We hope you weathered our latest round of New-Englandy weather safely, beloved patrons, and that your shoveling was easy and at least relatively ache-and-pain free.  We here at the Library are eager to help you have a relaxing weekend full of literary adventures, cinematic marvels, and audio revelations.  Here is just a sampling of the new books that braved the storm to make it on to our shelves this week:

Women and Power: This book is a wildly appropriate choice for this week’s selection, seeing as how yesterday was International Women’s Day, however, Mary Beard’s tiny-but-powerful manifesto on language and power is one that can, and should, be read by all humans.  In this magisterial little marvel, Beard, an internationally renown Classicist,  traces the origins of this misogyny to its ancient roots, examining the pitfalls of gender and the ways that history has mistreated strong women since time immemorial. As far back as Homer’s Odyssey, Beard shows, women have been prohibited from leadership roles in civic life, public speech being defined as inherently male. Using examples from ancient history as well as the present day Beard discusses cultural assumptions about women’s relationship to power―and how powerful women provide a necessary example for resisting these historically fraught issues of language and identity. With personal reflections on her own online experiences with sexism, Beard asks: If women aren’t perceived to be within the structure of power, isn’t it power itself we need to redefine? And how many more centuries should we be expected to wait?  This is a beautifully written, powerfully insightful work that is both timely and timeless.  Academics and popular reviewers alike have been praising Beard’s work and courage for speaking out about her own experiences as well as the experiences of women through time, with People magazine describing “Beard’s thrilling manifesto turns to ancient times to find the seeds of misogyny, beginning with Homer’s Odyssey (the first instance of a woman told to shut up) and continuing through Elizabeth Warren’s 2017 silencing in the Senate. An irresistible call for women to speak up, act and redefine their power.”

Self-Portrait With a Boy: Rachel Lyon’s debut novel deals with some heavy and difficult topics, but she does so in a way that is both sympathetic and spell-binding work that deals with the dues we pay for success, and the bonds that end up defining our lives.  Lu Rile is a relentlessly focused young photographer struggling to make ends meet, and with family and financial obligations weighing her down, she’s reaching desperation.  But then, in the background of a self-portrait, Lu accidentally captures on film a boy falling past her window to his death. The photograph turns out to be startlingly gorgeous, the best work of art she’s ever made. It’s an image that could change her life…if she lets it.  But the decision to show the photograph is not easy. The boy is her neighbors’ son, and the tragedy brings all the building’s residents together. It especially unites Lu with his grieving mother, Kate. As the two forge an intense bond based on sympathy, loneliness, and budding attraction, Lu feels increasingly unsettled and guilty, torn between equally fierce desires: to use the photograph to advance her career, and to protect a woman she has come to love.  With it’s early ’90’s setting, this book is a powerfully nostalgic one that is earning positive reviews from other authors and critics alike.  The Los Angeles Times, for example, raved “The conflict is rich and thorny, raising questions about art and morality, love and betrayal, sacrifice and opportunism and the chance moments that can define a life. The novel wrestles with the nature of art but moves with the speed of a page-turner.” 

The Gone World:  Here’s another book set in the ’90’s, but this sci-fi thriller posits the decade as the doorway to any number of possible futures with a chilling conspiracy at play behind each of them.  It’s 1997, and Shannon Moss is part of a clandestine division within the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.  Assigned to solve the murder of a Navy SEAL’s family, and to locate his vanished teenage daughter, Moss discovers that the missing SEAL was an astronaut aboard the spaceship U.S.S. Libra–a ship assumed lost to the currents of Deep Time. Moss knows first-hand the mental trauma of time-travel and believes the SEAL’s experience with the future has triggered this violence.  Determined to find the missing girl and driven by a troubling connection from her own past, Moss travels ahead in time to explore possible versions of the future, seeking evidence to crack the present-day case. To her horror, the future reveals that it’s not only the fate of a family that hinges on her work, for what she witnesses rising over time’s horizon and hurtling toward the present is the Terminus: the terrifying and cataclysmic end of humanity itself.  Non-fiction and science lovers will find plenty to enjoy in Tom Sweterlitsch’s use of cutting-edge astrophysical theory to create his time-traveling protagonists, and readers looking for a thriller that pushes at all the boundaries of genre and expectation will love this book.  It earned a starred review from Kirkus Reviews, who called it “A mind-blowing fusion of science fiction, thriller, existential horror, and apocalyptic fiction…The power of this novel is two-fold: Sweterlitsch’s intricately plotted storyline will keep readers on the edges of their seats until the very last pages, and his extended use of bleak imagery coupled with his lyrical writing style make for an intense and unforgettable read.”

Madness is Better than Defeat: Ned Beauman’s newest release is a startlingly-funny, strange and wonderfully literary thriller that has a little bit of something for everyone–and is sure to get the attention of those readers convinced they’ve seen it all already.  In 1938, two rival expeditions descend on an ancient temple recently discovered in the jungles of Honduras, one intending to shoot a screwball comedy on location there, the other to disassemble the temple and ship it back to New York. A seemingly endless stalemate ensues, and twenty years later a rogue CIA agent sets out to exploit it for his own ends, unaware that the temple is a locus of conspiracies far grander than anyone could ever have guessed. Shot through with insanity, intrigue, ingenuity, and adventure, this is a book that earned a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, who called it “[A] rowdy, thoroughly satisfying literary adventure. . . . Exquisitely comic and absurd, Beauman’s imaginative novel brims with the snappy dialogue, vivid scenery, and converging story lines of an old Hollywood classic.”

The Last Wild Men of Borneo: A True Story of Death and Adventure: Carl Hoffman’s books are always filled with terrific sensory detail, an take even the most stories armchair explorer to new parts of our world.  This latest book tells the story of two western explorers, and their entangled history on the island of Borneo.  In 1984, Swiss traveler Bruno Manser joined an expedition to the Mulu caves on Borneo, and slipped into the forest interior to make contact with the Penan, an indigenous tribe living among the Dayak people, who were famous in western culture as the “Headhunters of Borneo.” Bruno lived for years with the Penan, gaining acceptance as a member of the tribe. However, when commercial logging began devouring the Penan’s homeland, Bruno led the tribe against these outside forces, earning him status as an enemy of the state, but also worldwide fame as an environmental hero. He escaped captivity under gunfire twice, but the strain took a psychological toll. Then, in 2000, Bruno disappeared without a trace.  American Michael Palmieri staged expeditions into the Bornean jungle to acquire astonishing art and artifacts from the Dayaks. He would become one of the world’s most successful tribal-art field collectors, supplying sacred works to prestigious museums and wealthy private collectors. And yet suspicion shadowed this self-styled buccaneer who made his living extracting the treasure of the Dayak: Was he preserving or exploiting native culture?   Hoffman’s book includes exclusive interviews with Manser’s family and colleagues, and rare access to his letters and journals, making this story as insightful as it is exciting.  Booklist agreed, giving this book a starred review and calling it “Compelling and haunting, a story of lofty ideals and base desires, a deeply personal story written by a man who loves Borneo and who struggles to understand the forces that threaten to tear it apart.”

Until next week, beloved patrons…Happy Reading!

It may not be as autumnal-looking here as it is in the Hundred-Acre Wood, but as I write this blog post dear readers, and listen to the wind whistle down Main Street, this is all I can think of:

So a very Happy Windsday to you all!  Please be safe, and stay alert to any flood warnings and such.  Otherwise, we plan to be open according to our normal hours (though you can always call our Main Number and double-check!), in case you find yourself in need of some new books or media to while away this dreary deluge of a weekend.  Check out some of the new books that blew onto our shelves this week!

The Maze at Windermere: One review compared Gregory Blake Smith’s new novel to a carousel ride–a magical blend of colors, faces, and narratives that swirl together to create an unforgettable and utterly enjoyable ride.  Fans of books of novels with multi-generational protagonists will be delighted with this work, which examines the multi-layered lives lived in Newport Rhode Island.  A reckless wager between a tennis pro with a fading career and a drunken party guest—the stakes are an antique motorcycle and an heiress’s diamond necklace—launches a narrative odyssey that braids together three centuries of aspiration and adversity. A witty and urbane bachelor of the Gilded Age embarks on a high-risk scheme to marry into a fortune; a young writer soon to make his mark turns himself to his craft with harrowing social consequences; an aristocratic British officer during the American Revolution carries on a courtship that leads to murder; and, in Newport’s earliest days, a tragically orphaned Quaker girl imagines a way forward for herself and the slave girl she has inherited.  At once brilliantly artistic and utterly human, this novel earned a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly, who raved, “Taken individually, each story is dramatic and captivating, but as the author makes ever-increasing connections among the stories and shuffles them all into one unbroken narrative, the novel becomes a moving meditation on love, race, class, and self-fulfillment in America across the centuries.”

The Spinning Magnet: The Electromagnetic Force That Created the Modern World–And Could Destroy It : Well, there’s an attention-grabbing title for you!  For anyone who found that unit on magnets in science class interesting, journalist Alanna Mitchell’s fast-paced and fascinating history of electromagnets is the book for you.  And for all you science buffs and history enthusiasts who enjoy seeing the real-world applications of theories and the influence of historic figures, look no further!  Mitchell roams through space and time to craft her story, from the thirteenth-century French investigations into magnetism and the Victorian-era discover that electricity and magnetism emerge from the same fundamental force–to the latest research into the Earth’s magnetic fields, which shows that our pole can reverse…often coinciding with periods of mass extinction….and that the Earth’s magnetic force field is decaying faster than previously thought.  Nevertheless, there is a lot to enjoy here, and plenty to learn, not only about magnets and the people who love them, but about the planet that is still shifting and changing around us.  Io9 broke with it’s tradition to feature this book, noting “We don’t usually feature nonfiction books on this list, but science journalist Mitchell’s narrative history of the science of electromagnetism—with a look toward the future and the imminent, inevitable reversing of the North and South Poles—sounds as thrilling as any scifi tale.” 

The Other Side of Everything: For all that Lauren Doyle Owens’ debut novel is a crime thriller, it is also a very insightful exploration of the connections between neighbors, and the power of community to bind, as well as to separate.  Bernard is a curmudgeonly widower who has lived alone in Seven Springs, Florida for decades. When his neighbor is murdered, he emerges from his solitude to reconnect with his fellow octogenarians. These connections become a literal lifeline as a second, and then a third, elderly woman is murdered.  Amy is an artist and cancer survivor whose emotional recovery has not been as successful as her physical one. After the woman next door is murdered, she begins to paint imagined scenes from the murder in an effort to cope with her own loss. But her paintings bring the wrong kind of attention, isolating Amy in ways she never imagined.  Finally, there’s Maddie, a teenage waitress coping with her mother’s abandoment and fighting to keep her family afloat, all the while being drawn to the man the authorities believe had a hand in the grisly crimes.  As Bernard, Amy, and Maddie uncover the connections that bind them, this novel becomes much more than a traditional murder mystery, challenging genre conventions and readers’ expectations to create a book that is as compelling as it is original.  Florida Weekly loved this book set close to home for them, saying in their review, noting that Owens’ “stunning literary murder mystery debut is at once a nail-biter and a brilliantly nuanced evocation of how communities work and don’t work….Ms. Owens builds a vibrantly realized world spreading across three generations. She traces the ebbs and flows of individual and collective destinies, her narrative charged by a lyricism that is constantly evocative and revealing.”

The Source : How Rivers Made America and America Remade Its Rivers: The North American continent has more than 250,000 rivers, coursing over more than 3 million miles.  These waterways connect the disparate regions of the United States, commercially, culturally, and historically.  Over the course of this nation’s history rivers have served as integral trade routes, borders, passageways, sewers, and sinks. Over the years, based on our shifting needs and values, we have harnessed their power with waterwheels and dams, straightened them for ships, drained them with irrigation canals, set them on fire, and even attempted to restore them.  In this fresh and powerful work of environmental history, Martin Doyle tells the epic story of America and its rivers, from the U.S. Constitution’s roots in interstate river navigation, the origins of the Army Corps of Engineers, the discovery of gold in 1848, and the construction of the Hoover Dam and the TVA during the New Deal, to the failure of the levees in Hurricane Katrina and the water wars in the west. Along the way, he explores how rivers have often been the source of arguments at the heart of the American experiment―over federalism, sovereignty and property rights, taxation, regulation, conservation, and development.  Kirkus Reviews really enjoyed this work, calling Doyle’s work “A vigorous look at American history through the nation’s waterways…Doyle speaks well to issues that are as pressing today as in the first years of the republic.”

Searching for the Amazons: The Real Warrior Women of the Ancient World: For as long as western civilization has known of them, we have been fascinated by accounts of the Amazons, an elusive tribe of hard-fighting, horse-riding female warriors. Described as equal to men in battle, legends claimed they cut off their right breasts to improve their archery skills and routinely killed their male children to purify their ranks.  For centuries people believed in their existence and attempted to trace their origins through art, poetry, and archaeology.  Now, John Man’s sweeping and beautifully-researched book traces the origins of the actual Amazons (who did indeed exist).  This book not only sheds light on the history of the Amazons, but also of Man’s travels to the grasslands of Central Asia―from the edge of the ancient Greek world to the borderlands of China―to discover the truth about the truth about these women whose legend has resonated over the centuries.  Kirkus Reviews also had praise for Man’s book, calling it  “A great historical resource about a mysterious people that also shows how women, through the ages, have gathered strength from each other and continue to do so today.”

Until next week, beloved patrons–Happy Reading!