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Fiction Picks: Stories Featuring Pets

Calling all pet lovers - check out these paw-sitively wonderful stories featuring our favorite furry friends!

Girls and Their Horses by Eliza Jane Brazier

When the nouveau riche Parker family moves to an exclusive community in the heart of Southern California, they believe it’s their chance at a fresh start. Heather Parker is determined to give her daughters the life she never had - starting with horses. She signs them up for riding lessons and, before long, becomes a “Barn Mom,” part of a group of wealthy women who hang at the stables, drink wine, and prepare their daughters for competition. It’s not long before the Parker family is fully enmeshed in Horse World and, before the summer is over, lies turn lethal, accidents happen, and someone turns up dead.

A Troubling Tail by Laurie Cass

The charming town of Chilson, Michigan, is beautiful in the spring, and the bookmobile is delivering great reads far and wide on one of the first warm days of the year. But a chill sweeps through when they discover that one of their favorite patrons, the owner of Henika’s Candy Emporium, has been found murdered. Although Minnie can’t understand who could have had a motive to murder such a kind man, she decides that the problem isn’t hers to solve. However, when rumors start flying around town and the police have no leads, Minnie and her rescue cat, Eddie, throw their investigative hats into the ring.

This is the 11th volume in the "Bookmobile Cat Mystery" series.

Housebroke by Jaci Burton

After her ex took their money and bailed, Hazel Bristow is left broke and homeless. A kind friend whose home is on the market lets Hazel and her foster dogs stay there until it sells. It’s the perfect setup, until her friend forgets to tell Hazel she’s sold the house. Linc Kennedy is shocked to find Hazel and her pups squatting in the house he just bought, but after some negotiating, he agrees to let her remain while he’s renovating the place. They are soon intrigued by one another and come to realize they are feeling more than puppy love.

Starter Villain by John Scalzi

A divorced substitute teacher living with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, all Charlie wants is to open a pub downtown, if only the bank will approve his loan. Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business to Charlie. But becoming a supervillain isn't all giant laser death rays and lava pits. Jake had enemies, and now they're coming after Charlie. It's up to Charlie to win the war his uncle started. But with unionized dolphins, hyper-intelligent talking spy cats, and a terrifying henchperson at his side, going bad is starting to look pretty good. In a dog-eat-dog world...be a cat.

#pets #fiction books #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #books to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Staff Favorites for National Library Week!

Enjoy a handful of staff favorites as we celebrate National Library Week!

Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders

February 1862. The Civil War has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, Willie dies and is laid to rest. Bending the historical truth, this story finds Willie Lincoln in a strange purgatory, where ghosts mingle, gripe, commiserate, quarrel, and enact bizarre acts of penance. Within this transitional state - called, in the Tibetan tradition, the bardo - a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie's soul.

The Round House by Louise Erdrich

One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface because Geraldine Coutts is traumatized and reluctant to relive or reveal what happened, either to the police or to her husband, Bazil, and thirteen-year-old son, Joe. While Joe tries to help heal his mother, she slips into an abyss of solitude. Increasingly alone, Joe finds himself thrust prematurely into an adult world for which he is ill prepared and soon sets out with his trusted friends to get some answers of his own. 

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune

Linus Baker leads a quiet, solitary life. As a Case Worker at the Department in Charge Of Magical Youth, he spends his days overseeing the well-being of children in government-sanctioned orphanages. When Linus is unexpectedly summoned by Extremely Upper Management he's given a curious and highly classified assignment: travel to Marsyas Island Orphanage, where six dangerous children and their enigmatic caretaker, Arthur Parnassus, reside. As Arthur and Linus grow closer and long-held secrets are exposed, Linus must make a life-changing choice.

This is the first volume in "The House in the Cerulean Sea" series.

The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

Cassandra is lost, alone, and grieving. Her much loved grandmother, Nell, has just died and Cassandra, her life already shaken by a tragic accident ten years ago, feels like she has lost everything dear to her. But an unexpected and mysterious bequest from Nell turns Cassandra’s life upside down, challenging everything she thought she knew about herself and her family. Inheriting a book of fairytales, Cassandra takes her courage in both hands to follow in the footsteps of Nell on a quest to find out the truth about their history, their family, and their past.

#national library week #staff picks #fiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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April is... National Poetry Month!

Check out a volume of poetry this April for National Poetry Month!

Blood Snow by Dg Nanouk Okpik

Here, in a true Inupiaq voice, dg okpik's relationship to language is an access point for understanding larger kinships between animals, peoples, traditions, histories, ancestries, and identities. Okpik's poems have a fraught relationship to her former home in Anchorage, Alaska, a place of unparalleled natural beauty and a traumatic site of devastation for Alaskan native nations and landscapes alike. In this way, okpik's poetry speaks to the dualistic nature of reality and how one's existence in the world simultaneously shapes and is shaped by its environs.

Falling Back in Love with Being Human by Kai Cheng Thom

Kai Cheng Thom grew up a Chinese Canadian transgender girl in a hostile world. When overwhelmed with the viciousness of others, she gathered all her rage and grief and took a leap of faith: she wrote. Whether prayers or spells or poems, she wrote to affirm the outcasts and runaways she calls her kin. She wrote to flawed but nonetheless lovable men, to people with good intentions who harm their own, to racists and transphobes seemingly beyond saving. What emerged was a blueprint for falling back in love with being human.

I Done Clicked My Heels Three Times by Taylor Byas

These poems take their inspiration from the cult classic film The Wiz to explore a Black woman’s journey out of the South Side of Chicago and into adulthood. At every stop, the speaker is made to confront her womanhood, her sexuality, the visibility of her body, alcoholism in her family, and various ways in which narratives are imposed on her. Re-casting Chicago as a living, breathing entity, this volume spans sestinas, sonnets, free-verse, and erasures, all to reimagine the concept of home.

Grand Tour by Elisa Gonzalez

This debut collection of poetry by Elisa Gonzalez dramatizes the mind in motion as it grapples with something more than an event: she writes of a whole life, to transcendent effect. By the end, we feel we have been witness to a poet remaking herself. Gonzalez’s poetry depicts the fullness of living, moving through elegy, romantic and sexual encounters, family history, and place to answer one, persistent question: How do you reconcile a hatred for the world’s pain with a love for that same world?

#national poetry month #poetry #nonfiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Page-to-Screen Adaptations: Fiction Picks

Check out these titles recently adapted for the big screen - the book is always better!

Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty

If your mother was missing, would you tell the police? Even if the most obvious suspect was your father? This is the dilemma facing the four grown Delaney siblings. Two of the Delaney children think their father is innocent, two are not so sure - but as the two sides square off against each other, all of the Delaneys start to reexamine their shared family history in a very new light.

This adaptation is currently streaming on Peacock.

Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Daisy is a girl coming of age in L.A. in the late sixties, sneaking into clubs on the Sunset Strip and dreaming of singing at the Whisky a Go Go. The sex and drugs are thrilling, but it’s the rock ’n’ roll she loves most. By the time she’s twenty, her voice is getting noticed. Also getting noticed is The Six, a band led by Billy Dunne. Daisy and Billy cross paths when a producer realizes the key to supercharged success is putting them together. 

This adaptation is currently streaming on Prime Video.

Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh

The Christmas season offers little cheer for Eileen Dunlop, an unassuming yet disturbed young woman trapped between her role as her alcoholic father’s caretaker and a day job at a boys’ prison. But when the bright, beautiful, and cheery Rebecca Saint John arrives on the scene as the new counselor at the prison, Eileen is enchanted and her affection for Rebecca ultimately pulls her into complicity in a crime that surpasses her wildest imaginings.

This adaptation is currently available to rent/buy on Prime Video.

Red, White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston

First Son Alex Claremont-Diaz is the closest thing to a prince this side of the Atlantic. When photos of a confrontation with his longtime nemesis Prince Henry at a royal wedding leak to the tabloids and threaten American/British relations. the plan for damage control involves staging a fake friendship between the First Son and the Prince. As President Claremont kicks off her reelection bid, Alex finds himself hurtling into a secret relationship with Henry that could derail the campaign and upend two nations. 

This adaptation is currently available to stream on Prime Video.

#page to screen #book adaptation #fiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Women's History Month: Historical Fiction Recommendations

Celebrate Women's History Month by checking out these historical fiction picks!

The Mitford Affair by Marie Benedict

Between the World Wars, the six Mitford sisters dominate the English political, literary, and social scenes. Though they've weathered scandals before, the family falls into disarray when Diana divorces her husband to marry a fascist leader and Unity follows her sister's lead, inciting rumors that she's become Hitler's own mistress. Novelist Nancy Mitford is the only member of her family to keep in touch with Diana and Unity after their desertion, so it falls to her to act when her sisters become spies for the Nazi party. 

Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati

You were born to a king, but you marry a tyrant. You stand by helplessly as he sacrifices your child to placate the gods. You watch him wage war on a foreign shore, and you comfort yourself with violent thoughts of your own. This was not the life you ever deserved. And this will not be your undoing. Slowly, you plot. For you understood something long ago that the others never did. If power isn't given to you, you have to take it for yourself.

Song of a Captive Bird by Jasmin Darznik

All through her childhood in Tehran, Forugh is told that Iranian daughters should be quiet and modest. She is taught only to obey, but she always finds ways to rebel. It’s during the summer of 1950 that Forugh’s passion for poetry really takes flight - and that tradition seeks to clip her wings. Forced into a suffocating marriage, Forugh runs away and falls into an affair that fuels her desire to write and to achieve freedom and independence. Forugh’s poems are considered both scandalous and brilliant, and the power of her writing only grows stronger amid the upheaval of the Iranian revolution. 

The President's Wife by Tracey Enerson Wood

Socialite Edith Bolling has been in no hurry to find a new husband since she was widowed, preferring to fill her days with good friends and travel. But the enchanting courting of President Woodrow Wilson wins Edith over and she becomes the First Lady of the United States. While uncomfortable for the fiercely independent Edith, she soon warms to the new role and is soon indispensable to her husband's presidency. When Woodrow's delicate health takes a dramatic turn for the worse, she all but assumes the presidency herself in order to preserve both his progress and his reputation.

#women's history month #historical fiction #strong female characters #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Gardening Recommendations

Are you ready for spring? Check out these books to help you start your garden this season!

Did you know you can also get seeds from the library? Our Seed Library is now open for the 2024 growing season! For more details, visit our website here.

100 Plants to Feed the Birds by Laura Erickson

In this volume, readers will find in-depth profiles offering planting and care guidance for 100 native plant species that provide food and shelter for birds throughout the year, from winter all the way through breeding and migrating periods. Readers will learn about plants they can add to their gardens and cultivate, as well as wild plants to refrain from weeding out. Plant photographs and range maps provide visual guidance to selecting the right plants for any location in North America.

Beginning Seed Saving for the Home Gardener by Jim Ulager

This comprehensive volume explores how seed saving is not only easier than we think, but that it is also essential for vibrant and bountiful gardens. This guide includes information on why seed saving belongs in the home garden; principles of vegetative and sexual reproduction; tips for easy inbreeding plants, like lettuce and tomatoes; tips for more challenging plants, like squash and spinach; and a brief discussion of more difficult crops, such as corn, carrots, and cabbage. 

The Compost Coach by Kate Flood

This volume is a colorful, comprehensive, and accessible guide to creating the very best compost AKA garden gold. Pitched at the home composter, including people who live in apartments and houses with or without gardens, Kate Flood helps readers rethink their waste management and teaches them how easy it is to divert food scraps and household carbon away from landfill. She unravels the technicalities of soil science, talks through the building blocks of a robust compost system, and busts a few myths along the way. 

Veg Out by Heather Rodino

Watching delicate seedlings sprout from the ground and plucking cute cherry tomatoes at the peak of ripeness - if this is your idea of living the dream, you'll want this friendly guide. This volume teaches the basics of growing your own vegetables, such as how to choose the right plants for a climate and guarding the crop from critters. Included are 30 profiles of beginner-friendly vegetables and herbs with detailed instructions on where to grow, when to harvest, as well as their sunlight, watering, and soil needs.

#gardening #food gardening #spring garden #native plants #nonfiction #reading recommendations #book recommendations #reading recs #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Women's History Month: Nonfiction Recommendations

Celebrate Women's History Month this March by checking out one of these nonfiction recommendations!

The Six by Loren Grush

When NASA sent astronauts to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s the agency excluded women from the corps, arguing that only military test pilots - a group then made up exclusively of men - had the right stuff. Eventually, NASA recognized its blunder and opened the application process to a wider array of hopefuls, regardless of race or gender. From a candidate pool of 8,000 six elite women were selected in 1978 - Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Anna Fisher, Kathy Sullivan, Shannon Lucid, and Rhea Seddon. Together, "the Six" built  the tools that made the space program run.

The Exceptions by Kate Zernike

In 1963, a young Nancy Hopkins fell in love with the promise of genetics. In 1999, Hopkins, now a noted molecular geneticist and cancer researcher at MIT, found herself underpaid and denied the credit and resources given to men of lesser rank. Galvanized by the flagrant favoritism, Hopkins led a group of sixteen women on the faculty in a campaign that prompted MIT to make the historic admission that it had long discriminated against its female scientists, which then set off a national reckoning with the pervasive sexism in science

The Doctors Blackwell by Janice P. Nimura

Elizabeth Blackwell believed from an early age that she was destined for a mission beyond the scope of "ordinary" womanhood. Though the world at first recoiled at the notion of a woman studying medicine, her intelligence and intensity ultimately won her the acceptance of the male medical establishment. In 1849, she became the first woman in America to receive an M.D. She was soon joined in her iconic achievement by her younger sister, Emily. This biography celebrates two complicated pioneers who exploded the limits of possibility for women in medicine. 

The Girl Explorers by Jayne Zanglein

This is the inspirational and untold story of the founding of the Society of Women Geographers - an organization of adventurous female world explorers - and how key members served as early advocates for human rights and paved the way for today's women scientists by scaling mountains, exploring the high seas, flying across the Atlantic, and recording the world through film, sculpture, and literature. For these women dared to go where no woman―or man―had gone before, achieving the unthinkable and breaking through barriers to allow future generations to carry on their important and inspiring work.

#women's history month #women's history #nonfiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Black History Month: Fiction Recommendations

Moonrise Over New Jessup by Jamila Minnicks

After leaving the only home she has ever known, Alice Young steps into the all-Black town of New Jessup, Alabama, where residents have largely rejected integration as the means for Black social advancement. Instead, they seek to maintain, and fortify, the community on their “side of the woods.” Alice soon falls in love with Raymond Campbell, whose clandestine activities challenge the town's status quo, and finds herself trying to balance her support of Raymond's underground work, while also protecting New Jessup from pressures of upheaval within and without the town. 

Coconut Drop Dead by Olivia Matthews

Brooklyn’s annual Caribbean American Heritage Festival is finally here, and Spice Isle Bakery is thrilled to be one of the event’s food vendors. Co-owner Lyndsay Murray hopes their West Indian pastries and finger foods draw people back to the bakery in Little Caribbean. She’s looking forward to having fun, connecting with customers, and celebrating with family. The day's festivities are cut short, however, when the lead singer of an up-and-coming band dies. The police think it's a tragic accident, but Lyndsay’s cousin believes otherwise and needs Lyndsay’s help to make sure the killer faces the music.

This is the third volume of the "Spice Isle Bakery Mysteries" series.

Black Cloud Rising by David Wright Faladé

By fall of 1863, Union forces had taken control of Tidewater, Virginia, and established a toehold in eastern North Carolina. Thousands of freed slaves and runaways flooded the Union lines, but Confederate irregulars still roamed the region. In December, a newly-formed African Brigade set out to hunt down the rebel guerillas. From this little-known historical account comes a dramatic novel about these soldiers: men who only weeks before had been enslaved, but were now Union infantrymen setting out against former owners.

The Human Origins of Beatrice Porter and Other Essential Ghosts by Soraya Palmer

Sisters Zora and Sasha Porter are drifting apart. Bearing witness to their father’s violence and their mother’s worsening illness, an unsettled Zora escapes into her journal, dreaming of being a writer, while Sasha discovers sex and chest binding, spending more time with her new girlfriend than at home. But the sisters, like their parents, must come together to answer to something more ancient and powerful than they know - and reckon with a buried family secret.

#black history month #black history #fiction books #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #tbr #tbr pile #to read #library books #booklr #book tumblr #fiction #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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February is... Library Lovers Month!

Celebrate Library Lovers Month by visiting a library to check out a book... about a library!

How Can I Help You by Laura Sims

No one knows Margo’s real name. Her colleagues and patrons at a small-town public library know only her middle-aged normalcy, congeniality, and charm. They have no reason to suspect that she is, in fact, a former nurse with a trail of premature deaths in her wake. She has turned a new page, so to speak, and the library is her sanctuary, a place to quell old urges. That is, at least, until Patricia, a recent graduate and failed novelist, joins the library staff. Patricia quickly notices Margo’s subtly sinister edge and, when a tragic incident in the library gives her a hint of Margo’s past, Patricia can’t resist digging deeper.

The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill

The ornate reading room at the Boston Public Library is quiet, until the tranquility is shattered by a woman's terrified scream. Security guards take charge immediately, instructing everyone inside to stay put until the threat is identified and contained. While they wait for the all-clear, four strangers, who'd happened to sit at the same table, pass the time in conversation and friendships are struck. Each has his or her own reasons for being in the reading room that morning - it just happens that one of them is a murderer.

The Littlest Library by Poppy Alexander

Jess Metcalf is perfectly content with her quiet life. But when her beloved grandmother passes away and she loses her job at the local library, her life is turned upside down. Unable to part with her grandmother's cherished books, she packs them all up and moves to a tiny cottage in the English countryside. To her surprise, Jess discovers an old red phone box that was left on the property. Missing her job at the local library, she decides to give back to her new community by using her grandmother's collection to turn the ordinary phone box into the littlest library in England.

The Librarian Spy by Madeline Martin

Ava thought her job as a librarian at the Library of Congress would mean a quiet, routine existence. But an unexpected offer from the US military has brought her to Lisbon with a new mission: posing as a librarian while working undercover as a spy gathering intelligence. Meanwhile, in occupied France, Elaine has begun an apprenticeship at a printing press run by members of the Resistance. It's a job usually reserved for men, but in the war, those rules have been forgotten. As the battle in Europe rages, Ava and Elaine find themselves connecting through coded messages and discovering hope in the face of war.

#library love #libraries #fiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #tbr #tbr pile #to read #library books #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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New Romance Picks

Fall in love with reading by immersing yourself in a new romance!

To Have and to Heist by Sara Desai

Simi Chopra is on a bad-luck streak. She’s lost yet another job, her student loan debt won’t stop growing, her basement apartment is a certifiable flood zone, and now her best friend has been accused of stealing a multimillion-dollar diamond necklace. To put it lightly, she’s desperate for a break - that’s right when Jack waltzes into her life. When he offers to help her infiltrate a high-society wedding to steal back the necklace, Simi jumps at the chance to clear her friend’s name. But the ultimate robbery might not be the wedding con, but the way Jack is stealing her heart.

One Night in Hartswood by Emma Denny

Oxford 1360: When his sister's betrothed vanishes the night before her politically arranged marriage, Raff Barden must track and return the elusive groom to restore his family's honour. William de Foucart - known to his friends as Penn - had no choice but to abandon his fiancé, and with it his own earldom, when he fled the night before his enforced marriage. Ill-equipped to survive on the run, however, he must trust the kindness of a stranger, Raff, to help him escape. Unaware their fates are already entwined, their unexpected bond deepens into a far more precious relationship, one that will test all that they hold dear. 

Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner

Grace Henderson has been a star of the US Women’s National Team for ten years, but when she’s sidelined with an injury, a bold new upstart, Phoebe Matthews, takes her spot. Phoebe is too focused on her first season as a professional soccer player to think about seducing her longtime idol, but when Grace ends up making the first move, they can’t keep their hands off of each other. As the World Cup approaches, both players soon have to decide what's more important - being together or making the roster.

The Build Up by Tati Richardson

Rumpled and ragged was not how architect Ari James envisioned kicking off her first day at a new firm. And few things can top the horror of her extremely hot new colleague, Porter Harrison, walking in on her at the worst moment ever. Meanwhile, nothing is going to stand in the way of Porter absolutely killing it on his new project: especially not his new coworker whose gorgeous curves he accidentally saw and can't get out of his head. Though neither of them is looking for love, Ari and Porter's connection is obvious and when their shared goal has always been winning at work, a relationship might cost them everything.

#romance books #contemporary romance #historical romance #new books #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Black History Month: Nonfiction Picks

Black AF History by Michael Harriot

It should come as no surprise that the dominant narrative of American history is blighted with errors and oversights - after all, history books were written by white men with their perspectives at the forefront. In this volume, Michael Harriot presents a more accurate version of American history. Combining unapologetically provocative storytelling with meticulous research based on primary sources, as well as the work of pioneering Black historians, scholars, and journalists, Harriot removes the white sugarcoating from the American story, placing Black people squarely at the center.

Caste by Isabel Wilkerson

Beyond race, class, or other factors, there is a powerful caste system that influences people’s lives and behavior and the nation’s fate. Linking the caste systems of America, India, and Nazi Germany, Wilkerson considers eight pillars that underlie caste systems across civilizations. Using riveting stories about real people - including Martin Luther King, Jr., baseball’s Satchel Paige, a single father and his toddler son, and Wilkerson herself - this volume shows the ways in which the insidious undertow of caste is experienced every day. 

I Take My Coffee Black by Tyler Merritt

In this volume, Tyler Merritt tells hilarious stories from his own life as a black man in America. He talks about growing up in a multi-cultural community and realizing that he wasn't always welcome, how he quit sports for musical theater (that's where the girls were), to how Jesus barged in uninvited and changed his life forever, to how he ended up at a small Bible college in Santa Cruz because he thought they had a great theater program (they didn't). Throughout his stories, he also teaches readers about the history of encoded racism that still undergirds our society today.

South to America by Imani Perry

In this volume, Imani Perry shows that the meaning of American is inextricably linked with the South, and that our understanding of its history and culture is the key to understanding the nation as a whole. This is the story of a Black woman and native Alabaman returning to the region she has always called home and considering it with fresh eyes. Her journey is full of detours, deep dives, and surprising encounters with places and people. Weaving together stories of immigrant communities, contemporary artists, exploitative opportunists, enslaved peoples, unsung heroes, her own ancestors, and her lived experiences, Perry crafts a tapestry unlike any other.

#black history month #black history #nonfiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Historical Fiction Recommendations

Spanning from 18th century North America to 20th century Asia, check out these historical fiction recommendations!

Dust Child by Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai

In 1969 Vietnam, sisters Trang and Quỳnh, desperate to help their parents pay off debts, leave their rural village and become “bar girls” in Sài Gòn, drinking, flirting (and more) with American GIs in return for money. As the war moves closer to the city, the once-innocent Trang gets swept up in an irresistible romance with a young and charming American helicopter pilot, Dan. Decades later, Dan returns to Việt Nam with his wife, Linda, hoping to find a way to heal from his PTSD and, unbeknownst to her, reckon with secrets from his past. 

One Blood by Denene Millner

Raised by her beloved grandmother in tension-filled, post-segregation Virginia, Grace is barely a teenager when she loses her Maw Maw. Shellshocked, she is shipped up North to live with her formidably ambitious Aunt Hattie - a woman who firmly left behind her “undesirable” Southern roots in pursuit of upward mobility. Feeling like a fish out of water, Grace’s only place of sweet comfort is with the smart, handsome son of one of the society’s grand dames. However, when he gets caught up in a racial police killing and Grace ends up pregnant, she is quickly hidden away and deceived by Hattie in an ultimate act of betrayal.

The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng

The year is 1921. Lesley Hamlyn and her husband, Robert, a lawyer and war veteran, are living at Cassowary House on the Straits Settlement of Penang. When “Willie” Somerset Maugham, a famed writer and old friend of Robert's, arrives for an extended visit with his secretary Gerald, the pair threatens a rift that could alter more lives than one. Additionally, in desperate need of a subject for his next book, Maugham soon finds a story worthy of fiction when coming to learn more about Lesley's past. 

The Woman with the Cure by Lynn Cullen

In 1940s and ’50s America, polio is as dreaded as the atomic bomb. No one’s life is untouched by this disease that kills or paralyzes its victims, particularly children. Some of the world’s best minds are engaged in the race to find a vaccine. The man who succeeds will be a god. But Dorothy Horstmann is not focused on beating her colleagues to the vaccine. She just wants the world to have a cure. Applying the same determination that lifted her from a humble background to becoming a doctor, she hunts down the monster where it lurks: in the blood.

#historical fiction #literary fiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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January is... National Soup Month!

Every Season is Soup Season by Shelly Westerhausen

From broths and gazpachos to chowders and chilis, this flexible cookbook is overflowing with scrumptious soups for every season. Tips for batching and freezing soups and instructions for using an Instant Pot or a slow cooker ensure stress-free meals, with less time in the kitchen and more time at the table. With gorgeous photography and a bonus section on soup accompaniments, everyday soups have never been so simple - or delicious.

Seriously Good Chili by Brian Baumgartner

No one takes chili more seriously than Brian Baumgartner, whose character as Kevin Malone became a household name in the Emmy-winning TV series, The Office. In real life, Brian is a true chili master and aficionado who is just as serious as his fictional counterpart about making the most perfect pot of chili. Featuring 177 chili recipes stamped with Brian's "seriously good" approval rating, this volumecontains new ways to spice up chili for all occasions, all year long.

Healing Herbal Soups by Rose Cheung & Genevieve Wong

Combining the trends of culinary medicine and seasonal eating and adding a dash of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), this cookbook is the first of its kind to focus on boosting immunity and weathering the seasons, by a mother-daughter, Chinese-American duo. This volume provides a complete herbal encyclopedia and more than fifty tasty recipes - with full-color photographs - that mix herbs with meat and vegetables to create healing broths.

Zuppe by Mona Talbott

Much more than a collection of remarkable soups, this volume by Mona Talbott is also a wise and gentle tutorial on how the humblest foods can be the most profoundly satisfying. In addition to 50 recipes, Talbott shares approaches and techniques that can change the way a cook thinks about economy, improvisation, and using all the flavors and nutrients inherent in each ingredient. Organized seasonally, this cookbook also serves as a practical guide to using the bounty of farmers markets throughout the year. 

#soup season #soup recipes #cookbooks #nonfiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

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Celebrating the Legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr.

King by Jonathan Eig

In this revelatory new portrait of the preacher and activist who shook the world, Jonathan Eig gives us an intimate view of the courageous and often emotionally troubled human being who demanded peaceful protest for his movement but was rarely at peace with himself. Casting a fresh light on the King family’s origins, as well as MLK’s complex relationships with his wife, father, and fellow activists, this volume reveals a minister wrestling with his own human frailties and dark moods, a citizen hunted by his own government, and a man determined to fight for justice even if it proved to be a fight to the death.

The Heavens Might Crack by Jason Sokol

On April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr. was fatally shot as he stood on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. At the time of his murder, King was a polarizing figure - scorned by many white Americans, worshipped by some African Americans and liberal whites, and deemed irrelevant by many black youth. In this volume, historian Jason Sokol traces the diverse responses, both in America and throughout the world, to King's death. 

The Three Mothers by Anna Malaika Tubbs

Much has been written about Berdis Baldwin's son James, Alberta King's son Martin Luther, and Louise Little's son Malcolm. But virtually nothing has been said about the extraordinary women who raised them, who were all born at the beginning of the 20th century and forced to contend with the prejudices of Jim Crow as Black women. These three mothers taught resistance and a fundamental belief in the worth of Black people to their sons, even when these beliefs flew in the face of America's racist practices and led to ramifications for all three families' safety.

You Have to Be Prepared to Die Before You Can Begin to Live by Paul Kix

In this volume, Paul Kix takes the reader behind the scenes as he tells the story of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s pivotal 10- week campaign in 1963 to end segregation in Birmingham, Alabama. At the same time, he also provides a window into the minds of the four extraordinary men who led the campaign - Martin Luther King, Jr., Wyatt Walker, Fred Shuttlesworth, and James Bevel. With page-turning prose that reads like a thriller, Kix’s book is the first to zero in on the ten weeks of Project C.

#martin luther king jr #civil rights #history #nonfiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

[rockislandadultreads]

Warm Up with a Good Book!

Need a book to spark your interest & keep you warm? Check out one of these fiery recommendations! Make sure to also log whatever you read for our upcoming "Snow Many Books" Winter Reading Challenge, which begins this Friday, January 12th!

Where There Was Fire by John Manuel Arias

Costa Rica, 1968: When a lethal fire erupts at the American Fruit Company’s most lucrative banana plantation burning all evidence of a massive cover-up, and her husband disappears, the future of Teresa’s family is changed forever.

Now, twenty-seven years later, Teresa and her daughter Lyra are picking up the pieces. Lyra wants nothing to do with Teresa, but is desperate to find out what happened to her family that fateful night. Teresa, haunted by a missing husband and the bitter ghost of her mother, Amarga, is unable to reconcile the past. What unfolds is a story of a mother and daughter trying to forgive what they do not yet understand, and the mystery at the heart of one family’s rupture.

Dance Among the Flames by Tori Eldridge

Passion. Horror. Betrayal.

Across forty years, three continents, and a past incident in 1560 France, Serafina Olegario tests the boundaries of love, power, and corruption as she fights to escape her life of poverty and abuse. Serafina's quest begins in Brazil when she's possessed by the warrior goddess Yansã, who emboldens her to fight yet threatens to consume her spirit. Fueled by power and enticed by Exú, an immortal trickster and intermediary to the gods, Serafina turns to the seductive magic of Quimbanda. It's dangerous to dance in the fire. But when you come from nothing, you have nothing to lose.

Girls Burn Brighter by Shobha Rao

Poornima and Savitha have three strikes against them: they are poor, they are ambitious, and they are girls. After her mother’s death, Poornima has very little kindness in her life. She is left to care for her siblings until her father can find her a suitable match. So when Savitha enters their household, Poornima is intrigued by the joyful, independent-minded girl. Suddenly their Indian village doesn't feel quite so claustrophobic, and Poornima begins to imagine a life beyond arranged marriage.

But when a devastating act of cruelty drives Savitha away, Poornima leaves behind everything she has ever known to find her friend. Her journey takes her into the darkest corners of India's underworld, on a harrowing cross-continental journey, and eventually to an apartment complex in Seattle.

The Archive of the Forgotten by A.J. Hackwith

The Library of the Unwritten in Hell was saved from total devastation, but hundreds of potential books were destroyed. Former librarian Claire and Brevity the muse feel the loss of those stories, and are trying to adjust to their new roles within the Arcane Wing and Library, respectively. But when the remains of those books begin to leak a strange ink, Claire realizes that the Library has kept secrets from Hell - and from its own librarians.

Claire and Brevity are immediately at odds in their approach to the ink, and the potential power that it represents has not gone unnoticed. When a representative from the Muses Corps arrives at the Library to advise Brevity, the angel Rami and the erstwhile Hero hunt for answers in other realms. The true nature of the ink could fundamentally alter the afterlife for good or ill, but it entirely depends on who is left to hold the pen.

This is the second volume of the "Hell's Library" series.

#fiction #book covers #reading challenge #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #tbr #tbr pile #to read #library books #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

[rockislandadultreads]

Read-Alike Friday: The Lace Widow by Mollie Ann Cox

The Lace Widow by Mollie Ann Cox

New York, 1804. America’s beloved Alexander Hamilton lies dead after a duel with Aaron Burr. Meanwhile, Eliza Hamilton’s eighteen-year-old son, Alexander Jr., was seen fighting with a man in a tavern the night before his father’s duel and quickly comes under suspicion for murder when the man turns up dead.

Eliza searches for ways to clear her son’s name, even as she is grieving, but as she combs through her late husband’s papers, she finds evidence of a plot to steal money from the government during his tenure as secretary of state. Hamilton was accused of stealing that money, and it was a scandal that almost broke the family—but is Eliza now holding proof of Alexander’s innocence?

Deep in debt and despair, with eight children to support, Eliza turns to selling her handmade lace—and is drawn into a mysterious network of widow lacemakers who are intimately connected to New York’s high-society families. They know their dead husbands’ secrets—and soon, Eliza begins to piece together the truth.

There’s a dark plot connected with the duel, as one by one, witnesses to the bout are being killed. Now, Eliza must not only clear her husband’s and son’s names but keep herself out of the killer’s sights.

Because I Could Not Stop for Death by Amanda Flower

January 1855: Willa Noble knew it was bad luck when it was pouring rain on the day of her ever-important job interview at the Dickinson home in Amherst, Massachusetts. When she arrived late, disheveled with her skirts sodden and filthy, she'd lost all hope of being hired for the position. As the housekeeper politely told her they'd be in touch, Willa started toward the door of the stately home only to be called back by the soft but strong voice of Emily Dickinson. What begins as tenuous employment turns to friendship as the reclusive poet takes Willa under her wing.

Tragedy soon strikes and Willa's beloved brother, Henry, is killed in a tragic accident at the town stables. With no other family and nowhere else to turn, Willa tells Emily about her brother's death and why she believes it was no accident. Willa is convinced it was murder. Henry had been very secretive of late, only hinting to Willa that he'd found a way to earn money to take care of them both. Viewing it first as a puzzle to piece together, Emily offers to help, only to realize that she and Willa are caught in a deadly game of cat and mouse that reveals corruption in Amherst that is generations deep. Some very high-powered people will stop at nothing to keep their profitable secrets even if that means forever silencing Willa and her new mistress...

This is the first volume of the "Emily Dickinson Mystery" series.

What the Dead Leave Behind by David Housewright

Once a police detective in St. Paul, Minnesota, Rushmore McKenzie has become not only an unlikely millionaire, but an occasional unlicensed private investigator, doing favors for friends and people in need. When his stepdaughter Erica asks him for just such a favor, McKenzie doesn t have it in him to refuse. Even though it sounds like a very bad idea right from the start.

The father of Malcolm Harris, a college friend of Erica's, was found murdered a year ago in a park in New Brighton, a town just outside the Twin Cities. With no real clues and all the obvious suspects with concrete alibis, the case has long since gone cold. As McKenzie begins poking around, he soon discovers another unsolved murder that's tangentially related to this one. And all connections seem to lead back to a group of friends the victim was close with. But all McKenzie has is a series of odd, even suspicious, coincidences until someone decides to make it all that more serious and personal.

This is the 14th volume of the "Mac McKenzie" series.

A Study in Scarlet Women by Sherry Thomas

With her inquisitive mind, Charlotte Holmes has never felt comfortable with the demureness expected of the fairer sex in upper class society. But even she never thought that she would become a social pariah, an outcast fending for herself on the mean streets of London.

When the city is struck by a trio of unexpected deaths and suspicion falls on her sister and her father, Charlotte is desperate to find the true culprits and clear the family name. She’ll have help from friends new and old—a kind-hearted widow, a police inspector, and a man who has long loved her.

But in the end, it will be up to Charlotte, under the assumed name Sherlock Holmes, to challenge society’s expectations and match wits against an unseen mastermind.

This is the first volume of the "Lady Sherlock" series.

#mystery books #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory

[rockislandadultreads]

New Year, New Job!

Linked by Omar Garriott & Jeremy Schifeling

LinkedIn is synonymous with today's job market, where hirers meet job seekers en masse. Written by two former LinkedIn employees, Linked is the definitive guide to building a career in a digital world. It demystifies LinkedIn step-by-step and empowers every professional - from the newly minted college graduate to the midlife career-changer - with the most important strategies to win the job search game.

Coming Back! by Fawn Germer

Millions of mid- to late-career professionals are wondering why our careers are dying. We've been fired, downsized, job-eliminated, or we've left work voluntarily to raise children, care for loved ones, or go to school. It takes twice as long to get hired, and usually for far less money than we were making. Is it age discrimination? Maybe. But it’s not that simple.

Coming Back shows how you can save a career if still employed or get one back if cast out. Fawn Germer, one of the nation’s most popular leadership experts and global motivational speakers, has personally interviewed more than three hundred CEOs, senior executives, professors, lawyers, organizational experts, industry leaders, and professionals. The result is a tactical, tough-love call to action: to learn, re-tool, connect, grow, and get ready to work again.

The Big Book of Job-Hunting Hacks by Brenda Bernstein

In The Big Book of Job-Hunting Hacks, experienced job-hunting professionals offer detailed advice on every step of the job-hunting process. From how to navigate the interview process, to how to create the perfect resume, this book will help you stand out from your competitors. With a new introduction by John Henry Weiss, president of a recruitment firm, that contextualizes the current economic state as a result of COVID-19, this book offers hundreds of practical tips for those laid-off, fired, or new to enter the workplace.

Modernize Your Resume by Wendy Enelow

Based on today’s real-world job search trends, Modernize Your Resume shows you how to craft a winning resume to meet the complexities of today’s highly competitive and technologically driven employment market. The 2nd edition has been updated with new resume samples, new designs, and new ATS and e-resume guidelines, along with new chapters for jobseekers with special circumstances – career change, military transition, and return to work.

Clear guidelines and easy-to-follow examples give you practical know-how for building your own powerful resume that will serve all of your job search needs. You’ll learn what works, why it works, and how you can make it work for you.

#job hunting #job search #nonfiction #reading recommendations #reading recs #book recommendations #book recs #library books #tbr #tbr pile #to read #booklr #book tumblr #book blog #library blog #readers advisory