Happy May!
We’re changing up how we do our TBR suggestions. Each month we’ll suggest one recent release, one from a few years ago, and one on the more classic end of the spectrum. (There’s no such thing as an old book!) We’re also adding a new, book-of-the-week suggestion in a separate post. Here are three books to read this month:
The Cemetery of Untold Stories, by Julia Alvarez.
Literary Fiction | Magical Realism | Caribbean Fiction
What do you do as a writer who has difficulty finishing stories? You bury them. No harm could come from that. But once a character has been brought into the world, they are not so easy to bury.
Why we suggest this book: storytelling is a magical business no matter which tradition spawns it.
“Uplifting… Throughout, Alvarez seamlessly melds magical realism with heartfelt character portraits. This brims with the intoxicating power of storytelling.”—Publishers Weekly
Annihilation, by Jeff VanderMeer
Speculative Fiction
Released a few years ago (I know, it’s been a decade) Annihilation has been made into a movie, but if you haven’t read the book, do so. You might not recognize the movie.
Why we suggest this book: you still have time to read this and the rest of the trilogy, Authority and Acceptance, before the new fourth book, Absolution arrives, which you can preorder now.
The Obscene Bird of Night, by José Donoso.
Literary Fiction
Our “lost and forgotten” title of the week involves a mute caretaker of a former abbey who is hounded by a coven of ancient witches transforming him, bit by bit, into the terrifying imbunche: a twisted monster with its orifices sewn up, leaving him buried alive in its own body.
Why we suggest this book: in many ways this edition repairs a version that was never quite complete. Left behind in the murky 1970s, this restored novel deserves a contemporary look.
“One of the great novels not only of Spanish America but of our time.”—Carlos Fuentes
“Donoso, as I have long believed, belongs to that small company of storytellers who write not for a region but for the entire world: a gigantic masterpiece.”—Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
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