The Westport Library Resource Guides: Sybil's List: October 2016

Best New Books from Sybil Steinberg

Date: Friday, October 28 from 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm

Location: The McManus Room

Westporter Sybil Steinberg, contributing editor and former book review section editor for Publishers Weekly, returns with her ever-popular talk on the best new reads. Get ready for your fall and winter reading with this critic’s expert overview of newly-published titles that are not to be missed.

Fiction (In Order of Presentation)

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
Publication Date: 2016-08-02
The literary sensation that combines reality and surrealism to imagine the escape route for slaves as an actual train.
Nutshell by Ian McEwan
Publication Date: 2016-09-13
Narrated by a precociously intelligent and articulate fetus and based on Hamlet, this clever novel has plenty of surprises.
Commonwealth by Ann Patchett
Publication Date: 2016-09-13
An absorbing story of two families broken by divorce but mended by the offspring whose lives are now intertwined.
Moonglow by Michael Chabon
Publication Date: 2016-11-22
The narrator, Chabon’s alter ego, describes his grandfather’s tumultuous life as it encapsulates an era of American history.
A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
Publication Date: 2016-09-06
The protagonist is sentenced to house arrest in one of Moscow’s grand old hotels. A colorfully observant and suspenseful historical novel.
The Wonder by Emma Donoghue
Publication Date: 2016-09-20
A psychological thriller set in an 1850s Irish village and inspired by historical cases of girls who claimed to be living without food.
Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
Publication Date: 2016-06-07
The legacy of slavery during generations of bloody war between the Fante and Asante tribes in Guyana is traced through seven generations.
The Mothers by Brit Bennett
Publication Date: 2016-10-11
An amazingly accomplished debut novel reflecting the lives of two young black women who experience intimacy and grief.
Still Here by Lara Vapnyar
Publication Date: 2016-08-02
Four ambitious Russian immigrants try to achieve the American Dream in New York. Witty and insightful.
News of the World by Paulette Jiles
Publication Date: 2016-10-04
In lawless Texas after the Civil War, a 70-year-old widower attempts to return a young girl captured by the Kiowa tribe to her family.
Transit by Rachel Cusk
Publication Date: 2017-01-17
When a writer moves to London, a tapestry of personal, moral and artistic questions emerges in a transition to her new life.
We Love You, Charlie Freeman by Kaitlyn Greenidge
Publication Date: 2016-03-08
A black woman and her family are employed to teach sign language to a chimpanzee in a secretive research institution.
The Honeymoon by Dinitia Smith
Publication Date: 2016-05-03
The fascinating life of Victorian novelist George Eliot is vividly portrayed in this speculative historical novel.
The Nix by Nathan Hill
Publication Date: 2016-08-30
Extending over eight decades and ranging among Iowa, Chicago, and Norway, this ambitious debut is a shaggy Dickensian saga.
A Gambler's Anatomy by Jonathan Lethem
Publication Date: 2016-10-18
An international backgammon hustler who thinks he’s psychic moves through the underworld in this dark thriller.

Fiction Continued (In Order of Presentation)

Barkskins by Annie Proulx
Publication Date: 2016-06-14
At more than 700 pages, this generational saga explores the despoliation of our forests and the concomitant destruction of Native American culture.
Everyone Brave Is Forgiven by Chris Cleave
Publication Date: 2016-05-03
A tragic love triangle takes place in Britain and Malta as these nations endure WWII. Inspired by the author’s grandparents.
Noonday by Pat Barker
Publication Date: 2016-03-08
In London during the Blitz, a woman and her husband confront the possibility of death, and a former suitor creates complications. Third in a series.
Today Will Be Different by Maria Semple
Publication Date: 2016-10-04
Resolved that she’ll be a better wife and mother, a woman is frustrated by a series of cleverly humorous mistakes and accidents.
Hot Milk by Deborah Levy
Publication Date: 2016-07-12
An exquisitely written but painful account of an adult daughter tyrannized by her hypochondriac mother.
The Boat Rocker by Ha Jin
Publication Date: 2016-10-25
A Chinese-American journalist battles the wide corruption of the Chinese government and America’s compliance with tyranny.
Black Water by Louise Doughty
Publication Date: 2016-09-13
The extreme moral quandary that propels this intriguing thriller focuses on one man’s guilt about events in Indonesia.

Nonfiction (In Order of Presentation)

Everybody Behaves Badly by Lesley M. M. Blume
Publication Date: 2016-06-07
This focuses on Ernest Hemingway’s years in Paris and Spain, and the friends he turned into fictional characters in The Sun Also Rises.
The Pigeon Tunnel by John Le Carré
Publication Date: 2016-09-06
An unconventional memoir with fascinating revelations about the author’s often dangerous research for his books.
Avid Reader by Robert Gottlieb
Publication Date: 2016-09-13
As editor in chief of Simon and Schuster, Knopf, and The New Yorker, Gottlieb was a major player in the publishing industry.
American Heiress by Jeffrey Toobin
Publication Date: 2016-08-02
Toobin explores the enigma of Patty Hearst, heiress and gun-toting radical, and adds new information about her life
A House Full of Daughters by Juliet Nicolson
Publication Date: 2016-06-14
The granddaughter of Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicholson portrays the eccentric, creative women in her family’s history.
An Abbreviated Life by Ariel Leve
Publication Date: 2016-06-14
In a searing memoir, the talented journalist writes about her harrowing childhood with an emotionally disturbed mother.
Every Moment of a Fall by Carol E. Miller
Publication Date: 2016-05-13
Having survived a plane crash when she was 16, the author conquered 20 years of trauma with a new therapy called EMDR
Becoming Grandma by Lesley Stahl
Publication Date: 2016-04-05
More than an ecstatic celebration of grandparenting, this widens the personal view with interviews and interesting facts.
Alive, Alive Oh! by Diana Athill
Publication Date: 2016-01-04
Now 98, the author of Somewhere Near the End, again shares memories and ruminates about growing very old.