Great Expectations
by Robert Gottlieb (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $25)
Profiles of Charles Dickens abound, but no other biography “has yet gone so deeply” into the great novelist’s career as a father, said Michael Gorra in TheDailyBeast.com. Though Dickens was “one of the world’s greatest writers on childhood,” he was a less than patient parent, regarding many of his 10 children as disappointments. Even so, two of them wrote memoirs lauding their father, underscoring a key Gottlieb point: that a true charismatic often casts a spell on his own circle.
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The Middlesteins
by Jami Attenberg (Grand Central, $25)
Sixty-year-old Edie Middlestein’s slide into life-threatening food addiction is depicted with “unfailing emotional accuracy” in Jami Attenberg’s “largely brilliant” third novel, said Julie Orringer in The New York Times. Attenberg alternates between nine different perspectives in telling how a Jewish family in suburban Chicago reacts to the decline of their matriarch. The “many engaging stories in play” clutter the narrative somewhat, but all add up to a complex study of a flawed but loving brood.
Brothers
by George Howe Colt (Scribner, $30)
George Howe Colt has written “the book on sibling rivalry,” said Heller McAlpin in NPR.org. In a series of “sometimes jaw-dropping mini-biographies,” the onetime National Book Award finalist walks us through a history of fraternal relations from the heartening (the Marx Brothers) to the ugly (actors Edwin and John Wilkes Booth). Colt intersperses memoir throughout, and offers just enough uplift “to prevent his book from being held up as an argument for only children.”
The Girl Who Fell to Earth
by Sophia Al-Maria (Harper Perennial, $15)
Despite some rough edges, Sophia Al-Maria’s new memoir offers “much to beguile you,” said Marie Arana in The Washington Post. The child of a devoutly Muslim Saudi Bedouin and a wannabe Rockette from rural Washington state, Al-Maria has chronicled her parents’ ill-fated marriage as well as her own upbringing “with an undeniable urgency.” As she shuttles between American and Qatari cultures, she seems to be “vacillating between worlds that are never entirely her own.”
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Can US tourism survive Trump's policies?Today's Big Question The tourist economy is 'heading in the wrong direction'
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September's books tell of friendship in middle age, teachers versus fascists, and Covid psychosisthe week recommends September books include Angela Flournoy's 'The Wilderness,' Randi Weingarten's 'Why Fascists Fear Teachers' and Patricia Lockwood's 'Will There Ever Be Another You'
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'Total rat eradication in New York has been deemed impossible'Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
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Also of interest...in picture books for grown-upsfeature How About Never—Is Never Good for You?; The Undertaking of Lily Chen; Meanwhile, in San Francisco; The Portlandia Activity Book
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Author of the week: Karen Russell
feature Karen Russell could use a rest.
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The Double Life of Paul de Man by Evelyn Barish
feature Evelyn Barish “has an amazing tale to tell” about the Belgian-born intellectual who enthralled a generation of students and academic colleagues.
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Book of the week: Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt by Michael Lewis
feature Michael Lewis's description of how high-frequency traders use lightning-fast computers to their advantage is “guaranteed to make blood boil.”
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Also of interest...in creative rebellion
feature A Man Called Destruction; Rebel Music; American Fun; The Scarlet Sisters
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Author of the week: Susanna Kaysen
feature For a famous memoirist, Susanna Kaysen is highly ambivalent about sharing details about her life.
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You Must Remember This: Life and Style in Hollywood’s Golden Age by Robert Wagner
feature Robert Wagner “seems to have known anybody who was anybody in Hollywood.”
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Book of the week: Astoria: John Jacob Astor and Thomas Jefferson’s Lost Pacific Empire by Peter Stark
feature The tale of Astoria’s rise and fall turns out to be “as exciting as anything in American history.”