15 Books to Read in October
From riveting biographies of Muhammad Ali and Jann Wenner to long-awaited novels by Philip Pullman and John Green, here are the best books to curl up with this fall.
Egan's first novel since 2011's Pulitzer Prize-winning A Visit From the Goon Squad follows a young woman in World War II-era New York who's trying to understand the shady circumstances of her father's disappearance. Meanwhile, she's struggling to support her mother and sister with her job as the first female diver at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 3)
Drawing on interviews with Muhammad Ali's friends, family, and colleagues—as well as recently discovered recordings from the 1960s and extensive FBI files—Eig tells the life story of the legendary boxer, political activist, and hero in all his complexity. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 3)
Roz Chast’s Going Into Town is a gorgeous graphic memoir fashioned as a deeply personal love letter to New York. Her cartoons paint a bustling picture of Manhattan in all of its machinations, interweaving moving anecdotes with guidebook-like details of the city’s many treasures, from restaurants and subways to museums and theaters. Buy it here.
In his latest — eight essays originally published in The Atlantic, each revisited in a new foreword — Coates brings both a big stick and a scalpel to what the book’s subtitle dubs An American Tragedy: the ugly realities of race, from the Civil War through last Nov. 8. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 3)
Girls run the world in this wildly inspired future fiction, thanks to an electric force awakened in their collarbones. But is the sudden ability to upend millennia of gender norms necessarily a good thing? Alderman navigates the tricky moral straits of her new matriarchy in a novel whose globe-spanning canvas gives the reader four drastically different protagonists, and one of the most vividly imagined concepts to come along in years.
Jason Reynolds' stunning, thrilling, and intoxicatingly innovative Long Way Down takes place in a 60-second timeframe. It provides an unrelenting, lyrical take on teen gun violence, using its own, disarming method of storytelling to reel you in and never let you go. Buy it here.
Lara Williams makes a bold debut with this razor-sharp, magnificently humane story collection. A Selfie as Big as the Ritz explores women as they navigate the rocky terrain between early 20s and middle age, piecing together a collage of persistent quests for joy, love, and meaning. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 31)
John Green hardly needs the accolades, but Turtles All the Way Down represents a new, exciting step for the best-selling author. He tells the story of Aza, a young would-be detective, and in the process vibrantly and sensitively tackles the thorny challenge of depicting mental illness. He succeeds, subtly but mightily. Buy it here.
It should come as no surprise that the great Gabrielle Union proves herself to be a crackling, compelling voice with her story collection We're Going to Need More Wine. Vulnerable, pointed, and unflinchingly genuine, the book is a powerful standalone read that also serves as a reminder of Union's essential voice and platform. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 17)
The Pulitzer Prize-winning Eugenides returns with his first literary project in six years. Fresh Complaint is a vibrant debut story collection from the Middlesex author, an exploration of adolescence and family that's told through a contemporary lens. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 3)
For years, Marc Maron's WTF podcast has provided some of the frankest, most illuminating celebrity interviews out there. Now the comic's comic has arranged some of his most memorable conversations in Waiting for the Punch, a powerful running narrative of the highs and lows encountered by some of the most recognizable names in the business. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 10)
The first of the Muppets Meet the Classics middle-grade series, this clever reimagining finds Erik Forrest Jackson (formerly of EW) fitting the likes of Kermit and Miss Piggy into the beloved vision of original Phantom author Gaston Leroux. (Per Jackson, it's a natural fit: "Miss Piggy rightly demanded a diva role.") Pre-order it here. (Oct. 17)
In this stunning, quite meta memoir, Vanasco attempts to come to terms with many things: Her beloved father's death, the name she shares with a dead half-sister she never met, and her own crescendoing mental illness. All the while, she talks the reader through her obsessive, meticulous writing process as she tries to finish the memoir she promised her dying father she'd write for him. Pre-order it here. (Oct. 3)
Time to Update Your Reading List
From riveting biographies of Muhammad Ali and Jann Wenner to long-awaited novels by Philip Pullman and John Green, here are the best books to curl up with this fall.
15 Books to Read in October
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