Two new releases about crime and complicity

Plus the most anticipated books of the second half of the year

I assumed I’d have a bunch of books to share with you after two weeks away from my regular Sunday newsletters, but it turned out to be a very sparse reading month for me. While I’m feeling a bit unmoored in my reading life, I think the break was really beneficial. Sometimes I need to not read and not write and just be in the real world. I’ll admit that now that I’m home from my trip, I’m having a hard time getting back into my typical work flow, but I’m so grateful for a bit of a break. And I did read a little, including one of the best literary mysteries I’ve ever encountered and page-turning beach read that kept me awake in spite of intense jet lag. So let’s get to the books!

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This week in books.

This week I read…

Culpability by Bruce Holsinger. This is a page-turning read that would make a great addition to your pool bag or a highly discussible selection for a book club. The book begins with a car accident. 17-year-old lacrosse star Charlie is at the wheel of his family’s autonomous driving vehicle when the car strikes an oncoming vehicle, and as the novel unfolds we learn how nearly every member of the family is culpable in some way. Adding to the intrigue is the fact that Charlie’s mother is an ethicist and consultant in the world of artificial intelligence and the book is interspersed with her philosophical writing on AI as well as daughter Alice’s frequent chats with an LLM bot. Filled with cliffhangers and reveals, Culpability was the fast-paced palette cleanser I was looking for this summer. Now this book certainly has it’s issues: POV issues, predicability issues, plot issues…if I squint at it too hard the whole thing kind of falls apart. But you know what? I had a great time reading it. It grabbed me from the first chapter and I needed to know what happened. In fact, I have this book to thank for helping me get through the early stages of jet lag. The other thing that saves it is that while it’s extremely obvious the social issues it wants to explore, it’s not heavy handed in terms of it’s own moral vision. There’s groan-worthy symbolism and dollar-store philosophizing, but it’s not beating the reader over the head with a single message. While the questions it poses are blatant, there’s still room for readers to arrive at their own answers, and I think that makes for a better beach read. Bookshop | Libro.fm

Fox by Joyce Carol Oates. 87-year-old Oates’ newest venture is one of the most compelling, provocative, and unsettling books I’ve read all year—it’s also not one I can recommend widely du to the subject matter. The novel open with the discovery of a body in a crashed car at the bottom of a ravine. We soon come to suspect—and, truthfully, hope—that the body belongs to one Francis Fox, a pedophile middle school teacher at the prestigious nearby Langhorn Academy. The first half of the book mostly explores Fox’s backstory. He is a despicable sociopath so being in his mind vacillates between uncomfortable to stomach-churning, but through his perspective, Oates is able to spotlight how a predator can maneuver within a system, using people’s own biases and blindspots against them. In this way, the book is a disturbing picture of complicity and the way the manners and morays of elite circles allow plenty of room for both abuse and coverup. Looming over the book and picking up steam in the second half is the investigation into the discovery of the car crash and the body, and Oates is incredibly skilled at crafting pacing and suspense while allowing the story plenty of room to explore a myriad of themes. Because although this book is primarily about human depravity and the complicity that surrounds it, Oates also seamlessly works in questions about class, gentrification, education, justice, and gender. There’s so much to take away from this book, but what I appreciated the most was the way Oates examined power in educational systems and the long-reaching legacy of celebrating male writers who abused young girls. Oates is undoubtedly a genius and this will be one of the best books I read all you, but you do have to be in the right headspace if you’re going to pick it up. Additionally, the audio of the book is fantastic (a huge that’s to PRH Audio for my copy!), but note that it’s harder to skim the disturbing sections on audio. Bookshop | Libro.fm

Now I’m reading…

It’s time to finish The Last Samurai. I’m so happy to be back in it, but I also don’t want it to end.

New on my TBR…

I wrote an entire list here.

The Weekly Dispatch.

• It was a really crappy week in American politics.

  Ayana Elizabeth Johnson
  wrote about what we do now.

• I know I’ve already shared about the The Runthrough’s lore series, but they just started in on the ice dancing and I can’t get enough! Part one came out on Wednesday and covered the 1970s to the late 1990s, including the wild exploits of Oksana Grishuk. My very first skating coach was Grishuk’s first skating partner and they won Junior World’s together before he retired and moved to the U.S. Grishuk went on to win two Olympic titles with Evgeni Platov, and, along the way, she stirred up a bunch of drama in the figure skating world. I had heard a lot of stories about Grishuk from my former coach and the Lake Placid figure skating rumor mill, but hearing them all narrated in outstanding form on the podcast was such a delicious treat. I also appreciate that they list programs to watch in the show notes…so fun! If you enjoyed reading Layne Fargo’s The Favorites (or if you read it and thought it was over-the-top), I highly recommend checking out this podcast series.

• I recently listened to two episodes of Ezra Klein’s show that got me thinking more about faith and religiosity. First was a conversation with Ross Douthat which I found endearing in their good natured discussion through opposing worldviews. The second was an interview with Sarah McBride, which I found so profound I intend to listen again and (as one of my friend’s did) take notes. The McBride interview was much less directly about religion, but her faith clearly plays a role in how she moves through the world and her entire ethos was inspiring to me. All of this is to say, I’ve been thinking more about faith and religion and was delighted to see Becca Rothfeld’s review of Routhat’s new book Believe: Why Everyone Should Be Religious juxtaposed with her thoughts on a book I hadn’t heard of, Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever: A New Generations Search for Religion by Lamorna Ash. Rothfeld has a lot of really exquisite critiques to level at Douthat’s evangelism and, in contrast, Ash’s book comes out sounding like a lovely personal exploration I’m now eager to read.

• Lit Hub released part two of their most anticipated books list, and it’s so good. This is my favorite most anticipated list from any publication. It’s so thorough and always contains a healthy portion of books from smaller presses. I added quite a few books to my watchlist, and it’s going to be a very good fall reading season.

Link Roundup.

Substack is where authors go to be weird. (Vulture)

15 small press books you should read this summer. (Electric Lit)

Summer Reading: The 50 hottest books to read now. (The Guardian)

The 10 most extreme experiments known to literature. (Electric Lit)

How to organize your digital library. (NYT, gift link)

NPR staffers favorite books of the year, so far. (NPR)

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Happy reading!

Sara