9 Books I Can’t Stop Thinking About

It’s a stormy night in 1866 New Zealand when Walter Moody stumbles across a secret gathering of 12 men discussing a series of inexplicable events: a wealthy man vanished, a prostitute attempted suicide, and a trunk of gold was discovered in a local drunkard’s home. The tension in the hotel bar is palpable and the scene itself is so vivid that it drifts into my mind every single week. If this masterpiece of a novel is ever turned into a movie, I could easily describe each of the required sets to the producer.

I am absolutely haunted by Hanya Yanagihara’s emotional, heart-wrenching novel of four college classmates who move to New York seeking fame and success. As the years pass and the men all grow up and change, they remain tied together through their devotion to Jude, a brilliant, enigmatic man scarred by severe childhood trauma. I have never loved or championed a character more than I have Jude, and I will never stop thinking about his story.

Read the full review of A LITTLE LIFE.

An exquisite family saga about two different brothers bound by tragedy, THE LOWLAND is vivid storytelling at its finest. Moving from the 1960s to the present and from India to America, my mind often drifts through the various and beautifully described settings as I’m falling asleep at night. I can picture Subhash in his Rhode Island home just as clearly as I can picture his brother walking to secret political meetings back home in India.

Read the full review of THE LOWLAND.

Every time one of my friends gets engaged, which seems to be increasingly frequent these days, I think about Nickolas Butler’s SHOTGUN LOVESONGS and the four childhood friends brought together back in Little Wing, Wisconsin, for a wedding. So far, none of the weddings I’ve attended have been as exciting, stressful, and dramatic as this rich and moving book about the true meaning of adult friendship and love.

My dad and I discuss how remarkable ORHAN’S INHERITANCE is at least once a month, likely more often. My dad was the one who first fell in love with this novel about a young Turkish man who inherits his eccentric grandfather’s kilim rug business. As soon as he told me about it, with its striking setting and intricate web of family secrets, I was hooked. You won’t ever again be able to look at a rug without thinking of this indelible novel.

I first read this debut novel on submission when I was an intern at a publishing house. I’ve been thinking about it ever since. I was obsessed, and still am. A sweeping, intergenerational saga set in the 1840s South, it follows 15-year-old Naomi—as she escapes an Alabama plantation, seeks refuge in a Georgia brothel, and falls in love with a white man—and her daughter, Josey, whose life as a slave is irrevocably changed by the Emancipation Proclamation.

A beautiful and profound novel about the interconnected lives of four women, each of whom experiences a life-changing moment at a classic Las Vegas casino nightclub, the characters in ’ROUND MIDNIGHT get into your head and stay there. These women feel more like people I know than characters on a page, and I often find myself thinking about their lives the way I think about my friends’ lives.

Read the full review of 'ROUND MIDNIGHT.

Samuel Andresen-Anderson hadn’t seen his mother in decades when she throws a stone at a prominent local politician, sparking a sensational news story and resulting in her arrest. This electric scene is burned into my brain—as is the rest of Samuel’s journey to uncover his mother’s past and long-buried secrets stretching across generations and continents.

I didn’t think I liked THE PAYING GUESTS when I first read it. But then I couldn’t stop thinking about the gorgeous, genteel 1922 London villa in which the characters live. Then I couldn’t stop thinking about Mrs. Wray, an impoverished widow, and her spinster daughter, Frances, who have to transform their home to take in lodgers for the much-needed source of income. Then I couldn’t stop thinking about Lilian and Leonard Barber, the modern young couple taken in as lodgers. Then I couldn’t stop thinking about the passionate affair that changed everything. Then I realized how much I actually love this book.