To the Lake: A Balkan Journey of War and Peace by Kapka Kassabova

“Love’s infinite garden holds other fruit besides laughter and tears.” This Rumi quote comes alive in the inimitable Kapka Kassabova’s newest voyage in book form. She transports us to the twin lakes of Ohrid and Prespa among the remote Balkans of her family’s past. Kassabova is one of my all-time favorites so she can do no wrong. Studded with generous doses of regional history, which some might argue is often too much of a digression, this marvel of a book is so well done that it moved me to tears many times. Arguably, nobody weaves personal stories with place better. 

The Burning by Megha Majumdar

A Facebook post is all it takes for Jivan to be accused of a horrific crime: the burning of a few train carriages in Kolkata, India, that leads to many deaths. Fate does not favor Jivan — she is poor and Muslim in a country where Hindu nationalism is on the rise. Against this background, a transgender woman named Lovely narrates her story and we learn about PT Sir, a teacher who once taught Jivan, who gets sucked into the maelstrom of right-wing politics. Scintillating dialog and a sharp eye for the nuances of class make for a spectacular debut.

The Museum of Whales You Will Never See and Other Excursions to Iceland's Most Unusual Museums by A. Kendra Greene

The Herring Era Museum. Sigurgeir’s Bird Museum. This delightful and surprisingly spiritual book steeps you in such a strong sense of place that you’ll want to visit Iceland right away. “There are so many flavors of loss. There is deprivation and disappointment. There is sacrifice and grief. There is trifling. There is needless. There is missing and forgotten. There is, though sometimes it is hard to imagine, necessary. There is, though we hardly need reminding, catastrophic. Iceland trades in all of them,” Green writes. There seems to be a museum for each. A book to be savored more than once.

Nights When Nothing Happened by Simon Han

Under the tranquil night skies, the Chengs: Liang, Patty, Jack and Annabel are trying their best to cobble together the definition of a family in Plano, Texas. Each brings the weight of his/her experience, however short-lived, to the assemblage. Jack spends his very early years in China while his parents are still trying to lay the foundation for the American dream. That vision threatens to crumble because of Annabel’s forceful personality and the unnamed burdens the rest bear. “Only in America are people naive enough to name everything they see,” Liang thinks. The unexamined life though is no picnic either. 

The Book of Rosy: A Mother's Story of Separation at the Border by Rosayra Pablo Cruz and Julie Schwietert Collazo

Yes, this is Rosayra Pablo Cruz’s story about her migration from Guatemala to the United States and paying a steep price in the process. The moving book also serves two larger purposes: it puts a face to the Trump administration’s cruel zero tolerance policies that have separated parents from their children at the U.S.-Mexico border. Second, it explores how Rosy’s life intersected with that of Julie Schwietert Collazo, founder of Immigrant Families Together, a nonprofit that has been reuniting separated families and helping them live full lives in their newly adopted country. Heartbreaking and hopeful, a home run.

Full disclosure: Julie's a dear friend and colleague.

Take Me Apart by Sara Sligar

Miranda Brand might have been in the spotlight as a famous photographer but who was she really? And how did she die? Did her handsome son have anything to do with it? Archivist Kate Aitken has moved to Callinas, a plush California beachside town to take on the work of archiving her subject’s personal belongings. But as Kate digs deeper the story she finds tends to tear her own fragile self apart. Sligar’s debut is a rewarding mystery centered on obsession, womanhood and fragility told through the lens of an increasingly unreliable narrator. Sure to be a smash summer hit.

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

Brit Bennett does it again. Her brilliant compulsively readable novel explores the everlasting bond between twins Desiree and Stella Vignes who grow up under the shadow of a vicious hate crime. The Black girls come of age in a fictional Louisiana town populated with people who look like them: they can pass off as white. Bennett explores the fluidity of identity through various angles: “Being anyone else was the thrill. To transform into a different person in plain sight, nobody around her even able to tell,” remembers Stella as she slips into a life unrecognizable even to her own self.