Review by New York Times Review
THE BOOK THAT CHANGED AMERICA: How Darwin's Theory of Evolution Ignited a Nation, by Randall Fuller. (Penguin, $18.) Fuller's lively account focuses on the responses of a group of New England intellectuals to Darwin's "On the Origin of Species." The book is perhaps most surprising on the subject of Thoreau, for whom Darwin's writings would prove influential. MANHATTAN BEACH, by Jennifer Egan. (Scribner, $17.) In a follow-up to her novel "A Visit From the Goon Squad," Egan tells the story of a Brooklyn Navy Yards worker during World War II. The Times critic Dwight Garner called it "an old-fashioned page turner, tweaked by this witty and sophisticated writer so that you sometimes feel she has retrofitted sleek new engines inside a craft owned for too long by James Jones and Herman Wouk." RETURN TO GLORY: The Story of Ford's Revival and Victory at the Toughest Race in the World, by Matthew DeBord. (Grove, $16.) Over 50 years ago, a Ford heir set out to win Le Mans, the dangerous race across France's backroads. In 2016, the company returned again to the high-stakes course; DeBord recounts the designers and drivers behind the renewed push, and tells the story of Ford's triumphs. THE ANSWERS, by Catherine Lacey. (Picador, $16.) To pay for her unconvetional physical therapy, a woman becomes part of an actor's latest project: to design the perfect partner, piece by piece. The woman serves as an "Emotional Girlfriend," agreeing to leave a toothbrush at his house, give him keys to her place, affirm his views and send him pithy texts. Molly Young, our reviewer, wrote that the story is "funny and eerie and idea-dense - a flavor combination that turns out to be addictive." MY LOVELY WIFE IN THE PSYCH WARD: A MEMOIR, by Mark Lukach. (Harper Wave/HarperCollins, $15.99.) Three years into their marriage, the author's wife suffers a psychotic breakdown, setting in motion a nightmarish cycle of major depressive states, psychosis and nearly round-the-clock care. Lukach's voice - unsparing and even ruthless, but grounded in love - helps the book vault past the stereotype of an illness memoir. UNDERGROUND FUGUE, by Margot Singer. (Melville House, $16.99.) In this debut novel, the lives of four Londoners become entwined amid the terrorist attacks of 2005. Esther is caring for her dying mother, and strikes up a friendship with her neighbors, an Iranian scientist and his son, Amir. But her paranoia about Amir threatens to derail not only their friendship but the families' futures.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [July 29, 2018]
Review by Booklist Review
Singer's debut novel follows the intersecting paths of characters in personal transition amid changing societal landscapes. It's 2005 and Esther leaves New York for London to care for her dying mother, Lonia. Esther's life is in upheaval as she struggles in the wake of a separation from her husband and the death of her young son. Soon after her arrival, she meets her mother's neighbor Javad, who immigrated to London from Tehran 30 years prior, as well as Javad's son, Amir, who attends university nearby. While Esther and Javad's relationship deepens, Javad struggles to connect with Amir, who keeps his extracurricular activities a secret from his father. Interspersed with these conflicts are those of Lonia's last days, as she recalls her childhood and fleeing from the Nazis. The diverse voices come to a head amid the terror of the London Underground bombings, leaving behind questions and preconceptions that forever alter the characters' lives. Singer's introspective tale of displaced characters casts a subtle light on current events.--Strauss, Leah Copyright 2017 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In music, a fugue is a composition where two or more voices hand off a theme to each other, enriching it in their interplay; in psychology, a fugue is a dissociative state, a forgetting and flight from the self. Singer's novel utilizes both meanings for an unusually layered debut. In short, taut chapters, the novel alternates between two families who have suddenly become neighbors. Esther's surface reason for coming to London from New York in 2005 is to take care of her mother, Lonia, who's dying of cancer. But it becomes clear as the story progresses that she is in flight from the emotional pain following her son Noah's drowning, and from the dissolution of her marriage. Her neighbor Javad Asghari is an Iranian-born doctor researching the true case of the "Piano Man," an unidentified person who can't or won't speak and has become a tabloid sensation. Javad too has a failed marriage. His 19-year-old son, Amir (who is about the same age Noah would have been), has a penchant for exploring London's underground, a fact that will become significant as the plot approaches the July 2005 bombings. Interspersed are Lonia's memories of fleeing Poland in 1939. Occasionally the novel stumbles as the characters intertwine in predictably romantic ways, or when the themes of loss and longing are sounded for a bit too long. However, when terror strikes, the plot accelerates and the novel's strands converge brilliantly. Singer's debut novel satisfyingly fulfills a good novel's aim: to shed light on "the secret interiors of other people's lives." (Apr.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Review by Library Journal Review
Esther has fled New York for London, ostensibly to care for her dying mother, Lonia, but more accurately to avoid her crumbling marriage and the giant hole created when her son died. Smoking a cigarette outside her mother's flat one evening, she glimpses a young man in a dark hoodie and boots, acting furtively near the neighbor's door. Immediately alarmed, -Esther later chides herself when she discovers it's the neighbor's teenage son, Amir, returning home after a late night out. Over time, Esther gets to know Amir's father, Javad, a medical researcher originally from Iran. His gentleness and honesty about his struggles raising a sullen and moody youth gives Esther momentary hope that perhaps she could one day rebuild her life. Then terrorists bomb several tube stations, Amir disappears, and Esther has to make a call that changes their lives. Lonia's story, as a young Jewish woman fleeing Poland during World War II, contrasts with the experiences of -Javad and Amir as Muslims in London in 2005. VERDICT Award-winning short story writer Singer (The Pale Settlement) gracefully weaves the fugue motif throughout her debut novel without being heavy-handed. The result is a nuanced, realistic exploration of themes of loss and identity, which seem particularly relevant in these uncertain times.-Christine Perkins, Whatcom Cty. Lib. Syst., Bellingham, WA © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
In the months before the July 7 London bombings in 2005, a woman confronts the death of her son, the impending death of her mother, and her own various prejudices.When she arrives in London to care for her dying mother, Esther's life is in shambles. She has left her husband and her job as a museum conservationist; she's also grieving the death of her son in a swimming accident almost three years earlier. Esther doesn't know quite what to make of her life now. In London, she meets Javad, her mother's next-door neighbor, an Iranian transplant to England as well as a neuroscientist. Javad lives with his 19-year-old son, Amir, whom Esther is vaguely suspicious of. Singer's (The Pale of Settlement, 2007) first novel begins in the months before the July 7 terrorist attacks in London, and it is suffused with the paranoia that overtook much of the non-Muslim Western world after 9/11. Esther, who soon begins seeing Javad, suspects Amir of something she can't quite name; in fact, the first time she lays eyes on him, at 3 a.m. on his own front stoop, she assumes he's trying to break in. Singer is a capable storyteller, but these suspicions of Esther's are hard to sympathize with. Actually, they're a bit too reminiscent of a certain episode of 30 Rock in which Liz Lemon reports her innocent Middle Eastern neighbors to the authoritiesexcept that Singer lacks Tina Fey's wry, self-eviscerating humor. When July 7 finally arrives, Esther's and her mother's fates are meant to implode with Javad's and Amir's, but the various storylines ultimately fail to come together. Singer's plot is too heavily schematic, her prose too effortful, for the novel to breathe on its own. This ambitious first novel never comes fully to life. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Review by New York Times Review
Review by Booklist Review
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Review by Library Journal Review
Review by Kirkus Book Review
