VLADIMIR by Julia May Jonas

The cover leads one to believe it’s a romance novel. A man’s hunky torso. Suggested hint (wink) of a hand covering a crotch. Within its covers, the story hardly reads as genre romance. But more like dark irony about complicated gender dynamics examined from a unique angle. That of the wife of a philandering department chair at the university where they both work. Our narrator knows her husband cheats—they’ve been in an open marriage for decades. What disturbs this fifty-something women’s literature professor is how her female students react in calling for her resignation because of her husband’s behavior. So what about Vladimir? He’s the young, recently hired assistant professor our narrator lusts over. The author juggles the conflicting emotions about the inequities of aging, sexual shame, and MeToo with Shakespearean twists and turns.  

Favorite line(s): I wanted them to feel that fire, that was what college was for. They were enacting a right of all young people, unearthing what they felt were the systemic wrongs of the world. It was their right to look at us murderously, longing to stand where we stood. It was their right to believe that they could do our jobs better than we could. We, who had experienced enough bitterness in life to expect flaws, faults, and complexities in every situation we encountered. They had grown up with a constant stream of global warming and gun violence burbling on low from their parents’ radios as they were driven to and from soccer or clarinet. Their lives, for the most part (at least the majority of students who attended this liberal and very expensive college), were cloaked in the postmillennial blanket of peace and prosperity, while terrible threats loomed in the shadowy corners of the larger world. They were overpraised and overpressured. There were teenage billionaires, twelve-year-old YouTube stars, and no jobs for them once they graduated. Once Trump became president, the illusion, the one imparted to them comfortably from the driver’s seat of a minivan, the idea that the world would slowly get better, that “the arc of history is long but it bends toward justice,” was upended.

MY BODY by Emily Ratajkowski 

A model makes her living off how her body looks and responds in front of the camera and on the runway. How does its monetarization balance with the owner’s rights to her body image? This is the question model, and author Ratajkowski asks in these twelve essays as she examines body politics, feminism, and consent and abuse. Who ultimately wields the power in the cultural fetishization of women in the fashion industry? Of course, you know the answer. Ratajkowski shows us how it happened to her and what she did about it.

Favorite line(s): Despite my better judgment, it bothered me that the people at this party would look at me as a failure or nothing more than a piece of ass. Even though I thought they were assholes, it frustrated me that I’d lost their respect. On a good day, I’d call people sexist who condemned a woman for capitalizing on her body. On a bad day, I’d hate myself and my body, and every decision I’d made in my life seemed like a glaring mistake. Mostly, though, I knew I was a whole, complex person with thoughts and ideas and things I wanted to make and say. I wanted so desperately to prove them all wrong. I just hadn’t gotten the chance yet. 

OTHER PEOPLE’S CLOTHES by Calla Henkel

Were you obsessed—or at least mildly interested—in what really happened the night Meredith Kercher was murdered and her roommate, Amanda Knox, did cartwheels the next day as police compromised the apartment’s crime scene? Flash forward to Berlin, where two American art school students rent an unsuitably heated, over-the-top apartment from a famous mystery author. Zoe is still grieving the unsolved murder of her best friend. Hailey’s mantra is that “art is what you can get away with.” So the two decide to hold pay-at-the-door costumed parties in the flat as a way to distinguish themselves in Berlin’s art world. Oh, and the famous author is spying on them from inside the flat. It’s a dark place to be in for both the characters and the reader. There are lots of plot twists that keep the reader guessing until the very end.

Favorite line(s): I retraced the steps of that summer. Heavy-drinking Bud Light on the side of Wabasso bridge, letting the brown bottles wisp and crack into the rocks below. I met up with Molly, Ashleigh and Alexa, we waded into the stretch of beach where we’d hung out after school, passing a sandy bottle of Bacardi raspberry, lamenting—if only one of us had been there to loan her ten more bucks for another round or to walk with her home or to call her a taxi. Ashleigh was convinced it was her fault because she had bailed on Ivy that night to study for her nursing final. Ashleigh could barely speak unless completely liquored up, then she couldn’t stop the low sobby bursts—ITSsnortMYFAULTMYslpFUALTITSMYsobFAULT. Alexa wanted vengeance, at least vengeance was a direction. I felt still and useless. Alexa and Ashleigh and the others were interviewed, the police asking insensitive questions. Did she have a history of picking up men in bars? Would you describe her as a party girl? Did she always wear such short skirts? Did she have any enemies?