Tell the Wolves I'm Home - Carla Rifka Brunt

How great is that cover? So great. 

I generally consider myself a stone cold (fox) of a woman; not a lot of things in real life make me cry - which my therapist says isn't something to be proud of, but what does she know? However, this book... this book, you guys.

I read the book jacket before starting in order to remind myself of what I was getting in to, which is always a stupid thing to do. Book jackets are designed to sell books, and they do a Very Bad Job of it. But my point is that the book jacket says those dreaded words, "debut novel," so I promptly tweeted this very snarky thing:

And then 40 pages later, when I was in a figurative flood of tears, I took it back. Because this is what a "debut novel" should be, written by someone with proven writing chops who has turned her face to long-form fiction, and it. is. gorgeous.

It is 1987, Junie is 14, and her best friend is her uncle Finn, who is a fabulous artist in NYC and also dying of AIDS. Quickly. Like, definitely before THIS narrative is over, let's just say that much.

So, here's the deal. This book is about loneliness and growing up and learning about yourself, and also about family relationships and how complicated they can be. And really,

because *I* have a gay uncle who is my favorite, and I am his favorite, and we both love art and Mozart's Requiem and while this isn't our story, it could have been, and I...

I actually had to put the book down a few times to SOB. So nice work, CRB. Puffy eyes at work is my best look.

9.5 out of 11 Clandestine Trips to NYC

The Thing about Thugs - Tabish Khair

"Ranging from skull-lined mansions to underground runnels a ghostly people call home, The Thing about Thugs is a feat of imagination to rival Wilkie Collins or Michael Chabon." Book jacket, The Thing about Thugs. 

Well I've never read any Michael Chabon, but if you haven't yet discovered my deep and abiding love for this guy,

My favorite forehead in literature.

It was with only a little trepidation that I walked into this one because other members of the Cult of Wilkie read and recommended it - which is how it ended up on the library hold shelf in the first place. It  may shock you to be told that I am a sucker for great packaging, and things like full-edge bleeds and different fonts for different narrators in books make me happy. Also, language like this:

"It is the ghost of a true story that I tell in these once white pages." (4)

"Is that all we are: stories, words, breath? . . . Are we then nothing but the playthings of language?" (177-8)

Keep talking like that, Khair. 

And while the story is fantastic, this book is really all about the language. Khair is a master weaver of both words and story, which is so rare and precioussssssss that I want to close him up in a tower of my Enchanted April castle on the Italian coast - complete with rock-n-roll party boat, obvs - and make him write beautiful things for me forever (with access to the Internet, of course. Inspiration must come from somewhere).


8.5 out of 11 Uniques Phrenological Specimens