Body:
Rachel's Pick
To tell you too much about the plot of this book is to ruin it. In fact, even the jacket copy is somewhat misleading so as to not give away too much. So rather than talk about what this book is about, I’ll tell you something about the experience. Reading The Need is not unlike watching a good knife throwing act. The tension is almost suffocating; each gorgeous sentence is as dazzling as it is chilling. I already loved Helen Phillips because of her stunning little literary dystopia, The Beautiful Bureaucrat; The Need shows a writer who has not only grown, but who perhaps has no limits. I can’t wait to see what she does next.
Jason's Pick
I have read and loved every single book Ben Lerner has ever written, and his latest novel, a portrait of adolescence, masculinity, and cultural dysfunction in middle America in the 1990s (and essentially holding a mirror to today's societal ills), shows an author at the top of his game. Every sentence he writes is amazing and gorgeous, and his storytelling abilities here are unmatched.
Alex's Pick
High-stakes writing that imagines an outside to empire while trapped inside its blinding glow. Attending to the connections between subjecthood and state terror, the text continually circles back on itself as if to put theories of fugitivity into practice via poetic form. (What the hell is form? is among the questions the collection ponders.) A riotous book that refuses available representational paradigms, never content to accept the conditions of appearance that colonizers take as the given reality.
Ben's Pick
Coming out as gender nonconforming (or anything, really) often includes explaining what that is—along with what it means for you—to friends and family that have never encountered GNC people or vernacular. Unfortunately, one who realizes they are queer is not then magically imbued with the knowledge and teaching skills to educate everyone they interact with. Usually, we’re trying to define what it is we need to communicate. The snails and Sproutlings in this book can help. This gentle & informative guide is written for: concerned family, queer folk in need of an update, people preparing to come out, allies, and everyone else.
Christian's Pick
Mostly told by a pet crow, (though parts narrated by a cat threaten to steal the show, as cats often do) this zombie story asks “if humans all became zombies, how would our pets survive?” Thrilling action and riotous humor combine beautifully in this hero’s journey of a crow who thinks he’s human and his faithful dog companion.
Eddy's Pick
Go Ahead in the Rain is a different book to everyone I’ve spoken to who has read it. To some, it’s a book of essays on A Tribe Called Quest. To others, it’s a book of chunky poems written to the beat of old hip-hop records. To me it’s a time machine made up of lyrical prose instead of gears and wires and science fiction. A book that took me through my own childhood and adolescence by the tune of my old Sony headphones. Everyone I know who has picked it up, or even just heard an excerpt, calls it moving. Hanif Abdurraqib’s personal essays are so much more than pieces about music. He talks about violence, and youth, and sugar, and love, and a time and place that you’d swear you knew just by his words. Go Ahead in the Rain is a thing of magic. What will it be to you?
Lynda's Pick
Ever since I took D’aulaire’s Greek Myths out of the library as a child—and hid it so I wouldn’t have to return it in what would be a Hermes approved move—I have been a sucker for these stories. It is no surprise that Stephen Fry feels the same way, albeit it in a more erudite and hilarious way. These retellings of the lives of the arrogant gods and their human lovers, dupes, and victims, are wonderfully funny, delightfully footnoted, and perfect for anyone from a classics scholar to someone who can’t tell the difference between Ganymede and Gaea. This beautiful volume would make a perfect gift for someone you think is special. So do what Apollo would do and buy one for you.
Patrick's Pick
A quite definitive mantra of youthful precarity, Butler's sophomore novel will be most accessible to those who've found themselves in the purgatorial stasis between accomplishment and contentment. It harbors a satirical, though accurately ominous take on the existential crisis that is the millennial self image, and handily captures the essence of an emotional conflict that may seem as ambiguous as whatever the hell we're actually supposed to call this past decade, but will speak with clarity to worriers of a certain generation.