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Editorial Content for My Name Is Iris

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Jana Siciliano

From the PEN/Hemingway Award-winning author of THE MADONNAS OF ECHO PARK comes a new work that is so relevant to this era of immigrant experience that it will be a lasting testament to the difficulties of this particularly unjust time of political and social turmoil. Read More

Teaser

After years of drifting apart, Iris Prince and her husband are going through a surprisingly drama-free divorce. It feels like her life is finally exactly what she wants it to be. Then, one beautiful morning, she looks outside her kitchen window --- and sees that a wall has appeared in her front yard overnight. Meanwhile, a Silicon Valley startup has launched a high-tech wrist wearable called "the Band." Pitched as a convenient, eco-friendly tool to help track local utilities and replace driver's licenses and IDs, the Band is available only to those who can prove parental citizenship. Suddenly, Iris, a proud second-generation Mexican American, is now of "unverifiable origin." Amid a climate of fear and hate-fueled violence, Iris must confront how far she'll go to protect what matters to her most.

Promo

After years of drifting apart, Iris Prince and her husband are going through a surprisingly drama-free divorce. It feels like her life is finally exactly what she wants it to be. Then, one beautiful morning, she looks outside her kitchen window --- and sees that a wall has appeared in her front yard overnight. Meanwhile, a Silicon Valley startup has launched a high-tech wrist wearable called "the Band." Pitched as a convenient, eco-friendly tool to help track local utilities and replace driver's licenses and IDs, the Band is available only to those who can prove parental citizenship. Suddenly, Iris, a proud second-generation Mexican American, is now of "unverifiable origin." Amid a climate of fear and hate-fueled violence, Iris must confront how far she'll go to protect what matters to her most.

About the Book

From the PEN/Hemingway Award–winning author of THE MADONNAS OF ECHO PARK, an engrossing dystopian novel set in a near-future America where mandatory identification wristbands turn second-generation immigrants into second-class citizens --- “a well-imagined allegory of divisive racial politics” (Kirkus Reviews).

Iris Prince is starting over. After years of drifting apart, she and her husband are going through a surprisingly drama-free divorce. She's moved to a new house in a new neighborhood, and has plans for gardening, coffee clubs and spending more time with her nine-year-old daughter Melanie. It feels like her life is finally exactly what she wants it to be.

Then, one beautiful morning, she looks outside her kitchen window --- and sees that a wall has appeared in her front yard overnight. Where did it come from? What does it mean? And why does it seem to keep growing?

Meanwhile, a Silicon Valley startup has launched a high-tech wrist wearable called "the Band." Pitched as a convenient, eco-friendly tool to help track local utilities and replace driver's licenses and IDs, the Band is available only to those who can prove parental citizenship.

Suddenly, Iris, a proud second-generation Mexican American, is now of "unverifiable origin," unable to prove who she is, or where she, and her undocumented loved ones, belong. Amid a climate of fear and hate-fueled violence, Iris must confront how far she'll go to protect what matters to her most.

“Part social commentary and part thoughtful consideration of themes that include family, identity, transitions, perspectives, and hope” (Shelf Awareness), MY NAME IS IRIS is an all-too-possible story that offers a brilliant and timely look at one woman’s journey to discover who she can’t --- and can --- be.

Audiobook available, read by Alejandra Reynoso

September 22, 2023

And just like that, it’s fall. I swear that summer has fewer days than every other season. Last weekend, I was outside soaking up every moment of sunshine. This weekend, they are predicting wicked storms, which is not my idea of a fun weekend, especially since it’s been glorious all week. I am envisioning leaves scattered all over the pool!

The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger

September 2023

THE RIVER WE REMEMBER is one of my three favorite books of the year and the best of William Kent Krueger’s three stand-alone titles. The setting in Kent’s books always becomes a character, and his latest is no exception. Here we start with a river, where the lifeless body of Jimmy Quinn --- a man with a lot of money and countless enemies --- has been found. He has been dead long enough for the catfish to have discovered him.

Which of the following titles releasing in paperback in September have you read or do you plan to read? Please check all that apply.

September 22, 2023, 526 voters

September 22, 2023 - October 6, 2023

Here are reading recommendations with your comments and a rating of 1 to 5 stars for the contest period of September 22 - October 6.

Fall Preview 2023

The award-winning author of BILLY LYNN'S LONG HALFTIME WALK has penned a brilliant and propulsive new novel about greed, power and American complicity set in Haiti.

Sharon Virts, author of Veil of Doubt

Emily Lloyd, a young widow in Reconstruction-era Virginia, is accused of poisoning her three-year-old daughter, Maud. Her husband and three other children all died of mysterious illnesses, so when Maud succumbs to an unexplained malady, the town suspects foul play. Soon Mrs. Lloyd is charged not only with poisoning the child but also with murdering her children, her husband and her aunt. Enter Powell Harrison, a soft-spoken, brilliant attorney who recently returned to his Virginia hometown to help his brother manage their late father’s practice. As details about the widow’s erratic behavior and her reclusive neighbors emerge, Harrison begins to suspect that an even more sinister truth might lurk beneath the family’s horrible fate and finds himself irresistibly drawn to the case.

September 19, 2023

In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of September 18th and September 25th that we think will be of interest to Bookreporter.com readers, along with Bonus News, where we call out a contest, feature or review that we want to let you know about so you have it on your radar.

This week, we are calling attention to our "What's Your Book Group Reading This Month?" contest on ReadingGroupGuides.com. Three book groups will win 12 copies of MAD HONEY by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan, a "Good Morning America" Book Club pick and a Bookreporter.com Bets On selection that is now available in paperback. The deadline for your entries is Wednesday, October 11th at noon ET.

Tracy Daugherty, author of Larry McMurtry: A Life

In over 40 books, in a career that spanned over 60 years, Larry McMurtry staked his claim as a superior chronicler of the American West, and as the Great Plains’ keenest witness since Willa Cather and Wallace Stegner. Tracy Daugherty's latest book traces his origins as one of the last American writers who had direct contact with this country’s pioneer traditions. It follows his astonishing career as bestselling novelist, Pulitzer Prize winner, author of the beloved LONESOME DOVE, Academy Award-winning screenwriter, public intellectual and passionate bookseller.

Meg Kissinger, author of While You Were Out: An Intimate Family Portrait of Mental Illness in an Era of Silence

Growing up in the 1960s, Meg Kissinger’s family seemed to live a charmed life. With eight kids and two loving parents, the Kissingers radiated a warm, boisterous energy. But behind closed doors, a harsher reality was unfolding --- a heavily medicated mother hospitalized for anxiety and depression, a manic father prone to violence, and children in the throes of bipolar disorder and depression, two of whom would take their own lives. Through it all, the Kissingers faced the world with their signature dark humor and the unspoken family rule: never talk about it. WHILE YOU WERE OUT begins as the personal story of one family’s struggles and then opens outward, as Kissinger details how childhood tragedy catalyzed a journalism career focused on exposing our country’s flawed mental health care.