NYT Books

Our columnist on the month’s best books.

The two-time National Book Award winner collects essays, profiles and appreciations in a new book, “On Witness and Respair.”

Zayd Ayers Dohrn and Harriet Clark on activism, violence, guilt and trying to make sense of their “incomprehensible” early days.

In her ingenious “Dog Days,” Emily LaBarge writes about a terrifying event without resorting to “the trauma plot.”

Ali Smith’s new novel, “Glyph,” dispenses with subtleties and takes on an age of war and the ghosts left behind.

A stirring memoir by the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Ada Ferrer chronicles her family’s life in the aftermath of traumatic rupture.

A musical version of the 1980s tear-jerker will close months earlier than planned after opening in April to negative reviews and soft sales.

Zayd Ayers Dohrn’s parents were leaders of the Weather Underground. His new book traces how their revolutionary ideals collided with their family life.

The writer and illustrator William Steig lived several lives before his book about a surly ogre became a Hollywood hit.

The fast success of this play, about the children’s author Roald Dahl, is a rarity on Broadway, where most shows lose money.