Carol Iaciofano Aucoin
Book Critic
Carol Iaciofano Aucoin has contributed book reviews, op-ed columns and poetry to publications including WBUR, Pangyrus and The Boston Globe, and is a co-author of the personal computer anthology "Digital Deli."
Recently published

Two new novels offer page-turning summer escapes
WBUR book critic Carol Iaciofano Aucoin reviews Sarah MacLean's sophisticated romance "These Summer Storms" and Megan Miranda's intricate psychological thriller "You Belong Here." Both novels feature women who have to...

Gary Shteyngart's new novel offers a dystopian America that feels familiar
Shteyngart’s “Vera, or Faith" is a family drama set in an America on a slow slide toward totalitarianism told through the eyes of an endearing and anxious 10-year-old girl, "written...

Murder mystery 'We Would Never' is a twisty family character study
Based on true events, Tova Mirvis' new novel "might read in parts like a domestic romp wrapped in yellow crime scene tape, but you never forget that an innocent man...

Betty Shamieh's 'Too Soon' intertwines three generations of Palestinian American women
In the playwright's debut novel, a grandmother, daughter and granddaughter's stories are told in rotating, first-person voice, spanning "two continents and more than six decades of cultural and political change,"...

Han Kang's 'We Do Not Part' counters unimaginable brutality with courage and empathy
Based on real-life events, the Nobel laureate's fifth novel highlights the generational trauma that flows through one family from the 1948 massacre on Jeju Island off the coast of South...
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In 'Rental House,' Weike Wang crafts a bittersweet tale about a couple and their families
The author of "Chemistry" and "Joan is Okay," Wang's new novel explores "the challenge of how to become part of a new family without becoming consumed by it," critic Carol...

Louise Erdrich's 'The Mighty Red' is a tale of love, regret and second chances
With multiple connected storylines set against sweeping histories of North Dakota and surrounding lands, the novel is at once a tender coming-of-age story and a wise tale of older love,...

Ben Shattuck's wistful stories are an ode to New England, past and present
If you are not in the habit of reading short fiction, Ben Shattuck’s extraordinary “The History of Sound” might make you a convert.

J. Courtney Sullivan's 'The Cliffs' is a deeply moving exploration of history
In Sullivan's sixth novel, a large Victorian house on the Maine coast is the nexus for a story about lives once lost to history, and of one woman’s own rocky...

Claire Messud's latest novel is a multigenerational saga inspired by real events
Based on events in the author's family, “This Strange Eventful History” spans 70 years and tells the often-heartbreaking tale of three generations of the Cassar family through elite college educations,...