Book Reviews

Owen King and Mark Jude Poirier's new comic is a B-movie type portrait of college life interrupted by the arrival of alien beetles who feed on the shallowest kids.

From Kate Beaton (the creator of Hark! A Vagrant) comes a new collection of comics that combines deadpan humor with minimalist style, drawing inspiration from often surprising historical figures.

Chris Holm's new novel is about an hit man who only targets other hit men. Critic Jason Heller says the book's somewhat outlandish setup results in lean action and breakneck execution.

Fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer will get a kick out of a graphic novel series that takes the magical-teens-battling-evil-monsters trope and transplants it to a lovingly rendered Tokyo.

Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera's new book of poems melds the political with the personal. Critic Craig Morgan Teicher says it makes for deep yet accessible reading.

In her newest novel, Lauren Groff uses a split narrative to tell the story of a long marriage. Critic Jason Sheehan says the device works thanks to Groff's stunning language.

Critic Heller McAlpin calls Valeria Luiselli's novel a "philosophical funhouse" that melds the story of a charming auctioneer with meditations on the value of objects and the power of story.

The city at the center of Patrick Wensink's novel may be one of "America's Boringest," but critic Jason Heller says it makes a great setting for this "overstuffed buffet of a book."

Each of the ten narrators in Ceridwen Dovey's new book is an animal affected by human warfare. Critic Michael Schaub says the book lacks the imagination it would need to pull off its high concept.

Author Patrick DeWitt knows well how to mine delight from despair. But his distinctive dark humor gathers a few rays of light in Undermajordomo Minor -- a scrambled folk tale that keeps a quick pace.