October 18
Paul Morel both loves and is repelled by his mother, a good woman who makes up for her poor marriage to a violent, uneducated man by lavishing all her attention on her sons. But as Paul grows up and takes lovers, the feelings between mother and son will produce only terrible conflict between what Paul wants, and what he truly needs.
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November 8
A superb achievement, Pulitzer Prize–winner Harding’s novel fictionalizes a shameful true episode in American history. In 1912, the mixed-race residents of Malaga Island off Maine’s coast, who had lived there for generations, were forcibly removed for reasons of “public health” and tourism development.
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December 13
Sam and Sadie–two college friends, often in love, but never lovers–become creative partners in a dazzling and intricately imagined world of video game design, where success brings them fame, joy, tragedy, duplicity, and, ultimately, a kind of immortality. The novel examines the multifarious nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love.
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January 10
Protagonist Eugene Debs Hartke, West Point graduate, Vietnam vet, college professor, educator of the disabled and the illiterate, is awaiting trial for a crime initially unspecified. Until this time, Hartke has diligently and good-naturedly participated in whatever was expected of him, including involvement in the evacuation of American personnel from Saigon. The narrative is composed of short takes in which Hartke’s thoughts skip between the inconsequential and the profound, giving Vonnegut occasion to interject interesting tidbits of information, scientific and historical and otherwise.
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February 14
Affable Las Vegas PI Wyatt is happy doing background checks for casinos on potential management hires and getting home in time for dinner with his significant other, Laurie. When a casino exec asks him to look into who is harassing one of his in-laws, Wyatt is reluctant to take the case. When he learns he must go to Oklahoma City for it, he is emotionally rocked. Twenty-six years before, he was a 15-year-old OKC movie usher who, inexplicably, was spared execution in the murder of every other employee. That same summer, Julianna attended the state fair with her adored older sister, the beautiful and occasionally wild Genevieve, who disappeared into the crowd and was never seen again. Now a nurse, Julianna remains obsessed with Genevieve’s disappearance. Wyatt’s return to OKC brings everything back in a rush.
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March 14
This is the story of Jim Dixon, a hapless lecturer in medieval history at a provincial university who knows better than most that “there was no end to the ways in which nice things are nicer than nasty ones. Amis’s scabrous debut leads the reader through a gallery of emphatically English bores, cranks, frauds, and neurotics with whom Dixon must contend in one way or another in order to hold on to his cushy academic perch and win the girl of his fancy.
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April 11
With a quiet but strong hand, Stegner traces the bond that develops between Charity and Sid Lang and Sally and Larry Morgan from their first meeting in 1937 through their eventual separation to their final get-together in 1972 when Charity is dying of cancer and is determined “to do it right,” no matter what anyone else thinks. It seems only appropriate that Charity bring them together since she has been the driving force behind the relationship. As we discover now, her bull-headedness has had its price.
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May 9
The story follows opportunistic twentysomething Alex after she is dumped by older art dealer Simon in his tony beach town. She finds herself with a one-way ticket back to New York City, but things there are bleak. Recently kicked out of her apartment after skipping on rent and stealing from her roommate, she’s also on the outs with an angry ex-client, Dom. Rather than return to the city, Alex convinces herself that if she can make it through the week in the wealthy Long Island enclave, she can return to Simon’s good graces during his annual Labor Day party. She drifts through the lives of the townsfolk, relying on her charms to gain the trust of partying vacationers, hired help, and high schoolers to navigate the days. Long-simmering tensions build as Labor Day nears, and Alex’s situation becomes more complex when she gets tangled up with a troubled teenager, and Dom’s attempts to track her down become more threatening. Cline’s captivating narrative effortlessly weaves Alex’s unapologetic boldness into the varied lives she disrupts.
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June 13
The place is Ithaca, in California’s San Joaquin Valley. The time is World War II. The family is the Macauley’s–a mother, sister, and three brothers whose struggles and dreams reflect those of America’s second-generation immigrants. . . . In particular, fourteen-year-old Homer, determined to become one of the fastest telegraph messengers in the West, finds himself caught between reality and illusion as delivering his messages of wartime death, love, and money brings him face-to-face with human emotion at its most naked and raw.
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