Welcome to Today in Books, our daily round-up of literary headlines at the intersection of politics, culture, media, and more.
The New York Times’ Best Books of June
Last week, we took a look at the books The New York Times highlighted as the best of the summer. Now, with the start of the month, they’ve shared their most anticipated releases of June. Of course, there is some overlap—Ann Patchett’s Whistler and Maggie O’Farrell’s Land, for instance—but June’s list also zooms in to include the chaotic romance debut They All Fall in Love at the End by Haili Blassingame and Sublimation by Isabel J. Kim. There’s also a memoir by Lavern Cox (Transcendent), fabulist lit fic by Amitav Ghosh (Ghost-Eye), the latest by the Pulitzer Prize-winning Andrew Sean Greer (Villa Coco), gothic fantasy by YA horror/fantasy-author-turned-adult-author Melissa Albert (The Children), and more.
The Best Books to Read This Pride, According to Everyone and Their Mother
Pride Month is on and poppin’, which means these Pride Reading Lists are on and poppin’, too. The month has only just started, but we already have lists by Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org, and Goodreads. It looks like John of John by Douglas Stuart is That Girl. Not only has Oprah chosen it as her latest book club pick, it’s also on everyone’s must-read Pride list. Looking at the lists side by side, Amazon’s round-up is the shortest and the least diverse (tsk), Goodreads’ is the biggest and newest, and Bookshop.org’s is the most expansive.
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One thing I can get behind when it comes to Amazon’s list, though, is the mix of older, recent, and new titles. It’s easy to continuously get swept up in what’s new and forget good stuff that came out before. Goodreads, on the other hand, is good for just the opposite—its Pride list is comprised of 160 new and recent books. Among them, I’m most excited to read There’s Only One Sin in Hollywood by Rasheed Newson, Muñeca by Cynthia Gómez, Whidbey by T Kira Madden, and quite a few others. From Bookshop.org’s list, there’s a poetry collection (SOULMATE AS A VERB by Kelsey L. Smoot), a cookbook (Everyone’s Table by Gregory Gourdet and JJ Goode), and a picture book (From the Stars in the Sky to the Fish in the Sea by Kai Cheng Thom, illustrated by Kai Yun Ching and Wai-Yant Li) I’d love to get involved with.
Also, it feels worth mentioning that one of this year’s biggest books, Kin by Tayari Jones, is on the Goodreads list. I still haven’t read it, so I’m pleasantly surprised to find out it features queer characters. Haili Blassingam’s debut, mentioned earlier among the NYT’s best of June releases, made it to the Goodreads round-up as well.
*Bonus tip*: Bookshop.org is giving 15% off the books listed in their Pride Reading Lists.
Can We MARA (Make America Read Again)?
Brian Bannon, the chief librarian of the New York Public Library, answers this question in a recent op-ed for The New York Times. He starts off with some seemingly contradictory stats, like how more New Yorkers are borrowing books from the New York Public Library compared to 15 years ago, but America overall is reading less. This makes sense to me as someone who lived in NYC. The city has to be one of the most bookish in the country. I’ve literally seen people reading while walking down the street. The rest of the country, though…eek. Pretty much all the things we’ve been hearing as being counterproductive to reading—increased phone time, decreased attention spans, etc.—are, in fact, reducing reading time. Despite the decreased interest, Bannon thinks we can get back right. He suggests, unsurprisingly, investing more in library collections, but also encourages facilitating reading in less obvious places, like laundromats and barber shops.
Read These Books by d/Deaf Authors for the Read Harder Challenge
We’re now on task #11 of our Read Harder Challenge: Read a book by a d/Deaf author. This list includes a graphic novel, memoirs, a thriller, and more. It comes courtesy of Book Riot writer Kendra Winchester, who speaks on our need to appreciate and recognize disability culture more, which is one of the reasons why Disability Pride Month exists. That’s in July, but we celebrate the homies all year round here.
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