The Stacks

All book reviews

773 honest reviews across fiction, non-fiction, mystery, sci-fi, romance, and more.

Showing 169-192 of 773

Becoming

by Michelle Obama

Becoming by Michelle Obama 2018 review. Michelle Obama's memoir, from her South Side Chicago childhood through the Obama White House. The political memoir that sold seventeen million copies, and the one that genuinely earns its bestseller status.

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

by Yuval Noah Harari

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari 2014 review. A single-volume history of Homo sapiens from cognitive revolution to the present. The popular-history bestseller that defined the 2010s book-club shelf, with the trade-offs that ambition requires.

The Devil in the White City

by Erik Larson

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson 2003 review. The 1893 Chicago World's Fair and the serial killer H. H. Holmes, whose hotel operated three blocks from the fairgrounds. The narrative-nonfiction bestseller that defined the contemporary popular-history register.

Heart-Shaped Box

by Joe Hill

Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill 2007 review. An aging metal star buys a ghost on the internet. The ghost belongs to a former groupie's stepfather, and he is not happy. The debut novel that established Joe Hill as the heir to his father's horror legacy.

A Visit from the Goon Squad

by Jennifer Egan

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan 2010 review. An interconnected novel about a music-industry executive, his assistant, and the people their lives touch across forty years. Pulitzer Prize 2011 and the canonical postmodern American family novel of its decade.

The Corrections

by Jonathan Franzen

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen 2001 review. A Midwestern family gathers for one last Christmas as the patriarch slips into Parkinson's-related dementia. National Book Award 2001 and the canonical American family novel of its decade.

White Teeth

by Zadie Smith

White Teeth by Zadie Smith 2000 review. The friendship between Archie Jones and Samad Iqbal, two London immigrants whose families collide across half a century. The 1999 Whitbread debut that announced one of the most important contemporary British novelists.

Atonement

by Ian McEwan

Atonement by Ian McEwan 2001 review. On a hot summer day in 1935, thirteen-year-old Briony Tallis witnesses something she does not understand and tells a lie that destroys her sister's life. Booker shortlist 2001 and one of the canonical novels of the twenty-first century.

In the Woods

by Tana French

In the Woods by Tana French 2007 review. Dublin Murder Squad detective Rob Ryan is assigned to a child murder in the same woods where his two best friends disappeared twenty years earlier. The Edgar winner that launched the strongest contemporary literary-crime series.

The Pillars of the Earth

by Ken Follett

The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett 1989 review. The building of a twelfth-century English cathedral against the backdrop of civil war. The 1,024-page novel that defined the modern epic historical fiction.

Tell No One

by Harlan Coben

Tell No One by Harlan Coben 2001 review. A pediatrician receives an email containing a video clip of his murdered wife, eight years after her death. The single best Coben standalone and the one that defined the contemporary domestic-thriller register.

Postmortem

by Patricia Cornwell

Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell 1990 review. The debut Kay Scarpetta novel that invented the modern forensic-pathologist thriller. A Richmond, Virginia serial killer is targeting women, and the chief medical examiner is the one who can stop him.

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store

by James McBride

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride 2023 review. A 1972 skeleton found at the bottom of a Pottstown, Pennsylvania well sends the novel back to a 1930s neighborhood where Black, Jewish, and immigrant families lived alongside each other. The most important American novel of 2023.

The Underground Railroad

by Colson Whitehead

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead 2016 review. Cora, a slave on a Georgia plantation, escapes north via an actual underground railroad, a literalized version of the metaphor. Pulitzer Prize 2017 and the National Book Award winner that defined the contemporary Black literary moment.

The Fifth Season

by N. K. Jemisin

The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin 2015 review. On a continent where seismic activity defines life, three women's stories converge as a fifth season begins. Hugo Best Novel 2016, the first volume of the Broken Earth trilogy, and the most important fantasy debut of the 2010s.

Song of Solomon

by Toni Morrison

Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison 1977 review. Macon "Milkman" Dead III, born into a comfortable Black family in 1930s Michigan, travels south to discover his ancestral history. Morrison's third novel and one of her two unquestioned masterpieces alongside Beloved.

The Blind Assassin

by Margaret Atwood

The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood 2000 review. An elderly woman reconstructs the suspicious death of her sister, decades after the publication of the controversial novel-within-a-novel that bears the title The Blind Assassin. Booker Prize 2000.

Never Let Me Go

by Kazuo Ishiguro

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro 2005 review. Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy were students at Hailsham, a special English boarding school. As adults, they begin to understand what Hailsham was for. The novel that defined the contemporary literary-SF register.

Bring Up the Bodies

by Hilary Mantel

Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel 2012 review. Thomas Cromwell engineers the fall of Anne Boleyn and the rise of Jane Seymour. Booker Prize 2012, the second volume of the Cromwell trilogy, and the rare novel that exceeds an already-canonical predecessor.

The Goldfinch

by Donna Tartt

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt 2013 review. Theo Decker, thirteen, survives a Metropolitan Museum bombing that kills his mother and ends up with a stolen painting that defines the next decade of his life. Pulitzer Prize 2014.

Wolf Hall

by Hilary Mantel

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel 2009 review. Thomas Cromwell, the blacksmith's son who rose to serve Henry VIII, reorganizes the English state at the cost of his own soul. Booker Prize 2009 and the most important historical novel of the twenty-first century.

The Ocean at the End of the Lane

by Neil Gaiman

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman 2013 review. A middle-aged man returns to his Sussex childhood home for a funeral and remembers something he had carefully forgotten. Late Gaiman at his most patient and most personal.

Blood Meridian

by Cormac McCarthy

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy 1985 review. A nameless teenager joins a band of Indian-hunters along the Texas-Mexico border in 1849. The most violent American novel of the late twentieth century and the rare McCarthy book that demands the prose attention it requires.

No Country for Old Men

by Cormac McCarthy

No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy 2005 review. A Texas welder finds a satchel of cash at a drug-deal massacre, and the man who comes for it does not stop. Late McCarthy in his cleanest thriller mode.