Americanah
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Adichie skewers racism and sexism in America in a story that is both affecting and hilarious.
Undisturbed time
On Submergence
Submergence
J. M. Ledgard
Escaping into Ledgard’s language is itself a kind of submergence—the book has a vaguely liquid quality as it moves between its characters and between the surface and the lower depths.
A genetic code
On The Sixth Extinction & Lilith’s Brood
Lilith’s Brood
Octavia E. Butler
This collection of novels begins with a woman named Lilith, who survives a disastrous war on Earth only to find the planet invaded by aliens, themselves refugees from a world they can no longer remember.
The parable of the bees
On The Once and Future World & Small Is Beautiful
Legalese
Thoughts on GitHub, discrimination, and language.
You keep using that word
A close look at the origins and evolution of the word “meritocracy,” and the politics that our language reveals.
Overkill
On The Sixth Extinction & The Once and Future World
The Once and Future World
J. B. MacKinnon
MacKinnon calls for a “rewilding,” bringing the wild back into our lives rather than carving out a separate place for it. A compelling and beautiful read.
The Sixth Extinction
Elizabeth Kolbert
From frogs to bats to megafauna and the Great Barrier Reef, Kolbert’s tale is a terrifying and fascinating travelogue.
The soil and the machine
On The Rise of the Meritocracy
The Rise of the Meritocracy
Michael Young
Young’s 1958 treatise introduced the word “meritocracy” into the lexicon, something he himself would later regret.
Hild
Nicola Griffith
From the scant historical record of Hild of Whitby, Griffith spins an extraordinary story of a girl who learns to navigate the world of kings and thegns.
Back
A responsive redesign.
Less blood
The tragic mode versus the comic mode.
Just Enough Research
Erika Hall
Hall’s contribution to the unstoppable (yes, I’m biased) A Book Apart list is both an instructive reference and a critical corrective.
Scatter, Adapt, and Remember
Annalee Newitz
Newitz first dives into the history of evolution and extinction, looking at how past species have survived (or not) and what we can learn from them; then she projects a fascinating and divergent vision of humanity millions of years from now.
Mumbai New York Scranton
Tamara Shopsin
Shopsin writes in short, present-tense sentences. Frequent paragraph breaks are separated by empty lines. Many pages stop short. In the hands of someone less genuine, the effect would be gimmicky, but Shopsin is as real as it gets.