Three recent reads that I'd like to recommend to readers are TROPIC OF NIGHT, a novel by Michael Gruber, ALL DAY PERMANENT RED, poetry by Christopher Logue, and NOTES ON DIRECTING, non-fiction by Frank Hauser and Russell Reich.

Hauser and Reich's book is very short, and in the form of numbered rules for directing a stage play ("Never, never, never bully actors," "movement will always draw an audience's eye"). The book began as twelve pages of notes handed by Hauser (an English director who has directed the royalty of the stage: Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Lawrence Olivier [sic]) to Reich (an American neophyte) with the murmured words, "You might find these helpful." In addition to being a fascinating window onto a world I'm not familiar with, it is wickedly funny in places, and thought-provoking for anyone whose business is narrative.