New Fiction Roundup – January 2022

Let’s kick off the reading year! January brings us compelling tales of friendship, pulse-pounding thrillers, deep dives into historical eras both real and imagined, and much more.

1/4: Anthem by Noah Hawley
In this sprawling near-future thriller, a group of teenagers break out of an anxiety rehab center determined to bring down an evil billionaire, even as a plague spreads that seems to cause suicidal deaths in teenagers. (thriller/general fiction)

1/4: Brown Girls by Daphne Palasi Andreades
Four friends from immigrant backgrounds come of age in Queens, New York, vowing to stay close even while exploring different paths forward.  A Peak Pick! (general fiction)

1/4: Honor by Thrity Umrigar
Journalist Smita Agarwal returns to India for the first time since she left for the United States at age 14, where she covers an explosive court case involving a mixed Hindu/Muslim marriage. (general fiction)

 1/4: Fiona and Jane by Jean Chen Ho
In this intimate portrait of a friendship, two young Taiwanese American women, best friends since second grade, navigate friendship, identity, sexuality and heartbreak over two decades. (general fiction)

1/4: The Maid by Nita Prose
Molly Gray struggles with social situations and reading social cues, but navigates the world using a code of rules from her Gran. Now working as a hotel maid, Molly finds a wealthy guest murdered in his bed and sets out to solve the crime. A Peak Pick! (mystery)

1/4: No Land to Light On by Yara Zgheib
Young Syrian couple Hadi and Sama have made a home as expats in Boston, waiting on the birth of their first child. When Hadi’s father dies in Jordan, he flies back for the funeral – only to be refused reentry into the United States. Can they find their way back to the life they dreamed of together? (general fiction)

1/4: Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
Puerto Rican New Yorker Olga is a successful wedding planner to the wealthy who is grappling with her ambitions, both personal and professional, when her activist mother returns to New York City trailing family secrets. A Peak Pick! (general fiction)

 1/4: Reckless Girls by Rachel Hawkins
Six friends escape to remote Meroe Island for a good time, only to have one person go missing and another die, as they start to discover the dark history of the island. (thriller)

 1/4: The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan
In this dark dystopian satire that takes aim at parenting discourses, Chinese American mom Frida has a bad day that results in her 18-month-old daughter Harriet being taken away, while Frida is sent to a reform school for mothers. (general fiction)

 1/4: The Starless Crown by James Rollins
A gifted student foresees an apocalypse, launching an alliance featuring the student, a solider, a prince, and a thief on a quest to uncover past secrets in order to save their world, even as they are hunted by dangerous enemies. (fantasy)

 1/11: A Flicker in the Dark by Stacy Willingham
20 years ago, six teenage girls went missing from Chloe’s small Louisiana town, crimes that Chloe’s father confessed to. Now a psychologist, when two teenage girls go missing in quick succession, she fears parallels to her past. (thriller)

 1/11: The Final Case by David Guterson
In this examination of justice and injustice, a Seattle criminal attorney in the waning days of his career takes on a charged case, as the white adoptive parents of a young girl born in Ethiopia are charged with her murder. A Peak Pick! (mystery)

1/11: Mouth to Mouth by Antoine Wilson
In this suspenseful story of intertwined fates, the unnamed narrator runs into a college acquaintance, Jeff, in the first class lounge at JFK airport, and listens while Jeff confesses the unexpected story behind his meteoric rise as a successful art dealer. (thriller)

1/11: None But the Righteous by Chantal James
As a youth in foster care, Ham was gifted a locket by Miss Pearl said to house a relic – and the spirit – of 17^th century St. Martin de Porres. Now 19, Ham has been displaced from New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina but feels compelled to return and find out the fate of Miss Pearl. (general fiction)

1/11: Shit Cassandra Saw by Gwen E. Kirby
In this collection of short stories, Kirby plays with unconventional structures and zany plots to tell the stories of brave, sometimes mythic women, from the past to today. (general fiction)

1/11: Small World by Jonathan Evison
By exploring the lives of a group of present-day travelers on a train – and those of their ancestors in the early 1800s – Evison chronicles 170 years in American history, examining whether our nation has made good on its promises from a variety of viewpoints across time. (historical/general fiction)

1/11: To Paradise by Hanya Yanagihara
Three different versions of the American experiment unfold over three centuries, in 1893, 1993, and 2093, as the characters grapple with love, loneliness, illness, and power. By the author of A Little Life. (general fiction)

1/11: Weather Girl by Rachel Lynn Solomon
At local TV station KSEA 6, weather reporter Ari and sports anchor Russell launch a matchmaking scheme to reunite their divorced bosses, only to discover real chemistry developing between the two of them. (romance)

1/18: How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu
An ancient virus released from the Arctic permafrost causes a climate plague, prompting a cast of linked characters to search for inventive ways to create possibility and manage grief as they witness the rapid alteration of their world. (general fiction)

1/25: Devil House by John Darnielle
True crime writer Gage Chandler is offered a big break: the chance to move into the house where a pair of infamous murders occurred during the Satantic Panic of the 1980s. But as he researches, the narrative he creates reaches back into his own past and an examination of the dangers of storytelling. (general fiction)

1/25: Goliath by Tochi Onyebuchi
In 2050, those who have the means have left Earth for space outposts, going so far as to cannibalize the neighborhoods they left behind, brick-by-brick. Those left behind eke out a living. Told from multiple perspectives, including a space-dweller thinking of resettling in Connecticut, a group of laborers trying to rebuild crumbling cities, and a journalist, creating a mosaic about race, class, and gentrification. (science fiction)

1/25: Seasons of Purgatory by Shahriar Mandanipour
This collection of short stories from Iranian writer Mandanipour explores the personal struggles of characters against the sometimes tumultuous backdrop of everyday life in Iran. (general fiction)

1/25: Violeta by Isabel Allende
In the form of a letter, Violeta Del Valle recounts a life that spans 100 years, witnessing some of the most important events of history while also experiencing personal loss and joy. (historical fiction)

~ posted by Andrea G.