Shows / New Books in Literature
New Books in Literature
This podcast is a channel on the New Books Network. The New Books Network is an academic audio library dedicated to public education. In each episode you will hear scholars discuss their recently published research with another expert in their field. Discover our 150+ channels and browse our 28,000+ episodes on our website: newbooksnetwork.com Subscribe to our free weekly Substack newsletter to get informative, engaging content straight to your inbox: https://newbooksnetwork.substack.com/…
Episodes
- New Books in Literature
Writing the Counter-Book: Joshua Cohen with Eugene Sheppard (JP)
Eugene Sheppard joins his Brandeis colleague John Plotz to speak with Joshua Cohen about The Netanyahus. Is the 2021 novel a Pulitzer-winning bravura story of…
- New Books in Literature
Brad Kelly, "House of Sleep" (2021)
Today I talked to Brad Kelly about his novel House of Sleep (2021). A cerebral PsyFi thriller that will break your heart and then set it free. Think Chuck…
- New Books in Literature
Daniel M. Ford, "The Warden" (Tor, 2023)
Daniel M. Ford’s new novel The Warden (Tor, 2023) follows Aelis de Lenti, a young necromancer in her first year as the Warden of Lone Pine—a small frontier…
- New Books in Literature
Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi, "Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions: A Novel in Interlocking Stories" (Amistad Press, 2022)
Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi’s novel Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions: A Novel in Interlocking Stories (Amistad 2022), is a moving and unforgettable collection of…
- New Books in Literature
C. S. Harris, "Who Cries for the Lost" (Berkley Books, 2023)
Fans of Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, know that the individual tales that form his saga combine complex, fast-paced, often political mysteries with a…
- New Books in Literature
Douglas Bauer, "The Beckoning World" (U Iowa Press, 2022)
Douglas Bauer's novel The Beckoning World (U Iowa Press, 2022) is set in the first quarter of the twentieth century and follows Earl Dunham. His weeks are…
- New Books in Literature
Donnaldson Brown, "Because I Loved You: A Novel" (She Writes Press, 2023)
Today I talked to Donnaldson Brown about her new novel Because I Loved You (She Writes Press 2023) Sixteen-year-old Leni O’Hare loves her horse, so when her…
- New Books in Literature
Lauren Kay Johnson, "The Fine Art of Camouflage" (MilSpeak Books, 2023)
Lauren Kay Johnson is just seven when she first experiences a sacrifice of war as her mother, a nurse in the Army Reserves, deploys in support of Operation…
- New Books in Literature
Marianna Kiyanovska, "The Voices of Babyn Yar" (Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, 2022)
Today I talked to the translators of Marianna Kiyanovska's The Voices of Babyn Yar (HURI, 2022), Max Rosochinsky and Oksana Maksymchuk. With this collection of…
- New Books in Literature
Rebecca Makkai, "I Have Some Questions for You" (Viking, 2023)
A successful film professor and podcaster, Bodie Kane is content to forget her past--the family tragedy that marred her adolescence, her four largely miserable…
- New Books in Literature
Sassan Tabatabai: Poetry, Observation, and Form
"For me, there is something so solid and comforting in stone" says Sassan Tabatabai in our conversation, and in his poem "Firestones" the words roll, weigh and…
- New Books in Literature
G. P. Gottlieb, "Charred: A Whipped and Sipped Mystery" (DX Varos, 2023)
In Charred, the third of G. P. Gottlieb’s Whipped and Sipped Mysteries, her heroine, Alene Baron, has a lot on her mind. Chicago is in lockdown, a response to…
- New Books in Literature
S. L. Wisenberg, "The Wandering Womb: Essays in Search of Home" (U Massachusetts Press, 2023)
Today I talked to S. L. Wisenberg about her book The Wandering Womb: Essays in Search of Home (U Massachusetts Press, 2023). As a child, S. L. Wisenberg…
- New Books in Literature
Jonan Pilet, "Nomad, Nomad" (Bound to Brew, 2021)
In his debut short story collection, Nomad, Nomad (Bound to Brew, 2021), Jonan Pilet explores the lives of Mongols and expats looking for a sense of home…
- New Books in Literature
Ronald Niezen, "The Memory Seeker" (Black Rose Writing, 2023)
The Memory Seeker is a novel that, drawing upon Professor Ronald Niezen's background in researching human rights, takes on the experiences of war violence and…
- New Books in Literature
Sarah Fawn Montgomery, "Halfway from Home: Essays" (Split/Lip Press, 2022)
Today I interview Sarah Fawn Montgomery about her new collection of essays, Halfway from Home (Split Lip Press, 2022). These essays explore, in nuanced and…
- New Books in Literature
Rasheed Newson, "My Government Means to Kill Me: A Novel" (Flatiron Books, 2023)
Earl "Trey" Singleton III arrives in New York City with only a few dollars in his pocket. Born into a wealthy Black Indianapolis family, at 17, he is ready to…
- New Books in Literature
Leslye Penelope, "The Monsters We Defy" (Redhook, 2022)
Leslye Penelope’s latest novel, The Monsters We Defy (Redhook, 2022), takes readers to a version of 1920s Washington D.C. where bootleggers, powerful spirits…
- New Books in Literature
Zeno Sworder, "My Strange Shrinking Parents" (Thames & Hudson, 2023)
When the two immigrant parents in Zeno Sworder’s latest illustrated book go to the baker asking for a cake for their son, the baker asks for something…
- New Books in Literature
Sarit Yishai-Levi, "The Woman Beyond the Sea" (Amazon Crossing, 2023)
Today I talked to Sarit Yishai-Levi about The Woman Beyond the Sea (Amazon Crossing, 2023). The book was translated by Gilah Kahn-Hoffmann. Eliyah is 25 when…
- New Books in Literature
Kelly Barnhill, "The Crane Husband" (Tordotcom, 2023)
Today I talked to Kelly Barnhill about her book The Crane Husband (Tordotcom, 2023). Our unnamed narrator, a fifteen-year-old girl, manages to care for her…
- New Books in Literature
Sherry Thomas. "A Tempest at Sea" (Berkley Books, 2023)
Sherry Thomas' latest book in her Lady Sherlock Series, A Tempest at Sea (Berkley, 2023), finds Charlotte Holmes in a dangerous investigation at set in the…
- New Books in Literature
Jinwoo Chong, "Flux" (Melville House, 2023)
Four days before Christmas, 8-year-old Bo loses his mother in a tragic accident, 28-year-old Brandon loses his job after a hostile takeover of his big-media…
- New Books in Literature
Svetlana Lavochkina, "Dam Duchess" (Whiskey Tit, 2018)
Svetlana Lavochkina's book Dam Duchess (Whiskey Tit, 2018) invites readers to take a surreal journey into the past: the construction of Dnipro Dam, the…
- New Books in Literature
Jacqueline Winspear, "The White Lady" (Harper, 2023)
It’s just after World War II, and Elinor White (born Elinor de Witt, which also means “white”), a single woman in her mid-forties, lives as a recluse in a…
- New Books in Literature
Julia Langbein, "American Mermaid" (Doubleday, 2023)
Broke English teacher Penelope Schleeman is as surprised as anyone when her feminist novel American Mermaid becomes a best-seller. Lured by the promise of a…
- New Books in Literature
Victoria Garza, "The Field" (Jackleg Press, 2022)
Victoria Garza begins her poetic memoir with her ten-year-old self learning that her little sister and cousin have died in a car accident. She painstakingly…
- New Books in Literature
Patricia L. Hudson, "Traces" (Fireside Industries, 2022)
An early American adage proclaimed, "The frontier was heaven for men and dogs―hell for women and mules." Since the 1700s, when his name first appeared in…
New Books in LiteratureBook Chat: "Human Glitches" (2020)
In this episode, our podcast host, Ti-han Chang, invited Ms Lin Hsin-hui, a bourgeoning Taiwanese Sci-fi writer to talk about her award-winning short story…
- New Books in Literature
Lawrence Osborne, "On Java Road: A Novel" (Hogarth Press, 2022)
The star of On Java Road (Hogarth: 2022), the latest novel from Lawrence Osborne, is Adrian Gyle, a down-on-his-luck correspondent in Hong Kong, in the midst…
- New Books in Literature
Idra Novey, "Take What You Need: A Novel" (Viking, 2023)
Today I talked to Idra Novey about her new novel Take What You Need (Viking 2023). Leah, her husband, and their little son are driving back to where she grew…
- New Books in Literature
Juliana Lamy, "You Were Watching from the Sand" (Red Hen Press, 2023)
Playful, kinetic, and devastating in turn, You Were Watching from the Sand (Red Hen Press, 2023) is a collection in which Haitian men, women, and children who…
- New Books in Literature
Mohamed Tonsy, "You Must Believe in Spring" (Hajar Press, 2022)
You Must Believe in Spring (Hajar Press, 2022) is Mohamed Tonsy's "speculative fiction." It is about the future of Egypt when people's memory of the recent…
- New Books in Literature
Omer Bartov, "The Butterfly and the Axe" (Amsterdam Publishers, 2023)
Spring 1944. A Jewish family is murdered in a remote Ukrainian village. Who were they? Who were the killers? Three generations later, an Israeli woman and a…
- New Books in Literature
Molly Greeley, "Marvelous" (William Morrow, 2023)
Once in a while, a novel comes along that is both different and special. Marvelous (William Morrow, 2023) is such a book. Retellings of fairy tales are not…
- New Books in Literature
Kashana Cauley, "The Survivalists: A Novel" (Soft Skull Press, 2023)
Kashana is the author of the novel The Survivalists, which was published in January 2023 by Soft Skull Press. She’s also a TV writer who has written for The…
- New Books in Literature
Talia Lakshmi Kolluri, "What We Fed to the Manticore" (Tin House Books, 2022)
Through nine emotionally vivid stories, all narrated from animal perspectives, Talia Lakshmi Kolluri’s debut collection explores themes of environmentalism…
- New Books in Literature
Priscilla Gilman, "The Critic's Daughter: A Memoir" (Norton, 2023)
Growing up on the Upper West Side of New York City in the 1970s, in an apartment filled with dazzling literary and artistic characters, Priscilla Gilman…
- New Books in Literature
Lavanya Lakshminarayan, "The Ten-Percent Thief" (Solaris, 2023)
In Lavanya Lakshminarayan’s science fiction novel, The Ten-Percent Thief (Solaris, 2023), is set in a world centered on meritocracy, where everyone is judged…
- New Books in Literature
Rebecca Gayle Howell et al., "What Things Cost: An Anthology for the People" (UP of Kentucky, 2023)
What Things Cost: An Anthology for the People (UP of Kentucky, 2023) is the first major anthology of labor writing in nearly a century. Here, editors Rebecca…
- New Books in Literature
Olivia Atwater, "Half a Soul" (Orbit, 2022)
Today I talked to Olivia Atwater about her new book Half a Soul (Orbit, 2022). When a nasty fairy Lord tries to take young Dora’s soul, her doting cousin…
- New Books in Literature
Kyla Zhao, "The Fraud Squad" (Berkley Books, 2023)
Can anyone break into high society? From Cinderella, Eliza Doolittle and Jay Gatsby to Don Draper and Anna Sorokin, characters that can fool their way into the…
- New Books in Literature
Deepti Kapoor, "Age of Vice" (Riverhead Books, 2023)
Today I talked to Deepti Kapoor about her new novel Age of Vice (Riverhead, 2023). Deepti Kapoor grew up in northern India and worked for several years as a…
- New Books in Literature
Joanna Higgins, "In the Fall They Leave: A Novel of the First World War" (Regal House Publishing, 2023)
Today I talked to Joanna Higgins about her new book In the Fall They Leave: a Novel of the First World War (Regal House Publishing, 2023). Nineteen-year-old…
- New Books in Literature
Lynn Cullen, "The Woman with the Cure" (Berkley Books, 2023)
The essential contribution of The Woman with the Cure (Berkley Books, 2023) can be summarized in one sentence: like most of its future readers (I assume), I…
- New Books in Literature
Freddy Prestol Castillo, "You Can Cross the Massacre on Foot" (Duke UP, 2019)
In 1937 tens of thousands of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic were slaughtered by Dominican troops wielding machetes and knives. Dominican writer and…
- New Books in Literature
Lyudmyla Khersonska, "Today is a Different War" (Arrowsmith Press, 2023)
Today is a Different War (Arrowsmith Press, 2023) is Lyudmyla Khersonska's striking portrayal of life from inside war-torn Ukraine. Masterfully translated into…
- New Books in Literature
Mary Salisbury, "Side Effects of Wanting" (Mainstreet Rag, 2022)
In Side Effects of Wanting (Main Street Rag, 2022), author Mary Salisbury spent nearly twenty years gathering together the pieces of humanity she saw reflected…
- New Books in Literature
Nic Brown, "Bang Bang Crash: A Memoir" (Counterpoint, 2023)
In his memoir, Bang Bang Crash (Counterpoint, 2023), Nic Brown shares his experiences as a rock and roll drummer who abandons his successful music career to…
- New Books in Literature
Mark Eveleigh, "Kopi Dulu: Caffeine-Fuelled Island-Hopping Through Indonesia" (Penguin Southeast Asia, 2022)
“Kopi Dulu,” means “coffee first” in Indonesian–a common phrase from Indonesians who are happy to have coffee anywhere, anytime and with anyone. At least, that…
- New Books in Literature
Christopher M. Hood, "The Revivalists" (Harper, 2022)
Christopher M. Hood is the Director of the Creative Writing Program at the Dalton School in New York City and lives nearby with his wife and daughter. He…
- New Books in Literature
Kerri Schlottman, "Tell Me One Thing" (Regal House, 2023)
Today I talked to Kerri Schlottman about her new novel Tell Me One Thing (Regal House Publishing, 2023). Quinn and a friend are driving from New York City to…
- New Books in Literature
Angela Hui, "Takeaway: Stories from a Childhood Behind the Counter" (Trapeze, 2022)
Food journalist Angela Hui grew up in rural Wales, as daughter to the owners of the Lucky Star Chinese takeaway. Angela grew up behind the counter, helping…
- New Books in Literature
Denise Crittendon, "Where it Rains in Color" (Angry Robot, 2022)
Denise Crittendon’s debut science fiction novel,Where it Rains in Color (Angry Robot, 2022), is set far in the future, long after the Earth has been destroyed…
- New Books in Literature
Judy L. Mandel, "White Flag: A Memoir" (Legacy Book Press, 2022)
Cheryl said many times that "I'm done with that life, I'll never go back to it." But she did. When her Aunt Judy finds her in jail after two years of thinking…
- New Books in Literature
C. P. Lesley, "Song of the Storyteller" (Five Directions Press, 2023)
Today I talked to C. P. Lesley about Song of the Storyteller (Five Directions Press, 2023). It’s 1546, and Ivan the Terrible is about to be coronated and…
- New Books in Literature
Sanaë Lemoine, "The Margot Affair" (Hogarth, 2021)
Sanaë Lemoine is the author of The Margot Affair and a 2022 National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow. She was born in Paris to a Japanese mother…
- New Books in Literature
Anthony Valerio et al., "Charles Street Trio: A Novel in Three Voices" (2022)
Charles Street Trio: A Novel in Three Voices (2022) is a series of books that collectively form a tapestry of life in the form of a sprawling epic of a novel…
- New Books in Literature
Matthew Salesses, "The Sense of Wonder" (Little, Brown, 2023)
MATTHEW SALESSES is the author of eight books, including The Sense of Wonder, which comes out in January 2023 from Little, Brown. Most recent are the national…
- New Books in Literature
Mimi Herman, "The Kudzu Queen" (Regal House, 2023)
Kudzu salesman James T. Cullowee arrives in Cooper County, North Carolina in the spring of 1941 to spread the gospel of kudzu. It can apparently feed cattle…