September 2021: Librairie Bertrand's book recommandations

Librairie Bertrand is sharing their book recommendations! This September, the librarian is telling you all about their suggestions and why these are their favourite books of the month.

THE (OTHER) YOU – Oates, Joyce Carol (Harper Collins) 304 p.

A powerful reckoning over the people we might have been if we’d chosen a different path, from a master of the short story. In this stirring, reflective collection of short stories, Joyce Carol Oates ponders alternate destinies: the other lives we might have led if we’d made different choices. Joyce Carol Oates demonstrates here why she remains one of our most celebrated and relevant literary figures.

BEAUTIFUL WORLD, WHERE ARE YOU? – Rooney, Sally (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) 352 p.

Here is the extraordinary, thrilling new novel from Sally Rooney, author of the internationally bestselling "Normal People" and "Conversations with Friends". Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he'd like to travel to Rome with her. In Dublin, Alice, Felix, Eileen, and Simon are still young--but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get together, they break apart. They have sex, they worry about sex, they worry about their friendships and the world they live in. Are they standing in the last lighted room before the darkness, bearing witness to something? Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world?

A CROOKED TREE – Mannion, Una (Harper) 320 p.

Here the author skillfully combines a coming-of-age story with the plot of a thriller in this convincing debut novel. A haunting, suspenseful literary debut that combines a classic coming of age story with a portrait of a fractured American family dealing with the fallout of one summer evening gone terribly wrong.

THE PEOPLE WE KEEP – Larkin, Allison (Gallery Books) 368 p.

This lyrical, unflinching tale is for anyone who has ever yearned for the fierce power of found family or to grasp the profound beauty of choosing to belong. What does it mean to feel at home in the world? To find our true family? In this Allison Larkin’s new book, a young songwriter steals a car, hits the road, and struggles against all odds to try to find the answer. About the people we choose—and even more importantly the people who choose us—this novel is both a profound love letter to creative resilience and a reminder that sometimes even tragedy can be a kind of blessing.