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Jeff VanderMeer's Annihilation is the first volume in a planned trilogy about the exploration of the mysterious Area X — from which no expedition has returned unscathed. If its members return at all. Reviewer Jason Sheehan calls Annihilation "strange, clever, off-putting, maddening ... and altogether fantastic."

Nicole Helget's new novel, Stillwater, follows the lives of twins separated at birth — and raised on opposite sides of the tracks. Helget, who is proud to be called a "Minnesota novelist," tells NPR's Scott Simon about the photograph that inspired one of the book's central characters.

Juan Gabriel Vasquez' new novel, The Sound of Things Falling, is a sophisticated vision of the way the Colombian drug trade unravels lives. Reviewer Marcela Valdes says Vasquez shies away from stock drug war imagery in favor of a quieter, more sophisticated approach.

Author Jesse Walker argues that believing in shadowy cabals and ominous secrets isn't just for people on the margins — it's as American as apple pie. He says that our nation's paranoia stretches back to the colonial era, and that some conspiracy theories are believed by a majority of Americans.

Goliarda Sapienza's sprawling, posthumously published epic, The Art of Joy, follows the life of Modesta, born in Sicily on the first day of the 20th century. Reviewer Maria Russo says the book lacks editing, but that ultimately doesn't matter to a story of such "scale and seductive libertinism."

Swamplandia! author Karen Russell is back with a new collection of short stories, Vampires in the Lemon Grove. The title story features two elderly vampires, married for more than a century, who wonder what "till death do us part" means when you can't die.

Just after Ukrainian President Zelenskyy gave an address in the House of Commons, Canadian lawmakers gave 98-year-old Yaroslav Hunka a standing ovation when the House speaker drew attention to him.

Siri Hustvedt's latest uses fragmented documents to tell the story of an artist who chooses men to present her work. Reviewer Amal El-Mohtar calls the book complex, harrowing, playful and engrossing.

Saturday is the winter solstice — which means it will be the longest night of the year. For many artists and poets, that thought is far from depressing: instead, night's darkness is invigorating. Filmmaker Phil Cousineau has edited a new collection on the allure of the night, and Jeff Dowd — the inspiration for "The Dude" — wrote the foreword.

Nicola Griffith's immersive tale of a seventh-century seer is a rare gift in a genre that often lacks women in leading roles. Critic Amal El-Mohtar has fallen in love with the titular character, praising Griffith's "startlingly beautiful" prose and her thoughtful, meticulously-detailed approach to the world of the Middle Ages.