| Tana French’s new novel brings back the two young detectives from the Dublin Murder Squad, Antoinette Conway and Stephen Moran, who solved the prep-school slaying in her 2014 offering, “The Secret Place.” Conway narrates “The Trespasser,” and with her anger, intelligence and toughness emerges as French’s finest character yet. (Or would that still be Frank Mackey from “Faithful Place”? Hard to say.) Conway and Moran are assigned to investigate the murder of a young woman found dead in her Dublin home. Her boyfriend is the initial suspect, which leaves the two less than thrilled to have the case, because it looks like a routine domestic killing and solving those carries no glory. | | | | | | | | November’s Book Club Selection: “The Trespasser” | | Tana French’s new novel brings back the two young detectives from the Dublin Murder Squad, Antoinette Conway and Stephen Moran, who solved the prep-school slaying in her 2014 offering, “The Secret Place.” Conway narrates “The Trespasser,” and with her anger, intelligence and toughness emerges as French’s finest character yet. (Or would that still be Frank Mackey from “Faithful Place”? Hard to say.) Conway and Moran are assigned to investigate the murder of a young woman found dead in her Dublin home. Her boyfriend is the initial suspect, which leaves the two less than thrilled to have the case, because it looks like a routine domestic killing and solving those carries no glory. | |  |
| Patrick Anderson
Washington Post Book Reviewer • Read the full review » |
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 | | | A FANTASTIC DEBUT NOVEL BY BRIT BENNETT | | Mothers are everywhere in Brit Bennett’s fantastic debut novel. The title, “The Mothers,” specifically refers to a group of elders at Upper Room Chapel who hold very specific ideas about life and behavior. But there are other mothers in these pages — women who are callous or smothering, who keep their babies or don’t. And it’s worth noting that the best mothers in the story are a lesbian couple. | | Read more » |
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 | | | BEST SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY THIS MONTH | | Book World reviewer Nancy Hightower shares her top science fiction and fantasy picks including, the second edition to the “Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy;” Kai Ashante Wilson’s “A Taste of Honey;” and Emmi Itäranta’s evocative novel “The Weaver.” | | Read more » |
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| “The Whistler” by John Grisham | | Grisham’s new novel, “The Whistler,” is another ambitious look at corruption, this time involving a judge. The story begins with two investigators, Lacy Stoltz and Hugo Hatch, who work for the Florida Board on Judicial Conduct, which polices judicial misbehavior. They are approached by a whistleblower, a disbarred lawyer, who asks if they want to investigate “the most corrupt judge in the history of American jurisprudence.” | | Read the review » |
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| “Perfume River,” by Robert Olen Butler | | The story follows two brothers, Robert and Jimmy Quinlan, estranged for nearly five decades by their father’s incurable disappointment. Everyone circles the Quinlan family’s destruction, which began when Robert accepted military service to earn his father’s respect and Jimmy rejected it, protesting the war all the way to exile in Canada. Unrelated to them but braiding himself into their history is Bob, quickly sliding into madness, the homeless son of a long dead Vietnam veteran. They are all being pitched toward intersection. The past is ever in the moment. | | Read the review » |
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| “My Own Words” by Ruth Bader Ginsburg with Mary Hartnett and Wendy W. Williams | | In a new collection of the justice’s speeches, opinions and writings, “My Own Words,” curated by Ruth Bader Ginsburg and her biographers Mary Hartnett and Wendy W. Williams, the justice shows herself on balance to be far more comfortable in the latter posture. With deeply researched essays (often on pioneers such as the first Jewish justice, Louis Brandeis, or the first women in the legal profession, including Belva Lockwood) and warm tributes to her colleagues, there is scant evidence here of the bomb-throwing feminist icon — with the exception of some strong dissents and opinions from recent court terms. | | Read the review » |
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| “Homeward Bound: The Life of Paul Simon” by Peter Ames Carlin | | Paul Simon was never very happy about his appearance. According to Peter Ames Carlin’s biography “Homeward Bound,” as early as 1966 the young singer “became skilled with his comb, developing new and increasingly convoluted patterns to cover the pink top of his otherwise bushy head.” The alchemy of pop stardom is a curious process, and few stories are as unlikely and as absorbing as that of the Jewish kid from Queens turned folk superstar. Fresh off 2012’s “Bruce,” his take on another quintessentially American subject, Carlin provides a brisk and engaging overview of Simon’s career and protean musical output. | | Read the review » |
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