Noteworthy Fiction
Sirine hasn't left West Hollywood for years, but from her Iraqi father she learned how to conjure up the aromas of their lost desert home. Cookbooks have been Sirine's only travel guides. At 39, she knows more about spices than politics. One of the great pleasures of this sensitive novel is the way Abu-Jaber stirs culinary metaphors. With a little more zaniness, this could have been "My Big Fat Iraqi Wedding," but Abu-Jaber prepares a more complex dish that's equal parts romantic comedy, political protest, fairy tale, and cultural analysis. (March 27)
The genius of "Brick Lane" lies in Ali's ability to make the peculiar universal while making what's familiar comically odd. The story opens briefly in Bangladesh, where Nazneen enters the world two months early. Then as a teenager, Nazneen is sent to London to marry a 40-year-old stranger. She arrives knowing only two English phrases, "sorry" and "thank you." Ali handles this frightened girl with a delicate wit that never slips into condescension or tragedy. Booker Prize nominee. (Sept. 18)
This story about a raucous free-love commune in the 1960s follows the aimless experience of a young woman named Star, who's escaped her suburban parents. Boyle is a Dickensian genius at the portrayal of hypocrisy. He zeroes in mercilessly on the human tendencies that complicate this social experiment, even while portraying their simple yearnings with real tenderness and sensitivity. National Book Award nominee. (Feb. 20)
Reading Carey's novel about a case of literary fraud after World War II is like falling into an Escher drawing. A young poetry editor meets a man in Malaysia who claims to have been terrorized by a creature from his own invented prank. With stories nested in stories, narrators narrating the narratives of other narrators - it all sounds like the kind of poststructural challenge A.S. Byatt would twist into a web of complexity, but Carey never forgets that it's about entertaining readers. (Oct. 23)
Erdrich's novel opens in the ashes of World War I. A German sniper named Fidelis has married his late friend's pregnant wife, an act of camaraderie that quickly deepens. Graced with an eerie stillness, he sets about the careful task of building a life in North Dakota and forgetting the horrors he saw and inflicted. Erdrich knows just how to hover between what's plain and what's extraordinary, building on the life of this common German rifleman a story of legendary proportions. (Feb. 6)
This novel set in the 1920s, about two estranged brothers, makes you resent distractions like working, eating, or sleeping. Long regarded as the favorite son, Byron had been destined to take over the family's lumber empire, but he returned from World War I a troubled man. When his younger brother is sent to Louisiana to manage a mill and rehabilitate Byron, the Mafia stands in their way. There are enough ghastly creatures slithering through this woodland swamp to hold anyone's interest, and enough moral insight to enlighten anyone's conscience. (July 24)
