Four photographers documented the township violence in South Africa's transition years; two died. Marinovich and Silva's account of that work — the cost of bearing witness, the Pulitzers, the colleagues lost — is also an account of what photography does to those who take the photographs. The picture that wins the prize versus the picture that haunts you. These are not always the same.

Stevens has spent his life perfecting the performance of a great English butler, at the cost of every human connection he might have made. The drive west to visit Miss Kenton is the confrontation with what he chose. The dignity he values is the cage he built. The evening he contemplates at the pier is what remains.

Tita is forbidden from marrying because she must care for her mother, and her grief enters the food she cooks. Esquivel makes the body's grief literal — her tears salt the wedding cake, her desire sets the guests on fire. The magical realism is the only honest way to render what is done to women in the name of family obligation.