The Spy and the Traitor, Ben Macintyre

History

In the 60s, a reasonably high ranking member of the KGB became a double agent for British Intelligence. How that happened — why he did it, how MI6 ran him, how they did and didn’t share the info with allies — is fascinating, as is the detail about the inner workings of the KGB and how British diplomats broke him out of the Soviet Union. But it’s paired with a spare, cranky narrative about a CIA agent who turned double agent for Moscow for money, not ideals. While I can appreciate the difference, I wanted a deeper, more nuanced depiction and analysis than us-good-and-right, them-bad-and-wrong.

Carnegie’s Maid, Marie Benedict

Historical fiction

Historians don’t know why Andrew Carnegie went from being a ruthless industrialist to being a ruthless industrialist with a major philanthropic side (he’s why we have public libraries), but they suspect a personal relationship. Benedict imagines a young Irish immigrant trying to save her family after the Famine becomes his mother’s lady’s maid, and it’s their conversations that push him to make those choices. In addition to a great story, there’s lots of fascinating historical detail like how industry intersected with the Civil War, what industrial towns were like at the dawn of the Industrial Age, and the specifics of wealth and class at that time. (The Carnegies were so new money.)

This book was so good that I have planned a trip to the bookstore to get Bendict’s imagined life of Hedy Lamar.

How to Hack a Heartbreak, Kristen Rockaway

Contemporary romance

I loved the themes of this book — the casual misogyny of the tech world, the difficulty of knowing who to trust in a digital-dating world full of liars and surprise dick pics, the importance of friend groups. I liked the cranky heroine and her friends. But somehow the romance itself wasn’t super compelling. I’m not sure if it’s because the first-person narrator told instead of showed, but it felt to me like it needed a little more … something.

The Wife Between Us, Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen

Suspense

I won’t go too much into the plot because it’s too likely to give something away, but this was an interesting, nuanced book about the entanglements of marriage and other relationships. Beware that there is IPV, but it is not played for titillation. Worth reading if you like suspense. (Mostly it stresses me out, but once in a while I like a good one.)

Primates of Park Avenue, Wednesday Martin

Memoir/Anthropology

I picked this up for book research (it’s not like I have personal experience with overly rich New Yorkers) and while some of it was tongue in cheek, some of it was really enlightening as well. The author doesn’t seem to really grasp her privilege; she’s definitely on the lower end of the income scale on the Upper East Side, but she also bought a Birkin bag, and those are five figures. Still, I always like a look into the lives of people who aren’t me and mine.

Into the Rogue Sea, Rachel Slade

Creative non-fiction

On a routine run from Florida to Puerto Rico, a container ship goes down in a hurricane — which just doesn’t happen. Slade traces all the different forces (corporate, cultural, patriarchal, governmental) that conspired to lead to 33 people dying. It’s full of fascinating details, like how shipping shaped the Constitution and the tiny but fierce community of maritime lawyers. An excellent book.