![\"Emily](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/XK7ZG3QCAFHW5A2BD2ECG6XMBQ.jpg\")
Emily Hunt Kivel’s “Dwelling” is due out Aug. 5. (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)<\/p>\nIn her debut novel Dwelling, Austin writer Emily Hunt Kivel takes on America\u2019s housing shortage by confining the crisis within the phantasmagoric folds of a fairy tale. <\/p>\n
When Evie Cavallo, a graphic designer in her twenties, is evicted from her New York apartment, she attempts to ask her boss Gregory for a raise, only to learn that not only is an increase in salary out of the question but her boss is as homeless as she is.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis isn\u2019t just happening to you,\u201d says Gregory, who spills his strife over the loss of his rent-controlled apartment, and the impossibility of maneuvering a moving van through streets thronged by the recently evicted. \u201cChaos. Chaos! And I\u2019ve got the dogs to take care of.\u201d <\/p>\n
Emily Hunt Kivel’s “Dwelling” is due out Aug. 5. (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)<\/p>\n
News Roundups<\/p>\n
As a result of the mayor\u2019s scheme to increase tourism by rendering all apartments into high-end vacation rentals, New Yorkers are now squatting in storage units, reconciling with exes for floor space and moving back in with Mom and Dad. <\/p>\n
With her parents dead and her only sister in a mental institution, Evie makes a desperate trip to a Texas town called Gulluck, hoping to seek shelter with a distant cousin she does not know. This relative, named Terry Lang, happens to be a real estate agent and is sympathetic to her plight. He sets Evie up in a carriage house before securing a more stable space for her in the form of a boot-shaped building that was a shoe repair shop before becoming a honky-tonk.<\/p>\n
While attempting to work remotely, Evie\u2019s world soon goes from weird to wondrous. Terry\u2019s son Andrew invites her to observe a humanoid fish-creature that sleeps in what the locals call \u201cLake Unknown.\u201d She falls in love with a mysterious locksmith who employs psychic skills to create skeleton keys. And after deciding to become the town\u2019s shoe doctor, Evie discovers she possesses a supernatural talent for crafting footwear, and that her seemingly random move to Gulluck might be the fulfillment of an ancient podal prophecy.<\/p>\n
Stylistically, Kivel\u2019s fable finds its contemporary footing in culturally critical asides regarding vitamin shops and two-year colleges that recall the deadpan surrealism of Bret Easton Ellis\u2019 American Psycho, while the dreamlike logic of her prose pays happy homage to the spiritual fantasies of George MacDonald. <\/p>\n
Dwelling \u2014 a novel that introduces its readers to a cabal of immortal cobblers and a talking bear trying to fathom the protagonist\u2019s veganism \u2014 is a book of miracles masked by the mundane, an entertaining antidote to urban ennui that doubles as a survival guide for souls refusing to surrender to the superficiality of their surroundings. <\/p>\n
Dwelling<\/p>\n
By Emily Hunt Kivel<\/p>\n
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 320 pages, $28; due out Aug. 5)<\/p>\n
The author chronicles her own battle with an eating disorder and provides insight into recovery. <\/p>\n Readers remember a big sister; appreciate the Dallas Sanitation Department; and enjoy the DMN political cartoons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In her debut novel Dwelling, Austin writer Emily Hunt Kivel takes on America\u2019s housing shortage by confining the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":29285,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[353,49,48,75,544],"class_list":{"0":"post-29284","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-books","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-texas"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29284\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Author](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/1753703288_210_JWWQU6ENSZF4LCWWXPZIJP3UQE.JPG\")
<\/a>Mallary Tenore Tarpley to discuss her book \u2018Slip\u2019 at Interabang Books<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Michelle](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/1753703288_1_BTE34M3NZBHTLL3YNKX3U2AXJE.jpg\")
<\/a>Letters to the Editor – Three Cheers for a big sister, a city department, cartoons<\/a><\/p>\n