 In We Do Not Part, Han Kang, now crowned with the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, continues to unravel the raw sinews of the human spirit with her trademark elegance, restraint, and haunting brutality. If you’ve read The Vegetarian or Human Acts, you already know that she is not here to comfort you. She is here to disarm you, to offer silence as indictment of past sins, and pain as a kind of testimony.
This latest novel is perhaps her most distilled expression of sorrow and connection yet. It is a story soaked in grief, not just personal grief, but historical and national grief, a grief that simmers beneath the skin, unnamed and yet entirely felt. Her language is stripped down to the bone, almost surgical in its precision, leaving vast, aching white space between sentences like unspoken truths hanging in the air. At its core, We Do Not Part is about the relationship between two friends. But it’s also about war, memory, intimacy, and the ways violence echoes through generations like a haunting melody. The lines between presence and absence, love and loss, flesh and memory blur. Han Kang does not offer resolution. She never has. But what she does offer is something far more rare: an invitation to sit in discomfort, to witness the beauty in fracture, and to confront the quiet devastation of history without blinking. It is no surprise that the Nobel committee recognized her. Han writes not with ink but with absence, making you feel the ghosts between the words. We Do Not Part is not just a novel, it is a requiem for everything we cannot hold on to, and a prayer for what lingers anyway. A devastating, masterful work. Read it, but don’t expect to emerge unchanged. Her books are always a favorite of mine even though they leave me devastated, and this did not disappoint. Check it out at the library. Aimee Clark, IT Librarian
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 Colored Television by Danzy Senna
Riverhead Books, released September 3, 2024 By Robin Munson In Colored Television by Danzy Senna, Jane, a Professor at a small Los Angeles College, wrote her first critically reviewed, but not a top seller, novel ten years ago and is hoping to finish her second novel, get tenure, and secure a life changing book deal. Jane, with her husband Lenny and their two children have bounced from apartment to apartment and house sitting for a wealthy friend in order to navigate the expensive Los Angeles housing market. Unfortunately the stress of the families dire financial situation causes Jane to go to plan B (writing for television) as plan A (selling her novel for millions of dollars) has crashed and burned. Jane lies to Lenny (he believes television is not a pure artistic form) about working with television producer Hampton Ford to make a biracial comedy sitcom. Of course, one lie leads to another and then another until the monster is no longer sustainable. I really loved this novel. Although it was difficult to watch Jane go down her destructive path in search of her ideal bourgeois life for her family, her journey, no doubt, made her stronger and more grounded in the end. The humor that Senna brings to the pages was a bonus (she meets her husband at a party based on a psychic’s vague description of her future love) and the character development throughout the novel is spot on. This book is a perfect book club read with themes such as balancing artistic integrity and financial security, the erasure of biracial people, and what makes a person truly happy. I give it five out of five stars. Thank you Riverhead Books for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own. Colored Television is available for ebook and audiobook download.  Let me start with a confession: I usually avoid series. The thought of investing in six, seven, or OMG ten volumes of anything makes me feel like I'm being roped into a cult. So when I picked up Dungeon Crawler Carl, I wasn’t expecting to get hooked. I was expecting a few laughs, maybe some dumb fun. What I got was an obsessive, page-devouring spiral of pure joy, horror, and unhinged delight.
This book, this series, is absurd, brilliant, and bananas in all the best ways. Imagine if The Hunger Games got drunk with The Running Man, invited a sentient cat with a gambling addiction, and then all of them were thrown into a sadistic alien reality show dungeon designed by someone who clearly has beef with humanity. That’s the vibe. Carl is our reluctant hero, snatched from a crumbling Earth in his boxers and thrust into a dungeon where survival is livestreamed for galactic entertainment. His companion, Princess Donut, a bedazzled, talking Persian cat with the charisma of a diva and the bloodlust of a warlord, might just be one of the best-written characters in genre fiction, full stop. The tone whiplashes between comedy, gore, heart, and sheer insanity in a way that somehow works. Dinniman writes like he’s in on the joke but still deeply committed to telling a real story underneath the chaos. And, he does. The world-building is endlessly creative and unrelenting. There’s no time to catch your breath, just as you're getting used to one deranged monster or trap, the next level hits harder. It’s funny, horrifying, emotionally sincere, and yes, addictive. I devoured these books. Plural. Me. The stand-alone-book-preferring heathen. If you’re tired of Sci-fi/Fantasy/Dystopia that takes itself too seriously, or if you want to read something where the stakes are real, the satire is sharp, and the cat has better dialogue than most human protagonists, start crawling. Just don’t expect to stop. Oh, and sadness. Book Eight isn't out until this fall. Get Dungeon Crawler Carl at the library. Aimee Clark, IT Librarian |
The SPL StaffWe work here at the library, and we’re into all kinds of books! How Do I Get These Books?See our Quickstart Guides page for information on how to use the online catalog and how to get eBooks and audiobooks for your specific device. You can also contact us there if you need more help!
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