“The future is there… looking back at us. Trying to make sense of the fiction we will have become.” – William Gibson, Pattern Recognition
FICTION
American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins ★
Lydia Quixano Perez lives in the Mexican city of Acapulco. She runs a bookstore. She has a son, Luca, the love of her life, and a wonderful husband who is a journalist. And while there are cracks beginning to show in Acapulco because of the drug cartels, her life is, by and large, fairly comfortable.
Even though she knows they’ll never sell, Lydia stocks some of her all-time favorite books in her store. And then one day a man enters the shop to browse and comes up to the register with four books he would like to buy–two of them her favorites. Javier is erudite. He is charming. And, unbeknownst to Lydia, he is the jefe of the newest drug cartel that has gruesomely taken over the city. When Lydia’s husband’s tell-all profile of Javier is published, none of their lives will ever be the same.
American Dirt will leave readers utterly changed. It is a page-turner; it is a literary achievement; it is filled with poignancy, drama, and humanity on every page. It is one of the most important books for our times.
Description from Goodreads.
“Destined to be a classic.” – Woman’s Day
“American Dirt is a literary novel with nuanced character development and arresting language; yet, its narrative hurtles forward with the intensity of a suspense tale. Its most profound achievement, though, is something I never could’ve been told… American Dirt is the novel that, for me, nails what it’s like to live in this age of anxiety, where it feels like anything can happen, at any moment.” – Fresh Air
“A heart-pounding, page-turning, can’t-put-it-down, stay-up-till-3 a.m., adrenaline-pumping story… that examines, with sensitivity, care, and complexity of thought, immense, soul-obliterating trauma and its aftermath.” – Los Angeles Times
“As literature, American Dirt is modern realism at its finest: a tale of moral challenge in the spirit of Theodore Dreiser wrapped inside a big-hearted social epic like The Grapes of Wrath. American Dirt is going to be the defining book of 2020.” – New York Journal of Books
Available Formats:
Print Book | Audiobook | eBook | eAudiobook
A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende ★
In the late 1930s, civil war gripped Spain. When General Franco and his Fascists succeed in overthrowing the government, hundreds of thousands are forced to flee in a treacherous journey over the mountains to the French border. Among them is Roser, a pregnant young widow, who finds her life irreversibly intertwined with that of Victor Dalmau, an army doctor and the brother of her deceased love. In order to survive, the two must unite in a marriage neither of them wants, and together are sponsored by poet Pablo Neruda to embark on the SS Winnipeg along with 2,200 other refugees in search of a new life. As unlikely partners, they embrace exile and emigrate to Chile as the rest of Europe erupts in World War.
Starting over on a new continent, their trials are just beginning. Over the course of their lives, they will face test after test. But they will also find joy as they wait patiently for a day when they are exiles no more, and will find friends in the most unlikely of places. Through it all, it is that hope of being reunited with their home that keeps them going. And in the end, they will find that home might have been closer than they thought all along.
Description from Goodreads.
“Majestic… both timeless and perfectly timed for today… Allende’s assured prose vividly evokes her fictional characters [and] historical figures… seamlessly juxtaposing exile with homecoming, otherness with belonging, and tyranny with freedom.” – Publishers Weekly, STARRED REVIEW
“A tale that is seductively intimate and strategically charming… a virtuoso of lucidly well-told, utterly enrapturing fiction… Allende deftly addresses war, displacement, violence, and loss in a novel of survival and love under siege.” – Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
“Allende’s style is impressively Olympian and the payoff is remarkable: a huge overview of generations, decades and countries.” – The Guardian
“…towering… Allende imbues the experience of displaced people trying to find a new home with the dignity, idealism and even romance it has been stripped of in our cruel times.” – Newsday
Available Formats:
Print Book | Audiobook | eBook | eAudiobook
Yellow Earth by John Sayles
In Yellow Earth, the site of Three Nations reservations on the banks of the Missouri River in North Dakota, Sayles introduces us to Harleigh Killdeer, chairman of the Tribal Business Council. “An activist in his way, a product of the Casino Era,” Kildeer, who is contracted by oil firm Case and Crosby, spearheads the new Three Nations Petroleum Company.
What follows, with characteristic lyrical dexterity, insight, and wit, introduces us to a memorable cast of characters, weaving together narratives of competing worlds through masterful storytelling.
Set shortly before Standing Rock would become a symbol of historic proportions of the brutal confrontation between native resistance and the forces of big business and law enforcement, the fate of Yellow Earth serves as a parable for our times.
Description from Goodreads.
“Mr. Sayles writes with such verve and colloquial humor that even the most esoteric issues brighten with fascination… Mr. Sayles superbly dramatizes the man-made disruptions in his novel’s small pond, but in a book motored by anarchy the most unsettling section occurs when the boom goes bust, bringing Yellow Earth to a surprisingly quiet conclusion: the depiction of a modern-day ghost town.” – Wall Street Journal
“Without falling prey to false ‘both sides’ equivocation, Sayles masterfully balances and gives fair hearings to competing agendas and doesn’t shy away from the ugly side of human nature; by the same token, he doesn’t give in to cynicism or despair. What animates his fiction is curiosity about different kinds of people and their experiences, and an imagination expansive enough to portray their inner lives. He doesn’t fetishize diversity, but his stories are naturally diverse as a result of his engaged interest in the world around him. Now entering the fifth decade of his career, Sayles remains a standard-bearer for the American novel.” – Slant
“Sayles’s scrawl achieves a sensational pace. It is the impressive result of a comprehensive portrayal of all four stages and an incredible amount of layering, symbolism, and ideology. There is an urgency to Yellow Earth, and Sayles wastes no words… The magic of Yellow Earth is that it doesn’t feel didactic or like an overdone parable. Rather, Sayles fills his work with contradictions. The competing perspectives and ideologies manifest through the characters’ colloquial conversations, inner dialogue, and motivations.” – Chicago Review of Books
Available Formats:
Hoopla eBook | Hoopla eAudiobook
SUSPENSE
The Janes by Louisa Lana
On the outskirts of San Diego, the bodies of two young women are discovered. They have no names, no IDs, and no family looking for them. Fearing the possibility of a human trafficking ring, the police and FBI reach out to Alice Vega, a private investigator known for finding the missing, for help in finding out who the Janes were–and finding the others who are missing.
Alice Vega is a powerful woman whose determination is matched only by her intellect, and, along with her partner Cap, she will stop at nothing to find the Janes before it is too late.
Description from Goodreads.
“PI Alice Vega is nothing less than an utterly compelling protagonist in her second case (after Two Girls Down, 2018), which resumes her remarkable partnership with fellow PI Max Caplan… A somewhat Shakespearean ending satisfies with triumphant women standing strong on a stage littered with battered villains.” – Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
“An intricately plotted, adrenaline-fueled conspiracy thriller… Luna’s latest entertains while subverting gender stereotypes and confronting the politics of immigration.” – Kirkus Reviews
“Thrilling… [Luna’s] novels have established her as a powerful up-and-coming voice in the genre, and we can’t wait to see what she does next.” – Crime Reads
Available Formats:
Print Book
HISTORICAL FICTION
Remembrance by Rita Woods
Remembrance… It’s a rumor, a whisper passed in the fields and veiled behind sheets of laundry. A hidden stop on the underground road to freedom, a safe haven protected by more than secrecy… if you can make it there.
Ohio, present day. An elderly woman who is more than she seems warns against rising racism as a young woman grapples with her life.
Haiti, 1791, on the brink of revolution. When the slave Abigail is forced from her children to take her mistress to safety, she discovers New Orleans has its own powers.
1857, New Orleans—a city of unrest: Following tragedy, house girl Margot is sold just before her 18th birthday and her promised freedom. Desperate, she escapes and chases a whisper… Remembrance.
Description from Goodreads.
“The novel’s originality makes it worth reading.” – Kirkus Reviews
“Woods’ writing is assured, the historical settings vivid, and her characters fully realized. Hand this to fans of Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing and Octavia Butler’s Kindred, who will appreciate this complex, genre-blending debut.” – Booklist
“Fine attention to sensory details and brutal honesty concerning the horrors of slavery and racial relations over more than two centuries of American history make this a standout.” – Publishers Weekly
Available Formats:
Print Book | eAudiobook
SCI-FI & FANTASY
Agency by William Gibson ★
San Francisco, 2017. In an alternate time track, Hillary Clinton won the election and Donald Trump’s political ambitions were thwarted.
London, 22nd century. Decades of cataclysmic events have killed 80 per cent of humanity. A shadowy start-up hires a young woman named Verity to test a new product: a ‘cross-platform personal avatar’ that was developed by the military as a form of artificial intelligence.
Meanwhile, characters in the distant future are using technological time travel to interfere with the election unfolding in 2017…
Description from Goodreads.
“Engaging, thought-provoking and delightful… [Gibson] can always be counted on to show us our contemporary milieu rendered magical by his unique insights, and a future rendered inhabitable by his wild yet disciplined imagination.” – Washington Post
“An immersive thriller, fueled by an intelligent, empathetic imagination.” – Boston Globe
“Gibson blurs the line between real and speculative technology in a fast-paced thriller that will affirm to readers that it was well worth the wait.” – Booklist
“With its pithy short chapters and mind-bending plot, with the recognizably erudite characters and Gibson-esque language and dialogue, and with the inventiveness of a great science fiction, this is a fun first read of the new decade. Agency will entertain you, but it will also leave you with thoughts to chew on.” – Amazon Book Review
Available Formats:
Print Book | eBook | eAudiobook
YOUNG ADULT
Tweet Cute by Emma Lord
Meet Pepper, swim team captain, chronic overachiever, and all-around perfectionist. Her family may be falling apart, but their massive fast-food chain is booming ― mainly thanks to Pepper, who is barely managing to juggle real life while secretly running Big League Burger’s massive Twitter account.
Enter Jack, class clown and constant thorn in Pepper’s side. When he isn’t trying to duck out of his obscenely popular twin’s shadow, he’s busy working in his family’s deli. His relationship with the business that holds his future might be love/hate, but when Big League Burger steals his grandma’s iconic grilled cheese recipe, he’ll do whatever it takes to take them down, one tweet at a time.
All’s fair in love and cheese ― that is, until Pepper and Jack’s spat turns into a viral Twitter war. Little do they know, while they’re publicly duking it out with snarky memes and retweet battles, they’re also falling for each other in real life ― on an anonymous chat app Jack built.
As their relationship deepens and their online shenanigans escalate ― people on the internet are shipping them?? ― their battle gets more and more personal, until even these two rivals can’t ignore they were destined for the most unexpected, awkward, all-the-feels romance that neither of them expected.
Description from Goodreads.
“From meme wars to social media marketing, Lord accurately depicts various sides of today’s online culture. Amid all the digital hoopla is an engaging story about family loyalty and pursuing one’s own passions… A just-right combination of sweet and cheesy.” – Kirkus Reviews
“A precursor to the way teen love stories will be told for years to come.” – Booklist
“Filled with humor, heart, and a dose of social media reality… debut author Lord packs a punch in this adorably fun novel.” – School Library Journal
Available Formats:
Print Book
NONFICTION
A Very Stable Genius: Donald J. Trump’s Testing of America by Philip Rucker & Carol Leonnig
Rucker and Leonnig have deep and unmatched sources throughout Washington, D.C., and for the past three years have chronicled in depth the ways President Donald Trump has reinvented the presidency in his own image, shaken foreign alliances and tested American institutions. It would be all too easy to mistake Trump’s first term for pure chaos. But Leonnig and Rucker show that in fact there is a pattern and meaning to the daily disorder. Relying on scores of exclusive new interviews with first-hand witnesses and rigorous original reporting, the authors reveal the 45th President up close as he stares down impeachment. They take readers inside Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation and the Trump legal team’s scramble for survival, behind the curtains as the West Wing scurries to clean up the President’s mistakes and into the room to witness Trump’s interactions with foreign leaders and members of his Cabinet, and assess the consequences.
Description from Goodreads.
“[Rucker and Leonnig] are meticulous journalists, and this taut and terrifying book is among the most closely observed accounts of Donald J. Trump’s shambolic tenure in office to date… Their newspaper’s ominous, love-it-or-hate-it motto is ‘Democracy Dies in Darkness.’ A Very Stable Genius flicks the lights on from its first pages.” – New York Times
“Imagine, for a moment, a high-octane courtroom prosecutor summing up for the jury a case built on the vivid testimony of multiple eye-witnesses… You could scarcely ask for more capable advocates. Leonnig won a Pulitzer Prize for her reporting on the U.S. Secret Service in 2015, then joined Rucker and others on a team awarded the Pulitzer for stories on Russian interference in the 2016 election. Their new, collaborative account… walks readers step by step through the first 30 months or so of a presidency like no other… harrowing…” – NPR
“As befitting Pulitzer winners for investigative reporting, [Rucker and Leonnig’s] book is richly sourced and highly readable. It sheds new light on how the 45th president tests the boundaries of the office while trying the patience and dignity of those who work for or with him. It is not just another Trump tell-all or third-party confessional. It is unsettling, not salacious.” – The Guardian
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