By Deirdre Donahue, Jocelyn McClurg and Bob Minzesheimer, USA TODAY
Devil in the Junior League author Linda Francis Lee is back with the sweet but predictable Emily and Einstein. Elena Mauli Shapiro, Teju Cole and Rebecca Hunt make their debuts in fine novel form.
Emily and Einstein
By Linda Francis Lee
St. Martin's, 356 pp., $24.99
In the hilarious The Devil in the Junior League, about Texas high society, Linda Francis Lee proved she could write. But Emily and Einstein has a fatal flaw: a heroine so self-sacrificing, she seems more suited to an Amish inspirational than a chick-lit tale set in Manhattan. Book editor Emily Barlow has spent her life squashed by her legendary feminist mother, her free-spirited little sister and her wealthy sleazebag husband, Sandy. When a taxi hits and kills him, Sandy isn't gone, just transformed into a dog. "Einstein" the stray watches as the loving wife he mistreated sheds her meekness, runs a marathon and finds love with her hunky ex-Navy SEAL neighbor. Sweet but predictable. ? Deirdre Donahue
Lucky for readers: '13' was inspired by a small box that proves to be a treasure-trove of emotions.
13, Rue Th�r�se
By Elena Mauli Shapiro
Little, Brown, 272 pp., $23.99
Some novels are like surprise presents, the most delightful kind. Elena Mauli Shapiro's debut, a lovely gift to readers, was inspired by an actual small box, one salvaged by the author's mother after a neighbor in their Paris apartment building died in the 1980s. Louise Brunet's treasure-trove was filled with love letters from World War I, dried flowers, a rosary. In 13, Rue Th�r�se (which includes photos of these items), Shapiro wonderfully imagines Brunet's life and her loves, including an illicit liaison that makes this "Paris Wife" a sensual treat. Tr�s charmant. ? Jocelyn McClurg
Wandering through post-9/11 New York: It's a form of therapy, and a wellspring of observations.
Open City
By Teju Cole
Random House, 259 pp., $25
The appeal of Teju Cole's impressive debut novel is not its plot, but the voice of its narrator, a thirtysomething New York psychiatrist who is half Nigerian, half German, and fully isolated and sensitive. As a form of therapy, he wanders through post-9/11 Manhattan, musing on the people he meets and what he sees ? from the African Burial Ground to Chinatown ? as well as music by Mahler and books by Roland Barthes. Cole, a Nigerian immigrant, historian and photographer, is full of observations and questions about identity in a multiracial New York, when "it is dangerous to live in a secure world." ? Bob Minzesheimer
He talks. He hulks. He's the "strikingly hideous" Labrador named Mr. Chartwell.
Mr. Chartwell
By Rebecca Hunt
The Dial Press, 242 pp., $24
What if Sir Winston Churchill's infamous "Black Dog" of depression were to come to literal life? That's the conceit behind Mr. Chartwell, a refreshingly original take on the done-to-death "dog" book. It's 1964, and Churchill, 89, is just days from retiring from Parliament. He is stalked by an ominous, foul-odored presence: Mr. Chartwell, who next turns up to let a room from Esther Hammerhans, a lonely librarian at the House of Commons. Yes, Mr. Chartwell is a dog, a talking, hulking, "strikingly hideous Labrador." And yet there is something seductive about this revolting creature. Rebecca Hunt's humane debut novel cleverly explores the dark allure of such a "loyal, devoted" companion. ? McClurg
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