Next Week’s Fiction
The debut to watch this week is Cleaning Nabokov’s House by Leslie Daniels (Touchstone). It follows a woman rebuilding her life after losing her children to her ex-husband. It’s an in-house favorite at S&S because it “hits the sweet spot of being both literary and commercial.” PW agrees, “Despite the curiosities of the grief-to-gumption plot, Daniels’s writing is slick and her characters richly detailed, and even when it dips into sheer goofiness, it’s still a pleasure to read.” Blackstone publishes the unabridged audio and a large print version is coming from Thorndike in July (9781410438478; $30.99). The author lives in Ithaca, NY.
Usual Suspects
Sing You Home by Jody Picoult (Atria) follows a custody battle for fertilized embryos between a lesbian couple and one of their newly religious ex-husbands. Booklist says “Picoult’s gripping novel explores all sides of the hot-button issue.” It has a 150,000 copy first printing, and includes a CD of songs that correspond to each chapter.
Minding Frankie by Maeve Binchy (Knopf) takes place in a closely knit Irish neighborhood where a young alcoholic struggles with unexpected fatherhood. Library Journal calls it “an enjoyable novel about life, love, and second chances.”
The Night Season by Chelsea Cain (Minotaur/Macmillan) is, amazingly, the fourth novel featuring Portland detective Archie Sheridan. The Wall Street Journal features the author today, calling the new book Cain’s “tamest to date” and says her “bid to reach a broad, mainstream audience without disappointing Gretchen fans may prove tricky.”
The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss (DAW) is a continuation of the 2007 fantasy novel The Name of the Wind, in which an innkeeper recalls a life of heroic deeds. Library Journal declares it “reminiscent in scope of Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series and similar in feel to the narrative tour de force of The Arabian Nights, this masterpiece of storytelling will appeal to lovers of fantasy on a grand scale.”
Rodin’s Debutante by Ward Just (Houghton Mifflin) follows a boy’s adolescence and early adulthood in Chicago during the mid-20th century. Entertainment Weekly gives it an A-, “Don’t be misled by the title; this engaging coming-of-age tale has little to do with either Auguste Rodin or a debutante.”
River Marked by Patricia Briggs (Ace) is book six in the supernatural Mercy Thompson series.
Children’s Books
Fancy Nancy: Aspiring Artist by Jane O’Connor and illustrated by Robin Preiss Glasser (HarperCollins) is a children’s book about the artistic aspirations of a little girl with glitter markers.