This series has already won two well deserved Hugo awards. I hardly want to say anything about the plot, for fear of spoiling some of the epic reveals at the end of the first volume; let me say only that this one is a dark, heartbreaking masterpiece, adding new layers of understanding and complexity to this astonishing world. N.K. Jemisin is a powerhouse. I plan to read through her entire collection of work over the next few years.

This book records the massive undertaking of 10 years of research and interviews with over 250 families by the author Andrew Solomon. Solomon's area of interest here is children who turn out different from their parents in ways that are difficult or impossible to predict before birth. In the first chapter Solomon lays out the idea of vertical identities, such things that are generally passed down in families (religion is a common one of these, as are race, language, nationality, etc) and horizontal identities- things such as being queer, being deaf, being born with a disability. People who have horizontal identities usually have to search for community outside of the family to find people who mirror their experience. Sometimes this is handled well by the family, with love, acceptance, grace and dignity and sometimes it is not. As readable and conversational as it is rigorous, I speed through the early chapters, titled "Deaf", "Dwarfs", "Down Syndrome", "Autism", "Schizophrenia", "Disability", and "Prodigies." I got stuck on the heaviest two chapters of the book and ended up having to skip over 100 pages of it in the middle as I haven't been in a place where I can read about "Rape" and "Crime" lately. I finished out the last two chapters though, one about Transgender children and one about the author's own unconventional but loving parenting set-up.