Best of 2022

Whoever the lambdas might be, and wherever they really come from, they're already here among us. Outwardly alien arrivals from a distant sea, the lambdas are genetically human. They slip quietly into low- to middle-income jobs and appear to want nothing more than to be left alone. For Cara Gray, they are first a haunting presence in her otherwise ordinary childhood, then the inscrutable target of her police surveillance work. When a bomb goes off...

Imbler profiles ten of the ocean's strangest creatures, drawing astonishing connections between their lives and ours and illuminating wondrous models of survival, adaptation, identity, sex, and care on our faltering planet.--Adapted from publisher's description.

A novel in which a successful art dealer confesses the story of his rise to a former classmate in an airport bar--a story that begins with his rescue and resuscitation of a drowning man with whom he becomes inextricably and disturbingly linked.

"This novel, written in the form of a memoir, follows the members of a search committee as they seek a new pastor for their church congregation. The narrator is a restaurant-review writer; meals at local restaurants and in committee members' homes occur in the course of the story. Recipes are included"--

"From award-winning author R. F. Kuang comes Babel, a thematic response to The Secret History and a tonal retort to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell that grapples with student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire. Traduttore, traditore: An act of translation is always an act of betrayal. 1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to London by the mysterious...

Katie heads out west to take advantage of Alberta's oil rush-part of the long tradition of East Coasters who seek gainful employment elsewhere when they can't find it in the homeland they love so much. Katie encounters the harsh reality of life in the oil sands, where trauma is an everyday occurrence yet is never discussed. Beaton's natural cartooning prowess is on full display as she draws colossal machinery and mammoth vehicles set against a sublime...

"Maud Newton's ancestors have vexed and fascinated her since she was a girl. Her mother's father, who came of age during the Great Depression in Texas, was supposedly married thirteen times, and survived being shot in the stomach by one of his wives. His father purportedly killed a man in the street with a hay hook, and later died in a mental institution. On her father's side, a Massachusetts ancestor was accused of being a witch, who cast sickness...