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Welcome to Today in Books, our daily round-up of literary headlines at the intersection of politics, culture, media, and more.
Big Book Season Has Officially Begun
The race for Book of the Year is R.F. Kuang’s to lose. With its August 26 release date, Katabasis is either the last heavily anticipated book of summer to hit shelves or the first Big Book of Fall—why not both?—and this wide-ranging New Yorker profile confirms my suspicion that the 29-year-old author, who is publishing her sixth novel while she completes a PhD at Yale, is one of the most dynamic figures in the world of books and reading. Everything about Katabasis is interesting. It’s a Dante-inspired adventure infused with magic, and it’s a satire of academia. It’s packaged like a BookTok romantasy hit complete with stenciled edges and illustrated endpapers, but the writing leans literary and rewards some familiarity with the classical canon. If anybody has a shot at crossover success that pleases the algorithm and the literati alike, it’s Kuang. This one’s going to be fun to watch.
Wuthering Heights is Getting Weird
Hold onto your bustle. Saltburn creator Emerald Fennell’s adaptation of Wuthering Heights hits the big screen on Valentine’s Day, and test audiences are calling it “aggressively provocative and tonally abrasive.” It also sounds extremely NSFW. Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi star as Catherine and Heathcliff in the new “deliberately unromantic” spin on Emily Brontë’s gothic romance that will surely launch a thousand takes. I’m rarely concerned about an adaptation negatively impacting its source material, and this is no exception. Brontë is going to be just fine, but I’ll admit, it would be fun to have a reason to use “Wuthering Yikes” as a headline.
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A Pathway for Reading Pynchon
I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but there are too many books! So many! It’s impossible to catch ’em all, but sometimes it’s fun to play catch-up. If, like me, you’re newly interested in Thomas Pychon because One Battle After Another looks pretty great, here’s a guide to getting into him.
New Mysteries to Read This Fall
We’ve got murder at a Chicago soul food cafe. We’ve got a YA graphic novel about the It Girl who is found dead after opening night of her high school production of Romeo and Juliet. We’ve got works in translation and an Indigenous YA tale. Here are a bunch of great mysteries to keep you captivated this fall.