Bookshelf — Leah Worthy

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As a reader, I care less about a novel’s plot than I do about discovering the motivations and emotions of its characters. As a writer, I tend to focus on these things as well. My plot development usually comes naturally out of character develop

Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont is about a woman who moves to a hotel in London that’s popular among aging residents in their last years of independence. Mrs. Palfrey is a window, and while she’s not estranged from her family, she isn&rsquo

Happiness & Love is hard to put down. It’s a breathless rush of gripping interiority, and the fact that it’s so gripping is incredible considering that it takes place during a single evening, at a dinner party in Manhattan. Its unname

Sometimes, you just need to read The Secret Garden again. Still just as magical as it seemed when I was young, and a good reminder to never outgrow our capacity for wonder.

What’s your favorite book from childhood?
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#TheSecretGarden

Katie Kitamura’s narrator in Audition never feels settled in her roles as an actor or in life, and she’s searching for a sense of a lasting and reliable identity. She questions her reality, her interpretation of events and memories, and t

With less plot than First Love and even more emotional punch, My Phantoms proves how impactful an exploration of one relationship can be. The novel focuses on a mother and daughter, Bridget and Helen. Everything else in their lives fades to the backg

Gwendoline Riley’s prose is straightforward and clean, poetic without needing to be lyrical. When it’s described as “deceptively simple,” it’s because it’s always taking you to a place of emotional resonance, and s

Set in 1950s New Orleans, The House on Coliseum Street is centered around unforgettable, 20-year-old Joan Mitchell. Her sparkling personality and humor reminded me of The Dud Avocado’s Sally Jay Gorce, and her despair, which deepens throughout

In her new story collection, Ayşegül Savaş returns to familiar themes, exploring them with her signature elegance and remarkable ability to combine subtlety with power.

Savaş’s characters often experience displacement, feeling estranged

I came to The Robber Bridegroom not knowing what to expect, only that I love Eudora Welty’s short stories, and this was her first novella. I didn’t even read the jacket copy before diving in. So, I was quickly surprised by the way its sto

Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle is told through the journal entries of a seventeen-year-old girl living in the 1930s with her family in a rundown castle in the English countryside. Cassandra Mortmain is, as another character puts it, both ol

In her final semester at Wilder College, Isabel Rosen has an affair with her married professor that comes on the heels of an unwanted sexual encounter with someone she considered a friend. For a time, Isabel believes her professor listens to her in a

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