There‘s something inherently fascinating about cult stories. Dektar creates such a vivid setting, atmosphere and mood. There‘s a subtle feeling of ominous tension that she teases out, while simultaneously lending insight into Berie‘s desperate need for belonging. Her ambivalence is what keeps her so interesting as a character: constantly teetering between what she wants to do and what she feels like she ought to do—often confusing the two.

Like a bitter, vengeful version of Call Me By Your Name, this tight novel provides a claustrophobic account of the narrator‘s passionate, obsessive, erotic relationship. He‘s the ultimate unreliable narrator, and it‘s fascinating the way he distorts his recollection of events, intent on painting himself as the “good guy” in his own story as his actions become increasingly troubling.

This taut novel is less of a twisty thriller and more of an engrossing character study about a woman‘s gradual descent into madness. I was hooked from the first page, drawn to the unnamed narrator‘s caustic voice and incisive observations. Sims‘ writing is precise and sharp, capturing the tragic madness of the narrator. The abrupt ending fell a little flat for me, but as a character study this debut was everything I wanted it to be.

This character-driven novel follows two families over the course of decades as they confront difficult issues such as mental illness, alcoholism, and a violent event that forever links them. There are no “good” characters or “bad” characters—just flawed people in difficult situations. The major success of the novel, and Keane‘s intricate writing, is that everything that happens feels earned. I think this will be big when it comes out.

This quirky novel about a listless thirty-something woman, the 12-year-old girl she befriends and a box of mysterious letters is such a hidden gem. The characters are so strange and well-drawn. Their interactions with each other are unconventional, funny and surprisingly tender. I loved this book about human connection, about finding hope, meaning and companionship in the most unexpected places.

Many of these brief vignettes are very funny, but although the four (white) authors note up front that they are trying to be conscience of making it as intersectional as possible, it ultimately feels a lot like standard white feminism. (Lots of predicable RGB references, for instance.)

More of a coffee table or bathroom book than anything. Between a so-so and a pick for me.

I could read endless books about disaffected young women navigating the absurdities of modern life, so maybe I‘m a little biased, but I loved this biting satire. Millie reminds me of an Ottessa Moshfegh protagonist: cynical, depressed, misanthropic...and overall pretty gross and pathetic. Butler perfectly captures working life for millennials in modern capitalist America stuck in the endless cycle of the gig economy.

This taut novel is a brilliant fever dream about motherhood and identity. It‘s a perfect combination of thrilling page turner and cerebral, literary transcendence. I had a similar feeling reading this as I had reading Annihilation. The tension and dread are palpable, heightened by a constant sense of the uncanny: the strange terror and awe of the world not behaving the way you expect it to. I recommend going into it knowing as little as possible.

Wowww! This stunning, explosive debut confronts brutal realities about racism and capitalism in a series of surreal, speculative, dystopian short stories that echo George Saunders at his very best. Adjei-Brenyah immerses us in the darkest depths of humanity and modern life, but leaves us with hope for “[making] the bleak a little better,” as he puts it. Some books make you feel like you‘ve come across something really special. This is one of them.

This was...fine. It held my attention and was a very fast read. I personally prefer my thrillers to be more literary, but if you crave a decent genre read this will certainly do. What appears at first to be a fairly straight-forward plot about two women clashing over a baby they both believe to be theirs becomes something even darker and sadder. The women are given sufficient character development to elicit sympathy for each of them.

This quirky, outrageous workplace satire was written in 2009, but feels especially relevant in the #MeToo era. It‘s definitely a book that makes you cringe, as does most satire that‘s all too plausible. DeWitt‘s writing is fresh and hilarious, reminding me of George Saunders and David Foster Wallace. The plot, unfortunately, does become redundant. But I‘m glad to have DeWitt on my radar now, and will definitely continue seeking out her writing.

If you had the ability to give yourself a second shot at life, to change the one thing that has caused you so much pain, would you? What if you could extend that opportunity on a much larger scale, using this power to undo human misery? The premise is interesting, but the convoluted plot does become tiresome. I‘m more ambivalent about this than Dark Matter (which I loved), but the fact remains that Crouch can write a mean sci-fi pageturner.

I'm not the biggest fan of historical fiction, so I wasn't expecting to enjoy this 700+ page family epic as much as I did. Aino is the ultimate feminist heroine, and I learned so much about the labor movement, an essential part of American history. It was empowering to read about early 20th century left-wing organizing, and I found myself continuously cheering on Aino's impassioned arguments against capitalism.

I can‘t believe this is a debut. It has all the complexity, tension, nuance and pacing that you would expect from a much more seasoned novelist. Kim is unafraid to wade through murky gray areas, no matter how uncomfortable. Her characters are real people trying to do their best in difficult situations, and that means they‘re not always entirely likable. I think this will be a huge hit when it comes out, especially for the literary mystery crowd.

This dark, perverse, macabre collection is perfect for fans of Carmen Maria Machado and Ottessa Moshfegh. The subjects are mostly women, and they are at times the victims and the villains. The stories are visceral, depraved and deeply uncomfortable—but if you‘re anything like me, it‘s hard to resist the allure of fiction that probes the hidden depths of humanity, those taboo thoughts and feelings we don‘t dare allow to the surface.

This thought-provoking dystopian thriller imagines a world in which lying is the ultimate crime. It‘s definitely a page-turner, with the added bonus of Winters being a good writer. His world-building is especially intriguing, with lots of thought going into the rules that shape the Golden State. Placing epistemology at the center of it all makes for a thoughtful read, especially in our current era of “alternative facts” and conspiracy theories.

Interesting, timely ideas packed into an imperfect yet highly readable narrative. The plot itself is engaging and at times suspenseful, but the real strengths lie in the more subtle themes throughout: the striking class divisions, the stark reality of working-poor immigrants making impossible choices in pursuit of the American Dream, the lengths to which mothers will go for their children, and the ways that capitalism places profits over people.

I think the problem is me because so far I‘ve been underwhelmed by every book I‘ve read this year! 😭 This narrative unravels like one of Plato‘s dialogues, the women using reason + discourse to address notions of faith, duty, justice, + agency. It‘s such a clever + interesting approach, but I almost wish it had been written as a play or dialogue instead of a novel, because most of the filler outside the women talking failed to hold my attention.

The plot of this is really intriguing on paper, but I just didn‘t find any of it all that engaging. In fact, I was quite bored by the weighty prose and the distance I felt between myself and the characters. Even the tension was tepid, tempered by a foreshadowing prologue. Sometimes certain writing just doesn‘t work for certain readers, and I think that was the case here. I‘m confident there will be readers who appreciate this more than I did.

This was...fine but a little underwhelming. While it‘s a raw and candid account of an adolescent in the throes of mental illness, there lacked a sense of freshness or novelty about this often written about subject. Most compelling to me was not the redundant progression of Juliet‘s life (get high, self-harm, repeat), but the more introspective insights on the horrors of mental illness: that claustrophobia of being unable to escape your own mind.

This inventive and ambitious novel displays a clever mastery of both language and storytelling. Nevertheless, can‘t say I fully enjoyed it. At its heart are timely and uncomfortable themes, such as consent and power dynamics. But really what it‘s about are the ways that we shape our narratives and deal with the past, the perspectives that get muddled and lost when we play the role of both director and main character in the story of our lives.

Attenberg paints such a vivid portrait of this quintessential Jewish-American family, with observational writing both hilarious and touching. The different characters‘ perspectives are all given their due, allowing for a rich and nuanced understanding of the family dynamics.

This is one of those books where not a lot happens, yet you still end up in a much different place than where you began. Attenberg is a master of the human condition.

Whoaaaa, boy. This book goes to some dark places. I picked it up after seeing Ottessa Moshfegh recommend it in a recent article. It clearly fell beneath the radar in 2018, which is a shame because it‘s quite good. As far as families go, it‘s hard to get more dysfunctional than this one. A bold, assured and captivating debut about mental illness, self-destruction and the possibility of emerging on the other side broken but still whole.

This book is unapologetically feminist; empowering without being sanctimonious; and candid about the realities of pregnancy, birth and motherhood without without making me more anxious than I already am about the toll that they take on the mind and body. I‘m coming away from it with a better understanding of my own body and a sense of confidence that I‘ll be better equipped to advocate for myself as I navigate post-partum life and new motherhood.

After facing the painful rejection of coming out to her family, Andy creates her own family among a group of other lesbians in Portland in the late ‘90s. When she becomes unexpectedly pregnant following a clandestine fling with a male drummer named Ryan, her life does a complete 180. Queer identity and belonging are the central themes of this debut. At 400+ pages, it‘s a novel for readers who relish the opportunity to really sit with a character.

I‘m sad to say that I‘m DNF-ing this one. As intrigued as I was by the premise, the shifting perspectives really aren‘t working for me. Multi-narration is such a tricky thing.

Let me be clear: this is a completely readable book. It‘s just not the kind of book that left me wanting to keep picking it up to read more. Between the three narrators it seems like a lot is happening, but then I would realize that nothing much had really happened at all.

I‘m a huge fan of Catherine Lacey‘s novels, but this short story collection left something to be desired.

The characters and themes are indeed compelling—confronting the absurdity, loneliness and urgency of being a person in this world—and the writing is consistently solid. But one of the main things I hope for in a short story is that it feels complete and satisfying by the end, and most of these didn‘t.

This is an incredibly nuanced literary thriller that relies on complex human dynamics instead of the usual gimmicks. I absolutely loved it. The characters exist in a gray area between good and bad. They do what they think is right at the time, and suffer the consequences of their misjudgments. They attempt to overcome the chasm between who they want to be and who they really are by seeking redemption and companionship in the unlikeliest places.

Welp, here it is. My favorite reads of 2018! I definitely have a “type” when it comes to books I love, and I feel like that‘s largely reflected here.

I‘m aware that this ambitious debut accomplished something structurally inventive, but I can‘t entirely wrap my head around what that is. This is clearly a writer‘s novel. It‘s as much about Halliday herself as it is the fictional characters within, though not in the trite, novel-as-autobiography way that we have come to expect. In fact, in many ways it satirizes that very concept and turns it on its head. I feel very ambivalent about it overall.

Although this book was guilty of some of my big bookish pet peeves (narrative built around interviewer and subject, lots of telling and not a lot of showing) I was undeniably captivated by Evelyn—in all her fierceness, shrewdness and unexpected tenderness. And the commentary on relationships of all kinds—romantic, platonic, parental—was sincere and poignant. We all want to be seen and understood, and that‘s ultimately what this book is about.

“Why did the Curator do it so rong, making the groop with the gratest skils the meenest?”

Saunders has done it all, this time writing a short story from the perspective (and poor spelling) of a fox.

This brief fable is a funny, sad and ultimately hopeful meditation on humans and their interactions with the natural world.

I was not prepared for how touched I would be by the final pages.

This is a dark, gritty book about two teen girls who get in over their head. You can feel how dirty their world is. You can smell the sweat on their bodies. While the focus is often on their physical appearances, it‘s really about the ugliness and darkness that lurks within. The normal teen anxieties and insecurities are exacerbated by the bleakness of their surroundings. The narrative didn‘t entirely work for me, but I liked it overall.

I‘m pleased to report that this book was nothing like I expected it to be. (Yes, I judged it by its cover.) It‘s so much darker and sadder and heavier than it appears, dealing with topics like rape culture, drug addiction, sexual abuse and terminally ill children. Attenberg‘s writing is sharp, witty, honest and darkly funny. I loved being inside the main character‘s head as she navigates friendship, family, work, life and death.

This is a very smart book. And it‘s nice reading about a very smart woman‘s thoughts on pregnancy and motherhood—among other topics. In reality, though, I think I expected something different—and yes, much of that is on me. There are passages I loved, particularly when Nelson was more focused on the personal parts of her life. But so much of it is abstract and theoretical, making it difficult for me to fully connect with it the way I had hoped.

This short, experimental novel is a snapshot of a specific time period. It‘s 2017, in the midst of Brexit and Trump‘s presidency and the rise of fascism worldwide. Laing certainly succeeds in conveying the numbness and bemused surrealism of how bad things are, just a constant barrage of shit. But for the most part it just didn‘t work for me, with its stream-of-consciousness prose and strange narrative choices, the meaning of which was lost on me.

Ugh. I don‘t know how to rate this. I‘m not as seduced by Boyne as most readers. I found this to be gimmicky, contrived, repetitive and predictable—and yet its undeniably very captivating and not without its strong points. The truth is, I devoured it. It‘s always hard to rate books like this that are deliciously readable in spite of a plethora of distracting annoyances. It‘s more of a So-So but I‘m giving it a Pick in spite of myself. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Okay, I just laughed out loud.

😱😱😱😱😱😱

I don‘t think I can adequately convey how little I care about the topic of this book—and how much I loved it regardless. There are so many sharp metaphors about ambition, purpose and meaning. Each character clings to an illusion of control, a conviction that they‘re doing what‘s right for the greater good. There‘s nothing more existentially distressing than the shattering of such illusions, and Reed conveys this with tragic humor and heart.

Mailhot apparently started writing this in the hospital where she sought treatment for PTSD and BPD. This experience is chronicled within, along with disjointed excerpts about her childhood, motherhood, and romantic relationships.

The result is an excruciatingly intimate memoir in essays about a woman overcoming significant trauma and gaining control of her life.

Mailhot‘s writing is a punch in the gut—so raw and painful and intense.

This is a book about the gravity of being a teenage girl, with changing bodies and new physical experiences (sexual and otherwise) and the feeling of being transformed into something scary and exciting.

It‘s also about the hysteria that grips a small town, and the tendency to look for answers in all the wrong places when they‘re really much simpler than we imagine. Abbott, as always, nails the realities of teenage girlhood.

This was a quick, dark, fun little read about two Nigerian sisters, one of whom can‘t seem to stop murdering her boyfriends. What I found most compelling of all was Korede‘s stake in all of it. Does her complicity make her any better or less dangerous than her sister? What motives drive her choices and actions? There are subtle hints of darkness inside her, too; they just manifest less dramatically.

This is a compelling story about a young American woman‘s coming of age and sexual awakening while abroad in Denmark. Locascio did a really good job portraying in visceral prose the complicated emotions that accompany the early phases of sexual discovery for women. I liked that it delved into deeper political topics, though some of Zlatan‘s parts did feel forced. Roxana‘s internal conflicts are where the novel shines the most.

In this quirky little novel, an odd woman named Keiko finds that the only way she can become “a normal cog in society” is to build her entire identity around being a convenience store worker. Murata examines thoughtfully and absurdly the contemporary themes of everything from capitalism and work culture to identity and conformity. Keiko is a modern heroine who finds meaning and purpose in the strangest of ways.

Do you ever read one of those books where you realize you‘re 80% done and nothing has really even happened? That was this book. There‘s an interesting kernel of an idea here—about multiverses and what happens when they overlap—but it just never goes anywhere, and when it finally does (kind of?) it‘s rushed and winds up feeling very incomplete. There is no depth here whatsoever and when that‘s lacking I expect a good plot. This delivered neither.

This profound and insightful debut novel is ALL about the voice, with stream-of-consciousness prose that‘s so sharp and wry. It‘s one of the most striking accounts of motherhood I‘ve come across, offering candid insight into the joy, fear, anxiety, awe, monotony and love that comes with being a new mother. It also tackles bigger topical issues, like the carelessness and callousness of American immigration policies driven by Islamophobia.

This is a story about how trauma can shape a person‘s life, and what it means to possibly move forward from it. Hope, the protagonist, is a complex, flawed character—but above all she is a survivor. That can mean something different for everyone, even among two sisters who shared a similar experience.

Eden is a nuanced novel about trauma with no easy answers or tidy resolutions. Anything else would be a disservice to its characters.

I liked how this novel centered women who are a product of their circumstances without making excuses for their actions. Maren keeps the perspective objective, unsentimental and without judgment, similarly to The Mars Room. That said, there was something that kept me from ever becoming fully invested in these characters. There‘s not a lot of narrative tension, and I wasn‘t always convinced by the main characters‘ choices and interactions.

A strange, ambitious book that partly succeeds in what it sets out to do, though not entirely. 15-year-old Pony‘s mother disappears from their isolated cult-like community. The book is split into 3 sections, each with its own narrator: Pony, the family dog, + a teen boy named Supernatural. There are secrets + mysteries that slowly unravel, with Pony‘s family at the center. I appreciated this book as a whole a lot more than I enjoyed reading it.