A bountiful harvest Unprecedented year for books yields bumper crop of fascinating fall titles By: Ben Sigurdson Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Friday, Sep. 4, 2020 Last Modified: 4:54 PM CDT Tuesday, Sep. 8, 2020 Updates

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 04/09/2020 (1610 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There’s never been a fall books season quite like this one.

As the COVID-19 pandemic began taking hold across the globe, publishers found themselves scrambling to deal with the slate of books set to be released in the spring. Many books set to be released in March and April were pushed back to the summer, or fall, or even to next year. Book tours by authors were cancelled and festivals were moved online as we socially distanced.

Sales of printed books initially dipped before bouncing back as readers pined for new (or new-to-them) titles to help them get through our pandemic-related social isolation. But summer is typically a slow season for new releases, meaning readers and publishers are champing at the bit in anticipation of this year’s slate of fall releases.

Here are 20 titles — 10 fiction, 10 non-fiction — to watch for in the coming months that are sure to have book clubbers and critics alike talking…

FICTION

Transcendent Kingdom

By Yaa Gyasi (Sept. 1)

Gyasi’s follow-up to her debut, 2016’s Homegoing, follows Gifty, a Ghanaian immigrant in Alabama working on her PhD in neuroscience and studying behaviours in mice — specifically, depression, addiction and reward. Science and faith collide as she tries to cope with the death of her brother as well as her mother’s depressive behaviour.

 

 

 

Red Pill

By Hari Kunzru (Sept. 1)

The Brooklyn-based Kunzru follows up his critically acclaimed 2017 novel White Tears with a story of a writer who lands a writing fellowship in a Berlin suburb, sees where the Nazis’ Final Solution was planned, binge-watches a violent police TV show and ends up on a harrowing quest for self, with Kunzru bringing commentary on the likes of QAnon in modern culture.

 

 

 

 

Noopiming: The Cure for White Ladies

By Leanne Betasamosake Simpson (Sept. 1)

Nishnaabeg writer Leanne Betasamosake Simpson brings poetic and narrative fragments together in a decolonizing tale of a narrator frozen in the ice, and seven ancient characters and their connections to our modern world. The title is Anishinaabemowin for “in the bush,” a riff on Susanna Moodie’s 1852 book Roughing it in the Bush.

 

 

 

Homeland Elegies

By Ayad Akhtar(Sept. 15)

The latest novel by the Pulitzer prize-winning playwright is set in a post-Trump America, blending fact and fiction in the story of an American son and his immigrant father searching for a way to belong. The novel spans all manner of homes, countries and political climates as the pair yearn to discover who they are and where they should be.

 

 

 

Jack

By Marilynne Robinson (Sept. 29)

Robinson returns to Gilead, her fictional Iowa town that was the scene of her 2004 Pulitzer winner Gilead as well as Home and Lila, for her latest. Set in 1956, Jack tells the story of John Ames Boughton, the son of Gilead’s Presbyterian minister, who falls in love with Della Miles, a teacher, and the torment and passion of their interracial romance.

 

 

 

Just Like You

By Nick Hornby(Sept. 29)

The About a Boy and High Fidelty’s latest is about a teacher and divorced mother of two who finds love in the most unlikely of people — namely, a 22-year-old butcher living with his parents. As their relationship and happiness blossom, Hornby delivers an introspective romance sure to please his legion of devoted fans.

 

 

 

The Night Piece

By André Alexis (Oct. 13)

Spanning his literary career — which has included widespread acclaim for novels such as the Giller-winning Fifteen Dogs — André Alexis’ latest surreal short-fiction collection plucks stories from his 1994 book Despair, and Other Stories of Ottawa, 2010’s Beauty and Sadness as well as unpublished works, and includes an afterword by Madeline Thien.

 

 

 

A Time for Mercy

By John Grisham (Oct. 13)

Grisham once again summons Clanton, Miss. lawyer Jack Brigance (of A Time to Kill) back to the courtroom in his latest legal thriller, which sees Brigance defending a 16-year-old boy accused of murder and facing the death penalty. The Clanton regulars and the obligatory small-town twists and turns are all here for the Grisham faithful.

The Silence

By Don DeLillo (Oct. 20)

The much-lauded American author of White Noise, Underworld, Zero K and many others brings a taut and timely novel to market this fall. Completed just before the pandemic, The Silence is set in a Manhattan apartment on Super Bowl Sunday 2022, when a catastrophic event takes place and the digital world essentially shuts down.

 

 

 

 

Inside Story

By Martin Amis (Oct. 24)

Amis’ autobiographical novel was spurred by the death of his real-life friend, writer/thinker Christopher Hitchens. In Inside Story the book’s Martin ruminates on his literary influences, his romantic obsessions, his family and the world in which he moves and writes — and what it has all taught him about how to be a writer in our age.

 

---

 

NON-FICTION

Vesper Flights

By Helen Macdonald (Aug. 25)

Macdonald’s 2014 memoir H is for Hawk chronicled her time training a northern goshawk after her father’s passing; in her latest collection of essays she again touches on the natural world and feelings of love and loss, this time weaving in stories of science fiction, Uzbek solar power plants, Iranian refugees, English country shows and more.

 

 

 

Eat a Peach: A Memoir

By David Chang with Gabe Ulla (Sept. 8)

Momofuku and Ugly Delicious creator David Chang is a driving force in the North American culinary scene, and in Eat a Peach he recalls his humble upbringing in Virginia, his life and culinary learning in Japan, his struggles with mental illness and feelings of inadequacy as well as his successes and failures as a restaurateur.

 

 

 

 

Through the Garden – A Love Story (With Cats)

By Lorna Crozier (Sept. 8)

Revered Canadian poet Lorna Crozier lovingly chronicles her life with her longtime partner, Governor General award-winning writer Patrick Lane (as well as a number of cats). Having met in a writing workshop in the mid-1970s, Lane and Crozier wrote dozens of books between them before Lane’s illness in 2017 and death in 2019.

 

 

 

People You Follow: A Memoir

By Hayley Gene Penner (Sept. 19)

Born in Winnipeg, singer-songwriter Hayley Gene Penner’s memoir is a coming-of-age story steeped in the music industry — when your father is revered children’s musician Fred Penner, how can it not be? Penner recalls her artistic inspirations, abusive bosses, questionable decisions and more.

 

 

 

 

Black Water: Family, Legacy and Blood Memory – A Memoir

By David A. Robertson (Sept. 22)

Prolific Winnipeg author David A. Robertson turns the spotlight on his late Cree father Don’s early life near Norway House and his first meeting David’s non-Indigenous mother Beverly. Robertson structures the book around a visit to the family’s northern trapline to reflect on the family’s history, his relationship with his father and more.

 

 

 

Field Notes from a Pandemic: A Journey Through a World Suspended

By Ethan Lou (Sept. 29)

On a trip in January to visit his dying grandfather, journalist Ethan Lou experienced the initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic first hand. Looking at current and former outbreaks, he argues COVID-19 will have profound long-term ramifications in all manners of life, and that we’ve not yet seen the worst of this pandemic.

 

 

 

 

Friends and Enemies: A Memoir

By Barbara Amiel (Oct. 13)

The longtime writer and editor (as well as wife of ex-media mogul Conrad Black) has led a fascinating life, from her birth in London during the Blitz to her rise through the ranks of journalism in Canada to her often-controversial takes on social and political issues. An avid socialite, Amiel’s book also includes a jaw-dropping cast of characters.

 

 

 

If I Knew Then: Finding Wisdom in Failure and Power in Aging

By Jann Arden (Oct. 27)

A memoir by beloved singer-songwriter Jann Arden is never going to be boring. In her latest, Arden uses her razor-sharp wit, biting humour and profound self-awareness to explore notions of getting older, the women in her family who came before her and becoming the person she’s always wanted to be.

 

 

 

 

One Life

By Megan Rapinoe (Nov. 10)

The successful American soccer player has done more than succeed on the pitch; she has also used her high-profile status to speak out on matters of social justice, community, LGBTTQ+ rights and more. Her book urges us all to stand up against discrimination, and to consider the impact we can make on our communities.

 

 

 

 

The Lesser Known: A History of Oddities from the Heart of the Continent

By Darren Bernhardt (Nov. 27)

Rather than focus on the tried-and-true components of Manitoba’s history, Bernhardt delves into the incidents and stories on the fringes of our past — some of which have never been properly chronicled or widely recalled. A collection of sometimes-bizarre tales floating in our history, Bernhardt’s book lands just in time to tuck under the Christmas tree.

books@freepress.mb.ca