Torrey Peters Has Written the Trans Novel Your Book Club Needs to Read Now P.14
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Featuring 329 Industry-First Reviews of Fiction, Nonfiction, Children'sand YA books KIRKUSVOL. LXXXIX, NO. 1 | 1 JANUARY 2021 REVIEWS Torrey Peters has written the trans novel your book club needs to read now p.14 Also in the issue: Lindsay & Lexie Kite, Jeff Mack, Ilyasah Shabazz & Tiffany D. Jackson from the editor’s desk: New Year’s Reading Resolutions Chairman BY TOM BEER HERBERT SIMON President & Publisher MARC WINKELMAN John Paraskevas As a new year begins, many people commit to strict diets or exercise regimes # Chief Executive Officer or vow to save more money. Book nerd that I am, I like to formulate a series MEG LABORDE KUEHN of “reading resolutions”—goals to help me refocus and improve my reading [email protected] Editor-in-Chief experience in the months to come. TOM BEER Sometimes I don’t accomplish all that I hoped—I really ought to have [email protected] Vice President of Marketing read more literature in translation last year, though I’m glad to have encoun- SARAH KALINA [email protected] tered Elena Ferrante’s The Lying Life of Adults (translated by Ann Goldstein) Managing/Nonfiction Editor and Juan Pablo Villalobos’ I Don’t Expect Anyone To Believe Me (translated by ERIC LIEBETRAU Daniel Hahn)—but that isn’t exactly the point. [email protected] Fiction Editor Sometimes, too, new resolutions form over the course of the year. Like LAURIE MUCHNICK many Americans, I sought out more work by Black writers in 2020; as a result, [email protected] Tom Beer Young Readers’ Editor books by Claudia Rankine, Les and Tamara Payne, Raven Leilani, Deesha VICKY SMITH [email protected] Philyaw, and Randall Kenan were among my favorites of the year. Young Readers’ Editor Those caveats aside, here are my reading resolutions for 2021: LAURA SIMEON [email protected] . See above. Rodrigo Fuentes’ collection Read more literature in translation Editor at Large of stories about life in rural Guatemala, , translated by Ellen MEGAN LABRISE Trout, Belly Up [email protected] Jones (Charco Press, Jan. 28), looks like a good place to start, as does Sea Loves Vice President of Kirkus Indie KAREN SCHECHNER Me (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Feb. 23), a selection of stories by the Mozam- [email protected] bican writer Mia Couto. Senior Indie Editor DAVID RAPP Read more to understand current events. Surely, we’ve all had enough up-to- [email protected] the-minute current events, lurching from tweet to tweet, over the past four Indie Editor MYRA FORSBERG years, you say? Perhaps. But nonfiction that explores a timely topic with [email protected] depth can offer insight you’ll never get from the latest breaking story on Associate Manager of Indie KATERINA PAPPAS CNN or trending topic on Twitter. And, I’ll confess, my nonfiction reading [email protected] often leans toward memoir, biography, and history—all worthy genres, but Editorial Assistant JOHANNA ZWIRNER isn’t the point to read a bit more outside my comfort zone? A good place to start would be Charles [email protected] Kenny’s The Plague Cycle: The Unending War Between Humanity and Infectious Disease (Scribner, Jan. 19), Mysteries Editor THOMAS LEITCH which is, technically, a history, but will surely put the Covid-19 pandemic into better context. Like- Contributing Editor wise, Charles M. Blow’s The Devil You Know: A Black Power Manifesto (Harper/HarperCollins, Jan. GREGORY McNAMEE 26) promises outside-the-box thinking about racial politics in America, suggesting that Black voters Copy Editor BETSY JUDKINS could form solid majorities if they were to reverse the Great Migration and Designer move back to the South. “Valuable as a thought experiment alone,” says our ALEX HEAD reviewer, “but also an ‘actual plan’ for effecting lasting political change.” Kirkus Editorial Production Editor ROBIN O’DELL Read more debut authors. It felt like 2020 was the year when books by our [email protected] modern masters were met with a yawn—sorry, Messrs. Amis and DeLillo— Kirkus Editorial Associate Production Editor while work from new talents thrilled ordinary readers and prize judges alike. STEPHANIE SUMMERHAYS [email protected] Debut novels won both the Booker Prize and the Kirkus Prize, and dozens of Website and Software Developer PERCY PEREZ others showed up on awards shortlists and best books of the year lists. A few [email protected] 2021 debuts on my radar: Mateo Askaripour’s novel, Black Buck (Houghton Advertising Director MONIQUE STENSRUD Mifflin Harcourt, Jan. 12), Dantiel W. Moniz’s story collection, Milk Blood [email protected] Heat (Grove, Feb. 2), and Zak Salih’s novel, Let’s Get Back to the Party (Algon- Advertising Associate TATIANA ARNOLD quin, Feb. 16). [email protected] Explore the work of a writer I haven’t read. The news last month of John le Carré’s death confronted Graphic Designer KYLA NOVAK me with a sad realization: I’ve never read any of his books. What better author to explore in 2021, [email protected] especially since he has such a robust backlist—up to and including his last novel, Agent Running in the Controller MICHELLE GONZALES Field, published in 2019? Kirkus called it a “tragicomic salute to both the recuperative powers of its [email protected] has-been hero and the remarkable career of its nonpareil author.” for customer service or subscription questions, Here’s to a rewarding year of reading for us all. Check back in a year to see how I did. please call 1-800-316-9361 Print indexes: www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/print-indexes Submission Guidelines: www.kirkusreviews.com/about/submission-guidlines Kirkus Blog: www.kirkusreviews.com/blog Subscriptions: www.kirkusreviews.com/subscription Advertising Opportunities: www.kirkusreviews.com/about/advertising- Newsletters: www.kirkusreviews.com/subscription/newsletter/add Cover photo by opportunities Lia Clay 2 | 1 january 2021 | from the editor’s desk | kirkus.com | you can now purchase books online at kirkus.com contents fiction INDEX TO STARRED REVIEWS ...........................................................4 The Kirkus Star is awarded REVIEWS ...............................................................................................4 to books of remarkable EDITOR’S NOTE.....................................................................................6 merit, as determined by the ON OUR COVER: TORREY PETERS .................................................. 14 impartial editors of Kirkus. MYSTERY ..............................................................................................35 SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY ......................................................... 41 ROMANCE ...........................................................................................42 nonfiction adult young INDEX TO STARRED REVIEWS .........................................................44 REVIEWS .............................................................................................44 EDITOR’S NOTE...................................................................................46 INTERVIEW: LINDSAY KITE & LEXIE KITE ......................................52 children’s INDEX TO STARRED REVIEWS ......................................................... 81 EDITOR’S NOTE (PICTURE BOOKS) ................................................. 82 REVIEWS ..............................................................................................83 EDITOR’S NOTE (MIDDLE-GRADE BOOKS)....................................88 INTERVIEW: JEFF MACK ................................................................. 92 WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH PICTURE BOOKS ...........................123 young adult INDEX TO STARRED REVIEWS ........................................................130 REVIEWS ............................................................................................130 EDITOR’S NOTE..................................................................................132 Distinguished New York Times columnist INTERVIEW: ILYASAH SHABAZZ & TIFFANY D. JACKSON .......136 Charles M. Blow offers a daring but utterly sensible plan to advance Black civil rights. indie Read the review on p. 45. INDEX TO STARRED REVIEWS ........................................................143 REVIEWS ............................................................................................143 Don’t wait on the mail for reviews! You can read pre-publication reviews as they are released on kirkus.com—even before they are published in the magazine. EDITOR’S NOTE.................................................................................144 You can also access the current issue and back issues of Kirkus Reviews on our website by logging in as a subscriber. If you do not have a username or password, SEEN & HEARD ................................................................................. 162 please contact customer care to set up your account by calling 1.800.316.9361 or APPRECIATIONS: CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS .............................. 163 emailing [email protected]. | kirkus.com | contents | 1 january 2021 | 3 fiction These titles earned the Kirkus Star: DANGEROUS WOMEN Adams, Hope Berkley (336 pp.) FOREGONE by Russell Banks ...............................................................5 $26.00 | Feb. 16, 2021 978-0-593-09957-5 THE HURLY BURLY AND OTHER STORIES by A.E. Coppard .......... 9 WHAT’S MINE AND YOURS by Naima Coster .................................10 Alas for the hopes of an ardent young reformer aboard a shipful of women con- THE MISSION HOUSE by Carys Davies ............................................11