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
Mally Becker, "The Counterfeit Wife: A Revolutionary War Mystery" (Level Best Books, 2022)
Today I talked to Mally Becker about her new book The Counterfeit Wife: A Revolutionary War Mystery (Level Best Books, 2022). Philadelphia, June 1780. George…
- New Books in Literature
Clay Vagrant, "The Empire's Bladesmen: Forbidden Relics" (Armored History, 2021)
Set during the Ming Dynasty that ruled over China, The Empire's Bladesmen: Forbidden Relics (Amored History, 2021) by Clay Vagrant is a gripping story of…
- New Books in Literature
Chelsea Martin, "Tell Me I'm An Artist" (Soft Skull Press, 2022)
Today I talked to Chelsea Martin's new book Tell Me I'm An Artist (Soft Skull Press, 2022). Martin's first novel, tell me i'm an artist, is published with Soft…
- New Books in Literature
Faleeha Hassan, "War and Me" (Amazon Crossing, 2022)
An intimate memoir about coming of age in a tight-knit working-class family during Iraq's seemingly endless series of wars. Faleeha Hassan became intimately…
- New Books in Literature
Bruce Holsinger, "The Displacements: A Novel" (Riverhead Books, 2022)
Bruce Holsinger’s novel The Displacements (Riverhead Books, 2022) is a gripping saga about what might happen in a world in which climate change can wreak havoc…
- New Books in Literature
Steven Kotler, "The Devil's Dictionary" (St. Martin's Press, 2021)
Hard to say exactly when the human species fractured. Harder to say when this new talent arrived. But Lion Zorn, protagonist of Last Tango in Cyberspace, is…
- New Books in Literature
Ellen Doré Watson, “In Which Raging Weather is a Gift," The Common magazine (Spring, 2022)
Ellen Doré Watson speaks to managing editor Emily Everett about her poem “In Which Raging Weather is a Gift,” which appears in The Common’s spring issue. Ellen…
- New Books in Literature
Karen Heenan, "Coming Apart: A Novel of the Great Depression" (2022)
Today I talked to Karen Heenan about Coming Apart: A Novel of the Great Depression (2022). Ava has always been poor, so she doesn't think the Great Depression…
- New Books in Literature
Tanvi Berwah, "Monsters Born and Made" (Sourcebooks Fire, 2022)
Today I talked to Tanvi Berwah about Monsters Born and Made (Sourcebooks Fire, 2022). In our narrator Koral’s world—an oceanic world full of sea monsters…
- New Books in Literature
Rita Zoey Chin, "The Strange Inheritance of Leah Fern" (Melville House, 2022)
The Strange Inheritance of Leah Fern (Melville House 2022) by Rita Zoey Chin is equal parts coming of age, epic travel tale, quest to find a mother who…
- New Books in Literature
Kristina Marie Darling, "Daylight Has Already Come" (Black Lawrence Press, 2022)
Kristina Marie Darling’s Daylight Has Already Arrived (Black Lawrence Press, 2022) spans six years and countless styles. Motifs and images reappear, but the…
- New Books in Literature
A. M. Homes, "The Unfolding" (Viking, 2022)
A. M. Homes most recent book is The Unfolding (Viking, 2022). Her previous work includes, This Book Will Save Your Life, which won the 2013 Orange/Women’s…
- New Books in Literature
4.3 Strange Beasts of Translation: Yan Ge and Jeremy Tiang in Conversation
Yan Ge and Jeremy Tiang are both writers who accumulate languages. Sitting down with host Emily Hyde, they discuss their work in and across Chinese and…
- New Books in Literature
Victor Manibo, "The Sleepless" (Erewhon, 2022)
Part mystery, part thriller, with a splash of cyberpunk, Victor Manibo’s debut novel The Sleepless (Erewhon, 2022) imagines a near-future New York City where a…
- New Books in Literature
Celeste Ng, "Our Missing Hearts: A Novel" (Penguin, 2022)
Celeste Ng is the author of three novels, Everything I Never Told You, Little Fires Everywhere, and Our Missing Hearts. Her first novel, Everything I Never…
- New Books in Literature
Jill Stukenberg, "News of the Air" (Black Lawrence Press, 2022)
Immigration problems, climate issues, dysfunctional families, road barricades, and the division between haves and have nots play a role in this dream-like…
- New Books in Literature
Jane Satterfield, "Letter to Emily Brontë," The Common magazine (Spring, 2022)
Jane Satterfield speaks to managing editor Emily Everett about her poem “Letter to Emily Brontë,” which appears in The Common’s spring issue. Jane talks about…
- New Books in Literature
Bárbara Mujica, "Miss Del Río: A Novel of Dolores del Río, the First Major Latina Star in Hollywood" (Graydon House Books, 2022)
Miss del Río (Graydon House Books, 2022) explores the biography of a real-life actress, Dolores del Río, who became a silent movie star in Hollywood, navigated…
- New Books in Literature
Susanne Davis, "Gravity Hill" (Madville Publishing, 2022)
Gravity Hill (Madville Publishing 2022) is the story of a small town in Connecticut grappling with the tragic death of three teenage boys. What first appears…
- New Books in Literature
Murasaki Yamada, "Talk to My Back" (Drawn & Quarterly, 2022)
Manga historian Ryan Holmberg introduces the influential alternative manga artist Murasaki Yamada (1948-2009) to English readers through a scholarly…
- New Books in Literature
Olga Melnyk, "Ship Life: Seven Months of Voluntary Slavery" (2022)
Ship Life: Seven Months of Voluntary Slavery (2022) is written in the form of a diary of a Ukrainian girl who worked as a bar server on an American cruise…
- New Books in Literature
Light and Sound: Boubacar Boris Diop with Sarah Quesada
Boubacar Boris Diop is the author of Murambi: The Book of Bones, (Indiana UP, 2016; translated by Fiona McLaughlin), an unforgettable novel of the Rwandan…
- New Books in Literature
Andrew Sean Greer, "Less Is Lost" (Little Brown, 2022)
Andrew Sean Greer is the Pulitzer Prize winning author of six works of fiction, including the bestsellers The Confessions of Max Tivoli and Less. Greer has…
- New Books in Literature
Martha Anne Toll, "Three Muses" (Regal House Publishing, 2022)
In Three Muses (Regal House Publishing, 2022) by Martha Toll, John Curtin survives the Holocaust by singing for the entertainment of the kommendant who…
- New Books in Literature
Chris Belcher, "Pretty Baby: A Memoir" (Simon and Schuster, 2022)
"The dominatrix is the id of American femininity. She says the words that we all wish we could say when we find ourselves frozen in the presence of men. No is…
- New Books in Literature
Courtney Zoffness, "Spilt Milk" (McSweeney's, 2021)
Courtney Zoffness is the author of Spilt Milk, out now with McSweeney’s, and forthcoming in paperback in September 2022. Spilt Milk was named a best debut of…
- New Books in Literature
89* Charles Yu with Chris Fan: The Work of Inhabiting a Role (Novel Dialogue Crossover, JP)
Charles Yu won the 2020 National Book Award for Interior Chinatown but some of us became fans a decade earlier, with How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional…
- New Books in Literature
David Crow, "The Pale-Faced Lie: A True Story" (Sandra Jonas Publishing, 2019)
A violent ex-con forces his son to commit crimes in this unforgettable memoir about family and survival. Growing up on the Navajo Indian Reservation, David…
- New Books in Literature
Marion Deeds, "Comeuppance Served Cold" (Tordotcom, 2022)
A clever magical mystery which needs your full attention, Comeuppance Served Cold (Tordotcom, 2022) challenges this podcaster to write a review without a…
- New Books in Literature
Vauhini Vara, "The Immortal King Rao" (Norton, 2022)
Vauhini Vara was born in Saskatchewan, Canada, as a child of Indian immigrants, and grew up there and in Oklahoma and the Seattle suburbs. Her debut novel, The…
- New Books in Literature
Steve Stern, "The Village Idiot" (Melville House, 2022)
The Village Idiot by Steve Stern (Melville House, 2022) opens with a marvelous boat race on the River Seine in 1917. The already well-known artist Amedeo…
- New Books in Literature
Joma West, "Face" (Tordotcom, 2022)
People have always cared about their social status and how others perceive them, but advances in technology have changed how we ascend the social ladder…
- New Books in Literature
Davida Breier, "Sinkhole" (U New Orleans Press, 2022)
Davida Breier talks about her debut novel Sinkhole (University of New Orleans Press, 2022). Humidity, lovebugs, and murder. Lies from the past and a dangerous…
- New Books in Literature
Joanna Campbell, "Instructions for the Working Day" (Fairlight Books, 2022)
In Instructions for the Working Day by Joanna Campbell (Fairlight Books, 2022), Neil Fischer has inherited his father's former hometown of Marschwald in East…
- New Books in Literature
Laurie R. King, "Back to the Garden: A Novel" (Bantam, 2022)
Today I talked to Laurie R. King about her new novel Back to the Garden: A Novel (Bantam, 2022). Inspector Raquel Liang of the San Francisco Police Department…
- New Books in Literature
Rebecca Bernard, "Our Sister Who Will Not Die: Stories" (Madcreek Books, 2022)
This stories in this collection ask the reader to evaluate the humanness of the characters as well as readers’ own humaneness and capacity for empathy. A man…
- New Books in Literature
Sarah Thankam Mathews, "All This Could Be Different" (Viking, 2022)
Sarah Thankam Mathews grew up between Oman and India, immigrating to the United States at seventeen. She is a recipient of a Best American Short Stories 2020…
- New Books in Literature
Karinne Keithley Syers, "Astrs" (53rd State Press, 2022)
Karinne Keithley Syers is the founding editor of 53rd State Press, and Astrs is the play that inspired that long-running experiment in publishing avant-garde…
- New Books in Literature
Ben Ackerman, "Open When You Are: A Mystical Novel" (2016)
Gabel's eatery is always open, feeding hungry hearts, bodies, and souls. When Strad, a young man at odds with life, wanders in, an uncanny encounter propels…
- New Books in Literature
Larry F. Sommers, "Price of Passage: A Tale of Immigration and Liberation" (DX Varos, 2022)
Price of Passage: A Tale of Immigration and Liberation (DX Varos, 2022), Larry Sommers opens in 1853 in Norway, where only firstborn sons inherited their…
- New Books in Literature
Lan Samantha Chang, "The Family Chao: A Novel" (Norton, 2022)
The Fine Chao, a Chinese restaurant in the town of Haven, is known for its food and its boisterous owner, Big Leo Chao. Leo is loud, assertive and aggressive…
- New Books in Literature
Geetanjali Shree, "Tomb of Sand" (Tilted Axis Press, 2021)
Today I talked to Daisy Rockwell, translator of Geetanjali Shree's novel Tomb of Sand (Tilted Axis Press, 2021) An eighty-year-old woman slips into a deep…
- New Books in Literature
Liesl Schwabe, "The Marching Bands of Mahatma Gandhi Road," The Common magazine (Spring, 2022)
Liesl Schwabe speaks to managing editor Emily Everett about her essay “The Marching Bands of Mahatma Gandhi Road,” which appears in The Common’s spring issue…
- New Books in Literature
R. F. Kuang, "Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution" (Harper Voyager, 2022)
In R. F. Kuang’s Babel, or The Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution (Harper Voyager in 2022), we meet Robin Swift…
- New Books in Literature
His Sister, Her Monologue: A Discussion with Hilton Als
In this 2011 episode from The Vault, Hilton Als reads from, and discusses, His Sister, Her Monologue, a novella he published in Mcsweeney's #35. Als is a staff…
- New Books in Literature
Howard Jay Smith, "Meeting Mozart: A Novel Drawn From the Secret Diaries of Lorenzo Da Ponte" (Sager Group, 2020)
Today I talked to Howard Jay Smith about his new novel Meeting Mozart (The Sager Group, 2020). It’s 1946, and a young army intelligence officer is awakened…
- New Books in Literature
Elaine Hsieh Chou, "Disorientation: A Novel" (Penguin, 2022)
Elaine Hsieh Chou is a Taiwanese American writer from California. A 2017 Rona Jaffe Graduate Fellow at NYU and a 2021 NYSCA/NYFA Fellow, her short fiction…
- New Books in Literature
Meenal Shrivastava, "Amma’s Daughters: A Memoir" (Athabasca UP, 2018)
Today I talked to about Amma’s Daughters: A Memoir (Athabasca UP, 2018). This book is available open access here. As a precocious young girl, Surekha knew very…
- New Books in Literature
Megan Giddings, "The Women Could Fly" (Amistad, 2022)
The Women Could Fly (Amistad, 2022) is set in our contemporary world with one big difference. A belief in witches gives rise to laws and a culture that…
- New Books in Literature
Rena Rossner, "The Light of the Midnight Stars" (Redhook, 2021)
Rena Rossner is a literary agent at The Deborah Harris Agency, based in Jerusalem, Israel, which represents Israeli, Palestinian and other…
- New Books in Literature
Simone White, "Or, on Being the Other Woman" (Duke UP, 2022)
In or, on being the other woman (Duke UP, 2022), Simone White considers the dynamics of contemporary black feminist life. Throughout this book-length poem…
- New Books in Literature
Brad Schaeffer, "The Extraordinary" (Post Hill Press, 2021)
The Extraordinary by Brad Schaeffer (Post Hill Press 2021) tells the story of a family that is forced to confront both autism and post-traumatic stress…
- New Books in Literature
Julia May Jonas, "Vladimir: A Novel" (Simon & Schuster, 2022)
Julia May Jonas is a writer, director, and the founder of theater company Nellie Tinder. She has taught at Skidmore College and NYU and lives in Brooklyn with…
- New Books in Literature
Ben Stroud, “Three Omens of Federico da Montefeltro," The Common magazine (Spring, 2022)
Ben Stroud speaks to managing editor Emily Everett about his story “Three Omens of Federico da Montefeltro,” which appears in The Common’s spring issue. The…
- New Books in Literature
Mohsin Hamid, "The Last White Man" (Riverhead, 2022)
Mohsin Hamid is the author of five novels -- The Last White Man, Exit West, How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, and Moth Smoke…
- New Books in Literature
Laurie Buchanan, "Iconoclast: A Sean Mcpherson Novel" (Sparkpress, 2022)
A trained killer without a drop of human compassion shows up early in Laurie Buchanan’s second Sean McPherson thriller (Iconoclast (Spark Press 2022)). She has…
- New Books in Literature
Kathleen Rooney, "Where are the Snows: Poems" (Texas Review Press, 2022)
Hello, this is Eric LeMay, a host on New Books in Literature, a channel on the New Books Network. Today I interview Kathleen Rooney about her new collection of…
- New Books in Literature
Alice Elliott Dark, "Fellowship Point: A Novel" (Simon and Schuster, 2022)
Alice Elliott Dark is the author of the novels Fellowship Point and Think of England, and two collections of short stories, In The Gloaming and Naked to the…
- New Books in Literature
Judith Berlowitz, "Home So Far Away: A Novel" (She Writes Press, 2022)
After author Judith Berlowitz found both Gestapo and Soviet records about a relative named Klara Philpsborn, she began thinking about writing Home So Far Away…
- New Books in Literature
Learning to Drive: A Talk by Katha Pollitt
A longtime Institute member, Katha Pollitt is an American poet, essayist and critic. She is the author of four essay collections and two books of poetry. Her…