13 New Books to Watch For in January Essays from Joan Didion, George Saunders on why fiction matters and plenty more. Published Dec. 23, 2020Updated Jan. 19, 2021 If your days are feeling monotonous, you might find entertainment and variety in this flurry of new books about subjects that span the globe. A Danish writer’s collected memoirs trace her effort to nurture artistic ambition in spite of a grim family life and, later, addiction. A biography revisits the lives of two pioneering sisters who paved the way for women to practice medicine in the United States. And a debut novel imagines a romance between two enslaved men in Civil War-era Mississippi. No matter what you’re seeking, you can find it in the pages of a book next month.