THE NEW YORK TIMES, FRIDAY, JULY 31, 2020 Y C3
Books
August is often a quiet month for publish-
ers, but this year there’s a lot to look for-
ward to: new books from Akwaeke Emezi
and Daisy Johnson; a timely re-examina-
tion of William Faulkner, with a special fo-
cus on how he wrote about race; and an as-
trophysicist’s (surprisingly soothing) guide
to the end of the universe as we know it.‘CASTE: THE ORIGINS OF OUR DISCONTENTS’
Isabel Wilkerson (Random House, Tuesday)
Wilkerson, the Pulitzer Prize-winning jour-
nalist and author of “The Warmth of Other
Suns,” places America’s racism in a global
context, linking it to the caste system in In-
dia as well as Nazi ideology. She identifies
eight cornerstones of caste systems
throughout history and across the world,
and uses vignettes from real-life people to
illustrate how inequality acts as an invisi-
ble, but deeply felt, blueprint for their lives.‘THE DEATH OF VIVEK OJI’
Akwaeke Emezi (Riverhead, Tuesday)
A family in southeastern Nigeria confronts
what little it knew of — and was willing to
accept about — its son after his body is de-
livered to his mother’s doorstep. This mys-
tery, by the author of “Freshwater” and
“Pet,” raises an unsettling question: How
does a family mourn a young man who was
forced to hide his true self?‘EL JEFE: THE STALKING OF CHAPO GUZMÁN’
Alan Feuer (Flatiron, Aug. 25)
El Chapo, the most famous drug trafficker
of his generation, received a life sentence
last year. He had evaded the Mexican au-
thorities for years, smuggled hundreds of
tons of drugs and became notorious for his
violence and corruption. Feuer, a Metro re-
porter for The New York Times who cov-
ered El Chapo’s trial, gives a brisk, rich ac-
count of the kingpin’s rise to power and his
downfall.‘THE END OF EVERYTHING (ASTROPHYSICALLY
SPEAKING)’
Katie Mack (Scribner, Tuesday)
“In about five billion years, the sun will
swell to its red giant phase, engulf the orbit
of Mercury and perhaps Venus, and leave
the Earth a charred, lifeless, magma-cov-
ered rock.” That’s how Mack, a theoretical
astrophysicist, begins her engrossing, ele-
gant timeline of the cosmos. Despite the
book’s sobering title, she sprinkles in de-
lightful esoterica along the way, while pro-
viding a guide to some of the most plausible
scenarios about the end of the universe.Are You Looking
For a Good Yarn?
New works about El Chapo,
Reagan, fictional sisters and
more are ready to be perused.
By JOUMANA KHATIB‘EVIL GENIUSES: THE UNMAKING OF AMERICA’
Kurt Andersen (Random House, Aug. 11)
Starting in the 1970s, according to Ander-
sen, a “cultural U-turn” caused the nation to
abandon the middle class, instead reward-
ing corporate interests and capitalist greed.
The United States, he writes, might be “the
first large modern society to go from fully
developed to failing.” But for all his grim as-
sessments, he offers solutions (including
stronger unions and a universal basic in-
come), and believes change is possible — if
the left adopts tactics the right used dec-
ades ago.‘LIFE OF A KLANSMAN: A FAMILY HISTORY IN
WHITE SUPREMACY’
Edward Ball (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Tuesday)
In his National Book Award-winning book
“Slaves in the Family,” Ball tracked down
descendants of the people that his ances-
tors, plantation owners in South Carolina,
had enslaved. Now, he returns again to his
family, focusing on one of his great-great-
grandfathers and his association with the
Ku Klux Klan.‘LUSTER’
Raven Leilani (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Tuesday)
Edie is a Black woman in her 20s, an artist
in Bushwick who is unfulfilled by virtually
every part of her life. When she begins dat-
ing a white man in an open marriage, she
becomes entangled in his family’s life —
emotionally, physically and even economi-
cally.‘MIDNIGHT SUN’
Stephenie Meyer (Little, Brown, Tuesday)
It’s been almost 15 years since Meyer pub-
lished “Twilight,” the best-selling young-
adult vampire novel that sparked a world-
wide interest in paranormal romance. Now
she returns to the story of Edward Cullen
and Bella Swan, but this time, she tells it
from his point of view.‘REAGANLAND: AMERICA’S RIGHT TURN 1976-
1980’
Rick Perlstein (Simon & Schuster, Aug. 18)
By 1976, Ronald Reagan’s political career
appeared to be over. In Perlstein’s new
book, the final volume of his series charting
the ascendancy of the right in America, he
traces Reagan’s political comeback and how
he reinvigorated the Republican Party’s
base with his pledge to “make America
great again.” Perlstein, an engaging story-
teller, offers a clear guide to the intellectual
and ideological debates of the time.‘THE SADDEST WORDS: WILLIAM FAULKNER’S
CIVIL WAR’
Michael Gorra (Liveright, Aug. 25)
Faulkner’s enduring, ubiquitous quote that
“the past is never dead” might be a fitting
epitaph for this new book. In this timely re-
examination, Gorra considers how Faulk-
ner should be read in the 21st century, with a
focus on the depiction of Black people and
racism in his fiction.‘SISTERS’
Daisy Johnson (Riverhead, Aug. 25)
With her debut novel, “Everything Under,”
Johnson became the youngest author short-
listed for the Booker Prize. Her new book
focuses on two teenage sisters, July and
September, who arrive with their mother at
a desolate house on the eastern coast of
England after leaving school for reasons
that aren’t entirely clear. The sisters are
fiercely close, less than a year apart in age,
but their relationship takes on a sinister
tone over time. As their circumstances and
past come into focus, Johnson delivers a
shocking twist.‘SUMMER’
Ali Smith (Pantheon, Aug. 25)
The final volume in Smith’s seasonal quar-
tet, set during the coronavirus pandemic,
centers on Sacha and Robert, two siblings
grappling with the awakening of their politi-
cal and cultural consciousness. As she did in
the series’ earlier books, Smith balances
current issues (Brexit, the refugee crisis,
Trump) with her characters’ inner lives —
and characters from the previous books re-
appear, too.‘VESPER FLIGHTS’
Helen Macdonald (Grove Atlantic, Aug. 25)
Macdonald’s debut, “H Is for Hawk” —
about grappling with the death of her be-
loved father by training a goshawk — was
one of the Book Review’s 10 best books of- Now, Macdonald returns with a col-
lection of essays, new and previously pub-
lished, about the natural world.
Fill the grid with digits so as not to repeat a digit in any row or column, and so that the digits within each
heavily outlined box will produce the target number shown, by using addition, subtraction, multiplication or
division, as indicated in the box. A 4x4 grid will use the digits 1-4. A 6x6 grid will use 1-6.
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Put two stars in each row, column and region of the grid. No two stars may touch, not even diagonally.
Copyright © 2020 http://www.krazydad.com
What six-letter word completes this analogy? Stallion : pride :: oafish : ________Brain Tickler
ANSWERS TO
PREVIOUS PUZZLESPUZZLE BY WILL SHORTZ YESTERDAY’S ANSWER Beavers have transparent eyelids so they can see underwater.
Crossword Edited by Will Shortz
ACROSS
1 Ball in a gym,
maybe
5 More than buds
9 Country whose
name is believed
to come from
ancient Greek for
“honey-sweet”
14 Prefix with static
or dynamic
15 Superhero in
“The Incredibles”
17 Sports org.
headquartered
in Indianapolis
18 They’re made
up of stacked
sheets
19 “Whatever”
21 Ram sign
22 Director Lee
23 Whiskey or beer
choice
24 Columbia
athlete
25 “The Color
Purple”
protagonist
27 It’s used in a
flash
28 Org. for good
drivers
31 Like some
monogrammed
towels33 1980s-’90s
series set in
California
35 Way to go ... or,
as two words,
lead-in to “way to
go”
36 ___-pop
37 Bring down
38 Overlook
39 Trainees
known to work
notoriously long
hours
41 Med. device
regulator
42 Scrunches up
44 Some like it hot
45 Lead-in to
amorous
46 One may be
cooped up
47 How-___
49 Not sleepy
51 Stage for a big
star?
53 “Preach!”
55 Pants, slangily
56 TV host in the
World Golf Hall
of Fame
57 Life partner
58 “The funny thing
is ...”
59 The Forest
Service is part of
it, in brief60 Brand with
“Classic” and
“Wavy” varietiesDOWN
1 Diplomatic gift
from China
2 Made peace
3 Crush
something?
4 Feature of
Tokyo’s Imperial
Palace
5 Secured, as a
sailor’s rope
6 Signal for help
7 Actress Alice of
old Hollywood
8 Abbr. aptly
hidden in
COMPASSES
9 Eyebrow-filling
technique10 “What’s that
___?”
11 “What’s that
___?”
12 Número atómico
of lithium
13 Hilton ___,
Pulitzer-winning
critic for The
New Yorker
16 Be behind
20 Beyond
awkward
24 Groin pulls?
26 A.P. English subj.
27 Gymnastics
eponym of a
double back
somersault with
three twists
28 Meteor showers?
29 Food-filled field
30 Blows away31 Like 50 U.S.
senators
32 Indefatigable
34 Not yet astir
40 Cold brew
43 Los ___ (city in
Silicon Valley)
45 ___ code
46 In one ear?
48 Movie
reviewers often
trash them
49 During
50 Act like a shark,
in a way
51 Density symbols
52 “___ pass”
53 Fuss
54 Day when the
Last Supper is
commemorated:
Abbr.ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLEPUZZLE BY CLAIRE RIMKUS AND ERIK AGARD7/31/20Online subscriptions: Today’s puzzle and more than 9,000 past puzzles,
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Read about and comment on each puzzle: nytimes.com/wordplay.1234 5678 91011121314 15 1617 1819 20 2122 23 2425 26 27 28 29 3031 32 33 3435 36 3738 39 4041 42 43 4445 46 47 4849 50 51 5253 54 5556 5758 59 60WI FE TOBE SCRAP
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