Back in the 1980s, Lenya Fischer served as an intelligence officer for the Stasi, where her attributes—“sneaky, stealthy, a deep-diver”—earned her the nickname Der Narwhal. Now, after a stint in prison for bribery, the 63-year-old is back on the street working as one of Europe’s most tenacious corporate investigators for hire. Her current case has her looking into the activities of Peter Brunner, the scion of a lumber empire who seems to be hiding something in his Cyprus-, Malta-, and Liechtenstein-based shell companies. It won’t be an easy job: “The Brunners have been a kind of power behind the throne all across Europe since the Holy Roman Empire,” a friend warns her. “They didn’t stay on top through two world wars by being nice. They don’t like to be investigated.” Luckily, Lenya is one of the only people in the world with access to the perfect man to probe Brunner’s holdings: Orell Schneider, the so-called “007 of Money Laundering” (and Lenya’s ex-lover) whose past employers include Liechtenstein’s Financial Intelligence Unit and the Vatican’s Financial Information Authority. When Orell is killed in a car bombing just days after Lenya tries to make contact, she knows she’s being sent a warning—if Orell’s death wasn’t clear enough, the killers also take the liberty of murdering Lenya’s cat, Fritz. Perhaps the Brunners don’t like to be investigated, but Lenya is not the sort of woman to back down once blood has been spilled. “Whoever did this was a ghost trying not to see the Grim Reaper,” she fumes. (“Lenya would hang on to the bottom of a car for a thousand miles to…watch the soul leave their eyes.”) Her investigation soon reconnects her with an East Texas spy she crossed swords with during the Lebanese Civil War, as well as a cavalcade of Russian mobsters, Corsican gun-runners, and other European ne’er-do-wells who stand between her and an international conspiracy the size of a continent.

In addition to the engaging revenge plot—which is more about avenging Fritz the cat than Orell—Nichols keeps his readers entertained with an endless supply of pseudonymous spies and criminal organizations. (For example: the Black Jackals, “founded by former Serbian special ops commandos who reinvented themselves as a gang of highly sophisticated international jewel thieves after the Balkans War in the Nineties.”) Lenya is a brilliant protagonist, a Russophile and true-believer who once reported her own husband for treason (he was executed) and who now finds herself doing the bidding of some of the world’s grossest capitalists. Nichols manages to pack the last 50 years of European conflict and interconnection into her personal history, illustrating how money and those who possess it circulate heedless of national borders. As the story unfolds, the vision of our tenuous global economy and democratic order that emerges is more terrifying than anything hidden in a Liechtenstein bank. Readers will undoubtedly look forward to Lenya’s next case.

Initially, Cathcart’s novel seems to follow a familiar beat: a young man named Scoot mourns his departed friend, Hannah. Both have been living with cystic fibrosis; in the aftermath of Hannah’s death, Scoot finds that Hannah has left him money and a detailed request. It’s that request that lead things in a strange direction: Hannah’s wishes involve Scoot traveling to Europe to find the preserved heart of the composer and pianist Chopin. (That isn’t as random as it seems: several characters remark on parallels between Chopin’s tuberculosis and the cystic fibrosis that afflicts Hannah and Scoot.) The journey takes him to Tbilisi, Georgia, and involves Niki, a woman with her own connection to Hannah. Gradually, the boundaries of the novel expand even further, to include several chapters narrated by the late novelist George Sand. Cathcart moves backward and forward in time, filling in details about Scoot and Hannah’s relationship, Scoot’s troubled family history, and how precisely Niki fits into the narrative. There’s also the matter of Hannah’s desire for posthumous revenge on the sinister Dr. Owning and the supernatural Haint pursuing Scoot. A madcap energy keeps much of the story going, but there’s also a lot of plot happening here, including an allusion to the many crimes of Soviet secret police head Lavrentiy Beria, an organization called the Oulipo that seems distinct from the literary organization Georges Perec belonged to, and a subplot involving performance artist and cystic fibrosis patient Bob Flanagan. It’s tremendously ambitious, but it also sometimes loses sight of the human connections at its heart.

Americans Eleanor and Talbot meet in Florence just after World War II—Eleanor came to Italy to study sculpture in 1939 and got stuck when war broke out, and Talbot was there as part of a U.S. intelligence group within the U.S. Army. They eventually marry and move to Washington, D.C., where Talbot joins the CIA and Eleanor, unable to find work in the art world, settles for a job in the Arlington Public Library system. Fifteen years later, distance has grown between them, and while Eleanor turns a blind eye to Talbot’s numerous affairs, the cracks in their seemingly idyllic life start to show. On the night of Eleanor’s 40th birthday party, an operation led by Talbot goes badly awry when a surveillance plane is shot down over the Soviet Union just weeks before Eisenhower and Khrushchev are scheduled to have peace talks. Talbot’s extramarital activities come back to haunt him, and a foundational plot twist midway through the novel completely shifts the narrative that readers thought they were following, to great effect. Amid the political intrigue, Norsworthy ensures the story’s focus remains on Eleanor and Talbot’s relationship; chapters written from both of their perspectives deepen the context of their relationship and add to the emotional stakes. The real-life events serving as a backdrop for the story are thoroughly researched, and the robust cast of supporting characters is brought to life in a vividly rendered historical setting (“Anxiety was high that the Soviets had more missiles and were building bombers so fast the United States would never catch up”). The narrative occasionally drags in the second half of the book, over-emphasizing the logistics of various aspects of spycraft employed by the CIA and the USSR, but overall, the pacing works effectively to keep readers invested and to take Talbot and Eleanor through realistic inner journeys as they contemplate the future of their marriage.

This thoughtful, epigrammatic book by a scholar at Saint Mary’s College of California encourages us all to write not simply to communicate with others but to shape ourselves. “Writing changes us,” writes Arndt, author of Arendt on the Political (2019). “In a way, it is similar to practices such as athletics for the body or meditation for the mind: just as the practice of physical exercise changes the body, so the practice of writing changes the soul.” This book goads us into writing well: not just by developing a style but by considering the very ethics of our work, our needs, and our responsibilities to be true and honest to ourselves and others. Marcel Proust offers one guide: We should not “model writing on conversation but on solitary meditation,” Arndt writes. Good writing leads to wisdom: The order of words in the sentence, the structure of the paragraph, and the arc of the essay all contribute to a form of knowing. The first sentence should arrest attention. Rousseau: “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.” There’s high philosophy here, and there’s blunt advice: “Don’t futz around.” Be concise. Organize your argument. Find the right word. In the end, writing well is about conveying truth beautifully, to “effect some sort of good.” Read this book and you’ll never think of freshman composition in the same way again.

This Ramadan, neither Malak nor her Teta will be fasting—Malak’s too young, and Teta’s on a new medication. So they decide to find another way to make the holy month special. Malak asks her grandmother to show her how to prepare iftar, the meal eaten to break the fast each evening. But what to cook? Their Palestinian family’s favorite meal—makloubeh! The dish contains layers of meat, rice, and fried vegetables, but everyone prefers a different kind. Malak’s grandfather likes eggplant makloubeh best, while her mom’s favorite is cauliflower. As the ingredient list grows, Malak worries: “What if everything doesn’t go together?” But, as Teta points out, “Every makloubeh is unique…Just like each family.” Soon, the meal is nearly ready, and Malak’s uncle places a tray over the simmering pot and, per tradition, flips it upside down before serving it (indeed, makloubeh is Arabic for “upside down”). While many children’s stories about Ramadan emphasize fasting, this charming tale, rooted in the author’s own experiences, notably shifts focus to the iftar. Issa’s cozy, digital illustrations exude familial warmth and feature deeply meaningful threads of cultural identity such as the traditional Palestinian thobe, keffiyeh, olives, and keys hanging on the wall, symbolizing the right of return.