What should you read this weekend? USA TODAY’s picks for book lovers include a timely novel about the Titanic and actor Frank Langella’s gossipy memoir.
The DressmakerBy Kate Alcott; Doubleday, 306 pp., $24.95; fiction
Dozens of non-fiction books are being published to mark the 100th anniversary of the Titanic. but fiction fans won’t want to miss Kate Alcott’s gripping take on the tragedy.
Her novel revolves around a controversial real-life character, British designer Lucile Duff Gordon, who survived the disaster. in The Dressmaker, Duff Gordon is accompanied onboard by her maid, Tess Collins, an ambitious seamstress who thinks she has landed her dream job.
But Tess, who also survives in a different lifeboat, finds herself in murky waters after learning that her employer may have bribed sailors so they wouldn’t return for more survivors.
USA TODAY says *** 1/2 out of four. “Seamlessly stitching fact and fiction together, Alcott creates a hypnotic tale.”
Dropped Names: Famous Men and Women As I Knew ThemBy Frank Langella; Harper, 356 pp., $25.99; non-fiction
In this memoir, Frank Langella — whose many celebrated roles include Count Dracula, Sherlock Holmes and Richard Nixon — “reveals a first-rate gift for gab that translates wonderfully onto the page.” Look for gossipy encounters with everyone from Elizabeth Taylor to Rita Hayworth to Jack and Jackie Kennedy.
USA TODAY says *** ½ out of four. a “juicy page-turner.”
The Gods of GothamBy Lyndsay Faye; Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam, 414 pp., $25.95, fiction
Fans of Gangs of New York and The Alienist will want to put The Gods of Gotham on their to-buy list. Set in 1845, it depicts the cultural cataclysm created in New York City by the Irish potato famine. Newly minted copper Timothy Wilde must investigate why Irish immigrant children are being savagely murdered.
USA TODAY says *** out of four. “A treat for readers obsessed with Manhattan history.”
WatergateBy Thomas Mallon; Pantheon, 448 pp., $26.95; fiction
The women of Watergate — first lady Pat Nixon, loyal secretary Rose Mary Woods and Alice Longworth, the viper-tongued 88-year-old daughter of Teddy Roosevelt— steal the show in the novel Watergate. but “Tricky Dick” Nixon is also a sympathetic and complex character in Thomas Mallon’s hands.
USA TODAY says *** out of four. “Surprisingly entertaining and warm-hearted.”
The Song of AchillesBy Madeline Miller; Ecco, 378 pp., $25.99; fiction
Madeline Miller is hardly the first writer to put her own spin on The Iliad. but her discreet, “remarkable” take on the love story between Achilles and his companion Patroclus makes her “the latest heir to the legacy of the greatest of all historical novelists, Mary Renault,” writes Robert Bianco.
USA TODAY says **** out of four. “It takes a truly gifted writer to make a song this old feel this beautifully new…(an) enormously promising debut novel.”