NOTEWORTHY PAPERBACKS

A selection of summaries from The New York Times Book Review:

WHAT HAPPENED, by Hillary Rodham Clinton. (Simon & Schuster, $18.99.) Clinton’s bluntly titled book chronicles her failed presidential bid, and she considers the factors that blocked her path to victory (the hyped debate over her email, President Donald Trump’s nativist and populist appeal) and compares her loss with those of other defeated candidates. To understand the upheaval of 2016, this book would be a good place to start.

A GOOD COUNTRY, by Laleh Khadivi. (Bloomsbury, $16.) In her third novel, Khadivi charts the psychological transformation of a teenager, Rez, from the high-achieving son of prosperous Iranian immigrants to Islamist radical. Rez’s search for a stable identity eventually takes him to Syria; the story suggests radicalization is less a political problem than one of a deep need to belong.

THE FUTURE IS HISTORY: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia, by Masha Gessen. (Riverhead, $17.) Gessen, a journalist and longtime critic of Vladimir Putin, tells the story of post-Communist Russia through the lives of seven Russians; politics became a force people could not escape. This account won the 2017 National Book Award for nonfiction and traces the rise of Homo sovieticus, a fearful, authority-loving personality forged by Communism.

LULLABY ROAD, by James Anderson. (Broadway, $16.) Ben Jones is a decent, honest truck driver who makes deliveries along Route 117 in a remote stretch of Utah. But when he finds a mute Hispanic child abandoned at a gas station along with a cryptic note, he decides to bring him along, a choice with lasting ramifications for everyone. Book Review columnist Marilyn Stasio praised the novel and its central character, writing that “Anderson rewards him with a deadly adventure and the most poetic prose this side of Salt Lake City.”

THE RIVER OF CONSCIOUSNESS, by Oliver Sacks. (Vintage, $16.95.) In this essay collection, the neurologist and philosopher reflects on some of his favorite subjects: creativity, evolution, Darwin and the workings of memory. This final book, which Sacks worked on until his death in 2015, “brings both the joy of hearing from him again, and the regret of knowing it will likely be the last time,” Times reviewer Nicole Krauss wrote.

MIDWINTER BREAK, by Bernard MacLaverty. (Norton, $15.95.) On a short vacation to the Netherlands, Bernard and Stella’s decadeslong marriage begins to quickly unravel. Bernard, a retired architect, tries to hide the extent of his alcoholism; Stella contemplates acting on her wish to leada more devout life; and they are roiled by memories of violence in their home country, Ireland.