May 24, 2025
Two fierce short-story collections this week spotlight women who explore contemporary American culture; two novels examine privilege and the behavior it induces in both women and men; a prize-winning Frenchman brings us two strands of a novel investigating the effects of war and violence; and a darkly comic novel features a clueless-but-confident young man preying upon NYC’s upper classes. Expect outrageous behavior and psychologically probing narratives—and enjoy your holiday weekend!
Happy reading,
Melanie Fleishman
Buyer, The Center for Fiction Bookstore
Featured Books
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The Bombshell
By DARROW FARR
Published by PAMELA DORMAN BOOKS
A wealthy family’s daughter is kidnapped by a Corsican political terrorist group advocating independence. Severine (not yet 20) is fascinated by the group, especially Bruno, to whom she is physically drawn. (Patty Hearst redux?) Severine’s dreams of becoming a successful actress inform her confidence to join their cause. Is she just a pretty, spoiled, narcissist enthralled by the spotlight as she becomes the ‘face’ of the group? Or does she really embrace the movement? The author gives us much evidence of both—creating a compelling story that takes us behind the scenes of her characters’ motivations, strengths, and weaknesses, while throwing in a fair amount of sex along the way.
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Sympathy for Wild Girls
By DEMREE McGHEE
Published by THE FEMINIST PRESS AT CUNY
The characters in McGhee’s first published collection are consistently surprising and provocative. She presents young, queer Black women looking for a comfortable place in an often-unwelcoming environment. In the title story, 13-year-old Daisy’s mother recounts gruesome stories of murdered girls, which make her feel like “fat, bright bait pierced against a hook.” She becomes paranoid and flees her house in the middle of the night to lie in the grass among the beautiful, hungry coyotes. In “Scratching,” a nurse at an underfunded school becomes attached to a student with the “tragically geriatric” name of Gertie, who is into animal dismemberment. Don’t be put off by the subject matter, this is tremendous writing.
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The Deserters
By MATHIAS ÉNARD
Published by NEW DIRECTIONS
Translated by Charlotte Mandell
This is arresting post-apocalyptic fiction from a Goncourt Prize-winning writer. Énard is a French-born, globe-trotting author whose books are a welcome intellectual challenge, always imparting something important for the reader. His latest looks at the aftermath of war through stories of survivors in parallel narratives—one taking place on September 11, 2001 aboard a cruise ship hosting a conference in honor of a mathematician who survived Buchenwald, the other following a soldier fleeing an unnamed war. Persian mysticism, the Holocaust, and the Twin Towers place the characters’ search for meaning in the context of catastrophic world events. In spare, luminous prose he tackles life’s big questions.
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Are You Happy?
By LORI OSTLUND
Published by ASTRA HOUSE
Ostlund’s deeply imagined characters seek their versions of happiness, enlivening these nine pieces that feel much richer than brief slices of life. The title story was included in 2024’s Best American Short Stories anthology. In “The Bus Driver,” two Minnesota schoolgirls become “unlikely” friends, and when our narrator Clare goes off to college to escape her claustrophobic upbringing, Jane, whose father drives the school bus, begins working in a local chicken factory. Their childhood experiences haunt Clare as she recalls the fate-sealing affair Jane had with their creepy married basketball coach. These stories, filled with glimpses of small-town life and loss, are wise, witty, and wonderful.
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The Stalker
By PAULA BOMER
Published by SOHO PRESS
Over ten years ago, Bomer remarked in an interview: “I think I’m trying to offend some people. I think I’m trying to push some buttons.” She continues to do this rather brilliantly in her new novel. Like her own version of American Psycho leavened by an element of dark comedy, an unlikable protagonist exhibits shocking obsessive behavior. Due to a privileged childhood in Connecticut, Doughty assumes his cossetted background will afford him a smooth transition into ’90s NYC. He embarks on a series of drug-filled sexual predations, especially targeting two very different women, with the hubris of an unexamined life. Doughty is an audacious character, and The Stalker is a brave, page-turning read.
