Held by Anne Michaels
Speaking of book awards, this is on the 2024 Book Prize shortlist, which we announced in a news post and discussed twice in our book news newsletter Today in Books. Here’s how Erica recommends it: “The latest by poet and novelist Michaels is both spectral and ethereal. It opens in 1917 as John, a British soldier, lies barely holding onto life on a battlefield in France. As he lies there, memories play on a loop — his coastal childhood, chance pub encounters, and time spent in hot baths with lovers. When he returns home, he’s reunited with his artist wife, Helena, and reopens a photography business. But the past keeps resurfacing, in his own trauma, but in another way as well — he can see faint images of the loved ones of photography subjects. As the narrative continues on — including both fictional and historical figures like the Curies — the thin space between life and death is explored through John and generations of his descendants.”