A Book A Week

What's cooler than being cool? Colson Whitehead may have the answer.

Over the last several years, the two-time Pulitzer Prize winner has been writing one of the finest trilogies in contemporary fiction. Through the story of furniture salesman and occasional crook Ray Carney, Whitehead's Harlem Trilogy has chronicled a changing New York City across the 1960s and '70s with equal parts wit, insight, and swagger. Earlier this week, that journey came to an end with the release of the aptly titled Cool Machine.

True to form, the novel is thoughtful, zany, and effortlessly cool. As with the previous two books in the series, Whitehead's publisher graciously provided me with a review copy. I won't bury the lead here. Cool Machine brings Ray Carney's story to a satisfying close.

It's the early 1980s, and the world looks a lot different than it did when we first met Ray Carney in Harlem Shuffle. Back then, he was a young furniture salesman trying to build a legitimate business, no small feat for a Black man in 1960s Harlem. His dream was simple. Provide a better life for his wife and children. But when honest work wasn't enough to pay the bills, and a family member found himself in over his head, Ray was pulled into the city's criminal underworld. Once he crossed that line, there was no turning back.

Now, Ray has become something of an institution in his neighborhood. His furniture store has grown from a modest storefront into the kind of place customers visit to furnish an entire home. But while Ray has found stability, Harlem continues to change around him. New buildings rise, old neighborhoods disappear, and the gap between those with money and those without only widens. On paper, Ray has everything he ever wanted. His children are grown, his business is thriving, and he's earned the respect of his community. Yet beneath that success lingers a familiar itch. The careful planning. The impossible score. The thrill of getting away with it. For a man like Ray Carney, it's awfully hard to walk away from that life for good.

Cool Machine brings Whitehead's Harlem Trilogy to a close with the same wit, energy, and exuberance that defined its opening while embracing a more reflective tone that suits Ray at this stage of life. Across three novels, he's evolved alongside Harlem itself. He began as a reluctant criminal, came to relish the thrill of the score, and now finds himself wondering whether there's still a place for him in a city that's changing faster than he is.

Whitehead weaves that quiet introspection effortlessly into the humor, action, and razor-sharp social commentary that have become hallmarks of the series. It's rare for a trilogy to entertain while also saying something meaningful about the people and places at its center, and this one accomplishes both with remarkable confidence. I'll certainly miss spending time with Ray Carney, but I have no doubt I'll be there for whatever story Colson Whitehead decides to write next. 

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

There's probably very little we wouldn't do for our family. For Malcolm, that means keeping watch beside his dying mother's bed during her final hours. Their relationship is...complicated, to say the least. Ask anyone in town, and they'll tell you she's a witch. Maybe that's why she's lived such an impossibly long life. Tonight, though, it's just Malcolm, his sister-in-law (his brother couldn't be bothered to show up), his dying mother, and the mysterious figure cloaked in darkness standing silently beneath a tree in the front yard.

As death draws near, Malcolm's mother makes one final request: take her body to her final resting place in Maine. There's a time limit, of course, and she warns that failing to get her there in time will have terrifying consequences. Malcolm isn't sure what to believe, but when strange things begin happening almost immediately after her death, he realizes he has little choice. Whatever his mother was, whatever she knew, her final wish may be the only thing standing between him and something far more sinister.

From its opening pages, Carry Me to My Grave immerses readers in a horror mystery shrouded in questions and unease. Who is this woman? Why is her death so consequential? Who is the shadowy figure waiting for her final breath? Christopher Golden poses these questions in a way that makes it nearly impossible to stop reading. I found myself racing through the opening chapters, desperate to understand what was happening and why.

To Golden's credit, the answers are well worth the wait. As he's done throughout much of his career, he takes a familiar corner of the horror genre and finds a fresh angle into it. I won't spoil exactly what that angle is because discovering it alongside Malcolm is one of the novel's greatest pleasures. Better still, the horror is grounded by characters grappling with complicated family dynamics, giving the story an emotional weight that keeps it from becoming mere spectacle. While Carry Me to My Grave isn't my favorite of Golden's novels, it's another atmospheric, satisfying horror story from an author who clearly understands what makes the genre tick.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 58)

Paul Tremblay has built a career writing clever, terrifying horror novels like A Head Full of Ghosts, The Cabin at the End of the World, and Horror Movie. Time and again, I've been impressed by his ability to pair horror with richly drawn characters, making him one of my automatic "must-read" authors. His latest, Dead but Dreaming of Electric Sheep, explores a very different kind of horror. This isn't the supernatural, keep-the-lights-on kind of terror readers have come to expect from Tremblay. Instead, he sets his sights on artificial intelligence and the unsettling ways our growing reliance on it could reshape what it means to be human. It leans more toward science fiction than horror, but it still packs quite the punch.

Julia is a down-on-her-luck twenty-something and former semi-professional gamer who's struggling to figure out what comes next. She lives with her uncle while juggling two jobs, neither of which she particularly enjoys. Then, out of the blue, her estranged mother calls with an unexpected opportunity. The tech company where she serves as CFO is looking for temporary help, and the paycheck is too good to ignore.

She's hesitant. Her relationship with her mother has never been easy.

But money talks.

After flying to the company's West Coast headquarters and breezing through an interview that feels more like a formality than an actual hiring process, Julia lands the job. It's just not the job she was expecting.

Her assignment is to chaperone a man in a vegetative state on a cross-country trip. Only he isn't lying in a hospital bed.

The company has implanted an experimental AI-powered chip into his brain, allowing employees to control his movements with what's essentially a video game controller. Perfect for Julia, right? Her task is simple. She just has to escort him safely from the West Coast to the East.

What could possibly go wrong?

While the title Dead but Dreaming of Electric Sheep is clearly inspired by Philip K. Dick, the novel imagines a future that feels much closer to the present day than we'd probably like to admit. Artificial intelligence has already worked its way into many aspects of our everyday lives, and it's impossible to know what its long-term impact will be. As the novel progresses, Tremblay alternates between Julia's perspective and that of the man she's controlling. The effect is fascinating, forcing readers to wrestle with questions of consent, morality, and whether we've really stopped to consider the consequences of handing so much of ourselves over to emerging technology.

Spoiler: we haven't.

Tremblay also includes brief interludes written in his own voice, stepping outside the narrative to reflect on artificial intelligence and the act of writing itself. AI may be able to generate words, he argues, but writing is about far more than stringing sentences together. It takes iteration. It takes wrestling with ideas, throwing them away, and reshaping them until they become something meaningful. As if determined to prove that point, Tremblay fills this novel with moments that feel unmistakably human. They're strange, inventive, and unlike anything I've encountered before. You'll know them when you get there.

The result is a novel that's fun, chilling, occasionally absurd, and ultimately a thoughtful cautionary tale about our race toward an increasingly automated future. It's another original, thought-provoking work from an author who continues to surprise me with every new release.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 57)

There's nothing better than a summer vacation. Okay, hold on. If I'm being honest, the season matters a lot less than the fact that you're taking a vacation in the first place. I'm probably more accurate in saying there's nothing better than a vacation, period. But for the sake of this review, just roll with me.

Summer vacations come with ample opportunity to relax and read, which is exactly what I did this weekend. Well...if I'm being technical, I actually spent most of it walking what felt like a marathon around Disneyland celebrating the park's 71st anniversary. Still, the flights there and back gave me plenty of uninterrupted reading time, and I happily spent them with Ally Condie's latest thriller, The Girls Trip. If you're going to take a vacation inside the pages of a thriller, though, you'd better expect a little drama. Ally Condie delivers plenty of it.

Two years ago, Hope, Ash, and Caro were complete strangers. They met during an online book club that didn't exactly go as planned. While everyone else logged off, the three stayed behind, struck up a conversation, and discovered an unexpected friendship. They still meet regularly for book club, though these days the books are often secondary to simply catching up.

Despite talking for years, they've never actually met in person.

Now, all three women find themselves in need of a getaway. Hope, a Hollywood actress, can't escape the spotlight. Caro, a doctor, is reeling after the death of a patient has left her questioning her career. And Ash, who runs a successful business with her husband, isn't so sure their marriage is as strong as it once was.

A few days together at the secluded Sonnet Resort in Eden National Park seems like exactly what they all need. But each woman has arrived carrying secrets of her own, and as their long-awaited vacation unfolds, it becomes clear that someone isn't telling the truth.

The Girls Trip is exactly the kind of thriller I want to pack for a vacation. It's fast-paced, effortlessly readable, and easy to lose yourself in whether you're stretched out on the beach or squeezed into an airplane seat. Having enjoyed Ally Condie's previous novel, The Unwedding, I suspected she'd deliver another compulsively readable mystery, and she didn't disappoint. The twists keep coming, and while the plot occasionally veers into the silly and convoluted, it's all part of the fun. Sometimes a vacation read doesn't need to reinvent the genre. It just needs to keep you eagerly turning the pages until you reach your destination. And no matter where your travels take you this summer, The Girls Trip deserves a spot in your carry-on.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 56)

Dear Readers,

I found myself wondering, "How do I possibly write a review of The Correspondent that conveys just how original and brilliant this novel is?" It's an epistolary work told entirely through letters and emails, and yes, I know that format has been used before, but perhaps never to such wonderful effect.

Then it hit me.

Why not write this review as a letter to you?

After all, you're the one visiting my blog, Amazon, or Goodreads, hoping to hear my thoughts on whatever I've just finished reading. I'll admit, I had my doubts. This format is a departure from the way I usually write reviews, and I wasn't entirely sure I could pull it off. But then I thought, "What the heck?" If Virginia Evans was willing to trust letters to tell her story, surely I could trust one to tell you why I admired it so much.

So, dear reader, allow me to tell you about a novel that completely charmed me.

One of the questions The Correspondent asks is this: How does one tell the story of a life?

For Sybil Van Antwerp, that life is told through letters.

She writes to everyone she can: her brother in France, her best friend, her neighbor, the child of a family friend, even the authors of whatever novel she's just finished reading. And through those letters, we gradually come to know her. She's complicated. Retired, aging, and struggling to come to terms with her failing eyesight. She can be warm, but also stern. Generous, yet occasionally petty. Perhaps the most revealing letters, though, are the ones she never sends—the words she can't quite bring herself to share.

Readers, I was apprehensive when I began this novel. I worried the format would amount to little more than a gimmick. But in the capable hands of Virginia Evans, I needn't have worried. This is a story that worms its way into your heart not through grand revelations, but through the simple rhythms of everyday life. Within these letters, we witness love, grief, regret, forgiveness, and all the beautifully ordinary moments that make up a life. By the time I reached the final page, I had the strange feeling that I'd been corresponding with Sybil myself all along. I wasn't ready for there to be no more letters left to read. That's the remarkable power of Evans's writing, and it's what made The Correspondent such a memorable read.

Should you choose to read The Correspondent, I hope you'll find the same sense of wonder that I did as I reached its final letter. If you do, I think you'll understand why I felt compelled to write this one to you.

Until our next book,

Ethan

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 55)

There's one in every family. The kid who couldn't wait to leave home. The one people still ask about, even though they already know the answer. They're long gone. The moment they turned eighteen, they packed their bags, ran, and never looked back.

Vesper was that kid.

She couldn't wait to leave. Growing up in the shadow of her mother was enough to overwhelm anyone. Her mom was a movie star—a scream queen extraordinaire and cult horror icon. But it wasn't just fame that loomed over Vesper. It was something far more oppressive.

Religion.

The isolated community where she was raised expected her to carry on its traditions, but the first chance she got, Vesper escaped. She hasn't been back since.

When we meet her, Vesper is stuck working a dead-end job at one of those forgettable chain restaurants we've all eaten at but can never remember the name of. You know the kind. Wooden booths. Servers in stiff polo shirts that look uncomfortable before you even put them on. Forced renditions of "Happy Birthday" accompanied by a complimentary slice of frozen cheesecake.

Vesper has resigned herself to the fact that this is simply her life. After one particularly miserable shift—and one ill-advised decision to sneak a customer an unauthorized side of molten cheese in hopes of earning a better tip—she finds herself fired and heading back to the rundown apartment she's no longer sure she can afford.

Then she finds an envelope waiting for her. Inside is an invitation to her cousin Rosie's wedding, back at the family farm. The one place Vesper swore she'd never return. Every instinct tells her to throw the invitation away. Instead, she goes home. There, Vesper is forced to confront everything she spent years trying to escape, and, in the process, begins to uncover the truth behind the secret that's haunted her for her entire life.

Black Sheep sees Rachel Harrison write a darkly comic novel about family, faith, and the struggle to discover who we are in spite of both. The book is billed as horror, but I wouldn't call it horror in the traditional sense. Instead, Harrison uses elements of the genre to craft a story that is far more interested in its characters than in frightening its readers.

I went into the novel completely blind, picking it up solely on the recommendation of Sarah at All the Book Blog Names Are Taken. At first, I wasn't entirely sure what to make of it. The story seemed to meander. It was obvious that Vesper was miserable and desperately trying to outrun her past, but I kept wondering where it was all leading.

Then she returns home.

As the true nature of her family—and, let's call it what it is, the religious cult they belong to—comes into focus, everything that came before suddenly clicks into place. I won't spoil the revelation because discovering it is part of the novel's fun, but it's a wonderfully clever turn that completely reframes the story.

By the end, Black Sheep had won me over. What begins as an offbeat family drama evolves into a timely, darkly funny meditation on how family, religion, and tradition shape our identities, and what it takes to finally break free from them.

For more information, visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2026, 54)