Literature

In her latest novel “Hello Stranger,” released July 11, Center embraces the rom-com's predictability: The story is undoubtedly cheesy, and it’s easy to see where it’s headed — but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

In “Once More with Feeling,” Sussman makes use of similar time jumps and faux media clippings to answer the question, “What if Britney Spears went to Broadway?”

Emma Cline’s “The Guest” may take place in the Hamptons, but it’s no Emily Henry “Beach Read” romance. As the novel weaves through sandy shorelines and seaside residences, it’s much more “The White Lotus” meets “Inventing Anna” meets “My Year of Rest and Relaxation.”

The plot is classic exes-to-lovers, but the varied temporal planes strap readers in for a complex emotional journey that belies any back cover summary.

Love, Pamela captures the multiple dimensions of Anderson’s character, granting her an opportunity to provide rationale for her decisions and reflect on an immensely colorful, eventful life.

At times, the novel appears to reach outward from the page and wrap around the reader, blurring the boundary between fiction and reality.

Charmingly ambitious yet prosaically pedestrian, “Now is Not the Time to Panic” carries just enough poignance to casually rivet, but falls short of the charisma, depth and execution necessary to be truly incandescent.

Choi’s most recent book introduces apocalypse as a chemical catalyst, fueling her interrogations of what it means to witness the world’s incessant sequence of catastrophe.

“A Series of Unfortunate Events” author Daniel Handler made an appearance at UC Berkeley on Tuesday evening for a “fireside chat” hosted by Berkeley Forum. 

Chatagnier’s writing, rendered with reflective and evocative vitality, scintillates starlike on the page. For a science fiction novel so rooted in the groundedness of its mathematical particulars, it’s also enamored with forging prosaic beauty.