Hot News This Week
September 18, 2025
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On Monday, the Library of Congress named Arthur Sze the 25th Poet Laureate of the United States. “His poetry is distinctly American,” says Acting Librarian of Congress Robert Randolph Newlen. “Like Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman, Sze forges something new from a range of traditions and influences.”
Browse Sze’s acclaimed works published with Copper Canyon Press over four decades, including Into the Hush, his latest collection; The Glass Constellation, a 2024 Science + Literature selection from the National Book Foundation; and The Silk Dragon II, an anthology of Chinese poetry translated into English. Sze is the third Copper Canyon poet to serve as US Poet Laureate, joining the ranks of W.S. Merwin and Ted Kooser.
“I like to say poetry must resist all forms of coercion,” Sze tells the New York Times, and per the Library of Congress, he plans to have a special focus on poetry in translation during his 2025-2026 tenure.
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| Coming Soon: Helen DeWitt and Ilya Gridneff’s Highly Anticipated Collaboration
On September 14, a roundup of notable fall fiction in the New York Times highlighted Your Name Here (Deep Vellum / Dalkey Archive), Helen DeWitt and Ilya Gridneff’s “sprawling metatextual collaboration.” The New York Times also featured the novel in a broader cultural preview with ten things staffers are excited about for fall: critic Jennifer Szalai writes, “From the looks of it, this new book will have more in common with the sprawling genius of The Last Samurai than the bawdy satire of Lightning Rods. But who knows? DeWitt is a brilliant risk-taker. I truly have no idea what to expect.” Elsewhere, NPR has also named the novel as one of twelve books they’re excited about this season.
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| LibraryReads Recommends Vampires at Sea
Vampires at Sea by Lindsay Merbaum (Creature Publishing) is a LibraryReads bonus pick for October. “Decadent, carnal, hilarious, and tragic,” says LibraryReads board member Alene Moroni, “this horror comedy of manners skewers queer culture, cruise ships, recreational sex, class, and self-actualization.” Publishing next month, Vampires at Sea follows a pair of chic immortal beloveds on a cruise vacation, eager to relax and feast upon their fellow passengers’ desires and sorrows.
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| Ann Patchett Features I Who Have Never Known Men
The new hardcover edition of Jacqueline Harpman’s I Who Have Never Known Men (Transit Books), translated by Ros Schwartz, was featured on Ann Patchett’s popular Parnassus Books social media series last week. “It’s absolutely mesmerizing,” bookseller Hannah P. tells Patchett. “You can read this in one sitting, and you will read it in one sitting.” Patchett notes she selected the title after an anonymous fan kept sneaking the book into prominent shelf space. Watch the video on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
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| Consortium Corner with Mary Burns
In the latest Consortium Corner, we’re CC’ing Mary Burns, our metadata support specialist and resident manga expert. Read the full interview here, which features:
- Mary’s recs for manga and a murderous beach read
- A Consortium publisher whose works influenced her studies
- Childhood rides on lion statues at the local library
Consortium Corner is a Q&A series with staff and reps to celebrate Consortium’s 40 years of independent book distribution.
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| | Maria La Divina
by Jerome Charyn
Bellevue Literary Press • September 2025 • 9781954276482
“This is the story of the greatest diva ever to grace the stage—Maria Callas— told as only an aficionado could tell it. . . . Read this one if you love opera, if you admire Maria Callas, or if you just like a good biography.” — Linda Bond, Auntie’s Bookstore (Spokane, WA)
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| | Prisons Must Fall
by Mariame Kaba and Jane Ball, illus. Olly Costello
Haymarket Books • April 2025 • 9798888904411
“A beautiful kids’ picture book offering a sing-a-long story urging that prisons must fall. . . . With other thoughtful discussion questions at the end, this is a great way to begin challenging ideas and infrastructures that do allow mutual growth and healing.” — Morgan DePerno, Bookmarks (Winston-Salem, NC)
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| | Animal Stories
by Kate Zambreno
Transit Books • September 2025 • 9798893380200
“The genre-bending reports in Animal Stories form a fascinating, kaleidoscopic meditation on the act of observing other animals and how we view ourselves among them. . . . It’s an outstanding marriage of personal narrative and literary criticism.” — Keith Rutowski, Boswell Book Company (Milwaukee, WI)
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★ “A disquieting and beautifully written warning of young adult masculinity gone terribly wrong. Strongly recommend to readers interested in chilling, psychological crime fiction and the concepts in Netflix’s popular drama Adolescence.” — Booklist
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★ “My Home Is in My Backpack is a superb book that evokes empathy for families facing forced migration, examining the topic in an accessible, age-appropriate way for children.” — BookPage
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★ “Readers will find a wide assortment of riches on offer here. . . . This beautiful anthology of poetry and prose by contemporary Native American writers includes traditional motifs along with works of stark feminism and hopeful futurism.” — Publishers Weekly
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“Mrs. Unguentine’s account of her marriage and its downfall is a hymn, a dirge, a fantasia and an omen. Crawford said he thought of the book as an ‘apocalyptic novel,’ but its prose is lush and generative.” — Wall Street Journal
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“Welcoming women’s voices into Jewish texts from the past is an inseparable part of the Jewish present and future. The Rooster Princess and Other Tales is a valuable contribution to this legacy.” — Jewish Book Council
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“Sloane’s amused, quizzical but deeply sympathetic approach catches just the right tone. . . . This lively book draws on nearly half a century of posthumous Ed Wood scholarship to construct a compelling case for him as being . . . well, as the author tactfully puts it, ‘not merely bad.’” — Sight and Sound
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“Mr. Patel is a smart and informed interviewer, nudging his sources to the edge of what they know or can say publicly.” — Wall Street Journal
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| | New Digital Review Copies
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Happy New Years by Maya Arad (New Vessel Press), translated by Jessica Cohen, is the inaugural book pick for Nu Reads, a new subscription series curated by the Jewish Book Council.
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“One can live in denial of horror, and one can become a perpetrator while living in the spirit of ‘good.’ I wanted Helen to serve as an example of a person who is actively living in this juxtaposition.” Makenna Goodman, author of Helen of Nowhere (Coffee House Press), was interviewed by author Idra Novey last week for Chicago Review of Books.
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ABA, NAIBA, MIBA, GLIBA, MPIBA, PNBA, SCIBA, SIBA, NCIBA, and USA Today Bestseller
I Who Have Never Known Men
by Jacqueline Harpman, trans. Ros Schwartz
Transit Books • May 2022 • 9781945492600
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USA Today Bestseller
All These Ghosts
by Silas House
Blair • September 2025 • 9781958888698
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