The books we needed in 2022

The MoJo Daily newsletter, Monday through Friday. [View in browser]( [Mother Jones Daily Newsletter](     December 15, 2022 Once I noticed it, I started seeing it everywhere. Novelists in my 2022 reading list kept experimenting with a similar structure: braiding together three or more narratives, flipping between characters from long ago, from a contemporary setting, and from far into the future. There it was in Sequoia Nagamatsu’s How High We Go in the Dark and again in Matt Bell’s Appleseed. Anthony Doerr played with the format in his National Book Award–nominated Cloud Cuckoo Land, as did Emily St. John Mandel in her new novel Sea of Tranquility, both of which were reviewed in our brand new feature, "[The Books We Needed in 2022](." Why did authors love this structure so much? Maybe there were some clues in an interview Mandel [did with journalist and podcaster Ezra Klein]( in April. In the interview, Mandel attributes our love for post-apocalyptic fiction over the past 15 years to "a certain ambiguity around how we feel about our technology." What then explains the recent boom in time-travel literature? "I wonder if our interest in time-weirdness, time loops, contingencies, multiverse," she told Klein, "is a reaction in some way to the two years we’ve just lived through"—the pandemic. "What if officials had taken those early reports of this terrifying new virus in Wuhan seriously? What if that hadn’t been suppressed and hadn’t been allowed to spread around the world and change everything, and put all of us in this state that felt like suspended animation?" Reading great books allows us to process the world through the lens of someone else's imagination. That's why it's always such a joy to edit our compilation of the [best books of the year](. You'll find staff picks of favorite nonfiction and novels (and even some cookbooks) published over the course of 2022, and some older classics that resonated in new ways. Happy reading! —Maddie Oatman Advertisement [House Store Ad]( [Top Story] [Top Story]( [Newly Revealed Texts Show Mark Meadows Is a Liar]( The messages contrast sharply with his account of the aftermath of the 2020 election. BY DAVID CORN [Here are the facts] December is [make-or-break]( for Mother Jones’ fundraising. We have an ambitious $350,000 goal and all online gifts will be matched and go twice as far until we get there. We can’t afford to come up short: Donations big and small make up 74 percent of our budget. If you can right now, this is an important time to support Mother Jones with a year-end gift—it will be doubled thanks to an incredibly generous donor. [Donate]( [Trending] ["Suicide by cop": How police present killings as unavoidable]( BY ISAAC SCHER   [This Indigenous trick may help protect shellfish against acidification]( BY JEN SCHMIDT   ["Harry & Meghan" is just not that interesting]( BY ISABELA DIAS   [Big Plastic wants you to think you can recycle your yogurt container]( BY JOSEPH WINTERS Advertisement [House Donations Ad]( [Special Feature] [Special Feature]( [The books we needed in 2022]( The best nonfiction, novels, and cookbooks published this year—and some older reads that resonated anew. MOTHER JONES STAFF Did you enjoy this newsletter? Help us out by [forwarding]( it to a friend or sharing it on [Facebook]( and [Twitter](. [Mother Jones]( [Donate]( [Donate Monthly]( [Subscribe]( This message was sent to {EMAIL}. To change the messages you receive from us, you can [edit your email preferences]( or [unsubscribe from all mailings.]( For advertising opportunities see our online [media kit.]( Were you forwarded this email? [Sign up for Mother Jones' newsletters today.]( [www.MotherJones.com]( PO Box 8539, Big Sandy, TX 75755