Recommended New Novels for Autumn Reading
by Larry Cox on Nov. 01, 2010, under UncategorizedKill the Dead: A Sandman Slim Novel by Richard Kadrey (EOS/HarperCollins, $22.99)
In the second book in the series and a sequel to “Sandman Slim,” Sandman Slim drafts Stark as a body guard. After a series of inexplicable murders, the victims return as the walking undead. Set against the backdrop of Los Angeles, this story is a mix of hitmen, demons, porn, profanity, unexpected wit, zombies, and interesting characters. In addition to protecting Sandman Slim, Stark deals with questions of his paternity, his place in eternity, and a zombie plague that turns the City of Angeles into an edgy, dangerous hell-like town. San Francisco-based Kadrey is a frequent contributor to various publications. “Kill the Dead” is difficult to define, one of the many reasons why this provocative novel is so intriguing.
Driving on the Rim by Thomas McGuane (Knopf, $25.95)
Thomas McGuane, who lives on a ranch in Montana, is the author of nine novels, three works of nonfiction, and two collections of stories. His latest novel is set in Montana and focuses on Dr. Irving Berlin “Berl” Pickett, the son of Pentecostal owners of a rug-shampooing business. After medical school, I.B. Pickett becomes close friends with a local physician and a solitary bird hunter. When he is suspected of negligent homicide in the death of a former lover, Dr. Pickett’s life becomes even more complex. This novel is darkly comic with a narrative that is both sarcastic and sassy. McGuane’s new book has colorful and intriguing characters swept up in enough plot twists and turns to keep readers flipping pages until the very end. This is an exceptional piece of writing.
Take Me Home by Brian Leung (Harper, $24.99)
Brian Leung, a Kentucky-based writer who is an associate professor of creative writing at the University of Louisville and winner of the Asian American Literary Award and the Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction, bases his latest novel on an actual racial riot and massacre that was triggered in Wyoming during the late nineteenth century. Adele “Addie” Maine, a strong-willed white woman, befriends Wing Lee, a Chinese male cook, so that she can sell meat to the coal miners in the small community. When her friendship attracts attention, Addie is mysteriously shot and Wing disappears, possibly murdered. She is horrified and flees to California. Forty years later, Addie returns to Wyoming to bid farewell to a friend from decades ago. When she encounters the man she is certain once tried to kill her, she must confront the situation in order to heal the wounds of the past. This is a powerful story about friendship, love, and eventual triumph, set against the dramatic backdrop of 1880s Wyoming. It is thought-provoking, crisply written, and compulsively readable.
Take One Candle Light a Room by Susan Straight (Pantheon, $25.95)
The main character in this unsettling story is Fantine Antoine, an African-American travel writer based in Southern California. Fantine returns to her former hometown of Rio Seco, in rural Louisiana, to mark the fifth anniversary of the murder of her closest childhood friend, Glorette. She soon finds herself pulled into the tumultuous life of Glorette’s twenty-two-year-old son, Victor, who has fled to New Orleans after being involved in a shooting. Fantine pursues Victor so that she can, perhaps, help him avoid what is quickly becoming a life mired in crime. White members of Rio Seco see Victor as a threatening black man, even though he has — against all odds — managed to graduate from community college with honors. Frantine sees him as both her godson and a man with a bright future who she wants to get into a four year college. As Fantine’s arrives in Southern Louisiana, Hurricane Katrina strikes which complicates an already complicated situation.
The Trials of Zion by Alan M. Dershowitz (Grand Central Publishing, $26.99)
Alan M. Dershowitz, a high profile criminal attorney and professor at Harvard Law School, sets his latest novel in modern day Israel. After shocking acts of terror bring the Holy Land to the brink of explosion, a Palestinian is arrested and charged. A young Jewish-American lawyer, the daughter of a famed criminal defense attorney, joins his defense team of a Palestinian when it becomes evident that the arrested man could be innocent. This riveting story combines the tension of the greatest courtroom dramas with heart-thumping violence, a challenging love story, interesting characters, and a forceful plot set against the backdrop of of one of the most historically significant, cultural settings in the world. Dershowitz writes with the legal insight that only a seasoned attorney can deliver. This is, without a doubt, one of Dershowitz’s best novels and proves that he is a writer who is still at the top of his game.
World and Town by Gish Jen (Knopf, $26.95)
Gish Jen, author of three previous novels and a book of stories, has won numerous awards and is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She sets her latest book in a small New England town but there is nothing small about the scope of her story. Even though it takes a chapter or two to get fully involved in “World and Town,” once you do you are carried along like a craft on a river of rapids. At the center of this story is Hattie Kong, a feisty Chinese woman, who has lost both her husband and best friend to cancer. After two years, she realizes it is time to start over and she relocates to the town of Riverlake, where she is soon joined by an immigrant Cambodian family. Starting over and moving forward is the focal point in “World and Town,” a novel that questions such things as religion, home, what America is, what neighbors are, what love is, and — in the larger sense, what “worlds” we make of the world. Much like in her previous book, “Typical American,” Jen writes with insight and a wisdom that celebrates friendship, love and human connections.
Mary Ann in Autumn by Armistead Maupin (Harper, $25.99)
Armistead Maupin first introduced readers to the colorful cast of 28 Barbary Lane in his 1970s-era San Francisco newspaper columns. The columns triggered a Peabody Award-winning TV miniseries with Olympia Dukakis and Laura Linney in addition to six best-selling novels. Three years ago, “Michael Tolliver Lives” was published which more or less provided an updated to the main “Tales of the City” characters. Twenty years have passed since Mary Ann Singleton left her husband and child in San Francisco to pursue a television career in New York. After a series of personal calamities, she returns to the city by the bay where she settles into a cottage owned by her oldest friend, Michael Tolliver, and his much-younger husband. She licks her wounds, takes stock of her mistakes, and with the help of Facebook, begins building a new life. This sassy, irreverent book explores the boundaries of the human experience which was the hallmark of Maupin’s earlier work. The main point is that Maupin has lost none of his magic and his characters remain an indelible part of our pop culture.
Kind of Blue by Miles Corwin (Oceanview, $25.95)
Miles Corwin is a former Los Angeles Times crime reporter. His previous novel, “The Killing Season” brought him international acclaim and it was a bestseller. “Kind of Blue” follows the same path, with a plot that is so gritty and realistic one has to keep in mind it is a work of fiction. It’s that good. When a legendary ex-cop is murdered in Los Angeles, the pressure is on to find the killer. Enter Lt. Frank Duffy who needs his best man on the case. The problem is that Ash Levine, formerly his top investigator and a seasoned, tenacious, obsessive detective quit the force the previous year when Latisha Pattan, a witness in a homicide case, was murdered. Levine blames himself for the incident but when he is asked to rejoin the force he reluctantly agrees. He is determined to not just find the cop killer but the person responsible for Latisha’s murder as well.
The False Friend by Myla Goldberg (Doubleday, $25.95)
With school bullies in the national headlines, this novel couldn’t be more relevant or timely. Celia and Djuna are fierce friends at rural Jensenville Elementary school where they reign over a small circle of friends with a publishing cruelty. One day, the two girls walk into the woods and only Celia comes out. Fast forward 20 years. Celia lives in Chicago with a boyfriend in a strained relationship. Even though she has not comes to terms with her actions that fateful day in the woods, she believes she might be partially responsible for what happened. This is a poignant tale by the author of “Bee Season.” Myla Goldberg lives in Brooklyn.
