Reader's Choice: Novels From Independent Presses
Your options: 'The Long Form' by Kate Briggs, 'One or Two' by H.D. Everett and 'The Gloaming' by Melanie Finn
This week’s poll combines two things I love: showcasing novels from independent publishers and spring cleaning. Two of the books below have been on my TBR for a while (a recurring theme this year), and the other is a recent addition. I’m excited to read them all, but which should I review first? Remember to scroll down and vote!
‘The Long Form’ by Kate Briggs
‘The Long Form’ has been on my TBR for so long I’ve forgotten where I bought it. Maybe it was at the Harvard Book Store, where I remember being surprised to find this edition. You see, before that Cambridge visit, I thought only the all-blue Fitzcarraldo Editions version existed, so when I saw the Dorothy Project cover, I was like:
Dorothy is a publishing project that’s ‘an award-winning feminist press dedicated to works of fiction or near fiction or writing about fiction,’ and it publishes two books a year. The real-life Dorothy was a great aunt of the imprint’s editor who was ‘a librarian, rose gardener, animal lover, children’s book author, and bookmobile driver.’ I love that! Briggs’s novel follows a young mother named Helen and her baby. ‘Together they move through a morning routine that is in one sense entirely ordinary—resting, feeding, pacing,’ the back-cover blurb reads. ‘Then the rhythm of their morning is interrupted: a delivery person arrives with a used copy of Fielding’s The History of Tom Jones, which Helen has ordered online. She begins to read, and attention shifts. As their day unfolds, the intimate space Helen shares with her baby becomes entwined with Fielding’s novel, with other books and ideas, and with questions about class and privilege, housing and caregiving, and the support structures that underlie durational forms of codependency, both social and artistic.’ I’ve heard good things about this novel and I’m looking forward to reading it.
‘One or Two’ by H.D. Everett
‘The Gadfly’ by Ethel Lilian Voynich was featured in our first roundup of books from indie presses, and I enjoyed it so much that I had to feature another novel from its publisher, Mandylion Press. The imprint recently revived two more novels, both originally published in the 1800s—per Mandylion’s M.O. One of them is ‘One or Two’ by H.D. Everett. I recently attended a sold-out book club event at McNally Jackson that featured this novel and was attended by the two women behind Mandylion. I am not experienced with book clubs (I’d never been in one before)—I thought this event would be more of a Q&A with the publishers. So I hadn’t read it, and there I was, forced to reveal my ignorance to the group. I was mortified, and wished I could hide, like:
But everyone at the book club was kind and accepted me anyway, and it was enlightening to hear more about the novel. The front-cover blurb says ‘One or Two’ is ‘the freakiest metaphysical thriller you’ve never heard of. Frances Bethune is desperate to lose weight before her husband’s return from India—in just two weeks! On the advice of a bad-breathed spirit, Frances undertakes a slenderizing séance. While she succeeds in her quest for thinness, she is horrified to discover that her discarded weight has taken on a new life of its own.’ This sounds fascinating and weird, and right up my alley!
‘The Gloaming’ by Melanie Finn
Two Dollar Radio is one of my go-to indie presses, and I’ve featured several of its books over the years, including ‘They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us’ by Hanif Abdurraqib, 'I Will Die in a Foreign Land' by Kalani Pickhart and, of course, ‘The Deeper the Water the Uglier the Fish’ by Katya Apekina. I’ve even reviewed another book by Melanie Finn: ‘The Hare.’ So I was shocked earlier this week to see that the imprint has been bought by Seven Stories Press. I was like:
Two Dollar Radio rarely has missed with the books it’s published, and I hope that tradition continues. I used to have a subscription, and one of the novels I received is Finn’s ‘The Gloaming.’ The back-cover blurb says, ‘Pilgrim Jones’ husband has just left her for another woman, stranding her in a small Swiss town where she is one day involved in a tragic accident. Overcome with guilt, she alights for Africa, befriending a series of locals—doctors without medicine, policemen without laws, mercenaries and philanthropists—each with their own tragic past, each isolated in their own private way.’ Sounds like it could be good!
Books on GIF does not solicit or accept review copies. We feature books we purchase at independent bookstores around New York City and on our travels, or were borrowed electronically from the Brooklyn Public Library.
Thanks for reading, and thanks especially to Donna for editing this newsletter!
Until next time,
Mike
The Long Form was my favorite book I read last year ♥️
I was ready to vote for The Long Form on cover alone, and then I read the blurb for One or Two. That's the easy winner for me. Sounds wacky.