Translators and tortured teens

Plus why diversity initiatives in publishing are failing and when to DNF a book

Readers, I am back and I am energized!

While it’s true that I’m having a bit of an existential crisis about my career as a public reader, I am also feeling inspired after some long overdue international travel. I am a major anglophile—I have always loved British literature, Jane Austen is my happy place, and anything steeped in a British accent wins me over. I sometimes feel embarrassed by loving the things I love but now that I’ve entered my late thirties I’m working to shed that shame and fully embrace them. Something about this particular trip has me feeling really in tune with my taste and my values, and I’m ready to bring even more of that to this space. It’s going to take me some time to work through what that evolution will look like, but I’m eager to see it through.

I’ll share more about my trip and my musings in August’s In Summation, but for now let’s get to some books.

This week in books.

This week I read…

• Foster Dade Explores the Cosmos by Nash Jenkins. This is an example of the spontaneous reading I want to be doing more of. I found this book (it’s cute bright cover called to me!) while browsing my local Barnes and Noble, and because it’s a campus novel, I knew it had to come home with me. The story is about Foster Dade—a sophomore boy whose wealthy, workaholic parents have recently divorced. He’s spent the summer between freshman and sophomore year playing tennis (but only against the ball machine), smoking weed, and falling in love with books, and as autumn begins he finds himself a new student and loner at a prestigious prep school. Foster is sensitive and loves books, but he can’t escape the social hierarchies of his new environment. He becomes enamored with the popular crew, especially the beautiful Annabeth, and eventually finds his way into the in crowd by selling drugs. The book is told in a sort of backwards-looking mock exposé—the kind we’re all now used to seeing—by the boy who occupied Foster’s room after he was expelled. There was a little bit of clunkiness in that framing that inhibited my total immersion in the world, but overall I loved the way Jenkins brought the campus setting to life with vivid writing and multimedia elements (including playlists!) sprinkled throughout. My last caveat is to say that there were some cringey choices made here and there when it came to characterization that made the book feel dated, even though it was only published last year. Still, this was a very fun and all-consuming read that’s perfect for fans of Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld and I Have Some Questions for You by Rebecca Makkai. Amazon | Bookshop | Libro.fm

• The Extinction of Irena Rey by Jennifer Croft. It’s rare for me to feel like I can’t adequately review a book, but this is one of those cases. I read The Extinction of Irena Rey with the FictionMatters Patreon crew and I’m so glad we chose it for Women in Translation month. While this is not a book in translation, Jennifer Croft is the award-winning translator of Olga Tocarzcuk’s novels and the insight she brings to her own novel about translation was uniquely genius. The simplest way to describe this very convoluted novel is that it follows eight translators who go to Poland to translate their famous author Irena Rey’s magnum opus. Irena disappears. Chaos ensues. It’s told from the perspective of Emi—the Spanish translator—who wrote this book in Polish and it is now being translated into English by the English translator character, Alexis. Her footnotes throughout are some of my favorite parts of the novel. As you can tell, it’s all very meta and I loved the way those elements bent my brain and made me think about art and artifice and translation and truth. Croft’s examinations of translation as a craft are also fascinating and the way she simultaneously philosophized about and allegorized her ideas was brilliant. At the same time, I didn’t really enjoy reading this novel. The plot was a lot and extremely zany (intentional, yes, but still overwhelming) and while Emi and Alexis—and their delightfully antagonistic relationship—were great characters, many of the others felt a bit flat. This is a book that might grow on me as I think more and more about the ideas Croft espoused. It’s also one I might entirely forget about. So I suppose only time will tell my true feelings about it, but I can say definitively that it makes for fantastic conversation fodder for anyone interested in translated literature. Amazon | Bookshop | Libro.fm

Now I’m reading…

• I just finished up My Brilliant Friend and am reading a seriously good fall release that I can’t wait to tell you about in a few weeks!

New on my TBR…

• So many books procured at British bookstores. One I’m really looking forward to is All Souls by Javier Marías, which is set in Oxford and is the FictionMatters Book Club selection for September.

Links I love.

This interrogation of how diversity initiatives in the publishing industry have failed is essential reading. (NYT, gift link)

I appreciate this nuanced exploration of when and why to DNF a book. (Atlantic, gift link)

If classic writers wrote the 2024 election. This is so so good. (Electric Lit)

I love this literary road trip around the United States. (Lit Hub)

Why readers love—and love to hate—Colleen Hoover. (Vox)

Five of the best books about yearning. (Guardian)

7 novels that shine a light on overlooked women in history. (Electric Lit)

All the literary TV and movies coming this fall. (Lit Hub)

I must read this debut novel from an octogenarian author. (NPR)

End Notes.

• Ezra Klein’s brilliant analysis of the DNC completely consumed my week. I love listening to smart rhetorical analysis of a moment that matters.

• Charco Press is offering 40% most of their books. Today’s the last day so stock up now!!

• This fresh, tangy chicken salad is so good.

• I’ve been doing Melissa Wood Health workouts this week and really loving them. I love that she gives a weekly plan at beginner, intermediate, and challenge levels and that many of the workouts are between 10 and 30 minutes. It’s the type of Pilates-based exercise that my body responds well to and the perfect way to get back into the habit of exercising after many years of avoiding it.

• I live in an arid climate so I don’t need rain boots. But I also have a toddler who loves to jump in puddles so I kind of need rain boots. I’m happy to have these cute ones for the occasional rainy day.

• This perfect summer-to-fall dress sold out in my size before I could snag it and I’m so bummed.

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Happy reading!

Sara