Spring is almost here! How about checking out the latest books in our collection while listening to those March winds!
Adult Fiction
Big Time by Ben H. Winters ~ Grace – The best part of Grace’s job at the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health is that she can clock out at five. She’s got things to do–like care for her aging, cantankerous mother, her angsty and remarkably bright teenager–with little time for herself to spare. Which is why Grace is peeved when in the late evening, she’s called into work. A woman has appeared at a local hospital, injured, shaken, and with an unusual portacath implanted in her chest. The hospital cannot recognize the model. As Grace investigates, the scant info on the device’s provenance appears apocryphal. What’s been done to this girl? And who is behind it?
Ana – When she comes to, she realizes she’s been taken. She’s in the back seat of a black woozy, scared. She’d been asleep, and then she’d been awake, a woman with a catalog face, dressed in tailored pants and a crisp white blouse had dragged her out of her tent beneath the overpass and stabbed her in the neck. The same woman who was now in the front seat. Somehow, Ana escapes. When she arrives at a hospital in Hanover, Maryland, she’s found with an usual device attached to her body. Ana is confused, and as she tries to grasp for any memory or scrap of the past, she comes up empty. She can’t remember anything.
Desiree – Desiree is on fire with pain, the pulp of her right eye a bloody mess. She can’t believe the girl had blinded her, can’t believe that she’d escaped. Tending to the it had set her back. And now the client is not happy. What she needs is to fulfill the mission. Desiree has a job to do, and she is almost out of time. . .
The Haunting of Velkwood by Gwendolyn Kiste ~ The Velkwood Vicinity was the topic of occult theorists, tabloid one-hour documentaries, and even some pseudo-scientific investigations as the block of homes disappeared behind a near-impenetrable veil that only three survivors could enter—and only one has in the past twenty years, until now. Talitha Velkwood has avoided anything to do with the tragedy that took her mother and eight-year-old sister, drifting from one job to another, never settling anywhere or with anyone, feeling as trapped by her past as if she was still there in the small town she so desperately wanted to escape from. When a new researcher tracks her down and offers to pay her to come back to enter the vicinity, Talitha claims she’s just doing it for the money. Of all the crackpot theories over the years, no one has discovered what happened the night Talitha, her estranged, former best friend Brett, and Grace, escaped their homes twenty years ago. Will she finally get the answers she’s been looking for all these years, or is this just another dead end?
Finlay Donovan Rolls the Dice by Elle Cosimano ~ Finlay Donovan and her nanny/partner-in-crime Vero are in sore need of a girls’ weekend away. They plan a trip to Atlantic City, but odds are-seeing as it’s actually a cover story to negotiate a deal with a dangerous loan shark, save Vero’s childhood crush Javi, and hunt down a stolen car-it won’t be all fun and games. When Finlay’s ex-husband Steven and her mother insist on tagging along too, Finlay and Vero suddenly have a few too many meddlesome passengers along for the ride. Within hours of arriving in their seedy casino hotel, it becomes clear their rescue mission is going to be a bust. Javi’s kidnapper, Marco, refuses to negotiate, demanding payment in full in exchange for Javi’s life. But that’s not all-he insists on knowing the whereabouts of his missing nephew, Ike, who mysteriously disappeared. Unable to confess what really happened to Ike, Finlay and Vero are forced to come up with a new plan: sleuth out the location of Javi and the Aston Martin, then steal them both back. But when they sneak into the loan shark’s suite to search for clues, they find more than they bargained for-Marco’s already dead. They don’t have a clue who murdered him, only that they themselves have a very convincing motive. Then four members of the police department unexpectedly show up in town, also looking for Ike-and after Finlay’s night with hot cop Nick at the police academy, he’s a little too eager to keep her close to his side. If Finlay can juggle a jealous ex-husband, two precocious kids, her mother’s marital issues, a decomposing loan shark, and find Vero’s missing boyfriend, she might get out of Atlantic City in one piece. But will she fold under the pressure and come clean about the things she’s done, or be forced to double down?
The Hunter by Tana French ~ It’s a blazing summer when two men arrive in a small village in the West of Ireland. One of them is coming home. Both of them are coming to get rich. One of them is coming to die. Cal Hooper took early retirement from Chicago PD and moved to rural Ireland looking for peace. He’s found it, more or less: he’s built a relationship with a local woman, Lena, and he’s gradually turning Trey Reddy from a half-feral teenager into a good kid going good places. But then Trey’s long-absent father reappears, bringing along an English millionaire and a scheme to find gold in the townland, and suddenly everything the three of them have been building is under threat. Cal and Lena are both ready to do whatever it takes to protect Trey, but Trey doesn’t want protecting. What she wants is revenge. From the writer who is “in a class by herself,” (The New York Times), a nuanced, atmospheric tale that explores what we’ll do for our loved ones, what we’ll do for revenge, and what we sacrifice when the two collide.
Adult Non-Fiction
Change your diet, change your mind : a powerful plan to improve mood, overcome anxiety, and protect memory for a lifetime of optimal mental health by Georgia Ede ~ We are in the midst of a global mental health crisis: -More than one in six American adults now take psychiatric medication. -The prevalence of Alzheimer’s disease is expected to triple by 2050. -Depression is now the number one cause of disability in the world. -The COVID-19 pandemic has quadrupled reports of anxiety and depression. Although medications may ease suffering for some, in Change Your Diet, Change Your Mind, Dr. Georgia Ede argues that the most powerful way to change brain chemistry is with food, because what we eat is where our brain’s chemicals come from. For years, we’ve been told the way to protect our brains is through superfoods and supplements–we top our oatmeal with blueberries, choose plant-based patties over hamburgers, and wash down handfuls of supplements with green smoothies. But the science says: not only do these strategies fail people, but they can also work against them. The truth about brain food is that meat is not dangerous, vegan diets are not healthier, and antioxidants will not help you. In this provocative, illuminating book, Dr. Ede explains why everything we think we know about eating for neurological psychological well-being is wrong. Most of what we accept as true is based on studies that take an “outside-in” approach, making associations between healthy people and what they eat.
Medgar & Myrlie : Medgar Evers and the love story that awakened America by Joy-Ann Lomena Reid ~ Reid traces the extraordinary lives and legacy of civil rights icons Medgar and Myrlie Evers, situating Medgar Evers’s assassination as a catalyzing moment in American history. Myrlie Louise Beasley met Medgar Evers on her first day of college. They fell in love at first sight, married just one year later, and Myrlie left school to focus on their growing family. Medgar became the field secretary for the Mississippi branch of the NAACP, charged with beating back the most intractable and violent resistance to black voting rights in the country. Myrlie served as Medgar’s secretary and confidant, working hand in hand with him as they struggled against public accommodations and school segregation, lynching, violence, and sheer despair within their state’s “black belt.” They fought to desegregate the intractable University of Mississippi, organized picket lines and boycotts, despite repeated terroristic threats, including the 1962 firebombing of their home, where they lived with their three young children. On June 12, 1963, Medgar Evers became the highest profile victim of Klan-related assassination of a black civil rights leader at that time; gunned down in the couple’s driveway in Jackson. In the wake of his tragic death, Myrlie carried on their civil rights legacy; writing a book about Medgar’s fight, trying to win a congressional seat, and becoming a leader of the NAACP in her own right. In this groundbreaking and thrilling account of two heroes of the civil rights movement, Joy-Ann Reid uses Medgar and Myrlie’s relationship as a lens through which to explore the on-the-ground work that went into winning basic rights for Black Americans, and the repercussions that still resonate today.
Four thousand paws : caring for the dogs of the Iditarod by Dr. Lee Morgan ~ An intimate account―the first from a trail veterinarian―of the canines who brave the challenges of the Iditarod. Few events attract as much attention, or create as much spectacle, as the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. Each March, despite subzero temperatures and white-out winds, hundreds of dogs and mushers journey to Anchorage, Alaska, to participate in “The Last Great Race on Earth,” a grueling, thousand-mile race across the Alaskan wilderness. In Four Thousand Paws , award-winning trail veterinarian Lee Morgan tells the story of the heroic canine athletes who, using only their muscle and an innate drive to race, carry handlers between frozen outposts, risking injury, illness, and fatigue. From the huskies of Iditarods past to the dauntless dogs of today, Morgan shows how competitors surmount the dangers of the Arctic; how their body language anticipates the race; and how they despair, often refusing to eat, when pulled.
Relinquished : the politics of adoption and the privilege of American motherhood by Gretchen E. Sisson ~ A powerful decade-long study of adoption in the age of Roe, revealing the grief of the American mothers for whom the choice to parent was never real Adoption has always been viewed as a beloved institution for building families, as well as a mutually agreeable common ground in the abortion debate, but little attention has been paid to the lives of mothers who relinquish infants for private adoption. Relinquished reveals adoption to be a path of constrained choice for those for whom abortion is inaccessible, or for whom parenthood is untenable. The stories of relinquishing mothers are stories about our country’s refusal to care for families at the most basic level, and to instead embrace an individual, private solution to a large-scale, social problem. With the recent decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization revoking abortion protections and the upcoming decision in Brackeen v. Haaland likely to revoke the Indian Child Welfare Act, we are in a political moment in which adoption is, increasingly, being revealed as an institution devoted to separating families and policing parenthood under the guise of feel-good family-building. Rooted in a long-term study, Relinquished is an analysis of hundreds of in-depth interviews with American mothers who placed their children for domestic adoption. The voices of these women are powerful and heartrending; they deserve to be heard as a response to this moment.
Young Adult
The Prisoner’s Throne by Holly Black ~ Prince Oak is paying for his betrayal. Imprisoned in the icy north and bound to the will of a monstrous new queen, he must rely on charm and calculation to survive. With High King Cardan and High Queen Jude ready to use any means necessary to retrieve their stolen heir, should Oak attempt to regain the trust of the girl he’s always loved, or remain loyal to Elfhame and hand over the means to end her reign – even if it means ending Wren too…With war looming and treachery lurking in every corner, neither Oak’s guile nor his wit will be enough to keep everyone he loves alive. He will have some terrible choices to make.
Skater Boy by Anthony Nerada ~ Stonebridge High’s resident bad boy, Wesley “Big Mac” Mackenzie, is failing senior year–thanks to his unchecked anger, rowdy friends, and a tendency to ditch his homework for skateboarding and a secret photography obsession. So when his mom drags him to a production of The Nutcracker, Wes isn’t interested at all . . . until he sees Tristan Monroe. Mr. Nutcracker himself. Wes knows he shouldn’t like Tristan; after all, he’s a ballet dancer, and Wes is as closeted as they come. But when they start spending time together, Wes can’t seem to get Tristan out of his head. Driven by a new sense of purpose, Wes begins to think that–despite every authority figure telling him otherwise–maybe he can change for the better and graduate on time.
Daughter of the Bone Forest by Jasmine Skye ~ Two girls reluctantly bound by fate must weather a dangerous courtship as a prophesied war grows ever closer in Jasmine Skye’s high-stakes, queernormative dark fantasy debut, Daughter of the Bone Forest. Rosy is a bone familiar, gifted with the power to shift into animals marked with exposed bone. She spends most of her days in the magical Bone Forest, caring for her feral grandmother and hiding her powers to avoid conscription by the Witch King’s army. Until the day that Princess Shaw, a witch known as Death’s Heir, visits the Forest. When Rosy saves Shaw’s life, the princess offers her the chance to attend the prestigious school, Witch Hall, as payment. Though Rosy is wary of Shaw’s intentions, she cannot pass up the opportunity to find the cure for her grandmother’s affliction. But at Witch Hall, Rosy finds herself embroiled in political games she doesn’t understand. Shaw wants Rosy for her entourage, a partner to help lead the coming war. All Rosy wants is to stay out of trouble until she can graduate and save her grandmother, but she can’t deny her attraction to Shaw or the comfort Shaw’s magic gives her. Will Rosy give in to her destiny, or will the Bone Forest call her home once and for all?
A Suffragist’s Guide to the Antarctic by Yi Shun Lai ~ In 1914 England, eighteen-year-old American Clara lies about her age and citizenship to land a coveted spot on an Antarctic expedition, but when the crew is marooned on an ice floe, Clara’s mission to advance the women’s suffrage movement takes a back seat to survival.
