A Hologram for the King by Dave Eggers
“Public and private explorations come together, and as this groundbreaking writer grows wiser and deeper and more melancholy, evolving from telling his own stories to voicing America’s, he might be asking us how we can bring the best parts of our past into a planetary future.” –Pico Iyer, The New York Times
The Watch by Joydeep Roy-Bhattacharya
“The soldiers’ stories are an affecting collage of contemporary American life, timeless concerns, and divided loyalties. But the raw emotional power of the story is often traded for cleverness in the telling.” –A light drinker, The New Yorker
Meander: East to West Indirectly Along A Turkish River by Jeremy Seal
“The river's name seemed to encourage Mr. Seal to wander, ‘aimlessness being a productive virtue I had mislaid and thought to rediscover.’ These peregrinations, pleasant though they are, jar with the river's urgent plight, and the cumulative effect is underwhelming.” –Alice Albinia, The Wall Street Journal
The Fishing Fleet: Husband-Hunting in the Raj by Anne de Courcy
“The Fishing Fleet is a fascinating and evocatively told history, which summons both the exoticism of India under British rule and the lives and characters of the women who risked all for a husband.” –Carl Wilkinson, The Financial Times
Paris, I Love You but You’re Bringing Me Down by Rosecrans Baldwin
“Ultimately, Paris, I Love You will never be regarded as an ‘important’ book in the expat canon, but that doesn’t mean it is without its small appeals. The result is less Memoirs of Montparnasse and more a portrait of an artist as a young professional.” –Eric Been, The New Republic
Breasts: A Natural and Unnatural History by Florence Williams
“Next dude who talks to my cleavage instead of my face will be expected to send 20 bucks to Planned Parenthood.” –Lindy West, Slate