Reviews

Adele’s portrait depicted a triumph of Jewish assimilation and art patronage in Middle Europe, a community that inspired Mark Twain, Sigmund Freud, and countless other creative geniuses. But the crimes surrounding the artwork make it a relic of assimilation’s tragic failure.

Beukes, who gained recognition for the literary science-fiction noir Zoo City, is a South African writer fostering the gradual recognition that science fiction and literary fiction can be at least neighbors if not actual housemates. The Shining Girls offers the reader a time-traveling serial killer stalking his victims through Chicago from the Great Depression to the early 90s. Via the properties of a mysterious house which seemingly exists outside of time, Harper Curtis, the novel’s antagonist, is able to pass between eras freely.

James Reich's new novel stands out because, for all the loudness of its characters and subject matter, it manages to feel subtle and seamless in its execution. It's a novel that doesn't sacrifice politics for plot, or vice versa, and it's a novel that will pass by too quickly and leave you wondering what in the world its author will dream up next.