80 Books Like None but the Righteous

This book is the blueprint. From the concept—persona poems and scenes from New Orleans, told from the perspective of Hurricane Katrina—to the flawless execution of that concept, this book is a must-read for understanding disasters.

I loved the sustained attention to the storm and the people and the way that Smith finds fresh ways to create the scenes before, during, and after the storm. I loved Katrina the persona, too, as much as I feared her destructiveness. Her rage and vengeance felt entirely real, and the poems made me want to walk the earth as if every step would shatter the ground. This book lives up to its succinct, evocative title. 

In the wake of super-hurricanes and the deadly pandemic that follows, New Orleans has been quarantined from the rest of the United States, and those who seek to cross the border wall are killed. Narrator Fen, a member of the clan-based culture that has developed behind the wall, tells the story of her people and her personal quest for freedom in a dialect voice that is both beautifully rendered and brutally honest.

Humans can be brave, and humans can be stubborn. Abdulrahman Zeitoun is both.

Refusing to leave New Orleans as Hurricane Katrina built strength out at sea in 2005, he stays and finds himself stranded in an eerily flooded city, seemingly alone and without help. He paddles the watery “streets” in an old kayak and finds others who could not or did not leave, offering help, and for his efforts, is arrested as a suspected terrorist and looter.

This book is not a simple tale of an everyday hero. We meet a character that downplays the dangers of a brewing storm but, despite his stubbornness, is also capable of great selflessness and bravery. The negligence of the institutions we expect to protect us is an insidious theme that runs throughout.

With the unusual title, this book was recommended to me by a bubbly store book clerk. Afraid to tell her no, thank you. I paid for the book and fled the store. I was hooked from the first line of the book to the last. As LJ takes the stage full of suspicion, Andra is on edge yet stoic. They seem an unlikely pairing. The unfolding of the story is like a long-awaited date night. Hopeful, warm, with the promise of more. This story is a reminder that odds can be overcome if you are strong enough to stand alone when others want you to sit down. 

The Tin Roof Blowdown shows us New Orleans, and the surrounding areas the days after Katrina raged havoc. Taking into account the lives that have been traumatized as crime and murders increased nine-fold. Detective David Robicheaux of Iberia Parish finds himself in the midst of a murder in an old-time neighborhood, as he tries to figure out if the murder of a local black boy during a robbery was racially motivated or not. The details and stories of this horrific tragedy show the bleakness of the aftermath and that not only did many reach their deaths, but how many who survived died also. No order exists as Robicheaux tries to unravel his latest mystery.

As someone who lived in New Orleans before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina, I often wondered why different communities bounced back from that terrible flooding. Mark van Landingham finds that, despite low levels of English fluency, education, and income, the Vietnamese and Vietnamese-American community of Village De L’Est brought back more people and businesses than any other part of the city. Within a year they were back to 90% capacity of pre-Katrina levels. This community's residents – connected to each other through Catholicism and a shared language and history – worked collectively to help evacuees who had scattered across the country. Through collective action, they rebuilt their community even better, adding in new schools, medical centers, and even urban farms.

Claire DeWitt is a troubled detective hired to solve a disappearance in post-Katrina New Orleans.

She learned her craft by studying the teachings of an elusive French detective, and was set on her career path after failing to find her missing friend as a teenager. She is haunted by disappearances of all kinds, and through this fascinating main character Gran weaves an atmospheric, compelling mystery.

The first time I read this book a hidden door in my writing brain unlocked—detective novels can be more than the classic setup of a talented sleuth following the clues. They can be messy and enigmatic and unsettling—in fact, Gran convinced me that they should be.

I often wonder about the generations of people who lived in my house before me, but for better or worse, that context is lost to history. Conversely, Sarah M. Broom is privy to 60 years of intimate history of her childhood home in New Orleans East.

Making a home is an act of love; sustaining one hinges on determination, work, and community. It also helps to be treated like you matter by those in power. Broom’s tribute to her tenacious mother and family, who kept their home through times of security and lack thereof, only to lose it to Hurricane Katrina, is stunning. The house still exerts a tumultuous pull on Broom and her family. The crossing threads of love and heartbreak are sewn through this vivid, haunting memoir.

This time, let’s have a look at a young adult novel. In Color Blind, April Lockhart's dad has passed away, and since she's only 17 years old she has to go live with her aunt in New Orleans. To say that April is unhappy about this is to greatly understate the situation. She meets Miles Baptiste when she decides to take a cemetery and voodoo tour ... and that's when she meets Marguerite, as well.

The voodoo priestess seems to know a good many things about April. The book proceeds through April's misadventures, taking the reader on a tour of New Orleans that touches not only the tourist spots but also the Lower Nine and more hard-hit areas yet to recover after Hurricane Katrina. We see April go on a journey of maturation and self-discovery as well.

What I loved about this book was its examination of New Orleans… show more.

The book is a collection of short stories by my favorite mystery novel writer. Burke’s series detective, Dave Robicheaux, who is both a Louisiana cop and a moral philosopher, repeatedly strives to overcome his own flaws and set right the cruel catastrophes wrought by human ignorance, stupidity, and cruelty. Jesus Out to Sea is infused with the same narrative and poetic ferocity, but without Robicheaux this time. The collection is set in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and probes the human costs of the devastation wrought by nature and exacerbated by administrative corruption and bad faith. 

A surprising and powerful adaptation of one of the stories—“Winter Light”—will be released theatrically in the fall of 2022 with the title God’s Country. It’s the first feature by Julian Higgins, a promising young director (who happens to be my son). The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival to enthusiastic reviews and… show more.