A writer boards a plane for a literary festival in an unnamed European city, and offers a wry account of her seatmate’s boorish behavior, including his tale of putting down his dog before driving to the airport. So begins the third novel in Cusk’s much lauded auto-fictional trilogy (after Outline and Transit). Faye recounts a series of literary moments at the festival that end in monologues by people who are interviewing her, accompanying her to her festival events, publishing her work or meeting her at parties. One first novelist describes a mishap with her daughter’s hamster – it was a good story, she concludes; her agent sold it to The New Yorker. The college-age son of the festival director talks about his mother’s pride in his “kudos”. Cusk’s distinctive narrative radiates fierce intelligence. (Credit: Farrar, Straus and Giroux)