Algonquin Books

When the last surviving member of a family writes a memoir, that person has license to say what he wants to say, with little resistance from others. Barry Moser, the incomparable book print maker and illustrator who has created vivid and memorable illustrations for classic books ranging from The Holy Bible to Alice in Wonderland, has written a lovely tribute to his now-deceased brother, their family and the Southern world they all lived in. While he worries that his recollections are one-sided, I can say with confidence that his family would approve of We Were Brothers, which is set at the base of the Appalachian Mountains in Chattanooga, Tennessee during the last century. While Moser's illustrations are black and white, with rendered realism bordering on the photographic, this book is written in vivid color. Moser and his older brother Tommy are typical of brothers growing up in the same household who, on the way to independent adulthood, fail to truly connect with each other. Their differences continue to grow and when the two men finally engage, both wanting some resolution before they are dead, the cultural and social differences between them create an emotional chasm that they struggle to cross. The message here is clear: do not wait until a loved one dies to make amends. – Rob Eckman

A hand hovering over a control; a question about what the camera is revealing; an order from above. And so lives change—just as they do in another part of the U.S. where another finger hovers over another button while a distracted mind calculates odds. Once again a button is pushed and once again lives change. The control in the first instance is in the hands of Jessica, a drone pilot in the Nevada desert, who sees innocents enter her target area but is ordered to fire anyway. The button in the second instance is controlled by Ethan, whose specialty is calculating the impact of terrorism on the markets of the world and who, with one push of a button, one miscalculation he may or may not have made, is cast out like Jessica, adrift in a world with which he is not prepared to cope. Through the eyes of Ethan and Jessica, both on the run, both searching for a way to get at the truth of what has happened, the story expands, explodes, pulling us into intersecting lives and into the web of technologies the impact of which we’re just beginning to understand. And West Is West is not just a great read, it’s eye-opening in terrifying ways. – Betsy Burton

Brown, a New York Times columnist and practicing registered nurse, takes us on her 12-hour dayshift on the hematology/oncology ward in a busy Pittsburgh teaching hospital.  Her patients:  Mr. Hampton, who suffers from lymphoma and for whom Brown is charged with administering a drug that could either kill or cure him; Sheila, who may have been dangerously misdiagnosed; Candace, a returning patient whose paranoia leads her to bring disinfectants for all room surfaces; and Dorothy, who has myeloblastic leukemia and is awaiting a positive blood count so she can go home. Brown had previously earned a PhD in English and was teaching at Tufts University when she announced to her husband she wanted to go back to school to become a nurse.  She has given us an authentic look at a nurses’ duties, their relationships with various hospital staff and their overwhelming responsibilities. I would urge anyone interested in a health care profession to read this excellent one-day memoir. – Sue Fleming

Fans of Evison's Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving will delight in this new book which, like his last, has been built around a smaller cast of quirky and unique characters, many of whom resemble people we already know, would like to know or wish we didn't know. Moving through nearly eighty years of Harriet Chance's existence on earth, visiting all the pivotal moments that have shaped her, Evison delicately opens up the life of his novel's namesake in a poignant homage to the quiet strength of a wife and mother whose life has flashed by, and who finds herself, of a sudden, in her final years. Tragic, funny, and transcendent, Evison's fourth book is a fine addition to his oeuvre. – Aaron Cance