Welcome to What We’re Reading

To start, here’s what I’ve been recommending lately, to those who ask.

For aimless millennials: “Down Time,” by Andrew Martin. At the outset of this slyly observed COVID novel, its five protagonists—preposterously high-minded, obnoxiously self-absorbed—are all in varying degrees of flight from who they are and what they want. By the end, four years later, they have become, if not wiser, at least somewhat less annoying.

For history dads: “The Spy and the Traitor,” by Ben Macintyre. This true-life espionage story—gripping even if you’re not a Cold War aficionado—is built around an intricate operation to smuggle a highly placed M.I.6 spy, a K.G.B. double agent, out of Moscow after his cover was blown. An impeccable Father’s Day present.

For M.F.A. students: “Lonely Crowds,” by Stephanie Wambugu. This exceptional début novel did not get the recognition it deserved when it came out last year, perhaps owing to its misleadingly generic title and unaccountable nineteen-nineties setting. Don’t let either dissuade you: it’s a standout entry in the canon of female-friendship novels, which follows its entwined protagonists from a childhood in Rhode Island to art school in upstate New York and beyond, written with a kind of unaffected precision that takes great skill to pull off.

For the audiobook-curious: “Vineland,” by Thomas Pynchon. The work of the reclusive, forbiddingly erudite author turns out to be perfect easy-listening material. The audio version of this mid-career novel, which loosely inspired Paul Thomas Anderson’s film “One Battle After Another,” unfolds like a shaggy nearly sixteen-hour podcast, full of surreal digressions and stoner humor. Call it the Thomas Pynchon Experience.

For neat freaks and masterminds: “Cold Comfort Farm,” by Stella Gibbons. In this very funny parody of portentous British novels about nature, a pragmatic young woman goes to live on the family farm with her cousins, the passionately miserable Starkadders, and decides to reform them. Read it, and then stream the movie version, starring a young Kate Beckinsale.

For new moms (my own cohort): “A Life’s Work,” by Rachel Cusk. This book of essays, notorious for its ambivalent portrayal of early motherhood when it was published in the U.K., in 2001, is Cusk at her best. Frank, moving, and just slightly deranged.

We’ll be bringing you more recommendations every week—no matter your particular taste. Feel free to pass these along to family, friends, and fellow book-club members.

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P.S. Bed-Stuy is getting a new bookstore—from the journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones. She plans to call it The North Star. 🌟