Set on an imaginary island at the twilight of the Ottoman Empire, “Nights of Plague,” by the Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk, is a chronicle of an epidemic, a murder mystery and a winking literary game.
Two new books on Berlin track the city through decades of growth, economic desperation, artistic innovation, Nazi terror, political division, and reunification.
Berlin: Life and Death in the City at the Center of the World by Sinclair McKay
The Undercurrents: A Story of Berlin by Kirsty Bell
Jared Kushner’s anti-ideological ideology is to get the best deal for whomever he represents—the business he was born into, the business he married into, and, most of all, himself.
Breaking History: A White House Memoir by Jared Kushner
Our new issue is finally online, ft Mahmood Mandani on leaving Uganda, Tony Wood on Russia’s energy crisis, @MJCarter10 at Westminster Abbey, @danielsoar on Ian McEwan, @amiasrinivasan on Andrea Dworkin, T.J. Clark on painting & poetry & a @Jon_McN cover.
This week’s @TheTLS , featuring @RichardEvans36 on German militarism; Laura Thompson on Raine Spencer; A. N. Wilson on Turgenev; @colincraiggrant on Eureka Day; Claire Lowdon on Kamila Shamsie; @rauchway on interest rates – and more.
After Ethiopia’s Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed, ended a decades-long border conflict, he was heralded as a unifier. Now critics accuse him of tearing the country apart.
This September 23, 2022 @TheTLS:Nicola Shulman on the obituarist’s art; @LeoLensing on Bambi; Jonathan Rée on rules; @Dr_Dimitra_Fimi on The Rings of Power; Eric Naiman on Yuri Felsen – and more.
When Abdulrazak Gurnah won the Nobel Prize in literature last year, most Americans had never read anything by this fascinating author.
Born in 1948 in Tanzania, Gurnah fled to England after the 1964 uprising in Zanzibar. Over the years, he’s written 10 critically-acclaimed novels.
The latest, “Afterlives” (Riverhead), offers an intimate look at village life in East Africa during the period of German colonialism at the start of the 20th century. This is a book that reclaims forgotten history and honors lost people in a way that’s heartbreaking and revelatory.
Maggie O’Farrell’s novel “Hamnet,” about the death of William Shakespeare’s only son, was one of the best books of 2020.
Now O’Farrell is back with “The Marriage Portrait” (Knopf), a terrific historical thriller that drops us into the panicked mind of a teenage girl who knows her husband is plotting to kill her.
The girl is Lucrezia de’ Medici, immortalized by Robert Browning’s poem, “My Last Duchess.” History tells us she died in 1561 before she could celebrate her first anniversary, but O’Farrell will have you guessing ’til the very last page.
What if Americans elected a narcissistic psychopath to the White House?
Some people might say we’ve already seen what that would be like. But James Patterson’s breathless new thriller, “Blowback” (Little, Brown), takes that scenario to the brink of World War III.
Written with Brendan DuBois, “Blowback” imagines a president determined to defeat America’s enemies once and for all.
A pair of secret agents are honored to help the president’s plan – until they realize he’s about to destroy the country.
“Blowback” by James Patterson and Brendan DuBois (Little, Brown and Company), in Hardcover, Large Print Trade Paperback, eBook and Audio formats, available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Indiebound
Mary Rodgers, who died in 2014, lived her life in the melodies of American musical theater. She was Richard Rodgers’ daughter, composer Adam Guettel’s mother, and Stephen Sondheim’s friend – and she was an accomplished composer and author herself.
Through painful relationships and happy ones, disappointments and successes, Rodgers is never anything but candid, forgiving and witty. So, take a seat and let the curtain rise.
Boomers Daily 