Cody's 10 Years of Staff Picks

The mind-bending miniature historical epic is Sjon's specialty, and Moonstone: The Boy Who Never Was is no exception. But it is also Sjon's most realistic, accessible, and heartfelt work yet. It is the story of a young man on the fringes of a society that is itself at the fringes of the world--at what seems like history's most tumultuous,... Read more »

An autobiographical novel about growing up gay in a working-class town in Picardy.

“Every morning in the bathroom I would repeat the same phrase to myself over and over again . . . Today I’m really gonna be a tough guy.” Growing up in a poor village in northern France, all Eddy Bellegueule wanted was to be a man in the eyes of his family and...

An essay collection exploring his education as a man, writer, and activist—and how we form our identities in life and in art.

As a novelist, Alexander Chee has been described as “masterful” by Roxane Gay, “incendiary” by the New York Times, and “brilliant” by the Washington Post. With How to Write an Autobiographical Novel, his first collection...

Spanning eras, continents, and genres, CoDex 1962―twenty years in the making―is Sjón’s epic three-part masterpiece

Over the course of four dazzling novels translated into dozens of languages, Sjón has earned a global reputation as one of the world’s most interesting writers. But what the world has never been able to read is his great trilogy of...

Based on the wildly popular Instagram account @CrazyJewishMom, Kate Siegel's essay collection about life with the woman who redefined the term "helicopter mom."
 
There is nothing more wonderful than a mother’s love. There is also nothing more annoying. Who else can proudly insist that you’re perfect while simultaneously making you question every... Read more »

Broken People

“Broken People tells one man’s deeply personal story of confronting insecurities, obsessions, and frustrations while challenging many current cultural constructs. The pain and self-doubt will be recognized by many a reader, who will in equal measure cheer and thank Lansky for sharing a hopeful journey to forgiveness.”

Linda McLoughlin Figel, {pages} a bookstore

The definitive biography of America's greatest playwright from the celebrated drama critic of The New Yorker.

John Lahr has produced a theater biography like no other. Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh gives intimate access to the mind of one of the most brilliant dramatists of his century, whose plays reshaped the American theater...

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE directed by Denis Villeneuve, starring Timothée Chalamet, Josh Brolin, Jason Momoa, Zendaya, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Javier Bardem, Dave Bautista, Stellan Skarsgård, and Charlotte Rampling.

Set on the desert planet Arrakis, Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, who would become the mysterious man known as...

Will Sedgwick can’t believe that after months of searching for his oldest friend, Martin Easterbrook is found hiding in an attic like a gothic nightmare. Intent on nursing Martin back to health, Will kindly kidnaps him and takes him to the countryside to recover, well away from the world.

Martin doesn’t much care where he is or even how he got...

The award-winning poet Anne Carson reinvents a genre in Autobiography of Red, a stunning work that is both a novel and a poem, both an unconventional recreation of an ancient Greek myth and a wholly original coming-of-age story set in the present.

Geryon, a young boy who is also a winged red monster, reveals the volcanic terrain of his fragile,... Read more »

Bring Your Baggage and Don't Pack Light

“I love Helen Ellis! As usual, I listened to the audiobook from Libro.fm because her narration brings so much laughter to each story. Her stories are relatable, and she writes what we all say in our head. I grew up in South Carolina, so I can totally picture her in Alabama at the garage sale, telling jokes with friends, and simply being herself. Much love!”

Sara, Roundabout Books

NAMED ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF SUMMER 2018 BY O Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, New York Post, The Millions, Southern Living, POPSUGAR, The Wall Street Journal, Chicago Review of Books

Praised by the Washington Post as "Tennessee Williams . . . transposed to the twenty-first-century South," Nick White returns with a stunning... Read more »

Acclaimed author, historian, and Guggenheim Fellow Kevin Starr is a professor at the University of Southern California. His extensive knowledge shines through this concise, yet comprehensive, depiction of the most fascinating aspects in California's history. From its colonial beginnings through Governor Schwarzenegger's administration, the... Read more »

If you enjoyed What Belongs to You, then you’ll love Cleanness.

“I liked What Belongs to You, but I LOVED Cleanness. In this honest and utterly human work, Greenwell revisits the narrator and world of his previous novel. In beautifully crafted prose, he deftly captures the complexities of human interiority, identity, and sexuality. Where What Belongs to You offered a deep dive into the narrator's sense of self through the lens of a single relationship, Cleanness uses a kaleidoscopic and episodic structure to great effect. We move easily from the intimately personal to the global and political. Throughout the collection, Greenwell's narrator offers a deeply resonant look at growing up and living as a gay man, both in the American South and in Eastern Europe; falling in and out of love; and sex as an act of healing and of self-destruction. Greenwell is a gem of a writer, and he's a truly stellar reader. I both read a copy and listened to the audiobook, and Cleanness gains even more immediacy and empathy when it's voiced. Slim but never light, this volume cements Greenwell's place in my personal literary canon alongside the likes of Virginia Woolf. ”

Rayne, Rediscovered Books

A realistic and emotional look at a woman who falls into the grips of insanity written by the iconic American writer Sylvia Plath

“It is this perfectly wrought prose and the freshness of Plath’s voice in The Bell Jar that make this book enduring in its appeal.” — USA Today

The Bell Jar chronicles the crack-up of Esther Greenwood: brilliant,...

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • NAMED ONE OF TIME’S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST • ONE OF OPRAH’S “BOOKS THAT HELP ME THROUGH” • NOW AN HBO ORIGINAL SPECIAL EVENT
 
Hailed by Toni Morrison as “required reading,” a bold and personal... Read more »

When A Single Man was originally published, it shocked many by its frank, sympathetic, and moving portrayal of a gay man in midlife. George, the protagonist, is adjusting to life on his own after the sudden death of his partner, and determines to persist in the routines of his daily life; the course of A Single Man spans twenty-four hours in an... Read more »

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A fascinating portrait of life as a Chinese American woman in the 1930s and ’40s.”—The New York Times Book Review
 
“Superb . . . This emotional, informative and brilliant page-turner resonates with resilience and humanity.”—The Washington Post (One of the Best Books of the Year) 
 
San Francisco, 1938: A world’s fair is... Read more »

The New York Times bestselling memoir about identity, love and understanding. Now a major motion picture starring Nicole Kidman, Russell Crowe, and Lucas Hedges, directed by Joel Edgerton. "Every sentence of the story will stir your soul" (O Magazine).
 
The son of a Baptist pastor and deeply embedded in church life in small town Arkansas, as a... Read more »

An acclaimed “5 Under 35” fiction writer’s much-anticipated first novel
 
In 2012, Claire Vaye Watkins’s story collection, Battleborn, swept nearly every award for short fiction. Now this young writer, widely heralded as a once-in-a-generation talent, returns with a first novel that will more than meet readers’ hopes, harnessing the sweeping... Read more »