BY SIDNEY BOKER ’21
New year, new books! This list of books to look out for in 2019 was compiled from Literary Hub’s “Most Anticipated Books of 2019,” Goodreads’ “43 Highly Anticipated Books of 2019” and Entertainment Weekly’s “50 most anticipated books of 2019.” This year’s new books span genres including YA, thriller, contemporary, fantasy and essay collections. The books spotlighted here are a few of this year’s top picks curated to meet a range of literary interests at Mount Holyoke.
BY ISABEL RODRIGUEZ ’21
On Jan. 24, online storytelling platform Wattpad announced that they will enter the print industry with their own publishing division, Wattpad Books. The website announced that, starting in the fall of 2019, Wattpad Books will publish six Young Adult (YA) titles, all stories that are popular on Wattpad.
BY KATE FLAHERTY ’19
Art, deception, love and murder are the centerpieces of B.A. Shapiro’s historical mystery novel, “The Collector’s Apprentice.” Shapiro, whose 2012 novel “The Art Forger” became a New York Times best-seller, delivers a lyrical and elegant story set in 1920s Paris and Philadelphia. Shapiro weaves in the lives of dozens of historical figures like Henri Matisse and Gertrude Stein, immersing the reader in a world of postImpressionist artists.
BY ISABEL RODRIGUEZ ’21
Since the release of George R. R. Martin’s “A Dance with Dragons” in 2011, fans have been impatiently awaiting the sixth book in Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” series, “The Winds of Winter.” An ongoing joke with “A Song of Ice and Fire” fans is that winter is not coming soon enough.
BY DEANNA KALIAN ’20
“I have a history of dragging friends into questionable endeavors,” explained Chris Baty, the creator of National Novel Writing Month, otherwise known as NaNoWriMo. “And NaNoWriMo was one of many self-improvement schemes that began with me saying ‘What if we all got together and….’”
BY BEATA GARRETT ’20
This year, “The Kissing Booth,” a romantic comedy on Netflix, and the supernatural thriller “Light as a Feather” were released on Netflix and Hulu. Both films started as novels on Wattpad, a website and a community for the online publication of user-generated fiction, and were subsequently published by Penguin Random House and Simon Pulse, respectively.
BY SIDNEY BOKER ’21
“Little Women” by Louisa May Alcott is being adapted into a new film, set to be released in 2019. According to the New Yorker, Alcott wrote the book in 1868 after publisher Thomas Niles prompted her to write a “girls’ story.” Before “Little Women,” Alcott published thriller stories in different weekly papers under the pseudonym A.M. Barnard to help her financially-strapped family. The Alcott family consisted of Bronson, Alcott’s transcendentalist and jobless father, her mother Abba and her three sisters, who served as Alcott’s inspiration for the March sisters in “Little Women.”
BY ISABEL RODRIGUEZ ‘21
Stephen Dillon, an assistant professor of critical race and queer studies at Hampshire College, spoke to a packed crowd at Amherst Books last Friday night. His new book, “Fugitive Life: The Queer Politics of the Prison State,” focuses primarily on the work of underground women activists in the United States during the 1970s.
BY BEATA GARRETT ’20
Ask any American who Stephen King is and it’s almost certain they will have seen one of his adapted movies or read one of his books. Katie McLain at Bookriot, a website that focuses on book news researched which horror writers appeared most when “best horror writer” is Googled, revealing King as the winner.
BY SIDNEY BOKER ’21
Book subscription boxes are just what they sound like: a recurring (usually monthly) delivery of a themed assortment of products. Two examples of these genre-focused boxes stand out in particular for their superior quality of monthly new Young Adult (YA) literature and literary goods, like pins, t-shirts and bookmarks.
BY BEATA GARRETT ’20
Written by Marjorie Liu and illustrated by Sana Takeda, “Monstress” is a comic series that follows protagonist Maika Halfwolf’s journey in learning about her mother’s death and unlocking a devastating power within. The series is set in 20th century Asia during a war between humans and Arcanics, a race descended from gods. The comics highlight the way women of color survive the trauma of war both alone and through the relationships they form with one another. The content is violent — touching upon topics such as slavery, physical disabilities and PTSD — but never becomes exploitative.
BY ISABEL RODRIGUEZ ’21
Sonia Sotomayor, the third woman and first-ever Hispanic person to hold a Supreme Court seat, has recently released two autobiographies, now abridged for young readers. Her writing journey began in 2013 with her autobiography, “My Beloved World,” which she then adapted into two new books designed for young readers.
BY BEATA GARRETT ’20
On the night of Tuesday, Sept. 11, in Gamble Auditorium, Mount Holyoke welcomed four young adult (YA) authors to speak about their recent series and to share their writing experiences. The panel included Cassandra Clare, Holly Black and Scott Westerfeld and it was moderated by David Levithan.
BY DEANNA KALIAN ’20
What makes a good summer read? It’s something experts and book lovers have long debated. According to Reader’s Digest, books that are “an escape in and of themselves” make the best beach reads. PBS claims that summer is for “endless reading,” and therefore the perfect time to tackle a hefty volume which would present too much of a task during the academic year. According to Sarah Paust ’20, “If I’m home on the beach reading it, it’s a summer read!”
BY SARAH CAVAR '20
On Tuesday, Cristina Henríquez, acclaimed author of Mount Holyoke Common Read “The Book of Unknown Americans,” spoke in Chapin auditorium. Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students Marcella Runell Hall began the evening by asking the waiting audience to consider: “What kind of community do we want to be in together?”
BY CASEY ROEPKE ’21
The beginning of this summer was shaped by the Trump administration’s family separation policy. As photographs of toddlers in cages, recordings of children crying for their parents and statements of utter inaction from elected officials flooded the news cycle, Mount Holyoke students sat down to read this year’s Common Read, “The Book of Unknown Americans.” Within its pages they found solace and its captivating characters and bittersweet moments were made to seem even more important by the real-world events happening in the U.S.
BY DEANNA KALIAN ‘20
“The Director: A Memoir” by Stein is a narrative that begins during her early post-graduate years as she struggled to make her way in New York City. The story, which hit the shelves in January, details the relationship between 22-year-old Stein and a 65-year-old high-profile director.
