Hot News This Week
October 14, 2025
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| Two Dark Academia Picks
Jawbone by Mónica Ojeda, translated by Sarah Booker (Coffee House Press): “Six friends at a Catholic school transform a cobwebby, long-abandoned house into a cultish headquarters where they can explore their darkest impulses. . . . [A] moody and unsettling novel, which draws on the internet tradition of creepypasta to explore the dark side of girlhood.”
In Other Lands by Sarah Rees Brennan (Small Beer / Big Mouth House): “A hilarious, and moving, sendup of magic school novels. . . . Brennan explores gender dynamics, diplomacy in wartime, xenophobia and the ways that deeply damaged people can learn to care for each other—all with a per-page joke rate that puts Douglas Adams to shame.”
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| Sweetly Spooky Stories for Kids
In a roundup of sweetly spooky stories for Halloween, Kirkus Reviews recommended two titles from Consortium publishers . . .
Cecilia Heikkila’s The Slightly Spooky Tale of Fox and Mole (Floris Books), translated by Polly Lawson, which is “a triumphant blend of humor and horror, perfect for teaching and scaring by turn,” according to the Kirkus starred review.
Stepanka Sekaninova’s Let’s Get Spooky (Albatros Media), illustrated by Lukas Figel, which Kirkus says is “a spellbinding excursion into scary, sometimes amusing, and enthrallingly illustrated settings.”
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| Nonfiction News
“Holding the Line Through Tear Gas and Censorship”: Listen to Truthout’s Movement Memos podcast for an interview between Read This When Things Fall Apart (AK Press) editor Kelly Hayes and contributors Maya Schenwar and Eman Abdelhadi, in which they discuss immigration raids and the violent repression of protesters in Chicago.
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| Consortium Corner with Josh Brown
In the latest Consortium Corner, we’re CC’ing Josh Brown, our manager of operations and metadata. Read the full interview here, which features:
- Josh’s excellent recs for cosmic horror and Ursula K. Le Guin’s poetry
- A Beowulf readathon
- Two whimsical Star Wars tshirts
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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| | Haze
by Katharine Kerr
CAEZIK SF & Fantasy • November 2025 • 9781647101510
“Absorbing far-future tale of space travel and true AI, focusing on a drug-addicted pilot. . . . Good characterizations, believable aliens, and awe-inspiring puzzles make for solid SF.” — Mary B., Long Beach Public Library
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| | Happy New Years
by Maya Arad, trans. Jessica Cohen
New Vessel Press • August 2025 • 9781954404342
“I loved this book! I wasn’t sure how well the epistolary format would work but it was perfect. Leah was so real to me and it was sad to see how hard she tried to be optimistic and positive when life kept throwing her curve balls.” — Paula H., Wake Tech Library
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| | White Winter
by Milena Lukesova, illus. Jan Kudlacek
Albatros Media • October 2025 • 9788000076201
★ “A timeless tale about the transformative magic of a snowstorm and imaginative play. . . . This simple, beautifully conveyed story is an installment in the ‘Poetic Vintage Tales’ series originally published in the Czech Republic in 1978.” — School Library Journal
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| | The Mongoose
by Joana Mosi
Pow Pow Press • October 2025 • 9782925114475
★ “A poignant portrait of mourning, grief, and recovery. . . . Through minimalistic black-and-white outlines of panels strategically scattered on each page, the story behind what the mongoose represents gradually emerges.” — Booklist
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| | The Mind Reels
by Fredrik deBoer
Coffee House Press • October 2025 • 9781566897372
“DeBoer, who has elsewhere written about his own battles with mental health, tells a gripping story about one young woman’s descent into illness.” — Vulture
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| | Perverts
by Kay Gabriel
Nightboat Books • September 2025 • 9781643622941
“[Gabriel] beat everyone to the finish line in the smartest, most roundabout way.” — Hari Nef, via Interview Magazine
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“Slippery yet playful and fun, what a joy it is to have [Emshwiller’s] work at hand. . . . The stories in this collection span from 1958 to 2012. ‘Her work still feels brand new,’ Kelly Link writes in the foreword, ‘inventive and rigorous, experimental and slapstick and astonishing.’” — Washington Post
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“A striking composite of literary biography, criticism, and autobiography that surely counts as one of [Özlü's] best works. . . . Despite the incessant presence of death and loss, Özlü’s books remain invigorating and bracing.” — The Nation
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“If one ever forgets what poetry is for, this newly-released collection is a reminder of its ability to renew, sooth and provoke. Mirror is a translation of a lengthy posthumous selection of Chinese poet Zhang Zao’s lifelong opus.” — Asian Review of Books
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“A lone wolf and a sick bunny save each other in this sweet, understated fable about the power of an unlikely friendship. . . . A simple, heartwarming story filled with kind and humorous forest creatures that offers readers hope in the face of cancer treatment.” — School Library Journal
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| | Come Back Out, Mole!
by Alicia Acosta, illus. Alessandro Montagnana
NubeOcho • October 2025 • 9788410406506
“This will allow for excellent discourse about worrying and about the quiet joys that can be found in friendship and in the world.” — School Library Journal
“A lighthearted look at common fears and the rewards of bravery.” — Kirkus Reviews
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| LibraryReads Pick for October
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Vampires at Sea
by Lindsay Merbaum
Creature Publishing • October 2025 • 9781951971229
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ABA, SCIBA, PNBA, NAIBA, NEIBA, SIBA, GLIBA, NCIBA, MPIBA, and MIBA Bestseller
I Who Have Never Known Men
by Jacqueline Harpman, trans. Ros Schwartz
Transit Books • May 2022 • 9781945492600
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Known for his work on the podcast It Could Happen Here, journalist James Stout offers a unique perspective on both war and on anarchism while centering the voices of those too often overlooked in conflict studies.
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Relevant for both new and seasoned community organizers, this guidebook for social change provides strategy and tools to create a more just and desirable future for everyone.
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Engineered Conflict is a hard-hitting exploration of how state policy displaces and isolates Black communities through housing instability, criminalization, and school closures.
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These essays examine two decades of US foreign policy failures toward Iran, offering crucial lessons for anyone interested in the history of US–Iran relations and the evolving political dynamics in the Middle East.
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