With the new year comes new books! I don’t know about you, but I have been completely overwhelmed trying to keep track of everything. On New Year’s Eve, I spent HOURS looking up, writing down, and organizing my most anticipated new releases. Of course, you will always find new books here, but you could also check out Book Riot’s new releases newsletter, which you can subscribe to here. So let’s jump into some new books, but first, bookish goods!
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Bookish Goods
Library Card Pillows by dirtsastudio
I may be pillow obsessed. Why suffer through uncomfortable season if you can just solve the problem by adding a pillow (or 12)?! These adorable library card pillows would be a great choice. $32
New Releases
Simply Chinese Feasts: Tasty Recipes for Friends and Family by Suzie Lee
Just in time for the Lunar New Year, Simply Chinese Feasts highlights the author’s family traditions around great food and celebrations. From her parents’ hometown of Hong Kong to Lee’s new home in Northern Ireland, Lee’s recipes include culinary inspiration from around the world.
The Age of Deer: Trouble and Kinship with our Wild Neighbors by Erika Howsare
Nature lovers will adore The Age of Deer’s investigation into humanity’s relationship with deer. For millennia, humans have hunted, protected, and lived with these gentle creatures. Howsare examines what the deer has symbolized throughout human culture and what it means today.
For a more comprehensive list of new releases, check out our New Books newsletter.
Riot Recommendations
Black Folk Could Fly: Selected Writings by Randall Kenan
Black Folk Could Fly is a posthumous collection of nonfiction works from throughout Randall Kenan’s career. In it, he writes about his childhood in rural North Carolina, his move to New York City to work on his writing career, and his travels around the country to interview Black people about their experiences. Kenan was always pondering, “What does it mean to be Black in America today?” Through his writing, we can see the progression of his thought process as he mulls over this question and reads other Black writers on the topic.
Divine Might by Natalie Haynes
We are now in a golden age of myth retellings. Everyone and their mother’s brother has been trying their hands at these myth-inspired tales, but few authors are as good as Natalie Haynes. While Haynes is more known for her fiction, Divine Might is nonfiction, with each chapter examining different goddesses and their stories. Haynes’ holistic way of viewing these goddesses invites readers to reexamine their own assumptions about these divine figures.
That’s it for this week! You can find me over on my substack Winchester Ave, over on Instagram @kdwinchester, or on my podcast Read Appalachia. As always, feel free to drop me a line at kendra.d.winchester@gmail.com. For even MORE bookish content, you can find my articles over on Book Riot.
Happy Reading, Friends!
~ Kendra