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What to Read in June: 10 Books for Warmer Days
This month we’re reading a new Tracy Flick novel from Tom Perrotta, historical fiction about the 19th century racehorse, Lexington, and German filmmaker Werner Herzog’s first novel / BY Nathalie Atkinson / May 31st, 2022
Whether you prefer thrillers, literary fiction or family drama, it’s finally time to take our reading outside. As we prepare our summer reading extravaganza list (stay tuned – it’s coming later in June!), we couldn’t resist sharing our picks of the month’s most anticipated fiction.
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1The Exhibitionist “The longer the marriage, the harder truth becomes,” writes Mendelson, whose novels have been long listed for the Booker and The Women’s Prize, dissecting the dysfunction of a middle-class London family over the course of a weekend. Friends and adult children are gathered to celebrate artist Ray’s first exhibition in 20 years. Even for a self-styled artistic genius, he’s a monstrously Lear-like patriarch deluded by his own ego. Will this be the day his three submissive children and long-suffering wife (a more talented, but less egotistical artist, who sabotaged her own promising career for his) finally break free? The answer is a feat of darkly comic domestic realism. (June 1)
“The longer the marriage, the harder truth becomes,” writes Mendelson, whose novels have been long listed for the Booker and The Women’s Prize, dissecting the dysfunction of a middle-class London family over the course of a weekend. Friends and adult children are gathered to celebrate artist Ray’s first exhibition in 20 years. Even for a self-styled artistic genius, he’s a monstrously Lear-like patriarch deluded by his own ego. Will this be the day his three submissive children and long-suffering wife (a more talented, but less egotistical artist, who sabotaged her own promising career for his) finally break free? The answer is a feat of darkly comic domestic realism. (June 1)
2How to be EatenJumping on the recent trend for literary retellings, this Copenhagen-based American writer has opted for classic fairy-tale heroines. Inventively transposed into a contemporary setting, five women who have lived through fantastical traumatic events (like Little Red Riding Hood, for one) are part of the same PTSD support group. In this sardonic, funny and dark novel, they bond and dissect how the stories of their personal trauma have been twisted, questioned, sensationalized and commodified by the public (think: the Amber Heard/Johnny Depp trial) and may leave readers second-guessing their own casual misogyny and cultural assumptions. (June 1)
Jumping on the recent trend for literary retellings, this Copenhagen-based American writer has opted for classic fairy-tale heroines. Inventively transposed into a contemporary setting, five women who have lived through fantastical traumatic events (like Little Red Riding Hood, for one) are part of the same PTSD support group. In this sardonic, funny and dark novel, they bond and dissect how the stories of their personal trauma have been twisted, questioned, sensationalized and commodified by the public (think: the Amber Heard/Johnny Depp trial) and may leave readers second-guessing their own casual misogyny and cultural assumptions. (June 1)
3Iona Iverson’s Rules for CommutingMuch as she did in her heartwarming bestseller The Authenticity Project, the London-based former advertising executive brings unlikely people together for the pleasure of forging unexpected friendships (and changing their outlook on life). This time, they’re seasoned commuters to Waterloo Station – familiar strangers on a magazine columnist’s daily commute – who come together to intervene during a life-threatening incident. It’s a book to lift the spirits. (June 7)
Much as she did in her heartwarming bestseller The Authenticity Project, the London-based former advertising executive brings unlikely people together for the pleasure of forging unexpected friendships (and changing their outlook on life). This time, they’re seasoned commuters to Waterloo Station – familiar strangers on a magazine columnist’s daily commute – who come together to intervene during a life-threatening incident. It’s a book to lift the spirits. (June 7)
4The MidcoastIt’s a family saga and character study smuggled into a simmering suspense thriller – one where ambition and tensions between middle and working class commingle in a summer tourist town on the coast of Maine. After a local writer moves back to his hometown, he takes an interest in the meteoric rise of the Thatch family’s fortunes and how they became the big fish of their the small town. Unravelling past crimes comes with a great sense of place. (June 7)
It’s a family saga and character study smuggled into a simmering suspense thriller – one where ambition and tensions between middle and working class commingle in a summer tourist town on the coast of Maine. After a local writer moves back to his hometown, he takes an interest in the meteoric rise of the Thatch family’s fortunes and how they became the big fish of their the small town. Unravelling past crimes comes with a great sense of place. (June 7)
5Tracy Flick Can’t WinIn this sequel to his satirical 1998 novel Election, Perrotta revisits his anti-hero, the relentlessly driven candidate for student council president (a character so indelible in the culture that comparisons were made, as insults, to Hillary Clinton during her campaign). Two decades have passed and Flick, now a frustrated assistant principal at her old high school, is back in battle mode when the top job comes up. Given the projects addressing male power and sexism that Reese Witherspoon (who starred as in Alexander Payne’s 1999 film adaptation) has been spearheading, the A-lister could easily reprise her pitch-perfect portrayal in this follow-up about the fallout of toxic masculinity and frustrated ambition. (June 7)
In this sequel to his satirical 1998 novel Election, Perrotta revisits his anti-hero, the relentlessly driven candidate for student council president (a character so indelible in the culture that comparisons were made, as insults, to Hillary Clinton during her campaign). Two decades have passed and Flick, now a frustrated assistant principal at her old high school, is back in battle mode when the top job comes up. Given the projects addressing male power and sexism that Reese Witherspoon (who starred as in Alexander Payne’s 1999 film adaptation) has been spearheading, the A-lister could easily reprise her pitch-perfect portrayal in this follow-up about the fallout of toxic masculinity and frustrated ambition. (June 7)
6HorseLexington, the famous 19th century American racehorse, is the nominal subject of this historical literary novel that shifts between two main timelines: Smithsonian researchers in 2019 Washington, D.C., who are intrigued by the horse’s story, and an enslaved groom in the 1850s, with a brief stop in the 1950s New York art world. Brooks has an abiding interest in fleshing out the truth in history’s margins (the Australian-American journalist won the Pulitzer Prize for March, her retelling of Little Women from the point of view of their abolitionist father and Union Army chaplain). So the antebellum South, with its reliance on Black-created wealth, is the most rigorously researched in what is, at its core, a novel about the legacy of structural racism. (June 14)
Lexington, the famous 19th century American racehorse, is the nominal subject of this historical literary novel that shifts between two main timelines: Smithsonian researchers in 2019 Washington, D.C., who are intrigued by the horse’s story, and an enslaved groom in the 1850s, with a brief stop in the 1950s New York art world. Brooks has an abiding interest in fleshing out the truth in history’s margins (the Australian-American journalist won the Pulitzer Prize for March, her retelling of Little Women from the point of view of their abolitionist father and Union Army chaplain). So the antebellum South, with its reliance on Black-created wealth, is the most rigorously researched in what is, at its core, a novel about the legacy of structural racism. (June 14)
7The Twilight WorldPublishing his first novel at the age of 79, the celebrated German filmmaker (who has made more than 50 films since 1968) fictionalizes the quixotic story of real-life legend Hiroo Onada. Beginning in 1944, the Japanese commando spent 30 years living on the small island of Lubang in the Philippines, convinced the Second World War was ongoing and that the island needed defending. It’s a new and fascinating chapter in Herzog’s career of examining solitary characters gripped by compulsion. (June 14)
Publishing his first novel at the age of 79, the celebrated German filmmaker (who has made more than 50 films since 1968) fictionalizes the quixotic story of real-life legend Hiroo Onada. Beginning in 1944, the Japanese commando spent 30 years living on the small island of Lubang in the Philippines, convinced the Second World War was ongoing and that the island needed defending. It’s a new and fascinating chapter in Herzog’s career of examining solitary characters gripped by compulsion. (June 14)
8LapvonaThis Southern California writer earned a cult following for My Year of Rest and Relaxation, her bestselling 2018 twist on the classic metamorphosis tale. The new novel, set among the denizens of a village in a medieval fiefdom, is a weird and wild ride about the tragic things that happen to a 13-year-old boy whose parents and community neglect him. The sin, hell, corruption and even pandemic themes of her timely and disturbing latest could be plucked out of a Hieronymus Bosch painting, and are just as unsettling. (June 21)
This Southern California writer earned a cult following for My Year of Rest and Relaxation, her bestselling 2018 twist on the classic metamorphosis tale. The new novel, set among the denizens of a village in a medieval fiefdom, is a weird and wild ride about the tragic things that happen to a 13-year-old boy whose parents and community neglect him. The sin, hell, corruption and even pandemic themes of her timely and disturbing latest could be plucked out of a Hieronymus Bosch painting, and are just as unsettling. (June 21)
9The GoldenacreThe novel gets its title from the watercolour that was, reputedly, the final work of renowned Scottish artist Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The painting is at the crux of this literary noir drama of crime and inheritance, in which an embittered investigative reporter and the government official called in to authenticate it follow separate investigative threads until their stories converge in Glasgow. (June 28)
The novel gets its title from the watercolour that was, reputedly, the final work of renowned Scottish artist Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The painting is at the crux of this literary noir drama of crime and inheritance, in which an embittered investigative reporter and the government official called in to authenticate it follow separate investigative threads until their stories converge in Glasgow. (June 28)
10Elsewhere The Massachusetts writer’s 2020 debut Saint X, about the disappearance of a teenage girl on Caribbean vacation, was a New York Times notable book of the year.
She uses the set-up of her new speculative tale (described as Shirley Jackson meets Margaret Atwood) – about a remote mountain community where children and parents alike await “the affliction,” a ritual phenomenon in which random mothers in the community simply vanish – to explore what it means to be a mother. (June 28)
The Massachusetts writer’s 2020 debut Saint X, about the disappearance of a teenage girl on Caribbean vacation, was a New York Times notable book of the year.
She uses the set-up of her new speculative tale (described as Shirley Jackson meets Margaret Atwood) – about a remote mountain community where children and parents alike await “the affliction,” a ritual phenomenon in which random mothers in the community simply vanish – to explore what it means to be a mother. (June 28)