A true smorgasbord of options is on offer for readers this week, with flavors to suit a variety of palates.
Care for an inspirational memoir? Check. Reminders of mortality and the precarious position of civilization itself? Yep, that's here. And if you want a head start on summer, there are a couple of books publishing this week that may fit that bill too. You'll just have to decide first if your preferred page-turner features people falling in love — or dying in inventively grisly ways.
A difficult decision, to be sure. But don't worry, the stakes are low: You really can't go wrong with any of this week's notable books.
Atavists, by Lydia Millet
"Is there a writer more profound and less pretentious than Lydia Millet?" That question leads NPR's review of the author's previous short story collection, Fight No More, and bears asking again now. After a spell that saw her publish a couple of novels and a work of nonfiction, the former Pulitzer and National Book Award finalist has returned to short fiction with her latest, a collection of 14 interconnected stories set in a Los Angeles that is teetering on the cusp of climate catastrophe. Careful though: As always with Millet, the writing here is spare, straightforward and often funny — but beware of its dark and perilous depths.
Change the Recipe: Because You Can't Build a Better World Without Breaking Some Eggs, by José Andrés with Richard Wolffe
How should you introduce Andrés — with his work in the kitchen, which has earned him Michelin stars and TV appearances, or his humanitarian work in war zones and disaster areas? In this memoir, the Spanish-American chef connects the dots of his dovetailing passions. Expect plenty of recipes — both the metaphorical, life-lesson variety and the kind that you can actually follow to make dinner tonight. In a confusing, often painful world, "at least feeding people is what makes sense," as Andrés told NPR in 2022.
Great Big Beautiful Life, by Emily Henry
Henry is on quite a run. For the better part of a decade now, the prolific young novelist has published a book each year that feels sunkissed by the promise of the coming summer. Heck, one of them was even named Beach Read. This year is no different. In Great Big Beautiful Life, the star-crossed leads in question are a pair of journalists who both have designs on an exclusive interview with an aging heiress, whose life story is an important thread woven throughout the novel. Let the competition — and inconvenient sexual tension — commence!
Notes to John, by Joan Didion
The notes collected here comprise the late writer's private reflections after her sessions with a psychiatrist beginning in 1999, during a tumultuous time in her life. The "John" addressed in the title is her husband, John Gregory Dunne, but the journal really focuses on a broad swath of topics — from her own childhood and career anxieties to her complicated relationship with her adoptive daughter, whose death just a handful of years later would inspire Didion's 2011 memoir Blue Nights. It's unclear whether Didion — whose body of work features plenty of intimately personal writing — intended to publish these particular notes, which were found neatly arranged among her files after her death in 2021.
When the Wolf Comes Home, by Nat Cassidy
There will be blood. That much, at least, you can count on in Cassidy's fourth novel, a relentlessly paced slice of horror. Jess, an actress down on her luck and reeling from a particularly terrible night, finds a young boy hiding in the bushes — and quickly realizes the night is about to get much, much worse. That boy is hiding for a very good reason, you see. Don't go into this one expecting a slow burn. Cassidy himself commented on the book's Goodreads page that this is his "homage to '80s action horror paperbacks, the kind you might pick up in an airport or a grocery store."
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