20 ON PAGE ON ONTINUED C rain transplants, transplants, rain B essica Winter explores explores Winter essica J rrol Morris, Fareed Zakaria and and Zakaria Fareed Morris, rrol E LIFE LIFE hat Don Lemon is reading is Lemon Don hat UMANITY 2.0 UMANITY LUS IKE enetic editing and toxic chemicals toxic and editing enetic he craze for autofiction for craze he L g P w t H And from Dyja himself: “In the Meatpacking Dyja the himself: “In And from Elaine’s “a men’s club for the literary lonely,” the lonely,” club for the literary men’s “a Elaine’s writer Lewis Lapham diagnosing money as “the critic and the architecture of the town” sickness Helmsley’s calling Harry Ada Louise Huxtable wall of unforgiv- curtain “a tower Hotel Palace able, consummate mediocrity.” men hung District, both sides of beef and gay the hedge funds “meant leaving hooks”; from USTRATION BY MATT DORFMAN. PHOTOS FROM LEFT: TERRY DISNEY/EVENING STANDARD HULTON STANDARD DISNEY/EVENING TERRY FROM LEFT: DORFMAN. PHOTOS BY MATT USTRATION ILL ARCHIVE, VIA GETTY VIA GETTY SANTI VISALLI, VIA GETTY IMAGES; ANDREW BURTON, IMAGES IMAGES; YORK, NEW YORK, NEW YORK, EW EW YORK EW y Thomas Dyja xcess, andxcess, Transformation our Decades of Success, N N F E B & Simon 544 pp. Illustrated. $30. Schuster. ting that “there’s only so much wholesomeness ting that “there’s designer Tibor the graphic take,” can York New “should Square advising us that Times Kalman but a well- York, of New the rest be a zoo, like unem- zoo instead of a depressed, maintained and the kind of zoo,” and crack-smoking ployed a promising Heiskell Andrew philanthropist the hiding places “All Park: Bryant crime-free is Spy magazine Here been eliminated.” have headlining Rudy Giuliani as “The Toughest calling Feiffer Jules in America,” Weenie hard time getting through getting time hard a

21, 2021

WILL HAVE WILL Here is the journalist Michael Tomasky fret- is the journalist Michael Tomasky Here YOU Thomas Dyja’s “New York, New York, New York, New York, “New Thomas Dyja’s is an idea on every there mostly because York,” — and usually paragraph page, if not in every the host of to a perfect line from attached he has collected for this history of New sources decades. its last four rollicking over City York By Kevin Baker By Kevin

MARCH Gotham Revival *3LB1* 2 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 Book Review MARCH 21, 2021 “Confi rms Herron’s stature as the BEST SPY NOVELIST NOW WORKING” !NPR, FRESH AIR

Fiction 18 FLIGHT OF THE DIAMOND SMUGGLERS A Tale of Pigeons, Obsession, and Greed 10 MONA Along Coastal South Africa By Pola Oloixarac By Matthew Gavin Frank Reviewed by Sadie Stein Reviewed by Nate Blakeslee

13 Crime 21 COUNT DOWN Reviewed by Sarah Weinman How Our Modern World Is Altering Male and Female Reproductive Development, 19 FOREGONE Threatening Sperm Counts, and Imperiling By Russell Banks the Future of the Human Race Reviewed by Adam Haslett By Shanna H. Swan with Stacey Colino Reviewed by Bijal P. Trivedi 19 ALL GIRLS By Emily Layden 26 The Shortlist Reviewed by Kate Elizabeth Russell Memoirs Reviewed by CJ Hauser Nonfiction Children’s Books 1 NEW YORK, NEW YORK, NEW YORK Four Decades of Success, Excess, and 22 A SHOT IN THE ARM! Transformation By Don Brown By Thomas Dyja Reviewed by Lydia Kang Reviewed by Kevin Baker 22 THE LEAK 11 MR. HUMBLE AND DR. BUTCHER By Kate Reed Petty A Monkey’s Head, the Pope’s Neuroscientist, Illustrated by Andrea Bell and the Quest to Transplant the Soul Reviewed by Julie Bosman By Brandy Shillace Reviewed by Sam Kean Features 12 THE CODE BREAKER Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the 8 By the Book Future of the Human Race Don Lemon By Walter Isaacson Reviewed by Dava Sobel 15 Essay Our Autofiction Fixation “RIDICULOUSLY 14 THE SHADOWS OF EMPIRE By Jessica Winter How Imperial History Shapes Our World By Samir Puri 27 Sketchbook Reviewed by Fareed Zakaria ENTERTAINING” By Grant Snider 16 FLOATING IN A MOST PECULIAR WAY !THE SEATTLE TIMES By Louis Chude-Sokei Reviewed by Ijeoma Oluo Etc.

16 LAST CALL 4 New & Noteworthy A True Story of Love, Lust, and Murder in 6 Letters Queer New York 23 Best-Seller Lists “WICKEDLY IMAGINED” By Elon Green Reviewed by Christopher Bollen 23 Editors’ Choice !THE WALL STREET JOURNAL 24 Inside the List 17 AMORALMAN A True Story and Other Lies 24 Paperback Row By Derek DelGaudio Reviewed by Errol Morris SOHO CRIME ON SALE NOW

TO SUBSCRIBE to the Book Review by mail, visit nytimes.com/getbookreview or call 1-800-631-2580

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 3 New & Noteworthy

ZABOR, OR THE PALMS, by Kamel Daoud. (Other Press, paper, $17.99.) An ode to story- telling with shades of Scheherazade, this nov- el by the author of “The Meursault Investiga- tion” features a hero convinced that his jour- give the gift of love nal writing keeps those he loves alive.

THE PHONE BOOTH AT THE EDGE OF THE WORLD, by Laura Imai Messina. Translated by Lucy Rand. (Overlook, $25.) Set in the aftermath of the 2011 Japanese tsunami, this novel about grief and resilience was inspired by a real phone booth where survivors imagined con- necting with those they had lost.

THE TRUTH AT THE HEART OF THE LIE: HOW THE CATHOLIC CHURCH LOST ITS SOUL, by James Car- roll. (Random House, $28.99.) A former priest and a longtime liberal critic of the church, Car- roll here turns to memoir to explain his grad- ual disenchantment with Catholicism’s domi- nant male hierarchy.

THE CHEERFUL SCAPEGOAT: FABLES, by Wayne Koestenbaum. (Semiotext(e), paper, $16.95.) These charmingly insouciant short stories by the noted critic, poet and essayist exhibit the same surreal whimsy that distinguishes his work in other formats.

MIDNIGHT IN CAIRO: THE DIVAS OF EGYPT’S ROAR- ING ’20S, by Raphael Cormack. (Norton, $28.95.) A century ago, ambitious women shaped Cairo’s thriving entertainment scene as performers and entrepreneurs. Cormack’s fascinating history profiles seven of them.

Here are 175 true stories of love, each told in 100 words or less. Romantic and platonic, sibling and parental, requited and unrequited, lost and found: The stories are tiny, but the loves they contain are WHAT WE’RE READING anything but. Honest, funny, tender, wise, and always surprising, It’s late October 1960, a few weeks before the these ordinary moments burn so bright that they reveal humanity, Nixon-Kennedy presidential election, and Mar- and our own selves, in their light. tin Luther King Jr. is arrested at a protest in At- lanta. It’s the ultimate October surprise: From the editors of the Modern Love column in The New York Times. Should the campaigns call for his release and risk alienating white Southern voters? Stay quiet and risk alienating civil rights support- ers? The rapid-fire decisions end up swinging the election in (spoiler alert) Kennedy’s favor. I’ve been steeping myself in the 1960s lately, and NINE DAYS, by Stephen Kendrick and Paul Kendrick, made that historic time feel artisanbooks.com messy, chaotic, improvisatory — human. The book’s heroes are a few obscure Kennedy staffers who dramatically overstep their Available now wherever books are sold. bounds and, without their bosses’ knowledge, throw the Kennedy campaign directly into the fray. I put the book down marveling at how that week’s harried phone calls still echo today, and wonder- ing what our grandchildren, in 2080, will be reading about 2020.

—SAM DOLNICK, ASSISTANT MANAGING EDITOR

4 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 5 Letters NEW from Katherine Schulten and mann, who (according to Hannah Arendt) said to his jailer guard THE NEW YORK TIMES that he found “Lolita” to be “quite an unwholesome book.” There is Learning Network more irony in the world than there is iron. “The essays in Student Voice loudly proclaim LOUIS PHILLIPS NEW YORK what young writers are capable of: insightful ♦ opinions, thoughtful argument, compelling TO THE EDITOR: evidence, and—most importantly—lively writing.” I will spare your readers the details of what was done to me — Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, Executive Director, by an older man at a young age in the name of love (it lacks hilar- National Writing Project ity and does not lend itself to brilliant prose), and I will spare them the precise number of women I am personally ac- BRÁULIO AMADO quainted with who experienced similar degradations. Make Some Noise Within that focus, his analysis is But I will tell you that Emily well informed, authoritative and Mortimer’s giddy praise for TO THE EDITOR: desperately needed. “Lolita” made me literally sick. In discussing the larynx, the MICHAEL MURPHY I’m too old now, but someone subject of “This Is the Voice” SAN FRANCISCO must write a comparably “exhila- (March 7), both the reviewer, rating and paradoxically cleans- ♦ Mary Roach, and the author, John ing” novel that will allow us all to Colapinto, miss a major point. TO THE EDITOR: “relinquish concern with right They skirt the underlying anat- In his By the Book interview and wrong and just to feel things omy and overlook the contribu- (Feb. 14), Bill Gates writes about as another person feels them.” tion of the hyoid bone entirely. how Google searches can be used The dissolution of one’s very self This horseshoe-shaped structure to “make life better.” I would is an experience perhaps impossi- resides immediately under the rather that people could search ble to portray, unfortunately, but jawbone and attaches to muscles without being tracked. The ac- that’s the only novel that would that help in swallowing and vo- ceptance of the “end user” as a shake the degeneracy and callous- calizing. It is our only bone out of nobody to manipulate and collect ness that marks our engagement roughly 206 that does not contact information on is increasingly with “Lolita.” This is not a mor- any others. sophisticated and increasingly alistic condemnation. It is a pure The howler monkey represents inappropriate, and I look forward human expression of truth. the epitome of the hyoid’s develop- to a growing resistance to it. SUSAN MULLENDORE ment, where the bone is about the It’s great that Gates is against TUCSON, ARIZ. general shape of a round-bottomed climate change. However, having cup. The hyoid is instrumental in worked vainly as of late to keep EDITORS’ NOTE the howler’s ability to project its Microsoft from telling me what voice about two miles. Given the I’m typing — all in my best inter- An essay on March 7 by the relative numbers of howlers and est, of course — while being screenwriter and actress Emily Now collected for the first time in one volume, humans, it’s good that we are not informed that my “data makes Mortimer about “Lolita,” obscen- Student Voice: 100 Argument Essays by so well voiced. ads more meaningful” as if I ity laws and cancel culture in- ROY A. MEALS wanted more meaningful ads, I’m cluded several sentences adapted Teens on Issues That Ma! er spotlights the LOS ANGELES less and less interested in hear- without attribution from an arti- perspectives of 13-to-18-year-olds on race, lockdown ing tech moguls opine on much of cle by Caitlin Flanagan, “How Bill Gates anything. ‘Lolita’ Seduces Us All,” that drills, immigration, Covid-19, social media, and more. CHRISTINA ALBERS appeared in the September 2018 TO THE EDITOR: NEW ORLEANS issue of The Atlantic. The online I have followed Bill McKibben’s version of the essay has been Also available as a 2-book set with Raising writings for 30 years with unflag- Rust and Disgust revised to include attributions to ging admiration, but I was disap- Flanagan’s work. Student Voice, a guide with classroom-ready pointed by his review of Bill TO THE EDITOR: Gates’s “How to Avoid a Climate CORRECTION activities, writing prompts, and a sample essay In her essay “Witness for the Disaster” (March 7). Defense” (March 7), Emily Morti- annotated by Times judges. It is unfair to criticize an au- mer makes a wonderful and A bibliographic note with a re- thor for staying within the limits perceptive witness for the de- view last Sunday about “The of his competence. As Gates fense of Vladimir Nabokov’s Good Girls,” by Sonia Faleiro, acknowledges, he thinks like an “Lolita.” She does her father misidentified the book’s publisher engineer and accordingly proud. in some copies. It is Grove Press, presents an engineer’s evaluation Reading her essay, however, not Viking. of the available options to fore- reminded me of a much less stall the looming climate crisis. inspiring witness: Adolf Eich- [email protected] 6 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 7 By the Book

learned from a book recently? I learned from “Four Hundred Souls” that my ancestors arrived here on a slave ship before the Mayflower. Just because I went to a Black Catholic elementary and middle school, which drilled Black history into us, I thought I knew more about our history than most. Alas, I was wrong.

Which subjects do you wish more authors would write about? I wish more authors would weave full and true American history into their work. There’s an awful lot that was left out, fabricated and embellished to favor cer- tain people and diminish others. That’s really where “the conversation” around racism should start — at the beginning.

How do you organize your books? I do organize my books, but not alphabet- ically or by subject. I like to create inter- esting shapes and colors on the shelves. I was doing it before Zoom bookshelves were a thing. Interior designers eat your hearts out.

What kind of reader were you as a child? Which childhood books and authors stick with you most? The only novels I remember reading as a child were “Moby-Dick” and “Jonathan Livingston Seagull.” I went to Catholic school. We read the Bible a lot. The first Don Lemon book I ever read was a “Dick and Jane” primer. “See Dick run. Run Dick run.”

The CNN host and author of ‘This Is the Fire’ didn’t like the Harry Pot- You’re organizing a literary dinner party. ter books: ‘There are often Harry Potter clues in New York Times cross- Which three writers, dead or alive, do word puzzles. I never know the answers.’ you invite? Obvious answer: Baldwin, Morrison and Capote. What books are on your night stand? The ideal reading experience is a Sunday Disappointing, overrated, just not good: “The Fire Next Time,” by James Bald- afternoon in fall or winter with PJs, fur- What book did you feel as if you were win; “Giovanni’s Room,” by James Bald- lined slippers, a roaring wood-burning supposed to like, and didn’t? Do you win; “Four Hundred Souls,” edited by fireplace, WBGO Jazz 88 playing quietly remember the last book you put down Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain; “It’s in the background with a good book in without finishing? Up to Us,” by John Kasich; and “Ten hand and the Sunday New York Times in Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World,” by reach. I hate to say this, but Harry Potter for all Fareed Zakaria. of the above. It really sucks, too, because What’s your favorite book no one else has there are often Harry Potter clues in New What’s the last great book you read? heard of? York Times crossword puzzles. I never “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents,” I’m not sure no one has heard of it, but I’d know the answers. by Isabel Wilkerson. I’m not sure how have to say it’s “Power vs. Force,” by What books are you embarrassed not to much I even need to say about this book. David R. Hawkins. You’d have to read it have read yet? This is the first book since Michelle Alex- to understand my love for it. The books of ander’s “The New Jim Crow” to broaden his that follow are “Transcending the I feel like I should read a lot more Whit- my knowledge on racism in America — Levels of Consciousness” and “The Eye man. Maybe when I retire or actually get and how America is both influenced by of the I.” I suggest everyone read them. to take more than one week off at a time. and has influenced racism the world over. By approaching the subject through Has a book ever brought you closer to What do you plan to read next? casteism she expands the lens and gra- another person, or come between you? “All Boys Aren’t Blue,” by George M. ciously gives us a new perspective and “The Fire Next Time” brought me closer Johnson. A friend recommended it as we perhaps a more fitting definition to tackle to my fiancé. He read it and really began were talking by phone just before I began America’s original sin. to talk to me about the book and race. It’s answering these questions. 0 a beautiful thing. Describe your ideal reading experience An expanded version of this interview is (when, where, what, how). What’s the most interesting thing you available at nytimes.com/books.

8 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 ILLUSTRATION BY JILLIAN TAMAKI THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 9 Other People In this novel, a writer finds herself surrounded by competing vanities and insecurities.

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By SADIE STEIN sort of cultural capital”) but dependent on lator, Adam Morris — that you’re almost NDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2008 its academic appointments, publishing eager to prolong the conference beyond its contracts and monetary awards. When we antic and hallucinatory (in a bad way) con- THIS IS A GREAT MOMENT, in contemporary meet her, she is en route from Stanford to clusion. Clearly, this is a world the author letters, for crummy people. I’m not talking Sweden for the presentation of the lucra- knows all too well, whose vanities she de- about Bernhardian antiheroes or protago- tive Basske-Wortz — “the most important spises. Each of the writers Mona meets is nists who are hard to relate to. I mean literary award in Europe,” for which she convinced of the unique importance of his jerks. Their voices have generally been and 13 others have been nominated. Mona work, yet even the palatable ones seem to honed by Twitter to a rapier-sharp mean- is brilliant, superficial, mysteriously suffer from the same underlying corrup- ness, alternating between dismissive bruised, exhibitionistic, insecure, vain and tion. sneering and scrupulous sanctimony. impossibly glamorous. Needless to say, The problem, of course, is that Mona They tend to mistake oversharing for inti- she is adept at social media. buys into it too. For all of her relentless macy, neurosis for vulnerability, self- Once in Sweden, Mona finds herself sur- winking, she craves the reader’s admira- loathing for charm. Trauma is allowed, but rounded by preening jackasses of many tion like the Valium she keeps in a gold pill- not heart. lands. There’s the swaggering Colombian box. Both she and her author need us to ap- Marxist Marco; Hava, the combative Is- preciate the barrage of in-jokes and up-to- MONA raeli feminist; the frequently naked local the-minute signifiers, to recognize a dizzy- By Pola Oloixarac classicist Akto. Preceding the award cere- ing array of philosophical and literary ref- Translated by Adam Morris mony is a four-day conference: punishing erences, or even better, to not recognize 176 pp. Farrar, Straus & Giroux. $25. rounds of talks, panels, group meals, petty them. To understand, above all, that she is intellectual one-upmanship, casual mi- important. For all the pre-emptive diffi- Why you should invest in these charac- sogyny and lackadaisical love affairs. To dence, the self-consciousness, the self-dis- ters’ fates is never made clear; your inter- blunt the experience — as well as the re- gust, the self-criticism, there is a perni- est — or at least a kind of readerly Stock- pressed memory of the obscure hurt that cious thread of . . . self-regard. Indeed, one holm syndrome — is simply assumed. haunts her mind and body — Mona spends might call it the most genuine thing about Such characters (or their creators) appear most of her time on various drugs, or in a the novel. to believe that the less sympathetic they porn-glazed reverie. As for the recurring At the end of the book, Oloixarac tries to are, the more authentic they sound, and fox and the sinister phalanx of silent men melt and clarify Mona’s defenses in the that they’re just saying what all of us would who seem occasionally to trail her — are heat of emotional truth: Flanked by the if we only had the nerve. I hate myself, they they a manifestation of inner demons, or sensitive, beautifully jacketed Sven (the say smugly. More than you possibly could. something real and menacing? “Alpine nonfictionalist”), Mona is able to The title character of “Mona,” a new nov- Pola Oloixarac’s debut, “Savage Theo- face the trauma in her recent past and, in el by the Argentine writer Pola Oloixarac, ries,” a multilayered novel spanning eras theory, casts the events of the novel into Subscribe to the might have been perfectly nice once, but and continents, generated both adulation sinister high relief. But after 170 pages of New York Times Crossword. we’ll never know it. Mona is a rising star on and obloquy. Even its harshest critics had relentless, knowing brittleness, this climax nytimes.com/solvenow the Latin American literary scene, scorn- to acknowledge its ambition; it took on Ar- has the feeling of a deathbed conversion to ful of the international establishment that gentina’s Dirty War, gaming culture and some older model self. Mona’s defensive ir- exploits her for her identity (“being a high theory, wrangling with the problem of reverence has cheapened what could have ‘woman of color,’ in the vade mecum of how to dramatize intellection and laying been real tragedy into a jarring piety. American racism, began to confer a chic bare a fascinating mind. Of course, Mona would probably tell you By any measure, “Mona” is a slighter ef- that was what she intended all along. As SADIE STEIN’S writing has appeared in Vogue, fort, though Oloixarac frequently made me she says to Sven, “I do believe that con- New York and The New Yorker, among other laugh out loud. There are moments so cas- tempt is the lingua franca of our era, and on publications. ually well observed — hat-tip to her trans- that I’ll bet we can both agree.” 0

10 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 Head Case A transplant surgeon who wanted to understand the brain. “HE’S THE PARK AVENUE SURGEON of all surgeons. I don’t take chances – my face is my money.” – By SAM KEAN fact seemed to consider “Frankenstein” Sonja Morgan of The Real Housewives of New York City not a cautionary tale but a how-to manual.) Nor did he see any conflict between sci- ONE DAY IN the 1960s, a priest walked into ence and religion. “Quite the contrary,” an operating room in Cleveland to find a Schillace writes, “he viewed the operating dead dog lying on the table. The transplant theater as a ‘sacred space,’ a place where “An honest look behind the curtain at surgeon Robert White had drained its his God-given talents met their God-di- today’s advanced facial enhancement blood and cooled its brain to 50 degrees. rected end.” options from a world leader in the The priest then looked on, aghast, as White Indeed, White’s work got into some field and the one spread a picnic cloth on the table and be- pretty heavy metaphysical territory. His gan munching on a sandwich. ultimate goal in surgery was to transplant I TRUSTED WITH Halfway through his meal, White asked a human head from one body to another — MY OWN FACE.” the priest if he thought the dog really was purportedly to prolong the life of someone —Dr. Paul Nassif, dead. The priest said yes — right? With a like Stephen Hawking. In private, though, plastic surgeon and star of Botched merry twinkle, White set to work, recircu- White had an ulterior motive. He was fasci- lating blood and rewarming the brain. nated with the question of where the hu- However groggy, the dog eventually man “soul” resides. In the brain? The body In THE PARK AVENUE FACE, lurched to life and began staggering at large? He hoped head transplants would world-renowned facial plastic surgeon around. At this, White winked at the priest. allow him to study the question scientif- Dr. Andrew Jacono reveals how to achieve “Maybe like Christ,” he teased. “Dead and ically. He also pondered removing brains flawless, undetectable plastic surgery so revived.” from their skulls and keeping them alive in you can fix what you don’t like, restore White didn’t pull this stunt to mock reli- jars. Could such brains think? White ar- what you’ve lost, or prevent signs of aging gion; he was actually a devout Catholic gued yes. He in fact believed that detached — to ensure that you love your face. who attended Mass daily. Nor was he sim- brains might be superior to regular brains ply showing off his medical skills. Rather, in realms like mathematics, since they as Brandy Schillace explains in her de- could manipulate pure symbols without the “distraction” of sensory information. MR. HUMBLE AND DR. BUTCHER This work might seem like the relic of a LEARNMORE: THEPARKAVENUEFACE.COM more brutal age in medicine. But in 2019, A Monkey’s Head, the Pope’s AVAILABLEWHEREVERBOOKSARESOLD Neuroscientist, and the Quest to scientists at Yale University discovered Transplant the Soul how to reboot dead, disembodied pig By Brandy Schillace brains in the lab. Moreover, surgeons in It- 303 pp. Simon & Schuster. $27. aly and China are actively pursuing a head transplant today. “To the last,” Schillace notes, White “remained convinced that the lightfully macabre “Mr. Humble and Dr. surgery would be performed, somewhere, Butcher,” White’s real goal was to push the someday, and that his work would be exon- boundaries of both surgery and theology, erated.” In other words, while White may which he viewed as complementary fields be forgotten now, his ghost still haunts — each one wrestling with big questions medicine — a prospect that would have de- about life, death and the human soul. lighted this pious, puckish Frankenstein. 0 Schillace, a medical historian at Case Western Reserve University, first learned of White when a doctor in Cleveland, aware of her love for gruesome tales, presented her with an old, blood-spattered lab note- book of White’s. It more than lived up to her expectations. The book that resulted from her fascination is partly a history of trans- plant surgery — especially its fraught early days, when accusations of murder, Good friends racial bias and sadism were surprisingly common. The bulk of it, however, focuses deserve extraordinary on White, whose entire life, which spanned the 20th century (1926-2010), was a series of contradictions. journalism. He was nominated for a Nobel Prize for developing lifesaving surgical techniques, yet also inspired shlocky horror films like Refer someone to The Times. “The Brain That Wouldn’t Die.” He advised Visit nytimes.com/refer. the pope on bioethics, yet appalled actual bioethicists, as well as animal-rights activ- ists. He demanded to be taken seriously by the medical community, yet strutted around on Halloween with a medical bag emblazoned “Dr. Frankenstein.” (He in

SAM KEAN is the author of the forthcoming “The Icepick Surgeon: Murder, Fraud, Sabo- tage, Piracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetrated in the Name of Science.” Robert White

PHOTOGRAPH FROM THE WHITE FAMILY ARCHIVE THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 11 Deus Ex Machina A biography of the Nobel-winning scientist who has revolutionized gene editing.

By DAVA SOBEL what her years of effort have wrought. “The Code Breaker” is a handsome vol- ume with color photos distributed gener- THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC forced Jen- ously throughout. While the pictures en- nifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpen- hance the storytelling, the narrative flow is tier to accept the 2020 Nobel Prize in constantly interrupted by subheads and Chemistry virtually, instead of actually at- space breaks. Almost every spread in- tending the Royal Swedish Academy of cludes one, as though admonishing the Sciences’ annual December ceremony at reader to pay attention. the Stockholm Concert Hall, where the Isaacson keeps a firm, experienced king of Sweden, Carl XVI Gustaf, would hand on the scientific explanations, which have given each of them an 18-karat gold he mastered through extensive readings medal along with a congratulatory hand- and interviews, all of which are footnoted. shake. This year’s gala, like so many In a chapter called “I Learn to Edit,” he events everywhere, was canceled for the tries his hand at editing human DNA using first time in decades. CRISPR, expertly guided by Doudna’s as- sociates. THE CODE BREAKER Most of Isaacson’s first-person appear- Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the ances in “The Code Breaker,” which are nu- Future of the Human Race merous, demonstrate his diligence as a re- By Walter Isaacson porter. He attends scientific conferences, Illustrated. 516 pp. Simon & Schuster. $35. tours labs, consults experts on both sides of disputes, even facilitates an important phone call between two principal person- The landmark research that brought alities. However, a certain clubbiness at- Doudna and Charpentier to the pinnacle of tends some of these references, as when he global acclaim has the potential to control names the restaurants where key conver- future pandemics — either by outwitting sations occur, even including, in one case, the next viral plague through better the menu highlights: screening and treatment or by engineer- “When the first day of presentations is ing human beings with better disease re- over, Doudna and Sternberg go to a casual sistance programmed into their cells. The restaurant in Old Quebec City, but I accept technique of gene editing that they pat- an invitation from Feng Zhang to join him ented, which goes by the unwieldy acro- Jennifer Doudna’s landmark work has been celebrated with multiple awards and grants. and a small group of his friends for dinner. nym of CRISPR-Cas9, makes it possible to Not only do I want to hear his perspective, selectively snip and alter bits of DNA as but I also want to check out the inventive though they were so many hems to take up of the book’s title, but she is only part of ises immediately. new restaurant he has chosen, Chez or waistbands to let out. The method is Isaacson’s story. The subtitle promises a This is a good place to start the story, be- Boulay, which features crispy seal meat- based on defenses pioneered by bacteria in wider reach: “Jennifer Doudna, Gene Edit- cause “The Code Breaker” is in some re- loaf, huge raw scallops, Arctic char, seared their ages-old battle against viruses. ing, and the Future of the Human Race.” spects a journal of our 2020 plague year. By bison and cabbage blood sausage.” Doudna and Charpentier — one Ameri- This may sound like publisher’s hyperbole, the final chapter, Isaacson has enrolled in a Some of the most exciting sections of can, the other French — are the sixth and but Isaacson devotes much anguished dis- vaccine trial. Between the main charac- “The Code Breaker” detail the way seventh women to win the chemistry No- cussion to the ethics of gene editing, espe- ter’s frantic road trip and the author’s CRISPR researchers rose to the Covid bel in its century-plus history. (Marie Curie cially when it comes to “germline” changes rolled-up sleeve, there is room to explore challenge: They developed rapid test pro- was first, in 1911, followed by her daughter that can be passed on through generations Doudna’s childhood, trace her career, meet cedures and vaccine strategies — and Irène in 1935.) The names Doudna and and “enhancements” such as green eyes or her competitors and collaborators, fret posted them to an open database for the Charpentier had already been notably high I.Q. that prospective parents could in- over the future fallout of the CRISPR revo- benefit of the entire scientific community, paired in 2015, when they jointly won the sert into their offspring’s genomes. lution and marvel at its positive potential. spurring progress to a gallop. $3 million Breakthrough Prize in Life Sci- The term “code breaker” also describes Considerable challenges attend the writ- ences, and again in 2018, when they col- the CRISPR complex itself, which cuts ing of a book about a developing field of sci- lected the coveted Kavli Prize in Norway. through the double strands of the DNA CRISPR promises to engineer ence. For all the care invested, not to men- Although they have never belonged to the molecule carrying the genetic code. human beings with better tion the perfect timing of the Nobel Prize, same research institution, they formed a “The Code Breaker” introduces Doudna disease resistance. the epilogue of “The Code Breaker” con- successful collaboration with each other on a sleepless night early last March, just trasts sadly with our current reality. Isaac- and numerous colleagues in several coun- before “lockdown” became a household son, enjoying a fine day last fall on his bal- tries by building on shared interests, ca- word. She and her husband, the Berkeley Fortunately for Doudna, her early read- cony in New Orleans’s French Quarter, maraderie and competition. geneticist Jamie Cate, are driving to ing of “The Double Helix,” by James Wat- “can again hear music on the street and The CRISPR history holds obvious ap- Fresno to retrieve their teenage son, Andy, son, proved formative. She breezed right smell shrimp being boiled at the corner peal for Walter Isaacson, a biographer of from a robotics competition set to begin past Watson’s snarky comments about the restaurant.” There was no way for him to Albert Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, Steve later that day. A few hours’ reflection has structural biologist Rosalind Franklin’s know the enemy virus would surge and Jobs and Leonardo da Vinci. In “The Code left Doudna time to question the wisdom of looks and took away an important mes- mutate by his book’s publication date to be- Breaker” he reprises several of his previ- leaving Andy with more than a thousand sage: Rosalind Franklin was a scientist; come even more contagious than before, ous themes — science, genius, experiment, other kids in an enclosed convention cen- therefore Jennifer Doudna could be one, though he suspected it might. code, thinking different — and devotes a ter, given the specter of the incipient epi- too. Echoes of those encouraging words Reflecting on the nature of scientific re- full length book to a female subject for the demic. Andy, understandably, is none too emanate from the pages of “The Code search, Isaacson lets Emmanuelle Charp- first time. Jennifer Doudna, a genuine her- happy to see his parents again so soon, but, Breaker,” as well as from Doudna’s own entier have the next-to-last words: “At the oine for our time, may be the code breaker as the reunited family decamps, he re- book, “A Crack in Creation,” written with end of the day,” she tells him, “the discover- ceives a text message announcing the her former student Samuel Sternberg and ies are what endure. We are just passing on DAVA SOBEL is the author of “Longitude,” competition’s cancellation. All of Andy’s published in 2017. Its subtitle, “Gene Edit- this planet for a short time. We do our job, “Galileo’s Daughter” and, most recently, “The fellow robot enthusiasts from high schools ing and the Unthinkable Power to Control and then we leave and others pick up the Glass Universe.” statewide must likewise leave the prem- Evolution,” reflects a sober respect for work.” 0

12 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 PHOTOGRAPH BY ANASTASIIA SAPON FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES CRIME / SARAH WEINMAN Disappearing Acts

THERE’S SOME HEAVY irony at man who turns out to be the jazz Sharise, who is jailed for murder- work in RED WIDOW (Putnam, 352 musician Gabriel Keyne. Both ing the son of a senator. So, too, is pp., $27) as one of its leads, the soon realize they are in a densely the author, a New Jersey-based C.I.A. agent Lyndsey Duncan, is forested part of Central Park litigation specialist. This matters known by colleagues as the “hu- called the Ramble. Gabriel has a because Gigl writes scene after man lie detector.” Polygraphs are clue cut into his skin, and Alice scene where her characters’ so inaccurate that many courts finds another on a piece of paper basic humanity is ignored, won’t admit them as evidence. — left, perhaps, by a serial killer laughed at, mocked or cause for But their continued use by intelli- she has tried and failed to appre- imminent harm. (That the story gence divisions is a metaphor for hend. takes place in 2006 and 2007, the lack of trust inherent in this Musso, as reflected in Sam when trans rights garnered far work, a metaphor Alma Katsu Taylor’s nimble translation, less public discussion, also mat- employs in sly fashion. spoons out details and misdirec- ters.) The misgenderings sting, Lyndsey, in particular, has tion with brio, along with the and should, but Gigl is too astute excellent reason to be wary of roots of Alice’s raw rage, carry- and compassionate a writer to everybody. A Russian asset she’s create cartoon villainy out of spent months developing has anti-trans attitudes. Both Erin been fatally poisoned. His family and Sharise will find acceptance, needs safe harbor, but she’s get- often slow, sometimes fervent, ting resistance from the higher- among recalcitrant loved ones. ups. And a fledgling friendship Both women also find them- with the titular widow, Theresa selves caught up in a terrifying Warner, seems predicated on conspiracy that costs the lives of falsehood and betrayal. Figuring far too many. The resulting legal out who’s doing the most double- resolution feels inevitable, but dealing, and how many layers of open-ended enough for more Erin deception are involved, makes for McCabe appearances, a welcome delicious suspense. — and quietly groundbreaking — Katsu, a longtime intelligence development. analyst for the C.I.A. and N.S.A., writes what she’s most profes- THE 1959 DISAPPEARANCE of 900 sionally familiar with after years residents from a small Swedish in the paranormal and horror enclave is more than mere docu- novel trenches. The plotting is mentary subject for Alice Lindst- sophisticated and laced with edt. She grew up hearing stories surprises, but what stands out about Silvertjarn from her grand- most is the emotional core of mother, whose parents and Lyndsey and Theresa’s alliance, PABLO AMARGO younger sister counted among and whether there is room, in a the missing. So why not recruit nest of vipers, for true sis- ing this reader along for longer friends old and new to help her terhood. than she bargained for. More make a film and solve lingering jarring, in addition to that credi- family mysteries? It will not YEARS OF READING and reviewing bility-shattering last-act twist, surprise any discerning reader of crime novels has led me to a were the inappropriate, power- THE LOST VILLAGE (Minotaur, 352 consensus judgment about their imbalanced meet-cutes that men pp., $23.99), Camilla Sten’s un- construction: A book can open have with Alice, inexorably link- nerving debut, that Alice’s obses- with an outlandish premise and ing her romantic life with death. sion will get the better of her. still feel credible, but when simi- Sten does not break new lar twists appear late in the nar- WHEN READERS MEET Erin Mc- ground, nor does she need to. The rative, they almost always sink Cabe, the protagonist of Robyn abandoned Silvertjarn and the the book. I’m still puzzling over Gigl’s emotionally resonant de- ghosts that have long haunted CENTRAL PARK (Little, Brown, 336 but, BY WAY OF SORROW (Kensing- the village — and continue to pp., $28), by the French suspense ton, 304 pp., $26), she’s in a court- haunt it — hold enough menace. king Guillaume Musso; the initial room for the first time in five Flashbacks to the last days of the conceit provoked plenty of inter- years, hoisting a homophobic functioning village fill in requisite est, but the latter-half plot shift judge by his own petard. Estab- gaps and flesh out the level of didn’t feel earned. lishing Erin’s capability and loss Alice is contending with, and That opener is a doozy, howev- creativity as a lawyer right away show how easy it is for her and er: The Paris-based homicide is a smart gambit, because the her friends to lose whatever hold detective Alice Schafer wakes up bulk of the novel juxtaposes her on reality they had before volun- in an autumn woodland one professional acumen with the tarily cohabiting with ghosts. morning, handcuffed to a strange struggles she and her client Come for the mounting horror Sharise face being recognized for and scares, but stay for a devas- SARAH WEINMAN writes the Crime who they are. tating examination of the nature column for the Book Review. Erin is transgender, as is of family secrets. 0

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 13 Legacies of Imperialism The imperial past is never dead; it’s not even past. Taste the World, By FAREED ZAKARIA

From Home. WE ARE ALL in the throes of a hangover, Samir Puri writes, a “great imperial hang- A selection of high-quality over.” He explains in “The Shadows of Em- wines are delivered right pire” that we are living in the “first empire- to your door. free millennium” in history and yet the leg- acy of these empires still powerfully shapes our times. He is aware of the notion of informal empires but makes a strong case that there was something distinct and notable about formal empires, which ex- isted from the days of the oldest human civilizations until 1991, when the Soviet Un- ion collapsed. This juxtaposition — imperi- al legacies in a postimperial world — is an intriguing idea that proves a clever prism through which to look at the world. Rus- sia’s annexation of Crimea, Britain’s exit New Member Offer THE SHADOWS OF EMPIRE $59.95 How Imperial History Shapes Our World By Samir Puri Regular Price $109.95 384 pp. Pegasus Books. $28.95. British troops on the way to Baghdad, 1917.

For your first 6-bottle shipment inclusive from the European Union and the break- gether in 1920 out of three provinces of the tion infected Russia itself.” These deep im- downs in Iraq and Syria all have deep roots collapsing Ottoman Empire. London could perial ties with Ukraine help explain why of shipping with code in an imperial past that still casts shadows once again decide Baghdad’s fate. Putin’s brazen annexation of Crimea was VINE on the present. Brexit was animated by a view that Brit- broadly popular within Russia. Once you start to think along these lines, ain was not a country defined by its proxim- We enter the postimperial 21st century you see the shadows of empires every- ity to Europe. In fact, what had often char- with an unusual geopolitical dynamic. The where. The day I began the book, I had acterized British nationalism was its sepa- two leading powers on the planet, the been reading about a topic that Puri does ration from the Continent. (In Shake- United States and China, both derive a nytwineclub.com not discuss but is one more example of his speare’s “Richard II,” John of Gaunt gives great deal of their internal legitimacy and 877.698.6841 thesis: the roiling debate about what to do voice to a deep-rooted English nationalism purpose from the notion that they are anti- with the hundreds of thousands of artifacts when he describes the island nation as “this imperial nations. In America’s case, its © 2021 The New York Times Company and that were, over the centuries, taken from precious stone set in the silver sea / Which identity is tied to its birth story of rebelling © 2021 Lot18 Holdings, Inc. Offer applies across the globe and now sit proudly in the serves it in the office of a wall / Or as a moat against the British Empire. In China’s case, to first ongoing club shipment only and cannot be combined with other promo- great museums of the West. In recent his- defensive to a house, / Against the envy of every schoolchild is taught that the coun- tions. Subsequent shipments will be billed tory, because of the reach of Western less happier lands.”) The leading Brexi- try’s modern history began with Western at the standard price. Restrictions apply. power, most countries have either acted as teers, including now-Prime Minister Boris imperialism humiliating and crippling the Offer does not apply to existing Wine Club members, one-time Wine Gifts or Wine imperialists or found themselves subju- Johnson, often spoke about a “global Brit- Middle Kingdom for over a century. And yet Shop. Expires 9/30/21. The New York gated, and in both cases their national ain,” continuing its historical mission both countries have informal empires. The Times, where local law allows, has cho- identity was profoundly shaped by the ex- around the world, forging closer ties in par- American one is a vast network of economic sen Lot18 Holdings, Inc., and its panel of experts, to select the wines and operate perience. Even the United States has been ticular with its old colonies and dominions alliances and military bases scattered the clubs on our behalf. The Wine Club is deeply affected by imperialism, Puri says, from Canada to India to Australia. around the world. China, for its part, is try- operated without the participation of the Times wine critics or other members of arguing that American slavery was an idea The Russian case is in some ways even ing to develop something quite similar with the newsroom. Lot18 Holdings, Inc. uses imported from Europe’s empires and was easier to make. Puri points out that “the its huge Belt and Road Initiative, which direct-to-consumer permits and ships in “the ultimate manifestation of coloniza- evolution of Russia was inextricably linked may swell to 10 times the size of the Mar- accordance with direct shipping laws for sales to Conn., Ga., Kan., Md., Mass., tion, not of land but people.” In fact, the to its expansion, so much so that it is un- shall Plan. Nev., N.H., N.D., Pa., Va., W.Va., Wis., MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes has described clear whether Russia created an empire or How will these two distinctive postimpe- S.C., N.C., Colo., N.M., Wash., La., Mo., the historical circumstance of African- the process of imperialism created Rus- rial superpowers interact in the 21st cen- Ohio, Neb., Ore., Tenn., N.Y., Vt., Ill., Ind., Iowa, Mont., Idaho and S.D. For all other Americans as “a colony within a nation.” sia.” He dates the start of Russia’s Euro- tury? What will be the consequences of the states, ALL ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES PUR- Puri, an expert on armed conflict who pean-facing empire to the kingdom of imperial shadows cast in this new, emerg- CHASED FROM NEW YORK TIMES WINE CLUB ARE SOLD IN THE STATE OF CALI- has worked in the British Foreign Office, Kievan Rus, which began in the ninth cen- ing bipolar era? Unfortunately, Puri does FORNIA AND TITLE PASSES TO THE BUY- makes the case that Britain’s two pivotal tury in Kyiv, the present-day capital of not have much to say about any of this. Hav- ER IN CALIFORNIA. New York Times Wine decisions of the last several decades — Ukraine. From those modest beginnings ing provided a fresh perspective on all the Club and Lot18 Holdings, Inc. make no representation to the legal rights of any- joining the United States in the Iraq war grew an empire that at its height, after the issues I have raised above, he offers brief one to ship or import alcoholic beverages and Brexit — were both crucially condi- Soviet Union’s victory in World War II, and intelligent speculation, but mostly pro- into any state outside of California. The tioned by the country’s imperial hangover. spanned 11 time zones and comprised al- ceeds to simply recount the imperial histo- buyer is solely responsible for the ship- ment of alcoholic beverage products. By Once the world’s greatest imperial power, most 200 million people. When you con- ries of major countries or parts of the world. placing an order, buyer authorizes Lot18 Britain clung to the idea that it had the mili- sider this history, Vladimir Putin’s remark Much of this is well written, comprehensive Holdings, Inc. to act on buyer’s behalf to engage a common carrier to deliver buy- tary strength, the diplomatic skill and that the collapse of the Soviet Union was “a and judicious, but it is still potted history. er’s order. All credit card payments will be above all the ambition to shape far-flung major geopolitical disaster of the century” Having introduced a fascinating subject, facilitated by Lot18 Holdings, Inc. Due to parts of the globe. In addition, modern-day makes sense, especially if you listen to Puri declines to fully engage and explore state laws, wine can be purchased only by adults 21 years and older. Drinking wine Iraq was a British creation, cobbled to- what he said immediately after: “Tens of his own thesis. He seems to imply that this may increase risk for cancer, and, during millions of our co-citizens and co-patriots task is left to the reader, but that leaves too pregnancy, can cause birth defects. FAREED ZAKARIA’S most recent book is “Ten found themselves outside Russian terri- much to us, and lets the author of this stimu- Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World.” tory. Moreover the epidemic of disintegra- lating book off the hook too easily. 0

14 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 PHOTOGRAPH FROM PRINT COLLECTOR/GETTY IMAGES Essay / Our Autofiction Fixation / By Jessica Winter Why do we assume that a work of literary fiction must be based on its author’s life?

IN FEBRUARY 2020, at a book party in a Brooklyn brown- stone, a smiling stranger walked up to me. “We have something in common, you know,” she said. “We con- ceived our children without having sex.” My memory of the exchange then goes blank for a moment — I must have spluttered some confused pleasantry in response — but it quickly emerged that she had read my first novel, which explores its protagonist’s struggles with infertility, and drawn the conclusion that I myself had undergone I.V.F., as she had. It was an audacious introduction. But I could not be- grudge the assumption she had made, even if I was disoriented by the way she had expressed it. I, too, as- sume that much of the contemporary fiction I read is autobiographical. The most celebrated novels of the past year — Douglas Stuart’s “Shuggie Bain,” which won the Booker Prize, drew openly on the author’s childhood. Ayad Akhtar wrote “Homeland Elegies” in the form of a memoir, and Brandon Taylor, a former doctoral student in biochemistry, called his campus novel “Real Life.” Two of the buzziest books of early 2021, Lauren Oyler’s “Fake Accounts” and Patricia Lockwood’s “No One Is Talking About This,” blur the lines between art and life while deploying the language and brain fugue of internet im- mersion. None of these books would be caught off-guard by a prying party guest. “Write what you know” has been the novelist’s imper- ative at least since Charles Dickens retooled fragments LINDA HUANG of an abandoned memoir for “David Copperfield,” and reached a logical extreme with the autofiction boom of The expectation that fiction is autobiographical is writer may not. Of his debut, “Edinburgh,” Chee writes: the last decade. The belief that every novel is a self- understandable for the simple reason that so much of it “I wish I could show you the roomful of people who’ve accounting is timeworn, too: Some early readers of is. When that expectation becomes prescriptive, howev- told me the novel is the story of their lives. . . . I still “Lolita” suspected that only someone with the mentality er, critical reading can devolve into a tiresome kind of don’t know if I’d be in that room.” Part of this mystery is of a child predator could have conjured the depraved fact-checking. In a tepid review of “The Need,” a writer due to the chaotic consciousness native to the novel- Humbert Humbert. Publishers, meanwhile, often appear for The London Review of Books used Phillips’s ac- writing process, which requires a degree of possession. to want readers to see books as thinly veiled autobiogra- knowledgments section as a bizarre gotcha, saying it Nobody is asking you to do what you are doing. There phy, and their publicity campaigns typically emphasize “testifies against her vision of motherhood as embattled are more than enough novels in the world, and nobody is authors’ personal connections to their work. This can isolation, thanking 10 family members from three gener- more painfully aware of that than the person attempting backfire, as with the P.R. blitz for Jeanine Cummins’s ations for help.” A reviewer for Kirkus, the trade publica- to write one. To dig a book out of the ground can be border-crisis blockbuster “American Dirt,” which exag- tion, took a similar approach, though to opposite effect, backbreaking, hand-tearing work; you need to forget gerated the author’s Latina heritage and suggested that in a rave for “Shuggie Bain,” writing, “Readers may get what you are doing, to fall into a trance, and when the her husband is an undocumented Central American through the whole novel without breaking down — then spell breaks, you can’t be entirely sure what you’ve immigrant (he’s from Ireland). read the first sentence of the acknowledgments and lose unearthed, where it came from or who will recognize it Some of the boldest and most exciting novels of recent it.” as belonging to them, too. And however much of what years have taken the autobiographical assumption and There is something backhanded about using authors’ results is pure invention (or so you think), your everything knit up in it — the nature of truth, the bound- personal statements as a Captcha tool for verifying the subjectivity is all you have. You made it up. It’s made of aries between what is real and what is imagined — as a emotional resonance of their work. This tendency you. shadow theme. The first third of Susan Choi’s “Trust reached a nadir with the conversation around Kate Eliz- After I had revised a draft of my second novel, which is Exercise” steeps itself in the horny adolescent drama of abeth Russell’s “My Dark Vanessa,” in which the author, set in my hometown, Buffalo, a friend proposed the title a performing-arts high school modeled in part on the one facing unfounded allegations of plagiarism, felt com- “The Fourth Child.” I had used a passage from Doris Choi herself attended in Houston in the 1980s. Then, pelled to restate publicly that she, like her protagonist, Lessing’s “The Fifth Child” as my book’s epigraph, but so however, Choi raises another curtain and yet another, was a survivor of sexual abuse. An author working in explicitly nudging my work into line with that of a Nobel her book shape-shifting into a dazzling metafiction on good faith can’t win at this game. If she is forced to con- Prize winner felt arrogant, unseemly. Then, however, authorship and self-performance. From the opening firm that her material is autobiographical, then she risks another friend flagged the actual provocation. “You are pages of “The Need,” Helen Phillips, a mother of two, forfeiting both the privacy and the power of transfigura- the fourth child,” she said. “In your family.” I hadn’t no- captures the sticky overwhelm of early parenthood — tion that fiction promises. If she denies it, then she sur- ticed this parallel — that, like one of my characters, I am the engorged breasts, the toddler mayhem — with dia- renders a badge of authenticity that she may never have the youngest of four children, with a large age gap be- ristic, feels-real precision. But from the jump, Phillips’s wished to claim in the first place, and lays herself open tween my older siblings and me — until my friend book is also operating in the realms of science fiction and to accusations that she is appropriating the pain of oth- pointed it out. This is not merely embarrassing; it’s pre- body horror, becoming a wondrously demented commen- ers. posterous. It points to a rather terrifying lack of self- tary on the slipperiness and duality of the maternal Whether or how much a book draws from real life isn’t knowledge, a near total absence of control over the thing state. strictly quantifiable. In his essay collection “How to I spent five years making. If someone else told me this, Write an Autobiographical Novel,” Alexander Chee I’m not sure I would believe her. But look: I wrote it JESSICA WINTER is an editor at The New Yorker. Her new novel is posits a kind of epistemological mystery: A reader may down. You just read it. So it must be true, it must have “The Fourth Child.” see himself accurately reflected in such a novel, but the really happened — right? 0

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 15 Life on the Outside After Hours A memoir of grasping for Black identities that never quite fit. Uncovering the victims of a killer who preyed on gay men at bars.

never quite seems to belong. Too African led pointedly secret lives. In the book’s epi- By IJEOMA OLUO for Jamaica, too Jamaican for America, too By CHRISTOPHER BOLLEN logue, he explains that he was motivated American for Nigeria, Chude-Sokei grows by the lives that these men “wanted but I WAS ABOUT 10 when I found out that my up grasping at these various identities in ON A SUNDAY afternoon in May 1991, a couldn’t have. Here was a generation of whole life I’d been saying my name wrong. the hopes of finding a Blackness that fits maintenance worker emptying garbage men, more or less, for whom it was difficult A friend of my father’s — an “uncle” — had him, as each of these realms places its own, barrels on the Pennsylvania Turnpike to be visibly gay. To be visibly whole.” I come to town, and my white mom had often contradictory, expectations upon made a grisly discovery: Wrapped inside would have put the emphasis on visibly dressed us up for the occasion in tradi- him. eight knotted trash bags was the mutilated rather than on whole. Closeted gay people tional Nigerian dress. My top and wrap I cringed with recognition as Chude- body of a 54-year-old man, killed by stab do, of course, lead rich, satisfying exist- skirt were of a gorgeous orange- and red- Sokei attempts and fails to escape Ameri- wounds to the abdomen, his severed penis ences, even if they leave fewer traces. One printed fabric, hand-sewn by a woman can racism by embracing his African fore- shoved in his mouth. In a notable conces- of the perils of writing about marginalized from my father’s village in Rivers State. bears’ prejudice against Black Americans. sion to the overriding paranoia of the era, murder victims is that their lives can be But when this uncle asked me my name, I But Chude-Sokei resists editorializing. the maintenance worker was advised to framed as one long sorrowful arc of victim- embarrassed myself and my family by There are no life lessons, no rationaliza- take an AIDS test, even though he hadn’t ization — in a sense fated to be found dead mispronouncing it “Joma.” tions of the bigotry and violence that exist come in direct contact with blood. in a trash bag on the side of the road. Gay “That is not your name,” he replied. in a diaspora so ravaged by white colonial- men pressured to hide their sexuality at “Your name is Ijeoma. You have to know ism. We must look at the author’s story, see LAST CALL the height of the AIDS epidemic are partic- how to say your name. It is a very good Ni- how messy it is, and try to figure out why A True Story of Love, Lust, and ularly susceptible to all-consuming tragic gerian name.” Suddenly my clothing felt alongside him. Reading this book I won- Murder in Queer New York narratives. tight and uncomfortable, as if my uncle dered if white readers would get its com- By Elon Green Green seems to anticipate this journalis- could see that none of this — the clothing or plexity, if they’d be able to reserve judg- 255 pp. Celadon Books. $27. tic conundrum. With great compassion, he the name — fit me. widens his scope to explore the social value of gay bars to the queer community and the FLOATING IN A MOST PECULIAR WAY A little over a year later, a second dis- vital work of grass-roots groups like the By Louis Chude-Sokei membered body was discovered wrapped New York City Anti-Violence Project, 219 pp. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. $27. in bags off a remote New Jersey highway. which fought for fair treatment for gay Both victims — older, white-collar profes- crime victims during a period when they sional men, with the heterosexual vest- were often treated like career criminals. To this day, when people ask me how to ments of marriages and children — had He also fills the narrative void by telling pronounce my name, part of me knows last been seen at an upscale Midtown Man- the stories of bar patrons and employees, that no matter how much I’ve practiced, I hattan gay piano bar called the Town- including those of the cultishly popular pi- still don’t say it right. It is a good Nigerian house. ano players who serenaded the victims name, and my father was a good Nigerian, So begins Elon Green’s terrific, harrow- and their murderer. As a result, Green while I am floating in this space just out- ing, true-crime account of an elusive serial proves a conscientious crime writer. He side. killer who preyed upon gay men in the provides an adrenalized police-procedural In his debut memoir, “Floating in a Most 1990s, perfidiously turning the safe havens plot without ever losing sight of the fact Peculiar Way,” Louis Chude-Sokei writes of gay bars into hunting grounds, and semi- that these were innocent human beings from that space outside, detailing with un- anonymous late-night hookups into an op- who were duped, butchered and discarded. flinching directness the confusion, isola- portunity to kill with impunity. Two more We are never allowed a moment of per- tion, horror and bizarre humor of his life as men would be added to the body count in verse awe for the murderer. a child born to a high-ranking Biafran ma- 1993: a struggling prostitute known to op- Ultimately, that strength is also the jor father and a Jamaican mother in the erate out of the Port Authority and the book’s weakness. In 2000, thanks to ad- midst of civil war in Nigeria. Born the day Louis Chude-Sokei “hustler buffet” in the East 50s; and a mild- vances in forensic science, the trash bags that war was declared in 1967 — “Family mannered patron of a West Village piano were reanalyzed for fingerprints, which legend had it that while she was in labor bar. The most prolific serial killers exploit led back to Richard Rogers Jr., a nurse at she could hear the first fruits of the federal ment. As I reached the end I was anxious the vulnerabilities of the social order; the Mount Sinai Hospital who lived on Staten government’s bombing campaign against for a satisfying resolution, a clear take- “Last Call Killer” took advantage of gay Island. In the chapter devoted to his life, he Biafra” — Chude-Sokei, the director of the away, to soothe the pain of this uncomfort- men’s need for discretion and the endemic is described in all the ways a person never African-American studies program at Bos- able journey. homophobia of law enforcement. wants to be remembered unless he is an ton University, doesn’t remember being But as I sat with that discomfort I began “Last Call” is Green’s first book, and it opportunistic murderer: normal, average, carried away by his mother to Jamaica. By to laugh at the absurdity of my expecta- admirably demonstrates his commitment gangly, introverted, unassertive, round- 6 he was living in a “home for left-behind tions. How very American to expect a to sidestepping easy sensationalism for shouldered and sunken-chested, someone children” in Montego Bay while his mother story so wide, so vast, so nuanced to be tied the far grittier work of checking sources, who walked without swinging his arms. tried to find work in the United States. up in a bow. This is not a Hollywood movie; poring over police reports and rein- Rogers was tried but not convicted of mur- “America was a place where people disap- this is a man’s life, and a life like those of so terviewing witnesses. In choosing a serial dering a male roommate in 1973, and it is peared all the time,” Chude-Sokei writes, many of us who make up the African dias- murder case that was scantly covered at likely that his killing rampage exceeded “mothers in particular.” But eventually, af- pora. Herein lies the beauty of “Floating in the time, Green takes us far from the ter- the number of victims found by chance on ter years in this austere and often abusive a Most Peculiar Way”: It reveals how we rain of fashionably notorious Netflix psy- roadsides in the early ’90s. environment, he joined his mother as an carry trauma with us, how that trauma can chopaths like Andrew Cunanan (whom Green acknowledges that Rogers, who is adolescent in Inglewood, Calif. cause us to hurt one another, and how we Gary Indiana described in 1999 as “a dia- serving two consecutive life terms in pris- Chude-Sokei’s prose is both direct and still love and carry one another with bolic icon in the circus of American celebri- on, declined his attempts to interview him. poetic, describing horrific trauma with wounds unhealed. I finished this book ty”; that this now reads like a high compli- That missing confrontation creates a fis- such flat immediacy that at times I had to wanting to know more — about Chude- ment gives some indication of the culture’s sure in his otherwise impressive reporting. set the book down for a moment, just to Sokei’s mother’s story, about my own fa- ever-tightening embrace of the criminal). Exactly how, where and why Rogers killed process what I was reading. ther’s. There were times when I enjoyed Instead of focusing on the killer, Green remains a vexing mystery. More than once This is a story of a young Black man try- this book and times when I felt like I sur- opts to humanize his victims. This proves a in the abrupt final chapters, in the midst of ing to find himself in a world where he vived it, but there was never a time when I thorny task when dealing with men who reading about him, I forgot the murderer’s did not find myself within it. These are name. But it is to Green’s credit that I never IJEOMA OLUO is the author, most recently, of words in which those of us who have CHRISTOPHER BOLLEN is the author of four forgot the names of the four known vic- “Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White floated outside for so long can touch down novels, most recently “A Beautiful Crime,” now tims. How many serial-killer victims can Male America.” for a bit, and connect. 0 out in paperback. you name? 0

16 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 PHOTOGRAPH BY SHARONA JACOBS Now You See It A magician’s memoir gets at the nature of truth and deception.

doing is right and good. There’s the sense By ERROL MORRIS that the only thing we can be certain of is that we’re being deceived. But also, that LYING IS UBIQUITOUS. Why should it be oth- the real Amoralman, the most amoral man erwise? There are far more reasons to lie of all, is ourselves. than to tell the truth. Isn’t lying beneficial? There is a much-told anecdote some- Often, it is. And the importance of truth- times attributed to William James. It con- telling — is it a fiction we tell ourselves? A cerns the little old lady who on being told fairy tale? A form of self-deception? Our that the Earth revolves around the sun, original lie? said, “I’ve got a better theory.” And yet we have this absurd belief that “And what is that, madam?” inquired we are truth-tellers, or at least that we’re James politely. capable of occasionally telling the truth. “That we live on a crust of earth which is In “Amoralman,” Derek DelGaudio’s on the back of a giant turtle.” masterly memoiristic account of lying and “If your theory is correct, madam,” he self-deception, we start life fully capable of asked, “what does this turtle stand on?” truth-telling. Man in the state of nature or “You’re a very clever man, Mr. James, in infancy (take your pick) revels in telling and that’s a very good question,” the little the truth to others. In his epigraph DelGau- old lady replied, “but I have an answer to it. dio — a sleight-of-hand artist and stage The first turtle stands on the back of a sec- performer — quotes Ecclesiastes: “We are ond, far larger, turtle, who stands directly born knowing only truth. Then we see.” under him.” “But what does this second turtle stand AMORALMAN on?” asked James. A True Story and Other Lies To this, the little old lady replied, “Oh, By Derek DelGaudio Mr. James — it’s turtles all the way down.” Illustrated. 238 pp. Alfred A. Knopf. $27. In DelGaudio it is turtles all the way down. Turtles on top of turtles on top of more turtles without surcease. Certainty leads to uncer- Maybe we retain this ability later in life. tainty and then more uncertainty. But it seems unlikely. We may know the For me, the shadow of Ricky Jay runs truth, but quickly realize no good can come through much of this. Ricky was a friend of of it. So we give up on it. mine, a master magician, an incredible ar- “Amoralman” offers up successive para- chivist and raconteur. DelGaudio is a less bles. Central among them is the parable of misanthropic version of Ricky. Not neces- the cave from Plato’s “Republic.” In the sarily nicer, but less misanthropic. What parable, men are in shackles. They can we don’t know about man doesn’t lead us turn neither to the left nor to the right, nor into a pit of despair, but perhaps to a future can they look behind them. They spend of enlightenment and to greater possibility. their lives looking at the shadows of things We are opening our eyes not to slavery but — not the things in and of themselves. (Not MAX LÖFFLER to infinite possibility. Such an optimistic vi- so coincidentally, the title of DelGaudio’s sion almost gives me the heebie-jeebies. Off Broadway play and its subsequent screen adaptation is “In & Of Itself.”) They The second part of the book is an ex- despairing vision — a vision I would not be are prevented from seeing the truth and tended poker game. Hired to cheat others, at all unsympathetic toward — is a belief ‘I am not interested in fooling when shown the things in their real and DelGaudio imagines he’s in control. After that life is not less than what it seems, but people. ... To know illusions is to substantial form, prefer to return to shad- all, he’s the one involved in false dealing. It more. We are limited by how we see our- know reality.’ ows and shackles. It is summed up in Del- turns out differently than he might have selves, and once we shed those blinders Gaudio’s maxim: “I lost sight of reality just expected. the possibilities are endless. Once we real- enough to glimpse the truth.” This is a story of unending ironies and ize we are all slaves dealing in a world of But it’s the end of the Trump era, and we The book is in two parts. The first part, a misconceptions. That which we expected shadows, we can imagine (or even con- deserve to turn over a new leaf, no? bildungsroman, introduces DelGaudio’s to be the truth is a lie, or at least a partial front) almost infinite possibility. So, is this In the first part of the book, there’s an ex- family, his mother’s lesbian lover, Jill, and fiction. Anecdotes could be true, but falsely ultimately about deception? Or is it about change between DelGaudio and his then Ryan, the boy next door. Their Col- attributed. Intentions could be and are truth? mother where he tells her he wants to be a orado neighborhood comprises two differ- misrepresented or misunderstood. Good Why not both? “I am not interested in Christian. Then he learns that Christianity ent religious groups: conservative Chris- guys turn out to be bad guys and vice fooling people,” DelGaudio tells us. “It’s can be as much about intolerance as about tians and ultraconservative Christians. versa. And the purpose of magic and about truth. To know illusions is to know forgiveness. But there’s this additional Ryan and his family are members of the sleight-of-hand in such a universe? It goes reality. . . . I want to be the prisoner that re- irony in DelGaudio’s presentation of him- latter. DelGaudio’s happy childhood is per- back to Plato’s cave, which reminds us that turns to the cave.” He imagines an escapee self. At times he seems like a Pentecostal manently interrupted when he tells Ryan things are always different than they seem. who “picks up the tools of the puppeteer revivalist. He often has the air of a disap- about having two mothers. “My mother We misunderstand context. We confuse and teaches himself to cast shadows, with pointed true-believer. This is the stuff not had taught me the value of truth, but she shadowy representations for the things in the hope of using those illusions to set the of nihilism, but of someone searching for neglected to teach me the cost,” he writes. and of themselves. We live in a shadowy, others free.” true belief. Perhaps searching for some- “She told me that honesty was always the fictional world. His deepest epiphany comes when he re- thing beyond belief. best policy, but now I had evidence to the DelGaudio believed when he was a boy alizes that the game of duplicity that he’s It reminds me of one of my favorite lines contrary.” that the puppeteers in Plato’s cave were running is being run on him. He is duping in literature — the last line of Huysmans’s trying to dupe the prisoners. But he could- others, but he is also duping himself. Like “À Rebours”: “O Lord, pity the Christian ERROL MORRIS’S many feature documentaries n’t answer why. By the end of his story, he Plato’s cave, nothing is as it seems. who doubts, the skeptic who would believe, include “The Thin Blue Line,” the Oscar- realizes that the puppeteers may have “Amoralman” can be seen as a series of the convict of life embarking alone in the winning “The Fog of War” and, most recently, been themselves deceived. And yet, illustrations about how we deceive our- night, under a sky no longer illumined by “My Psychedelic Love Story.” grafted onto what might at first seem like a selves into believing that whatever we’re the consoling beacons of ancient faith.” 0

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 17 Birds of a Feather The surprising role pigeons play in South African diamond smuggling.

them from the mine’s vast pits in the hopes cally elected councils. Frank and his wife, on. Here is the author on some fogbound By NATE BLAKESLEE they will deliver the booty back to their who is from South Africa, managed to fina- miners spotted on the side of the highway: homes undetected. The practice has be- gle their way into an area that hosted the “The soil of their hearts feels alluvial, rife DIAMOND MINING ISN’T the only business come so common that pigeons have been original DeBeers mines, the enormous pits with stones both precious and feral, the built on a lie, though the industry’s central outlawed in mining towns and are killed on that made the company among the world’s metastable carbon allotropes (now re- myth — that diamonds are scarce and sight by shotgun-toting security guards. wealthiest. What Frank finds is a lesson in sponsible for their livings and their crum- therefore extremely valuable — has to be Frank describes disturbing scenes of over- what happens to a company town when the bling towns) having eons ago exploded among the most brazen. loaded pigeons landing on beaches, too ex- company pulls up stakes. Eerie scenes of from the center of the earth through kim- The cartels that mine South Africa, hausted to make it home, only to be set depopulated and denuded landscapes and berlitic pipes” and so on. That’s a steeper which for generations provided the lion’s upon by villagers who know all too well empty highways are made spookier by mountain than the average reader will be share of the world’s diamond supply, per- what payload they are carrying. tales miners share of what happens when willing to climb, not to mention a lot of in- petuated this inconceivably lucrative fic- It’s only the most recent in a long list of sight to glean about the miners’ interior tion by carefully limiting annual produc- indignities visited upon the pigeon during lives without actually talking to them. In tion, which is why smuggling was consid- a partnership with humans that spans mil- You will realize what an another such town, he spots two women ered such a threat. Black-market dia- lenniums. Relied on for food, fertilizer and, astonishing creature you are chatting at a store counter. To the best of monds — mostly smuggled out by the of course, delivering messages in both shooing out of your way. my knowledge, the women of South Africa impoverished miners themselves — wartime and peacetime, no other animal chat much as they do anyplace else, but to threatened the illusion of scarcity, Frank they “appear to be dancing and so mining concerns long ago be- with the cashier’s counter between came exercises in total control. them, as if bound, forever sepia and Until the area began to open up in strobe-lit, to some epileptic 2007, a huge portion of South Africa’s phenakistoscope.” Frank seems to west coast was a virtual no-go zone enjoy the people with whom he actu- called Die Sperrgebiet (“the Forbid- ally does talk, but you have to won- den Zone”) that remained closed to der if it occurred to him how few of the public for nearly 80 years. Min- them, given the opportunity, would ers lived in company houses, sent ever reach the end of a book like this their kids to company schools and one. Whether or not you enjoy this FLIGHT OF THE DIAMOND kind of prose is a matter of personal SMUGGLERS taste, but the author’s talent is not in A Tale of Pigeons, Obsession, and question. Frank gets great quotes Greed Along Coastal South Africa from the characters he interviews, and the book’s structure — search- By Matthew Gavin Frank ing for the mysterious Mr. Lester — 208 pp. Liveright. $25.95. keeps the story moving and offers a payoff in the end that is disappoint- played cricket on company fields. ing, but in all the best ways. The ma- They never needed to leave and his- terial in general — ghost towns, cor- torically were forbidden to do so. At porate cruelty, the centuries-old re- the mines themselves, there are X- lationship between humans and a ray machines, constant pat-downs species almost magical in its abili- and random application of powerful ties — is fabulous. laxatives to discourage those who The problem is that there is not would swallow contraband. Pos- enough of it. Somewhere in this session of a diamond in a mining manuscript is an outstanding New town is cause for arrest, and touch- No other animal aside from the dog has been as useful to humans, and few have been as thoroughly studied. Yorker-style piece of perhaps 10,000 ing a diamond with your bare skin is words on pigeons and diamond min- not allowed even inside the mines. ing, but successfully extending that Miners who die on the job are buried on aside from the dog has been as useful to hu- smugglers get caught. Confirmed (or even to book length would have required more site, lest their bodies be stuffed with dia- mans, and few have been as thoroughly suspected) offenses have historically been reporting than we get here. What we do get monds on the way out. Everything in the studied. We still don’t know exactly how pi- dealt with extrajudicially — usually with a is not really reportage, in any case. Frank mine, the mining town and the mining re- geons find their homes even when re- broken finger or a gouged eye or even a seems to know this; a running joke gion is designed to make it as difficult as leased hundreds of miles away, but we do bullet through the head. It’s a reign of ter- throughout the book is his failure to show possible to get the tiny unpolished stones know they are among the smartest of ani- ror lately overseen, Frank learns, by the up to interviews with an actual notebook out of the company’s control. mals, capable, for example, of distinguish- larger-than-life “Mr. Lester,” the DeBeers and being forced instead to scribble on re- That’s where the birds come in, as the es- ing all 26 letters of the alphabet and pass- security chief whose very name invokes ceipts or whatever else is at hand. Nor sayist Matthew Gavin Frank explains in ing the “mirror test” by recognizing their averted eyes among the locals, who seem does the material really work as a book- “Flight of the Diamond Smugglers,” his ru- own reflections — something very few ani- to regard him as something akin to a length essay along the lines of Helen Mac- mination on brutality and resistance in the mals can do. And their stamina is legend- boogeyman. donald’s “H Is for Hawk”; themes hinted at mines of South Africa. Homing pigeons, ary; they have been known to fly up to 800 “Flight of the Diamond Smugglers” has early on — including the author’s grief hidden inside miners’ lunchboxes or miles in a single day at speeds of over 60 some affecting scenes and some wonderful over his wife’s lost pregnancy — are never tucked under clothes, have been used for miles per hour. If you get nothing else from turns of phrase. In a cafe in a near-aban- fully developed. I would call this travel decades to illicitly spirit gems away from this book, you will realize what a truly as- doned company town, Frank spots some writing, which is nothing to be ashamed of the mines. Smugglers fit their birds with tonishing creature you are shooing out of old trophies on the wall, “testaments to the for a writer with literary aspirations — we tiny diamond-filled parcels, usually one on your way on the sidewalk or cursing for golf contests that were once held here, have all read travel writers so literate that each leg and under each wing, and release crapping all over your car. when there were still things here that their work transcends the genre. But we In recent years, companies have begun could be won.” But there are also some have all eaten thin soup, too, and know that NATE BLAKESLEE is a writer at large for Texas pulling back from South Africa’s coast, an wrong turns, phrasing-wise, in some cases nothing can really save it — not even page Monthly and the author, most recently, of area now considered “overmined,” and so many in one sentence that readers could after page filled with allotropes and “American Wolf.” turning their company towns over to lo- be forgiven for just giving up and moving phenakistoscopes. 0

18 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 PHOTOGRAPH BY KIM LUDBROOK/EUROPEAN PRESSPHOTO AGENCY Big Reveal No Boys Allowed In this novel, an aging filmmaker confronts his hidden past. A fictional boarding school is hit with rape allegations.

run from ever since. saging is unclear. The headmistress com- By ADAM HASLETT Fife’s parents exhibited an “unbroken By KATE ELIZABETH RUSSELL mends the work of the frustrated newspa- sadness and lassitude and constant low- per editors even as she silences them. A LEONARD FIFE, the protagonist of Russell level anxiety and detachment and pes- THE CENTRAL FIGURE in Emily Layden’s dorm parent suggests to her freshmen Banks’s furiously driven new novel, has simism bordering on despair,” which he be- debut novel is Atwater, not a person but a charges the accuser might be lying, then been hiding all his life — from the world lieves he “caught” from them. At 16, in the place: an all-girls boarding school in north- expresses concern for any girl who might and from himself. On the outside he’s a suc- first of many attempts to escape the inher- west Connecticut. An institution steeped in feel triggered. cessful documentary filmmaker, a semifa- itance of his grim home outside Boston, he tradition and prestige, it’s the kind of “All Girls” is about teenage girls, but it’s mous left-wing figure in Canada, where he drives to Texas, where he’s molested by a school where the rich and powerful send also a portrait of an institution recalibrat- fled to from New England in 1968, suppos- blind, middle-aged man and drinks himself their daughters. The academic standards ing itself, trying to figure out how to retain edly to avoid the draft. He resides in a well- into oblivion trying to forget the episode. are high, the campus is beautiful — and the power. appointed Montreal apartment with By 19, he has fled to Florida, married a administration is dealing with a sexual as- The novel reaches for nuance, though Emma, his wife and producer of 40 years, woman he met in a bar, gotten her preg- sault lawsuit from an alumna who was for some readers the situation may be too and has managed to be both materially nant and brought her back to Boston, raped by a teacher 20 years ago. straightforward for ambiguity: A teacher comfortable and morally righteous. But at where their relationship soon unravels. We learn this in the opening pages of “All raped a student and the school covered it 78, ill and on the verge of death, he’s now His second marriage, to a Virginian heir- Girls,” when yard signs reading “A Rapist up. Atwater’s mealy-mouthed statements consumed by the need to confess that his ess attracted to his pose as a “serious Works Here” appear around town on At- get tiresome as it becomes clear there will life is as riddled with lies and betrayal as young man” and writer, lasts longer and water’s move-in day, strategically placed be no real accountability and around the his body is with cancer. frames the bulk of his memories of his so families driving to the school are guar- halfway mark, I began to yearn for a char-

FOREGONE ALL GIRLS By Russell Banks By Emily Layden 305 pp. Ecco. $28.99. 320 pp. St. Martin’s Press. $27.99.

To tell his story, he invites a former stu- anteed to be confronted with the allega- dent, Malcolm, and a small crew to his tion. The signs are quickly taken down and apartment for what his acolyte believes is the school does its best damage control, the chance to make a film about his men- but the local paper runs a story. The truth, tor’s career. Fife, however, has a different or some version of it, gets out. purpose. To tell Emma — through the cam- It feels like the setup of a thriller, but era and in the spotlight — what he cannot rather than delve into institutional drama, bring himself to tell her in private: that be- “All Girls” looks to the periphery of the fore meeting her he abandoned two wives scandal: to current Atwater students who and two children and that he moved to Can- experience the fallout of the rape allega- ada to escape not Vietnam but his own hol- tion as a backdrop to their academic year. low self. Russell Banks With each chapter focusing on a different “Foregone” is Fife’s confession. In the girl, readers navigate Fall Fest, vespers, present timeline of the novel, we never prom, a breakup, a sexual assault, the leave the film shoot. Where we go is deep younger self. But it ends in the same fash- chance meeting of an estranged friend. into his bleak experience as a boy, young ion — with his disappearance. Nine narrators is a lot and names can be man and young father. Emma either al- As always, Banks’s prose has remark- hard to remember, but the pages turn fast ready knows what Fife has to say, or does- able force to it. Like Emma, the reader too and the girls are complex, compelling and n’t want to hear it. She’d rather he stop the might prefer that Fife stop torturing him- written with incredible tenderness. Lay- interview and protect his reputation. But self in public, indulging in what is at times a den excels at rendering the everyday de- MIKYUNG LEE like a man desperate to expel a demon, kind of baroque self-recrimination com- tails of boarding school life — a dorm hall- which he can be free of only if his wife wit- plete with the sexist presumptions of the way littered with plugged-in hair straight- acter willing to burn it all down. But even nesses the exorcism, Fife insists repeat- postwar American male. But there is such eners and makeup bags, girls groggy at so, I appreciated why this wouldn’t hap- edly that she stay and listen. His mind ad- brio in the writing, such propulsion as the Saturday breakfast dressed in sweats and pen. The majority of Layden’s characters dled by medication, he’s transported into lashes are applied, that we follow Fife into socks, the LOL-laden group texts of gossip. come from privilege and wealth, some his past, leaving the reader to guess how the depths. The book’s real theme is the The girls deal with their own problems, groomed from birth to attend this boarding much of what we read is ever heard by his curse of being convinced that one is unlov- anxieties over school, relationships and school, and even non-legacy students de- captive audience and how much is the dy- able. And who among us hasn’t suffered the future, but hovering over every indi- scribe Atwater with a devotion that bor- ing man’s flight of memory. that conviction to one degree or another? vidual experience are unifying questions ders on obsession. One girl notes, “This One of the main strands of Banks’s fic- Such hollowness will haunt Fife till the end. of the scandal. Is the alumna telling the school sinks into your veins.” Another de- tion has long been what you might call a He has managed to remain with Emma all truth? Which teacher is the rapist? Did At- scribes it as a place students “never really working-class New England existential- these years only because early on she pro- water really try to cover it up? leave.” These girls are trapped. ism. In bitterly eloquent novels such as fessed not to “need him more than he Layden is generous with her characters “All Girls” takes place during the 2015-16 “Affliction,” “The Sweet Hereafter” and needed her,” a self-sufficiency they took as as they try to understand the implications academic year, which places the narrative “Continental Drift,” he has chronicled the a mutual “compliment.” Only it isn’t. It’s a of the ongoing crisis. Some sneer at At- pre-#MeToo. The movement’s absence is blunted, pragmatic affect of Northern fantasy détente with the human condition water’s “corporate jargon,” others blame felt — not just in Atwater’s infuriating lack white men and the women unfortunate of vulnerability. A condition that only now, the victim and defend the school. Some of transparency, but also in the girls’ am- enough to be entangled with them. “Fore- in his final hours, does Fife no longer seek recognize the wrongdoing, but don’t know bivalence and confusion. I can’t help won- gone” is in the same vein, only here the to hold at bay. how to address it. The student paper puts dering how much more clearly these char- protagonist is an artist. And what Banks To his credit, Banks has never solicited together a special issue focused on the acters might have seen Atwater’s manipu- reveals of this artist’s life is a profound his readers’ approval of his characters, and rape allegation, only to have the adminis- lations if the novel were set a couple of emptiness, seeded early on, which Fife has many are unlikely to be charmed by Leo tration ax it. Instances of activism contin- years later. Without understanding how Fife. But what they will find in “Foregone” ue in the wake of the yard signs, but mes- your school’s abuse of power mirrors ADAM HASLETT is the author of “Imagine Me is a character, a novel and a writer deter- countless other cases, how can you recog- Gone,” “Union Atlantic” and “You Are Not a mined not to go gentle into that good KATE ELIZABETH RUSSELL is the author of “My nize the pattern? How do you begin to un- Stranger Here.” night. 0 Dark Vanessa.” derstand how you’ve been betrayed? 0

PHOTOGRAPH BY NANCIE BATTAGLIA THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 19 Gotham Revival

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 2,500 new magazines came out.” From the his entire adult life in New York, beginning called it. In the end, “too many good ideas, start of Ronald Reagan’s term to 2000, “the almost two years before “I Love New York practical strategies and necessary tempo- rich to their own devices; historically, a top 1 percent had gotten 86 percent of the Day,” I vehemently deny the claim, for- rary measures became permanent, inflexi- dangerous idea,” and “while the smart stock gains”; and New York City lost over warded from the Koch parks commis- ble policies applied to a place in constant money had been going to real estate, so 100,000 single-room-occupancy units at sioner Gordon Davis, that Urban Park flux.” A “proactive” police department that had the stupid money.” “Bruce Ratner be- roughly the same time New York State’s Rangers had to “help New Yorkers relearn he credits with helping crush crime has de- lieved he made money doing good — the psychiatric units dumped 50,000 inmates how to behave in the city at large.” The act- volved in many cases into what he calls story many in New York had been telling back on the streets. At the nadir of the ing out that Dyja and Davis refer to was racist “security guards and mercenaries” about themselves for a decade”; Richard crack epidemic, “some 150,000 New York- largely the doing of the young and the abusing their power. Runaway real estate Ravitch “had the burly sense of purpose ers were plying the drug trade,” and in 1990 crazy, and if the rest of us did not always speculation created a “Luxury City,” with found in fighting mammals of the Upper “2.28 million Black men were jailed in the interfere it was mostly because of a senti- more and more of it privatized by parks Midwest”; Jeff Van Gundy “led the Knicks U.S. while 23,000 earned a college degree.” mental attachment to things like our teeth. “conservancies” and business improve- to the N.B.A. finals with all the ugly luck of And that “by the end of 1983, New York’s But go have your own argument with ment districts, housing more and more un- finding a winning scratch-off on a bodega entire contribution to AIDS services and Dyja; you will enjoy it. In our current at- affordable, small businesses steamroll- floor”; Al Sharpton “on the face of it . . . had education totaled $24,500.” mosphere of political fanaticism and fan- ered by chains and mega-developments, a deathbed conversion, but really he’d just Dyja’s narrative starts with the decline tasy, his reasoning is a joy, as are his sense and the Upper East Side reduced to “a kind rebranded.” And “of all the things Abe of what he calls, with only faint irony, “The of nuance and his willingness to question of jewelry store now,” with “a third of the Beame can be blamed for, Donald J. Trump Workers’ Paradise,” the legendary work- his own assumptions. He elides what he apartments between 49th and 70th be- is by far the worst.” ing-class/middle-class city that emerged calls the “morality play” that has warped tween Fifth and Park . . . vacant 10 months “New York x 3” begins on Feb. 14, 1978, after World War II with a million manufac- most arguments about New York for the a year, owned by shell companies and designated “I Love New York Day” for the turing jobs and what was — for America — last 40 years, giving each mayor his due — L.L.C.s.” ubiquitous jingle introduced that after- an unrivaled social welfare state. But even and his skewering — with astonishing ob- The original sin was tying so much of noon, part of a last-ditch publicity cam- this fabled New York, as he notes, “existed jectivity, and each genuine reformer the New York’s fate to Wall Street, a depend- paign to revive a city that even those who during a period of exclusion” for most citi- benefit of the doubt. He looks at the city ence that has grown exponentially over loved it feared was dying. But New York zens who did not happen to be white, and from all points of view, from that of the the years, and that has set the city’s econ- wasn’t dying, and why it wasn’t — the crumbled under the batterings of deindus- poorest outsiders to the Masters of the omy on its seemingly endless roller coast- women and men, policies and plans, trends trialization, corruption, mismanagement Universe, and best of all he brings to life er ride. A trillion dollars “evaporated” after and revolutions in everything from music and the usual neglect from Washington the volunteers, everyday New Yorkers, the 1987 stock market crash, nearly $4 tril- to technology to public spaces to private and Albany. Its aura lingered on, though, who stepped forward to save their city lion after the 2000 slump. And at the same desires that transformed it — is Dyja’s complicating things for those trying to when it needed them most. time, like a bad dream, the city’s poverty story. What he has produced is a tour de forge a new city. (When a woman urged Ed What they accomplished was remark- levels have remained intractable, today force, a work of astonishing breadth and Koch to “make the city what it once was,” able, as Dyja recognizes, a New York that “around 20 percent, with another 20 per- depth that encompasses seminal changes the mayor told her with characteristic was and is — at least pre-Covid — wealthi- cent highly vulnerable” — or 3.4 million in New York’s government and economy, bluntness, “Lady, it was never that good.”) er, healthier, safer, greener, longer-lived people in all — and “almost 50,000 people along with deep dives into hip-hop, the What to do? Dyja frames the struggle as and more modern than it has ever been. sleeping on the streets any given night.” AIDS crisis, the visual arts, housing, archi- a fundamental shift in how New York oper- The city has absorbed an entire Philadel- “The result” — well before the pandemic tecture and finance. ated, “from mass society to networks,” phia’s worth of immigrants, from all over — “was a city flush with cash and full of It’s quite a high-wire act, and one that with “the collective world of unions, bor- the world, more than 1.5 million new Amer- poor people, diverse but deeply segre- Dyja, who has previously written a cultural ough machines, the archdiocese and even icans since 1978, two-thirds of whom live in gated, hopeful yet worryingly hollow un- history of Chicago, pulls off without ever the Mob” giving way “to one of individuals Brooklyn and Queens and have trans- derneath the shiny surface,” Dyja de- losing the rush of his narrative. He slips in who define themselves primarily by the formed those boroughs into the dynamic clares. telling statistics with the skill of a banderi- networks they belong to.” As he neatly puts places they are today. They are “half of the What is to be done? Dyja sees the need llero, using them always to secure a point it: “Information took over from Industry.” city’s accountants and nurses, 40 percent for another reinvention of New York, and move his story forward. Thus we learn I’m not sure this is as much of a change of its doctors, real estate brokers and prop- though he offers no easy answers — proba- that 60 percent of the African-American as Dyja believes it to be — but then, this is a erty managers.” Dyja celebrates how the bly because there are none. He can counsel population in Harlem left between 1950 good book to argue with. I, for one, don’t city has indeed managed to monetize its only that which has worked best, when it and 1980. That there were about 86 pub- think that Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s culture in a postindustrial world, between has been tried, which is selflessness, mod- lishing houses in New York at the start of “The Gates” did a thing for Central Park. I tourist sites, high art and hip-hop, “New eration, involvement, empathy, creativity; the 1980s and that “between 1979 and 1989, believe Dyja exaggerates wildly when he York’s most globally influential cultural in- “a New York built on a bedrock of justice, describes New Yorkers as so shellshocked vention.” not just noblesse oblige.” But he has al- KEVIN BAKER is the author, most recently, of by 1990 that they “turned their self-impris- And yet, for Dyja, New York has become ready, in this outstanding work, done all “The Fall of a Great American City: New York onment into a trend; they became couch in too many ways a victim of its own suc- that a historian can do to light the way for- and the Urban Crisis of Affluence.” potatoes.” And as someone who has lived cess, or “oversuccess,” as Jane Jacobs ward, by so vividly illuminating the past. 0

20 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 PHOTOGRAPHS, FROM LEFT: JIM ESTRIN/THE NEW YORK TIMES; MICHELLE AGINS/THE NEW YORK TIMES; CHESTER HIGGINS JR./THE NEW YORK TIMES; NEAL BOENZI/THE NEW YORK TIMES; STAR BLACK FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES Chemical Reaction The plastics and pesticides around us may be putting the future of our species at risk.

two decades. If these trajectories continue, By BIJAL P. TRIVEDI in vitro fertilization and other artificial re- productive technologies may become a IF YOU’VE SMUGLY enjoyed the dystopian widely needed tool for conceiving children. worlds of “The Handmaid’s Tale” (where Swan distills information harvested infertility is triggered in part by envi- from hundreds of published studies and ronmental pollutants) or “Children of while some ring familiar, the conclusion Men” (where humanity is on the precipice she reaches hits hard. These chemicals are of extinction) — and believed that these limiting the ability of current and future stories were rooted firmly in fantasy — generations to have children. They could, Shanna Swan’s “Count Down” will serve as ultimately, snuff out the human species al- an awakening. together. “Count Down,” which Swan wrote with This is why Swan was compelled to write the health and science journalist Stacey this book, one with apocalyptic implica- Colino, chronicles rising human infertility tions. Despite the publicity, these alarming and warns of dire consequences for our findings haven’t sparked changes in envi- species if this trend doesn’t slow. The rea- ronmental policies, regulations or public son, Swan explains, may be growing expo- demand for safe substitutes. sure to “endocrine disrupting chemicals” Her focus on male infertility marks an that are found in everything from plastics, overdue inflection point, with the medical community’s acceptance that the health of COUNT DOWN both sexes is equally important. When a How Our Modern World Is Altering Male couple can’t conceive or a woman miscar- and Female Reproductive Development, ries, she usually bears the blame. Swan Threatening Sperm Counts, and Imperiling dispels the myths surrounding reproduc- the Future of the Human Race tive failure. Yes, as women get older, their If these trajectories continue, Shanna H. Swan writes, in vitro fertilization and other artificial ability to get pregnant drops, but Swan re- By Shanna H. Swan with Stacey Colino reproductive technologies may become a widely needed tool for conceiving children. minds us that a man’s reproductive clock is 304 pp. Scribner. $28. also ticking as he ages. Abnormal sperm, increasingly common in men over 40, can also cause miscarriages. — and if he is later exposed to endocrine dis- cally United States federal policies that re- flame retardants, electronics, food packag- Teasing out the mechanisms behind ruptors, his sperm production may drop so quire companies to prove chemicals safe ing and pesticides to personal care prod- plummeting fertility rates is complicated. low that he becomes infertile. Swan de- before using them commercially. Euro- ucts and cosmetics. While man-made chemicals certainly play scribes the collateral damage caused by a peans favor this precautionary principle She outlines the danger. These sub- a role, Swan emphasizes that timing mat- combination of lifestyle factors — such as and are currently phasing out or banning stances interfere with normal hormonal ters, with different impacts for those ex- stress or bad diet — and daily exposure to the most dangerous chemicals. Swan un- function, including testosterone and estro- posed in utero, as newborns, adolescents toxic chemicals. The effects can radiate derscores how this contrasts with the gen. Even in small doses, they pose partic- or adults. She walks the reader through the down through several generations. American approach of “innocent until ular danger to unborn babies and young reproductive problems that result from Although most of Swan’s analyses focus proven guilty,” which then requires tax- children whose bodies are growing rapidly. contact with flame retardants, pesticides on Western countries, she has uncovered payer-funded government studies to in- These hormone-warping chemicals, which and what she calls “an alphabet soup” of similar trends in South America, Asia and vestigate health effects. can enter even the placenta, have the abil- chemicals. Africa. “Count Down” is an important book for ity to alter the anatomical development of For men, phthalates, found in many Swan offers a sense of relief in her wrap- anyone concerned about the environment, girls and boys, change brain function and products, from plastics to shampoos, are up, providing practical advice on steps that pollution, successful childbearing or de- impair the immune system. the worst offenders, tanking testosterone individuals can take to protect their health. clining health of the human species. Other Swan is a noted environmental and re- levels and sperm counts — and causing She goes beyond lifestyle recommenda- than the pervasive chemical names, it is productive epidemiologist who has studied sperm to basically commit suicide. In tions, outlining a far more difficult task: written in a casual, accessible style and this subject for more than two decades. women, these chemicals may cause early Purging harmful chemicals from our will be of practical relevance to couples Her work on falling sperm counts gar- menopause or cysts in the ovaries, or they homes by reading the ingredients on bath- and young adults who are considering hav- nered worldwide attention in 2017. Media may disrupt monthly cycles. room and kitchen cleaners. Choosing per- ing a family. coverage focused on her central finding: Bisphenol A, a ubiquitous chemical used sonal care products that are phthalate-free Fertility is already an issue for some From 1973 to 2011, the total sperm count of in hard plastics, electronics and millions of and paraben-free. Ditching air freshener who have children later in life, when the ef- men in Western countries dropped by 59 other items, affects both sexes but is par- and scented products. Not microwaving fects of these chemicals may be more pro- percent. The quality also nose-dived, with ticularly concerning for women. It inter- food in plastic, making sure to filter drink- nounced. Swan offers somewhat bracing more odd-shaped sperm and fewer strong feres with conception and causes miscar- ing water and toss out plastic food storage recommendations for women who choose swimmers capable of fertilizing an egg. riages early in pregnancy. containers and nonstick cookware. The to delay pregnancy: Freeze your eggs in Perhaps most important, the DNA they Swan broadens her argument by docu- suggestions go on. your 20s as an insurance policy. For men, carried was also more damaged. menting how these chemicals are jeopar- Swan does miss an opportunity to give investigating their sperm count early A study Swan cites in “Count Down” dizing the survival of many other crea- more attention to real-life stories. When might reveal infertility trends when they found that just over a quarter of men expe- tures. Genital abnormalities are of great she mentions individuals, their reproduc- are easier to correct. More broadly, this riencing erectile dysfunction were under concern: distinctly smaller penises in alli- tive problems are often described without book provides a wake-up call that in- 40. That may be, in part, because testoster- gators, panthers and mink, as well as fish, the history or context that strengthens a creases understanding of fertility, its chal- one levels have been dropping at 1 percent frogs, snapping turtles and birds that ap- narrative. There are times when a memo- lenges and the recognition that both part- per year since 1982. The outlook for women pear to have both male and female gonads, rable personal story might have sup- ners play a role. isn’t good either. The miscarriage rate has and mating difficulties in many species planted a rather detailed anatomical and But ultimately her conclusion is a plea risen by 1 percent per year over the last caused by altered behavior. chemical description. There are passages for swift national and global actions that Swan highlights another layer of risk. Par- that suffer from what Swan herself refers ban the use of these chemicals and miti- BIJAL P. TRIVEDI is the author of “Breath From ents’ exposure to these chemicals can affect to as “stat overload” or dozens of foreign- gate the effects of those that are impacting Salt: A Deadly Genetic Disease, a New Era in the sexual development of their children. If a sounding chemical names. health and even life itself worldwide. Swan Science, and the Patients and Families Who woman smokes when she is pregnant, her Over all, her conclusion is well sup- makes it clear that the future of many Changed Medicine Forever.” son’s sperm counts may drop by 40 percent ported: the need for regulation, specifi- species, including our own, depends on it. 0

PHOTOGRAPH BY IVAN COURONNE/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 21 Children’s Books / Graphic Books An Ounce of Prevention The history of vaccines, one crazy idea at a time.

using variolation (a method of inoculating Brown (an award-winning author and il- By LYDIA KANG smallpox-naïve patients with tiny doses of lustrator of many nonfiction graphic nov- smallpox through cuts in the skin) to save els for kids, including “Fever Year: The THE HISTORY OF VACCINES is a deserving lives in 18th-century Massachusetts, it was Killer Flu of 1918”) doesn’t shy away from addition to Don Brown’s Big Ideas That Onesimus, an enslaved man from Africa the uglier parts of vaccine history. We Changed the World graphic nonfiction se- (his home country is a matter of debate), learn about how smallpox-infected blan- ries, and the arrival of “A Shot in the Arm!” who enlightened Mather about the well- kets were weaponized against Native couldn’t be more timely. Narrated by Lady known process performed in his home vil- Americans, and about the (sometimes vio- Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762), this lage. Likewise, you may have heard about lent) conflicts surrounding vaccines. fascinating and enlightening journey takes the British physician Edward Jenner Brown appreciates that children can ab- scratching cowpox blister liquid into the sorb these complex issues. A SHOT IN THE ARM! arm of a little boy to prevent full-blown Many will be intrigued by the ingenious By Don Brown smallpox, but a dairy farmer named Ben- Chinese practice of inoculating people by 144 pp. Amulet. $13.99. jamin Jesty had successfully inoculated having them inhale smallpox virus, but Despite these missteps, the author’s (Ages 8 to 12) his own family with the liquid years earlier. this section gave me pause. Balancing en- goals are clear and vitally important, and Montagu — known within high society tertainment and gross-outs while effec- the delivery is lively and engaging. The for her beauty — herself suffered the dis- tively delivering a story is challenging in book ends, unsurprisingly, with Covid-19, us around the world and introduces us to a figurement of smallpox. Later, while living kidlit. In this case there are too many touching on the outbreak linked to a Wu- range of scientific superstars of germ the- in Turkey, she learned of inoculation to pro- “Ews” on the page, or perhaps not enough han market, which may be viewed differ- ory and vaccination development. tect her children, then spread the word elsewhere in the book. Given the othering ently as we learn more about its origins. Many lesser-known but key players are throughout Britain upon her return. of people of Asian and Pacific Islands de- Brown takes a firm and necessary stance rescued from obscurity here. Though Cot- One of the book’s shining moments is a scent throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, in support of the science behind vaccines. ton Mather received most of the credit for clever infographic depiction of how vac- it’s unfortunate. Additionally, supersti- But we can’t argue away anti-science sen- cines help antigens more efficiently fight tious practices, such as using red clothing timent around the world. Telling a story LYDIA KANG, an internal medicine physician certain pathogens. After personally ex- to ward off smallpox, are cited only in con- about the science, with all its positive and and young adult novelist, is co-author of the plaining the concept to countless patients, nection with non-Western countries, negative facets, all its known and rela- forthcoming “Patient Zero: A Curious History I am thrilled to see it presented in such a though it is documented that they occurred tively unknown heroes, is how the book of the World’s Worst Diseases.” simple, accurate and entertaining way. throughout Europe. persuades. Stories have power, too. 0

Sludge Report A budding journalist uncovers a Flint-like scandal in her own backyard.

nalist ambition to a new level, seeing mis- impostor syndrome, coaches her through By JULIE BOSMAN deeds and corruption around every corner an interview and shares basic rules of jour- in her town of Twin Oaks. During a fishing nalistic ethics. AS A NOSY KID in Wisconsin with endless excursion with a boy from school, she dis- But Ruth is also surrounded by grown- unstructured outdoor time, I occupied my- covers suspicious black slime in the lake ups who can be clueless, hostile or conde- self with the comings and goings of my by a country club, and a dead fish that scending. Corporate executives lie to her neighbors. A self-styled Harriet the Spy, I might have succumbed to whatever was in and a sexist country club owner calls her carried a notebook, filed dispatches for my it, setting her on the trail of local busi- “little lady.” (Note to aspiring journalists: homemade newspaper and proudly mailed nesses dumping polluted water in drains. Yes, this stuff still happens.) Ruth is armed with tools that would have Ruth frequently stumbles. She is im- THE LEAK put my circa-1991 self to shame: a cell- petuous and jumps to conclusions. During Written by Kate Reed Petty phone for snapping surreptitious photos, a her reporting, she doesn’t hesitate to vio- Illustrated by Andrea Bell computer for research, lab equipment for late the law — breaking and entering, run- 240 pp. First Second. $14.99. running tests and a weekly e-newsletter — of failing to brush her teeth. During the ning when she’s caught. Her desire to (Ages 8 to 12) with a subscriber base that skyrockets af- car ride home, her mother sides with the break stories leads to a difficult confronta- ter each investigation. dentist and reminds her that cavities are tion with a pack of girls at school. “The Leak” is a spirited story of civic re- expensive, leaving Ruth in a seething, The grown-ups do eventually come copies of it — The Bosman Bulletin, written sponsibility, of how to tell fake news from weeping state of misery. Over a family din- through, spurred by Ruth’s passion. She in navy ballpoint on loose-leaf paper — to the real thing, of when to trust adults and ner, her melancholy deepens when she’s finds an ally in her science teacher, who my older sister at sleepaway camp. when to publicly stick it to them. Dedicated scolded for interrupting the adults with has been told to rein in Ruth’s journalism Kids have seriously evolved since then. to the people of Flint, Mich., it might not headlines that pop up on her phone. but makes a quiet move that allows a cru- In the graphic novel “The Leak,” by Kate have been conceived if it hadn’t been for Journalism is her escape. Perhaps an- cial breakthrough in her investigation. Reed Petty and Andrea Bell, Ruth Keller, a that city’s water crisis, a cautionary tale of ticipating the Substack craze, she starts As one of the journalists who are still 12-year-old news junkie, takes tween-jour- the perils of trusting government to keep the CoolsLetter, a digest of her own investi- covering the Flint story, I know that when citizens safe from harm. gations, local crime items and op-eds. She you talk to Flint residents today they say JULIE BOSMAN is a Times national correspon- Ruth’s story begins to unfold while she is is encouraged by Sara, her older brother’s they still don’t trust the water that flows dent who has covered the water crisis in Flint, in the chair at the dentist, who spots a cav- girlfriend, who is an intern at The New from their taps. Ruth Keller would under- Mich. ity and accuses her — despite her denials York Times. Sara explains the concept of stand why. 0

22 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 For the complete best-seller lists, visit Best Sellers nytimes.com/books/best-sellers

COMBINED PRINT AND E-BOOK BEST SELLERS SALES PERIOD OF FEBRUARY 28-MARCH 6

THIS LAST WEEKS THIS LAST WEEKS WEEK WEEK Fiction ON LIST WEEK WEEK Nonfiction ON LIST 1 LIFE AFTER DEATH, by Sister Souljah. (Atria/Emily Bestler) In a sequel to “The Coldest 1 1 1 HOW TO AVOID A CLIMATE DISASTER, by Bill Gates. (Knopf) A prescription for what 3 Winter Ever,” Winter Santiaga emerges after time served and seeks revenge. business, governments and individuals can do to work toward zero emissions.

2 LATER, by Stephen King. (Hard Case Crime) An N.Y.P.D. detective asks the son of a 1 2 4 CASTE, by Isabel Wilkerson. (Random House) The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist 31 struggling single mother to use his unnatural ability to track a killer. examines aspects of caste systems across civilizations and reveals a rigid hierarchy in America today. 3 DARK SKY, by C. J. Box. (Putnam) The 21st book in the Joe Pickett series. The Wyoming 1 game warden becomes a target when taking a tech baron on an elk hunting trip. 3 2 THINK AGAIN, by Adam Grant. (Viking) An examination of the cognitive skills of rethinking 5 and unlearning that could be used to adapt to a rapidly changing world. 4 1 THE FOUR WINDS, by Kristin Hannah. (St. Martin’s) As dust storms roll during the Great 5 Depression, Elsa must choose between saving the family and farm or heading West. 4 9 UNTAMED, by Glennon Doyle. (Dial) The activist and public speaker describes her journey 52 of listening to her inner voice. 5 THE AFFAIR, by Danielle Steel. (Delacorte) A French author’s extramarital relationship 1 affects various members of his wife’s family. 5 6 JUST AS I AM, by Cicely Tyson with Michelle Burford. (HarperCollins) The late iconic 6 actress describes how she worked to change perceptions of Black women through her career choices. 6 KLARA AND THE SUN, by Kazuo Ishiguro. (Knopf) An “Artificial Friend” named Klara is 1 purchased to serve as a companion to an ailing 14-year-old girl. 6 3 GREENLIGHTS, by Matthew McConaughey. (Crown) The Academy Award-winning actor 20 shares snippets from the diaries he kept over the last 35 years. 7 THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD, by Colson Whitehead. (Doubleday) A teenage girl heads 17 north on the network that helped slaves escape to freedom, envisioned in this novel as a secret system of actual tracks and tunnels. 7 7 THE SUM OF US, by Heather McGhee. (One World) The chair of the board of the racial 3 justice organization Color of Change analyzes the impact of racism on the economy. 8 6 THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY, by Matt Haig. (Viking) Nora Seed finds a library beyond the 14 edge of the universe that contains books with multiple possibilities of the lives one could 8 8 A PROMISED LAND, by Barack Obama. (Crown) In the first volume of his presidential 16 have lived. memoirs, Barack Obama offers personal reflections on his formative years and pivotal moments through his first term. 9 5 THE DUKE AND I, by Julia Quinn. (Avon) Daphne Bridgerton’s reputation soars when she 10 colludes with the Duke of Hastings. The basis of the Netflix series “Bridgerton.” 9 10 NOMADLAND, by Jessica Bruder. (Norton) A look at an expanding low-cost labor pool, 2 which largely consists of transient older adults, and what this might portend. 10 LIGHTNING GAME, by Christine Feehan. (Berkley) The 17th book in the GhostWalker 1 series. Rubin returns to his family’s homestead and Jonquille cannot control the lightning 10 5 WALK IN MY COMBAT BOOTS, by James Patterson and Matt Eversmann with Chris 4 her body produces. Mooney. (Little, Brown) A collection of interviews with troops who fought overseas. 22 The New York Times best sellers are compiled and archived by the best-sellers-lists desk of the New York Times news department, and are separate from the editorial, culture, advertising and business sides of The New York Times Company. Rankings reflect unit sales reported on a confidential basis by vendors offering a wide range of general interest titles published in the United States. ONLINE: For complete lists and a full explanation of our methodology, visit www.nytimes.com/books/best-sellers.

Editors’ Choice / Staff Picks From the Book Review

HOW BEAUTIFUL WE WERE, by Imbolo Mbue. (Random UNDER A WHITE SKY: The Nature of the Future, by THE DEVIL YOU KNOW: A Black Power Manifesto, by House, $28.) Mbue’s quietly devastating second Elizabeth Kolbert. (Crown, $28.) A fascinating survey Charles M. Blow. (Harper/Harper Collins, $26.99.) novel — about a fictional African village with high of attempts to manage the environment, from pre- Blow makes the provocative argument that Black mortality due to an American oil company’s pollu- serving tiny populations of desert fish to altering Northerners should move south in a reverse migra- tion — charts the ways oppression, be it at the the entire atmosphere, this book crackles with the tion as a way of fighting white supremacy and hands of a government or a corporation or a society, realities of an era that has proved there is no mean- increasing their political power. can turn the most basic needs into radical acts. ingful distinction between nature and humanity. ANIMAL, VEGETABLE, JUNK: A History of Food, From BROTHER, SISTER, MOTHER, EXPLORER, by Jamie FOUR LOST CITIES: A Secret History of the Urban Sustainable to Suicidal, by Mark Bittman. (Houghton Figueroa. (Catapult, $25.) Figueroa’s debut novel Age, by Annalee Newitz. (Norton, $26.95.) Like a Mifflin Harcourt, $28.) Bittman’s treatise on agricul- follows adult siblings in an unnamed Spanish- guide to vanished places, this book offers archaeo- ture is urgent but realistic about the challenges speaking country, who perform for tourists to make logical clues to our urban roots, from the little- facing us. “You can’t talk about food,” he writes, a living. It shows how these picturesque people in known Catalhoyuk (a 9,000-year-old city located in “without talking about income inequality, racism “exotic” lands have lives as complex as anyone’s, today’s Turkey) to the famed Pompeii, with its and immigration.” with fewer resources to help them cope. exquisitely preserved brothels and bars and graffiti. TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE: A Murder, a Private Inves- NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT THIS, by Patricia Lockwood. THE BONE FIRE, by Gyorgy Dragoman. Translated by tigator, and Her Search for Justice, by Ellen McGar- (Riverhead, $25.) This singular novel by Lockwood, a Ottilie Mulzet. (Mariner, paper, $16.99.) Set in the rahan. (Random House, $28.) In 1990, as a reporter, lauded memoirist and poet who first gained a follow- aftermath of a revolution, this Hungarian novel McGarrahan attended the execution of a convicted ing on Twitter, distills the experience of life online considers how superstitions rise in times of turmoil. murderer. But questions about the crime inspired while transfiguring it into art. The result is a book On one level, it’s a coming-of-age story about a her to switch careers and take a closer look. that reads like a prose poem, at once sublime, pro- 13-year-old orphan and her eccentric grandmother fane, intimate, philosophical, witty and, eventually, navigating personal and political crises; on another, The full reviews of these and other recent books deeply moving. it’s a tale of ghosts, folklore and ancient memory. are online: nytimes.com/books

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 23 Inside the List PRINT | HARDCOVER BEST SELLERS SALES PERIOD OF FEBRUARY 28-MARCH 6 ELISABETH EGAN

...... THIS LAST WEEKS THIS LAST WEEKS WEEK WEEK Fiction ON LIST WEEK WEEK Nonfiction ON LIST

Road Warrior In the month since the 1 1 3 1 LIFE AFTER DEATH, by Sister Souljah. (Atria/Emily Bestler) 1 HOW TO AVOID A CLIMATE DISASTER, by Bill Gates. publication of her memoir, “Between In a sequel to “The Coldest Winter Ever,” Winter Santiaga (Knopf) A prescription for what business, governments and Two Kingdoms,” which just spent three emerges after time served and seeks revenge. individuals can do to work toward zero emissions. weeks on the hardcover nonfiction list, Suleika Jaoaud has heard from a num- 2 1 THE FOUR WINDS, by Kristin Hannah. (St. Martin’s) As dust 5 2 2 JUST AS I AM, by Cicely Tyson with Michelle Burford. 6 ber of individuals she storms roll during the Great Depression, Elsa must choose (HarperCollins) The late iconic actress describes how she didn’t expect to be in between saving the family and farm or heading West. worked to change perceptions of Black women through her touch with — includ- career choices. ing her fourth grade 3 KLARA AND THE SUN, by Kazuo Ishiguro. (Knopf) An 1 teacher; a California “Artificial Friend” named Klara is purchased to serve as a 3 6 CASTE, by Isabel Wilkerson. (Random House) The Pulitzer 31 oncologist who was a companion to an ailing 14-year-old girl. Prize-winning journalist examines aspects of caste systems fellow at Mount Sinai across civilizations and reveals a rigid hierarchy in America today. Hospital in New York 4 DARK SKY, by C. J. Box. (Putnam) The 21st book in the Joe 1 ‘I’m always City when Jaoaud was Pickett series. The Wyoming game warden becomes a target interested in diagnosed with when taking a tech baron on an elk hunting trip. 4 3 THINK AGAIN, by Adam Grant. (Viking) An examination of 5 traveling to leukemia at the age of the cognitive skills of rethinking and unlearning that could be used to adapt to a rapidly changing world. where the 22; and a lawyer offer- 5 THE AFFAIR, by Danielle Steel. (Delacorte) A French 1 silence is.’ ing counsel to a Texas author’s extramarital relationship affects various members of prisoner Jaouad writes his wife’s family. 5 9 UNTAMED, by Glennon Doyle. (Dial) The activist and 52 about in the book. public speaker describes her journey of listening to her inner voice. These readers have been moved by 6 3 THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY, by Matt Haig. (Viking) Nora Seed 14 Jaouad’s story of surviving cancer and finds a library beyond the edge of the universe that contains then taking a 15,000-mile road trip to books with multiple possibilities of the lives one could have 6 4 GREENLIGHTS, by Matthew McConaughey. (Crown) The 20 visit people — many of them strangers lived. Academy Award-winning actor shares snippets from the — who responded to the New York diaries he kept over the last 35 years. Times blog where she chronicled her 7 THE LOST APOTHECARY, by Sarah Penner. (Park Row) An 1 experience as a young adult facing her aspiring historian in London finds a clue that might put to 7 7 A PROMISED LAND, by Barack Obama. (Crown) In the first 16 own mortality. By now, we all know it rest unsolved apothecary murders from 200 years ago. volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama offers takes a village (albeit a socially dis- personal reflections on his formative years and pivotal moments through his first term. tanced one) to endure illness, isolation 8 5 THE VANISHING HALF, by Brit Bennett. (Riverhead) The 40 and fear. “Between Two Kingdoms” lives of twin sisters who run away from a Southern Black drives home the fact that, where cancer community at age 16 diverge as one returns and the other 8 5 WALK IN MY COMBAT BOOTS, by James Patterson and Matt 4 is concerned, it takes an empire. takes on a different racial identity but their fates intertwine. Eversmann with Chris Mooney. (Little, Brown) A collection of interviews with troops who fought overseas. The idea for the road trip and the memoir arrived when Jaouad found INFINITE COUNTRY, by Patricia Engel. (Avid Reader/Simon 1 9 8 3 herself at a crossroads. “I felt like I & Schuster) A kaleidoscopic story of a family occupying two 9 THE SUM OF US, by Heather McGhee. (One World) The should be living some version of the different countries, Colombia and the United States. chair of the board of the racial justice organization Color of Change analyzes the impact of racism on the economy. heroic journey I’d been bombarded with,” she said in a phone interview. 2 A COURT OF SILVER FLAMES, by Sarah J. Maas. 3 10 1 “But I didn’t feel excited; I didn’t feel (Bloomsbury) The fifth book in A Court of Thorns and Roses 10 HUNT, GATHER, PARENT, by Michaeleen Doucleff. (Avid Reader/Simon & Schuster) A look at different approaches to done. There was this strange omertà of series. Nesta Archeron is forced into close quarters with a warrior named Cassian. rearing children from various parts of the planet. silence that seemed to enshroud sur- vivorship. I’m always interested in trav- An asterisk (*) indicates that a book’s sales are barely distinguishable from those of the book above. A dagger (†) indicates that some bookstores report receiving bulk orders. eling to where the silence is, so once I detected it, I knew that would be some- thing that I wanted to interrogate.” Jaoaud’s nearest and dearest under- Paperback Row / BY JENNIFER KRAUSS stood that there was no talking her out of her journey once her mind was made up, although some worried about her THE ILLNESS LESSON, by Clare MINOR FEELINGS: An Asian Ameri- BUBBLEGUM, by Adam Levin. (An- safety since she’d only had her driver’s Beams. (Anchor, 288 pp., $16.) It’s can Reckoning, by Cathy Park Hong. chor, 784 pp., $18.) “For comedy, (One World, 224 pp., $18.) A Na- for sensibility, for style,” our re- license for a month. She recalled visiting 1871 in small-town Massachusetts. tional Book Critics Circle Award viewer, Garth Risk Hallberg, wrote, her parents in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., Eight female students at odds with the male founder of a girls school finalist, this collection of essays, this “ruminative tromp” through a about a week into the expedition: “My fall mysteriously ill, but are told full of “candor and dark humor shot few days in the life of Belt Magnet, dad explained to me how, if you lean they are not ill. “Then there is that through with glittering self-aware- “a novelist-cum-memoirist-cum- forward and look in the mirror, you can flock of ‘disastrous-bright’ red birds ness,” in the words of the Times unemployed schlub,” and his rela- notice your blind spots.” that shows up, inexplicably, one critic Jennifer Szalai, explores tionship with Keblankey, a “velvety Along the way, Jaouad had books for day, injecting an element of Hitch- feelings that are “ambient and soft, forearm-length ‘flesh-and- company. She turned to Stephen King cockian surrealism” into this “sly,” chronic” — or, as its Korean-Ameri- bone robot that thinks it’s your novels and true-crime accounts for “astoundingly original” debut novel can poet-author puts it, built from friend®,’” is “prodigiously sustain- that, according to our reviewer, the “sediments” of “everyday racial ing,” not to mention “admirably guidance on narrative suspense; she experience.” bonkers and fitfully phenomenal.” devoured Audre Lorde’s “The Cancer Siobhan Jones, “belongs on the shelf with your Margaret Atwood Journals” and John Green’s “The Fault and Octavia Butler collections.” TOPICS OF CONVERSATION, by DOMINION: How the Christian in Our Stars,” which she called “no small Miranda Popkey. (Vintage, 224 pp., Revolution Remade the World, by gift.” But her true “sick girl bible,” as she THEN THE FISH SWALLOWED HIM, by $15.) This novel in 10 conversa- Tom Holland. (Basic, 640 pp., put it, was Lucy Grealy’s “Autobiogra- Amir Ahmadi Arian. (HarperVia, 288 tions highlights “inflection points” $18.99.) This “galloping tour of phy of a Face.” Jaouad said, “She’s one of pp., $16.99.) A lonely bus driver in the narrator’s life, from which Christianity’s influence across the the few who writes about the aftermath named Yunus (after the prophet she hopes to “excavate some sort last 2,000 years,” as the Times of trauma and the imprints of her own Jonah, who is swallowed by a big of arc,” a “scaffolding” for her own Op-Ed columnist Ross Douthat cancer that haunted her long after it was fish) becomes the scapegoat for “pulsing interior dialogue.” Our described it, concludes that the violence at a union strike in this reviewer, Antonia Hitchens, de- Christian faith “still shapes the way gone.” 0 novel of entrapment and torture at clared Popkey good company. “I even the most secular modern Iran’s notorious Evin Prison. liked being inside her mind.” people think about the world.”

24 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 MONTHLY BEST SELLERS SALES PERIOD OF JANUARY 31-FEBRUARY 27

THIS MONTHS THIS MONTHS “Yankee history is rich and deep, with MONTH Graphic Books and Manga ON LIST MONTH Mass Market ON LIST players so iconic their first 1 CAT KID COMIC CLUB, by Dav Pilkey. (Scholastic) 3 1 THE VISCOUNT WHO LOVED ME, by Julia Quinn. 2 Stories within a story come to life as Li’l Petey, (Avon) The second book in the Bridgerton series. or last name, or their nickname, Flippy and Molly show baby frogs how to create comics. THE DUKE AND I, by Julia Quinn. (Avon) Daphne 3 2 Bridgerton’s reputation soars when she colludes is identification enough.” CLAUDIA AND THE NEW GIRL, by Ann M. Martin. 1 with the Duke of Hastings. The basis of the Netflix 2 Illustrated by Gabriela Epstein. (Scholastic) The series “Bridgerton.” ninth book in the Baby-sitters Club series. Claudia – ALEC BALDWIN, from the introduction must choose between spending time with the very THE NUMBERS GAME, by Danielle Steel. (Dell) An 1 artistic Ashley or the Baby-sitters Club. 3 affair wrecks a marriage and a daughter seeks to get out from her family’s shadow while old dreams GRIME AND PUNISHMENT, by Dav Pilkey. 1 and new love are pursued. 3 (Scholastic) The ninth book in the Dog Man series. After turning in his badge, the canine cop is RECKLESS ROAD, by Christine Feehan. (Berkley) 1 determined not to just roll over. 4 The fifth book in the Torpedo Ink series. One of the motorcycle club’s members needs a second chance IN LOVE & PAJAMAS, by Catana Chetwynd. 1 after thinking an intimate encounter was just a 4 (Andrews McMeel) Humorous and authentic dream. moments within intimate relationships. AN OFFER FROM A GENTLEMAN, by Julia Quinn. 1 THE DARK SECRET, by Tui T. Sutherland. Illustrated 1 5 (Avon) The third book in the Bridgerton series. 5 by Mike Holmes. (Scholastic) The fourth book in the Wings of Fire series. Starflight discovers NightWings REVENGE, by James Patterson and Andrew 1 have imprisoned several innocent RainWings. 6 Holmes. (Grand Central) A former member of the British Special Air Service looks into the death of a FETCH-22, by Dav Pilkey. (Scholastic) The eighth 1 young woman in London at her parents’ urging. 6 book in the Dog Man series. Li’l Petey struggles to find good in the world. A MINUTE TO MIDNIGHT, by David Baldacci. (Grand 2 7 Central) When Atlee Pine returns to her hometown NEW KID, by Jerry Craft. (HarperCollins) Jordan 16 to investigate her sister’s kidnapping from 30 years 7 Banks, an artistically inclined seventh grader from ago, she winds up tracking a potential serial killer. Washington Heights, has a tough time navigating an upscale private school where diversity is low. THE LOST AND FOUND BOOKSHOP, by Susan 2 8 Wiggs. (Avon) Natalie Harper takes over the care of FOR WHOM THE BALL ROLLS, by Dav Pilkey. 1 her mother’s bookshop and her ailing grandfather. 8 (Scholastic) The seventh book in the Dog Man series. A new villain has a bone to pick with Dog ROMANCING MISTER BRIDGERTON, by Julia 1 Man while Petey the Cat starts a new life. 9 Quinn. (Avon) The fourth book in the Bridgerton series. BRAWL OF THE WILD, by Dav Pilkey. (Scholastic) 1 9 The sixth book in the Dog Man series. When he is TO SIR PHILLIP, WITH LOVE, by Julia Quinn. 1 wrongly sent to the pound, Dog Man’s friends try to 10 (Avon) The fifth book in the Bridgerton series. prove his innocence. Eloise Bridgerton confounds a brutish gentleman’s expectations. MY HERO ACADEMIA, VOL. 1, by Kohei Horikoshi. 14 10 (VIZ Media) Will Izuku Midoriya’s chance encounter LONG RANGE, by C. J. Box. (Putnam) The 20th 1 with a superhero change his fate? Most likely! 11 book in the Joe Pickett series. A grizzly bear attack and an attempted assassination of a local judge THE TWISTED ONES, by Scott Cawthon and Kira 1 baffle the Wyoming game warden. 11 Breed-Wrisley. (Scholastic) The second book in NOW the Five Nights at Freddy’s series. When bodies are HIGHLAND TREASURE, by Lynsay Sands. (Avon) 1 UPDATED! found near her school, Charlie is drawn back into 12 The ninth book in the Highland Brides series. After the world of her father’s creations. escaping an English dungeon, Lady Elysande de Valance is escorted to the Highlands by the rugged LORD OF THE FLEAS, by Dav Pilkey. (Scholastic) 1 Rory Buchanan. 12 The fifth book in the Dog Man series. The villainous cat Petey becomes an unlikely ally. THE SEA GLASS COTTAGE, by RaeAnne Thayne. 1 13 (HQN) When her estranged mother becomes LOGAN LIKES MARY ANNE!, by Ann M. Martin. 1 injured, Olivia Harper returns with her daughter to 13 Illustrated by Gale Galligan. (Scholastic) The eighth Cape Sanctuary and their secrets come to light. book in the Baby-sitters Club series. SHADOWS IN DEATH, by J. D. Robb. (St. Martin’s) 2 GINA — THE GIRL WHO BROKE THE WORLD, by 1 14 The 51st book of the In Death series. A hitman with 14 Judd Winick. (Random House) The seventh book possible connections to Eve Dallas’s husband is in the Hilo series. Can Gina, DJ and Hilo protect seen near the scene of a crime. magical beings in jeopardy? WHEN HE WAS WICKED, by Julia Quinn. (Avon) 1 THE PROMISED NEVERLAND, VOL. 1, by Kaiu 1 15 The sixth book in the Bridgerton series. Will things 15 Shirai. Illustrated by Posuka Demizu. (VIZ Media) between Francesca Bridgerton and Michael Stirling More than 350 articles, profiles and essays, Kids at the Grace Field House orphanage learn the grow into something more or will she marry his dark truth of the outside world. cousin? and over 200 vintage and current photographs, Sales are defined as completed transactions between vendors and individual end users during the period on or after the official publication date of a title. that capture every era of the most storied franchise Graphic book rankings include all print and digital formats. Adult, children’s, young adult, fiction and nonfiction graphic books are eligible for inclusion on the graphic books and manga list. ONLINE: For complete lists and a full explanation of our methodology, visit www.nytimes.com/books/best-sellers. in baseball history.

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THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 25 The Shortlist / Memoirs / By CJ Hauser

WHAT DOESN’T KILL YOU PEDRO’S THEORY FEATHERHOOD A Life with Chronic Illness — Lessons From a Body in Reimagining the Promised Land A Memoir of Two Fathers and a Magpie Revolt By Marcos Gonsalez By Charlie Gilmour By Tessa Miller 291 pp. Melville House. $26.99. 295 pp. Scribner. $27. 303 pp. Holt. $26.99. With “Pedro’s Theory,” Gonsalez has created “Featherhood” is the story of a magpie Miller’s memoir, about chronic illness and a memoir that is at once a collection of es- named Benzene, whom Gilmour and his wife the intersection of mental and physical says about his life and also a kaleidoscopic (the set designer Janina Pedan, whom he health, should be read by anyone with a investigation of the things America has tried calls Yana) adopt and raise in their London body. to promise him. flat, a tale that is woven together with the “What Doesn’t Kill You” is the story of In his book, Gonsalez writes about the story of Gilmour’s biological father, the poet Miller’s fight for competent and compassion- Americas, about race, about queerness, Heathcote Williams, and Gilmour’s own ate care after she was diagnosed with in- about passing, about colonialism, about bodies, about evolving thoughts on fatherhood as he and Pedan plan to flammatory bowel disease. Though this is Miller’s first pride and about shame. Gonsalez is a well-published have a child. book, she has already made a name for herself as a essayist and a scholar, and in “Pedro’s Theory,” he is As animal stories go, “Featherhood” is mercifully free health and science journalist. Now, in her memoir, she writing against projections of Latino identity that exist of schmaltz — Gilmour respects the wildness and ab- writes explicitly for fellow chronically ill people, with elsewhere as much as he is writing toward himself. Of surdity of Benzene’s birdness and has a knack for ele- chapters divided by topic, an index for practical use and his childhood neighborhood, he writes: “I live for nearly gant, visceral imagery. For instance, he details how, in an instructions throughout to advise readers. If the book at twenty years in this place constructed by the white early moment of caretaking, Pedan crushes grub heads times feels as if its primary function is dispensing infor- imagination. And through this white imagining is how I with pliers to feed the magpie. mation rather than storytelling, that’s because informed conceive an image of myself and my family for the dec- He is similarly vivid when writing about emotional care for our bodies is the story Miller is telling. ades to come.” connections. His parentlike care of Benzene stirs up Throughout “What Doesn’t Kill You,” Miller’s training The memoir is thrilling because it engages the reader questions about why Williams abandoned him as a baby, as a journalist shines. She writes with precision, convic- in the active process of exploring, seeking and discover- as well as fears about his own potential fatherhood. tion, respect and thoughtfulness about pain as well as ing how we “compose a life.” Perhaps the best term for Gilmour’s chronic sense of loss is palpable in the pas- the disparate, and at times unjust, experiences that Gonsalez’s book is the one he borrows from Audre sages about Williams’s absence, but when the writing people face when navigating the American health care Lorde: “biomythography,” a combination of autobiogra- turns to his present, multigenerational, blended family, system. But her storytelling is also shaped by her per- phy, history and myth. bird included, the scenes are lush with the warmth and sonal experience — she writes with the frankness and These pages are full of pathos — the details of his life comfort of everyday living. intimate knowledge of someone living with chronic ill- Gonsalez chooses to hold up always have ballast to In the book’s most striking anecdote about fatherhood, ness. (I, for one, am charmed by Miller’s fondness for them, because, as he makes us aware, everything he Gilmour dissects a tale Williams told him about a Turk- the term “butthole,” which she uses often enough in her conjures comes at the expense of something else elided ish barber who Williams was convinced would slit his early pages to establish a winning authorial tone.) or forgotten. throat to steal his wallet midshave, and the sleight-of- Stylistically, the experience of reading “What Doesn’t To quibble, the memoir’s masterly structure speaks so hand trick Williams performed to delight and distract Kill You” can feel a bit whiplashy. Lyrical lines like “I clearly for itself that readers may grow impatient when the barber from this (dubious) murderous intent. Of the created my own little spinning planet to mourn in” sit Gonsalez spends time pointing out the form of the book, story, Gilmour writes: “I’ve wondered if he was uncon- alongside chapters with titles like “The Most Important like someone trying to sell you a house you’re already sciously confessing something about his approach to- Poop of Your Life,” which sit alongside cries for health quite happily inhabiting. But Gonsalez writes with an ward me that day: that he dreaded being made to open care reform. And yet, Miller’s book insists on being all appealingly telescoping range. His attention lights upon up, to spill, and was using magic like a matador uses his things at once because, Miller argues, to understand granular topics — a childhood photo in one moment, cape, to distract and misdirect, to remain untouched.” chronic illness one needs the scientific and the personal “Napoleon Dynamite” in another — as well as larger Gilmour, on the other hand, is fearless in sharing himself and the political. ideas like the effects of colonization and, in some of the with readers. As he works through his relationships, the “What Doesn’t Kill You” is relentlessly researched and most excellent writing in the book, a history of burlap. emotional freight is not always subtle, but this comes from undeniably smart, but more than that, it is humane and Because how else to tell the story of a life these days a generosity and openness on his part, which, ultimately, is offers reliable information to chronically ill people and but to run the gamut from the individual to the commu- what makes “Featherhood” so lovely and inviting. Gilmour their allies. nal to the systemic to the cosmic? Gonsalez’s storytell- practices no magic here; he distracts the reader with no ing feels honest for its expansiveness, and he manages glitzy baubles. He gives us a man and a bird and tells us, this without ever sacrificing the intimacy of his strong, best he can, what they’ve come to know about the world as personal voice. it is. He is willing to spill a little blood.

CJ HAUSER is the author of “Family of Origin,” a novel, and a forthcoming book of nonfiction, “The Crane Wife & Other Essays.” She teaches creative writing and literature at Colgate University.

26 SUNDAY, MARCH 21, 2021 ILLUSTRATION BY JOHN GALL Sketchbook / By Grant Snider

GRANT SNIDER is a cartoonist, author and illustrator. His most recent book is “I Will Judge You by Your Bookshelf.”

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 27