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OUR BEST INTENTIONS

by Vibhuti Jain ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 14, 2023

A powerful, story-driven exploration of some of today’s most pressing social issues.

Coming-of-age drama meets suburban thriller in a debut novel driven by the question: What happens when people’s best intentions threaten to cause more harm than good?

Angela Singh wrestles with the typical teenage travails: worrying over the distance growing between her and her best friend, Sam McCleary; managing an unrequited crush on Sam's brother, Henry; training to stay competitive on the swim team; and navigating an often fraught relationship with her single dad, who’s been raising her on his own since she was 6. However, her world is turned upside down when, walking home from swim practice one day, she finds Henry on the football field, having been stabbed in the abdomen. The affluent town of Kitchewan, New York, becomes enmeshed in a web of social politics, gossip, and backroom power plays as everyone attempts to defend their innocence. Or perhaps the incident merely uncovers the racial and economic tensions that always existed in the town, especially as Chiara Thompkins, a Black teenager, emerges at the center of the drama. Angela, whose memory of finding Henry remains blurry, must navigate her torn loyalties to her family and friends, self-preservation, and her sense of justice as she grows more deeply entangled in the community’s investigation into what exactly happened that day at the school. Rotating among multiple perspectives and moving backward and forward in time, the novel intertwines teenage drama with an incisive intersectional exploration of the complexities of intergenerational immigrant families, class, and racism. Jain tackles the novel’s themes effectively and subtly for the most part, especially in the beginning. The final chapters seem rushed, diluting the complexity and drama that made the first two-thirds so riveting and resulting in a too-tidy ending.

Pub Date: March 14, 2023

ISBN: 9780063278783

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2022

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2023

LITERARY FICTION | GENERAL FICTION

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Awards & Accolades

Our Verdict

New York Times Bestseller

by Kristin Hannah ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 6, 2024

A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.

A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.

When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.

Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024

ISBN: 9781250178633

Page Count: 480

Publisher: St. Martin's

Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023

FAMILY LIFE & FRIENDSHIP | GENERAL FICTION | HISTORICAL FICTION

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by Kristin Hannah

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Kirkus Reviews' Best Books Of 2015

Kirkus Prize winner

National Book Award Finalist

A LITTLE LIFE

by Hanya Yanagihara ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 10, 2015

The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.

Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.

Yanagihara ( The People in the Trees , 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.  

Pub Date: March 10, 2015

ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8

Page Count: 720

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015

GENERAL FICTION

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by Hanya Yanagihara

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Our Best Intentions : Book summary and reviews of Our Best Intentions by Vibhuti Jain

Summary | Reviews | More Information | More Books

Our Best Intentions

by Vibhuti Jain

Critics' Opinion:

Readers' rating:

Published Mar 2023 352 pages Genre: Literary Fiction Publication Information

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About this book

Book summary.

A pulsating debut about an immigrant family that gets caught in the middle of a criminal investigation, perfect for readers of Everything I Never Told You and Ask Again, Yes .

Babur "Bobby" Singh, single parent and owner of fledging Uber business "Move with Bobby," remains ever hopeful about ascending the ladder of American success. He lives in an affluent suburb of New York with his daughter Angie, an introverted teenager who is uncomfortable in her own skin unless she's swimming. During summer break, Angie is walking home after training at the high school pool when she finds Henry McCleary, a classmate from a wealthy, prominent family, stabbed and bleeding on the football field. The police immediately focus their investigation on Chiara Thompkins, a runaway Black girl who disappears after the stabbing and—it's later discovered—wasn't properly enrolled in the public high school. The incident sends shock waves through the community and reveals jarring truths about the lengths to which families will go to protect themselves. As the town fractures, Angie must navigate conflicting narratives and wrestle with her own moral culpability. Meanwhile, Babur's painstaking efforts to shield Angie and protect his hard-earned efforts to assimilate overshadow his ability to see right from wrong. Alternating between multiple perspectives, Our Best Intentions is a suspenseful drama about a father and daughter re-examining their familial bonds and place in the community. Both a gripping page-turner and an intimate portrait of an immigrant family, Vibhuti Jain's provocative debut explores how easily friendships, careers, communities, and individual lives can unravel when the toxicity of privilege and racial bias are exposed.

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Reader reviews.

"Jain's riveting debut centers on a stabbing at a high school… Jain excels at revealing each character's motivations and fears, and at how easily the truth can be distorted. This page-turner will stay with readers." - Publishers Weekly (starred review) "This moving, thought-provoking debut will be a hit with book clubs, and fans of Celeste Ng should take note." - Booklist (starred review) "Jain tackles the novel's themes effectively and subtly for the most part, especially in the beginning. The final chapters seem rushed, diluting the complexity and drama that made the first two-thirds so riveting and resulting in a too-tidy ending. A powerful, story-driven exploration of some of today's most pressing social issues." - Kirkus Reviews "With subtlety, humor and piercing insight, Vibhuti Jain creates a propulsive page-turner that will touch your heart. This is a gorgeous and complex exploration of race, immigration and class wrapped up in a thrilling story you won't be able to put down. A must-read!" - Jean Kwok, New York Times bestselling author of Searching for Sylvie Lee " Our Best Intentions , the lyrical debut by Vibhuti Jain, is equal parts suspense and the best kind of literary fiction. Centered on the assault of a wealthy teen by a Black classmate, this novel is a heartbreaking story of class, family, and the tragedy that often occurs when the two intersect." - Julie Clark, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Flight and The Lies I Tell

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More Information

Vibhuti ("Vib") Jain lives with her husband and daughter in Johannesburg, South Africa, where she works in international development. She began her career as a corporate lawyer in New York City. She holds degrees from Yale University and Harvard Law School. She grew up in Guilford, Connecticut. Our Best Intentions is her first novel.

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Read Between the Spines

Our best intentions.

Vibhuti Jain

Quick synopsis.

A suspenseful drama about an immigrant family caught in a criminal investigation, perfect for readers of  Everything I Never Told You .

Publisher’s Synopsis

Babur “Bobby” Singh, single parent and owner of fledging Uber business “Move with Bobby,” remains ever hopeful about ascending the ladder of American success. He lives in an affluent suburb of New York with his daughter Angie, an introverted teenager who is uncomfortable in her own skin unless she’s swimming.

During summer break, Angie is walking home after training at the high school pool when she finds Henry McCleary, a classmate from a wealthy, prominent family, stabbed and bleeding on the football field. The police immediately focus their investigation on Chiara Thompkins, a runaway Black girl who disappears after the stabbing and—it’s later discovered—wasn’t properly enrolled in the public high school.

The incident sends shock waves through the community and reveals jarring truths about the lengths to which families will go to protect themselves. As the town fractures, Angie must navigate conflicting narratives and wrestle with her own moral culpability. Meanwhile, Babur’s painstaking efforts to shield Angie and protect his hard-earned efforts to assimilate overshadow his ability to see right from wrong.

Alternating between multiple perspectives,  Our Best Intentions  is a pulsating story about a father and daughter re-examining their familial bonds and place in the community. Both a gripping page-turner and an intimate portrait of an immigrant family, Vibhuti Jain’s provocative debut explores how easily friendships, careers, communities, and individual lives can unravel when the toxicity of privilege and racial bias are exposed.

Book Review

Our Best Intentions is a debut novel about an Indian immigrant father, Barbur, raising his daughter, Angie, in the rich, suburban enclave of Westchester County, New York. As Angie returns from swim practice one summer day, she stumbles upon the remnants of a crime and becomes unwillingly involved by calling for help.

Our Best Intentions is complex exploration of race, class, and culture and the privilege they afford. The story dives into the struggles of navigating a culture and community outside your own, particularly from a first and second generation immigrant perspective. While there is a bit of mystery woven into the narrative, this novel falls much more in the literary fiction genre.

Our Best Intentions offers readers a narrative that feels like a firsthand biographical account. Told through multiple points of view, each character’s voice reflects their thoughts, feelings, and motivations. In this way, the story becomes immersive and emotional. I do think the ending could be stronger and provide more closure. Still, I was satisfied where Jain chose to end.

For a debut novel, I found Jain’s character development to be especially strong. Each narrator and character is distinct with their own internal conflicts. For me, Barbur was written perfectly. Despite not particularly liking some of his opinions or actions, Barbur was incredibly reminiscent of an Indian immigrant I know, from the things he said, felt, and understood to his treatment of mental health. Whether you know someone like the characters or not, Jain crafted characters that feel fully formed and familiar.

In Our Best Intentions, Jain’s writing does border on young adult at times. I think you could interpret this as a positive or a negative. On the positive side, that means Jain captured the voice of a teenager since several of the narrators are in high school. On the negative side, a lot of serious topics and deep issues are included in the story. However, the issues are not given the full depth and exploration they demand.

I struggled with Our Best Intentions but not because the book or writing was bad. Instead, Jain’s piercing insight, complex characters, and immersive writing struck a chord – one that happens to be sensitive.

The things that frustrated and enraged me in Our Best Intentions were not writing or plot issues that reflect poorly on the novel. Instead, the book was accurate and reflective of people, particularly BIPOC and immigrant individuals, living in white, wealthy communities. It was my personal history and familiarity with the situations and events the book presented that angered me and caused me stress. Our Best Intentions encapsulated all my negative academic and school experiences in one book plus those which I have not experienced but infuriate me nonetheless.

Overall, Our Best Intentions is a solid debut novel that explores hard-hitting, evocative topics through a strong story and robust characters. I definitely recommend it and look forward to Jain’s future books.

Overall Rating

Character Development

RECOMMENDED

Genre Literary Fiction

Publication Date March 14, 2023

Storygraph Rating 3.89 stars

Goodreads Rating 3.98 stars

Note: I received an e-galley of this book from its publisher, William Morrow. Regardless, I always provide a fair and honest review.

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• About the Book

A suspenseful drama about an immigrant family caught in a criminal investigation, perfect for readers of EVERYTHING I NEVER TOLD YOU.

During summer break one day, Angie, the teenage daughter of Indian immigrant Babur Singh, is walking home after swimming at the high school pool when she finds Henry McCleary, a white classmate from a wealthy family, stabbed and bleeding on the football field. The police immediately focus their investigation on Chiara Thompkins, a runaway Black girl who disappears after the stabbing and --- it’s later discovered --- wasn’t properly enrolled in the public high school.

The incident sends shock waves through the community and reveals jarring truths about the lengths to which families will go to protect themselves. Alternating between multiple perspectives, OUR BEST INTENTIONS is a gripping story about a father and daughter re-examining their familial bonds and place in the community that explores how easily friendships, careers, communities and individual lives can unravel when the toxicity of privilege and racial bias are exposed.

Our Best Intentions by Vibhuti Jain

• Publication Date: March 19, 2024
• Genres: Fiction , Women's Fiction
• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks
• ISBN-10: 0063278766
• ISBN-13: 9780063278769

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Our Best Intentions: A Novel

A pulsating debut about an immigrant family that gets caught in the middle of a criminal investigation, perfect for readers of Everything I Never Told You and Ask Again, Yes .

Babur “Bobby” Singh, single parent and owner of fledging Uber business “Move with Bobby,” remains ever hopeful about ascending the ladder of American success. He lives in an affluent suburb of New York with his daughter Angie, an introverted teenager who is uncomfortable in her own skin unless she’s swimming.

During summer break, Angie is walking home after training at the high school pool when she finds Henry McCleary, a classmate from a wealthy, prominent family, stabbed and bleeding on the football field. The police immediately focus their investigation on Chiara Thompkins, a runaway Black girl who disappears after the stabbing and—it’s later discovered—wasn’t properly enrolled in the public high school.

The incident sends shock waves through the community and reveals jarring truths about the lengths to which families will go to protect themselves. As the town fractures, Angie must navigate conflicting narratives and wrestle with her own moral culpability. Meanwhile, Babur’s painstaking efforts to shield Angie and protect his hard-earned efforts to assimilate overshadow his ability to see right from wrong.

Alternating between multiple perspectives, Our Best Intentions is a suspenseful drama about a father and daughter re-examining their familial bonds and place in the community. Both a gripping page-turner and an intimate portrait of an immigrant family, Vibhuti Jain’s provocative debut explores how easily friendships, careers, communities, and individual lives can unravel when the toxicity of privilege and racial bias are exposed.

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The 1A Book Club reads 'Our Best Intentions'

We’re convening the first gathering of the 1A Book Club to read “Our Best Intentions” by Vibhuti Jain.

It’s a story about how – as the saying goes – our best intentions can lead us down a regretful path. In the book, a high schooler arrives at the scene of a crime and calls for help. But her good deed sweeps her up into a complicated, risky situation.

We talked to Jain a month ago to introduce the book. Now, she’s answering your questions. Plus, a panel of readers, including 1A listeners, will share their thoughts on the book.

What book should the 1A Book Club discuss next? We’re aiming to feature debut novels and novelists. Email us [email protected] or leave a message, 1-855-236-1212.

Copyright 2023 WAMU 88.5

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Our Best Intentions: A Novel Hardcover – March 14 2023

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A Good Morning America Buzz Pick * NPR 1A Inaugural Book Club Pick * A 'Must-Read' by USA Today * Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize * Booklist Editor's Choice * CrimeReads' Best of the Year

A suspenseful drama about an immigrant family caught in a criminal investigation, perfect for readers of Celeste Ng's  Everything I Never Told You .

“ Our Best Intentions is a thoughtful, gripping suspense that shakes up definitions of family and identity in a beautiful and refreshing way!” —Kal Penn, actor and national bestselling author

During summer break one day, Angie, the teenage daughter of Indian immigrant Babur Singh, is walking home after swimming at the high school pool when she finds Henry McCleary, a white classmate from a wealthy family, stabbed and bleeding on the football field. The police immediately focus their investigation on Chiara Thompkins, a runaway Black girl who disappears after the stabbing and—it’s later discovered—wasn’t properly enrolled in the public high school.

The incident sends shock waves through the community and reveals jarring truths about the lengths to which families will go to protect themselves. Alternating between multiple perspectives, Our Best Intentions is a gripping story about a father and daughter re-examining their familial bonds and place in the community that explores how easily friendships, careers, communities, and individual lives can unravel when the toxicity of privilege and racial bias are exposed.

• Print length 352 pages
• Language English
• Publisher William Morrow
• Publication date March 14 2023
• Dimensions 15.24 x 2.87 x 22.86 cm
• ISBN-10 0063278782
• ISBN-13 978-0063278783
• See all details

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“As readers, we are so often given feel-good stories of people surmounting the odds, of justice being wrangled back into the hands of those who deserve it. Instead of that, in a novel that will leave you aching—and thinking—Jain asks us to consider what a world might look like if justice really were for everyone, and any one of us could just 'happen' to be in the right place at the right time.” — New York Times

“Fans of Celeste Ng will instantly connect with this subtly funny thriller about a wealthy suburban community struggling in the aftermath of a crime that exposes the town’s deeply buried issues of privilege and bias.” — The Hollywood Reporter

“This moving, thought-provoking debut will be a hit with book clubs, and fans of Celeste Ng should take note.” — Booklist (starred review)

“Jain’s riveting debut centers on a stabbing at a high school…. Jain excels at revealing each character’s motivations and fears, and at how easily the truth can be distorted. This page-turner will stay with readers.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"With subtlety, humor and piercing insight, Vibhuti Jain creates a propulsive page-turner that will touch your heart. This is a gorgeous and complex exploration of race, immigration and class wrapped up in a thrilling story you won't be able to put down. A must-read!" — Jean Kwok, New York Times bestselling author of Searching for Sylvie Lee

“ Our Best Intentions is a thoughtful, gripping suspense that shakes up definitions of family and identity in a beautiful and refreshing way! This is a must-read for its characters, representation, layered story, and most wonderfully—Jain's gripping writing. It's the kind of story that makes you want more.”  — Kal Penn, actor and nationally bestselling author of You Can’t Be Serious

“Vibhuti Jain’s debut novel is marked by crime and prejudice, building to a story of human nature at its most vulnerable and manipulative…. Jain excels at developing multidimensional characters and an atmosphere of intrigue while also calling attention to the complicated web of class and race dynamics.” — BookPage

“ Our Best Intentions , the lyrical debut by Vibhuti Jain, is equal parts suspense and the best kind of literary fiction. Centered on the assault of a wealthy teen by a Black classmate, this novel is a heartbreaking story of class, family, and the tragedy that often occurs when the two intersect.”  — Julie Clark, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Flight and The Lies I Tell  

“Coming-of-age drama meets suburban thriller…a powerful, story-driven exploration of some of today’s most pressing social issues.” — Kirkus Reviews

“Our Best Intentions  realistically shows the endemic discrimination in the justice system.” — Buzzfeed

“Few literary pleasures equal that of coming upon the first novel of a supremely talented writer. Among the many gifts of Vibhuti Jain’s  Our Best Intentions  is the relationship of father and daughter—each the parent of the other—which is perfectly drawn, exquisite. There’s a real story here too. And important social issues raised. But we keep coming back to the two at the center, whom we carry with us long after the last page.” — Roger Rosenblatt, New York Times bestselling author of Making Toast

“Vibhuti Jain has crafted a powerful story of an Indian father and daughter entangled in a calamitous event that ripples through their wealthy suburb. In having to face their moral obligations and even their complicity, the pair see their community with new eyes, as they grapple with the racial biases and class disparities that are foundational to their hometown. But father and daughter finally see each other too, and their wary yet hopeful love for each other is the beating heart of this moving, remarkable novel.”  — Kirthana Ramisetti, author of  Dava Shastri's Last Day

"Vibhuti Jain’s gripping debut novel,  Our Best Intentions , about a working class Indian American father and daughter who get entangled in a criminal investigation of a brutal assault on a privileged white teenager in their wealthy suburban town, is both thought-provoking and riveting. Jain brilliantly captures the teenage angst and parent-child tensions, while also tackling issues of race and belonging with empathy and grace. The characters are so real they will stay with you long after you’ve finished the book.”  — Elyssa Friedland, author of Last Summer at the Golden Hote l and The Most Likely Club

“In Vibhuti Jain’s gripping debut novel, a truly diverse array of 21st-century lives collide on a high school football field on the Hudson River. Jain writes elegantly and with great empathy about the historical legacies and class tensions that shape every American community. A crime novel that’s really a family love story—and a story about swimming to safety. I couldn’t put it down.” — Katherine Hill, author of The Violet Hour and A Short Move

“[A] raw, unapologetic look at the way marginalized groups are mistreated and misjudged.” — Culturess

"Vibhuti Jain’s compelling novel challenges the carefully constructed American myths of the nice town and the striving immigrant success story, providing a nuanced take on the ways in which families and communities seek to protect themselves, even in the face of larger moral obligations...I tore through this book, rooting for the well-drawn characters despite their flaws, and despite knowing, as Jain shows us, that no amount of hard work, no number of laps swum, or even connections tapped and money paid, will ever let us fully outrun our pasts." — Rita Cameron, author of The House Party

“Taut and moving, this story contains the powder keg tensions of racial dynamics in suburban America and deeply felt heartbreak of growing up, making big irrevocable mistakes, and how we feel for, and struggle to connect with, the people we love most. It’s absorbing and vivid, sharp with detail and beautifully empathetic.”  — Leah Franqui, author of After the Hurricane and America for Beginners

“ Our Best Intentions offers a searing portrait of an immigrant father and daughter caught in the cross-currents of a shocking incident in their wealthy town. With a keen eye and immense empathy, Vibhuti Jain explores complicated topics in a beautiful debut that will leave you thinking long after you've turned the final page.” — Laura Hankin author of A Special Place for Women and Happy and You Know It

About the Author

Vibhuti (“Vib”) Jain lives with her husband and daughter in Johannesburg, South Africa, where she works in international development finance. She began her career as a corporate lawyer in New York City. She holds degrees from Yale University and Harvard Law School. Our Best Intentions is her first novel.

Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ William Morrow (March 14 2023)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 352 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0063278782
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0063278783
• Item weight ‏ : ‎ 505 g
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 15.24 x 2.87 x 22.86 cm
• #6,725 in Coming of Age Fiction (Books)
• #8,169 in Domestic Life in Women's Fiction
• #17,243 in Contemporary Women's Fiction

About the author

Vibhuti jain.

Vibhuti (“Vib”) Jain lives with her husband and daughter in Johannesburg, South Africa, where she works in international development. She began her career as a corporate lawyer in New York City. She holds degrees from Yale University and Harvard Law School. She grew up in Guilford, Connecticut. Our Best Intentions is her first novel.

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Introducing Vibhuti Jain, 'Our Best Intentions,' and the 1A Book Club

At 1A , we love books and we love talking about books, especially with you, our listeners. So it seems only natural that  1A is launching a book club.

The 1A Book Club will feature debut novels that merit our attention. Our picks will foster conversation about connections between the lives of characters and our own. We’ll talk to authors and to you.

First up: “Our Best Intentions” by Vibhuti Jain.

Jen Doll reviewed the book for The New York Times :

In her debut novel, “Our Best Intentions,” Vibhuti Jain uses a crime in an affluent Westchester suburb to reveal how views of right and wrong are shaded by privilege, status, color, and, of course, money. Whose intentions are best, and for whom, exactly?

Kirkus Reviews summarized the book :

Coming-of-age drama meets suburban thriller in a debut novel driven by the question: What happens when people’s best intentions threaten to cause more harm than good?

To launch The 1A Book Club, we introduce our first pick by talking to its author, Vibhuti Jain.

We’ll have another conversation soon about the book featuring readers and their questions. We’ll send a select few listeners a copy of “Our Best Intentions” and invite them onto our live program, scheduled for late May.

Join us on Goodreads , where we’ll be chatting about the book online as we read.

And if you enjoy talking books and want to participate, send us a voice recording telling us about why you love reading and discussing books. Email us at [email protected] with the subject line “book club” or you can leave us a message using our app, 1A Vox Pop .

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10 books to add to your reading list in April

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Critic Bethanne Patrick recommends 10 promising titles, fiction and nonfiction, to consider for your April reading list.

April’s book releases cover some difficult topics, including Salman Rushdie discussing his 2022 maiming, Leigh Bardugo’s fiction about the dark arts and Ada Limón’s poetry anthology about our fragile world. However, like April, there is also sunshine: Leif Enger’s wild Great Lakes love story, Helen Tworkov’s beautiful memoir of Buddhism and a collection of the inimitable Maggie Nelson’s essays. Happy reading, happy spring!

I Cheerfully Refuse: A Novel By Leif Enger Grove Press: 336 pages, $28 (April 2)

An unusual and meaningful surprise awaits readers of Enger’s latest, which takes place largely on Lake Superior, as a man named Rainy tries to reunite with his beloved wife, Lark. While the world around this couple, a dystopian near-future American where billionaires control everything, could not be bleaker, the author’s retelling of the myth of Orpheus (who went to the underworld to rescue his wife) contains the authentic hope of a born optimist.

The Familiar: A Novel By Leigh Bardugo Flatiron Books: 400 pages, $30 (April 9)

Bardugo departs from novels of dark academia in a standalone to make the hairs on your neck stand up, set in 16th century Spain. A hidden Sephardic Jew and scullery maid named Luzia Cotado matches wits with fellow servant Guillén Santángel. Luzia discovers a secret of Guillén’s, but she’s already fallen in love with him. And because he knows hers, too, they might both avoid the Spanish Inquisition. It’s a gorgeous tale of enchantments both supernatural and earthly.

The Sleepwalkers: A Novel By Scarlett Thomas Simon & Schuster: 304 pages, $28 (April 9)

A couple honeymoons at a Greek resort. What could go wrong? In Thomas’ hands, plenty – especially as the author has never written a comfortable story; her books, from “PopCo ” to “Oligarchy,” crackle with unreliable characters, as well as big philosophical ideas. In this case, the new marriage’s breakdown is chronicled through letters between the spouses, and sometimes bits of ephemera, that ultimately untangle a dark mystery relating to the title.

The Garden: A Novel By Clare Beams Doubleday: 304 pages, $28 (April 10)

Few novels of literary fiction are written as well as “The Garden,” let alone given its sadly relevant retro setting, a 1940s country-estate obstetrical program. Irene Willard walks through its gates having endured five miscarriages; pregnant again, she and her war-veteran husband George desperately hope for a live birth. But as Irene discovers more about the woman who controls all here, Dr. Bishop, she fears carrying to term as much as she once feared pregnancy loss.

Reboot: A Novel By Justin Taylor Pantheon: 304 pages, $28 (April 23)

David Crader, former teen TV heartthrob, just wants to reboot his career when his old show “Rev Beach” has a moment. His life has devolved through substance abuse, divorce and underemployment. But when he and colleagues launch a remake, devolution continues: The protagonist’s struggles are mirrored by climate-change issues, from flooding to wildfires. Despite that darkness, Taylor’s gift for satire might make this a must-read for 2024 beach bags.

You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World By Ada Limón (Editor) Milkweed Editions: 176 pages, $25 (April 2)

A wondrous artist herself, Limón is currently poet laureate of the United States, and this anthology is part of her signature project, “You Are Here,” which will also feature poetry as public art in seven national parks. Released in conjunction with the Library of Congress, the collection features 50 previously unpublished poems by luminaries including Jericho Brown, Joy Harjo, Carl Phillips and Diane Seuss, each focusing on a piece of regional landscape.

Like Love: Essays and Conversations By Maggie Nelson Graywolf Press: 336 pages, $32 (April 2)

While all of the pieces in Nelson’s new book have previously been published elsewhere, they’re made fresh here both through being collected and through their chronological placement. Readers can practically watch Nelson’s incisive mind growing and changing as she speaks with colleagues such as Hilton Als and Judith Butler, or as she writes about queerness, motherhood, violence, the lyrics of Prince and the devastating loss of a friend.

Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder By Salman Rushdie Random House: 204 pages, $28 (April 16)

On Aug. 12, 2022, the author Salman Rushdie was speaking at upstate New York’s Chautauqua festival when a man rushed the stage and attempted to murder him. Rushdie, a target of Iranian religious leaders since 1989, was permanently injured. In this book, he shares his experience for the first time, having said that this was essential for him to write. In this way, he answers violence with art, once again reminding us all that freedom of expression must be protected.

Lotus Girl: My Life at the Crossroads of Buddhism and America By Helen Tworkov St. Martin’s Essentials: 336 pages, $29 (April 16)

Dworkov, founder of the magazine Tricycle, chronicles her move from a 1960s young-adult interest in Buddhism to travels through Asia and deep study in the United States of the different strands that follow the Buddha’s teachings. Tworkov mentions luminaries such as the artist Richard Serra, the composer Charles Mingus and the Dalai Lama, but she’s not name dropping. Instead, she’s strewing fragrant petals from her singular path to mindfulness that may help us find ours.

The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War By Erik Larson Crown: 592 pages, $35 (April 30)

Even diehard Civil War aficionados will learn from Larson’s look at the six months between Lincoln’s 1860 election and the surrender of Union troops under Maj. Robert Anderson at Charleston’s Ft. Sumter. Larson details Anderson’s secret Christmas redeployment and explores this individual’s contradictions as a former slave owner who loyally follows Lincoln’s orders. The author also shares first-person perspective from the famous diaries of the upper-class Southerner Mary Chesnut. All together, the book provides a riveting reexamination of a nation in tumult.

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How disinformation fuels violence — and makes our politics worse

New books by barbara mcquade and sasha issenberg explore what’s at stake in the struggle against disinformation.

Barbara McQuade and I don’t have much in common, other than both having written books about disinformation and being women. But for the anonymous users on an online forum for automatic-weapons enthusiasts, that’s all that matters. We now also share the dubious honor of having received violent threats from that forum, as I learned from a recent Google alert.

McQuade — a U.S. attorney in Michigan from 2010 to 2017 — caught the forum’s attention when she discussed her new book, “ Attack From Within: How Disinformation Is Sabotaging America ,” on television with Rachel Maddow. She made a point that has become a familiar refrain from disinformation researchers over the past eight years: It is our very democratic freedoms that make us so susceptible to disinformation. Our steadfast commitment to every individual’s right to freedom of speech as enshrined in the First Amendment renders us more vulnerable to all manner of malign actors — including foreign adversaries using sock-puppet accounts, and political ad campaigns targeted at vulnerable populations. “We need to have a conversation and common-sense solutions to these things,” McQuade argued. “Instead, we throw out terms like ‘censorship,’ we call each other names, we use labels, and we all retreat to our opposite sides. We need to be pragmatic and come up with real solutions.”

A reasonable request, and one with which parliaments around the world and our own Congress have been wrestling (the former more seriously than the latter). But to the users on that forum, this sentiment singled McQuade out for violence. “This can only end one of two ways,” one of the few posts fit for print reads. “Either they win or we win, people need to prepare to and be willing to do the needful.” The others include graphic descriptions of violence and plans for a future in which all “communists” — meaning anyone who suggests anything less than free-speech absolutism — be “strung up.” Another post suggests that “any talking head, journalist, or editor found misleading, not telling the whole truth, or outright lying is to be … massacred with an anti aircraft gun.”

I have been a recurring target of the forum’s users, who appear to have bought into the lie that I had the intention or the authority to censor my fellow Americans when I was appointed in 2022 to lead the short-lived Disinformation Governance Board, an internal coordination body at the Department of Homeland Security focused on addressing disinformation that harmed national security. The board had no operational authority, no budget, and absolutely no purview or ability to censor, suppress or police speech. That didn’t stop media outlets, influencers and politicians from repeating the lie that I was a “Minister of Truth” who had at her disposal “men with guns to tell you to shut up.” As a result, my family and I have received regular violent threats from our fellow Americans. Merely working to counter disinformation marked me as a threat — or, at least, as someone who should be threatened.

Too often, the link between disinformation and violence is discounted, as if it is possible to disentangle the online and the offline, and as if the internet is a realm rife with deceit but the “real world” is where actual destruction happens. In “Attack From Within,” a textbook-style overview of disinformation throughout history and in modern America, McQuade recognizes that the distinction between the two realms is illusory: We inhabit a single reality, one in which disinformation and violence are part of the same authoritarian playbook. Laying out examples from Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and the presidencies of Andrew Jackson and Daniel Ortega, McQuade writes that “when people become inured to the cruelty of violence, they are more likely to accept it as the cost of attaining the type of society they seek.” Political violence, she argues, “not only eliminates some opponents, it also silences others,” leaving disinformation unchecked.

McQuade takes a lawyer’s approach to this sprawling subject. Her densely footnoted book explores the history, tactics, psychology and technology that gave birth to and exacerbate the challenge. She also explores disinformation’s effect on democracy, public safety, national security and the rule of law, all separated into the neat subheadings of a legal filing. The book often reads like a blistering indictment of Donald Trump , his administration and his enablers, for having so wholeheartedly embraced a top-to-bottom strategy of disinformation. When delineating strategies in the authoritarian playbook, for instance, McQuade is unsparing in placing Trump-era examples next to those from communist and fascist leaders, whose politics today’s MAGA crowd alternately praises or claims to be defending us from. While I’m sure fans of McQuade’s MSNBC commentary or her podcast, “Sisters in Law,” will nod along vigorously with these sections, I doubt they are the readers who truly need this book. It’s the believers of the “big lie,” the excusers of political violence and the distorters of history who do. Indeed, some of those who would benefit most from it are those who threatened McQuade in an anonymous internet forum.

The question of how to reach those voters is what concerns Sasha Issenberg in “ The Lie Detectives: In Search of a Playbook for Winning Elections in the Disinformation Age .” Issenberg taps into a deep pool of sources cultivated in part during his reporting for “ The Victory Lab ” (2012), which explored the then-novel world of internet- and data-enabled political campaigning. A decade later, he follows Democratic campaign operatives as they contend with the intentional and coordinated spread of politically motivated falsehoods online.

Where McQuade seeks to inform about the broad effects of disinformation on American society, Issenberg offers a glimpse of the war rooms that do battle with it. “The Lie Detectives” is a short volume: about 200 pages, typical for the style of its publisher, Columbia Global Reports. Unfortunately, that brevity undermines some of the material; Issenberg is forced to assume that his readers grasp the horrific and far-reaching consequences of disinformation that his main characters — a young political consultant, a funder seeking to disrupt the system and a variety of Democratic strategists — work punishing schedules to combat. By now, we ought to understand why combating disinformation is critical to democracy, public health and public safety. And yet, since Trump lost the 2020 election, a large portion of Americans have been fed the lie that anyone who studies or seeks to counter disinformation is actually censoring conservatives. Issenberg nods to this context in his introduction, quoting a Republican operative who believes that disinformation is “an excuse from Democrats for why they lose elections,” then listing a page of examples across five continents where disinformation had very real effects. A casual reader might assume the truth is somewhere in between.

Issenberg then plunges into the frenetic world of digital campaigning, where he explains the ins and outs of targeted online advertising. Readers meet, among others, a young political consultant preaching the merits of strategic silence (that is, not attempting to debunk or attribute to a malign foreign actor every false narrative that appears); a donor adviser who funded a variety of attempts to upset the Republican-dominated disinformation landscape, some of which he ended up renouncing; and a meme creator who sought to replicate pro-Trump methods of online engagement in an “ethical, legal, yet still effective manner.” Issenberg also detours to Brazil, giving Americans a glimpse of an environment where the government has more power and wherewithal to respond to the challenge. Or at least it seemed to, until Brazil experienced its own attempted insurrection, styled after Jan. 6 , 2021. Responding to the events in Brasília as “The Lie Detectives ” closes, Issenberg’s characters are bedraggled and beleaguered, uncertain that Democrats have what it takes to stand up to a well-funded, unscrupulous disinformation machine.

“Attack From Within,” for its part, leaves readers and policymakers with McQuade’s aforementioned “real solutions” to cure disinformation’s ills. They include reforms to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, 26 words that shield social media platforms from liability for the content they publish. On this front, McQuade argues for an approach that would make platforms liable for paid content and for the choices their algorithms make. She also proposes practices as varied as subsidizing news through coupons that would allow Americans to bypass paywalls of their choosing, as well as restoring the ban on assault weapons, a move she argues would protect U.S. citizens against disinformation-fueled violence.

I am gratified that almost a decade since disinformation became both a household term and a political lightning rod, there are still serious, fact-based explorations of the topic being published. But since these books went to print, the stakes have gotten higher; this month, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Murthy v. Missouri , a conspiracy-laden case that has already frozen cooperation between the federal government and social media platforms as they prepare to address disinformation from foreign sources in the 2024 election . For years, disinformation researchers have endured serious, sustained attacks, dealing with both legal and violent threats. This coordinated campaign against the truth is the biggest threat to freedom of expression and academic integrity since the McCarthy era.

Questions about American morals and values are at the heart of McQuade’s and Issenberg’s books. From my vantage, it isn’t just candidates or policies on the ballot this fall, but those morals, those values and our nation’s singular, shared reality, online and off — especially when the alternate reality touted by that weapons forum might be closer than we like to believe.

Nina Jankowicz is an expert in disinformation, democratization and digital hate, and the author of the books “How to Lose the Information War” and “How to Be a Woman Online.”

Attack From Within

How Disinformation Is Sabotaging America

By Barbara McQuade

Seven Stories. 374 pp. $35

The Lie Detectives

In Search of a Playbook for Winning Elections in the Disinformation Age

By Sasha Issenberg

Columbia Global Reports. 211 pp. $18

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Still need more reading inspiration? Super readers share their tips on how to finish more books . Or let poet and essayist Hanif Abdurraqib explain why he stays in Ohio . You can also check out reviews of the latest in fiction and nonfiction .

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Coddling Plus Devices? Unequivocal Disaster for Our Kids.

In “The Anxious Generation,” Jonathan Haidt says we’re failing children — and takes a firm stand against tech.

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By Tracy Dennis-Tiwary

Tracy A. Dennis-Tiwary is a professor of psychology and neuroscience, director of the Emotion Regulation Lab at Hunter College.

• Published March 26, 2024 Updated March 27, 2024
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THE ANXIOUS GENERATION: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness , by Jonathan Haidt

Imagine that your 10-year-old daughter gets chosen to join the first human settlement on Mars. She’s ready to blast off but needs your permission.

You learn that the billionaire architect of the mission hasn’t considered the risks posed by the red planet’s toxic environment, including kids developing “deformities in their skeletons, hearts, eyes and brains.”

Would you let her go?

It’s with this “Black Mirror”-esque morality play that Jonathan Haidt sets the tone for everything that follows in his erudite, engaging, combative, crusading new book, “The Anxious Generation.” Mars is a stand-in for the noxious world of social media. If we’d say no to that perilous planet, we should of course say no to this other alien universe.

Instead, we hem and haw about the risks, failing to keep our kids safely grounded in nondigital reality. The result can no longer be ignored: deformities of the brain and heart — anxiety, depression, suicidality — plaguing our youth.

Haidt, a social psychologist, is a man on a mission to correct this collective failure. His first step is to convince us that youth are experiencing a “tidal wave” of suffering. In a single chapter and with a dozen carefully curated graphs, he depicts increases in mental illness and distress beginning around 2012. Young adolescent girls are hit hardest, but boys are in pain, too, as are older teens.

The timing of this is key because it coincides with the rise of what he terms phone-based childhood. From the late 2000s to the early 2010s, smartphones, bristling with social media apps and fueled by high-speed internet, became ubiquitous. Their siren call, addictive by design and perpetually distracting, quickly spirited kids to worlds beyond our control.

It wasn’t phones alone. A second phenomenon coincided with the rise of the machines: the decline of play-based childhood. This change started in the 1980s, with kidnapping fears and stranger danger driving parents toward fear-based overparenting. This decimated children’s unsupervised, self-directed playtime and restricted their freedom of movement.

With parents and children alike stuck in “Defend mode,” kids were in turn blocked from discovery mode, where they face challenges, take risks and explore — the building blocks of anti-fragility, or the ability to grow stronger through adversity. Compared to a generation ago, our children are spending more time on their phones and less on, well, sex, drugs and rock n’ roll. While fewer hospital visits and teen pregnancies are obvious wins, less risk-taking overall could stunt independence.

That’s why parents, he argues, should become more like gardeners (to use Alison Gopnik’s formulation) who cultivate conditions for children to independently grow and flourish, and less like carpenters, who work obsessively to control, design and shape their offspring. We’ve overprotected our kids in the real world while underprotecting them in the virtual one, leaving them too much to their own devices, literally and figuratively.

It’s this one-two punch of smartphones plus overprotective parenting, Haidt posits, that led to the great rewiring of childhood and the associated harms driving mental illness: social deprivation, sleep deprivation, attention fragmentation and addiction. He has a lot to say about each of these.

Here is where his ideas and interpretation of research become contentious. Few would disagree that unhealthy use of social media contributes to psychological problems, or that parenting plays a role. But mental illness is complex: a multidetermined synergy between risk and resilience. Clinical scientists don’t look for magic-bullet explanations. They seek to understand how, for whom and in what contexts psychological problems and resilience emerge.

Haidt does recognize that nuance complicates the issue. Online — but not in the book — he and colleagues report that adolescent girls from “wealthy, individualistic and secular nations” who are “less tightly bound into strong communities” are accounting for much of the crisis. So perhaps smartphones alone haven’t destroyed an entire generation. And maybe context matters. But this rarely comes through in the book.

The final sections offer advice for reducing harmful, predatory aspects of technology and helping parents, educators and communities become more gardener and less carpenter. Some tips will be familiar (ban phones from school; give kids more independence). Other advice might give readers pause (no smartphones before high school; no social media before 16). Yet, taken together, it’s a reasonable list.

Still, Haidt is a digital absolutist, skeptical that healthy relationships between youth and social media are possible. On this point, he even rebuffs the U.S. Surgeon General’s more measured position. We’re better off banning phones in schools altogether, he asserts. Because, as he quotes a middle school principal, schools without phone bans are like a “zombie apocalypse” with “all these kids in the hallways not talking to each other.”

Whether or not you agree with the zombie apocalypse diagnosis, it’s worth considering the failure of prior absolutist stances. Nancy Reagan’s Just Say No drug campaign? A public health case study in what not to do. During the AIDS crisis, fear mongering and abstinence demands didn’t prevent unsafe sex. Remember the pandemic? Telling Americans to wear masks at all times undermined public health officials’ ability to convince them to wear masks when it really mattered.

Digital absolutism also risks blinding us to other causes — and solutions. In 1960s Britain, annual suicide rates plummeted. Many believed the drop was due to improved antidepressant medications or life just getting better. They weren’t looking in the right place. The phaseout of coal-based gas for household stoves blocked the most common method of suicide: gas poisoning. Means restriction, because it gives the despairing one less opportunity for self-harm, has since become a key strategy for suicide prevention.

“I’ve been struggling to figure out,” Haidt writes, “what is happening to us? How is technology changing us?” His answer: “The phone-based life produces spiritual degradation, not just in adolescents, but in all of us.” In other words: Choose human purity and sanctity over the repugnant forces of technology. This dialectic is compelling, but the moral matrix of the problem — and the scientific foundations — are more complex.

Yes, digital absolutism might convince policymakers to change laws and increase regulation. It might be a wake-up call for some parents. But it also might backfire, plunging us into defense mode and blocking our path of discovery toward healthy and empowered digital citizenship.

THE ANXIOUS GENERATION : How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness | By Jonathan Haidt | Penguin Press | 385 pp. | $30

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