Books briefing: Barack Obama’s new memoir

September 22, 2020

“A Promised Land,” by former president Barack Obama, is set for release Nov. 17.Penguin Random House

Hi readers,

Here’s your weekly catch-up on everything you need to know going on in the book world.

The news:

Former President Barack Obama will publish his latest memoir, “A Promised Land,” on Nov. 17. The book, the first of two volumes, will cover his early political career and election in 2008, ending with the death of Osama bin Laden in 2011.
Could the biggest publisher of the Big 5 succeed during a pandemic? We profile Madeline McIntosh, president and chief executive of Penguin Random House.
The National Book Foundation named its 2020 nominees last week, honoring books in five categories: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature and young people’s literature. Winners will be announced at a virtual ceremony in November.
The Booker Prize announced its finalists last week, too. Here’s a look at how judging works in an unusual year.
John Sargent, Macmillan’s longtime C.E.O., will step down in January because of disagreements over the company’s direction. The publisher has been roiled by disputes in recent months, including a reckoning over diversity.
Erno Rubik, the creator of the Rubik’s Cube, opens up about his creation in a new memoir. “I’m very close to the cube,” Rubik says. “The cube was growing up next to me and right now, it’s middle-aged, so I know a lot about it.”
Fiction out today: “Here We Are,” by Graham Swift; “Hench,” by Natalie Zina Walschots.
Nonfiction out today: “Conditional Citizens,” by Laila Lalami; “Divided We Fall,” by David French; “God-Level Knowledge Darts,” by Desus and Mero; “Our Bodies, Their Battlefield,” by Christina Lamb; “White House, Inc.,” by Dan Alexander; “The Folly and the Glory,” by Tim Weiner.

The critics:

Jennifer Szalai reviews “Where Law Ends,” by Andrew Weissmann, a top lawyer working on Robert Mueller’s investigation. The book offers an inside view of how the country’s institutions have failed, Weissmann writes, to hold a “lawless White House” to account.
Szalai also writes about “White House, Inc.,” a new book by the Forbes reporter Dan Alexander that takes a close look at the president’s coffers. As she puts it: “As much as Trump says he loves money, ‘White House, Inc.’ shows that he seems to have a hard time holding on to it.”
In “Jack,” Marilynne Robinson returns to her fictional universe of Gilead, centering on an interracial romance. In his review, Dwight Garner calls the title character “among the more memorable characters in recent American literature.”
And Parul Sehgal writes that “The Book of Unconformities,” by Hugh Raffles, is “among the most mysterious books I’ve ever read — a dense, dark star.” It’s a deeply unconventional memoir, detailing how the author found solace in geology after the sudden deaths of his two sisters only months apart.

That’s all for now. Please stay in touch and let me know what you think — whether it’s about this newsletter, our reviews, our podcast, our literary calendar, our Instagram or what you’re reading. We on the Books desk read all of it, and I’ll make every effort to write back. You can reach me at books@nytimes.com.

All my best,

Joumana Khatib

Books at The New York Times

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