Malvern staff member Fernando is a New York Review Books Classics enthusiast, and he has an excellent recommendation for y’all…

In the Heart of the Heart of the Country by William H. Gass

Gass’s breakthrough 1968 collection is a book that reminds me of Bruno Schulz’s The Street of Crocodiles in its brevity and unexplained power. His setting is the Midwest, where the seasons tower over confined living spaces and great expanses of land. Gass’s language can be spooky and melancholy as it animates the brutality and wonder of these unique, stylistic stories. It’s a great read to hide out with during the first pangs of autumn cold.

Also recommended: The Fox in the Attic by Richard Hughes. The first part to Hughes’s self-proclaimed “20th-Century War and Peace” dazzles and disturbs.