New Releases: October 30, 2020
Adult Fiction
Daughter of Black Lake - Cathy Marie Buchanan
Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Historical
In a northern misty bog surrounded by woodlands and wheat fields, a settlement lies far beyond the reach of the Romans invading hundreds of miles to the southeast. Here, life is simple, or so it seems to the tightly knit community. Sow. Reap. Honor Mother Earth, who will provide at harvest-time. A girl named Devout comes of age, sweetly flirting with the young man she's tilled alongside all her life, and envisions a future of love and abundance. Seventeen years later, though, the settlement is a changed place. Famine has brought struggle, and outsiders, with their foreign ways and military might, have arrived at the doorstep. For Devout's daughter, life is more troubled than her mother ever anticipated. But she has an extraordinary gift. As worlds collide and peril threatens, it will be up to her to save her family and community. Immersing readers in a lost world of pagan traditions, Daughter of Black Lake is a transporting story of love, family, survival, and the sublime power of the natural world.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Daughter of the Black Lake” by Cathy Marie Buchanan
Devil and the Dark Water - Stuart Turton
Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Historical, Thriller
Samuel Pipps is the greatest detective of his day . . . but now he's a prisoner, accused of an unknown crime by one of the world's most powerful men. Along with his faithful sidekick, Arent Hayes, he's sailing back to Amsterdam from the East Indies, where he'll stand trial. But no sooner are they out to sea than devilry begins to blight the voyage. Still shackled in his cell, Pipps sends Hayes to solve a mystery that connects every passenger on board. All hope is pinned on Hayes solving the mystery, but when he goes missing, Pipps is faced with the most dangerous puzzle of his career. All the while, voices whisper to him in the dark. But are those whispers clues? Warnings? Or the devil himself?
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Devil and the Dark Water” by Stuart Turton
The Girl in the Mirror - Rose Carlyle
Genres: Fiction, Thriller
Cynical and insecure, Iris has long been envious of her twin sister Summer's seemingly never-ending good fortune... including her perfect husband Adam. Called to Thailand to help her sister sail the family yacht to the Seychelles, Iris unexpectedly finds herself alone in the middle of the Indian Ocean. When she makes it to land, Iris allows herself to be swept up by Adam, who assumes that she is Summer. Now she has the golden life she's always envied, and is one step closer to the hundred-million-dollar inheritance left by her manipulative father. All Iris has to do is be the first of his seven children to produce an heir. How far will she go to ensure no one discovers the truth?
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “The Girl in the Mirror” by Rose Carlyle
The Invisible Life of Addie Larue - V. E. Schwab
Genres: Fiction, Historical, Fantasy
France, 1714. In a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever-- and cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Addie LaRue's life will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art. After nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore. He remembers her name-- and everything changes. How far will she go to leave her mark on the world?
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “The Invisible Life of Addie Larue” by V. E. Schwab
Life After Life - Kate Atkinson
Genres: Fiction, Magical Realism
What if you could live again and again, until you got it right? On a cold and snowy night in 1910, Ursula Todd is born to an English banker and his wife. She dies before she can draw her first breath. On that same cold and snowy night, Ursula Todd is born, lets out a lusty wail, and embarks upon a life that will be, to say the least, unusual. For as she grows, she also dies, repeatedly, in a variety of ways, while the young century marches on towards its second cataclysmic world war. Does Ursula's apparently infinite number of lives give her the power to save the world from its inevitable destiny? And if she can -- will she?
Medicine Walk - Richard Wagamese
Genres: Fiction
Franklin Starlight is called to visit his father, Eldon. He's sixteen years old and has had the most fleeting of relationships with the man. The rare moments they've shared haunt and trouble Frank, but he answers the call, a son's duty to a father. What ensues is a journey through the rugged and beautiful backcountry, and a journey into the past, as the two men push forward to Eldon's end. From a poverty-stricken childhood, to the Korean War, and later the derelict houses of mill towns, Eldon relates both the desolate moments of his life and a time of redemption and love, and in doing so offers Frank a history he has never known, the father he has never had, and a connection to himself he never expected.
A Song for the Dark Times (Inspector Rebus #23) - Ian Rankin
Genres: Fiction, Mystery, Thriller
When his daughter Samantha calls in the dead of night, John Rebus knows it's not good news. Her husband has been missing for two days. Rebus fears the worst - and knows from his lifetime in the police that his daughter will be the prime suspect. He wasn't the best father - the job always came first - but now his daughter needs him more than ever. But is he going as a father or a detective? As he leaves at dawn to drive to the windswept coast - and a small town with big secrets - he wonders whether this might be the first time in his life where the truth is the one thing he doesn't want to find...
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “A Song for the Dark Times” by Ian Rankin
Still Life (Karen Pirie #6) - Val McDermid
Genres: Fiction, Mystery, Thriller
When a lobster fisherman on an early morning run pulls in his traps, he finds something he wasn't expecting to catch-a body. Turns out the dead man was the brother of a senior Scottish government official who vanished without a trace, and Detective Chief Inspector Karen Pirie is asked to take over the investigation. At the same time, a woman in the wealthy enclave of Perth is clearing out her sister's home after a fatal road accident and finds a mysterious camper van in the garage containing a skeletonized body. But who is it? And how long has it been there? The two cases will draw Karen into the world of imposters, identity theft, and art forgery.
A Time For Mercy (Jake Brigance #3) - John Grisham
Genres: Fiction, Mystery, Thriller
Jake is the court-appointed lawyer for Drew Gamble, a young man accused of murdering a local deputy. Many in Clanton want a swift trial and the death penalty, but Brigance sees it another way. Once he learns the details of the case, he realizes he has to do everything he can to save Drew--who is sixteen. Jake's commitment to the truth puts his career and the safety of his family at risk.
Transcendent Kingdom - Yaa Gyasi
Genres: Fiction
Gifty is a fifth year candidate in neuroscience at Stanford University's School of Medicine studying reward-seeking behaviour in mice and the neural circuits of depression and addiction. Her brother, Nana, was a gifted high school athlete who died of a heroin overdose after a knee injury left him hooked on OxyContin. Her suicidal mother is living in her bed. Gifty is determined to discover the scientific basis for the suffering she sees all around her. But even as she turns to hard science to unlock the mystery of her family's loss, she finds herself hungering for her childhood faith, and grappling with the evangelical church in which she was raised, whose promise of salvation remains as tantalizing as it is elusive. Transcendent Kingdom is a deeply moving portrait of a family of Ghanaian immigrants ravaged by depression and addiction and grief--a novel about faith, science, religion, love.
Troubles in Paradise (Paradise #3) - Elin Hilderbrand
Genres: Fiction, Mystery
After uprooting her life, Irene Steele has just settled in at the villa on St. John where her husband Russ had been living a double life. But a visit from the FBI shakes her foundations, and Irene once again learns just how little she knew about the man she loved.
Meanwhile, as Irene and her sons try to get on with setting up their new lives, evidence mounts that the helicopter crash that killed Russ may not have been an accident.
As a storm gathers strength in the Atlantic, all will be revealed about the secrets and lies that brought Irene and her sons to St. John at last.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Troubles in Paradise” by Elin Hilderbrand
When We Were Young and Brave - Hazel Gaynor
Genres: Fiction, Historical
China, December 1941. Elspeth Kent left England for a teaching post at a missionary school in northern China. Ten-year-old Nancy Plummer has always felt safe at Chefoo School, protected by her British status. When Japan declares war on Britain and America, Japanese forces take control of the school. Nancy and her friends face privation, uncertainty and fear. The children look to their teachers- to Miss Kent and her new Girl Guide patrol especially- to provide a sense of unity and safety. Sent to a distant internment camp, even greater uncertainty and danger await.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “When We Were Young and Brave” by Hazel Gaynor
Adult Non-Fiction
Be Water, My Friend - Shannon Lee
Genres: Non-fiction, Spirituality
Bruce Lee's daughter illuminates her father's most powerful life philosophies--demonstrating how martial arts are a perfect metaphor for personal growth, and how we can practice those teachings every day. "Empty your mind; be formless, shapeless like water." Bruce Lee is a cultural icon, renowned the world over for his martial arts and film legacy. But Lee was also a deeply philosophical thinker, learning at an early age that martial arts are more than just an exercise in physical discipline--they are an apt metaphor for living a fully realized life. Now, in Be Water, My Friend, Lee's daughter Shannon shares the concepts at the core of his philosophies, showing how they can serve as tools of personal growth and self-actualization. Each chapter brings a lesson from Bruce Lee's teachings, expanding on the foundation of his iconic "be water" philosophy. Over the course of the book, we discover how being like water allows us to embody fluidity and naturalness in life, bringing us closer to our essential flowing nature and our ability to be powerful, self-expressed, and free. Through previously untold stories from her father's life and from her own journey in embodying these lessons, Shannon presents these philosophies in tangible, accessible ways. With Bruce Lee's words as a guide, she encourages readers to pursue their essential selves and apply these ideas and practices to their everyday lives--whether in learning new things, overcoming obstacles, or ultimately finding their true path. Be Water, My Friend is an inspirational invitation to us all, a gentle call to action to consider our lives with new eyes. It is also a testament to how one man's exploration and determination transcended time and place to ignite our imaginations--and to inspire many around the world to transform their lives.
Field Notes from a Pandemic - Ethan Lou
Genres: Non-fiction, Health
Equal parts travelogue and pandemic guide, journalist Ethan Lou examines the societal effects of COVID-19 and takes us on a mesmerizing journey around a world that will never be the same. Visiting Beijing in January to see his dying grandfather, Canadian journalist Ethan Lou unknowingly walks into a state under siege. In his journey out of China and into other hot zones in Asia and Europe, he finds himself witnessing the very earliest stages of a virus that will forever change the world as we know it. Lou argues that Coronavirus will have a far greater impact than SARS, for example, simply because China is now many more times integrated with the increasingly interconnected world. Over decades, globalization has crafted a world painfully sensitive and susceptible to shocks such as this pandemic. A crisis like it has thus been long overdue--and we have yet to see it unfold fully. In our integrated world, events that may previously be isolated now ripple farther and wider and in ways we do not expect and cannot foresee. We have not seen the worst, and if and when we outlast this pandemic, nothing will ever be the same--not just healthcare systems but also economies, politics and culture. Decisions now--or indecisions--will shape and define the world for decades. These ideas are fleshed out through the virus's spawning and how it spread, the unprecedented measures to contain it and an examination of past pandemics and other crises and how they shaped the world--and an argument for why this one's different. Lou shows how drastically the virus has transformed the world and charts the greater and more radical shifts to come. His ideas and arguments are framed around his journey around the world, whose path the virus seemed to follow until he landed safely in quarantine in a small town in Germany where he was able to take stock and start telling his story.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Field Notes from a Pandemic” by Ethan Lou
Finding Murph - Rick Westhead
Genres: Non-fiction, Biography, Sports
Joe Murphy had it all. In 1986, he became the first college-educated hockey player selected first overall in the NHL entry draft. He won a Stanley Cup in Edmonton alongside Mark Messier four years later. But since then, his life has taken a tragic turn, largely due to the untreated brain injuries he suffered as a player. Murphy's life didn't begin on a track that would take him to homelessness and substance abuse. He was smart, dedicated to hockey, and he wasn't afraid to chart his own course. Murphy once scored eighty-two points in a season and was a key player for the Oilers, Red Wings and Blackhawks, among other teams. But one vicious body check during a game changed his life forever. Despite being shaken by the hit, Murphy was cleared to return to the game. Soon after, his entire life seemed to change. Murphy became a journeyman, moving from team to team. Along the way, other NHLers said they noticed something different about him too. Murphy wasn't acting like himself. He was using drugs and alcohol and soon found himself out of the NHL entirely. Eventually, Murphy became homeless. In the spring of 2018, Murphy made his way to Kenora, Ontario, where he lived in the bush, spending his days outside a local convenience store, muttering to himself and taking handouts of food and drinks from passersby. The player who had once set the NHL aflame now slept by the side of the road in the unforgiving North. In Finding Murph, Rick Westhead traces the tragic true story of Joe Murphy and examines the role of the NHL in the downward spiral of one of the league's most promising players.
Four Umbrellas - June Hutton & Tony Wanless
Genres: Non-fiction, Autobiography
A writing couple searches for answers when Alzheimer's causes one of them to lose the place where stories come from -- memory. At the age of fifty-three, Tony walks away from a life of journalism and into an unknown future dogged by self-doubt and financial worry. June is forty-eight years old then, a writer and a teacher, and over the following nine years she watches as her husband gradually changes -- in interests, goals, and behaviour -- until Tony has a sudden fall, ending their life as they have known it. While it will be another seven years before they receive a diagnosis of Alzheimer's, the signs of dementia are all around. A suitcase Tony packs for a trip contains four umbrellas jammed into every available space, a visual symbol of cognitive looping. But how far back do these signs go? The two of them begin looking, researching, and remembering -- and make some surprising discoveries about Alzheimer's that lead to one undeniable conclusion: this is not an old person's disease.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Four Umbrellas” by June Hutton & Tony Wanless
Golem Girl - Riva Lehrer
Genres: Non-fiction, Autobiography
What do we sacrifice in the pursuit of normalcy? And what becomes possible when we embrace monstrosity? In 1958, Riva is one of the first children born with spina bifida to survive. Her parents and doctors are determined to "fix" her, sending the message over and over again that she is broken. That she will never have a job, a romantic relationship, or an independent life. Enduring countless medical interventions, Riva tries her best to be a good girl and a good patient in the quest to be cured. Everything changes when, as an adult, Riva is invited to join a group of artists, writers, and performers who are building Disability Culture. Their work is daring, edgy, funny, and dark; it rejects tropes that define disabled people as pathetic, frightening, or worthless. They insist that disability is an opportunity for creativity and resistance. Emboldened, Riva asks if she can paint their portraits--an intimate and collaborative process that will transform the way she sees herself, others, and the world. With each portrait, and each person's story, the myths she's been told her whole life--about her body, her sexuality, and the value of normalcy--begin to crumble. Written with the vivid, cinematic prose of a visual artist, and the love and playfulness that defines all of Riva's work, Golem Girl is an extraordinary story of survival and creativity. With the author's magnificent portraits featured throughout, this memoir invites us to stretch ourselves toward a world where bodies flow between all possible forms of what it is to be human.
Humans - Brandon Stanton
Genres: Non-fiction
Brandon Stanton's new book, Humans ... shows us the world. Brandon Stanton created Humans of New York in 2010. What began as a photographic census of life in New York City, soon evolved into a storytelling phenomenon. A global audience of millions began following HONY daily. Over the next several years, Stanton broadened his lens to include people from across the world. Traveling to more than forty countries, he conducted interviews across continents, borders, and language barriers. Humans is the definitive catalogue of these travels. The faces and locations will vary from page to page, but the stories will feel deeply familiar. Told with candor and intimacy, Humans will resonate with readers across the globe-providing a portrait of our shared experience.
Is This Anything? - Jerry Seinfeld
Genres: Non-fiction, Comedy
Since his first performance at the legendary New York nightclub "Catch a Rising Star" as a twenty-one-year-old college student in fall of 1975, Jerry Seinfeld has written his own material and saved everything. "Whenever I came up with a funny bit, whether it happened on a stage, in a conversation, or working it out on my preferred canvas, the big yellow legal pad, I kept it in one of those old school accordion folders," Seinfeld writes. "So I have everything I thought was worth saving from forty-five years of hacking away at this for all I was worth." For this book, Jerry Seinfeld has selected his favorite material, organized decade by decade. In page after hilarious page, one brilliantly crafted observation after another, readers will witness the evolution of one of the great comedians of our time and gain new insights into the thrilling but unforgiving art of writing stand-up comedy.
Speaking for Myself - Sarah Huckabee Sanders
Genres: Non-fiction, Autobiography
A candid, riveting account of the Trump White House, on the front lines and behind the scenes. Sarah Huckabee Sanders served as White House Press Secretary for President Donald J. Trump from 2017 to 2019. A trusted confidante of the President, Sanders advised him on everything from press and communications strategy to personnel and policy. She was at the President's side for two and a half years, battling with the media, working with lawmakers and CEOs, and accompanying the President on every international trip, including dozens of meetings with foreign leaders--all while unfailingly exhibiting grace under pressure. Upon her departure from the administration, President Trump described Sarah as "irreplaceable," a "warrior" and "very special person with extraordinary talents, who has done an incredible job." Now, in Speaking for Myself, Sarah Huckabee Sanders describes what it was like on the front lines and inside the White House, discussing her faith, the challenges of being a working mother at the highest level of American politics, her relationship with the press, and her unique role in the historic fight raging between the Trump administration and its critics for the future of our country. This frank, revealing, and engaging memoir will offer a truly unique perspective on the most important issues and events of the era, and unprecedented access to both public and behind-the-scenes conversations within the Trump White House.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Speaking for Myself” by Sarah Huckabee Sanders
Spectrums - Maxfield Sparrows
Genres: Non-fiction, Anthology
This is an edited collection of human stories from trans autistic writers. The stories collected in this anthology address the struggles and joys of living at the intersection of neurodivergence and gender divergence with personal insight and nuance. They explore the positives of deep self-knowledge, belonging to a community and living a life in tune with one's inner being. They also address common struggles such as suicide, homelessness, and barriers to adequate healthcare. These are human narratives: lives filled with pain and pleasure, accomplishments and setbacks. The flesh-and-blood realities of the contributors' lives goes beyond the story told by statistics and research on the subject.
Young Adult Fiction
Love, Creekwood (Simonverse #3.5) - Becky Albertalli
Genres: Young adult fiction
It's been more than a year since Simon and Blue turned their anonymous online flirtation into an IRL relationship, and just a few months since Abby and Leah's unforgettable night at senior prom. Now the Creekwood High crew are in their first years at different colleges, navigating friendship and romance the way their story began-- on email.
The Once and Future Witches - Alix E Harrow
Genres: Young adult fiction, Fantasy
In 1893, there's no such thing as witches. There used to be, in the wild, dark days before the burnings began, but now witching is nothing but tidy charms and nursery rhymes. If the modern woman wants any measure of power, she must find it at the ballot box. But when the Eastwood sisters -- James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna -- join the suffragists of New Salem, they begin to pursue the forgotten words and ways that might turn the women's movement into the witch's movement. Stalked by shadows and sickness, hunted by forces who will not suffer a witch to vote -- and perhaps not even to live -- the sisters will need to delve into the oldest magics, draw new alliances, and heal the bond between them if they want to survive. There's no such thing as witches. But there will be.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “The Once and Future Witches” by Alix E Harrow
Star Daughter - Shveta Thakrar
Genres: Young adult fiction, Fantasy
The daughter of a star and a mortal, Sheetal is used to keeping secrets. Pretending to be "normal." But when an accidental flare of her starfire puts her human father in the hospital, Sheetal needs a full star's help to heal him. A star like her mother, who returned to the sky long ago.
Sheetal's quest to save her father will take her to a celestial court of shining wonders and dark shadows, where she must take the stage as her family's champion in a competition to decide the next ruling house of the heavens--and win, or risk never returning to Earth at all.
Junior Fiction
The Flower of the Witch - Enrico Orlandi
Genres: Junior fiction, Graphic novel, Fantasy
Defeating monsters and saving princesses has not been enough, and now he must find the fabled flower of the witch. But in his quest, Tami inadvertently sparks a feud between the villagers who shelter him and the demon Yabra! And when the conflict comes to a head, Tami will have to choose between proving himself as a man and protecting the villagers he has come to love.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “The Flower of the Witch” by Enrico Orlandi
Here in the Real World - Sara Pennypacker
Genres: Junior fiction
Ware can't wait to spend summer "off in his own world"--dreaming of knights in the Middle Ages and generally being left alone. But then his parents sign him up for dreaded Rec camp, where he must endure Meaningful Social Interaction and whatever activities so-called "normal" kids do. On his first day Ware meets Jolene, a tough, secretive girl planting a garden in the rubble of an abandoned church next to the camp. Soon he starts skipping Rec, creating a castle-like space of his own in the church lot. Jolene scoffs, calling him a dreamer--he doesn't live in the "real world" like she does. As different as Ware and Jolene are, though, they have one thing in common: for them, the lot is a refuge. But when their sanctuary is threatened, Ware looks to the knights' Code of Chivalry: Thou shalt do battle against unfairness wherever faced with it. Thou shalt be always the champion of the Right and Good--and vows to save the lot.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Here in the Real World” by Sara Pennypacker
Kitchen Princess (Vol. 1-3) - Natsumi Ando
Genres: Junior fiction, Graphic novel, Romance
Najika is a great cook and likes to make meals for the people she loves. But something is missing from her life. When she was a child, she met a boy who touched her heart-- and now she's determined to find him. The only clue Najika has is a silver spoon that leads her to the prestigious Seika Academy. Attending Seika will be a challenge. Every kid at the school has a special talent, and the girls in Najika's class think she doesn't deserve to be there. But Sora and Daichi, two popular brothers who barely speak to each other, recognize Najika's cooking for what it is-- magical. Is either boy Najika's mysterious prince?
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Kitchen Princess (Vol. 1-3) by Natsumi Ando
Over the Woodward Wall - A Deborah Baker
Genres: Junior fiction, Fantasy
Avery is an exceptional child. Everything he does is precise, from the way he washes his face in the morning, to the way he completes his homework - without complaint, without fuss, without prompt. Zib is also an exceptional child, because all children are, in their own way. But where everything Avery does and is can be measured, nothing Zib does can possibly be predicted, except for the fact that she can always be relied upon to be unpredictable. They live on the same street. They live in different worlds. On an unplanned detour from home to school one morning, Avery and Zib find themselves climbing over a stone wall into the Up and Under - an impossible land filled with mystery, adventure and the strangest creatures. And they must find themselves and each other if they are to also find their way out and back to their own lives.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Over the Woodward Wall” by A Deborah Baker
Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson
Genres: Junior fiction, Graphic novel
The story begins with the death of an old sailor and the discovery of a secret treasure map. Young Jack Hawkins sets out on the biggest adventure of his life. Will he live to tell the tale? Find out in this vivid graphic novel retelling of Robert Louis Stevenson's literary classic.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Treasure Island” by Robert Louis Stevenson
Early Chapter
Izzy in the Doghouse - Caroline Adderson
Genres: Early chapter
Seven-year-old Isabel is an adopted, only child, who lives with her single mom and her nanny, Rosa. Isabel's best friend is Zoë. Zoë adores the shenanigans they get up to together, EXCEPT when it gets them into trouble, which does happen now and then! Getting into trouble is Zoë's idea of CATASTROPHE. Each time it happens, it means the friendship is on the rocks -- freeze-out time. Whenever this happens, it's really tough on Isabel, who desperately misses her best friend and doesn't feel like herself at all. Isabel decides that her problem must be that she has TOO MUCH LOVE and not enough people to give it to. Luckily, her mom and Rosa present her with a solution! They decide to adopt a dog. "Just like when Mom adopted me!" Isabel thinks. Now Isabel will have her very own baby to LOVE LOVE LOVE with all her heart. But she soon discovers taking care of a baby is not as easy as she thought ... And when things go wrong, that's when Zoë and Isabel's friendship really shines through.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “Izzy in the Doghouse” by Caroline Adderson
Beginner Reader
The World Needs More Purple People - Kristen Bell & Benjamin Hart
Genres: Beginner reader
What is a purple person? Great question. I mean, really great! Because purple people always ask really great questions. They bring their family, friends, and communities together, and they speak up for what's right. They are kind and hardworking, and they love to laugh (especially at Grandpa's funny noises)! A purple person is an everyday superhero! How do you become one? That's the fun part! Penny Purple will lead you through the steps. Get ready to be silly, exercise your curiosity, use your voice, and be inspired.
CLICK HERE TO RESERVE “The World Needs More Purple People” by Kristen Bell & Benjamin Hart
