Jenny Offill’s Recommendations
Terrific, eerie short stories that linger in your mind long after you have closed the book. In one of them, a person wakes up and notices everyone around her is slowly turning blue.
This is a novel about a scheme to steal a million chickens. It somehow is bitingly dark and incredibly funny at the same time.
A dark and intricate tale of a daughter living in the shadow of her famous mother which opens up into an illuminating exploration of what celebrity really means.
In this engrossing novel, a young man is forced to live for several months on a desolate island in the Rhone if he wants to receive his inheritance. It's set in the 19th century, but the theme of seeking shelter in a chaotic world very contemporary.
Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin translated by Megan McDowell
This spare, haunting novel somehow reads like a thriller. It asks the terrifying question: what if we can't protect the people we love?
The Exhibition of Persephone Q by Jessi Jezewska Stevens
An uncanny, lyrical novel about a pregnant woman warily navigating the streets of New York City post 9/11.
In this fascinating novel, Four women, including James Joyce's schizophrenic daughter, Lucia, plot to kill Mussolini while they pass the days in an insane asylum.
Notes From An Apocalypse by Mark O'Connell
This is the perfect book for quarantine. It's funny and moving and brilliantly written and includes illuminating forays into the world of preppers, conspiracists and aspiring Mars colonists. It will make you feel less alone in these strange times.