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Boots!

Where would we be without books?

Where would we be without good?

No, Timberd.

It's a rhetorical question, sir.

But where would we need without books?

From KCRW and KCRW.com, I'm Michael Silverblatt.

This is Bookworm, and I have the honor of talking about a very, very interesting novel. It's called The Other Americans.

It's by Leila Lalami. It's published by Pantheon. And I guess let's begin. Who are

the other Americans? Well, the title refers to the group of characters who are narrating this book,

and they're all connected by their relationship to a Moroccan immigrant

who, at the opening of the novel, dies in a hit-and-run accident.

And it's a little bit suspicious, it's unclear whether it's just a random accident or

whether there's something more sinister at play. Each of the characters is connected to him in some way.

So, for example, one of them is his daughter, Nora, who's a musician. One is his wife, who's now

his widow. Another is his other daughter. One is the detective investigating

the accident. One is his neighbor, the person who owns the business next door, and so on.

So while these characters are connected, obviously, by their relationship to him, they're also

connected by their sense internally, that they are not at the center of the American story.

They each, I think, have the sense of looking at things from the outside of being alienated in some sense.

And I think they're also connected by their sense of this location.

...