photo credit: kennymatic
Recently the Seattle Times highlighted the following new releases… Which are you looking forward to? Personally, I’m in line for Julia Glass’s latest…
Flight: New and Selected Poems by Linda Bierds (Marian Wood/Putnam). A retrospective of the Bainbridge Island poet’s work, addressing “the things that unite us in our common humanity — art, science, music, history.” Bierds teaches at the University of Washington.
The Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown). “Lincoln Lawyer” attorney Mickey Haller and Detective Harry Bosch form an uneasy partnership as they investigate a case involving Walter Elliott, a prominent L.A. film executive accused of murder.
A Partisan’s Daughter by Louis de Bernières (Knopf). The author of “Corelli’s Mandolin” takes 1970s 
London as his backdrop, in a novel about a “bored, lonely” married man who invites a Yugoslavian hooker into his car. Only she’s not a hooker — and she is one hell of a storyteller.
The Eleventh Man by Ivan Doig (Harcourt). Seattle resident Doig’s latest novel tells a World War II story of a journalist and former member of a championship Montana college football team who is tapped by a government “press” agency to tell the wartime stories of 10 former teammates.
Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh (Farrar, Straus and Giroux). A saga set in India during the 19th century Opium Wars, with a cast of characters thrown together by colonial upheaval. A finalist for the Man Booker Prize by the author of “The Glass Palace.”
I See You Everywhere by Julia Glass (Pantheon). A novel about two sisters, one a risktaking rebel, the other more quiet and responsible but yearning for something more. By the winner of the National Book Award-winning “Three Junes.”
The English Major by Jim Harrison (Grove). A novel about a man in his 60s who, robbed of his farm by 
his “late-blooming real estate shark of an ex-wife,” takes a road trip to San Francisco to visit his movie-producer son. By the author of “Legends of the Fall” and “Dalva.”
Lulu in Marrakech by Diane Johnson (Dutton). The doyenne of American expatriate fiction (“Le Divorce”) moves the action from her usual Paris setting to Morocco, where her undercover CIA heroine “navigates the complex interface of Islam and the West.”
A Most Wanted Man by John le Carré (Scribner). Le Carré’s latest is set in Hamburg, where a young Russian Muslim, an idealistic German civil-rights lawyer and the aging scion of a failing British bank all cross paths — and become targets in the War on Terror.
To Siberia by Per Petterson, translated by Anne Born (Graywolf). A 1996 novel, making its first U.S. appearance, about two neglected teens living in Nazi-occupied Denmark. By the Norwegian novelist, whose “Out Stealing Horses” won the 2007 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
Death with Interruptions by José Saramago, translated by Margaret Jull Costa (Harcourt). In his new novel, the Portuguese Nobel laureate (“Blindness”) posits a world where no one dies.
The Widows of Eastwick by John Updike (Knopf). Updike’s sequel to his 1984 novel, “The Witches of Eastwick,” finds his three heroines contemplating a reunion in their Rhode Island hometown after divorce, remarriage and widowhood have carried them to the far corners of the world.
I had the WIDOWS OF EASTWICK pre-ordered the moment it came up – I’m so excited! I hope it was just as fun as The Witches of Eastwick – so much better than the movie.
I’m very surprised to not see Katherine Neville’s THE FIRE listed on there – this has been highly anticipated – also Jose Saramago’s latest release, DEATH WITH INTERRUPTIONS.
I suppose they can’t get all of the books in one shot – we are publishing at a rapid rate nowadays. It’s actually amazing when you look back 10-20 – even 30 years ago. I just wish that we would import more foreign publications. I visit a website called “Words Without Borders” for translated works – according to this website – almost 100% US publications are exported while only 3% of the world’s publications are imported. This is so sad! What are we missing?
Cynthia — It’s almost as if you anticipated tomorrow’s post on whether the U.S. is too insulated and shut off from translated works! Weird…
Thanks for the heads up on The Fire, too — I have read about Death with Interruptions, but not about Neville’s yet…
I was wearing my wizard’s hat… – it’s one of those days when you are supposed to be able to read everybody’s mind to know what they want [*sigh*]
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