The Middle Heart

Bette Bao Lord. Ballantine Books, $23 (408pp) ISBN 978-0-449-91232-4

Three unlikely companions find their bond tested throughout 50 cataclysmic years of war and upheaval in modern China. (July)

Featured Fiction Reviews

Brigitte Giraud

Giraud’s 2022 Goncourt Prize-winning novel, her English-language debut, is an exemplary work of autofiction focused on the death of her husband, Claude, 20 years earlier. In it, Continue reading »

Sonya Walger

Actor Walger debuts with a piercing autobiographical novel about a woman’s relationship with her charismatic but neglectful father. A hedonistic and adventurous Argentinian, he Continue reading »

Shubha Sunder

In Sunder’s astute and stimulating debut novel (after the collection Boomtown Girl), an Indian woman reckons with racial prejudice and draconian immigration laws in post-9/11 Continue reading »

Saou Ichikawa

Ichikawa’s provocative debut chronicles a disabled woman’s sexual awakening. Shaka, a Japanese woman who lives with myotubular myopathy, a genetic disease whose symptoms include Continue reading »