival Everett's Erasure and Jean Hanff Korelitz's The Plot.

P.J. Larkin is a Denver-based writer who drives for a ride-share company to pay the bills. She has three unpublished novels to show for herself; regarding her third unsold manuscript, her agent explains, "The market is saturated with #metoo novels." When P.J. reads the Publishers Marketplace description of a forthcoming title by New York-based acquiring editor George Dunn, she notes that his book's storyline resembles that of her third novel, which she knows he read and rejected a year and a half earlier. All it takes is one social media post from P.J.--excerpt: "Your book sounds a lot like my book.... Not good enough to publish but good enough to steal?"--to upend George's life ("#CancelGeorgeDunn"), and eventually her own.

Those preparing to read A Complete Fiction might consider donning gardening gloves before cracking its cover: its pages are thorny with spirited digs at publishing-industry fickleness, cancel culture, virtue signaling, performative outrage, and extreme environmentalism (P.J.'s commitment is almost beyond Thunbergian). Maizes has written a satirical novel in which the only villains are the humorless, and throughout which a serious question percolates: Is there such thing as good writing that should never be shared with the world? --Nell Beram, author and freelance writer

Discover: In R.L. Maizes's funny-pitiless look at the lengths writers will go to get published, an aspiring novelist accuses another writer of stealing her storyline.

No Hand Held Mine by Kim Soom, who's won every major Korean literary award, offers two extraordinary novellas, Granny Wild Goose and The Root's Tale, jointly translated by Joon-Li Kim and Doo-Sun Ryu.

Granny Wild Goose is a breathtaking homage to Gil Won-Ok (1928-2025), one of the last surviving comfort women when Kim interviewed her before the novella's original 2018 publication. By then, the nonagenarian's memory was in decline; Kim hauntingly mimics those gaps by writing in elliptical verse, creating white space, leaving half-empty pages. Hoping to earn 20 won to free her father from jail, Gil went to Manchuria at 13 for the promise of a job but was forced into sexual slavery for Japanese soldiers: "ten, twenty, thirty soldiers at a time visited our thirteen-, fourteen-year-old bodies." At 71, she was finally able to speak the unspeakable. Kim unleashes her silence and shatters hearts and souls.

A breath, a break seems necessary before delving into The Root's Tale, featuring a "stagnant relationship" between a 39-year-old narrator and her artist boyfriend, whose medium is (mostly) tree roots. His latest project incites memories of the narrator's late great-aunt, particularly her wizened hand that, decades previously, had reached for the narrator's only to be fervently rejected. Without permission, the artist exposes that severed connection.

In both stories, Kim's vulnerable first-person narration encourages heightened empathy, particularly transforming readers into witnesses in Granny Wild Goose. History professor Alexis Dudden's foreword addresses the Japanese government's ongoing refusal to acknowledge their heinous war crimes against comfort women, underscoring the urgency of Kim's outstanding storytelling. --Terry Hong

Discover: Award-winning Korean author Kim Soom's No Hand Held Mine presents two resonating novellas featuring the difficult lives of aging women.

The thrilling events of Megha Majumdar's novel A Guardian and a Thief take place over one week in a near-future Kolkata, India, where catastrophic consequences of climate change have caused flooding, food scarcity, and desperation.

Ma, her two-year-old daughter, Mishti, and elderly father, Dadu, are trying to flee the crumbling city and reunite with her husband in the U.S. "It was [Ma's] duty, as a guardian, to put into action the beautiful ideal of hope." Though their long-awaited immigration documents are finally in hand, their plan abruptly collapses when Boomba, a teenager, steals Ma's purse with the passports inside.

The situation, however, is not morally straightforward. Ma and Boomba are prepared to take appalling actions to protect their families, each easily playing the roles of both guardian and thief. Shortly before the theft, Boomba sees Ma, the former manager of the local shelter, steal food meant for residents, taking it for her family, "while the city outside wept for a handful of something to eat." Desperate to feed his own family, Boomba devises a plan to follow Ma home to steal money and food.

What follows is a whirlwind chase as Ma tries to recover the documents, while both she and Boomba contrive to hide a growing list of disasters and escalating crimes from their families.

In A Guardian and a Thief, Majumdar (winner of a Whiting Award and author of A Burning) goes beyond the academics of climate change to showcase its human costs--the ethics of survival, class inequality, and the global response to immigration--with great empathy and dignity. --Grace Rajendran, freelance reviewer

Discover: Nuanced character development and a propulsive plot are the stars of Megha Majumdar's second novel, a gripping portrait of climate disaster.

Clodagh "Clo" Harmon is a "Workhorse," forced by her moderate background to work hard to secure--and hopefully one day transcend--her highly coveted assistant position at "the magazine," an important and chic publication in the early 2000s. Clo finds that she is surrounded by "Show Horses": "Ivy League-educated... white [girls] who [were] born into some variation of generational wealth... whose pedigree and connections burnish the reputation of the magazine and confirm it as a safe space for their fellow elite." Desperate for acceptance into this alluring inner circle, Clo is determined for her ambition, ingenuity, and Louboutin sample sale boots to make it to the top.

Clo's struggle to fit into elite parties and sample sizes creates awkward, humorous moments that set her apart from her elegant, elusive peers. Davis Lawrence, a Show Horse in every sense of the term, takes Clo under her wing. Shopping trips on other people's accounts, weekends in the Hamptons, and nights out at the most exclusive clubs in New York give Clo a taste of the life she's always wanted. But as her shoes and the parties get glitzier, the glamour begins to fade and reveal the high stakes and morally questionable risks she must take to maintain it.

Clo's introspective, engrossing look into publishing explores how class, status, and gender roles formed and controlled the editorial world in the 2000s. A sharp and provocative debut, Caroline Palmer's Workhorse comments on the industry's drawbacks while celebrating the deep friendships, hard work, and extravagant perks that came with it. --Clara Newton, freelance reviewer

Discover: In this introspective and engrossing deep dive into the 2000s publishing industry, Clo Harmon must decide how many risks she is willing to take to make it to the top.

To begin by describing the plot in Caren Beilin's striking novel Sea, Poison would be a disservice both to readers and author, as it would suggest that the novel is concerned or even interested in convention when it wholly, thrillingly, is not. The incomparable Beilin (Revenge of the Scapegoat) instead creates a reading experience that rewards those who delight in surprising diction, syntax, and the unconventional, including characters, storytelling, and artificial constraints in the Oulipian tradition. She writes, "Now, sure, now it's all coming together. Nothing ever more you hear here shall be deemed coincidental. What am I doing? I'm writing this novel. Here it is."

The narrator is writer Cumin Baleen (who may have been called Matt in childhood), a Philadelphia-based woman in her 30s who has an unnamed autoimmune disease, for which she tries various medications. She receives laser eye surgery, which she believes damages something in her brain, causing writer's block. Cumin's boyfriend leaves her for their landlord, so she moves into the closet of a polyamorous woman, Maron, and lusts after one of Maron's partners, Alix. Beilan uses fractured and repetitive storytelling to swirl around some of Cumin's obsessions, including Shusaku Endo's novel The Sea and Poison, being perceived as having a Jewish appearance, rape inflicted by OB-GYNs, and Jewishness.

Those who enjoy erudite references, mixed with (among many themes) incest, medical trauma, and unusual storytelling, will be thrilled by Sea, Poison. --Nina Semczuk, writer, editor, and illustrator

Discover: Caren Beilin's novel Sea, Poison challenges readers' expectations of what a novel is and can do, while invoking the playfulness of the Oulipian tradition.

Stewart O'Nan's body of work is noteworthy for its diversity across 18 works of fiction, with settings that include post-Civil War Wisconsin, Jerusalem on the eve of Israel's statehood, and a failed Red Lobster restaurant in contemporary Connecticut. Throughout, however, he has displayed a special fondness for Pittsburgher Emily Maxwell, first seen in his 2002 novel, Wish You Were Here. She makes a fourth appearance in Evensong, a frank but deeply sympathetic portrait of a quartet of aging women who demonstrate that the challenges of advanced years need not impede one's ability to do good in the world.

Evensong centers on the work of Emily and three other women--her sister-in-law, Arlene, and their friends Kitzi and Susie (younger than the others by about 20 years), members of a volunteer network they call the Humpty Dumpty Club. The group performs a variety of tasks for older people needing assistance in their Pittsburgh neighborhoods. In the autumn of 2022, they're thrown into crisis when their longtime leader, Joan Hargrove, is hospitalized after a fall, and Kitzi is anointed as her successor.

As O'Nan (Songs for the Missing) constructs a credible plot, all the while he's digging below the surface to reveal how each woman copes with the often harsh realities of age. O'Nan renders their small victories and defeats with honesty and more than occasional wit. Despite the inevitable emotion it engenders, Evensong is noteworthy for its lack of sentimentality. Emily and her cohort are admirable survivors, resolutely absorbing the blows that life administers in one's waning years, yet rising each morning with gratitude to greet another day. --Harvey Freedenberg, freelance reviewer

Discover: An empathetic, but decidedly honest, reckoning with the realities of old age in the lives of a group of Pittsburgh women.

With The White Hot, Quiara Alegría Hudes (My Broken Language; Pulitzer Prize-winner for the play Water by the Spoonful) offers an expansive, surprising coming-of-age story about both a mother and a daughter. The novel opens on Noelle's 18th birthday, when she receives an envelope. Since she was 10, when her mother disappeared, Noelle has lived with her father, stepmother, and two half-brothers in New Jersey. Readers have just met the teenager when the voice shifts. "Dear Noelle... I am not going to send this," the letter begins. What at first masquerades as an interlude quickly takes over the book. Breathlessly, alongside Noelle, readers take in April Soto's story.

At age 26, April is weary. Her 10-year-old daughter is precocious, an artistic and academic genius, and disturbingly observant of her mother's shortcomings. Their household comprises four generations of Soto women. April is undone by her child's gimlet eye, her own unrealized potential, her lack of options, and daily drudgery, and in the wake of a scene at the dinner table, she simply walks away from their Philadelphia home.

What follows is an epic and astonishing journey of self-discovery. April tells her child she knows her leaving was a betrayal, but hopes she has also offered choice. April's narrative is astounding and vibrant. In her best and worst moments, she describes being cracked open, experiencing epiphanies: "She felt an un-looming, a separation into threads, some of which rose and drifted through nearby windows whose unseen inhabitants shimmered inside her, too." These, as well as the mundane, yield stunning, lightning-bolt prose. The White Hot is wide-ranging, thought-provoking, tender, and raw--unforgettable. --Julia Kastner, blogger at pagesofjulia

Discover: Delightful, unpredictable, and often harrowing, this mother-daughter tale of growing and learning will keep any reader riveted.

With The Birds, iconic 20th-century Norwegian author Tarjei Vesaas has, as Karl Ove Knausgaard opines, "written the best Norwegian novel ever." Translated by Torbjørn Støverud and Michael Barnes, The Birds proves to be a haunting and gutting novel in English as well.

The Birds tells the story of Mattis, a middle-aged man who is dependent, financially and otherwise, on his sister, Hege, because of an intellectual disability that undermines his ability to work and connect with other people. The siblings have been living together in the countryside for decades by the time the novel takes place, and the responsibility of caring for her brother is clearly taking a toll on Hege, who feels their isolation ever more keenly. Despite her attempts to remain kind, she is increasingly frustrated with Mattis.

Mattis has a deep connection with nature and perceives that the presence of a woodcock by their house is a harbinger of change. "He was standing by a dried-up patch of bog right underneath the woodcock's path, standing looking spellbound, reading a message or whatever it was that had been left there for him." Change does come when Mattis decides to become a ferryman and inadvertently brings another person into his and Hega's lives, altering their dynamic and the rhythm of their days. Ultimately Mattis is spurred by his altered status in the one place that had welcomed him to take dramatic action that calls into question his very survival.

Vesaas's beautiful, spare, and evocative prose elegantly braids together existentialist themes with modernistic depth and symbolism, exploring the alienation of a vulnerable protagonist trying to find a place in the world. --Elizabeth DeNoma, executive editor, DeNoma Literary Services, Seattle, Wash.

Discover: Norwegian author Tarjei Vesaas's The Birds is a haunting and gutting modernist exploration of the interiority of an intellectually disabled middle-aged man.

Brigitte Dale's compelling debut novel, The Good Daughters, immerses readers in the activism, challenges, and intertwined relationships of several young suffragettes in early 20th-century London. As the women face jeers, ostracism, imprisonment, and other hardships, they must band together to continue the struggle for suffrage--and consider whether the vote is worth their sacrifices.

Charlotte, a middle-class bookworm from Manchester, is thrilled to be attending Girton College in Cambridge. But she finds herself out of place among the other students, who are mostly posh young women biding their time before marriage. One of them, Beatrice, introduces Charlotte to the suffrage movement but has her own reasons for hesitating to commit fully. Both women eventually leave Cambridge for London, where they meet Emily, daughter of the warden of Holloway Prison. Emily, grieving her mother's death and wrestling with her plans for the future, becomes an insider ally to the suffragettes--and her help becomes increasingly vital as more suffragettes are imprisoned. Sadie, an American, injects fresh energy into the movement, but her presence also brings further complications.

Dale explores the external pressures and internal tensions facing the suffragettes, including the movement's bias toward women of privilege (the novel contains a mother-daughter pair inspired by Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst). The women's dedication to their cause is tested when prison officials begin force-feeding participants in a hunger strike, and Emily worries about the repercussions if her father discovers her involvement. With excerpts from historical suffragette speeches and songs, Dale's narrative shows the brilliance and grit of women whose dedication changed the world. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

Discover: Brigitte Dale's compelling debut novel immerses readers in the activism, hardships, and triumphs of suffragettes in early 20th-century London.

Quan Barry's psychological horror novel opens with a straightforward premise: Striker is a Black film-location scout on an Antarctic cruise that is mostly populated by wealthy white people. She's there for work but also to get away from Christmas and its reminders of her dead sister. The bickering passengers are on a kayak excursion when disaster strikes, leaving them stranded on an icy volcano unsure of what really happened in the accident and to the rest of their group. They discover the remnants of past expeditions and, as the days pass and the group splinters, Striker begins to relive the memories of those who died on the island.

The Unveiling isn't a story of a traditional haunting. Although the island itself remembers the trauma that the members of a previous excursion enacted on it and one another, the novel's primary pulse is one of racial and social tension, as well as Striker's avoidance of her own thoughts. As the edges of reality blur in the endless white, Barry (We Ride Upon Sticks) skillfully layers Striker's unreliability with a mist that shrouds the survivors while their numbers dwindle. The Unveiling is rife with avian harbingers of doom and an ever-increasing number of redacted sections of text as Striker loses her sense of time and place. Barry turns an unflinching and darkly funny gaze on actions and their repercussions in a novel that asks, "How much of our personal narratives are even true?" And moreover, who are humans at their core--particularly when they're fighting for survival at the ends of the Earth? --Kristen Coates, editor and freelance reviewer

Discover: In this unflinching and darkly funny psychological horror novel, a woman stranded on Antarctica loses her grip on reality as she fights to suppress her past and survive the elements.

Kate Belli fuses survivor's guilt and the unsteady art business in the wake of the September 11 attacks in her invigorating mystery The Gallery Assistant.

Two months after the Twin Towers fell, New York City has barely begun to recover and is rampant with suspicion concerning traffic delays and people of Middle Eastern descent. Chloe Harlow, who escaped the North Tower, deals with the emotional fallout through regular blackout drinking. She works as an assistant at a tony Upper East Side Manhattan art gallery, whose newest star, Inga Beck, is murdered following the party to celebrate her major show. The morning after the party, Chloe wakes up hungover and naked in her own bed with no memory of how she reached her Brooklyn apartment. She learns about Inga's murder after she gets to work. The art market has been "volatile since the attacks," but Inga's murder may make her paintings more valuable--meaning that the gallery, which is handling them, could make millions.

Chloe is thrust into the investigation because the police think she may know more about the murder, although she maintains she was too drunk to remember anything. But as Chloe slowly discovers, she may be more involved in the events of the night than she initially recalled. Furthermore, her continued nightmares and panic attacks about 9/11 threaten her mental state.

Belli's (The Gilded Gotham Mystery series) chilling depiction of Chloe's escape from the towers and its psychological aftermath serves as a memorable framework for the taut mystery of The Gallery Assistant and its in-depth look at the complicated art market. --Oline H. Cogdill, freelance reviewer

Discover: Survivor's guilt and the fragile art market in the wake of 9/11 provide the backdrop for this twisty mystery.

From its gorgeous cover (by Thomas Canty) to its heartfelt introduction (by Ellen Kushner), through each spellbinding story and onto its final remarks about fantasy, The Essential Patricia A. McKillip is a sumptuous feast. Sixteen previously published short stories by acclaimed fantasy and science fiction author Patricia A. McKillip (The Forgotten Beasts of Eld), who died in May 2022, offer nostalgia, adventure, and comfort.

An ethereal Lady of the Skull meets questing knights in a mysterious story whose details unfold as if from a mist. In "Wonders of the Invisible World," a time-traveling researcher appears as an angel to a Puritan and returns to her high-tech present only to question her research's ability to uncover truth. And the Minister of Water, in a world where water creatures control humanity's access to the element, races to solve baffling catastrophes in "King of the Well."

Ellen Kushner's personal introduction celebrates McKillip's "language of a musician," identifying a recognizable beat to the way McKillip's writing shifts to "fit the needs of any particular narrative." This characteristic is on full display in this collection, which spans fairy tale and fae worlds, worlds with mere hints of magic, high fantasy, science fiction, and stories that defy categorization. Regardless of genre, each story is told to perfection in McKillip's signature style of language that feels magical in and of itself. McKillip's 2004 speech at WisCon28--the world's first and most prestigious feminist science fiction convention--and an essay about writing high fantasy cap off a fantastic celebratory collection. --Dainy Bernstein, freelance reviewer

Discover: The Essential Patricia A. McKillip celebrates the author's distinctive writing and offers an array of entrancing fantasy stories that touch on deep human emotions.

A young woman desperate to become a mage and improve her family's fortunes finds an unlikely chance at love and fulfillment in the cozy, uplifting romantic fantasy The Keeper of Magical Things, set in the same world as author Julie Leong's previous novel, The Teller of Small Fortunes.

Certainty Bulrush is six years into her mage training, but her ability to speak with inanimate objects has still not earned her a promotion from being a novice. She feels useless to the Guild of Mages and her family, whom she could help if her pay rose. Hope arrives via a deceptively simple assignment: transport, catalog, and store a troublesome surplus load of minorly magical artifacts in exchange for promotion to full mage. Her assignment partner, Aurelia, is a beautiful, abrasive mage whose polished exterior hides a secret pain. They take the artifacts to Shpelling, a "remote, unwelcoming, bafflingly garlicky" village where surly locals, unfit lodgings, and a diet of garlic and bean stew with garlic bread wear on them. They learn a magical drought is ruining the village, and Certainty has the idea to "test" the artifacts to help the community. A spark grows between Certainty and Aurelia as their seemingly harmless efforts bear fruit, but one wrong spell could threaten everything they have built.

Leong's second novel hums with warmth and cheer, the power of community, and a sweet love story. Talkative magical objects and a dragon-winged cat add charm and humor. This dreamy, healing fantasy journey will beguile readers of Sarah Beth Durst and Travis Baldree. --Jaclyn Fulwood, blogger at Infinite Reads

Discover: A young novice mage finds love and purpose in a ramshackle village in Julie Leong's second cozy, uplifting romantic fantasy.

In Maureen Lee Lenker's A Star Is Scorned, Flynn Banks is one of Hollywood's most notorious leading men, with a woman for every occasion. Liv De Lesseps, a newcomer to Tinseltown, is his new co-star in his next picture. After a meet-cute right out of Singin' in the Rain, Flynn is smitten with Livvy, unaware of her true identity. Flynn's attraction only grows when they get to know each other on set, and Livvy realizes there is more to the man she admired on-screen than the gossip mags would have her believe.

Needing to clean up Flynn's image (and boost the stardom of their new leading lady) in Hays Code-era Hollywood, the studio stages a fake relationship for the pair. It soon becomes clear, however, that there is nothing fictional about their romance.

The third novel in Lenker's classic Hollywood world, A Star Is Scorned can be read as a stand-alone, though as in many romance series, characters from previous volumes appear. The yearning grows more palpable with each word as the lovers are convinced that they could never work as a couple. With its lingering touches and action-packed sword fights, A Star Is Scorned feels like an old movie come to life on the page. The themes of censorship and the consequences of speaking out against a powerful abuser are sadly still relevant and deepen the story.

Full of nods to classic movies and movie stars, A Star Is Scorned will make readers want to put on Glenn Miller, pour something bubbly, and imagine themselves on the silver screen. --Alyssa Parssinen, freelance reviewer and former bookseller

Discover: A Star Is Scorned is a romance full of longing, perfect for any reader whose favorite movie is in black-and-white.

Pepper Basham (Some Like It Scot; Authentically, Izzy) has crafted a delightful nod to Jane Austen in her Regency romance Sense and Suitability.

Emmeline "Emme" Lockhart has had two failed social seasons, and at 20, she's practically unmarriageable. Emme doesn't mind, as she is secretly busy writing gothic novels about pirates and vampires. But scandal would ensue if her authorial identity were discovered, so she suppresses both it and her lingering memories of Simon Reeves. Two years earlier, Emme thought Simon was about to propose to her, but instead he left her brokenhearted.

Meanwhile Simon--now Lord Ravenscross after the death of his father and cousin--must find a wealthy bride immediately. Though he had truly loved Emme, he let society believe she had merely aimed her flirtation too high because he found out that his profligate cousin and father nearly bankrupted his family's estate. When Simon and Emme cross paths again, she decides to forgive him and, as his friend, help him find a rich wife. She even loans him one of her favorite new books, Sense and Sensibility. As he reads it, Simon can't help wondering if he's a Willoughby or a Brandon.

Lighthearted and amusing, with Simon's irrepressible little siblings adding a great deal of humor, Sense and Suitability is perfect for those who like their romances sweet and clever. The characters are thoughtful, and dour aunts aplenty add a touch of balance to the romantic shenanigans. Basham's witty storytelling makes this a charming read for fans of Austen-inspired fiction. --Jessica Howard, former bookseller, freelance book reviewer

Discover: In this sweet and clever historical romance, a secret author falls for a bankrupt lord.

The Man of Many Fathers: Life Lessons Disguised as a Memoir is stand-up comic and former Daily Show correspondent Roy Wood Jr.'s wonderfully wry look at the men who shaped him, often by filling the void his father left even while the two were living under one roof.

Wood, who was born in 1978, was initially raised in Memphis by his mother; his parents split up in 1979 but never divorced. One summer, Wood's mother informed him that they were moving to Birmingham to live with his dad, pioneering Black radio entrepreneur Roy Wood Sr.: she wanted her son to have a father. As it played out, Roy Sr. spent most of his time working or off with his new family, so Roy Jr. cast a wide net for role models. He eventually learned lessons from an ex-con, men he worked with at a restaurant, and so on, intuiting that wisdom can be found in unlikely places.

This resourcefulness helped Wood as he made his way in the comedy world, and his account of his gradual rise is candid, demystifying, and, of course, funny. Still, he keeps returning to the subject of Roy Sr. and the man's generationally specific outlook on life: "My father was from an era of Black men who thought if you simply paid all the bills in the house, then that justified any other behavior." Wood frequently addresses The Man of Many Fathers to his own son--insurance that the boy won't lack for fatherly guidance. --Nell Beram, author and freelance writer

Discover: Daily Show veteran Roy Wood Jr.'s memoir is a wonderfully wry look at the men who shaped him, often by filling the void his father left even while the two were living under one roof.

Technological advancement seems to be reshaping not only how people direct their attention but also the economy itself, in ways that disenfranchise the average person. The Age of Extraction by professor of law, science, and technology Tim Wu (The Master Switch; The Attention Merchants) shows how those changes are happening. As an expert in competition and antitrust policies, he exercises that knowledge while analyzing how tech platforms have altered perceptions of what competition, and the stifling of competition, looks like today.

Wu explains in a forthright and commonsense way that despite the best efforts of the tech corporations to make it seem like there is a lack of resources for everyone, the amount of resources is not the problem. Rather, it is a distribution problem. While people used to exchange information and goods in the public agora, now the movement to do the same in digital spaces has added to the ability of platforms essentially to monopolize parts of the wider market. Wu argues that breaking up such monopolies is necessary to reinvigorate the economy. He offers a vision of the world where tech platforms can promote an economic model that supports everyone, not just major corporations: "It is not too late to restore the early promise of the Internet economy as a common square for commerce and an agent of economic uplift for all."

Accessible and engaging, The Age of Extraction addresses a critical problem and charts a path forward through both public skepticism of "accumulated economic power" and a distrust of "unaccountable power"--essentially mapping a way to trust in ourselves above tech platforms. --Michelle Anya Anjirbag, freelance reviewer

Discover: Professor of law and expert in antitrust, technology, and competition policy Tim Wu shows readers how power, money, and technology have become intertwined and what might be done about it.

British naturalist Tristan Gooley, known as the "Natural Navigator," takes readers on a fascinating journey of interpreting natural signs in his engaging, informative 10th book, The Hidden Seasons. Focusing on each month in turn, Gooley (How to Read a Tree; The Nature Instinct) highlights small but significant phenomena of flora, fauna, weather, and sky to help readers connect more deeply to, and understand the trends of, the shifting seasons in the temperate northern hemisphere.

"Our job is to decipher the patterns that hide in beauty," Gooley notes, before examining bonfire smoke and explaining how frost maps indicate relative heat. He indicates the major meteor showers in each month and gives handy tips on locating certain constellations and noticing daily shifts in light. As for plants, Gooley goes beyond the basic cycle of bud, leaf, flower, and fruit to describe patterns in different microclimates and the ways plants and animals interact with topography, the weather, and one another.

Although Gooley enjoys sharing nature facts, his instruction ultimately urges readers to get out and experience nature for themselves, piecing together clues to explore and observe the layers of change present in every season. In a clear, straightforward style peppered with mnemonic devices and wry humor, Gooley encourages readers to tune and retune their senses to growth, temperature, and light. Readers walking through the year with Gooley will be inspired to pay more attention to their own environments and the subtle delights of each season. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

Discover: British naturalist Tristan Gooley takes readers on a journey of connecting more deeply to nature by exploring the small but significant changes marking each season.

Eyes in the Soles of My Feet is a collection of essays about the natural world reflected through the lens of people and events in author Caroline Sutton's life: aging parents, grandchildren, husbands, and dogs. Sutton (How Do They Do That?) uses her relationship with her granddaughter, a welcome Covid-19 transplant to their home by the ocean, as a frame through which to consider. For instance, putting her granddaughter to bed for the night occasions the discussion of the sleep habits of tuna. Sutton is a keen observer whose wide-ranging curiosity functions as a compass, directing her attention onto a vast landscape of subjects that she investigates in elegant, unsentimental prose. She has a gift for making nature's complexity easier to comprehend without overlooking the profound and unknowable.

Sutton's essays meander and converge in surprising ways. One moment, she's delving into the seldom seen battles of insects such as hornets and spiders, her language as meticulous as a scientist's diagram. The next, she's reflecting on moral versus aesthetic perfection.

The topics may seem disparate--the ecology of a tidal estuary, Peruvian geoglyphs--but they are gracefully brought together by Sutton's relentless compassion and observation. Her essays are less about their subjects and more about the act of looking closely at something until its hidden intricacies reveal themselves. She teaches readers that a single phenomenon, such as a bird's migration pattern, can be a doorway to a broader understanding of the world. Eyes in the Soles of My Feet is a celebration of this investigative spirit, a book for anyone who finds wonder in details and the connections between them. --Elizabeth DeNoma, executive editor, DeNoma Literary Services, Seattle, Wash.

Discover: In this elegant essay collection, Caroline Sutton investigates the wonders of natural world through an intensely personal lens.

The dazzling poems of Daniel Schonning's elegant debut collection, As When Waking, relish linguistic experimentation and nature imagery.

The core of the book is an astounding set of 26 abecedarians and 10 syllabic pangrams. Each abecedarian starts with a different letter of the alphabet and loops back around (so the "E" poem ends with a "D" line, for instance); the pangrams, brief pieces using all letters of the alphabet at least once, have the repeated heading "[Little Box]." Short iterative sections bookend the main text. Throughout, alliteration and repetition create restful rhythms. "At first, it's as if all/ words are raining/ and from their forms, forms fall." Readers might not fully appreciate the variety of forms until a final note reveals multiple instances of terza rima and specific subtypes Schonning invented, such as a "lattice abecedarian."

Longer, anecdotal pieces alternate with staccato lists and pithy koans. Some of the poems were inspired by artworks, or by figures as varied as Amiri Baraka and William Blake and his wife, Catherine. There are also references to ancient history and Greek mythology and philosophy. Schonning is often in lyric mode. Personal stories of grief, doubt, and addiction are enwrapped in striking language. Nature vocabulary abounds, as in the title poem about ducks on an icy pond: "Two dozen of them/ litter the blue ice--doze against waves frozen/ mid-curl.... / While the mallards/ suck winter sun into/ their dark backs, they dream their way into the pond's green/ underneath." Impressive work indeed. --Rebecca Foster, freelance reviewer, proofreader, and blogger at Bookish Beck

Discover: The 37 poems in this dazzling debut collection relish linguistic experimentation and nature imagery as they convey philosophical musings and personal stories.

A varied cast of eccentric animal characters inhabits The Tree That Was a World, a hilariously irreverent and enchantingly strange book of short stories by Dutch author Yorick Goldewijk, translated into English by Laura Watkinson (Movies Showing Nowhere), and illustrated by Jeska Verstegen (I'll Keep You Close).

A tree "as old as the world" and "as big as the world" grows in a fog-swept forest, its branches filled with the secret lives and stories of a hidden community of creatures. A sloth sneaks out of the tree at night for some sprinting, gymnastics, and "lots of lovely screaming" away from prying eyes. A caterpillar learns a valuable lesson when she follows her heart and does not metamorphose. A stick tries to pass itself off as a stick insect, a spider cannot bring himself to eat the flies he catches, and a young aphid cannot stop herself from nibbling her siblings. The vignettes coalesce in a story about a party the animals hold to celebrate the tree, their shared home, and the companionship they have found with each other, except perhaps "those snooty pikes in the lake."

Verstegen's airy illustrations evoke the damp, cool air, filtered sunlight, and deep, soft night shadows of a forest. Her animal characters appear realistic, with occasional anthropomorphic props such as a table of place settings. Mirth, absurdism, and deep meaning entwine in Goldewijk's surreal fables. Middle-grade and adult readers who love humor, grace, and depth should enjoy this gem. --Jaclyn Fulwood, youth services manager, Allen County Public Library

Discover: A varied cast of eccentric animals share a tree in this hilariously irreverent and enchantingly strange book of short stories.

Debut picture book author Megan Clendenan (Design Like Nature) and illustrator Brittany Cicchese (No More Señora Mimí) skillfully combine their talents in the accessible, atmospheric picture book collaboration Just in Case.

Eight hundred miles from the North Pole, on a Norwegian island, in a frozen mountain is a global bank that holds only one kind of currency: seeds. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is a repository that stores duplicates of every seed housed in every single one of the "1,700 seed banks around the world." Clendenan's narrative explains the importance of collecting seeds: "Just like California condors, grizzly bears, and monarch butterflies need care, so do seeds--otherwise they could become extinct." Through a story-like text and supplemental sidebars, Clendenan emphasizes the special needs of seeds and the extraordinary work required to create and fill this perfect storehouse: thawing permafrost, blasting mountains, avoiding polar bears, even preparing the seeds themselves. "The packets... are tested. Water, heat, air, even stomping feet!" Cicchese's digital art adds layers to Clendenan's narrative as it uses a soft, rounded line to depict the different locations around the world (the swirls of the Northern Lights; the bending stalks in a rice paddy) and highlights the humanity of those harvesting and storing the seeds (family pictures on a wall; childlike drawings on a box).  

Detailed backmatter enriches the reading experience further, offering additional resources for budding agriculturalists and conservationists. Just in Case emphasizes the universal importance of the seed bank through diverse imagery and representation, allowing young readers to withdraw plenty of riches from Clendenan and Cicchese's bank of knowledge. --Jen Forbus, freelancer

Discover: Just in Case dynamically offers young readers a wealth of knowledge about the global seed bank hidden in the frozen mountains of Norway.

A quilt becomes a family album in The Quilt of Our Memories, a heartfelt picture book by author Desirée Acevedo and illustrator Víctor Jaubert, translated from the Spanish by Jon Brokenbrow.

"It was all my great-great-grandmother's idea," begins the narrator, whose identity is revealed at the end. "Every woman in the family would stitch a square for a very special quilt." Acevedo's prose resembles a well-trod litany as the narrator recites each contributor and the significance of the image on her quilt block: a seashell from grandmother Bianca, who "loved to take long walks along the seashore," a carnation from a great-great-aunt who wore the flowers in her hair, and so on. Though the quilt has been created by "the women of the family," narrator Mateo wants to experience "the wonderful gift of belonging to [his] family history." He adds a block depicting his infant daughter and bequeaths the quilt to her.

Jaubert's buoyant illustrations fittingly brim with color and texture. As the text moves through five generations of the narrator's family, Jaubert includes subtle nods to the passage of time, such as the pin curls worn by the narrator's great-great-grandmother, a tabletop radio behind his great-grandmother's sewing chair, and the bell-bottom pants and groovy vest shown on aunt Pia. Jaubert depicts each person's quilt square on one side of each spread; the squares mirror hues and visual motifs from the illustration on the opposite page; for instance, the background fabric of grandmother Bianca's block features waves and bubbles.

Acevedo and Jaubert have created a moving testament to the ability of physical objects to travel across history, laden with meaning. --Stephanie Appell, freelance reviewer

Discover: This brightly colored and heartfelt picture book offers a moving testament to one family's collectively created quilt and to the ability of physical objects to convey meaning.

Prolific author Jennifer A. Nielsen, best known for her YA fantasy (the Ascendance series) and historical fiction (Lines of Courage), offers readers The Free State of Jax, a funny, fast-paced coming-of-age adventure-mystery about one lonely boy's quest to claim agency over his out-of-control life.

Jaxon Averett is an orphan living in Walkonby, Kan., whose custodial relatives, the Grimmitzes, can't be bothered to get his name right; Jax is certain he needs to escape from his bullying and crude guardians. After posting his personal Declaration of Independence on the bathroom mirror, Jax sets out to claim eminent domain over a pond on a seemingly abandoned property next door; he establishes a new country he calls the Free State of Jax. Unfortunately, the Grimmitzes, with their six mostly awful children, are working just as hard to keep him from actualizing his independence. To make matters more complicated, the land Jax has claimed turns out to be owned by Owen O'Keefe, a possible thief and murderer, who ends up being one of the only adults who takes Jax's governmental aspirations seriously. Mr. O'Keefe also brings Jax tasty meals, and it's "hard to imagine a coldhearted villain blending [stew] seasonings so perfectly." Still, the man's reputation is clouded by rumors.

Nielsen deftly juggles a lively collection of plots and subplots, including a decidedly unusual main storyline. The outcome of Jax's efforts will likely feel like victory for readers, though not exactly what Jax had planned. The Free State of Jax should be a great read for any kid who enjoys Gordon Korman or Stuart Gibbs. --Emilie Coulter, freelance writer and editor

Discover: In this lively and unusual adventure-mystery, a boy creates a micronation by claiming eminent domain over a neighbor's pond--and finds friendship, family, and a way finally to be seen and heard.