NYT Books

Patrick Hutchison left city life to live an urbanite’s rural dream. The rest is funny, philosophical, chainsaw-wielding history.

The South Korean writer Gu Byeong-Mo’s novel “Apartment Women” imagines a commune of young families with a short fuse.

In that 1970 book and others, he wrote of history and apocalyptic predictions based on biblical interpretations and actual events of the time.

Reporting on the 40th anniversary of the popular pizza literacy program sent one writer on a mozzarella-scented memory trail.

The world is a gift, not a giant Amazon warehouse, Robin Wall Kimmerer said. In her new book, “The Serviceberry,” she proposes gratitude as an antidote to prevailing views of nature as a commodity.

Our columnist on some recent favorites.

Julia Armfield’s “Private Rites” is a contemporary reimagining of the Shakespearean tragedy, set in a flooded London.

Her Haight-Ashbury clothing store was ground zero for the counterculture. But she was best known for a tawdry book — which she later disavowed — published after Ms. Joplin’s death.

“If I come across ‘Dad’ or ‘Mommy,’ I’m out,” says the former U.S. poet laureate. “‘Grandma’ gets a pass.” His new collection is “Water, Water.”

In “The Miraculous From the Material,” the best-selling author Alan Lightman examines the science behind the wonder.