PEOPLE’s Fall Picks
A latecomer to the Fall Reading sweeps, the new issue of People magazine features the “Best Books of Fall” (available in print only).
Among the nine selections is Loner by Teddy Wayne (S&S; OverDrive Sample). People writes that “The dark narrative highlights hot-button issues on today’s campuses, making it seem all too real.”
Just released this week, the book is gaining attention. Maureen Corrigan gave it a strong review on Fresh Air yesterday, saying the novel, set in Harvard, “ultimately becomes a powerful and even a somewhat touching suspense story about a first-year student who finds himself outclassed in ways neither he nor the reader could possibly anticipate.”
Additional Buzz: Lit Hub ran this a compelling annotation from an Indie bookseller in their fall reading list:
“My quick pitch for Loner is ‘Humbert Humbert goes to Harvard.’ Teddy Wayne, author of the Bieber-inspired novel The Love Song of Jonny Valentine, drops his readers inside his young characters’ heads with a vibrant sense of authenticity and authority that is almost intoxicating. In Loner, you realize far too late how far off the rails you’ve followed its first-year student protagonist in his obsessions.”–Alex Meriwether, Harvard Bookstore
A review is scheduled for the New York Times Book Review, September 25.
People also lists the memoir When in French: Love in a Second Language, Lauren Collins (PRH/Penguin; PenguinAudio/BOT; OverDrive Sample).
The only source to include this title among their picks, the magazine says Collin’s efforts to better communicate with her husband by learning his native language, “A laugh-out-loud memoir about love, culture and belonging.”
Additional Buzz: The New York Times reviews it in the forthcoming Sunday BR, writing it is “far more ambitious than the average memoir about moving abroad … a thoughtful, beautifully written meditation on the art of language and intimacy.”
Tana French’s The Trespasser (PRH/Viking; Penguin Audio/BOT) has been featured on many other lists. People calls it, “Atmospheric and unputdownable.”
Additional Buzz: It gained the attention of both librarians and booksellers, making the LibraryReads and Indie Next lists. It is no stranger to Fall Reading lists either, Entertainment Weekly, Amazon’s Editors, BuzzFeed, and New York Magazine have all given it the nod.
The other six titles the list are:
Not Dead Yet: The Memoir, Phil Collins (PRH/Crown Archetype, October 25, 2016;RH Audio).
The Princess Diarist, Carrie Fisher (PRH/Blue Rider Press, November 22, 2016; Penguin Audio).
Today Will Be Different, Maria Semple (Hachette/Little, Brown, October 4, 2016; Hachette Audio).
Swing Time, Zadie Smith (PRH/Penguin, November 15, 2016; Penguin Audio).
Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen (S&S, September 27, 2016; S&S Audio).
Hungry Heart: Adventures in Life, Love, and Writing, Jennifer Weiner (S&S/Atria, October 11, 2016; S&S Audio).