Yahoo Lifestyle The 31 Best New Book Releases This Week: August 13-19, 2024
Here are the 31 best new book releases out the week of August 13-19, 2024. It’s never hard to find two or three dozen books to share with you. (Do I choose this book from France or that gem from Japan or how about this romance about a couple who meet on a transatlantic flight?) The hard part is deciding which books not to include. With more than a thousand books out every week (easily), it’s an embarrassment of riches. Though you should never be embarrassed about reading, even a guilty pleasure. Me, I only feel guilty when I’m not reading! So let’s get reading! At the head of the Parade are…
The 31 Best New Book Releases This Week: August 13-19, 2024
Courtesy of Little, Brown and Company; Henry Holt and Co.
1. Worst Case Scenario by T.J. Newman
2. Never Saw Me Coming by Tanya Smith
3. The Stranger at the Wedding by A.E. Gauntlett
In a disaster-movie plot Irwin Allen would envy, T.J. Newman shows a pilot having a heart attack while flying a commercial airliner…which promptly crashes into a nuclear power plant. What follows is a widescreen, cinematic thriller peopled with real people you care about, from a Cassandra who rang the alarm about nuclear power plant vulnerabilities to a young President determined to do what’s right to a brave man spending a moment with his son before heading to certain death. Don’t wait for the movie–it’s all here.
Tanya Smith’s memoir will have you rooting for the criminals. Smith got into high tech and ultimately banking systems, digitally stealing $5000 and putting it into her grandmother’s accounts. When police question who she’s working for, because obviously a young black woman couldn’t possibly have done something this sophisticated, Smith gets really mad. And really even, ultimately stealing $40 million. She’s caught…and then mounts her own legal defense. Actor/artist Janelle Monáe gives an admiring quote and surely has the movie rights already locked up.
It’s the dream of every employee at a publishing house or literary agency. Work on your own book and then get it published. That’s precisely what UK agent A.E. Gauntlett accomplished, who spun out a thriller about a woman in a whirlwind romance discovering–just after saying “I do”–that all is not as it seems. Great cover, but that’s just the sort of thing an agent will be keen on, isn’t it?
Worst Case Scenario by T.J. Newman ($30; Little, Brown and Company) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Never Saw Me Coming by Tanya Smith ($32; Little, Brown and Company) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
The Stranger at the Wedding by A.E. Gauntlett ($28.99; Henry Holt and Co.) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Recent: Bestselling Author T.J. Newman Shares Her Favorite Books
4. What’s Next: A Backstage Pass To “The West Wing” by Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack
What’s Next offers a complete look at the making of one of TV’s most acclaimed dramas. Sure, you can stream it all over again on Max, but why not dive into this making-of, so you can enjoy the ins and outs all the more. It’s the rare TV show about politics which is genuinely optimistic and hopeful. Yes, Veep is fun (as is House of Cards and Yes, Minister and…) but I’ll take hopeful where I can get it.
What’s Next: A Backstage Pass To “The West Wing” by Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack ($35; Dutton) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of William Morrow Paperbacks, Ballantine Books, Arndell
5. Scandalous Women by Gill Paul
6. A Great Marriage by Frances Mayes
7. The Bonus by TL Swan
Jackie Collins and Jacqueline Susann crashed the party of the publishing world and books have never been the same. Gill Paul’s novel plops an ambitious female publishing employee to bring the two women together and fight for her own agency amidst the Mad Men-like world of dismissive male editors. And what better excuse to reach for Valley of the Dolls and Chances than the moment you finish this?
Author Frances Mayes begins with a wedding-to-be. Everyone is delighted, except for the bride, who pulls the plug at the last moment. No pressure: her grandmother enjoyed a famously marvelous marriage and literally wrote the book on how others could achieve the same. So surely everyone will support her decision? For anyone who actually believes it when a nervous bride or groom is told “it’s not too late, we can just call it off” while all their friends are gathered and the catering is set to arrive.
Accomplished employee Grace is besotted with the physical perfection of her boss, but he’s such a sarcastic jerk she finally comes to her senses and quits. But some people can’t take no for an answer. He’s furious and won’t think of it, keeping Grace in his orbit the only way he can: by letting her be the boss, at least after hours. Steamy, right?
Scandalous Women by Gill Paul ($18.99; William Morrow Paperbacks) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
A Great Marriage by Frances Mayes ($30; Ballantine Books) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
The Bonus by TL Swan ($18.99; Arndell) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of Knopf
8. Burn by Peter Heller
Two best friends head into the middle of nowhere for their annual hunting trip in Maine. No cell phone connections; no contact with the outside world. Bliss. Then they step back into a United States turned upside down. Is it a civil war? An invasion? And who can they trust? Author Peter Heller delivers another unexpected novel, this time about a near-future that’s almost too near for comfort.
Burn by Peter Heller ($28; Knopf) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of Random House, HarperVia, Pantheon
9. Peggy by Rebecca Godfrey with Leslie Jamison
10. Jimi Hendrix Live In Lviv by Andrey Kurkov
11. Mina’s Matchbox by Yoko Ogawa
Peggy is an imaginative novel inspired by the life of Peggy Guggenheim. Peggy is orphaned at 14 when her dad famously dies on the Titanic and before you know it, she’s forging a dynamic, vibrant life in the art world as a patron who won’t be patronized. The final novel of Rebecca Godfrey, which was finished by her friend Leslie Jamison.
Andrey Kurkov is one of Ukraine’s most famous writers, publishing his first book just as the Soviet Union dissolved. He’s written everything from children’s books to mysteries and more literary fare. With Jimi Hendrix Live In Lviv, Kurkov has written a fairy tale. What else can you call a novel set in Ukraine in 2011, before invasion and before war? People are still a bit unmoored from post-Soviet life, but it’s magical and strange and love is in the air.
Fans of Yoko Ogawa’s The Memory Police only need to know that the Japanese author has a new novel out. For the rest, know this is a coming of age tale about a 12 year old girl who leaves her mother to live with an eccentric, wealthy aunt, an asthmatic 13 year old cousin and the rest of their family, which includes a pygmy rhinoceros. Strange, beguiling and acclaimed doesn’t begin to cover the praise this novel is receiving. One of the literary events of the year.
Peggy by Rebecca Godfrey with Rebecca Jamison ($29; Random House) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Jimi Hendrix Live In Lviv by Andrey Kurkov ($19.99; HarperVia) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Mina’s Matchbox by Yoko Ogawa ($28; Pantheon) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of W.W. Norton and Company; Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Penguin Press
12. Kent State: An American Tragedy by Brian VanDeMark
13. Nat Turner, Black Prophet by Anthony E. Kaye with Gregory P. Downs
14. Hitler’s People by Richard J. Evans
The subtitle to Kent State says it all: An American Tragedy. Writer Brian VanDeMark covers every angle of the day protesters against the Vietnam War were gunned down by the National Guard, a crystallizing moment and the end of the 1960s and its idealism.
The rebellious, righteous Nat Turner embodied every fear of the white ruling class of the pre-Civil War South. What if the people they whipped and beat and brutalized rose up? Turner did just that and with a Biblical fury. This new history of Turner and his time lays emphasis on Turner as a prophet, an Old Testament prophet to be specific, with all the bloody vengeance that implies.
For decades, Germany wrestled with guilt over World War II. The sins of the father are not the sins of the son, but first one must acknowledge that the father did in fact sin. Denial, the belief that the “bad” Germans did horrible things while the rest just followed orders or had no idea was very strong for years. But the country admirably confronted those lies again and again right up to today. Historian Richard J. Evans is acclaimed for his Third Reich trilogy but he still asks the questions the German peoples ask themselves. Who supported Hitler’s monstrous aims and why? He starts with the inner circle of Himmler and Goebbels and the like, but then burrows deeper into the lives and choices of people like schoolteacher Julius Streicher and director Leni Riefenstahl and on and on. Evans takes the time to examine these cogs in the machine and see them as people with complicated lives, which makes their choices all the more disturbing.
Kent State: An American Tragedy by Brian VanDeMark ($35; W.W. Norton and Company) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Nat Turner, Black Prophet by Anthony E. Kaye with Gregory P. Downs ($30; Farrar, Straus and Giroux) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Hitler’s People by Richard J. Evans ($35; Penguin Press) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
15. The Murders In Great Diddling by Katarina Bivald
Katarina Bivald’s light-hearted mystery The Murders In Great Diddling is a hilarious spoof of all those Midsomer and Cabot Cove places where bodies pile up like firewood. In this case, an unexpected murder finds the rather offbeat folk of Great Diddling embracing their notoriety and launching a book and murder festival. Of course, such an enterprise would greatly benefit from more murders, wouldn’t it?
The Murders In Great Diddling by Katarina Bivald ($16.99; Poisoned Pen Press) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of Algonquin Books, Dutton, Penguin Press
16. Bite: An Incisive History of Teeth by Bill Schutt
17. Gray Matters by Theodore H. Schwartz
18. The Wisdom of Sheep by Rosamund Young
Maybe it’s because I just spend five hours in a dental chair getting new crowns, but I can’t wait to read Bite, a look at teeth throughout the ages and the animal kingdom. Zoologist Bill Schutt says teeth are a key reason why vertebrates have flourished. (Opposable thumbs are pretty neat, too, says this primate.) He gives an engaging account of the role teeth played both in nature and culture. I’m going to read it as soon as I finish flossing. (P.S. And I just noticed the play on words: an "incisive" history. Incisors! Hey, I never said I was smart.)
Dr. Theodore H. Schwartz plays god. How else to describe holding a scalpel in your hand and cutting into the human brain? Brain surgery has been around for about a hundred years (not counting earlier attempts to tinker with it by slamming nails into people’s skulls and such) and Schwartz tells what it’s like to perform brain surgery and how it has evolved. Everything from JFK to the NFL’s shameful approach to brain injuries is tackled here, along with the future of what is after all a fairly new endeavor.
Rosamund Young enjoyed an unexpected hit with her farming memoir The Secret Life Of Cows. Now Young returns us to Kite’s Nest Farm, her home for more than 40 years. Just as her last book zeroed in on the personalities and surprising interactions with cows, here Young turns her keen eye onto the sheep. They are good judges of character, have long memories and don’t always sheepishly do as they’re told, by the way. One half James Herriott and one half, well it’s all pretty James Herriott, isn’t it? Since Kite’s Nest Farm also contains hens and pigs, you must imagine they eye Young a little suspiciously whenever she’s nearby, watching, waiting and taking notes.
Bite: An Incisive History of Teeth by Bill Schutt ($31; Algonquin Books) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Gray Matters by Theodore H. Schwartz ($32; Dutton) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
The Wisdom of Sheep by Rosamund Young ($27; Penguin Press) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
19. The Dark We Know by Wen-yi Lee
Wen-yi Lee’s novel The Dark We Know involves the horrors of small town life when you’re an odd bisexual teen who does not fit in and never will. Isadora Chang escaped to art school but is dragged back home by the promise of an inheritance from her late, abusive father. What she finds is her one remaining friend in a battle against evil forces wreaking havoc on a place she never cared about anyway. But Isadora won’t have to decide whether to challenge it or run, because it won’t let her go away again, not without a fight.
The Dark We Know by Wen-yi Lee ($19.99; Zando–Gillian Flynn Books) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of NBM, Faber and Faber
20. Pink Floyd in Comics by Nicolas Finet, Tony Lourenco and Theirry Lamy
21. Neu Klang: The Definitive History of Krautrock by Christoph Dallach; translated by Katy Derbyshire
Two cool music books that are right up my alley. The journey of Pink Floyd is pretty wild and extravagant, from the eccentric and rather daft Syd Barrett era to the creative peak of the Roger Waters era to the commercial behemoth (at least in touring) of the David Gilmour Roger-Waters-who?-era ever since. So what better way to tell this story than in comic book form? Of course! And since I’ve recently become enamored by the music of German bands Neu and Can, I am very primed indeed for Neu Klang, the definitive history of Krautrock.
Pink Floyd in Comics by Nicolas Finet, Tony Lourenco and Theirry Lamy ($32.99; NBM) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Neu Klang: The Definitive History of Krautrock by Christoph Dallach; translated by Katy Derbyshire ($34.95; Faber and Faber) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of Canary Street Press, Griffin, Gallery Books
22. Frequent Fliers by Noué Kirwan
23. The Break-Up Pact by Emma Lord
24. Miranda in Retrograde by Lauren Layne
More romances! You didn’t think I was going to stop with just Scandalous Women, A Great Marriage and The Bonus, did you? Here are three, more light-hearted romances to enjoy. Noué Kirwan is enjoying breakout praise for her second novel, this one about professionals who find love on a transatlantic flight but discover a relationship is hard when you’ve got miles between you and more to discuss than whether or not you’ll make your connection. Emma Lord delivers your typical viral-breakup, fake dating, friends to enemies to lovers romance of the modern era. We’ve all done it, right? And Lauren Layne looks to the stars with Miranda In Retrograde. A physics professor finds her life is a mess, a black hole of failed relationships and no tenure. So why not let astrology of all things dictate what she does? Why not indeed?
Frequent Fliers by Noué Kirwan ($18.99; Canary Street Press) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
The Break-Up Pact by Emma Lord ($18; Griffin) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Miranda in Retrograde by Lauren Layne ($17.99; Gallery Books) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Courtesy of Atlantic Monthly Press, Avid Reader Press/S&S, Hanover Square Press
25. In France Profound by T.D. Allman
26. Billionaire, Nerd, Savior, King: Bill Gates and His Quest to Shape Our World by Anupreeta Das
27. Drawn Testimony by Jane Rosenberg
T.D. Allman’s expansive memoir/history has the high-flown title In France Profound. Don’t let that fool you. Yes it’s ambitious and yes this work of history/personal biography shows his newly adopted home of Lauzerte, France enjoys a long, noble history of resisting the trends of the Paris elite. But it’s the memoir portion about life in a small French village that will stick in your brain, say critics, with the daily doings of fighting with pigeons, watching a local production of Tosca and waiting for the produce guy to appear putting all that history into charming perspective.
Anupreeta Das does a deep dive into Bill Gates, who has been a controversial software developer, a controversial monopolist and now a controversial philanthropist who believes he knows best when it comes to education, the climate crisis, nuclear power and pretty much every other complicated issue facing the world.
We all know the courtroom sketch artist, the person in a trial that’s not being televised who captures the major players in a courtroom with their artistry. For the first time, we learn from one of the best what that job–that craft and that career–is like, including sketches of the people author Jane Rosenberg has drawn, from former President Trump to Mick Jagger to Harvey Weinstein, Martha Stewart and more. Given the across the board acclaim, Rosenberg is as accomplished with words as she is with sketching.
In France Profound by T.D. Allman ($30; Atlantic Monthly Press) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Billionaire, Nerd, Savior, King: Bill Gates by Anupreeta Das ($32; Avid Reader Press/S&S) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Drawn Testimony by Jane Rosenberg ($30; Hanover Square Press) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Recent: The 10 Best Picture Books of 2024…So Far
Courtesy of First Second, DSTRLY Media, Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers
28. Ash’s Cabin by Jen Wang
29. Gone by Jock
30. Lion Dancers by Cai Tse
I don’t need to keep explaining or defending the graphic novel, do I? Three new releases cover the waterfront in terms of style and subject. Ash’s Cabin captures a teen understandably worried by the climate crisis. Less understandable is her decision to make like Thoreau and head deep into the woods, planning to discover a cabin built by her grandfather (maybe!) and if she can find it, life a self-sufficient life. Sci-fi is the genre of the striking Gone, in which another kid–in this case, 13 year old Abi–stows away on a luxury space liner to escape dire poverty on her planet. What could go wrong? Lion Dancers tells about the Chinese traditions of lion and dragon dancing, a cool, competitive art form I’d never heard of either. But it’s really about two friends who drift apart and then must learn to cooperate if they want to compete in the big upcoming tournament.
Ash’s Cabin by Jen Wang ($17.99; First Second) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Gone by Jock ($30; DSTRLY Media) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Lion Dancers by Cai Tse ($13.99; Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
31. Godfather Death by Sally Nicholls; illustrated by Júlia Sardà
This picture book retells a classic Grimm’s tale about a poor man who has no gift to give his newborn child. Determined to give the boy something, he walks outside determined to find an honest person to be the baby’s godfather. Unfortunately, the most honest person he finds is Death, who not only agrees to be the boy’s godfather but tempts the poor man with the promise of wishes. (“How would you like to be rich?” said Death. “Well–yes,” said the fisherman. “That would be nice.”) From the wonderfully measured text to the gorgeously retro images, this is a shivery treat.
Godfather Death by Sally Nicholls; illustrated by Júlia Sardà ($19.99; Viking Book for Young Readers) Buy now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Related: The 29 Best Mystery, Thriller and True Crime Books of 2024…so Far
