As we dust off the decks and start opening up the sheds and cottages, the long projects that have been gestating for months and months and months are starting to emerge. What has everyone been working on this past year? Well, for some authors, it's epic tomes, filled with lots and lots of pages.
For instance, here is China, Edward Rutherfurd's next historical novel, which begins in 1839, during the first Opium War, and careens through most of the 19th century with an eye toward making the history lessons as entertaining as possible.
It takes a certain brashness on the author's part to subtitle their historical epic "the novel" as opposed to "a novel." Apparently, this is Rutherfurd's schtick, and we say, "Lean into it, sir!"
Meanwhile, Alison Weir wraps up her Six Tudor Queens with Katherine Parr, The Sixth Wife. Katherine Parr was Henry the VIII's last wife, and as Weir has done all the research, this is a richly detailed account of a courageous and intelligent woman's life among the tumult of the Tudor court.
On a slightly different sort of scale, here is Thomas Rinaldi's Patented: 1,000 Design Patents. The contents are what the cover claims—pages and pages and pages of patent summaries—but here's the clever bit: Rinaldi has arranged them chronologically. Sure, he's picked what he thought was interesting, but the juxtaposition of objects is delightful. Where else could you find a picture of a TIE-Fighter from Star Wars next to an early Apple computer patent with Steve Jobs's name on it? Well, that's what was happening in the Patent Office, late in 1983.
This book is a perfect sort of Father's Day gift, by the way. Plan accordingly.
Meanwhile, progressive political figure Stacey Abrams has pivoted from non-fiction to fiction with While Justice Sleeps, a rousing legal thriller that taps into insider beltway machinations. When an irascible and outspoken Supreme Court Justice suddenly slips into a coma, it's up to his ambitious law clerk to discover who wants to put the snooze on justice before backroom machinations can result in an court decision that will have earth-shattering consequences.
And speaking of rollicking reads, Carl Hiaasen's Squeeze Me is out in paperback this week. As per usual, Hiaasen sets his sights on the political and environmental corruption that has swamped Florida, and his satirical scalpel is making deep cuts left and right. There's wildlife wranglers, Botox-infused martini swillers, a giant Burmese python, and a bumbling political figure that has no basis in reality. Kirkus Reviews calls it "frothy," Booklist gave it a starred review, and Publishers Weekly notes that Hiaasen "doesn't put subtlety at a premium." Excellent. We're doing enough heavy lifting this week with Rutherfurd.
P. Djèlí Clark has officially written a novel, by the way. Clark, who has been getting Hugo and Nebula nominations for his novellas (The Black God's Drums and The Haunting of Tram Car 015), returns to his marvelous alternate history Cairo of 1912 with A Master of Djinn. Fatma el-Sha-arawi is the youngest woman in the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, but she's no rookie when it comes to the strange and mysterious. When a member of a mysterious brotherhood is murdered, it's up to Agent Fatma to unravel the mystery before the world gets turned inside-out. Clark's world-building and narrative skills are impressive, and we're delighted to finally have a novel-length work from him.
And speaking of plots to get lost in, here is Jean Hanff Korelitz's The Plot. It's about a failed writer who "accidentally" ends up with a novel written by a nobody. The book becomes a phenomenal bestseller, and while out on tour, promoting this thing he stole, our writer is approached by someone who knows what he did. Naturally, things get more complicated from there. This isn't Korelitz's first time at the knobs of the suspense machine, and The Plot hurtles along at a very smart clip.
Meanwhile, in a slightly less organized manner, actor and producer Seth Rogen has put out a book that isn't quite a memoir and isn't quite a collection of essays. Year Book is more like a bunch of stories about Seth wandering through Hollywood, where he meets people and does a lot of drugs (much to his mother's dismay). It's a bunch of stories that Rogen himself hopes are either funny or life-changing. We'll leave that conclusion up to you, dear reader.
And finally, here is Julian Sancton's Madhouse at the End of the Earth, the true story of the Belgica, the ship of the Belgian Antarctic Expedition, which spent an unexpected winter, trapped in the polar ice. Filled with daring explorers and crafty naturalists, Madhouse at the End of the Earth is a nail-biter of an armchair read.
