Favorite Books — June 2023

Two very different books ended up being the standouts for me this month:

AMPHIBIAN, by Christina Neuwirth

It’s summer in Edinburgh. Rose Ellis arrives at MoneyTownCashGrowth one morning to find that the entire fourth floor has been flooded with water, in a desperate attempt to improve productivity. As the water steadily rises, her working situation becomes more and more absurd…

Strange, surreal, and delightful. This novella is like a funhouse mirror whose reflection is somehow truer than the reality. I loved it.

HOME, by Marilynne Robinson

Glory Boughton, aged thirty-eight, has returned to Gilead to care for her dying father. Soon her brother, Jack — the prodigal son of the family, gone for twenty years — comes home too, looking for refuge and trying to make peace with a past littered with tormenting trouble and pain.

This one was subtle, beautifully written, and emotionally real. While the book is set in a very specific time and place, it touches on many ongoing truths about family, regret, and the legacy of racism in the U.S. Although Jack may seem to be the center of the book, Glory is just as fascinating a character in her own right.

Other titles I thought were excellent this month included DAISY ON THE OUTER LINE by Ross Sayers, FRENCHMAN’S CREEK by Daphne du Maurier, TOWER by Bae Myung-hoon, TERRORTOME by Garth Marenghi, THE BEATRYCE PROPHECY by Kate DiCamillo, CAST ME GENTLY by Caren J. Werlinger, LORDS OF UNCREATION by Adrian Tchaikovsky, and THIS IS MY BODY, GIVEN FOR YOU by Heather Parry.