Know What's Happening in Books
Know What's Happening in Books
Book Riot Launches New Release Index for Mystery & Thriller Fans
Book Riot’s New Release Index is a searchable database that lists upcoming mystery and thriller titles by release date, letting readers filter by sub‑genre and add titles to a personal Watchlist. The tool is bundled with the All Access membership, which costs $6 per month and also unlocks premium articles. Users can scroll cover images and click for descriptions to stay ahead of new releases.
Zoe Strimpel's new book Good Slut positions capitalist‑driven sexual freedom as the pinnacle of modern feminism, arguing that women now have unlimited access to money, sex and power. The work mixes libertarian and conservative feminist rhetoric, championing individual choice while dismissing systemic barriers. Strimpel proposes controversial solutions such as mandatory martial‑arts training for women and promotes OnlyFans as a financial rescue, revealing a disconnect from working‑class realities. Critics describe the book as a self‑help manifesto that ignores intersectional concerns and reinforces elite, metro‑centric feminist narratives.
WHAT THE HELL... "This 1979 classic tells the darkly humorous story of I.C. Trumpelman, a man whose fancy determines the fate of others. Chosen as the head of a Judenrat, Trumpelman thrives on the power granted him and creates an authoritarian...
In this episode, host and Chuck Klosterman discuss Klosterman's book *Football*, exploring why the sport is a cultural touchstone and how it shapes American identity. Klosterman explains his lifelong fascination with football, from childhood hero Roger Staubach to the sport’s...
Rebecca Newberger Goldstein’s new book, *The Mattering Instinct*, expands a four‑decade philosophical inquiry into why humans crave to matter. Drawing on her earlier "matter‑map" concept, the work blends philosophy, psychology, and behavioral economics to explain the instinct for personal attention...
The Wonder Reader newsletter spotlighted Daniel Smith’s essay on boredom, invoking Joseph Brodsky’s 1989 Dartmouth commencement speech that frames boredom as a teacher of our insignificance. Smith argues that feeling boredom—whether while running errands or on hold—can become a conduit...
Lee Ann S. Wang’s book *The Violence of Protection* critiques the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), arguing that its funding of law‑enforcement rescue operations creates new forms of racial violence against survivors, especially Asian American women. By framing victims as...
The author reflects on personal writing experiments, noting an early admiration for John Stuart Mill’s structured sentences and a simultaneous desire for mathematical precision. By age twenty‑one, he aimed to convey ideas in the fewest clear words, even if it...
In this hour‑long interview, author Markus Zusak reflects on the 20th anniversary of The Book Thief, discussing its unexpected evolution, the deliberate structure of the novel, and the emotional journey of writing it. He shares anecdotes about characters that were...
Australian author Helen Garner’s short‑fiction collection ‘Stories’ has been released in the United States, gathering works first published between 1985 and 1998. The volume highlights Garner’s distinctive voice, which she often credits to the discipline of her diaries and a...
Icelandic children’s author Snæbjörn Arngrímsson turns to crime fiction with *One True Word*, a psychological thriller set on a remote Hvalfjörður islet. The story follows freelance writer Júlía, whose impulsive decision to abandon her husband spirals into a web of...
Mary Costello’s new novel *A Beautiful Loan* delves into the unquantifiable dimensions of the human psyche, following protagonist Anna as she seeks to know herself and others beyond scientific rationalism. The narrative contrasts Anna’s yearning for emotional truth with the...
Haley Pham’s debut novel *Just Friends*, released by Simon & Schuster, follows childhood best friends Blair and Declan as they reunite amid grief, career doubts, and a lingering love‑undercurrent. The story alternates between present‑day challenges—caring for a dying great‑aunt, family‑run stores, and a...
Superb read on the endless tug-of-war between human nature and the nature of reality, from Zeno's paradox to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle to Borges's mirror https://t.co/jNaaCY1w60
Megha Majumdar’s *A Guardian and a Thief* has earned a rare sweep of literary honors, including a longlist spot for the 2026 Women’s Prize for Fiction, a shortlist for the 2025 National Book Award, and the 2026 Andrew Carnegie Medal...
The romance genre is experiencing a renewed sales surge, prompting publishers to revisit metadata standards. BookNet Canada’s Stephanie Small highlighted how BISAC and Thema classifications can be combined to capture both broad categories and nuanced tropes, from sports romance to...
The piece compiles every Jimmy Fallon Book Club title from its 2018 launch through the 2025 summer list, noting format shifts such as fan voting, a single‑author pick, and a 16‑title spring slate in 2024. It records hiatus years (2020,...
One of the biggest mistakes I see writers making is submitting their projects too soon. Typing THE END feels so good. Finishing the first draft of a book is an accomplishment – and worth celebrating But it’s not time to dash...
What if I learned how to write about books I love in a way people actually liked? 🤪 40k+ views and 2 likes is actually so embarrassing. ☠️
Harold Bloom, the controversial literary critic, spent his later career defending a traditional Western canon and a theory of poetic influence that pits writers against their predecessors. His best‑selling books such as *The Western Canon*, *Shakespeare: The Invention of the...
Your girl got her hands on a used library copy of the out of print novel (co-authored by my @lafilmcritics colleague/ friend Stephen Farber) on the John Landis’ Twilight Zone Movie deaths, Outrageous Conduct.
Terry Tempest Williams’s new book *The Glorians* offers an "Epic Documentation" of fleeting, sacred moments she calls Glorians—tiny encounters that reveal nature’s hidden divinity. Drawing on Emersonian philosophy, the work weaves personal grief, desert ecology, and climate urgency into a...
Malcolm Cowley, once sidelined by his Communist affiliations, reinvented himself as a reporting, reviewing, and editing powerhouse in post‑World War II publishing. He curated the influential "Portable" anthologies for Hemingway, Faulkner and Fitzgerald, and later championed countercultural works like Kerouac’s On...
The article offers a comprehensive guide to reading Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander universe, listing more than 20 titles—including nine main novels, numerous novellas, short stories, and companion books—in both chronological and publication order. It highlights Gabaldon’s recommendation to follow the main series...
BuzzFeed launched a gender‑neutral quiz that assigns users to a specific romance subgenre based on their preferences. The interactive format blends pop‑culture references with personality‑type questions, delivering a personalized result such as "Historical Romance" or "Paranormal Romance." The quiz is...
Laura Field’s new audiobook, *Furious Minds*, examines how Donald Trump’s 2016 victory ignited a radical reconfiguration of American conservatism. Field, a former insider in conservative academia, documents the emergence of the New Right—a coalition of scholars, public intellectuals, and tech‑savvy...
Virginia Dignum’s new book *The AI Paradox* argues that the growing capabilities of artificial intelligence actually highlight the irreplaceable value of human creativity, moral judgment, and responsibility. She frames AI’s biggest challenges as enduring paradoxes—tensions between efficiency and control, innovation...
Steven Weitzman’s new book, *Disasters of Biblical Proportions*, examines how the ten plagues of Exodus have been continually reshaped by Jews, Christians, Muslims and secular thinkers to make sense of catastrophe. Inspired by the COVID‑19 pandemic, the work traces each...
Cornelia Woll's book argues US prosecutors increasingly rely on out‑of‑court settlements to enforce corporate criminal law beyond its borders, turning fines into a tool of geopolitical leverage. Data shows foreign companies, which represent only 16 % of cases from 2000‑2020, bear...
The post highlights a stark gender gap in business literature: while women now author the majority of new books overall, they remain vastly under‑represented in best‑selling business titles. In 2020, only 17 of the 200 top business books were written...
The Yale‑University‑Press volume "Gwen John: Strange Beauties" accompanies a landmark retrospective that reunites the artist’s oils, watercolors and drawings for the first comprehensive survey in four decades. Curated by Rachel Stratton and Lucy Wood, the show travels from National Museum...
Thirteen leading U.S. publishers, represented by the Association of American Publishers, have filed a federal lawsuit against the pirate site Anna’s Archive, accusing it of copying and distributing millions of copyrighted books and journal articles. The complaint alleges the site...
A new bill in Congress would punish schools for letting students read about gender identity — and “lascivious dancing.” Book bans aren’t fading. They’re evolving. Today’s newsletter: https://roncharles.substack.com/p/now-congress-is-coming-for-the-books
Letting in the golden light – Oliver Sacks on how love changes what we see https://t.co/VRmelozj2f
Elizabeth Day marks World Book Day and International Women’s Day by sharing a personal essay that doubles as a promotional platform for her new novel, ONE OF US. While traveling between Los Angeles and New York, she curates a list of favorite...
Doris Lessing was 14 when she dropped out of school and 88 when she won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Her abiding wisdom on how to read a book and how to read the world https://t.co/LlU7CVEqUQ
Álvaro Enrigue’s new novel *Now I Surrender* reframes the Apache Wars through a wildly inventive, absurdist lens, intertwining historical figures like Geronimo with fictional personas such as a disguised zarzuela singer. The narrative collapses textbook binaries, presenting the conflict as...
The Economist highlights six books that illuminate America’s Gilded Age, a period from the post‑Civil War era to World War I marked by massive immigration, industrial expansion, and the rise of “robber barons.” The works explore how vast fortunes were built...
The piece links the decline of deep reading to deliberately engineered digital design that fragments attention, arguing that today’s delivery mechanisms are the real culprits. It also highlights Daisy Edgar-Jones’ casting in the upcoming film adaptation of Gabrielle Zevin’s gaming‑industry...
The landmark volume *City of Victory: Hampi Vijayanagara (Pictor)* has been reissued in a 2026 large‑format edition, merging George Michell’s refreshed scholarship with John M. Fritz’s original framework. Photographer John Gollings contributes a five‑decade visual archive that captures the stone‑sculpted city in dramatic...
Friendly reminder: Buying books and reading books are two different hobbies. (visual by my friend @ash_lmb) https://t.co/h9Z2zH8iYk
António Lobo Antunes, the celebrated Portuguese novelist, died at 83, ending a career that produced over thirty novels and reshaped modern Portuguese literature. A former psychiatrist and army doctor, his wartime experiences in Angola informed his psychologically intense, polyphonic narratives....
The Art of Manliness roundup highlights Derrick Jeter’s debut novel *Blood Touching Blood*, which immerses readers in post‑Civil War Indian Wars through the eyes of Buffalo Soldiers. It also spotlights BAMF Style, a long‑standing men’s fashion blog that dissects iconic...
Granta’s latest podcast features Christopher Bollas, a pre‑eminent psychoanalytic theorist, discussing his forthcoming books *Essential Aloneness* and *Streams of Consciousness*. In the conversation, Bollas examines how psychoanalysis intersects with literature, the role of daydreams in uncovering unconscious material, and whether...
The article examines Iris Murdoch’s moral philosophy, arguing that it has been systematically misread by mainstream analytic philosophers. Mark Hopwood’s new book contends that Murdoch’s work is coherent, metaphor‑driven, and deliberately resists systematic codification. Central to her thought are concepts like "loving...
Kim Fu’s new novel, The Valley of Vengeful Ghosts, follows Eleanor Fan as she uses an inheritance to buy a dilapidated house in a rain‑soaked, terraformed valley. The story blends personal grief over her mother’s death with the broader anxieties...
The Library of America has released *George Templeton Strong: Civil War Diaries*, a 701‑page volume that concentrates on Strong’s entries from November 1860 through 1865. About 45 percent of the material is newly published, offering fresh insight into a Manhattan lawyer’s daily...
Welsh actress and writer Ruth Jones has been shortlisted for Author of the Year at the 2025 British Book Awards. Her memoir, "When Gavin Met Stacey And Everything In Between," chronicles the creation and success of the beloved sitcom, while...
Meet Me Under the Lights, a new YA novel by Cassie Miller, launches March 3, 2026 from Viking Books for Young Readers. Set in a North Carolina farm town, the story pits baseball‑royalty Eliza Crowley against rival pitcher Reed Fulton...
Katherine G. Charles’s new Cambridge University Press volume *Lost Plots* examines the pervasive use of interpolated, or “tales‑within‑a‑tale,” in eighteenth‑century novels. The book defines this narrative form, compiles a wide range of examples—from Fielding’s *Joseph Andrews* to Smollek’s *Peregrine Pickle*...
The article surveys seven contemporary poetry collections that reimagine the elegy, showing how poets blend memoir, lyric, and experimental forms to confront personal and collective loss. It highlights works by Agha Shahid Ali, Victoria Chang, Mary Jo Bang, Diana Khoi...
