If you could relive your last day, what would you do differently? This is what Samantha asks herself when, after a fatal accident driving from a party on Friday, she wakes in her bed to find she must repeat the entire day again. And again. As Samantha lives through multiple Fridays, desperate to prevent her death, she is struck by how even the most insignificant acts, like running late for school instead of being on time, can change everything. Suddenly she is noticing uncomfortable things—about her friends, about herself—she has never noticed before. It’s the ultimate learning experience, and it takes Samantha seven times—not to save her own life but to leave with one she can be proud of. Oliver, in a pitch-perfect teen voice, explores the power we have to affect the people around us in this intensely believable first novel. Samantha grows from an entitled, popular, yet insecure girl to one with the compassion and guts to make the right decisions. This is a compelling book with a powerful message that will strike a chord with many teens.
California native Bennett’s debut novel, set in the U.S. Marine Corps base city of Oceanside, unflinchingly examines the consequences of secret decisions born of pain and fear as they play out in the lives of three young people, decade by decade. The story is narrated in part by the eponymous mothers, a chorus of elder church women who—having lived through it all—demonstrate no compunction in judging and discussing the choices made by their fellow parishioners of the Upper Room Chapel. Seventeen-year-old Nadia Turner, beautiful, brilliant and broken by the recent suicide of her mother, hastily falls in love with Luke, the pastor’s son, who is literally broken, having suffered a college career-ending football injury. An unplanned pregnancy followed by the decision to terminate ends their relationship as quickly as it began. Nadia befriends Aubrey, who is harboring her own deep, if unseen, wounds. Nadia’s eventual escape from Oceanside ends when she returns to care for her ill father, and, inevitably, the secrets all three have been keeping from each other are exposed in an eruption as shattering as one would expect, with life-altering fallout. Bennett’s writing is both wrenching and light. She deftly blends the complex and serious situations her characters face with innate humor and understanding in this deeply affecting coming-of-age story.
aubes takes the topic of his best-seller, Why We Get Fat and What to Do about It (2011), one step further in his latest. Beyond implicating carbohydrates as the enemy in modern diets, Taubes lays out, as his title suggests, the prosecution’s argument if sugar alone were to be tried in criminal court, charged for causing the Western World’s plagues of diabetes and obesity. Imagined concept aside, Taubes deals in science and fact, and what he relays is staggering. Namely, that the refutable “calories in versus calories out” theory of weight management has taken responsibility for illness away from sugar for more than a century; that the twentieth-century decision to blame fats and salt for heart disease is an overly assumptive and sadly immovable one; and that modern studies of the manifestation of diabetes and obesity in recently Westernized populations suggest that “we’re likely to be facing grave new problems moving forward if our sugar use isn’t dramatically curbed.” Acknowledging that responsible public-health policy and good nutrition science won’t always overlap, as well as the difficulty in testing the effects of any single food in our diets, Taubes confidently recommends giving a severe reduction in sugar intake a try.
In a world where humanity has conquered death and a fraternity called Scythes are the only ones allowed to kill people in order to curb overpopulation, Citra Terranova and Rowan Damisch must cope with their newfound and terrible responsibilities as apprentices in killing. A brilliant and gripping sci-fi thriller that acutely explores the consequences of worldwide immortality and asks readers to think critically about the nature of morality.
You might want to get a firm grip on your socks before cracking open this one; otherwise, Gonzales is likely to knock them off. It’s very difficult to categorize this mind-bending novel. Is it comedy? Science fiction? Thriller? Spoof? Whatever it is, it’s pure excitement. The story involves a shadowy organization called the Regional Office, described by its mission statement as “a barrier of last resort between the survival of the Planet and the amassing forces of Darkness”; as the book opens, the Regional Office is being attacked by those very forces. As the mayhem progresses, the focus zooms in on two women: Rose, who’s leading the attack, and Sarah, who’s fighting for her life defending the Regional Office (even as her colleagues are dying around her). The story jumps back and forth in time, showing us how Rose and Sarah became the women they are today: Rose is a trained assassin, Sarah is a potential killing machine with a cybernetic arm. The prose is lively and self-aware (the author clearly knows his story is way over the top and has fun with it for that very reason); meanwhile, though, the action is pretty much nonstop, and there’s a thread of melancholy running throughout—Rose and Sarah might have been ordinary young women if certain events, and the machinations of highly placed individuals who saw them as weapons, had not intervened. All in all, a brilliant genre-blender.
A crash course in Skepticism 101."Much of what we read should raise our suspicions," warns Levitin (Psychology and Behavioral Neuroscience/McGill Univ.; The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload, 2014, etc.). Indeed, lies abound, and "bad statistics are everywhere." Averages can be manipulated. Graphs can distort. Misinformation proliferates in books, websites, videos, and social media. What to do? Levitin says we must engage in critical thinking, and he spells out in this lucid text exactly what that means when encountering words and numbers and trying to decide what's true and what's not. Using vivid examples from major media, the author shows how easily--whether accidentally or deliberately--data can lead us astray. For one thing, statistics are gathered by fallible people. Have terms been properly defined? Has a representative sample been taken? Have credible experts been cited? Are the sources reputable (peer-reviewed articles, books from major publishers)? Be suspicious of all information. "You shouldn't trust everything you read in the New York Times," he writes, "or reject everything you read on TMZ." With common sense as a first line of defense (if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is), readers must be mindful of the scientific method, a major focus of the book. Where's the evidence? Where's the control group? What are the possible alternative explanations? Levitin takes pains to emphasize that once misinformation takes hold, many people can believe things that aren't so.
Mason’s YA debut is an authentic, bittersweet story of friendship, first love, and finding one’s way. Josie moves with her girlfriend, Annette, from Minnesota to Connecticut to attend Brookwood Academy, an elite boarding school. Josie wants a school that will challenge her, but more than that, she wants to save Annette from Annette’s alcoholic mother. However, Annette fits in too well, spending all her time with the “soleets” (social elites), becoming unrecognizable, while Josie struggles with feeling homesick and isolated. The girls agreed to keep their relationship a secret at first, but when Josie is ready to come out, Annette wants to wait. Josie falls in with her artistic roommate and a group of boys, while Annette heads for a self-destructive path. Mason captures the tangled, painful feelings of hanging on to love when it’s no longer working, and learning when to let go. With relatable writing and well-rounded characters, as well as a sensitive depiction of lesbian romance, this is a strong contemporary novel for older readers.
Like cats, dogs have multiple lives. At least, Bailey, the canine narrator of this first novel, has more than one. Bailey’s first life is spent as a feral puppy who learns to trust humans after living with a loving but slightly dotty woman who owns too many dogs to suit the county. Bailey is removed by animal control, and his next life brings him to young Ethan, the human Bailey will love and search for through all his subsequent lives, first as part of K-9 Search and Rescue and then as a dumped and mistreated mutt. Through all these lives, Bailey contemplates his purpose in a voice full of curiosity and humor. He ruminates on the usefulness of cats (“none”) and the strange natures of humans (“Am I a good dog or a bad dog? They can’t decide”).
Things could have so easily turned out differently for Vance. Growing up in a working-class family riven by strife and seemingly incapable of escaping its rural Kentucky roots, Vance spent his youth bouncing between homes, a succession of father figures, and ever more explosive situations. The story of how he overcame his upbringing to graduate from Yale Law School and embark on a stable and happy adulthood poses the bigger question of how the obstacles facing other such “hillbillies” can be surmounted. Vance compellingly describes the terrible toll that alcoholism, drug abuse, and an unrelenting code of honor took on his family, neither excusing the behavior nor condemning it. Instead, he pulls back to examine the larger social forces at work for white, working-class Americans with ties to Appalachia. The portrait that emerges is a complex one, where die-hard cultural beliefs contribute to a downward spiral for Vance’s family and those like them. Unerringly forthright, remarkably insightful, and refreshingly focused, Hillbilly Elegy is the cry of a community in crisis.
Two separate narratives run parallel to each other in this thoughtful, poignant novel about the 9/11 attacks. In 2001, Alia, a Muslim teenager, goes to her father’s office in the World Trade Center to make peace after an argument. In 2016, angry teenager Jesse writes a racial slur on the Islam Peace Center in her hometown. The two are connected across time by the events of September 11: Jesse’s brother, Travis, died in them, and her father has been in a booze-fueled hate spiral ever since. Alia, who is in the towers when the planes hit, meets Travis, and the two attempt to escape together. Alia’s fight for her life, and Jesse’s struggle to overcome a lifetime of prejudice and fear are equally compelling. When discussing anti-Muslim views in America, this strays toward heavy-handedness, though forgivably so: it’s an important topic that deserves more dialogue than it receives. A moving portrait and important look at the lasting effects of one of our country’s greatest tragedies.
The Mothers by
California native Bennett’s debut novel, set in the U.S. Marine Corps base city of Oceanside, unflinchingly examines the consequences of secret decisions born of pain and fear as they play out in the lives of three young people, decade by decade. The story is narrated in part by the eponymous mothers, a chorus of elder church women who—having lived through it all—demonstrate no compunction in judging and discussing the choices made by their fellow parishioners of the Upper Room Chapel. Seventeen-year-old Nadia Turner, beautiful, brilliant and broken by the recent suicide of her mother, hastily falls in love with Luke, the pastor’s son, who is literally broken, having suffered a college career-ending football injury. An unplanned pregnancy followed by the decision to terminate ends their relationship as quickly as it began. Nadia befriends Aubrey, who is harboring her own deep, if unseen, wounds. Nadia’s eventual escape from Oceanside ends when she returns to care for her ill father, and, inevitably, the secrets all three have been keeping from each other are exposed in an eruption as shattering as one would expect, with life-altering fallout. Bennett’s writing is both wrenching and light. She deftly blends the complex and serious situations her characters face with innate humor and understanding in this deeply affecting coming-of-age story.
A Dog's Purpose by
Like cats, dogs have multiple lives. At least, Bailey, the canine narrator of this first novel, has more than one. Bailey’s first life is spent as a feral puppy who learns to trust humans after living with a loving but slightly dotty woman who owns too many dogs to suit the county. Bailey is removed by animal control, and his next life brings him to young Ethan, the human Bailey will love and search for through all his subsequent lives, first as part of K-9 Search and Rescue and then as a dumped and mistreated mutt. Through all these lives, Bailey contemplates his purpose in a voice full of curiosity and humor. He ruminates on the usefulness of cats (“none”) and the strange natures of humans (“Am I a good dog or a bad dog? They can’t decide”).
Sweetbitter by
Twenty-one-year-old Tess arrives in New York, chasing a ravenous desire to experience the world. Planning to take the first job she finds, she somehow lands a position at a prestigious Union Square restaurant. The staff, a colorful cast of characters who show her varying degrees of support and impatience, becomes her family. Especially the older Simone, who offers Tess her tutelage while harboring a mysterious past with Jake, the bartender who captures Tess’ heart. They teach Tess about enticing foods and amazing wines; then, in the after hours, they provide an education in edgier indulgences: heavy drinking, drugs, and dysfunction. Caught in a dangerous cycle of self-abuse, Tess will have harder lessons to learn than how to run the floor during the dinner rush if she is to have the sort of success she’s planned on. As Tess navigates the perils of her new life, she learns enough about herself for the novel to conclude with an encouraging note. Danler was working as a waitress at a tony New York restaurant when she wrote her debut, which offers deliciously vivid descriptions as well as dark, churning moments.
The Regional Office Is under Attack! by
You might want to get a firm grip on your socks before cracking open this one; otherwise, Gonzales is likely to knock them off. It’s very difficult to categorize this mind-bending novel. Is it comedy? Science fiction? Thriller? Spoof? Whatever it is, it’s pure excitement. The story involves a shadowy organization called the Regional Office, described by its mission statement as “a barrier of last resort between the survival of the Planet and the amassing forces of Darkness”; as the book opens, the Regional Office is being attacked by those very forces. As the mayhem progresses, the focus zooms in on two women: Rose, who’s leading the attack, and Sarah, who’s fighting for her life defending the Regional Office (even as her colleagues are dying around her). The story jumps back and forth in time, showing us how Rose and Sarah became the women they are today: Rose is a trained assassin, Sarah is a potential killing machine with a cybernetic arm. The prose is lively and self-aware (the author clearly knows his story is way over the top and has fun with it for that very reason); meanwhile, though, the action is pretty much nonstop, and there’s a thread of melancholy running throughout—Rose and Sarah might have been ordinary young women if certain events, and the machinations of highly placed individuals who saw them as weapons, had not intervened. All in all, a brilliant genre-blender.
News of the World by
In the winter of 1970, Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd has made a fairly comfortable living in northern Texas. He travels from town to town, reading current news of ratified amendments and polar expeditions to (mostly) attentive audiences. When he’s asked to deliver a 10-year-old German girl back to her relatives in San Antonio in exchange for $50 in gold, he agrees. Johanna’s parents had been killed by the Kiowa, but she was spared and was raised as one of their own for four years. Captain Kidd finds that Johanna, now in his care, has lost nearly all memory of her language, comportment, and upbringing. Facing a 400-mile journey filled with threats of ambush and an uncooperative charge, Captain Kidd wonders if his choice to deliver the girl was the right one. Jiles’ background as a poet is particularly evident when the captain and Johanna learn how to communicate, bantering bits of their respective languages back and forth. Jiles’ lyrical style and minimal punctuation allow the reader to become immersed in the dusty Texan landscape, witnessing the anguish, fear, compassion, and joy in the unlikely pair’s journey, which will appeal to fans of Tracy Chevalier and Geraldine Brooks.
Live by Night by
Lehane’s latest historical thriller, following The Given Day (2008), continues the author’s propulsive narrative train ride across twentieth-century American history. This time the train stops during Prohibition, and the individual focus is on Joe Coughlin, a Boston cop’s son by birth but a gangster by choice, rejecting his father’s platitudes about crime not paying and choosing, instead, to live by night, in a “world without nets—none to catch you and none to envelop you.” Joe begins in Boston, and after a stint in prison, it’s off to Tampa, where he quickly becomes the crime boss of Ybor City, rum-running capital of Florida. Joe, like Vito Corleone, is a thoughtful gangster, a family man who would prefer to do business without violence but who draws violence to him like a magnet. Despite evoking comparisons both to The Godfather and to the TV series Boardwalk Empire, Lehane’s novel carves its own unique place in the Prohibition landscape, partially because crime runs at a more languid if no less lethal pace in Ybor City than it does in the North. And, somehow, when the staccato rhythm of gunfire overwhelms the tranquil tempo of a slowly turning ceiling fan, the jolt to our system is stronger, as is the realization that Joe’s worlds of night and day are held together by the thinnest of fibers. This is an utterly magnetic novel on every level, a reimagining of the great themes of popular fiction—crime, family, passion, betrayal—set against an exquisitely rendered historical backdrop.
My Name Is Lucy Barton by
Lucy Barton recalls her months-long stay in the hospital after suffering complications during a routine appendectomy. Her husband, overwhelmed with job and child-care responsibilities, summons Lucy’s mother to stay with her, though they have long been estranged. Within the confines of her hospital room, Lucy and her mother seek to find common ground, gossiping about the neighbors in the small, rural town of Amgash, Illinois, where Lucy was raised. In this way, they avoid talking about the central event of Lucy’s life, her impoverished childhood. Obliquely, the harsh details are revealed: Lucy was frequently hungry, dirty, and terrorized by her abusive father. She felt isolated, ashamed, and fearful, feelings that still surface in adulthood. It seems a small miracle that she escaped to college, got married, had children, and became a writer while her siblings remained mired in dysfunction. She never confronts her mother about the fact that she failed to protect Lucy; indeed, though they seem incapable of expressing it, their love for each other is palpable. In a compact novel brimming with insight and emotion, Strout relays with great tenderness and sadness the way family relationships can both make and break us.
Along the Infinite Sea by
An epic story of star-crossed lovers in pre-war Europe collides with a woman on the run in the swinging '60s, in another riveting historical novel from the New York Times-bestselling author of A Hundred Summers and Tiny Little Thing.
Each of the three Schuyler sisters has her own world-class problems, but in the autumn of 1966, Pepper Schuyler's problems are in a class of their own. When Pepper fixes up a beautiful and rare vintage Mercedes and sells it at auction, she thinks she's finally found a way to take care of herself and the baby she carries, the result of an affair with a married, legendary politician.
But the car's new owner turns out to have secrets of her own, and as the glamorous and mysterious Annabelle Dommerich takes pregnant Pepper under her wing, the startling provenance of this car comes to light: a Nazi husband, a Jewish lover, a flight from Europe, and a love so profound it transcends decades. As the many threads of Annabelle's life from World War II stretch out to entangle Pepper in 1960s America, and the father of her unborn baby tracks her down to a remote town in coastal Georgia, the two women must come together to face down the shadows of their complicated pasts.
Indomitable heroines, a dazzling world of secrets, champagne at the Paris Ritz, and a sweeping love story for the ages, in New York Times bestselling author Beatriz William's final book about the Schuyler sisters.
The Shack by
Mackenzie Allen Phillips's youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation, and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later, in this midst of his great sadness, Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend. Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change his life forever.
The Queen of the Night by
When renowned soprano Lilliet Berne, the toast of Belle Epoque Paris, is offered the role of a lifetime in an original opera, she is shocked to realize that the libretto seems to be based on her own life. After reinventing herself and carefully shrouding the secrets of her early years, she believed she had moved away from the scandal, shame, and intrigue of her youth forever. Reaching back into time, she recalls her Minnesota childhood, her escape to Paris, her adventures as a hippodrome rider, her career as a courtesan, her stint as a spy, and her meteoric rise through the cutthroat ranks of the opera world. In order to unravel the mystery of who has betrayed her, she reviews her entire entangled history, recalling the twists and turns of her own life as well as the sweeping history of an era along the way. Peppering the unfolding plot with real-life events and figures, Chee provides a suitably operatic backdrop for the mesmerizing novel.
Tulip Fever by
Young Sophia willingly married elderly Cornelius Sandvoort, a wealthy merchant, to escape poverty and help her family. She realizes that she has a good life with an honorable man but everything changes when her husband decides to have their portrait painted as is the custom for well-to-do families in seventeenth-century Amsterdam. Jan van Loos, a talented, penniless painter, awakens Sophia's desires, and she succumbs, too, to the two Dutch passions for art and tulips. In order to flee Amsterdam together, the lovers need money, so they decide to gamble their limited resources on the latest craze of tulip speculation: if they buy the right bulb they can make a sizable fortune. But as their scheme gets closer to fruition, things begin to unravel. Moggach's lush and sensuously written novel will appeal to romantics as well as fans of historical novels, and the film rights have been sold to Steven Spielberg.
What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours by
Oyeyemi, who penned the magical novels Mr. Fox (2011) and Boy Snow Bird (2014), offers an equally imaginative set of nine short stories. Lovers populate the pages of these fable-like tales, pining passionately as their quest for a beloved takes them on bewitching journeys. For Radha in “is your blood as red as this?,” it means enrolling in a puppetry school in pursuit of Myrna, the beautiful instructor who catches her eye at a party. Myrna puts Radha off by choosing another student as her apprentice, but Radha is not to be deterred as she studies under another instructor and is given a puppet who used to be a live woman. In “books and roses,” Montse, a laundress who was left at a chapel as a baby and raised by monks, learns about her mother’s passionate love affair with a wealthy recluse as she herself falls in love with a painter haunted by her own lost love. And love turns to loathing when a teenager’s pop star idol brutalizes a prostitute in “‘sorry’ doesn’t sweeten her tea.” A beguiling collection.
The Fever Code by
He saw his parents murdered, he was separated from his sister, he was renamed, and he was told that it was all in the service of saving humanity from the dreaded Flare virus. Every day Thomas lives in the WICKED facility he becomes seemingly more privileged and simultaneously more haunted by what he sees going on around him. As the experiments and trials continue, he grows less able to convince himself they’re good and appropriate, until finally one day he has to do something about it. This is another prequel in the popular Maze Runner series, documenting the time before Thomas and Teresa find themselves in the maze and answering questions about how Flare began and WICKED’s role in the society Dashner has capably built. The plot moves apace, and tensions build nicely throughout. Although this is the fifth entry in the series, this combination adventure-thriller can be read on its own.
Without Annette by
Mason’s YA debut is an authentic, bittersweet story of friendship, first love, and finding one’s way. Josie moves with her girlfriend, Annette, from Minnesota to Connecticut to attend Brookwood Academy, an elite boarding school. Josie wants a school that will challenge her, but more than that, she wants to save Annette from Annette’s alcoholic mother. However, Annette fits in too well, spending all her time with the “soleets” (social elites), becoming unrecognizable, while Josie struggles with feeling homesick and isolated. The girls agreed to keep their relationship a secret at first, but when Josie is ready to come out, Annette wants to wait. Josie falls in with her artistic roommate and a group of boys, while Annette heads for a self-destructive path. Mason captures the tangled, painful feelings of hanging on to love when it’s no longer working, and learning when to let go. With relatable writing and well-rounded characters, as well as a sensitive depiction of lesbian romance, this is a strong contemporary novel for older readers.
All We Have Left by
Two separate narratives run parallel to each other in this thoughtful, poignant novel about the 9/11 attacks. In 2001, Alia, a Muslim teenager, goes to her father’s office in the World Trade Center to make peace after an argument. In 2016, angry teenager Jesse writes a racial slur on the Islam Peace Center in her hometown. The two are connected across time by the events of September 11: Jesse’s brother, Travis, died in them, and her father has been in a booze-fueled hate spiral ever since. Alia, who is in the towers when the planes hit, meets Travis, and the two attempt to escape together. Alia’s fight for her life, and Jesse’s struggle to overcome a lifetime of prejudice and fear are equally compelling. When discussing anti-Muslim views in America, this strays toward heavy-handedness, though forgivably so: it’s an important topic that deserves more dialogue than it receives. A moving portrait and important look at the lasting effects of one of our country’s greatest tragedies.
This Is Where It Ends by
Nijkamp’s debut adds to the growing list of novels about school shootings. As Opportunity, Alabama, high-schoolers are welcomed in for a new school year, an armed male student locks the student body inside the auditorium, and then the carnage begins. The subsequent 54 minutes unfold with breathless pacing in the alternating voices of characters who know the shooter: Claire, the track star and former girlfriend of the shooter, who’s outside when the shooting begins; Tomás, a troublemaker who rises to the occasion; Autumn, a promising dancer and the shooter’s sister; and Sylv, a straight-A student, who is Autumn’s closeted girlfriend and Tomás’ twin sister. Although the shooter’s motivation could have been more developed and the slow response times of authorities require a suspension of disbelief, Nijkamp’s story sadly reflects a very real concern in contemporary America. Strong characterizations capture diversity in gender, race, ability, and sexuality. Even reluctant readers will anxiously pursue the ending, unable to turn away from the tragedy and in desperate hope for a resolution, knowing there cannot be a happy ending.
Before I Fall by
If you could relive your last day, what would you do differently? This is what Samantha asks herself when, after a fatal accident driving from a party on Friday, she wakes in her bed to find she must repeat the entire day again. And again. As Samantha lives through multiple Fridays, desperate to prevent her death, she is struck by how even the most insignificant acts, like running late for school instead of being on time, can change everything. Suddenly she is noticing uncomfortable things—about her friends, about herself—she has never noticed before. It’s the ultimate learning experience, and it takes Samantha seven times—not to save her own life but to leave with one she can be proud of. Oliver, in a pitch-perfect teen voice, explores the power we have to affect the people around us in this intensely believable first novel. Samantha grows from an entitled, popular, yet insecure girl to one with the compassion and guts to make the right decisions. This is a compelling book with a powerful message that will strike a chord with many teens.
Wrecked by
When her roommate Jenny accuses fellow MacCallum College student Jordan of rape, Haley becomes mired in a thorny situation. For one thing, Haley cannot be sure of the accuracy of Jenny’s memory; she was the one who went to the wild campus party and got drunk. And try this complication on for size: Haley, who is serving as Jenny’s “advisor” during the investigation, would really like to date Richard, the cute math tutor. But Richard turns out to be Jordan’s advisor. Things are no simpler on Richard’s end. He is suspicious of housemate Jordan’s denial of Jenny’s account, and that impression only gets heightened after Jordan asks Richard to forget how Jordan originally bragged about hooking up with Jenny. But how can he forget that? As the investigation progresses, what actually happened becomes increasingly, distressingly muddied. Told from the alternating, limited third-person viewpoints of Haley and Richard and interspersed with revealing snapshots of the night in question, Padian’s latest boasts a swift, excellently crafted plot, exceedingly readable prose, and painfully relatable characters. It is especially surprising to find an affectionate involvement as believable as Haley and Richard’s in the middle of a story centering on a rape investigation. Particularly relevant for high-school seniors and college freshmen.
Fans of the Impossible Life by
This debut novel is the story of three friends: Mira, Sebby, and Jeremy. Each have been struggling through life, feeling alone, broken, and unworthy of being loved or saved. Mira is starting a brand-new school, after spending time in the hospital, and is not sure how she will make it through the day without her best friend Sebby. Jeremy sees Sebby and Mira, and just wants to belong with them. Together, they bring one another out of their dark periods and make the world seem brighter. But the brightness is only on the surface. Will their relationships be strong enough to withstand their secrets-from each other, their parents, and their teachers? Full of quirks, just like the characters, this book will resonate with many readers. LGBTQ identities are embraced in this work. Right on trend with its alternating narrators, this work is also told in a melody of points of view-first, second, and third are mixed throughout, which for some readers might prove disjointed. VERDICT So much more than a love triangle novel, Scelsa's debut is filled with teens discovering how to handle life's situations
The Hundred Lies of Lizzie Lovett by
When Lizzie Lovett goes missing, Hawthorn becomes obsessed—how could something bad happen to beautiful, popular Lizzie, who always seemed immune to pain? Hawthorn, who’s always coveted Lizzie’s seemingly easy existence, goes to desperate, nearly crazy lengths to explain her disappearance, and in the process of her investigation, she befriends Lizzie’s 25-year-old boyfriend, Enzo, who indulges her bizarre quest (more than he should) and makes Hawthorn feel like less of an outsider. But she becomes so caught up in her search that she finds herself even more alienated, and when the truth finally comes out, Hawthorn is forced to examine her own choices. Sedoti’s debut offers an enlightening look at the dangers of relying on outward appearances to judge someone’s character, and Hawthorn’s first-person narrative, filled with obsessive thoughts and, eventually, meaningful reflection, is a lively, engaging vehicle for the story. A rich cast of secondary characters, including Hawthorn’s family and a caravan of hippies camping in her backyard, adds depth. Fans of character-driven novels will appreciate this.
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Scythe by
In a world where humanity has conquered death and a fraternity called Scythes are the only ones allowed to kill people in order to curb overpopulation, Citra Terranova and Rowan Damisch must cope with their newfound and terrible responsibilities as apprentices in killing. A brilliant and gripping sci-fi thriller that acutely explores the consequences of worldwide immortality and asks readers to think critically about the nature of morality.
History Is All You Left Me by
After Griffin and Theo break up, after Theo moves to California for college, and even after Theo finds a new boyfriend in Jackson, Griffin continues to believe that they’ll end up together. Then Theo drowns, and all that’s left for Griffin is their fugitive history together. Griffin’s affecting account of that history is told partly in flashbacks that are simultaneously elegiac and melancholy. The present, meanwhile, finds him bereft, grieving but discovering, perhaps, a weird sort of comfort in continuing to speak to Theo, reliving their past while sharing what is happening in the here and now. But will Griffin, who is so stuck in the past, find a future? Silvera’s splendid sophomore novel is filled with tantalizing questions about lies and honesty, love and loss, and past and present, with answers gradually metered out through Griffin’s growth as well as that of the other characters populating this beautifully realized, character-driven work of literary fiction. Silvera leaves his readers enriched and challenged, inviting them to join Griffin in questioning the meaning of life and love. In those questions, they will find an unsparing honesty that brings closure to the novel and to Griffin’s quest to let go of the past and embrace the future.
The Memory of Light by
When high-school sophomore Vicky Cruz wakes up in the hospital psychiatric ward after a failed suicide attempt, she knows it’s only a matter of time before she tries again. She agrees to stay for two weeks, not because she thinks it will change anything, but because she can’t bear pretending anymore. Through Vicky’s interactions with others in group therapy—chatty, energetic Mona; bold, angry E.M.; and preternaturally wise Gabriel—she finds acceptance and understanding, while her sessions with kindly Dr. Desai help reframe her life from the perspective of someone with an illness that needs treatment, not someone who “isn’t trying hard enough.” While the final third of the novel is crowded with less-credible action sequences, including a near drowning and a violent confrontation with an abuser, overall Vicky’s story has undeniable emotional strength and an encouraging, compassionate message. Stork (Marcelo in the Real World, 2009) writes his characters with authenticity and respect, from their inner lives to their economic and cultural backgrounds (Vicky is Mexican American). As Vicky gradually recovers and begins to imagine her future, other characters work out their damaging assumptions as well.
Love and Gelato by
It has always been just Lina and her mom, Hadley, and Lina’s been fine with that. But when Hadley dies of cancer, her final wish is for 16-year-old Lina to go to Italy for the summer to meet her father. When she arrives at his home, she finds her mother’s journal awaiting her—words that recount Hadley’s year in Italy and her experience of love as she honed her craft as an artist. Lina comes to know her mother through new eyes while falling in love for the first time with a cute Italian boy. This poetic novel is replete with opportunities for discovery, including Lina’s exploration of the beautiful Tuscan countryside and her newfound relationship with her father. The journal works to parallel Lina’s and Hadley’s lives across generations and gives tension to the narrative. Lina is a likable heroine in spite of her flaws, and readers will be caught up in this story of romance, family, and what it really means to be loved.
Enchanted Air by
Reflecting on her childhood in Los Angeles and her Cuban heritage, Engle’s memoir in verse is, indeed, nothing short of enchanting. Descriptions of Cuba as a tropical paradise and the home of her beloved abuelita come alive in the spare free-verse poems. She evocatively addresses weighty issues, such as her mother’s homesickness, being bicultural, the challenge of moving homes and schools, the Cuban Revolution, and negotiating an identity that is being torn apart by politics and social attitudes at complete odds with her feelings and experiences. With characteristic precision, Engle captures a range of emotions and observations salient to a young girl: belonging (to Cuba or the U.S.?), daydreaming (about riding a horse), questioning (the absurdity of Cold War politics), needing (to run, play, fly), wishing (she could fit in), fear (of FBI agents), and more. In addition to the arresting content that provides many opportunities for learning, the craft of this memoir lends itself to creative exploration in the classroom. Poems might be examined in isolation, juxtaposed with others, or used as writing models.
The Fate of the Tearling by
The thrilling conclusion to the New York Times bestselling Tearling trilogy.
In less than a year, Kelsea Glynn has transformed from a gawky teenager into a powerful monarch. As she has come into her own as the Queen of the Tearling, the headstrong, visionary leader has also transformed her realm. In her quest to end corruption and restore justice, she has made many enemies—including the evil Red Queen, her fiercest rival, who has set her armies against the Tear.
To protect her people from a devastating invasion, Kelsea did the unthinkable—she gave herself and her magical sapphires to her enemy—and named the Mace, the trusted head of her personal guards, regent in her place. But the Mace will not rest until he and his men rescue their sovereign, imprisoned in Mortmesne.
Now, as the suspenseful endgame begins, the fate of Queen Kelsea—and the Tearling itself—will finally be revealed.
A Field Guide to Lies by
A crash course in Skepticism 101."Much of what we read should raise our suspicions," warns Levitin (Psychology and Behavioral Neuroscience/McGill Univ.; The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload, 2014, etc.). Indeed, lies abound, and "bad statistics are everywhere." Averages can be manipulated. Graphs can distort. Misinformation proliferates in books, websites, videos, and social media. What to do? Levitin says we must engage in critical thinking, and he spells out in this lucid text exactly what that means when encountering words and numbers and trying to decide what's true and what's not. Using vivid examples from major media, the author shows how easily--whether accidentally or deliberately--data can lead us astray. For one thing, statistics are gathered by fallible people. Have terms been properly defined? Has a representative sample been taken? Have credible experts been cited? Are the sources reputable (peer-reviewed articles, books from major publishers)? Be suspicious of all information. "You shouldn't trust everything you read in the New York Times," he writes, "or reject everything you read on TMZ." The Times, after all, runs daily corrections. With common sense as a first line of defense (if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is), readers must be mindful of the scientific method, a major focus of the book. Where's the evidence? Where's the control group? What are the possible alternative explanations? Levitin takes pains to emphasize that once misinformation takes hold, many people can believe things that aren't so. He details four pitfalls in critical thinking that have led many to blame vaccinations for the rise in autism rates. He also cautions against routinely accepting the information on websites, which can be biased or badly outdated. Often, he says, we become our own enemies. We blindly accept numbers that intimidate or insist on neat stories when not everything is explainable. Valuable tools for anyone willing to evaluate claims and get to the truth of the matter.
Rookie Yearbook One by
In Rookie Yearbook One, we explore breakups, love, feminism, street harassment, being happy, being sad, and other liferelated topics. Featuring contributions from and interviews with Rookie heroes like Daniel Clowes, Zooey Deschanel, Lena Dunham, Sky Ferreira, Jack Black, Anna Faris, Fred Armisen, Patton Oswalt, Paul Feig, Miranda July, Aubrey Plaza, Dan Savage, David Sedaris, Sarah Silverman, John Waters and Joss Whedon. Plus extra goodies like playlists, DIYs and stickers!
Rookie Yearbook Two by
In Rookie Yearbook Two, we tackle kissing, doubt, rejection, backhanded compliments, angsty art and more! Featuring interviews with Carrie Brownstein, Morrissey, Molly Ringwald, Neil Degrasse Tyson, Chris Ware and Emma Watson, and exclusive content from Judy Blume, Lena Dunham, Grimes and Mindy Kaling. Plus: handy DIYs, fortune tellers, tarot cards and stickers!
Rookie Yearbook Three by
An exciting new partnership between PYRG and Rookie (rookiemag.com), Yearbook Three is the ultimate compendium featuring the best of Rookie from the 2013-2014 year. There will be lots of beautiful art and writing: life lessons, diary entries, discoveries from Literally the Best Thing Ever, DIY projects, playlists, stickers and cutouts, plus brand-new, exclusive-to-print contributions from a dizzying array of influential writers, actors, musicians, and artists - all curated by Rookie's extraordinary seventeen-year-old editor, Tavi Gevinson
Rookie Yearbook Four by
The ultimate compendium featuring the very best of Rookie from the 2014-2015 year. As always, it's full of beautiful art and photographs, playlists, DIY tutorials, advice ranging from how to get over trauma to how to write a college admissions essay, interviews with Rookie role models like TLC, FKA Twigs, and Laverne Cox, exclusive content from some of Rookie's favourite humans, plus a sticker sheet and poster. Like a cleaned up Vice for switched on teenagers, Rookie champions positive media for young people, especially girls.
Hillbilly Elegy by
Things could have so easily turned out differently for Vance. Growing up in a working-class family riven by strife and seemingly incapable of escaping its rural Kentucky roots, Vance spent his youth bouncing between homes, a succession of father figures, and ever more explosive situations. The story of how he overcame his upbringing to graduate from Yale Law School and embark on a stable and happy adulthood poses the bigger question of how the obstacles facing other such “hillbillies” can be surmounted. Vance compellingly describes the terrible toll that alcoholism, drug abuse, and an unrelenting code of honor took on his family, neither excusing the behavior nor condemning it. Instead, he pulls back to examine the larger social forces at work for white, working-class Americans with ties to Appalachia. The portrait that emerges is a complex one, where die-hard cultural beliefs contribute to a downward spiral for Vance’s family and those like them. Unerringly forthright, remarkably insightful, and refreshingly focused, Hillbilly Elegy is the cry of a community in crisis.
Notorious RBG by
Rejoice! This is the year to celebrate the remarkable accomplishments of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (RBG), affectionately known as the "Notorious RBG." This eponymous-and humorous-book is the third recent publication providing biographical information and paying tribute to Ginsburg's Supreme Court opinions, with special attention to her famous-and influential-dissents. Coauthors Carmon, an MSNBC journalist who has interviewed RBG, and Knizhnik, recent alumna of New York University School of Law and creator of the Notorious R.B.G. Tumblr blog, bring a fresh, appropriately irreverent perspective to scholarship about the justice. In fact, this book is not at all scholarly-and this is a major asset. Rather, taking its chapter headings from the lyrics of late rapper Notorious B.I.G., it provides bare-bones biographical narrative and excerpts from a selection of Ginsburg's seminal opinions, while inserting cartoons, photos, poetry, and even opera lyrics. The brief, cogent excerpts from her court opinions are annotated in plain language by prominent legal academics. Moreover, the authors successfully situate RBG's work within a larger historical context, thereby illustrating her central role in advancing equal rights for all.
The Case Against Sugar by
aubes takes the topic of his best-seller, Why We Get Fat and What to Do about It (2011), one step further in his latest. Beyond implicating carbohydrates as the enemy in modern diets, Taubes lays out, as his title suggests, the prosecution’s argument if sugar alone were to be tried in criminal court, charged for causing the Western World’s plagues of diabetes and obesity. Imagined concept aside, Taubes deals in science and fact, and what he relays is staggering. Namely, that the refutable “calories in versus calories out” theory of weight management has taken responsibility for illness away from sugar for more than a century; that the twentieth-century decision to blame fats and salt for heart disease is an overly assumptive and sadly immovable one; and that modern studies of the manifestation of diabetes and obesity in recently Westernized populations suggest that “we’re likely to be facing grave new problems moving forward if our sugar use isn’t dramatically curbed.” Acknowledging that responsible public-health policy and good nutrition science won’t always overlap, as well as the difficulty in testing the effects of any single food in our diets, Taubes confidently recommends giving a severe reduction in sugar intake a try.
Super Famous by
Look out world, Kamala Khan is officially an Avenger! But will being one of Earth's Mightiest Heroes be everything she imagined? Or is life as a celebrity harder than she thought? But while saving the world is important, Jersey City still needs its protector too. A development company that co-opted Ms. Marvel's face might well have more in mind for gentrification than just real estate. Can Kamala take down the evil suits destroying her home without ruining her personal life?
Ms. Marvel Vol. 6 by
The Next Generation! As civil war brews, Ms. Marvel teams up with Spider-Man and Nova in their biggest challenge yet: a tri-state academic competition. But math isn't the only problem as tremors of war begin to surface. The best, brightest (and most adorable) heroes face off in the road to Marvel's biggest battle. Move over Iron Man, the kids got thi
Pop Sonnets by
The Bard meets the Backstreet Boys in Pop Sonnets, a collection of 100 classic pop songs reimagined as Shakespearean sonnets. All your favorite songs are here, including hits by Jay-Z, Johnny Cash, Katy Perry, Michael Jackson, Talking Heads, and many others. With stirring sentiments on everything from love and despair to wanton women, Pop Sonnets offers inspirational verse for every occasion.
Milk and Honey by
milk and honey is a collection of poetry and prose about survival. About the experience of violence, abuse, love, loss, and femininity.
The book is divided into four chapters, and each chapter serves a different purpose. Deals with a different pain. Heals a different heartache. milk and honey takes readers through a journey of the most bitter moments in life and finds sweetness in them because there is sweetness everywhere if you are just willing to look.
Secondhand Time by
Bringing together dozens of voices in her distinctive documentary style, 'Secondhand Time' is a monument to the collapse of the USSR, charting the decline of Soviet culture and speculating on what will rise from the ashes of communism
The Meaning of Michelle by
Sixteen writers discuss the life and accomplishments of First Lady, Michelle Obama.
At the Existentialist Café : freedom, being, and apricot cocktails with Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Albert Camus, Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspers, Edmund Husserl, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and others by