We’ll see new books from “The Overstory” writer Richard Powers and “Leave the World Behind” novelist Rumaan Alam, for instance. Here are five others we can’t wait to dive into, all due this month.

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“Creation Lake” by Rachel Kushner. (Simon & Schuster. 416 pp. $29.99. Out now.)

The latest from Kushner, who’s been a Booker Prize and National Book Award finalist, is about a woman who is lying to everyone about everything. Sadie (not her real name, of course) is a secret agent, sent to France to infiltrate a group of anarchists. She has a lover, whom she’s surveilling, and friends, whom she’s using, and everything works well until she becomes fascinated by a man who may be even more duplicitous than she is.

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“Devils Kill Devils” by Johnny Compton. (Macmillan. 288 pp. $28.99. Out now.)

Guardian angels are supposed to be a good thing, but Sarita isn’t so sure when, on her wedding night, her angel, Angelo, who has repeatedly saved her from disaster, kills her husband. Compton’s followup to last year’s “The Spite House” is said to be a super-violent tale of horror that casts vampires in a whole new light.

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“Final Cut” by Charles Burns. (Pantheon. 224 pp. $34. Sept. 24.)

This graphic novel (very graphic — it’s definitely not for kids) is a tale of romantic obsession that’s also about identity and nostalgia. Brian and Jimmy, who used to make goofy science-fiction short films when they were in middle school, reunite as adults to create a more ambitious feature film. Inspired by their beloved “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” it drives them and their collaborators, including muse and lead actor Laura, into a remote forest where things take a dark turn.

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“The Siege” by Ben Macintyre. (Crown. 400 pp. $32. Out now.)

The prolific British writer’s nonfiction accounts of spycraft — including “Agent Zigzag,” “Colditz” and “Operation Mincemeat” — generally take him to World War II and the heroes who worked in the shadows to bring it to a close. But the events of “The Siege” happened in 1980, during America’s Iran Hostage Crisis. It’s a minute-by-minute account of the six days after armed gunmen stormed the Iranian embassy in London, taking 26 hostages.

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“The Small and the Mighty” by Sharon McMahon. (Thesis. 320 pp. $32. Sept. 24,)

Duluth, Minnesota-based social media influencer, podcaster and “America’s government teacher” McMahon— whose popularity has zoomed as the country has become more divided and confusing — unveils 12 witty portraits of average Americans who made enormous contributions but didn’t get into the history books, like the guy who was at Alexander Hamilton’s deathbed and who wrote the preamble to the Constitution.

Chris Hewitt is the interim books editor at the Minnesota Star Tribune (Minneapolis).

Small publishing houses have known for years there’s an audience for young people’s books by and about Indigenous people. The Minnesota Historical Society, for example, published “How the Birds Got Their Songs” recently. But, if this spring is any indication, larger publishers are reaching out to that market, too.

Here are four new books that are worth checking out:

“Where Wolves Don’t Die,” by Anton Treuer, has potential to be a breakout hit. The Ojibwe professor at Bemidji State’s page-turner is a young adult title in the sense that Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” also would be categorized as YA if it were published now.

Ezra, the adolescent hero of “Wolves,” lives in Northeast Minneapolis but is whisked across the Canadian border when there’s an arson fire at the home of a classmate/enemy that results in two deaths. Ezra’s not a suspect exactly, but he keeps getting questioned by police so his dad (like Treuer, a professor of Ojibwe) sends him to live in Canada with Ezra’s grandparents. There, he can help his grandpa with chores and study remotely while also remotely pining for his friend-or-is-she-more Nora.

Initially, “Wolves” seems like it’s going to be a mystery, but Ezra’s ability to investigate the deaths leaves Minneapolis when he does. At that point, “Wolves” becomes an absorbing primer in the traditions of Ezra’s clan, including how they pay respect to the creatures they kill and, especially, how they interact with wolves, with whom they feel a kinship. Eventually, Ezra learns the surprising truth about what happened in Minneapolis and what might come next for him. (Levine Querido, $18.99)

“Being Home,” by Traci Sorell and Michaela Goade, could appeal to any kid who’s nervous about moving. The heroine of Sorell’s book is, like the author, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation and her notion of home is in flux. She’s moving from an unidentified city to her ancestral home, where she’s eager to reconnect with all her relations. It’s a simple, sweet story and Goade’s Starburst-colored illustrations, in a variety of media, are as joyous as the on-the-move girl is.

Goade, a Tlingit Nation woman, is the first Native American illustrator to win the prestigious Caldecott Medal. (Penguin/Random House, $19.99)

“A Family Tree,” by Staci Lola Drouillard and illustrated by Kate Gardiner, is based on a Drouillard family true story. It’s about a child named Francis who is the same age as a white spruce, named Gaawaandagoonce, planted in their grandmother’s yard. Like “Being Home,” “A Family Tree” incorporates the theme of relocating. When Francis’ grandmother moves from Grand Portage to be with her family, Gaawaandagoonce goes with her.

In an author’s note, Drouillard, who lives in Grand Marais and is a Grand Portage Band of Ojibwe direct descendant, writes that “like the little spruce tree, we continue to adapt and change while retaining the wisdom and knowledge of the forest, which was taught to us by our elders, who learned from those who came before them.” (Harper Collins, $19.99)

“Loaf the Cat Goes to the Powwow,” by Nicholas DeShaw and illustrated by Tara Audibert, is neatly summed up by its title. The St. Paul writer’s picture book is about a stowaway cat who gets to experience a powwow while readers learn about the musicians, grass dancers and storytellers there. DeShaw, who is Anishinaabe and Migiziwan Odoodeman, introduces young readers to some Ojibwe words in a story that could work as a personal connection for Indigenous littles or, for others, as an introduction to a beautiful culture they may know little about. (Penguin, $18.99)

Chris Hewitt is the interim books editor for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis).

Frank Figliuzzi’s book is best when it listens to its subtitle. The former assistant director of the FBI introduces us to a special FBI unit that, since 2004, has linked more than 850 killings to long-haul truckers. It’s shocking to learn that so many murders are believed to have been committed by truckers and that the problem is so grave that the FBI doubled down on it by creating the Highway Serial Killings Initiative.

Figliuzzi is quick to point out that the vast majority of truckers are law-abiding folks, whose difficult work keeps this country running (as we learned, sometimes painfully, when the COVID pandemic interrupted their labor). But “Long Haul” also gets at the unique aspects of the job that can make its practitioners turn violent: loneliness, sometimes-shadowy regulation, unhealthy hours (and the drugs that may fuel the drivers) and more.

All of which leads Figliuzzi, who leans toward the melodramatic even when he’s not discussing serial killers, to write, “Let me say that again: There is enough evidence of similarities among different clusters of killings for the FBI to say with confidence that there are multiple homicidal maniacs on our nation’s highways.”

That could give you pause next time you consider flipping off a trucker who makes it difficult to pass on the freeway.

“Long Haul” contains fascinating information on how some killers have been tracked down using methods that range from the latest in high-tech criminology to clues left carelessly behind. (One murderer’s name and phone number were conveniently found in a jacket on the corpse of his victim.)

There would seem to be plenty of information here for a true-crime stunner along the lines of Robert Kolker’s “Lost Girls.” But Figliuzzi muddies “Long Haul” by including chapters in which he drives along with a (law-abiding) truck driver, detailing their not-scintillating efforts to load and unload flatbeds. He also delves into the psychology of sex workers who hang out at truck stops, a little-explored subculture that merits its own book.

Readers may also be vexed by Figliuzzi’s methodology. The three most-quoted people in “Long Haul,” two truckers and a sex-worker-turned-counselor, use pseudonyms. Other sources aren’t named at all. That’s frustrating for the reader and was frustrating for the writer, too, I’ll bet. It made me curious at what point in the week they spent together that a trucker whose real name is not “Mike” insisted on anonymity.

In other words, I spent too much of “Long Haul” wondering about the story behind the story. Figliuzzi has spotlighted a fascinating world that I knew nothing about and I’m grateful for that. I just wish all of his sources had been with him for the long haul.

Chris Hewitt is interim books editor for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis).

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About the book

“LONG HAUL: Hunting the Highway Serial Killers”

Frank Figliuzzi

Mariner, 256 pp. $25.99.

Like the subject it covers, “Skies of Thunder” takes a while to get going.

Caroline Alexander’s World War II aviation history deals with Allied efforts to get supplies to China, a mission hampered when Japan captured the Burma Road, the tricky land route to China. Military flight was still fairly new, but it was the only way for the U.S. and Great Britain to move men and materiel where they needed to be in the region.

Or were they needed? One frustration of the new book by the author of “The Endurance” — the gripping account of a doomed Antarctic expedition — is that if you know much about the war, you know China didn’t end up being especially helpful because its leader, Chiang Kai-shek, was so demanding and unreasonable.

That frustration is a worthwhile issue for Alexander to explore. Allied pilots doubted the worthiness of their missions, which involved not just flying over the treacherous, uncharted Himalayas during monsoon season but also making decisions while oxygen-deprived, under-trained and hampered by malaria medication that caused hallucinations. So perhaps it makes sense for Alexander to transfer pilots’ frustrations to readers.

It’s not a ton of fun to read, though. Alexander’s account is beautifully researched and clear, but it’s also slow to get off the ground (like some Allied planes). The first chapters establish context, particularly in little-understood Burma (now Myanmar), but they force Alexander to sidestep a key concept: that focusing on people is the best way to engage readers in a story.

Alexander has almost no characters in the first 100 or so pages of “Skies,” with people wandering into her book for just a couple of pages, then out — not long enough to make an impact. Chiang, although he’s the villain of the piece, helps; he’s so vivid and confounding that he makes for fascinating reading. So does another man who comes off poorly: Joseph Stilwell, the American general who seemed determined to match Chiang tantrum-for-tantrum and who, bizarrely, hated the British (his allies) more than he did the Japanese (his enemy). 

Using diaries and letters, Alexander eventually humanizes the war with people such as Bob Boody, a pilot whose non-regulation trip to visit his fiancée ended up altering the course of his life forever, and reporter Eric Sevareid, who was on hand for a dramatic plane crash and eventual rescue.

Those sections come alive with memorable details about the startled residents of southeast Asia who were compelled to assist airplanes that crash-landed in their midst. (Alexander could have used a keyboard shortcut that inserted the phrase “never to be seen again” for the many iffy flights that seemingly vanished into thin air.)

The loss of life in “Skies of Thunder” — and, obviously, in the war itself — is shocking. And it’s certainly worthwhile for Alexander to point out that this particular corner of the war could have been fought better (the U.S.’s primary interest was keeping China from “going Communist,” not training its people for battle).

But, in the end, there doesn’t appear to be a great answer to the basic question of “Skies”: What on earth were we doing there?

Chris Hewitt is interim books editor for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis).

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About the book

“SKIES OF THUNDER: The Deadly World War II Mission Over the Roof of the World”

Caroline Alexander

Viking. 460 pp. $32.

There may be a tendency to think of the war in the same breath as Abraham Lincoln, but Larson, whose history-but-make-it-fun books include “Isaac’s Storm” and “The Devil in the White City,” argues it had much more to do with what Lincoln’s predecessor, James Buchanan, did or did not do. Mostly the latter. Buchanan is president for more than half of the 499-page book, in which he’s portrayed as lazy, underqualified and bizarrely ambivalent about slavery.

Larson covers the five months between Lincoln’s election and the shelling of Fort Sumter. As in his other work, he employs details that rescue the humanity of historic figures we’re more likely to think of as statues than people: When Lincoln, about to take his oath of office, couldn’t figure out what to do with his top hat, bitter rival Stephen Douglas held it for him with a smile. Other details bring moments to life: Larson describes the half-built Washington Monument, from which an American flag flew in supposed triumph while states began to secede, as “more a symbol of failure.”

In a foreword, Larson indicates he was already at work on “Demon” when the events of Jan. 6, 2021, unfolded. But, even if that weren’t the case, some events in “Demon” would seem shockingly familiar, including a violent, organized effort to seize control of our nation’s capitol in order to prevent a new president from taking office.

It’s alarming to read about this divided country going down a similar path more than 150 years ago and, seemingly, learning nothing from it. The immediacy of the story in “Demon” — as well as on-the-ground reports from inside South Carolina’s Fort Sumter, an early Union bulwark — lend the book vigor, especially in the first 300 pages.

The last 200 pages, as Lincoln takes office and assembles the team that would help him strategize through war and into peace, aren’t as gripping. Larson sometimes repeats himself (I lost count of how many times he wrote that Lincoln couldn’t spell “Fort Sumter”). And, as he notes in his acknowledgments, much of this territory was covered in Doris Kearns Goodwin’s magnificent “Team of Rivals.”

When in doubt, Larson returns to stories that reveal human foibles. He quotes extensively from the diaries of Mary Chesnut, whose husband was a senator until South Carolina seceded (Burns also used her diaries.) Gossipy, even catty, Chesnut emerges as just the sort of person you’d chuckle with over tea while making sure to reveal none of your own secrets.

The diaries also help Larson remind us that, for a time, the South was a foreign country. Although the years have settled Lincoln into near-sainthood, Chesnut has no kind words for him or for the bureaucracy that she sees as robbing her of a way of life — although she cares little for the lives of the 450 humans her family enslaved.

I wish “Demon” told us more about Black people of the time. There are references to enslaved men fighting for the South and about others fleeing plantations, but their untold stories will have to wait for another book.

Chris Hewitt is interim books editor for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis).

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About the book

“THE DEMON OF UNREST”

Erik Larson

Crown. 499 pp. $35.

That’s a shorthand way of saying that Jamison’s essays— three long ones are collected in her new “Splinters” — are so compassionate and insightful that she interests you in topics you may not think you care about and shows you new ways to view topics you already do care about.

“Splinters” is largely about motherhood, a topic Jamison addresses with her admirable ability to see things from many sides. That’s demonstrated when she writes that she finally understands what mothers are saying when they claim to love their babies so much that they could eat them up but she also notes that if she did eat her baby up, the baby would stop crying and Jamison could get some rest.

Jamison also writes about writing and teaching, which are difficult to separate from being a new mother, as she reveals in a section where she urges students to find fresh perspectives on stories they think they know while she urgently needs to pump breast milk.

“Digging underneath the cocktail-party version of a story was like turning over a smooth stone to get at the moss and dirt below,” Jamison writes. “Or perhaps it was like standing next to me at a cocktail party, when I gave you a twenty-minute reply to a perfunctory question.”

As that story reveals, Jamison is hilarious, with a dry and usually self-deprecating wit in which the jokes are so graceful and surprising that you may need to read them twice: “Whenever I asked someone I trusted if I should stay in my marriage — and by trusted, I guess I mean had tacos with — it was like stumbling across a mysterious figure in the forest and asking her to point me toward the path.”

Yes. The marriage. I loved Jamison’s relationship with her daughter but — and this may be my own antipathy to bad boys talking — I was less dazzled by Jamison’s writing about her painful relationships with men.

Sometimes, you catch her straining not to inflict her views on us about, for instance, her ex-husband (he is called C, but Googling reveals he’s novelist Charles Bock). Honestly, at about the point he spits at her and belittles her eating disorder, it becomes hard to care about the ambiguities of their severed bond. And a subsequent boyfriend is transparently bad news from the jump.

Even Jamison can’t interest us in that dude — which, in a way, works in the book’s favor by emphasizing the author’s messy humanity. Who among us is a completely reliable narrator of our own stories? And who doesn’t need someone to share a taco with us and tell us we deserve better?

Chris Hewitt reviewed “Splinters” for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis), where he is interim books editor.

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About the book

“SPLINTERS: Another Kind of Love Story”

Leslie Jamison

Little, Brown. 262 pp. $29.

I got to thinking about this while reading “The Christmas Guest.” Peter Swanson‘s 2023 mystery is fine, but I was most compelled by the afterword, in which Swanson says he wrote “Guest,” which is 96 pages long, specifically so it could be gobbled in one sitting.

In general, my take on book length would be similar to Roger Ebert’s pronouncement that “no good movie is long enough and no bad movie is short enough,” but Swanson has a point. There are times when a shortie is just what you need: If you’ve been taking a reading break and you’re diving in again; if everyone’s swamped and your book club needs a title that accommodates busy schedules; if it’s storming and you want to hang under an afghan until things clear; or even if you just crave the satisfied sigh you emit when you flip the last page (that’s not just me, right?).

The exact length of one-day reads depends on how speedily you read and the kind of book it is (I’m leaning toward titles written for adults, but much of Rebecca Stead, Kate DiCamillo and Lemony Snicket’s excellent work can be read in a day). I’m thinking the sweet spot is around 100 pages. In that spirit, here are some titles you can whip through on a lazy afternoon:

“Ballad of the Sad Cafe”: Not a week goes by in which I don’t think of Carson McCullers’ tragic romance, which insists “(t)here are the lover and the beloved, but these two come from different countries.” Its 50 pages aren’t hopeful about love, but they are packed with insight.

“Chronicle of a Death Foretold“: I know what you’re thinking: Gabriel García Márquez is known for dense masterpieces such as “One Hundred Years of Solitude” and “Love in the Time of Cholera.” Granted, but as much as I love both, my favorite is this riveting novella, which reads almost in the way an Alfred Hitchcock movie plays. Beginning with this foreboding sentence — “On the day they were going to kill him, Santiago Nasar got up at 5:30 in the morning to wait for the boat the bishop was coming on.” — it explores the near-misses and diversions on the way to a murder. (His “Until August,” just published, is also just 100 pages.)

“Notes on Grief“: That title sounds like a bummer, but Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s rage-filled reflections on the death of her father are strangely comforting, like a hand on your shoulder that reminds you that whatever you’re feeling is OK.

“Passing“: Nella Larsen’s Harlem Renaissance novel focuses on two women in the Jazz Age. Both biracial, they have taken different paths (one presents to the world, including her husband, as white). Things come to a shocking climax as Larsen explores the horrors of racism and the price of hiding from it.

“The Sense of an Ending“: Like several of these speed reads, Julian Barnes’ book turns on a character’s dramatic reappraisal of events he thought he understood. When Tony Webster meets up with an old friend, he helps Tony see the past in a new light and realize his life was built on a devastating lie.

“Small Things Like These“: Claire Keegan is ideal for your read-in-one-day needs because all of her work is brief, but ” Small Things” is the most satisfying. Set in Ireland in 1985, its hero is a coal merchant named Bill, who has a surprising encounter that helps him see how centuries of patriarchy have damaged the lives of Irish women.

Chris Hewitt is the interim books editor for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis).

I’m a fan, as I may have mentioned a million times, and so, apparently, is A.J. Finn, who has finally followed up his 2018 blockbuster “The Woman in the Window” with “End of Story.” Finn’s thriller/whodunit hybrid mentions Christie frequently, in fact. Its main character, Nicky Hunter, is a woman (and mystery fan) who has been summoned to the stately San Francisco mansion of a writer, Sebastian Trapp, whose life is as shadowy as his bestselling whodunits.

Trapp, who is dying, wants Nicky to write his biography and help him “solve an old mystery or two,” specifically, what happened to Trapp’s wife and adolescent son, both of whom vanished 20 years earlier.

If you’re up for being kept in the dark, one of the early pleasures of “End of Story” is not knowing precisely what sort of book it is. It’s set in the present but if Charlotte Brontë had a laptop and access to social media, you could imagine her crafting “End of Story,” which begins in the Gothic territory of her “Jane Eyre.”

Forbidding mansion? Check. Mysterious sounds? Check. Characters whose fate is unknown? Check. Second wife who is dogged by memories of the mysteriously disappeared first wife? Check. Haunting apparitions of supposedly dead people? Check. Creepy painting that seems to follow characters around a room? Check. There are no broody moors but it’s San Francisco, so there’s plenty of fog and the Pacific Heights mansion even has a secret passageway.

Eventually, there’s also a murder. It takes about 200 pages to get there and that feels too long. Finn ratcheted up the tension immediately in “Woman in the Window,” in which an unreliable narrator witnessed evildoing at the beginning of the book, but “End” spends a lot of time on scenery-setting. That’s tricky, since it’s difficult to invest in the disappearance of two characters who were gone well before the book begins.

Luckily, Finn is an assured, witty writer with a gift for entertaining description and sharp instincts about how many references to other mysteries he can get away with. Most of the time, he finds inventive ways to supply context — when Nicky’s situation is likened to that of the main character in Christie’s “Peril at End House,” Finn fills us in how they’re similar — but he also includes sly references to plot details invented by classic mystery writers, references that are fun if you happen to notice them but don’t bog down “End” if you don’t.

It could be dangerous to name-drop Christie, Arthur Conan Doyle, Raymond Chandler and others. Those legends raise expectations and plenty of writers since them have invented compelling situations that they couldn’t figure out how to resolve.

Finn, however, knows what he’s doing. The way he wraps up “End of Story” is so satisfying that it fits comfortably in that august company.

Chris Hewitt reviewed “End of Story” for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis), where he is interim books editor.

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About the book

“END OF STORY”

A.J. Finn

William Morrow, 408 pp. $30.

Honestly, any of them would be a great place to start — “The Boy in the Field” and “The Flight of Gemma Hardy” were my favorites before I read “Belhaven” — because the Scotswoman is such a graceful, distinctive writer. Mostly set in Scotland (although Livesey now lives in the U.S.), her books vividly convey the joys and sorrows of ordinary, usually rural, life, but they also leave room for the extraordinary. Whether it’s extra-sensory perception or the gift of premonitions, Livesey knows the world is not always explicable to the beautiful, complicated humans who live in it.

Lizzie Craig is one of many endearing folks in “Belhaven,” an orphan who grows up with her loving but severe grandparents on a small farm. It seems like a drama-free way of life, but it turns out there are secrets being kept (Lizzie has a sister whose existence she didn’t know of) and Lizzie occasionally has spells while feeding the chickens or trying her hand at sketching. For brief moments, she flashes a few weeks into the future and sees what will happen then, including a family illness and a disastrous fire.

Occasionally, Lizzie is able to use her premonitions to head off disaster, but one of the wisest things about Livesey’s book is that it insists that being able to (sometimes) predict the future won’t save messy, foolish humans from stumbling into it anyway. Lizzie doesn’t always interpret what she sees correctly, the few with whom she shares her secret powers don’t always believe in them and, even when she knows the disasters ahead, she makes big-time romantic and career mistakes.

Livesey has keen insight into the way people behave and she crafts lyrical, lucid sentences, but what’s best about her work is her understanding that magic and mystery are part of everyday life.

Lizzie’s gift is there from the opening sentence of “The Road from Belhaven,” a sentence in which even the missing comma perfectly captures the simple purity of the thought — “The summer she was ten she learned not to speak of it.” But there are so many other things for Lizzie to contend with, including that surprise sister and the hard work of a late-1800s farm and her crush on a Glaswegian who may not be worthy of her, that it’s easy to forget about the supernatural element of the book. Yes, Lizzie has premonitions, Livesey seems to be saying. Who doesn’t?

We’re so fully immersed in Lizzie’s world that we understand every move she makes, no matter how disastrous it is. “No, don’t do that,” you may find yourself saying two or nine times. But instead of leading you to toss the book in frustration, Livesey makes you want to give error-prone Lizzie a hug of comfort and recognition.

Livesey isn’t an unknown. She has received some big awards, she’s on the faculty of the Iowa Writers Workshop and her books are consistently reviewed. But “The Road from Belhaven” feels like the one that could bring her to the attention of a lot of new fans, who will then have this additional good news: She has 11 other novels at the ready.

Chris Hewitt is interim books editor for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis).

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ABOUT THE BOOK

“THE ROAD FROM BELHAVEN”

Margot Livesey

Knopf. 259 pp. $28.

We’re in the best time to read all those books we got in the fall and at the holidays — while nestled in a Slanket, with a cup of tea, of course. Fortunately, publishers are keeping the promising titles coming. As you plot your reading Excel spreadsheet for winter and spring (that’s a thing, right?), here are upcoming titles to reserve slots for.

“An American Dreamer: Life in a Divided Country” by David Finkel. I’ve already read Laurie Hertzel’s upcoming (rave) review of Pulitzer Prize winner Finkel’s nonfiction look at an Iraq War veteran who is disillusioned by the political divides ripping apart the country he fought for — and doesn’t give up. You can dive into the book when it’s published on Feb. 13.

“The Blueprint” by Rae Giana Rashad. Set in both 1800 and 2030, this debut novel is about a Black woman named Solenne who escapes from her dreary life — she’s forced to be the lover of a white senator in the near future, when choice no longer exists — by writing about an ancestor named Henriette. As she works, she realizes what they have in common: Both are enslaved. Feb. 13.

“Candy Darling” by Cynthia Carr. Carr’s complex, urgent biography of artist David Wojnarowicz, “Fire in the Belly,” was a phenomenal achievement. Here, she turns her attention to the transgender Andy Warhol “superstar” whose life was not as glamorous as it appeared. March 19.

“The Deerfield Massacre” by James L. Swanson. If you couldn’t put down Swanson’s riveting “Manhunt,” about the search for John Wilkes Booth after he assassinated Abraham Lincoln, the historian has a new challenge for you. It’s the true story of a deadly, little-remembered 1704 clash between colonists and Indigenous people. Feb. 27.

“The Demon of Unrest“ by Erik Larson. The insomniac in the latest nonfiction from the author of “The Devil in the White City” and “Thunderstruck” is Abraham Lincoln. In the first five months of his presidency, he stayed up nights worrying about: state after state seceding from the U.S., a secretary of state who was plotting against him and the souls of millions of enslaved Americans. April 30.

“End of Story” by A.J. Finn. A woman is summoned by a famous mystery novelist to help him write a memoir and, possibly, figure out what happened to his family, who vanished two decades ago. It’ll be interesting to see how the press tour goes for the pseudonymous Finn, who became a superstar when he published the 2018 blockbuster “The Woman in the Window” but whose star dimmed when The New Yorker revealed that many of his claims about himself were untrue. Feb. 20.

“Ferris” by Kate DiCamillo. The world is lucky to have DiCamillo writing in it. Even luckier that she’s prolific. In addition to “Orris and Timble: The Beginning” kicking off a new series in April, she has the middle-grade “Ferris,” with a title character who shares traits with other DiCamillo heroines: She’s a spirited tween, dealing with extraordinary circumstances and rambunctious relatives. March 5.

“The Husbands” by Holly Gramazio. I had only to read the first chapter to know that the Star Tribune would need to review this funny, suspenseful novel. After a night of many cocktails, Lauren returns to her London apartment to be greeted by a menacing stranger who somehow broke in, won’t leave her alone and claims to be her husband. As the title suggests, he’s not the only spouse. April 2.

“Lies and Weddings” by Kevin Kwan. The “Crazy Rich Asians” writer returns with another comic novel that includes a big wedding, family deception and piles of cash. May 21.

“The Light Eaters” by Zoë Schlanger. The staff reporter at The Atlantic concentrates on climate and the environment in a book of popular science that aims to reveal that plants have saved us, time and time again. She also explains how they pull that off. May 7.

“Long Island” by Colm Tóibín. The Irishman can write all the novels he wants about Jesus’ mother (“The Testament of Mary”) and Henry James (“The Master”). But what readers have been clamoring for is more Eilis Lacey, who came to America from Ireland in “Brooklyn.” “Long Island” is set a couple of decades after “Brooklyn,” when Lacey’s homeland beckons her. May 7.

“Martyr!” by Kaveh Akbar. Does a painting discovered in an art gallery hold the key to the life story of a poet, who is addicted to pills and booze? He thinks so, so he journeys into the past, with the help of a dying painter who lives in the Brooklyn Museum. Jan. 23.

“My Heavenly Favorite” by Lucas Rijneveld.  If your tastes veer more to discomfort, this Graywolf Press novel might be the ticket. The title character is a Dutch farmer’s daughter who believes she is meant to be a boy. Which presents a dilemma for a veterinarian who sympathizes with the child and possesses a few surgical skills. March 5.

“The Princess of Las Vegas” by Chris Bohjalian. The premise sounds goofy, but in the hands of the author of “The Flight Attendant” and “The Lioness,” it holds promise. An American whose job is impersonating Princess Diana Spencer in a Vegas cabaret act is drawn into the murder of a casino’s owner. Did she do it? Did the senator boyfriend who’s dumping her? Or her mysterious sister? Maybe the paparazzi struck again? March 19.

“Sipsworth” by Simon van Booy.  Look, Ann Patchett is not just a great novelist (“Tom Lake” ). She’s also a voracious reader and the owner of a bookstore. So when she writes “I loved it” on the cover of a book (italics hers), you listen. The novel is about an octogenarian named Helen who, after the death of her husband and son, feels ready to join them. Until she finds a new reason to live. May 7

“The Sleepwalkers” by Scarlett Thomas. The description of this chiller had me at the word “gothic” and then grabbed me when it name-dropped “Strangers on a Train” author Patricia Highsmith. It’s about a newlywed couple whose honeymoon gets weird fast because of a hotel owner who seems to want to get with the husband. There also are ominous stories about previous hotel guests whose vacation ended when they drowned. April 9.

“This Strange Eventful History” by Claire Messud. The “Emperor’s Children” novelist spins a tale that draws on her own family’s itinerant history. Messud follows a clan over seven decades, from Algeria in the 1940s to the United States in the 2010s. May 14.

“Table for Two” by Amor Towles. “A Gentleman in Moscow” and “The Lincoln Highway” may have been Towles’ biggest sellers, but my favorite is his witty “Rules of Civility,” about bright young things in midcentury Manhattan. These six stories return to that “Civility” world. April 2.

“Where Rivers Part” by Kao Kalia Yang. A Hmong woman named Tswb flees her family’s war-torn village in Laos, meets a man, escapes to the U.S. and raises her children, who include the author of this memoir. A Guggenheim fellow, Yang also has a book for young people, “The Rock in My Throat,” coming this spring. March 19.

Chris Hewitt is interim books editor for the Star Tribune (Minneapolis).