For All You Netflix Watchers, Check Out These Books by Writers on Your Favorite TV Shows

In Interior Chinatown, the story of Willis Wu, a Taiwanese man who seems himself more as “Generic Asian Man,” collides with a procedural cop show to explore immigration and assimilation. It’s part screenplay, part humor, part an exploration of tropes often thrust on Asian actors, like Generic Asian Man #1 or Kung Fu Guy. It delves into how actors, and people in general, get trapped into tropes they feel they have to conform to, and what happens when they want something outside those borders.

Ninety-year-old Ptolemy Grey is isolated from the rest of the world. His only connection, his grandnephew, was recently killed in a drive-by shooting. He lives like a hermit, unable to let anyone in. When he meets Robyn, his niece’s landlord, she pushes him to get back out into the world, to try new things, and to reflect on his life thus far. This novel explores aging, memory, and the way we depend on people to care for, and challenge us, all of our lives.

Bram lives above a bar and has an on/off relationship with one of his neighbors. His life is fine, if a bit mundane. That is, until one of Bram’s neighbors hands him a bundle of bones on morning. A child’s bones. And that’s where Midnight Picnic begins. The bones, Bram soon learns, belong to 6-year-old Adam, who has wrongs to settle. This weird, surreal, off-kilter ghost story centers on right and wrong, life and death, and the spaces between these dichotomies. You’ll be creeped out, but unable to tear your eyes away.

Fifteen-year-old Devon is a gymnastics prodigy with the Olympics on the horizon. Her parents, Katie and Eric Knox, have devoted their lives and energy to making it happen. Then, a death in their little community shocks everyone. Rumors, secrets, and lies emerge in the aftermath. Obsessions and sacrifices for the sake of one goal come into question. It’s part family drama, part murder mystery, and entirely a questioning of what choices parents must make when they have a child talented enough to achieve greatness.

Shonda Rhimes is many things: a writer, a producer, a mother. And, an introvert. Which makes it hard when people keep asking her to do interviews or public appearances. Rhimes, though, wanted to change things. She decided to say yes to everything she was asked to do for a year. Everything. Year of Yes is as funny and personal as it is inspirational, a reminder to us all to get out of our comfort zones.

Eric Cash is an aspiring actor and screenwriter living in New York City. Really, though, he’s a bartender with aspirations that aren’t getting off the ground. Others, like Ike Marcus, seem to be actually going places. Until a senseless crime leaves Ike dead, Eric claiming to be a witness to it all. Price is ruthless with his portrayal of the realities of New York City and the lackluster justice system lurking beneath its shiny surface.

Middle-aged divorcé Richard Novak is, for the most part, alone. He doesn’t need anyone in his life, just the way he likes it. But, when he winds up in the hospital and a sinkhole opens outside his house, he is thrust back into the land of people. Between donut shop owners and weeping housewives, Richard engages with, and occasionally saves, the people around him and they bring him closer to his family too. With the backdrop of a surreal Los Angeles, this novel explores isolation, engagement, and the importance of vulnerability.

Darren Mathews is a Black Texas Ranger in East Texas, a town with rampant racism permeating everything. When Mathews travels up Highway 59 to Lark after a Black lawyer and a white woman were murdered, he hits this racism head on. Still, he devotes his energy to solving these murders no matter who tries to stop him. This tension-filled crime novel is sure to horrify you as it keeps you glued to its pages.

Grief eventually comes for us all. In the form of a beloved pet, a divorce, a best friend, parents, dead birds, and those we imagine when we close our eyes. Liebegott explores this and more in this in-verse autobiography told through a string of interconnected vignettes. It will leave you thinking about death in its many forms, sure, but also the flip side of that coin, life.