Book Reviews

Alice Hoffman's new novel is a fictionalized account of the painter's early life and family, including the eccentric mother who raised him on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas.

Orson Welles' radio hoax famously convinced America that Martians had landed in New Jersey, right? A. Brad Schwartz's new Broadcast Hysteria argues that panic may have been blown out of proportion.

The famous 1978 Lufthansa robbery is a great crime story — it was even a plot point in GoodFellas. But a new book about the heist falls flat, hampered by purple prose and pointless details.

Jeff Bartsch's new novel is about a brainy couple who, after meeting at a 1960s spelling bee, conduct their troubled love affair through secret clues in the crosswords they compose for newspapers.

Women are the blood and backbone of Adrienne Celt's debut novel, and at the heart is Lulu, who's revisiting family stories and legends as she comes to terms with her daughter's birth and an old curse.

Yes, N.K. Jemison's newest epic is the kind of fantasy that has not one but two glossaries at the end — but reviewer Jason Heller says that just underscores her sumptuous detail and dimensionality.

Historian Alex Kershaw's latest book focuses on an American doctor and his family who worked with the French Resistance from their apartment just down Avenue Foch from the Paris SS headquarters.

Sophie Hannah's new psychological crime thriller is about the cruel machinations of outwardly nice married folks with too much time on their hands.

Acclaimed sci-fi author China Miéville hasn't been known for his short fiction, but reviewer Jason Heller says his new collection — subversive, strange and full of sick humor — will change that.