AWM Staff Picks: May 2026

Let’s Make Cocktails! by Sarah Becan

Get Lit: Art of the Cocktail
May 12, 5:30-7:30 pm

For our next Get Lit happy hour event, we combine the arts of writing, illustrating, and mixing drinks! Author and illustrator Sarah Becan joins us to demonstrate cocktail recipes from her latest, a fun and approachable comic book introduction to the wonderful world of cocktails. Then once you make the drinks, Sarah will lead a hands-on drawing session so you can illustrate the same cocktail you just made! We hope you can join us to sip, sketch, and mingle with fellow art and cocktail aficionados.

—Matt, Community Engagement Manager

Cabin Fever: A Suburban Father’s Search for the Wild by Tom Montgomery Fate

Nation of Writers: Henry David Thoreau coming soon

From the publisher: “Try to imagine Thoreau married, with a job, three kids, and a minivan. This is the sensibility—serious yet irreverent—that suffuses Cabin Fever, as the author seeks to apply the hermit-philosopher’s insights to a busy modern life…Fate seeks a more attentive, deliberate way of seeing the world and our place in it, not only in the woods but also in the context of our relationships and society. In his search for ‘a more deliberate life’ amid a high-tech, material world, Fate invites readers into an interrogation of their own lives, and into a new kind of vision: the possibility of enough in a culture of more.”

—Nate, Content & Exhibits Manager

Glyph: Graphic Poetry = Trans. Sensory by Naoko Fujimoto

AWM Author Talks: Naoko Fujimoto coming soon

From the publisher: “Naoko Fujimoto translates her poems (that are written in English on flat paper) into words and images to create a contemporary picture scroll. The picture scroll in Japanese is Emaki and the style has been popular since the 7-16th centuries in Japan. It is still a widely recognized art style in Japan and the rest of the world. Emaki is akin to a current graphic novel / poetry / comic.”

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Naoko about her new collection of Women: 20 Japanese Female Poets / 20 Waka Poems, coming this June. Our conversation will be released later this month on the AWM Author Talks podcast!

—Nate, Content & Exhibits Manager

Thoreau’s God by Richard Higgins

Nation of Writers: Henry David Thoreau coming soon

From the publisher: “Higgins invites seekers—religious or otherwise—to walk with the great Transcendentalist through a series of meditations on his spiritual life. Thoreau offers us no creed, but his writings encourage reflection on how to live, what to notice, and what to love. Though his quest was deeply personal, Thoreau devoted his life to communicating his experience of an infinite, wild, life-giving God. By recovering this vital thread in Thoreau’s life and work, Thoreau’s God opens the door to a new understanding of an original voice in American religion that speaks to spiritual seekers today.”

—Nate, Content & Exhibits Manager

Water to Water: Gaza Renga by Marilyn Hacker and Deema K. Shehabi

Listen to AWM Author Talks: Marilyn Hacker & Demma K. Shehabi here

“This book’s revolutionary form is most revolutionary of all in making serious political engagement and sophisticated poetic pleasure inseparable.” —Fiona Sampson, Professor of Poetry, University of Roehampton

—Nate, Content & Exhibits Manager

Bird Box by Josh Malerman

From the publisher: “Written with the narrative tension of The Road and the exquisite terror of classic Stephen King, Bird Box is a propulsive, edge-of-your-seat psychological horror thriller, set in an apocalyptic near-future where an unimaginable, incomprehensible, and invisible foe lurks in the shadows… Engulfed in darkness, surrounded by sounds both familiar and frightening, Malorie embarks on a harrowing odyssey of survival—a trip that takes her into an unseen world and back into the past, to the companions who once saved her. Malerman’s breathtaking debut novel is a horrific and gripping snapshot of a world unraveled that will have you racing to the final page.”

—Matt, Community Engagement Manager

Cherry Baby by Rainbow Rowell

From the publisher: “Cherry and Tom built a mostly quiet, mostly happy life together—until Tom’s semi-autobiographical webcomic went viral and turned their marriage into public property. Now the world knows Baby, the character based on Cherry, better than Cherry knows herself—and Tom and Cherry have been separated for months. That’s when Russ Sutton shows up. Floppy-haired, blue-eyed Russ Sutton, who Cherry had a crush on in college, and who now seems to have a crush on her. All that’s left is for Cherry to rewrite her own story. Because if she isn’t Baby, and she isn’t Tom’s wife, then who can she be? Told with deep tenderness and abundant wit, Cherry Baby is Rainbow Rowell’s most affecting, most surprising—sexiest—novel yet.”

—Annie, Administrative Associate

Dominion by Addie E. Citchens

From the publisher: “…Priscilla and Diamond, two women who love these men, bear witness to their charms and bear the brunt of their choices. Through their eyes and their stories, Dominion offers an intricate, intimate view of how secrets control us, how shame stifles us, how silence implicates us, and how even love plays a role in the everyday violence and casual sins of the powerful. A brilliantly crafted Black Southern family drama told with the captivating force, humor, and tenderness carried in the hearts of these women, Addie E. Citchens’s Dominion wrestles with the many brutal, sinister ways in which we are shaped by fear and patriarchy, and studies how we might yet choose to break free.”

—Deanna, Storyteller

Hacks created by Lucia Aniello, Paul W. Downs, and Jen Statsky

From Rotten Tomatoes: “A dark mentorship forms between Deborah Vance (Jean Smart), a legendary Las Vegas comic, and an entitled, outcast 25-year-old (Hannah Einbinder). A prickling debut that pulls few punches, Hacks deftly balances its sharp critiques of the comedy world with more intimate moments, all the while giving the incomparable Jean Smart a role worthy of her talents—and an excellent partner in Hannah Einbinder.”

—Annie, Administrative Associate

Hokum written and directed by Damian McCarthy

I loved it and recommend going in knowing as little as possible.

Just a little bit more from IMDB: “A horror writer visits an Irish inn to scatter his parents’ ashes, unaware the property is said to be haunted by a witch.”

—Hunter, Storyteller

Indecent by Paula Vogel

From the publisher: “When Sholem Asch wrote God of Vengeance in 1907, he didn’t imagine the height of controversy the play would eventually reach. Performing at first in Yiddish and German, the play’s subject matter wasn’t deemed contentious until it was produced in English, when the American audiences were scandalized by the onstage depiction of an amorous affair between two women. Paula Vogel’s play traces the trajectory of the show’s success through its tour in Europe to its abrupt and explosive demise on Broadway in 1923—including the arrest of the entire production’s cast and crew.”

Jane and Prudence by Barbara Pym

From the publisher: “Jane Cleveland and Prudence Bates were close friends at Oxford University, but now live very different lives. 41-year-old Jane lives in the country, is married to a vicar, has a daughter she adores, and lives a very proper life in a very proper English parish. Prudence, a year shy of thirty, lives in London, has an office job, and is self-sufficient and fiercely independent—until Jane decides her friend should be married. Jane has the perfect husband in mind for her former pupil: a widower named Fabian Driver. But there are other women vying for Fabian’s attention. And Pru is nursing her own highly inappropriate desire for her older, married, and seemingly oblivious employer, Dr. Grampian. What follows is a witty, delightful, trenchant story of manners, morals, family, and female bonding that redefines the social novel for a new generation.”

—Cassidy, Guest Services Manager

The Less Than Epic Adventures of TJ and Amal by E. K. Weaver

From the publisher: “In the span of a single day, Amal Chakravarthy calls off his arranged marriage, comes out to his conservative parents, promptly gets disowned, goes on a bender…and wakes up the next morning to find TJ—a lanky, dreadlocked vagrant—frying eggs and singing Paul Simon in his kitchen. TJ claims that the two have made a drunken pact to drive all the way from Berkeley to Providence. As it happens, Amal promised his sister he’d be there for her graduation from Brown University. And TJ, well…TJ has his own reasons. The winner of the 2016 Lambda Literary Award for best LGBT Graphic Novel, and a 2016 Eisner Award nominee for Best Graphic Album Reprint.”

—Matt, Community Engagement Manager

Peaky Blinders created by Steven Knight

I know I’m late to the party in watching Peaky Blinders. I am so glad I finally gave it a shot and have been binge-watching it since.

More from Rotten Tomatoes: “Britain is a mixture of despair and hedonism in 1919 in the aftermath of the Great War. Returning soldiers, newly minted revolutions and criminal gangs are fighting for survival in a nation rocked by economic upheaval. One of the most powerful gangs of the time is the Peaky Blinders, run by returning war hero Thomas Shelby and his family. But Thomas has bigger ambitions than just running the streets. When a crate of guns goes missing, he recognizes an opportunity to advance in the world because crime may pay but legitimate business pays better. Trying to rid Britain of its crime is Inspector Chester Campbell, who arrives from Belfast to try to achieve that goal.”

—Cristina, Development & Membership Associate

The Poppy War Trilogy by R. F. Kuang

The Poppy War Trilogy is a fantasy trilogy by R.F. Kuang, consisting of The Poppy War, The Dragon Republic, and The Burning God, inspired by 20th-century Chinese history. It is shocking to me that this was her first work published; it is very well written, complex, and will definitely make you cry. (I cried on the Blue Line while reading The Dragon Republic).

—Andrea, Education Program Coordinator

Salvation of a Saint: A Detective Galileo Novel by Keigo Higashino, translated by Alexander O. Smith

From the publisher: “Physics professor Manabu Yukawa—Detective Galileo—returns in a new case of impossible murder, where instincts clash with facts and theory with reality. Yoshitaka, who was about to leave his marriage and his wife, is poisoned by arsenic-laced coffee and dies. His wife, Ayane, is the logical suspect—except that she was hundreds of miles away when he was murdered. The lead detective, Tokyo Police Detective Kusanagi, is immediately smitten with her and refuses to believe that she could have had anything to do with the crime. His assistant, Kaoru Utsumi, however, is convinced Ayane is guilty. While Utsumi’s instincts tell her one thing, the facts of the case are another matter. So she does what her boss has done for years when stymied—she calls upon Professor Manabu Yukawa. But even the brilliant mind of Dr. Yukawa has trouble with this one, and he must somehow find a way to solve an impossible murder and capture a very real, very deadly murderer.”

—Cassidy, Guest Services Manager

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki

In Tokyo, sixteen-year-old Nao has decided there’s only one escape from her aching loneliness and her classmates’ bullying. But before she ends it all, Nao first plans to document the life of her great grandmother, a Buddhist nun who’s lived more than a century. A diary is Nao’s only solace—and will touch lives in ways she can scarcely imagine. Across the Pacific, we meet Ruth, a novelist living on a remote island who discovers a collection of artifacts washed ashore in a Hello Kitty lunchbox—possibly debris from the devastating 2011 tsunami. As the mystery of its contents unfolds, Ruth is pulled into the past, into Nao’s drama and her unknown fate, and forward into her own future. Full of Ozeki’s signature humor and deeply engaged with the relationship between writer and reader, past and present, fact and fiction, quantum physics, history, and myth, A Tale for the Time Being is a brilliantly inventive, beguiling story of our shared humanity and the search for home.”

—Andrew, Institutional Giving Manager

The Taming by Lauren Gunderson

From the publisher: “Tweetering, pandashrews, and undying giddiness for James Madison—what else could you expect to find at a Miss America pageant? In this hilarious, raucous, all-female ‘power-play’ inspired by Shakespeare’s Shrew, contestant Katherine has political aspirations to match her beauty pageant ambitions. All she needs to revolutionize the American government is the help of one ultra-conservative senator’s aide on the cusp of a career breakthrough, and one bleeding-heart liberal blogger who will do anything for her cause. Well, that and a semi-historically-accurate ether trip. Here’s lookin’ at you, America.”

—Matt, Community Engagement Manager

This Is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman

As a Jewish American woman myself, I have been a fan of Allegra Goodman’s writing for a while. I find her portraits of family life and American Judaism as culture and religion relatable and illuminating. Goodman’s latest novel, This is Not About Us, centers on the Rubenstein sisters and weaves a tapestry of family and life events around them. Family has always been at the heart of my relationship with Judaism, so this novel felt delightful on a personal level. I am sure other Jewish women readers, or any reader curious about the Jewish femme experience, will find this same joy in Goodman’s book.”

—Sydney, Systems Operations Coordinator

Welcome to Murder Week by Karen Dukess

I started this book expecting a cozy mystery. While it contains cozy elements—an impossibly charming town, check; new easy friendships, check; and a mystery with low stakes, check—there is another layer that is not often found in this sub-genre. Though there is a staged mystery to solve, clues to a real mystery start to emerge. The story explores themes of grief, mother-daughter relationships, and self-discovery. For fans of British mystery books and shows, which are often referenced.

—Cristina, Development & Membership Associate

Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke

As an instant New York Times bestseller optioned for adaptation before it was even released, Yesteryear is one of 2026’s buzziest books. Readers who have yet to pick it up wonder—is it worth the hype? In my opinion, it is.

The novel follows Natalie Heller Mills, a “trad-wife” influencer who flaunts a homesteading lifestyle to her millions of followers while hiding her husband’s generational wealth and the family’s slew of employees. Natalie’s life seems idyllic, if antiquated, until one day she wakes up in a real pioneer household. What follows is a mind-bending, engaging satire that taps into a topical part of our zeitgeist. Burke writes with a propulsive pace and cutting humor. The subject matter feels timely, and yet the writing holds up well enough for this book to serve as a snapshot of influencer culture and a new age of conservatism in the 2020s.”

—Sydney, Systems Operations Coordinator