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Staff Recommendations > Matt

sort list by title | author NW A Novel Zadie Smith Zadie Smith's new book is playful, psychogeographically rich, sometimes messy, dark, and has a wicked stiletto of an ending. Most of all, its subtleties hold up under the mulling over after you've finished reading it. A smart look at the complexities... Debt The First 5,000 Years David Graeber An history of debt written by an anarchist-sympathizing anthropologist (and a respected one, mind you)—who better to dig beneath the assumptions taken for granted by the Western science of Economics? From blood debts in moneyless societies... House of Prayer No. 2 A Writer's Journey Home Mark Richard Based on its subject matter and jacket copy, this might have been an inspirational memoir. But in Mark Richard's hands, the story of his own life is weird and unsettling and haunting and very much like an ocean hiding outlandish fauna somewhere beneath... West of the West Dreamers, Believers, Builders, and Killers in the Golden State Mark Arax With his reportage and essays, Arax is mining territory somewhere between Rebecca Solnit and James Ellroy—here you'll find both thoughtful musings on geography and intense crime investigations. Written with real vitality and engagement, this book makes... Conquered City Victor Serge Politically radical author Victor Serge lived through some of the 20th century's most crucial dramas—in this novel he reports directly from St. Petersburg during the Russian Revolution. But beyond its historical interest, this is an accomplished... The Tanners Robert Walser Loosely based on his own life and his large family, The Tanners follows Simon Tanner as he wanders from job to job, in search of a calling. Along his journey of self-definition, we meet his other siblings: the painter brother whose romantic brooding... Soul And Other Stories Andrey Platonov A Soviet author heavily censored in his time, Platonov writes about work, progress, war and love with incredible earnestness, dreamlike strangeness, and a uniquely animistic sense of the universe. The title story here is unforgettable: at once truly... Troia Mexican Memoirs Bonnie Bremser For those who are interested in the Beats and want to dig a bit deeper beyond the usual suspects, this long-neglected memoir of hard life in Mexico is raw, naked, honest, full of feeling, and sometimes barely in control. While avoiding statements about... The Great War for Civilisation The Conquest of the Middle East Robert Fisk If you want a better understanding of recent Middle east history, this tome is a distillation of years of courageous reportage. Fisk is a truly gripping writer—he mixes fascinating on-the-ground narrative with deeply informed historical analysis that... The Sheltering Sky Paul Bowles This book is brave, imaginative, and brutal; and just when you think it's gone far enough, it goes farther. Bowles spent most of his life in North Africa, but his genius is not in his familiarity with the culture; rather, it's in brilliantly recreating... Zeno's Conscience A Novel Italo Svevo This modernist classic deserves its reputation as a masterful immersion in the contortions of one neurotic mind. It's the voice here that wins one over, as our hero good-naturedly dissects his own petty motivations, gets caught up in layer after layer... Red Dust A Path Through China Ma Jian Red Dust is a rich, strange, searching travelogue through the outposts of communist China by an adventurous, dissident poet. Author Ma is often compared to the Beats--but imagine if Kerouac had to escape from a Kafka novel in order to go "on the road"... Zeno's Conscience Italo Svevo This modernist classic deserves its reputation as a masterful immersion in the contortions of one neurotic mind. It's the voice here that wins one over, as our hero good-naturedly dissects his own petty motivations, gets caught up in layer after layer... Suttree Cormac McCarthy McCarthy's last book set in the South before he moved his focus to the West, this is an emotionally opaque but terribly powerful portrait of a damaged man. This book teaches by a sort of unrelenting immersion; plunging you into a world of vivid squalor...