LAS VEGAS — As soon as former Las Vegas resident Lee Scrivner released his latest book “Casinolabs” he started getting people asking if he’d seen the hit show “Severance” from Apple TV+.

“My sister was the first one who insisted I watch it,” said Scrivner, who grew up in Las Vegas, “so I finally broke down and watched it and ...Read more

If you polled 100 people about who is the awfullest among the awful people in “The Great Gatsby,” I bet 99 of them would answer “that louse Tom Buchanan.” In the new “The Gatsby Gambit,” Buchanan finally gets what’s coming to him.

Daisy Buchanan’s loathsome husband is murdered early on in “Gambit,” Claire Anderson-Wheeler’...Read more

Although its publisher is comparing “Freakslaw” to Katherine Dunn’s great “Geek Love,” the reference point you might want to keep in mind is the Pied Piper of Hamelin.

In tone, “Freakslaw” — which could be described as light horror with strong queer representation — is nothing like “Geek Love.” It’s more playful and ...Read more

Shannon T.L. Kearns is ready to talk. Ready to talk about why being a man can be confusing. To talk about masculinity, hopefully without the word “toxic” in front of it. And to talk about why, as a transgender man, he has a unique perspective on all of that.

Kearns hopes his self-help book, “No One Taught Me How to Be a Man,” will spark...Read more

Sometimes a book comes along at just the right moment in life, aligning with what’s happening and offering eye-opening commentary. John Kenney’s “I See You’ve Called in Dead” is that book.

It’s not a self-help guide, although it sometimes reads like one, or a “Hallmark card,” as protagonist Bud Stanley says to his best friend ...Read more

Never read “The Great Gatsby”? Got 6½ hours free? Then, are you in luck.

As part of its yearlong celebration of the 100th anniversary of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel, Friends of the St. Paul Public Library has put together a reading of “The Great Gatsby” in its entirety, from “In my younger” to “into the past.” It’s ...Read more

Here are the bestsellers for the week that ended Saturday, March 29, compiled from data from independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers and independent distributors nationwide, powered by Circana BookScan © 2025 Circana.

(Reprinted from Publishers Weekly, published by PWxyz LLC. © 2025, PWxyz LLC.)

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. "Summer in ...Read more

Think of “A Better Ending” as a true crime book that becomes a memoir.

James Whitfield Thomson’s book is subtitled “A Brother’s Twenty-Year Quest to Uncover the Truth About His Sister’s Death.” It was ruled a death by suicide in 1974, a conclusion that never sat right with James and other family members. But it wasn’t until ...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS -- It’s not quite beach read weather in Minnesota but maybe it’s time for light-jacket reads? Cardigan reads? We’ll workshop that.

Meanwhile, the titles we are looking forward to most in April include one that probably will be the beach read of the summer (from superstar novelist Emily Henry), a picture book that reminds us ...Read more

While this century’s technological advancements have made communication easier, they’ve also made more people feel lonely, a trend well underway when the pandemic arrived to make everything worse.

Yet five years later, the only genuine attempts to reckon with those “unprecedented times” have come from fiction. Irish writer Colum McCann�...Read more

PHILADELPHIA -- Albert C. Barnes, founder of the Barnes Foundation, was too large a character to be restrained by mortality. He and his collection have been the subject of a documentary and books, and the terms of the indenture guiding the fate of his multibillion-dollar art collection, now housed on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, has spun off ...Read more

I’m not a person who talks to books but when I reached the lovely final lines of “The Evening Shades,” I couldn’t shut up, apparently. The words I said — gasped, if I’m honest — were, “Oh, my gosh.”

Lee Martin’s book — which may remind you of the small-town mini-dramas of Kent Haruf (“Plainsong”) and Ron Rash (“The ...Read more

Author L.J. Smith, who created the “Vampire Diaries” book series that inspired the CW drama of the same name and contributed to pop culture’s obsession with vampires, has died.

Smith died March 8 in a hospital in Walnut Creek, California, The Times confirmed. A statement shared to Smith’s website says she died “peacefully” after “...Read more

Here are the bestsellers for the week that ended Saturday, March 22, compiled from data from independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers and independent distributors nationwide, powered by Circana BookScan © 2025 Circana.

(Reprinted from Publishers Weekly, published by PWxyz LLC. © 2025, PWxyz LLC.)

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. "The Writer" ...Read more

“There isn’t a train I wouldn’t take, No matter where it’s going.”

That dandy epigraph, from Edna St. Vincent Millay’s poem “Travel,” begins Emma Donoghue’s entertaining new novel. “The Paris Express” gets much of its momentum from the relentless energy of a train. Both the epigraph and Donoghue’s book beautifully ...Read more

Twelve years ago, Nigerian American writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie published her third novel, “Americanah,” which cemented her reputation as an international literary star.

Since then, she has published an epistolary book on feminism, a delightful children’s book and a number of shorter pieces, perhaps the most memorable of them dealing ...Read more

In September 1966, John Lennon, who had just finished what would be the Beatles’ last world tour, visited an exhibition, “Unfinished Paintings and Objects.” Featuring the work of Japanese-born American artist Yoko Ono, it was scheduled to open in London the next day.

Spying a stand with a note saying “Apple,” Lennon took a bite. When ...Read more

ANAHEIM, Calif. — As Michael Hiltzik considered writing a new chronicle of California, he examined the region’s past five centuries in search of a fresh perspective.

“I pitched it as a look at what California had taught the world and the rest of the nation and why it remains such a focus of attention and curiosity around the world,” he ...Read more