- December 20, 2018
My Plain Jane
Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows
Hear, dear reader, is a frothy concoction of humor, romance, mystery, and adventure, packed in a well-plotted Young Adult novel. A reinvention and expansion of Charlotte Bronte’s classic Jane Eyre, it will entertain those of you who labored through the original for school, as ...
Read more… - December 20, 2018
A Carnival of Losses: Notes Nearing Ninety
Donald Hall
As always, the book flap has a nice concise summary of this slim but wonderful volume: “New essays from the vantage point of very old age …”
Donald Hall, a U.S. poet laureate and husband of poet Jane Kenyon (who died in 1995 of leukemia), finished this gem as ...
Read more… - December 20, 2018
The Collector’s Apprentice
B.A. Shapiro
There are several collectors in this story but only one is murdered!
Like B. A. Shapiro’s other two novels (The Art Forger and The Muralist), The Collector’s Apprentice masterfully blends art history with suspense, creating a perfect piece of historical fiction. It’s the roaring 20s Europe, and a young Belgian woman is ...
Read more… - December 20, 2018
Hey, Kiddo
Jarrett Krosoczka
Hey, Kiddo is a graphic memoir written by children’s author Jarrett Krosoczka. Jarrett tells his story of growing up with his grandparents, as his mother battles addiction and his father is out of the picture. To make sense of his difficult situation, he expresses himself though art. A National Book Award Finalist for ...
Read more… - December 20, 2018
Warlight
Michael Ondaatje
“In 1945 our parents went away and left us in the care of two men who may have been criminals.”
This is Nathaniel William’s opening statement in Warlight, a novel about his coming-of-age in post-World War II London. As the novel’s narrator, he tries to reconstruct and make sense of his adolescence after his parents ...
Read more… - December 20, 2018
Billy Gogan, American
Roger Higgins
Fifteen-year-old Billy Gogan, a Dubliner in Irish history’s hellacious An Gorta Mór (The Great Hunger) of the 1840s, is ever so alone in the world, fleeing from starvation, oppression, and dangers that lurk everywhere in his bleak surroundings. He leaves for America on the precarious tall ship On a Stormy Sea that ...
Read more… - December 20, 2018
The Poet X
Elizabeth Acevedo
Xiomara Batista is a teenage girl living in Harlem. Her mother is a devout Catholic; her father a mostly-silent presence haunting the living room; her twin brother whip-smart but timid. As the only daughter in her Dominican family, there are certain expectations of Xiomara: that she attend church regularly, that she ...
Read more… - December 20, 2018
Bloody Jack: Being an account of the curious adventures of Mary “Jacky” Faber, ship’s boy
L.A. Meyer, read by Kathrine Kellgren
Mary Faber has nothing left of her family. Mother, Father and her younger sister have all died in the plague besieging London. It is the 1800s, a time when an orphan thrown forcefully onto the streets ...
Read more… - December 19, 2018
The Overstory
Richard Powers
This is a novel that will keep you thinking long after you have finished reading it. Part One (called “Roots”) is almost a stand-alone collection of short stories about each of nine main characters in the book. Their stories all are very different, but extremely compelling, and sometimes heartbreaking. Some ...
Read more… - December 19, 2018
Head On: A Novel of the Near Future
John Scalzi
John Scalzi’s new book, Head On: A Novel of the Near Future, is not your usual police procedural. It’s gripping science fiction that is inventive and unpredictable. Head On‘s narrator is FBI agent Chris Shane, who is smart, rich, and cocky. He’s also ...
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