The Birdcatcher, by Gayl Jones, Beacon Press, September 2022.
Gal Jones is considered a recognized key figure in African American literature, Calvin Baker once called her "the best American novelist people may not know by name", and Tony Morrison called Jones her favorite author. In The Birdcatcher, the talented female sculptor Catherine Sugarg repeatedly tries to kill her husband, and the story is told by her close friend, the writer Amanda. Publishers Weekly commented that the book provides an in-depth demonstration of the connections between black women and their creative expression.
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands, translated by Kate Beaton, Drawn and Quarterly, September 2022.
Kate Beaton is a best-selling cartoonist in Canada who has written comic books such as Hark. This book can be seen as a graphic memoir of Kate. She retraces her career in the Alberta oil fields of Canada through comics, where she battles harsh sexism and loneliness in a remote place where men are particularly dominant. She also depicts the daily life of oil well workers through humorous strokes, telling the happiness and sorrow of the working class from their movements. According to Publishers Weekly, the book ultimately points to a deeper and broader story – humanity's growing dependence on fossil fuels in the context of globalization, and its social and environmental costs.
The Furrows: A Novel, by Namwali Serpell, Hogarth, September 2022.
Seiper is a Zambian writer who teaches in the United States. In this book, she makes a bold exploration of the motif of memory and grief. Cassandra's younger brother, Wayne, went missing in an accident when they were both very young. Circumstances changed the family, and their father chose to leave and start a new family elsewhere. The mother did not give up hope of searching and set up an organization to search for missing children. Cassandra grew up trying to find traces of her brother, and she saw his face on the faces of many people who passed by. Until in another accident, Cassandra meets another person who is also looking for something, and that person's name is also Wayne. Publishers Weekly argues that the book highlights a universal "sadness" emotion: the wounds of the past wash over the present forever like ocean waves. "Traces" is also a story about identity, dual consciousness, and even "wishful thinking" in family affection.
G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century, by Beverly Gage, Viking, November 2022.
Edgar Hoover was the first director of the FBI after its restructuring and the longest-serving director in history. He was a confidant, adviser and even rival to eight U.S. presidents. Franklin Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, and Nixon all had close dealings with him. During his long career, he has experienced many major events in the United States and the world, including the Kennedy assassination and Watergate, and he has participated in the suppression and criticism of many people, including Martin Luther King Jr. For Chinese readers, he is perhaps best known for his support for McCarthyism.
Yale historian Beverly Gage's biography of Hoover, based on newly released archival sources, creatively places Hoover at the center of our understanding of modern American history. Gage sought to point out how Hoover inherited a conservative value deeply ingrained in American society that explains why, even though he was understood as an authoritarian director, so many people still wanted him to be in office. Through Hoover's life, we can fully understand the trajectory of police power, racial ideology, and federal government power in the United States in the 20th century.
The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family, by Kerri Greenidge, Liveright, November 2022.
Sarah Grimke and Angelina Grimke were well-respected opponents of slavery in American history. As whites, they rejected a privileged life on the plantations of South Carolina and joined the protests in the North. Their anti-slavery pamphlets also became the most influential work during the American Civil War. But their older brother, a notoriously violent maniac, had a slave wife who bore him three sons, and the complicated relationship between the Grimke sisters and these three brothers became a window into slavery in the United States. The American historian Glenich has taken a unique approach to this 19th-century family, deepening our understanding of the struggle for race and gender equality from this particular perspective.
An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us by Ed Yong, Random House, June 2022.
Ed Dyong is a British science journalist who won the Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting in 2021 for his professional coverage of the coronavirus pandemic. In this new science work, he mainly explores the ability of animal senses. The song of whales can travel across the ocean, insects transmit information through plant stems and leaves, fish communicate through electrical signals, and even simple scallops have complex vision... All kinds of wonderful natural phenomena reveal the vast world that animals can perceive, which is difficult for humans to touch. Publishers Weekly called it the pinnacle of this year's science general reading.
Activities of Daily Living, by Lisa Hsiao Chen, W. W. Norton & Company, April 2022.
The book tells the story of Alice, a Taiwanese immigrant, who cares for her white stepfather who suffers from dementia. While caring for her stepfather, Alice is also engaged in research on a mysterious performing artist. The artist locked himself up for an entire year and then rang the bell every hour. Along with the study of the artist, Alice's life also underwent various changes. She watched her father's frailty and kept asking the question she cared about: What standard should we use to measure and evaluate our lives?
All the Lovers in the Night, by Mieko Kawakami, Europa Editions, May 2022.
Kawakami is the author of the best-selling book "Breasts and Eggs" and is known as one of the most unclassifiable Japanese novelists of the moment. " Publishers Weekly " commented that this " All Lovers in the Night " is the best in the writing plan of Kawakami Wei Shadow 's trilogy. It focuses on young professionals in Tokyo today, and tells the story of Fuyuko Irie, a freelance journalist in her 30s. Fuyuko Irie lives and works alone in Tokyo, hardly having to communicate deeply with anyone except her editor. One day, Fuyuko stops on the streets of Tokyo, sees her tired, monotonous, and clumsy reflection in the window, and is determined to change the status quo of her current life. However, change is always difficult. This book's observation and capture of the details of life are keen and insightful, and easily resonate with people.
The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness by Meghan O'Rourke, Riverhead Books, March 2022.
Among the various diseases that threaten human health, chronic diseases are often overlooked, but their dangers may be more persistent and pervasive than those of the most vigorous ones. What's more, so little is known about them, and most of them go undiagnosed and unrecognized. This book by the famous American non-fiction writer Megan O'Luke provides a comprehensive investigation and review of such "invisible" diseases, including autoimmune diseases, various post-treatment syndromes, and the more critical new crown epidemic and its sequelae. With decades of interviewing doctors, patients, and public health researchers, O'Luke has also traced the history of Western medicine, trying to examine chronic diseases from pathology, medical systems, and even perceptions, and reminding us from a sociological perspective that women, the working class, and people of color are particularly vulnerable to chronic diseases.
The Rabbit Hutch, by Tess Gunty, Knopf, August 2022.
Novelist Tess Gonty's book focuses on the social relationships between people today. A woman shares an apartment in an industrial area in Indiana with three teenage boys she doesn't like or understand, and the only thing they have in common is that they are all looking for meaning in their lives in confusion. Because of an accident, a conflict broke out between them. Through a fictional story, the novel attempts to highlight the common desire and obstacles of contemporary people to establish intimate connections with others.
Note: The cover title is a still from The Bookshop (2017).
Compiled by Liu Yaguang
Editor/Luo Dong
Proofreader/Liu Baoqing