New month, new books! Book Light is our Dandelion Chandelier curated list of the most-anticipated new book releases every month, and next up is November 2022. We think the perfect November reading list should be a cornucopia: overflowing with ideas, laughter, stories, tears, provocations and surprises. Feeling like almost too much, and then turning out to be just enough. So what are the best new book releases of November 2022? Our intrepid team has been exploring and here’s what we found: the best, most anticipated new novels, poetry and essay collections and non-fiction books coming out in November 2022.
what are the most anticipated new book releases coming in November 2022?
Wondering what to read in November 2022? We’ve surveyed the landscape, and rounded up a list of the best new books coming this November.
new novels and poetry in November 2022
In the world of fiction, there are new novels from luminaries including Percival Everett, N.K. Jemisin, Claire Keegan, Kevin Wilson and Lynn Steger Strong. Plus award-winning works from authors like Shehan Karunatilaka.
new non-fiction in November 2022
The big news in the non-fiction aisle is a new book from Former First Lady Michelle Obama. There’s also a new essay collection from Bob Dylan. And new work from Jerry Saltz, the beloved art critic. We learn about the Nordic practice of friluftsliv.
Here’s our take on the best new novels and non-fiction books coming in November 2022. You can pre-order them now if you like!
Our list of the best releases and most anticipated new novels, essay collections and non-fiction books coming out in November 2022.
new book releases November 1, 2022
1. The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka.
The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida won the 2022 Booker Prize. The novel follows a conflict photographer during Sri Lanka’s civil war who finds himself unexpectedly in the afterlife. He has “seven moons” to solve who killed him — and to recover his photographs. Along his journey, he meets other civilian victims of the war. Its a stunning excavation of the lasting trauma of the country’s decades-long war.
2. Dr. No by Percival Everett.
In the new novel Dr. No, a mathematics professor (and an “expert in nothing”) pairs up with a villain who wants to carry out a symbolic theft at Fort Knox. The professor goes by the name Wala Kitu (Wala means “nothing” in Tagalog, and Kitu is Swahili for “nothing.”) The aspiring Bond villain is John Sill, who wants to break into Fort Knox to steal, well, not gold bars. But a shoebox containing . . . nothing. As Sill says, “Professor, think of it this way. This country has never given anything to us and it never will. We have given everything to it. I think it’s time we gave nothing back.”
3. Trespasses by Louise Kennedy.
Amid daily reports of violence, in the new novel Trespasses a young woman lives a quiet life with her mother in a small town near Belfast. By day she teaches at a parochial school; at night she works at her family’s pub. Against her better judgment she begins an illicit affair with a man who is three times wrong for her: he’s Protestant but older, and married. When tragedy strikes, she’s left with the question: Is where we come from more important than who we are and what we choose to do?
4. The World We Make by N.K. Jemisin.
In this series, which began with Jemisin’s 2020 novel “The City We Became,” the five boroughs of New York are embodied by human avatars, who fight off their enemy: the Woman in White. Now, in The World We Make, a populist mayoral candidate spewing hateful rhetoric threatens the city, and the avatars team up with other cities across the world to defeat this new foe.
5. Foster by Claire Keegan.
Keegan, an Irish author, was a finalist for the Booker Prize this year for her novel “Small Things Like These.” Foster, a novella, was abridged in The New Yorker in 2010. Now the publisher is releasing the work as a book in the United States.
6. Meredith, Alone by Claire Alexander.
In many ways, the titular character in Meredith, Alone has everything she needs and wants. Including a full-time remote job and her rescue cat Fred. Her best friend Sadie and her two children. Her online support group, jigsaw puzzles, Emily Dickinson, the internet and the grocery delivery man. Why leave the house? Like, ever? But something’s about to change. Whether Meredith likes it or not, the world is coming to her door.
7. Art Is Life: Icons and Iconoclasts, Visionaries and Vigilantes, and Flashes of Hope in the Night by Jerry Saltz.
in Art Is Life, the acclaimed art critic and author draws on two decades of work to offer a real-time survey of contemporary art as a barometer of our times. Chronicling a period punctuated by dramatic turning points—from the cultural reset of 9/11 to the rolling social crises of today—Saltz traces how visionary artists have both documented and challenged the culture.
8. The Philosophy of Modern Song by Bob Dylan.
In this new essay collection, The Philosophy of Song, the Nobel laureate focuses on the work of other artists, from Elvis Costello to Nina Simone, exploring what makes each song work (or falter).
9. The Open-Air Life: Discover the Nordic Art of Friluftsliv and Embrace Nature Every Day by Linda Åkeson Mcgurk.
The Open-Air Life introduces readers to a wide array of Nordic customs and practices that focus on slowing down and spending more time outdoors. An outdoorsy cousin of hygge, friluftsliv is said to be “what Nordic people do outside all day before they cozy up in front of the fireplace.”
new book releases November 8, 2022
10. Now Is Not The Time to Panic by Kevin Wilson.
The author’s fourth book, Now is Not the Time to Panic, follows Zeke and Frankie, two teenaged kids who meet one summer in small-town Tennessee and forge a connection making art together. Years later, the events of that summer threaten to upend Frankie’s settled adult life.
11. Flight by Lynn Steger Strong.
Flight is the third novel by the author of Want. It centers on a family reuniting for Christmas, their first holiday after the matriarch has died. Over three days they must face old conflicts and resentments and figure out what to do with their mother’s house—and then a child from the town goes missing. Days before Christmas, siblings Henry, Kate and Martin convene with a gaggle of spouses and kids at Henry’s upstate New York house, but this is no idyllic family holiday. It’s the first without their late mom and the first away from her Florida home and soon the air is thick with unaddressed conflicts and clashing personalities. When a local mother and daughter need their help, they come together despite their differences
12. Fatty Fatty Boom Boom by Rabia Chaudry.
In Fatty Fatty Boom Boom, the host of the “Undisclosed” podcast and author of Adnan’s Story has penned a candid memoir about family, food and the push and pull these things have exhibited over her body.
13. The Grimkes by Kerri K. Greenidge.
Angelina and Sarah Grimke were white sisters who left their plantation in South Carolina to become abolitionist activists in the North. For many years, they have been upheld as antislavery heroes. But in The Grimkes, the author takes a closer and more nuanced look at their story. And fleshes out the full Grimke family, including its Black members who until now have been overshadowed by their white relatives.
14. Two Old Broads: Stuff You Need to Know That You Didn’t Know You Needed to Know by Dr. M. E. Hecht and Whoopi Goldberg.
In Two Old Broads, a renowned surgeon and expert on the art of aging teams up with Whoopi Goldberg for a lively conversation about growing older being “present, positive, and as extraordinary as ever.”
new book releases November 15, 2022
15. The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times by Michelle Obama.
In a follow-up to Becoming, in The Light We Carry the former First Lady shares her wisdom and practical solutions for surrounding ourselves with community and hope, drawing upon both her professional experiences and her personal stories of friends and family.
16. They’re Going to Love You by Meg Howrey.
The new novel They’re Going to Love You oscillates between New York City during the AIDS crisis and present-day Los Angeles. Growing up, Carlisle would travel from Ohio to New York to spend a few weeks in the summer with her father Robert and his partner James in their Greenwich Village brownstone. Drawn to the ballet world, like her mother before her, Carlisle becomes a choreographer and dreams of living with her father full time—until an affair irreparably changes their family dynamic forever.
new book releases November 29, 2022
17. Divine Blue Light (For John Coltrane) by Will Alexander.
From the finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry comes Divine Blue Light (For John Coltrane). It’s a new collection of poems from the intersection between surrealism and afro-futurism, where Césaire meets Sun Ra.
18. A Coastline Is an Immeasurable Thing: A Memoir Across Three Continents by Mary-Alice Daniel.
A Coastline is an Immeasurable Thing is a poignant coming of age story. The author’s family moved from West Africa to England when she was a very young girl, leaving behind the culture of her native land. Against the backdrop of a migratory adolescence, she reckons with race, religious conflict, culture clash, and a multiplicity of possible identities.
most anticipated releases of new novels and non-fiction books in November 2022
Those are our picks for what to read this month: 18 of the best and most anticipated new book releases coming in November 2022. What’s at the top of your list? Whatever you decide, stay safe and strong and have a great month, dear reader.
