The National Book Review

4 weeks ago | thenationalbookreview.com | Adam Cohen

GliffBy Ali SmithPantheon 281 pp. By Jim SwearingenIt might seem somewhat rash to argue that the field of futuristic-dystopian novels has been picked clean. Writers will of course always craft new riffs on timeless stories. But technical advances in monitoring and surveillance that have occurred in recent years have surpassed virtually every tyrannical gadget in the fictional canon.

1 month ago | thenationalbookreview.com | Adam Cohen

Alice Austen’s staggering debut novel 33 Place Brugmann, set during the Nazi invasion of Belgium, alternates narrators between residents of the titular Brussels apartment as each one; Jewish and gentile, European and American, children and adults; reckon with what their future under occupation may look like and what they must do to survive it.

2 months ago | thenationalbookreview.com | Adam Cohen

Several years ago, I attended a riveting Chicago Public Library event for Donna Seaman’s groundbreaking book, Identity Unknown: Rediscovering Seven American Women Artists. In person, Seaman exudes a quiet intensity, easily ignited by her many interests, and marked by her quick wit. In the huge auditorium, to a rapt audience, she shared photographs and tales of the seven accomplished artists she had spent years researching.

Feb 14, 2025 | thenationalbookreview.com | Adam Cohen

The figure at the center of Sasha Vasilyuk’s stunning debut novel Your Presence is Mandatory is Yefim Shulman: a veteran, academic, and patriarch of a Ukrainian Jewish family. Following his death, Yefim’s family discovers that he had been taken prisoner by the Nazis while serving in World War II, a secret he had kept his entire adult life. Shocked and confused, his family must now reckon with what this discovery reveals about their father, their country, and themselves.

Jan 13, 2025 | thenationalbookreview.com | Adam Cohen

By Ann FabianThere’s a note “about the author” at the end of Amy Gamerman’s remarkable book, The Crazies: The Catttleman, the Wind Prospector and a War Out West. Gamerman “has written about real estate and culture for the Wall Street Journal for more than two decades”—twin beats that have given her a perfect skill set for this meticulously reported story about a decades-long lawsuit over wind turbines in the shadows of Montana’s Crazy Mountains.