This is becoming a tradition!
September 6 is National Read a Book Day. For the third year, I thought I’d offer some reading suggestions to celebrate the day! This post is highly subjective and focuses (with some exceptions) on science fiction, fantasy and horror. But everything on the list is a good book.
Some Great Space Opera: Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh. This is apparently her first novel, and it’s outstanding. I flew through this wonderful space opera that starts out as military science fiction on an isolated space station, but ends up encompassing all of space and time, a huge canvas. In addition to a page-turning story there are themes of radicalization and a transforming worldview as Kyr discovers that the world is not as she’s been taught.
Something about Migrants: American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins. Although not written by a migrant, this is still a good story. Lydia, a Mexican bookseller, is forced to flee from cartel violence with her son, Luca. She sees only one place for them to go to escape with their lives: across the border into the United States. It’s fiction, and certainly not every migrant’s experience, but it’s a good place to start to explore fiction about a crisis we usually see only from our own viewpoint. And a moving story on a human level as well.
Something Intense: The Devil Takes You Home by Gabino Iglesias. Winner of the Bram Stoker Award and the Shirley Jackson Award, this horror novel is excellent but warning — it is also brutal in places, and full of rage and desperation. It paints a dark picture of human nature as the main character, Mario, sets out on a dangerous mission to interfere with a cartel’s drug shipment so he can try to pay back medical bills from his daughter’s fatal illness. This is a gripping story, touching on the supernatural as well as the lengths human beings will go to in greed or desperation. Some parts are in Spanish, but not enough to impede reading for non-Spanish speakers.
Something Old-fashioned: A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. This novel was published in 2016, but feels like a charming, old-fashioned long read. Set in the Soviet Union during a big chunk of the 20th century, this novel follows Count Alexander Rostov, a member of the Russian nobility who escapes death during the Revolution only to be sentenced to permanent house arrest in the Metropol, an elegant old-world hotel. There we meet a fascinating cast of characters, glimpse the march of history and enjoy the Count’s narrative on everything from food to the barber to the characters he meets.
Something Recommended by my Daughter: This year’s recommendation by my daughter is The Remarkable Retirement of Edna Fisher by E.M. Anderson. Edna Fisher is an elderly lady in a nursing home when she receives an unexpected visit from a wizard, who tells her she is the Chosen One — chosen to “save the Knights from a dragon-riding sorcerer bent on their destruction” (from the Amazon blurb). I love stories about unexpected heroes, and I am just getting started reading this one myself.
Something … by Me! This one’s easy, because it’s a short story and it’s online. My newest short story, “A Deep and Breathing Forest”, was in Issue 9 of Haven Speculative and is available here. It’s a short story, so I won’t summarize it, but I hope you’ll check it out along with the other stories and poetry in Haven Spec.
Author Anne Marie Lutz 