Weekend picks for book lovers
What should you read this weekend? Paste BN’s picks for book lovers include Joe Hill's sizzling sci-fi best-seller The Fireman, and Siddhartha Mukherjee's The Gene.
The Fireman by Joe Hill; William Morrow, 768 pp.; fiction
Some people want to watch the world burn. Joe Hill just writes about it.
The apocalypse comes not via zombies but by an outbreak of spontaneous combustion in Hill’s The Fireman. A sprawling and intimate sci-fi/horror tale, it surpasses mere genre mash-up by digging into love and passion while also boiling down the best and worst parts of ourselves when everything becomes literal hell.
A highly contagious spore called Dragonscale infects millions beginning in big cities and then moving to smaller haunts like her New Hampshire town. Those with the disease burst into flames — or give off roiling smoke for an air of deadly unpredictability — and the resulting wildfires cause widespread destruction to the landscape.
Hill, whose famous dad is Stephen King, creates a pandemic that's dangerous but also undoubtedly beautiful.
Paste BN says ***½ out of four stars. “Superbly crackling…deserving of a warm reception.”
The Gene: An Intimate History by Siddhartha Mukherjee; Scribner, 608 pp.; non-fiction
Mukherjee follows up his masterpiece The Emperor of All Maladies with a look at genetics.
Paste BN says ***½ stars. “Poignant and engaging…Mukherjee is at his best when he transitions from dogged historian to passionate commentator.”
Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld; Random House, 488 pp.; fiction
This modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen’s beloved Regency romance, takes place in Cincinnati and stars “Liz” Bennet, a magazine writer, and Dr. Darcy, a neurosurgeon.
Paste BN says *** stars. “Put aside your prejudice, Janeites. Eligible is good for some giggles on the beach.”
Kill 'Em and Leave: Searching for James Brown and the American Soul by James McBride; Spiegel & Grau, 232 pp.; non-fiction
A portrait of the Godfather of Soul by the National Book Award-winning author of The Good Lord Bird and The Color of Water.
Paste BN says *** stars. “A feat of intrepid journalistic fortitude… Somewhere, even James Brown is probably saying thanks.”
Zero K by Don DeLillo; Scribner, 274 pp.; fiction
Fiction about The Convergence, a remote compound where ailing but still-living people with significant means are cryogenically frozen to await advances in medicine and nanotechnology that they believe will allow them to return to life someday in rebuilt bodies.
Paste BN says **** stars. “A return to top form … Zero K is anchored in emotions as old and primal as humanity itself.”
Contributing reviewers: Brian Truitt, Matt McCarthy, Jocelyn McClurg, Barry Singer, Kevin Nance