This book encourages children to use their imagination. Throughout the book there are photos that encourage readers to really examine and appreciate. Just like cloud watching, you’ll eventually see something special inside of it. Here are two examples from this book.

This book is so interesting. After meeting Tilly, Tilly travels around the world and shares trees from around the world. With each tree there is Tilly in a boat with the country’s flag that the tree can be found. The book shares a bit about the tree and then asks the reader to share what they see in the photograph. On the next page is the same photograph but with an acetate page with a sketch over it sharing what Louise Wannier and April Tatiana Jackson see in the bark. The book is wonderful!!

Award-winning interdisciplinary writers Hoàng and Nào provocatively interrogate language,
comprehension, and communication in a global world. Their collaborative result is a polyglot
showcase that combines English, Vietnamese, and a hybrid Vietlish to present 10 “experimental
narratives”—a non-love story, disorienting conversations, dystopic genocide—that prove
intriguingly experiential.

With nods to “The Little Mermaid,” Ehrlich’s lovely sophomore outing (after Animal Wife) again probes themes of womanhood and monstrosity. Ceto, a siren and hunter of men, yearns to break the cycle of hunger and satiation that defines her life and so slices her tail to give herself legs and live among humans. She even marries a human man and gives birth to a human child.

Fifteen years later, having left her husband, she and her daughter, Naia, live in Sirenland, a tourist attraction that Ceto has created to be a haven for women, who can find shelter and a job working at Sirenland’s famed mermaid burlesque, where performers put on fake tales and lounge in human-size tanks.  

This is the debut novel written by author Jade Shyback. I believe this is the first book in the new young adult series. While the focus may be young adult, I am a senior fan and will definitely be watching for the next book in this series.

Earth is in trouble. It has become impossible for life to live on the surface of the planet. Marisol Blaise and her family were struggling to survive. One after the other of her family was succumbing to extreme conditions. Her mother begged a couple to take her with them to Aqueous, the underwater community. The couple had no children and treated her as their own.

I finished Alison Hawthorne Deming’s latest poetry collection, Blue Flax and Yellow Mustard Flower, and sat quietly absorbing it, stunned by its power. Deming is a writer whose work in both prose and poetry is deeply, lyrically engaged with the natural sciences, environmental history, and social justice. She cares about the world and what humans have done to the earth and all who live here. To assess the damage, to see for herself, she travels to earth’s farthest, wildest reaches. Her compassion for the brave and broken world she has found dovetails with her own fortitude and courage. No doom-sayer, however, she pondered some time ago,

“What if learning how broadly destructive the human presence has been on the planet provides us with catalyzing self-awareness? What if this sensitivity to brokenness is tweaking our intelligence to make the next leap in our evolutionary history, a leap that turns the runaway force of human culture toward restraint and mutual aid [?]”

Nào (The Six Tons of Water) and Hoàng (Underneath) join forces for a lyrical bilingual story collection. Each tale is presented three times, first in a combination of English and Vietnamese with a glossary of Vietnamese words, then in English, and finally in Vietnamese. “Broccoli” consists of a dialogue between an unnamed woman and her lover, Damien, in which their discussion about a head of broccoli she left in his fridge morphs into a coded conversation about their relationship (“Lizards and con rắn, all loài bò sát, really, they tắm nắng because they’re trying to get their blood đủ nóng to kill fungi,” Damien tells her in the first version, which is translated later as “lizards… sun-bathe because they’re trying to get their blood hot enough to kill fungi,” to which she responds, “Am I supposed to be the fungus in this metaphor?”). The elliptical closer, “Mid-27th Century,” follows a detective in the distant future who relies on philosophy and a Magic 8 Ball to track down a pair of twins who stole the 24th century. Throughout, the authors craft poetic rhythms and sounds, highlighting the potency of language. Readers seeking a linguistic challenge will enjoy these hypnotic tales. (Nov.)

M. Soledad Caballero’s Flight Plan spans geographies both physical and psychological—from cells to continents, from quotidian to unusual, from grounded to soaring. Intertwining seemingly dissimilar topical threads that include cancer, a migrant heritage, a fascination with birds, history, and ghosts, Caballero’s astute second collection shines with authentic voice, luminous imagery, incisive language, and creative form as it deftly and honestly reflects on the liminality inherent in the experiences of flesh, family, faith, and flight.

An immersive psychological portrait of one man’s battle with lifelong anger and guilt.

A young man’s troubles follow him after he trades his spiritual calling for life as a teacher.

Inspired by the life and teachings of Thomas Merton, Niall O’Malley leaves a stressful Ph.D. program to enter a Benedictine monastery in western Massachusetts full of “high hopes for communing with God and soothing his erratic temper.” But after five years, he abruptly abandons the refuge he sought in that religious vocation for a job teaching history at a public high school in a downtrodden town on the New Jersey coast within sight of Manhattan. 

Ehrlich, the author of the story collection Animal Wife (2020) presents a short and disturbing novel. Ceto is the cruel taskmaster of the sirens, women who are the main attraction in Sirenland, a popular tourist location. Visitors flock to see the sirens perform underwater plays in their false tails, then head to the boardwalk for more entertainment. Ceto came from the water herself, a true siren who left her tail behind for a life on land; the others have been transformed based on Ceto’s instructions.