Working at Reading!

It's fall and that means that work begins on top ten lists all over the publishing world. Library Journal is no exception. I so look forward to the December issue to see what books knocked reviewers out this year in all my favorite genres but I work in literary fiction and this year there are many outstanding novels to consider, not to mention the extraordinary number of debut novelists whose names we'd like to get out in front of the reading public.


This is all an excuse to explain why I may be absent for a little while as I read madly, deeply, writers from all over the globe and writers from right here at home that will sound very familiar to you, authors like James McBride, Louise Erdrich, or Marilynne Robinson.


Several of the books in contention I've already reviewed. A couple of standouts you may want to be watching for are Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi's "A Girl is a Body of Water." The title alone is enough to draw you in. 

Set in 1970s Uganda, this bewitching coming-of-age novel introduces readers to a smart, feisty heroine, Kirabo Nnamiiro, and her complicated extended family. Though deeply loved by the grandparents who are raising her, Kirabo yearns for knowledge of the woman who abandoned her at birth. She consults Nsuuta, the village seer, who recognizes in Kirabo evidence of the local myth of the first women; fiercely independent, changeable, and powerful, like the water from which they came. An exceptional student, Kirabo moves to Kampala, where her father has agreed to finance her education. It is here, as an observer of her unhappy, powerless stepmother and under the influence of her self-sufficient, modern aunt Abi, that Kirabo will learn to unravel the complexity of her lineage and to navigate the rapidly changing world for women in a modern Uganda. Though the novel is rife with the everyday fact of disappointment and loss, the overall atmosphere is one of joyous, feminist abandon. VERDICT A recipient of the Windham-Campbell Prize for Fiction and the Kwani Manuscript Project for her first novel, Kintu, UK-based Makumbi is a mesmerizing storyteller, slowly pulling readers in with a captivating cast of multifaceted characters and a soupçon of magical realism guaranteed to appeal to fans of Isabel Allende, Julia Alvarez, or Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing.


Another that actually hurt to read it was so spot on was "Like a Bird" by Fariha Roisin.

DEBUT In her extraordinary first novel, Róisín exposes the damaging effects of colorism through the Chatterjee family, who unconsciously pit their golden child, light-skinned, confident Alyssa, against Taylia, dark and brooding like her immigrant father and an unwelcome reminder of his roots in Calcutta. Crippled by low self-esteem and a poor body image, Taylia withdraws into her studies, hiding behind baggy, gender-neutral clothing, while her sister flaunts her sexuality and flouts her father's strict moral code. After Alyssa's shocking death, Taylia yearns finally to be seen by her grieving family, but rather than support her in the aftermath of a horrific rape at the hands of a trusted family friend, they exile her from their Upper West Side home. Róisín is masterly in her visceral representation of Taylia's despair and rage, her depression and self-loathing, and her inability to be open to even small acts of kindness. Yet as weeks of her wandering in the city unfold, readers sense Taylia's innate strength, a survival instinct at her core that enables her to find work in a bakery and a friend in Kat, its owner. VERDICT In lustrous, lyrical language, multifaceted artist Róisín has written an ode to the joy and healing power of self-love. This powerful novel is highly recommended


Both of these  novels will be out this month and if this is really the year of the woman then these two books should be on your list. They soar with tough, resilient, funny young women that you'll enjoy getting to know. These writers may not be household names right now but they are going places. Trust me.