Palaver*, by Bryan Washington (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)*. At the outset of this understated yet potent novel, a Jamaica-born woman travels from Houston, where she lives, to Tokyo, to visit her estranged adult son. After a dozen years in Japan, the son, an English teacher, has developed a surrogate family among the regulars at a local gay bar. Washington examines varying experiences of displacement, writing with tenderness about the tolls of emigration and exile, both cultural and familial. “The mother couldn’t help but wonder how little control she had over her life, and how little say everyone has in where they end up.” The text is enhanced by the inclusion of numerous black-and-white photographs of Tokyo.

The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother), by Rabih Alameddine (Grove). As the title suggests, this sprawling tale centers on Raja, a man in his sixties who lives with his mother in Beirut, a city shaking with political and ecological turmoil. While the duo—both outsized personalities—navigate their cohabitation, Raja must weigh the responsibility he feels as a son against an opportunity to attend a writing residency in America. Raja’s energetic narration is relentlessly funny, even (or especially) when it’s turned to dark or disturbing events from his past. The story jumps back and forth through time and across continents, but Raja’s sensitive and ultimately optimistic point of view is a gripping anchor.

What We’re Reading

Illustration by Ben Hickey

Discover notable new fiction, nonfiction, and poetry.

The Genius of Trees*, by Harriet Rix (Crown)*. The central argument of this wide-ranging treatise is that trees are ecosystem engineers par excellence, capable of influencing “water, air, earth, and fire” as well as the behavior of other organisms in their effort to create the conditions necessary for the trees’ survival. Using recent science, reports from field research, detours through evolutionary history, and sometimes surprising literary references, Rix reveals the myriad ways in which trees bend the natural world to their own ends, from seeding clouds with volatile organic compounds and mining minerals with their roots to wielding forest fires against their competitors and tempting animals (including dinosaurs, dodos, and humans) into spreading their seeds. In her telling, trees emerge as beings with “profound agency,” worthy of our continued attention, care, and respect.

Flashes of Brilliance*, by Anika Burgess (Norton)*. In this lively history, Burgess, a photo editor and writer, traces the dawn of early photography, a period of restless ingenuity when, she writes, “innovations were sometimes misguided, occasionally obsessive, periodically dangerous, and perpetually fascinating.” She recounts feats both scientific and artistic, including Nadar’s shots taken from a giant hot-air balloon, and underwater images captured in cumbersome diving gear. Most striking are some of the hazards that early photographers encountered—in the nineteenth century, their work required handling cyanide fixatives and flash powder that was explosive enough to shatter windows and blow up houses.