10 must-read books to heat up February

If Netflix's The Chair, Lisa Taddeo's Three Women, and the most compelling passages of Ottessa Moshfegh's Death in Her Hands had a love child, it would be this fiction debut. With a title character who's a sought-after young novelist new to a college faculty, Vladimir leaves the reader with more questions than answers — about sex, and sexual politics — in the most delicious way. (Feb. 1)

Clocking in at a hefty 912 pages and divided into seven sections, Nobel Prize winner Olga Tokarczuk's latest English-translation release might be her most impressive. Originally published in her native Poland in 2014, it's the story of Jacob Frank, a Jew from Poland who claimed to be the next messiah, told through the lens of a web of people connected to him. (Feb. 1)

The beating heart of Jennifer Haigh's seventh novel is a women's health clinic on Mercy Street, in the heart of the city. Protagonist Claudia is childless by choice and spends most of her days helping women who are seeking abortions for a variety of reasons — but the novel also weaves in story lines from several (male, of course) protesters who are hell-bent on terrorizing the clinic's patients and employees. Mercy Street was conceived and written before this year's slow-motion dismantling of Roe v. Wade, making it all the more urgent. (Feb. 1)

The evening before a prestigious, high-stakes Tchaikovsky competition, a Black violinist from the rural South finds his prized heirloom Stradivarius stolen and replaced with a ransom note. This debut thriller from Brendan Slocumb, who has been a music educator for decades, uses the search for the violin to explore racism embedded in classical music. (Feb. 1)

A delicious romp through underground Berlin is just the antidote to our cabin-fever-ridden winter woes. Hailey and Zoe are exchange students renting the flat of a well-known thriller writer and making their way through the city's notorious club scene when they start to suspect that their literary landlord is watching them, mining their lives for her own work. (Feb. 1)

As the citizens of Hong Kong continue to push back against Communist Chinese rule, often to harsher and harsher punishment, stories from ground zero become even more crucial. Here, Karen Cheung details her own coming of age and attempts to reconcile her family's conservative values with the more progressive viewpoints she learns at her international school, and the ways that the citywide protests eventually affected her own mental health. (Feb. 15)

Sheila Heti's surrealist story follows a woman named Mina: She meets a transformative woman named Annie, experiences her father's spirit moving into her after his death, reincarnates as a leaf, and tries to decide whether to return to earth, and Annie. It's otherworldly and needs to be read to be fully understood. (Feb. 15)

The second installment of the Dark Star Trilogy (following the best-selling Black Leopard, Red Wolf) traces the journey of heroine Sogolon as she gives her own accounts of the feuds and clashes that take place in Marlon James' mythical African landscape. (Feb. 15)

A group of recreational swimmers who frequent the local pool, seemingly disparate and relegated to their own lives, are brought together after a crack (literally) appears at the bottom of the pool. The metaphor is for the reader to decipher. (Feb. 22)

After tackling the topic of witchcraft among a Massachusetts high school field hockey team in We Ride Upon Sticks, Quan Barry moves to Mongolia, where a young monk and his identical twin set out to find the reincarnation of a spiritual teacher. (Feb. 22)