Books with buzz
Free Press literary editor flags 12 titles to watch for in early 2024
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 20/01/2024 (963 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
If you’re a book lover, chances are there was at least a tome or two tucked under the tree for you over the holidays.
But the more voracious readers out there might already be looking for new fiction or non-fiction to consume in the coming months — or for what’s next to be added to the teetering bedside stack of books. With the onslaught of new novels, short-story collections, volumes of essays, memoirs and more, it’s easy for some upcoming books to get lost in the proverbial shuffle.
Here are a dozen buzz-worthy, can’t-miss books to watch for in the months to come.
Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation
By Dr. Jen Gunter (Random House Canada, Jan. 23)
The Winnipeg-born, California-based Gunter came to prominence with her books The Vagina Bible and The Menopause Manifesto. In her latest (which she’ll launch in Winnipeg in March), Gunter works to dispel myths and misconceptions about menstruation, combining an arsenal of facts with her trademark non-nonsense feminist perspective.
Alphabetical Diaries
By Sheila Heti (Knopf Canada, Feb. 6)
For her latest, the 2022 Governor General’s Award for Fiction winner (for her novel Pure Colour) collected the last 10 years of her journals (over 500,000 words) and loaded them into a spreadsheet. Seeking patterns and repetitions, she reordered the sentences alphabetically, discovering surprising revelations and heightened insight into her way of thinking.
Fourteen Days: A Collaborative Novel
Edited by Margaret Atwood and Douglas Preston (Harper, Feb. 6)
This literary puzzle of a novel offers a cast of characters in a tenement in New York’s Lower East Side around the time of the COVID-19 pandemic. The catch — each of the many characters in the novel has been written by a different writer from a group called the Authors Guild (including Dave Eggers, Tommy Orange, Celeste Ng, Emma Donoghue and many more), and the reader’s not told which author wrote which character.
Wrong Norma
By Anne Carson (New Directions, Feb. 6)
The Toronto-born titan of poetry and essays returns with a collection of 25 pieces of poetic prose non-fiction. Subject-wise her essays run the gamut in terms of subject matter, from her father to Roget’s Thesaurus, snow, Joseph Conrad and more. Images created by Carson are also scattered throughout the book.
Wandering Stars
By Tommy Orange (McClelland & Stewart, Feb. 27)
The California-based Cheyenne/Arapaho author’s follow-up novel to his 2018 breakout debut There There offers echoes of the residential school experience in his latest. A survivor of the 1864 Sand Creek Massacre is forced to learn English and adopt Christianity, as is his son, who is brutalized by his father’s former jailer. In the present day, members of a Cheyenne family deal with the fallout of a shooting that happened in There There.
Parasol Against the Axe
By Helen Oyeyemi (Hamish Hamilton, March 5)
The author of Gingerbread and Peaces has set her new novel in Prague, and the city is as much a character as Hero, in town for her friend Sophie’s bachelorette party. The city seems to be messing with her, and the text in a book about Prague seems to change every time Hero opens it. Notable historical Czech figures begin appearing around town, offering bizarre insight about life, before a third woman from Hero and Sophie’s past shows up and wreaks havoc.
Until August
By Gabriel García Márquez, translated by Anne McLean (Viking, March 12)
Before the legendary Colombian author’s death in 2014, he had been battling dementia while writing Until August, and insisted it not be published posthumously. Ten years later, his sons have decided to go ahead and publish the book, which follows the annual trip of a middle-aged woman to the Caribbean, where her mother is buried, each August. Each year the woman grapples with new notions of love and freedom — as well as feelings of regret.
Who’s Afraid of Gender?
By Judith Butler (Knopf Canada, March 19)
Currently based in New York, the iconic author (of Gender Trouble, among others) and thinker returns with a look at how anxiety around gender is impacting and heightening reactionary politics. Butler looks at how the “gender” became a catch-all term for a range of anxieties, and how various cultures have used and/or understand notions of gender to tighten control over society and erode public discourse.
The Peace: A Warrior’s Journey
By Roméo Dallaire (Random House Canada, April 2)
The retired general and former senator adds to his writerly career (which includes the memoir Shake Hands With the Devil) with a reflection on the principles of how conflicts develop, the ways we react to the horrors of war — near or far — and the path forward towards true peace. Dallaire emphasizes the need to look at the ties that bind all of humanity together and act accordingly.
Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder
By Salman Rushdie (Knopf Canada, April 16)
For the first time, Rushdie details in his own words the August 2022 attempt on his life in New York as he was about to give a public lecture — a knife attack which left him blind in one eye and without the use of one of his hands. He ruminates on art, life, loss and more as he details the path to finding the strength to continue.
Eleven Huskies: A Dr. Bannerman Vet Mystery
By Dr. Philipp Schott (ECW Press, May 14)
The Winnipeg veterinarian and recently prolific author reconnects with his fictional rural Manitoba vet (with a nose for solving crimes) in his latest. While on summer vacation at a fishing lodge in northern Manitoba, a local team of huskies are poisoned and a float plane crashes into the lake, killing all on board. As a forest fire ignites, Bannerman is cut off from the outside world as he hurries to figure out the plight of the dogs and the plane’s passengers.
Coexistence: Stories
By Billy-Ray Belcourt (Hamish Hamilton, May 21)
The Driftpile Cree Nation author (now based in Vancouver) of A History of My Brief Body and A Minor Chorus offers a collection of 10 stories set everywhere from university campuses, reserves, literary festivals and beyond. No matter the setting, the stories are linked by the overarching themes of Indigenous love and loneliness, with characters searching for connections.
books@freepress.mb.ca
Ben Sigurdson
Literary editor, drinks writer
Ben Sigurdson is the Free Press‘s literary editor and drinks writer. He graduated with a master of arts degree in English from the University of Manitoba in 2005, the same year he began writing Uncorked, the weekly Free Press drinks column. He joined the Free Press full time in 2013 as a copy editor before being appointed literary editor in 2014. Read more about Ben.
In addition to providing opinions and analysis on wine and drinks, Ben oversees a team of freelance book reviewers and produces content for the arts and life section, all of which is reviewed by the Free Press’s editing team before being posted online or published in print. It’s part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Winter/spring 2024 books preview
Ben Sigurdson
Literary editor, drinks writer
Ben Sigurdson is the Free Press‘s literary editor and drinks writer. He graduated with a master of arts degree in English from the University of Manitoba in 2005, the same year he began writing Uncorked, the weekly Free Press drinks column. He joined the Free Press full time in 2013 as a copy editor before being appointed literary editor in 2014. Read more about Ben.
In addition to providing opinions and analysis on wine and drinks, Ben oversees a team of freelance book reviewers and produces content for the arts and life section, all of which is reviewed by the Free Press’s editing team before being posted online or published in print. It’s part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
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