On Time and Water – Andri Snӕr Magnason
It is a deeply personal reckoning with individual and collective responsibility in a time of reckless consumption, and a rich tapestry of myth, memory, and wonder.
To rely on memory is thus its own kind of slow violence, a delicate crumbling we cannot fully comprehend.
That Time of Year – Marie Ndiaye
NDiaye’s tale is also a vivid portrait of ennui: the seductiveness and corrosiveness of boredom, the draining experience of being trapped in a single space, isolated from the routines and relationships of your life.
Native Tongue Trilogy – Suzette Haden Elgin
A forgotten classic of feminist dystopian fiction, the NATIVE TONGUE trilogy is a brilliant illustration of how writers might use genre to grapple with the problems of patriarchy.
Labyrinth is the mystery novel at its most existential, in which the person who has disappeared is the protagonist himself, in which the mystery is the greatest of them all.
This is OVAL’s central joke, and also its most cutting observation: in our current age of convenience culture and mass gentrification, what does it take to live an ethical life?
The Book of Collateral Damage – Sinan Antoon
Paper is flammable, after all, and to count the dead would take a lifetime.
Dark Constellations – Pola Oloixarac
In Oloixarac’s hands, this world is one in which the boundaries between humans, plants, and animals have already begun to dissolve.
The book should’ve been called anything other than DEAD GIRLS.