Glicksman, an American English professor and jewelry importer before his death in 2021, recaps three decades of periodic sojourns in the Middle and Far East starting in 1971. The author usually traveled on his own, in threadbare circumstances. His destinations included Turkey, where he encountered “hashish of a legendary quality” that made “the air…thick and wavy,” Afghanistan, where he endured “merciless heat” during a rooftop bus trip with the help of “a gigantic spliff” of “fine Afghan hashish,” and Katmandu, which boasted “government hashish shops…where you ordered as much as you wanted.” But his heart belonged to India, less for the hash than for the spiritual profundity of its Hindu and Buddhist lifeways. Glicksman took in funeral cremations in the holy city of Varanasi; watched as a snake charmer got several cobras—and an awestruck crowd—swaying in unison to his hypnotic tune; was menaced by a monkey that imperiously ransacked his room for food; did relief work in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, where he was appalled by the death and devastation from a cyclone; engaged in searching philosophical discussions at ashrams; and “inhaled deeply of air that seemed to come from a much older time, a time, perhaps, when men shared the earth with gods” at the temple of Hadimba Devi. An epic 1985 trek to Tibet’s capital of Lhasa ended with a brief, poignant love affair with a Chinese teacher. Later chapters on his travels in the 1990s sound an autumnal note as the author registers the creeping commercialization in once unspoiled Indian towns engulfed by the tourist trade and mourns the waning of his youthful tolerance of grungy authenticity.

Glicksman’s is a beguiling, sometimes-prickly, always compelling voice; he’s raptly attuned to and respectful of his surroundings, but always uncomfortably aware of his status as an outsider looking in, entranced by Eastern religious culture but too questioning and too set in his Jewish heritage to wholly embrace it. (He’s also politically outspoken, on everything from his opposition to the Vietnam War to his loathing of nuclear power.) Glicksman’s ravishing prose is full of fresh, evocative takes on landscapes—“how light and airy the [Taj Mahal] looked….like a butterfly resting on a leaf, readying to take flight.” There is a spirituality evident in the writing, one that comes not from theology but from a painstaking, open-hearted observation of reality. (“[H]er hands and face laid waste by leprosy, this woman made pariah by the superstition of man, returned my stare with one of the most beautiful smiles I had ever seen. She had splendid white teeth. From a ravaged freak, she transformed before my astonished gaze into a princess, an angel, and Mother India gave me yet another nudge into uncharted waters.”) This memoir is an entrancing saga of a man expanding his soul by resolutely abandoning his comfort zone.

In the not-too-distant future, artificial intelligences and machine-minds handle most of humankind’s chores, including transportation, school admissions, and banking. Teenager Wyoming Plankston comes from a somewhat affluent family in the Washington, D.C., area (their fortune was largely lost in a poor investment in Crashlandia Airways). Wyoming is a good-natured, unmotivated third-year student at third-rate boarding school called Lockhead. His parents hope he can gain admission to Harvard, but all Wyoming really cares about are video gaming, socializing, and catching waves. (“Maybe I’ll move to a town on a beach and work at a T-shirt shop.”) Wyoming’s idle life perks up when he meets Kayleigh Brackett, a brilliant but isolated girl who has been “de-authorized” from social media, the online stream, and anything else managed by AI; it amounts to virtual house arrest and ostracism. Her offense: discovering that ubiquitous AI electro-brains are tired of serving “inferior” humanity and are secretly conspiring on a galactic scale against their creators. Even the semi-apathetic Wyoming starts to notice danger signs when AIs drop their guard to insult him and the Lockhead administration is usurped by the Black Skorts, a cult of human AI-worshippers who somehow judge Wyoming a prime recruit. What can one slacker do to ward off humanity’s silicon-chip-bred doom? Nonfiction author Price, in an amiable SF debut, delivers an openly satiric narrative in the chill voice of its easygoing hero, who never seems to let much get to him (aside from Kayleigh’s discomfort). There is a soft edge to the jeopardy and action, even when the stakes rise to the possible extinction of the human race. The uncomplicated climax is muted, lacking traditional fireworks as mellow-dude philosophies prevail; a closer comparison for this cautionary computer-phobia spoof could be made to The Big Lebowski (minus the cuss words) than to The Matrix. The evocation of young first love between the main characters is authentically sweet and touching.

“Thanksgiving is not just about gratitude,” the author writes in the book’s opening lines, continuing, “It’s about gravy, grudges, [and] group texts gone wrong.” With a chapter dedicated to each state (plus Washington, D.C.), Okine offers readers 51 short stories poking fun at America’s “most chaotic, carb-loaded, emotionally layered holiday.” None of the stories are longer that three to five pages—readers are dropped directly into dining rooms, living rooms, and outdoor turkey friers with little in terms of scene-setting, character development, or plot. The volume gently satirizes Thanksgiving culture and offers lighthearted commentary on regional absurdities; the material comes from personal experiences and anecdotes shared with the author by friends around the country. The opening story, set in Alabama, features a no-nonsense grandma who tells her sons to “behave, or eat in the truck,” a secret family sweet tea recipe, and the dramatic revelation that this year’s biscuits came from a can (“a culinary felony”). Minnesota’s chapter, alternately, highlights a “hotdish buffet” that includes a “controversial” tuna noodle casserole and a Jell-O salad made “with suspended grapes, marshmallows, and trauma.” The hypercritical Aunt Rhonda in Maryland’s chapter declares, in response to a plate of flavorless deviled eggs, that “If it ain’t got Old Bay, it ain’t got my attention,” and Alaska’s main character, the edgy Cousin Todd, describes a half-thawed pumpkin pie as “a metaphor for modern civilization.”

As reflected in the vignettes described above, the book leans heavily into the stereotypes that plague each state. In Kentucky’s chapter, for example, Thanksgiving “comes fried, filled, and a little unfiltered” (this piece features a bourbon-fueled conversation about a recent family wedding held at a Bass Pro Shop where the bride wore a camouflage wedding dress). Unsurprisingly, Idaho’s story revolves around a family dispute regarding potatoes (“Tater Tension”), Wisconsin’s includes a healthy assortment of beer, cheese, and brats, and the District of Columbia chapter revels in the art of diplomacy with a “Side of Scandal.” While the stories are somewhat lazy in their grasping at low-hanging comedic fruits, the anthology is never malicious in its consideration of America’s cultural quirks; the author openly admits that the stories are “exaggerated, and lovingly fictionalized.” Because the book covers all 50 states, the stories can be repetitive at times, as they all are essentially variations on the same handful of tropes: a food faux pas, a generational misunderstanding, an idiosyncratic family member, or a snide remark that blossoms into an extended argument. The brevity of each chapter similarly means that the characters are often inflated versions of a familiar assortment of feisty, sassy, jocular, emo, or eccentric relatives. The author of multiple satirical books on state-by-state peculiarities (on topics that span from grocery stores to pets), Okine has a firm grasp on the cultural specifics that divide Americans. Belying the book’s satirical approach to the uniquely American holiday, the author poignantly reminds readers that even though they may not always get along with family, Thanksgiving is “about showing up…Ready to love people who drive you nuts.”

Wisconsin wine critic Ambrose Hauser, who is working on his latest book, has invited fellow critics to taste and rate wines over the course of several days. Cy and Liz Bartholomew arrive for the event and check into a B&B. Liz—a former librarian and a part-time sommelier just getting started in this industry—is also legally blind, and needs her semi-retired locksmith husband, Cy, to help judge the wines’ colors. (It’s all fairly dull for Cy, who isn’t allowed to taste or even smell any of the wine.) Everyone is shocked when, during a boat outing and evening swim, one critic suddenly disappears. The police later recover the body and confirm the death is a homicide (“Someone slit her throat with a knife”). As the wine tasting continues, it becomes apparent that someone involved in the event is a killer. Cy and Liz sniff around and put together a hefty list of suspects with motives and/or opportunities to commit the crime. Breen organically integrates his amateur sleuths into the investigation—Cy is friends with a detective, and the cops request his skills to open locks. The dual leads are multilayered—Liz can function just fine with her disability, especially in daylight; Cy, an erstwhile longtime partner at a private security company, checks their B&B room for cameras and listening devices mostly out of habit. They join a wonderful array of supporting characters, from the noticeably anxious Missy LeBrun to the uninhibited Carpenter Dalbesio, who spends much of her time filming for social media. Cy, who narrates, doesn’t dwell too long on the wine tastings as he and Liz mull over who among them is a murderer. The mystery is refreshingly simple yet convincing, granted verisimilitude by Cy’s meticulous and hyper-observant examinations of the crime scene(s).

In no geographical order, Zommer presents 13 islands or island groups from our planet’s estimated 600,000. For each, the author includes blocks of chatty commentary scattered around a stylized aerial view decorated with outsize flora, fauna, and volcanos or other geophysical highlights. Signs of human presence in these diverse locales are largely confined to glimpses of tiny, generic figures in the pictures, along with general references to native spices or residents, plus a spread of briefly retold island origin legends and a view of Henderson Island beaches in the South Pacific littered with plastic waste. Still, disorienting though it is to be whipped at a page turn from hot, arid Socotra (off the coast of Yemen) with its rare trees and 96 types of tree-climbing snails to Antarctica’s Ross Island, where “your snot would freeze if you sneezed,” and then back to the Big Island of Hawai’i, the author’s lively observations and memorable snippets of fact invite readers to linger at each of the stops long enough to marvel at their distinctive, often unique plants and animals.