Books

Acclaimed journalist Tracie McMillan’s muckraking, experiential methods have earned her prizes, acclaim and the special animosity of Rush Limbaugh, a sure sign of the power of her investigative work. With The White Bonus: Five Families and the Cash Value of Racism in America, McMillan offers a powerful and necessary exposé of the financial benefits of

Silvana Reyes is a Mexican book blogger. She enjoys all types of sub-genres, but loves a good love story. Romance fiction is her heart and joy and you might find her screaming about book releases on her Twitter account. View All posts by Silvana Reyes Lopez Do you love a romance story where it takes

How complicated can breakfast possibly get? In Zao Fan: Breakfast of China, Michael Zee writes that the enormity of Chinese cuisine is “both terrific and terrifying”—and what is usually the simplest, smallest meal of the day is no exception. Yet Zee demonstrates a knack seldom seen in English-language cookbooks for succinctly yet fully conveying the

Not all book recommendation sources are equal. Years ago, I saw a tweet from a popular YA author asking his followers for their favorite little-known books. The responses were filled with books like The Hunger Games and Catcher in the Rye: some of the most read and recognized books of all time. I was so

Brendan Wenzel’s award-winning picture books (Every Dreaming Creature, A Stone Sat Still) invite readers to look carefully at every image. Two Together continues his exploration of perspective, this time through the eyes of a dog and a cat traveling home together. Two Together easily stands alone, but also fits as a companion to Wenzel’s They

Ann-Marie Cahill will read anything and everything. From novels to trading cards to the inside of CD covers (they’re still a thing, right?). A good day is when her kids bring notes home from school. A bad day is when she has to pry a book from her kids’ hands. And then realizes where they

Sophia Henry Winslow and her neighbor Sophie Gershowitz are best friends with a lot in common. They both go by “Sophie,” love the color mauve, aren’t big fans of quesadillas and loathe gossip. And both Sophies, as readers learn in Lois Lowry’s lovely and moving Tree. Table. Book., embody the saying that “age is just

Addison Rizer is a writer and reader of anything that can be described as weird, sad, or scary. She has an MA in Professional Writing and a BA in English. She writes for Book Riot and Publishers Weekly and is always looking for more ways to gush about the books she loves. Find her published

Kelly is a former librarian and a long-time blogger at STACKED. She’s the editor/author of (DON’T) CALL ME CRAZY: 33 VOICES START THE CONVERSATION ABOUT MENTAL HEALTH and the editor/author of HERE WE ARE: FEMINISM FOR THE REAL WORLD. Her next book, BODY TALK, will publish in Fall 2020. Follow her on Instagram @heykellyjensen. View

Kendra Winchester is a Contributing Editor for Book Riot where she writes about audiobooks and disability literature. She is also the Founder of Read Appalachia, which celebrates Appalachian literature and writing. Previously, Kendra co-founded and served as Executive Director for Reading Women, a podcast that gained an international following over its six-season run. In her

This originally appeared in our Today in Books daily newsletter, where each day we round up the most interesting stories, news, essays, and other goings on in the world of books and reading. Sign up here if you want to get it. _____________________________________________________ The Most Beautiful Libraries in the World In my time on the

This year’s Republic of Consciousness Prize has been announced. The prize was established in the UK in 2017 before getting a U.S. version, and seeks to support small presses, which often take the biggest literary risks with fewer financial means. This year’s UK winner is Charco Press because of the book Of Cattle and Men

Last weekend was one of my biggest holidays of the year: Dewey’s 24-Hour Readathon. It happens biannually, in April and October, and I have been doing it every year since 2012! This time really snuck up on me, though: I thought it was later in the month. Still, I had a low-key readathon — I

Erica Ezeifedi, Associate Editor, is a transplant from Nashville, TN that has settled in the North East. In addition to being a writer, she has worked as a victim advocate and in public libraries, where she has focused on creating safe spaces for queer teens, mentorship, and providing test prep instruction free to students. Outside

Signs of Hope, the Revolutionary Art of Sister Corita Kent presents readers with the life and art of nun, teacher and artist Sister Corita Kent. Written from the perspective of one of her many students, this vibrant picture book biography depicts the lessons Sister Corita taught about art and the world around us, encouraging her

Netflix just released the first trailer for the adaptation of Nobel Prize-winning author Gabriel García Márquez’s masterpiece One Hundred Years of Solitude. The trailer for the series adaptation opens with Colonel Aureliano Buendía as an adult (played by Claudio Cataño) facing a firing squad, with the book’s iconic opening line narrated in Spanish with English

We all have our routines. And while the otherworldly fellow in The Spaceman may have a very different mode of transportation from the rest of us— a super cool silver spaceship—he too has a routine: “I collect soil samples. I label the soil samples. And I file the soil samples. Then I move on to

When the truth is stranger than fiction, stories that use fiction to explore the truth can get pretty weird. In Weird Black Girls, Elwin Cotman delivers seven short stories that go long on fantasy and supernatural phenomena to delve into the very real dangers and anxieties of contemporary Black life. We’ve got a town ruled

A violent crime threatens the stability of the middle-class wife and mother at the center of Ethel Rohan’s Sing, I, a thoughtful novel about self-discovery and new beginnings. Ester Prynn’s mother chose her name in the hopes of making her unforgettable. Ester lives with her husband, Simon, and their two teenage boys in coastal Northern

Welcome to Today in Books, where we report on literary headlines at the intersection of politics, culture, media, and more. It’s been a quiet start to the week news-wise, and TBH, I don’t hate it. Let’s hit a few highlights and get to the “it” books of the week.  p.s. Don’t know what to get

Names often play a pivotal role in stories—and like many aspects of fiction, their importance is reflected in the real world. The novels of award-winning young adult author Darcie Little Badger draw on the power of names: In Elatsoe, Little Badger’s 2020 debut, the titular character carries the name of a legendary ancestor. Little Badger’s

Tomorrow is the release date for Knife by Salman Rushdie, a memoir about his attempted murder by stabbing. We haven’t heard much about this book in the lead-up: it appears that release copies weren’t offered even to the biggest publications. Today, though, reviews are starting to come in from media outlets, mostly with praise for

Celebrated Deaf poet Raymond Antrobus originally resisted the idea of writing children’s books because of what he called “snobbery” in a 2021 interview with The Guardian. Thankfully, Antrobus came to see the immense importance of these stories, and released a tremendous debut picture book, Can Bears Ski? Readers will delight at his latest offering, Terrible

April is Autism Acceptance Month! You can learn more about it, as well as find a lot of great resources about autism, at the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network, including their Autism Acceptance Month website. It’s important when seeking out representation or educational material about autism to research depictions by autistic people themselves. Today, I wanted to

Caoilinn Hughes’ third novel, The Alternatives, follows four sisters, all doctors of various sorts. When one of the four goes missing, the others set out across the Irish countryside to find her. With the COVID-19 pandemic and general global instability in the background, the Flattery sisters have a lot to navigate. Haunted by their childhood

Susie (she/her) is a queer writer originally from Little Rock, now living in Washington, DC. She is the author of QUEERLY BELOVED and the forthcoming LOOKING FOR A SIGN from Dial Press/Random House. You can find her on Instagram @susiedoom. View All posts by Susie Dumond Brought to you by Amazon Publishing In a city

Some writers have a gift for making ordinary lives as compelling as anything you’d find in an epic adventure. This ability to chart the human condition goes beyond technical proficiency or what we’d generally consider literary merit. Sunjeev Sahota has this gift, and his latest novel, The Spoiled Heart, wrings maximum emotional impact out of

This week, Kelly Jensen is on a well-deserved break, so we’re doing a more condensed version of her inimitable weekly censorship round-up: fellow editors Danika Ellis and Erica Ezeifedi have each picked a few of the censorship stories of the last week to highlight. Book Censorship News will be back to its regular programming with

The inimitable Nikki DeMarco is as well-traveled as she is well-read. Being an enneagram 3, Aries, high school librarian, makes her love for efficiency is unmatched. She lives in Richmond, Virginia, and is passionate about helping teens connect to books. Nikki has an MFA in creative writing, is a TBR bibliologist, and writes for Harlequin,

Often, cookbooks languish on our kitchen shelves, only to be referenced once in a blue moon—but the exuberant illustrations of Noodles, Rice, and Everything Spice: A Thai Comic Book Cookbook will have you turning to its recipes for years to come. In 2020, Thai Belgian cartoonist Christina de Witte sought to further connect with her