Enjoy the dog days of summer with seven new books from NER contributors! This roundup includes a new essay collection by a National Book Award finalist and former NER intern, a fresh translation of a Russian classic, two vibrant story collections set in the American South, and much more. Browse and shop these and other titles by NER authors on our Bookshop.org page.
So to Speak, MacArthur Fellow Terrance Hayes’s latest poetry collection, is out now courtesy of Penguin. With his singular attention to music, affinity for pop culture references, and capacious subject matter, Hayes delivers a profoundly evocative investigation on humanity and identity. In a starred review, Publishers Weekly described So to Speak as a collection of “original, ruminative poems [that] showcase one of the most rightly acclaimed poets writing today.” Three poems from Hayes’s “American Sonnet for My Past and Future Assassin” series appeared in NER 39.1.
Middlebury alumna, former NER intern, and National Book Award finalist Jenn Shapland‘s Thin Skin just released from Pantheon Books. An eclectic essay collection that centers both the personal and the ubiquitous, Thin Skin explores the impact capitalism, environmental degradation, feminism, and queerness have on American life. In starred reviews, Publishers Weekly praised the collection as “exhilarating,” and Kirkus deemed it “an eloquent and vibrantly lucid collection.” Shapland’s essay “You Are Glowing with Crystal White Light!” appeared in NER 42.3.
On August 15, Catapult published Genevieve Plunkett’s hypnotic debut novel, In the Lobby of the Dream Hotel. Written in a nonlinear style with vividly haunting prose, Plunkett‘s protagonist grapples with desire, loyalty, bipolar disorder, and a resentful husband who tries to weaponize her condition against her. Author Rachel Yoder called the novel “spellbinding,” praising its “bold jumps in time, nuanced observation, and flights of imagination.” Plunkett’s work has appeared in multiple issues of NER, most recently issue 37.4.
Oliver de la Paz elegantly chronicles his own family’s quest for home and belonging in his seventh poetry collection, The Diaspora Sonnets (Liveright). Cinematic and nuanced, The Diaspora Sonnets exposes the failures of the American Dream in the wake of displacement, as de la Paz’s sonnets drift across time and place to paint a striking depiction of Filipino diaspora. De La Paz’s poem “Autism Screening Questionnaire: Abnormal Symbolic or Imaginative Play” appeared in issue 39.1 and was discussed by the author in a Behind the Byline interview.
Onlookers—Ann Beattie‘s provocative new collection of linked stories set in Charlottesville, Virginia—released earlier this summer from Scribner. As the city continues to reel from the deadly “Unite the Right” rally of 2017, Beattie‘s characters reckon with complicated legacies that reveal the evolving politics of remembrance in America. In a glowing review, Kirkus described the work as “sharply focused,” and Beattie as “a master of the short fiction form.” Beattie’s story “Octascope” appeared in the very first issue of New England Review.
Michael Katz, C. V. Starr Professor Emeritus of Russian and East European Studies at Middlebury College, has delivered a fresh new translation of Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov (Liveright). With an incisive regard for the rich prose and emotion of the original text, Katz effectively captures the nuanced humor, turbulence, and fervor of this triumphant classic. Katz’s translations have appeared in multiple issues of NER, most recently issue 42.2.
Prolific Southern author George Singleton stirs and delights in The Curious Lives of Nonprofit Martyrs, his latest short story collection from Dzanc Books. Darkly comedic and wholly original, Singleton’s stories of drifters, drunks, and divorcees evoke both morbid curiosity and empathy, and serve as a testament to the complexity of the Southern landscape and its people. Singleton‘s stories have appeared in several issues of New England Review, most recently issue 24.2.
Find more books by NER authors on our Bookshop.org page.