Loot by Tania James

In the late eighteenth century, King Tipu Sultan of Mysore, India, commissioned “Tipu’s Tiger,” an automaton made in collaboration between the Indian and the French. That fact forms the basis for a raucous and entertaining tale about a teenaged Abbas, an artisan who discovers his potential under the tutelage of a French master, Lucien Du Leze. 

As Abbas wakes up to the wonders (and injustices) of the larger world as he travels, he abides by his cardinal rule: “do not look back. Forward, ever forward.” A winning story that confirms that no matter the class, race is the final ranking.

Arrangements in Blue: Notes on Loving and Living Alone by Amy Key

Gloria Steinem remarked that a woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle. The message is clear: Women don’t need men to lead fulfilling lives. While that’s true, Amy Key’s achingly raw memoir explores the emotional toll of becoming resigned to a lifetime without a partner. It’s a unique brand of melancholy, one Key explores creatively through songs in Joni Mitchell’s oeuvre. Your heart aches when the author recounts the imprints of her grandparents’ time together: “A still-warm cup in the sink. Or coming home to see a light on in the hall, home’s mood already animated.”

I Have Some Questions for You by Rebecca Makkai

The long shadows of a classmate’s murder haunts Bodie Kane decades later, when she returns to her New Hampshire boarding school to teach a short course on podcasting. A Black instructor was wrongfully convicted and Bodie’s students want to look under previously ignored rocks for new leads. Makkai uses the murder of teenaged student Thalia Keith as a stand-in for the many cases, new and old, where women are consistently ignored, their voices stilled, the abusers free to strike again. At times these instances feel a bit forced. Yet they’re also the ones that lend the novel its devastating heft.

Fish Swimming in Dappled Sunlight by Riku Onda

Aki and Hiro are two of the fish swimming against the current in this surreal novel. The third is a travel guide who falls to his death when hiking in mountains outside Tokyo with the couple. Who is this strange guide? Why are Aki and Hiro so shaken by an accident? And who are the two to each other anyway? These are a few of the questions that the slow-simmering story addresses. Told in viewpoints alternating between Aki and Hiro, the narrative travels systematically back in time to deliver a mildly entertaining if not fully satisfactory resolution to the mysteries.

Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin

 

In the South Korean  seaside town of Sochko, close to the border with the North, a young French Korean woman works as a hotel receptionist. When an older French comic book artist comes to stay for inspiration, the unnamed narrator is drawn to his promise of otherness. Forever judged by her looks by her mother and boyfriend, she hopes the Frenchman will truly see the person she is. The dimly lit hotel, the demilitarized zone, the harshness of the landscape in winter, add a layer of atmospheric vulnerability to this magical story. What’s escape for some is tedium for others. 

Antonio by Beatriz Bracher

 

Through the fractured perspectives of a few people close to them, Xavier and his son, Teo, come alive in this engaging if occasionally dense narrative. Coming from a rich Brazilian family, Xavier tries to break free from the ties that bind. But madness overtakes him and Teo. The disintegration of their lives is largely borne by their women. “Life is so hard on us, in one way or another, that we end up transforming ourselves, inevitably, into beings that are smaller than the destiny that youth promises us,” says a character in the novel. That sad fate unravels for all.

The Unseen by Roy Jacobsen

Along the Norwegian coast lies the tiny island of Barroy, home to a small family whose fortunes ebb and flow with the tides. Readers looking for a fast-paced novel should look elsewhere. But those who are willing to be soothed by the gentle patterns of life will find a treasure trove. By book’s end, Ingrid Barroy, who’s elementary school-aged when the story opens, has her family’s fate firmly in her able hands. There’s plenty of nuance in the gradual “progress” Barroy sees even if Ingrid’s father, Hans, had barely managed to keep the “rotting raft” that was their existence, afloat.

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

Sadie and Sam have a long history: they are childhood friends who grew apart but meet again when they attend college at MIT and Harvard. Once united by a love of video games, they decide to make their own while in college. The first is a runaway success and launches them into a production company with Sam’s roommate, Marx. The challenges of different players’ mixed priorities surface and brilliantly expose tensions between class and gender. An A+ story of  growing up, of the production of art and the many ways we hide our deepest selves from those we truly love.

The Swedish Art of Aging Exuberantly: Life Wisdom From Someone Who Will (Probably) Die Before You by Margareta Magnusson

Punctuated by whimsical illustrations,  this “life wisdom” is a warm and fuzzy memoir dispensed as advice. It’s a joy to hear from someone who has made peace with death. The advice ranges from “eat chocolate” to the philosophical—“take care of something every day.” Occasionally the book feels like a quickly cobbled-together follow-up to her bestseller about “death cleaning,” which I’ve not read. The nuggets are not profound but make an impact. I wonder if all aging people, including the poor, can use Magnusson’s advice though. After all, not everyone can afford the comfort of home or access universal healthcare.