Author: Aziz Ansari
Rating: 4.5 Stars
Review By: Shana

This is neither a humor book or a memoir, but rather a very amusing mix of social science through the prism of Ansari's patented humor. This book looks at how relationships play out in the modern world, for better or worse.

Author: Spencer Kope
Rating: 3.5 Stars
Review By: Shana

This was a nicely done FBI procedural with a twist - one half of the "Special Tracking Unit" masquerades as a man tracker but actually has something of a paranormal power to track people by their unique "shine" (an aura or essence that is particular to each individual). Known as "Steps," very few people know the true source of his amazing tracking ability.

Author: Meg Elison
Rating: 4.5 Stars
Review By: Shana

Science Fiction is my favorite fiction genre, but I admit to often approaching apocalyptic/post-apocalyptic books with a sense of dread. But if you feel the need to be well-read in the SF canon, you cannot very well avoid such books - especially those that have garnered excellent reviews. In Elison's Book of the Unnamed Midwife, such dread is warranted but not overwhelming.  

Author: Ted Koppel
Rating: 4 Stars
Review By: Shana

An incisive look at the existential threat of a cyberattack on our power grid. This book is streamlined and eminently readable, well-sourced and clear eyed.  Koppel's far-ranging access and variety of interviewees paints a disturbing picture of our unpreparedness for a very real threat (though any student of psychology will be unsurprised at the lack of urgency - we humans are awful at prediction and planning for disaster unless we clearly see the disaster coming). 

Author: Claire Fuller
Rating: 4.5 Stars
Review By: Shana

To call this book a mystery (or literary mystery) does not do it justice. At a basic level, this is the story Ingrid (a wife and mother) who went missing in 1992, how her fraught marriage led to the disappearance, and the aftermath for her family. But it is so much more. 

Author: Bryan Denson
Rating: 3.5 Stars
Review By: Shana

Denson brings a snappy writing style (if sometimes bogged down by clunky metaphors) to this story of a disgraced CIA officer (found out to be feeding Russia information) and his youngest son (who he manipulated into passing further information). 

Author: Chuck Wendig
Rating: 4 Stars
Review By: Shana

An enjoyable near-future SF, with the focus on cyber issues, artificial intelligence (AI), and intelligence augmentation (IA). In this 2015 book, Wendig has taken a slice out of life and built the plot around five characters who represent common hacker stereotypes. You have a white hat hacker/hacktivist, a black hat, an old school cyberpunk turned conspiracy theorist/prepper, classic social engineer, and an internet troll. Though they could be rote stand-ins, Wendig has made them all more than mere caricatures. In opposition lie two potential antagonists, the government (who spirits them away to a secluded compound in the woods, half penitentiary, half think tank), and a looming technology. What ensues is equal parts action/thriller and cyber SF, replete with shady federal actions and conspiracies.

Author: Maggie Nelson
Rating: 3 Stars
Review By: Shana

Upon finishing this book, I was and remain quite conflicted in how I feel about it. The writing itself is evocative and interesting. The subject matter is clearly serious and compelling - a sort of wandering exploration of how a murder impacts a family, the course of a trial, how certain events intersected with the author's life at the time. But the writing itself, though evocative and interesting, sometimes feels overwrought.

Author: Matt Ruff
Rating: 4 Stars
Review By: Shana

Lovecraftian themes, and their attendant horror, are put to supremely clever use in this book, where the supernatural has to struggle to be as terrifying as the realities of living as an African-American during Jim Crow times.

Author: John Scalzi
Rating: 4 Stars
Review By: Shana

First in the well-known SF series following septuagenarian recruit to the military, John Perry. In this far future universe, humans have stepped out into the stars and found it to be teeming with intelligent, and usually hostile, life. With multiple colonies throughout the universe, the fight to settle and protect new worlds is fierce and Earth's senior citizens are given the option to enlist at age 75 and join the Colonial Defense Forces.