Books - Sunday Book Review - The New York Times

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Bruce Springsteen: By the Book

The musician and author of the new picture book “Outlaw Pete” likes reading about cosmology: “I find men and women struggling to answer the deepest questions we can ask freeing.”

Thrillers

Killer Company

By CHRISTOPHER RICE

Reviews of new thrillers, including Tawni O’Dell’s “One of Us,” Sergey Kuznetsov’s “Butterfly Skin” and more.

Science Fiction and Fantasy

Dark Visions

By N. K. JEMISIN

New books by Robert Jackson Bennett, Peyton Marshall and more.

Nordic Noir

Northern Exposure

By MARILYN STASIO

New mysteries by Karin Fossum, Jens Lapidus and more.

Horror Novels

Be Very Afraid

By TERRENCE RAFFERTY

Reviews of Anne Rice’s “Prince Lestat” and several novels about middle-class domestic anxiety.

Atul Gawande: By the Book

The author, most recently, of “Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End” is a great fan of Dr. Watson: “He is intelligent, observant and faithful, the way we want all doctors to be.”

By the Book: Archive

‘On the Edge’

By EDWARD ST. AUBYN
Reviewed by DAVID LEAVITT

In Edward St. Aubyn’s novel, a large cast of seekers cross paths at Esalen.

‘Pay Any Price’

By JAMES RISEN
Reviewed by LOUISE RICHARDSON

James Risen argues that America’s open society has been a casualty of the war on terror.

‘A Brief History of Seven Killings’

By MARLON JAMES
Reviewed by ZACHARY LAZAR

Marlon James’s novel examines complicated politics and the growth of gang violence in Jamaica.

In the 1930s, crime writing was a British growth industry.

‘The Art of the English Murder’

By LUCY WORSLEY
Reviewed by SARA PARETSKY

Lucy Worsley examines the creation of British crime fiction and the growing fascination with foul play.

‘Ghosts: A Natural History’

By ROGER CLARKE
Reviewed by PATRICK McGRATH

A 500-year history of apparitions, poltergeists, séances and our longing to believe in the paranormal.

‘The Witch: And Other Tales Re-told’

By JEAN THOMPSON
Reviewed by LAURA MILLER

Folk and fairy tales are loosely reimagined and rendered with scrupulous realism.

Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's monster, 1931.

‘The Poet and the Vampyre’

By ANDREW MCCONNELL STOTT
Reviewed by MAXWELL CARTER

An 1816 “ghost story” contest had lasting literary consequences.

‘The Immortal Evening’

By STANLEY PLUMLY
Reviewed by PRISCILLA GILMAN

Keats, Wordsworth and Lamb attend a famous dinner party.

Critic's Take

Art of Darkness

By PICO IYER

Must the revolutionary artist ignore the basic laws of decency that govern our world in order to transform that world?

Book Review Features

Inside the List

By GREGORY COWLES

Richard Flanagan’s “The Narrow Road to the Deep North,” No. 10 in hardcover fiction, is the ninth consecutive winner of the Man Booker Prize to make our list.