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The Möbius Book by Catherine Lacey

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The Möbius Book by Catherine Lacey
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I was once graced the chance to go behind the scenes of a city aquarium and surprise-allowed to hand feed a shark. Noticing my hesitation, the friend-of-a-friend who got us “backstage” assured me I was totally safe: just hold the food a certain way, as once the shark’s eyes break the waterline they are near-to-completely blind. I don’t know why this fact dazzled me, as my vision also goes all weird below the waterline, but it stuck with me. The bifurcated-’n’-flipped novella/biography The Möbius Book gives us the above/below-the-waterline view into an epic point in Catherine Lacey’s life, but is also a wonderfully entertaining example of the Where’s-Waldo-ness of any author’s personal life hiding in plain sight within their fictions. And CL’s “shark” story is way more jaw-droppingly interesting.

The Möbius Book by Catherine Lacey, (List Price: $27, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 9780374615406, June 2025)

Reviewed by Ian McCord, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Too Soon by Betty Shamieh

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Too Soon by Betty Shamieh
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Too Soon by Betty Shamieh is a fantastic, delightfully funny, and meaningful read. Spanning over fifty years, you’ll meet three generations of Palestinian American women who are tough as nails and want more choices and something better for each generation, even as the pull of tradition informs their values. Zoya, Naya, and Arabella all have to negotiate for the chance to voice their true selves despite societal constraints. This would be a great book club choice for discussion.

Too Soon by Betty Shamieh, (List Price: $28.99, Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster, 9781668046548, March 2025)

Reviewed by Rachel Watkins, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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The Dad Rock That Made Me a Woman by Niko Stratis

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The Dad Rock That Made Me a Woman by Niko Stratis
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Niko Stratis’ essay collection The Dad Rock That Made Me a Woman begins in the realm of typical dad rock, describing the music heard in her own dad’s headphones throughout her childhood (accessing the same emotions I have when I hear the opening guitar riff of “Money for Nothing” or the first chords of “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road”). By the end of this transformative collection, however, Stratis has redefined dad rock by bringing you along through her own story. It helps, of course, that Stratis and I share the same dad rock playlist, from the now-traditional realms of The National (the in my mind quintessential “Sad Dads”) and Radiohead, to the slightly off-kilter choices of Neko Case or Julien Baker. Never did I think I would be read so thoroughly by an essay collection featuring all of the sad man music I hold so dear to my heart, or by the simple description of saying a person looks like they’re very into Pavement. This collection is tenderhearted and open, written in straightforward yet staggering prose and as someone who came into themselves listening to several of these same acts, I can’t help but adore this collection and rush to put it in the hands of everyone I know.

The Dad Rock That Made Me a Woman by Niko Stratis, (List Price: $27.95, University of Texas Press, 9781477331484, May 2025)

Reviewed by Mikey LaFave, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Suggested in the Stars by Yoko Tawada

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Suggested in the Stars by Yoko Tawada
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The characters that populate Yoko Tawada’s Suggested in the Stars are out of step with one another but cross paths, time, and space, all with what can only be described through Hamlet’s words, words, words. Tawada returns to the characters from Scattered All Over the Earth and their search for Hiruko’s homeland, Susanoo’s language, and the connection between them born of globalization and climate change. Full of light climate dystopia, this book turns your brain around through Tawada’s (and her translator Margaret Mitsutani’s) deft use of language. I am already greatly anticipating the third installment in this trilogy in 2025. I need more of this weird little series, but also don’t want it to end!

Suggested in the Stars by Yoko Tawada, (List Price: $16.95, New Directions, 9780811237932, October 2024)

Reviewed by Mikey LaFave, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Toto by Hyewon Yum

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Toto by Hyewon Yum
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I adore Toto: the book as well as the birthmark that bears the name! It’s lovely to encounter a story that focuses on learning to embrace what makes you different without hitting you over the head in case you’d otherwise miss the moral of the story. Yum’s evocative, warm illustrations and gentle prose deserve a place on your shelf.

Toto by Hyewon Yum, (List Price: $18.99, Neal Porter Books, 9780823453894, January 2025)

Reviewed by Janet Geddis, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Blob by Maggie Su

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Blob by Maggie Su
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Built on the premise of Build-a-Bear gone funhouse mirror build-a-boyfriend, Blob really is a love story, but maybe not in the way that you expect. Sure, Vi finds a sentient blob outside of a drag show in her Midwest college town, and sure she tries to turn that blob into the perfect boyfriend through the power of cereal, television, and wishful thinking, but at the core Blob is about falling back in love with the parts of yourself that you’ve thought you lost forever.

Blob by Maggie Su, (List Price: $26.99, Harper, 9780063358645, January 2025)

Reviewed by Mikey LaFave, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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To See an Owl by Matthew Cordell

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To See an Owl by Matthew Cordell
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I love a story about a young girl’s perseverance. Young Janie is singularly minded and deeply passionate about owls, all she wants is to see one, to witness “magic” that is real and here and accessible.

To See an Owl by Matthew Cordell, (List Price: $18.99, Random House Studio, 9780593649893, January 2025)

Reviewed by Hannah DeCamp, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Woo Woo by Ella Baxter

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Woo Woo by Ella Baxter
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Ella Baxter‘s novel Woo Woo joins a handful of brilliant 2024 books featuring female creatives (All Fours by Miranda July, Colored Television by Danzy Senna, Exhibit by R. L. Kwon). The daily struggle and balancing act of being a productive artist is examined here as conceptual artist Sabine preps for a huge solo exhibition. She is trying desperately to be seen while also hiding from a stalker. She wants to use social media rather than be used by it and all the while her marriage feels off-kilter. Woo Woo gives us insights into a woman trying to come into her own while forces want to make her smaller.

Woo Woo by Ella Baxter, (List Price: $27, Catapult, 9781646222551, December 2024)

Reviewed by Rachel Watkins, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo

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With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo
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You don’t see teen mothers in YA much, and I am so grateful Acevedo has introduced us to Emoni, a seventeen-year-old who is a loving mother, a devoted granddaughter, and an amazing cook. Readers will warm immediately to her story of juggling school, family, romance, and her culinary passion. Sprinkled with magical realism and brimming with heart, With the Fire on High is a dish everyone should dig into!

With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo, (List Price: $15.99, Quill Tree Books, 9780062662842, March 2021)

Reviewed by Hannah DeCamp, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Canoes by Maylis De Kerangal

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Canoes by Maylis De Kerangal
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Stories with a strong focus on reading mouths and interpreting voices, relevant for a time when facemasks are coming off. Though this isn’t the main focus, it coats each unrelated story in a relatable primer.

Canoes by Maylis De Kerangal, (List Price: $19, Archipelago, 9781953861962, October 2024)

Reviewed by Ian McCord, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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The Wilderness by Aysegül Savas

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The Wilderness by Aysegül Savas
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In this slim volume, Savas beautifully explores the “wilderness” of postpartum and the mythologies that surround the first forty days after birth. Each short entry dives deep into the chaos of new motherhood—the newborn days full of paradox and pain, the deep wells of care and emotion that emerge, the mystery and lore of the mother-child bond. Savas argues that we mothers emerge from that beginning inexorably changed; we enter the wilderness and cannot help but emerge a bit wild ourselves. A perfect companion for reading in snippets during nursing sessions or wakeful nights—this is a book for anyone who enjoyed Jazmina Barrera’s Linea Nigra or Rivka Galchen’s Little Labors.

The Wilderness by Aysegül Savas, (List Price: $17.95, Transit Books, 9798893389098, October 2024)

Reviewed by Hannah DeCamp, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison

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Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison
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What Jonathan Evison has done in Lawn Boy is give us an unlikely hero in Mike Muñoz, who tells it like it is and just wants a fair shake. Only twenty-two but already beaten down, Mike knows what it means to go hungry, to share a house with too many people, to never get ahead. Lawn Boy covers issues like racism, immigrant rights, and homophobia in the same breath as dating misadventures, Mike’s fledgling topiary carving artistry, and the pretentious writing MFA candidates produce. It is just this type of book (relatable, funny, entertaining) that could get us talking about social justice.

Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison, (List Price: $17.99, Algonquin Books, 9781616209230, March 2019)

Reviewed by Rachel Watkins, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Herscht 07769 by László Krasznahorkai

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Herscht 07769 by László Krasznahorkai
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Herscht opens as Gentle Giant in a Harsh World fable, then morphs into a checklist killfest revenge tale a la Death Rides a Horse, in a transition so sleek you’re tricked into feeling at peace in the heart of its violent outcome. Krasznahorkai books read like laminar flow, daunting and seemingly unreal until you set eye to sentence and the world explodes in all directions. But all in all, it’s just gravity and friction doing their thang. All the Krasznahorkai ingredients are here: heroes are comical despicables, villains risible despisables, a has-been town rundown and endbound, unnurtured nature in retaliature, and a long long sentence to rule them all.

Herscht 07769 by László Krasznahorkai, (List Price: $18.95, New Directions, 9780811231534, September 2024)

Reviewed by Ian McCord, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Colored Television by Danzy Senna

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Colored Television by Danzy Senna
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Danzy Senna’s Colored Television is a masterpiece and a gut-wrenching story of one woman’s need to create art through her writing, provide a safe home for her family, stay connected to her artist husband (who never sells any paintings) and all without the creature comforts everyone has. There is a desperation in Jane, a frantic pulling of herself forward, her chin and chest pointing towards what she needs, and this tension and desire is a bolt of electricity throughout. Based in Los Angeles and centered around the bureaucracy of academia and the BS of television writing, Colored Television examines race, class, social status, and gender issues with such a sharp edge you’ll be forever changed.

Colored Television by Danzy Senna, (List Price: $29, Riverhead Books, 9780593544372, September 2024)

Reviewed by Rachel Watkins, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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Bluff by Danez Smith

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Bluff by Danez Smith
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In Bluff, Danez Smith reckons with the role of art and poetry as a poet from the Twin Cities in 2020 and beyond. Bluff offers a meditation on the power of art against a world and a system designed in opposition. Particularly, the poems and mini-essays in this collection offer a reckoning of the Twin Cities and Minnesota through its history, its present, and its hopeful future. In “My Beautiful End of the World” – my favorite from Bluff – Smith asks “Who does this country believe deserves beauty? Who is allowed nature?” – a question that metonymously stands in for the question at the core of this collection – who is allowed beauty?

Bluff by Danez Smith, (List Price: $18, Graywolf Press, 9781644452981, August 2024)

Reviewed by Mikey LaFave, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia

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