The Python’s Kiss By Louise Erdrich Corsair, 225pp, £20Louise Erdrich has won the biggest literary prizes in the US, including the Pulitzer Prize for 2021’s The Night Watchman and 2012 National Book Award for The Round House. A citizen of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians, she’s revered for her portrayals of Native Americans, who again make up some of the protagonists in this short story collection. Here, Erdrich spreads her creative wings and lets her imagination run riot on tales that veer from Coen Brothers-esque western noir to disquieting science-fiction, where seven different virtual “afterlifes” are owned and operated by a corporate entity. Pick of the bunch, Borsalino, a romantic quasi-ghost story about a Venetian petty thief, is one of the finest examples of short fiction I’ve ever had the pleasure to read. Disquieting, compelling and frequently brilliant. John WalsheRunaway Joe By Pavel Barter Eriu, £16.99In this gripping investigation into one of the FBI’s oldest unsolved cases, Barter follows Irish-American Joseph Maloney from the murder of his wife in Rochester, New York, in 1967 to his reinvention as Michael O’Shea in Ireland years later. The story of how Maloney came to live in a stately home in the midlands and evade justice for six decades is shocking, and will be familiar to listeners of Barter’s RTÉ podcast series. The book’s strength lies in Barter’s novelistic eye for detail and extensive use of first-hand testimony, which he combines to create rich portraits of Maloney’s victims, enablers and eccentric associates. While too much historical context can at times detract from the pace, Runaway Joe is at once a compelling character study and taut true-crime thriller. Harry HigginsYesteryear By Caro Claire Burke 4th Estate, £16.99Caro Claire Burke’s debut novel, Yesteryear, forces Natalie, a tradwife influencer, to confront the grimy, dark nature of the pioneer life she sells online when she finds herself transported to the 1800s. Between alternating timelines of Natalie building Yesteryear Ranch’s social media following and the bizarre pioneer world, she is forced to reckon with the reality of her marriage and motherhood against the idyllic image she projects. Yesteryear is a quick read and a compelling dissection of influencer culture, but Burke craters the heart of the novel with her thin understanding of Natalie and the culture she comes from. She ultimately creates a stale caricature rather than a nuanced look at a topical and troubling corner of the internet. Lanie Brice