As we mentioned in a post a few years ago, beloved patrons, Friday the 13th is a day that plenty of people fear, but no one really seems to know quite why.  It might have something to do with the Knights Templar, as Dan Brown and Steve Berry have described in their books.  It might be because of  Thomas W. Lawson’s 1907 novel Friday, the Thirteenth, in which a stoke broker decides to take advantage of the superstitions regarding the day and create a panic on Wall Street.  It’s very much an Anglo-American fear, as Wikipedia notes that other cultures have superstitions regarding Tuesdays, or the 17th day of the month rather than the 13th.

Whatever the case may, we’re pretty sure that today is not going to be wildly different from any other Friday…at least insofar as we have books, and they are good, and they are eager to make your acquaintance.  So, without further ago, let’s take a moment to meet some of those brave titles who have trekked on to our shelves this week!

Unbury Carol: Fans of Josh Malerman’s sensational Bird Box need wait no longer, for his newest work is finally out and on our shelves.  This novel is a twisted, dark, and utterly engrossing re-telling of Sleeping Beauty, featuring a heroine named Carol Evers.  Carol has died many times . . . but her many deaths are not final: They are comas, a waking slumber indistinguishable from death, each lasting days.Only two people know of Carol’s eerie condition. One is her husband, Dwight, who married Carol for her fortune, and—when she lapses into another coma—plots to seize it by proclaiming her dead and quickly burying her . . . alive. The other is her lost love, the infamous outlaw James Moxie. When word of Carol’s dreadful fate reaches him, Moxie rides the Trail again to save his beloved from an early, unnatural grave.  And all the while, awake and aware, Carol fights to free herself from the crippling darkness that binds her—summoning her own fierce will to survive.  Brilliantly inventive, hauntingly claustrophobic, and touchingly human, this is another success for Malerman, and will no doubt prove a treat for any fans of his, or Poe, for that matter.  Kirkus Reviews noted in its review that “This one haunts you for reasons you can’t quite put your finger on. . . . Malerman is too fierce an original to allow anyone else’s visions to intrude on his. [He] defies categories and comparisons with other writers.”

Daughters of the Winter Queen: Four Remarkable Sisters, the Crown of Bohemia, and the Enduring Legacy of Mary, Queen of Scots: Nancy Goldstone’s newest history tells the tale of Elizabeth Stuart, granddaughter of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her four daughters.  When her godmother, Queen Elizabeth I, died and her father, James I, ascended to the illustrious throne of England, Elizabeth Stuart assumed a life of wealth and privilege that might surprise many even today.  At sixteen she was married to a dashing German count far below her rank, with the understanding that James would help her husband achieve the crown of Bohemia. Her father’s terrible betrayal of this promise would ruin “the Winter Queen,” as Elizabeth would forever be known, imperil the lives of those she loved, and launch a war that would last for thirty years.  Forced into exile, the Winter Queen and her growing family found refuge in Holland, where the glorious art and culture of the Dutch Golden Age formed the backdrop to her daughters’ education. The eldest, Princess Elizabeth, was renowned as a scholar when women were all but excluded from serious study and counted the preeminent philosopher René Descartes among her closest friends. Louise Hollandine, whose lively manner and appealing looks would provoke heartache and scandal, was a gifted painter. Shy, gentle Henrietta Maria, the beauty of the family, would achieve the dynastic ambition of marrying into royalty, although at great cost. But it would be the youngest, Sophia, a heroine in the tradition of Jane Austen, whose ready wit and good-natured common sense masked immense strength of character, who would fulfill the promise of her great-grandmother, a legacy that endures to this day.  Goldstone is a historian who is able to capture not only dates and trends, but to color in the details of individuals, to emphasize their successes and flaws so well that you’ll feel as if you’ve spent time with royalty after reading this book.  Fans of  The Crown, as well as history buffs of all stripes will love this book, which earned a starred review from Library Journal, which called it “A compulsively readable account of an otherwise unfamiliar royal family. Goldstone writes with knowledge, humor, and ease–a masterly storyteller who steers clear of overly academic language. Ideal for amateur Tudor historians who wish to be introduced to a lesser-known yet equally fascinating royal family.”

Ritz and Escoffier: The Hotelier, the Chef, and the Rise of the Leisure Class:  In early August 1889, César Ritz, a Swiss hotelier highly regarded for his exquisite taste, found himself at the Savoy Hotel in London. He had come at the request of Richard D’Oyly Carte, the financier of Gilbert & Sullivan’s comic operas, who had modernized theater and was now looking to create the world’s best hotel.  D’Oyly Carte soon seduced Ritz to move to London with his team, which included Auguste Escoffier, the chef de cuisine known for his elevated, original dishes. The result was a hotel and restaurant like no one had ever experienced, run in often mysterious and always extravagant ways–which created quite a scandal once exposed.  In a tale replete with scandal and opulence, Luke Barr transports readers to turn-of-the-century London and Paris to discover how celebrated hotelier César Ritz and famed chef Auguste Escoffier joined forces at the Savoy Hotel to spawn the modern luxury hotel and restaurant industry.  Booklist loved this energetic and illuminating book, calling it “[A] lively, gossipy account . . . not just a fluidly structured dual biography, but a provocative history of a turning point in the evolving hotel and restaurant industry.”

A Long Way From Home: Two-time-Booker-Prize-winner Peter Carey is back with a book in which he confronts head-on his native Australia’s history of race and racism, all while capturing the beauty, zaniness, and audacity of its infamous 10,000-mile race, the Redex Trial. Irene Bobs loves fast driving. Her husband is the best car salesman in southeastern Australia. Together they enter the Redex Trial, a brutal race around the ancient continent, over roads no car will ever quite survive. With them is their lanky, fair-haired navigator, Willie Bachhuber, a quiz show champion and failed schoolteacher who calls the turns and creeks crossings on a map that will remove them, without warning, from the white Australia they all know so well and into the heart of a country that is utterly unfamiliar to them–and yet one to which they are inextricably, and inexorably, bound.  As with so many of his best works, Carey uses comedy to soften some his fiercest punches, but doesn’t let the jokes get in the way of the deepest meanings of his books.  Many have agreed this is his best novel in decades (if not his best work, period), and Kirkus Reviews, who gave this work a starred review, said, “This picaresque comedy goes thematically deeper as it heads into the Outback… The comic spirit slyly suggests Shakespeare, an inquiry into identity and the farcical human existence. . . . Carey’s novel raises issues of culture and race that carry a thoroughly contemporary charge.”

A Necessary Evil: Readers who enjoyed Abir Mukherjee’s first mystery featuring Captain Wyndham and Sergeant Banerjee of the Calcutta Police Force will delight in their return in this second complex, historically detailed, and polished mystery.  The fabulously wealthy kingdom of Sambalpore is home to tigers, elephants, diamond mines, and the beautiful Palace of the Sun. But when the heir to the throne is assassinated in the presence of Captain Sam Wyndham and Sergeant ‘Surrender-Not’ Banerjee, they discover a kingdom riven with suppressed conflict. Prince Adhir was a modernizer whose attitudes―and romantic relationships―may have upset the more religious elements of his country, while his brother―now in line to the throne―appears to be a feckless playboy.  As Wyndham and Banerjee desperately try to unravel the mystery behind the assassination, they become entangled in a dangerous world where those in power live by their own rules―and those who cross their paths pay with their lives. They must find a murderer, before the murderer finds them.  Publisher’s Weekly gave this second entry into a sensational series a starred review, calling it “Impressive. This successful evocation of the Raj in the service of a brilliant whodunit demonstrates that Mukherjee’s debut was no fluke.”’

Until next week, beloved patrons–happy reading!

Today, dear readers, as the birds begin chirping and the grass begins greening, and it nearly freezing and we very well might see snow this weekend, I find T.S. Eliot’s opening lines from The Waste Land more and more appropriate:

April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.

 So, as we yearn for real spring to return to us, we can take solace in books–especially in these new books that have emerged onto our shelves this week, and are eager to pass the weekend in your company!

The Consciousness Instinct: Unraveling the Mystery of How the Brain Makes the Mind: How does physical “stuff”―atoms, molecules, chemicals, and cells―create the vivid and various worlds inside our heads?  The problem of consciousness has gnawed at us for millennia.  And while we’ve benefited in recent years from the marvels of modern science, the question about how brain matter makes ideas is still one we haven’t solved.  In this book Michael S. Gazzaniga, director of the SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind at the University of California, Santa Barbara, puts the latest research in conversation with the history of human thinking about the mind, giving a big-picture view of what science has revealed about consciousness.  The idea of the brain as a machine, first proposed centuries ago, has led to assumptions about the relationship between mind and brain that dog scientists and philosophers to this day. Gazzaniga asserts that this model has it backward―brains make machines, but they cannot be reduced to one. New research suggests the brain is actually a confederation of independent modules working together.  But what does that mean for us, as brain-possessing individuals?  And how does it help us learn more about our wonderful minds?  Gazzaniga’s wonderfully readable and enthusiastic book makes this all clear, and, as Kirkus noted in its starred review, “This is a book for readers of all ages who are intrigued by consciousness and how it works. As he has done in previous books, Gazzaniga easily draws readers into one of the most fascinating conversations taking place in modern science.”

Tangerine: Christine Mangan’s debut is drawing comparisons to authors like Gillian Flynn and Patricia Highsmith, so fans of those illustrious writers should definitely check out this taut, suspenseful novel!   The last person Alice Shipley expected to see since arriving in Tangier with her new husband was Lucy Mason. After the accident at Bennington, the two friends—once inseparable roommates—haven’t spoken in over a year. But there Lucy was, trying to make things right and return to their old rhythms. Perhaps Alice should be happy. She has not adjusted to life in Morocco, too afraid to venture out into the bustling medinas and oppressive heat. Lucy—always fearless and independent—helps Alice emerge from her flat and explore the country.   But soon a familiar feeling starts to overtake Alice—she feels controlled and stifled by Lucy at every turn. Then Alice’s husband, John, goes missing, and Alice starts to question everything around her: her relationship with her enigmatic friend, her decision to ever come to Tangier, and her very own state of mind. The New Yorker wrote a glowing review of this book, calling it “A juicy melodrama cast against the sultry, stylish imagery of North Africa in the fifties. . . . [Tangerine is] endearing and even impressive in the force of its determination to conjure a life more exciting than most. . . . Just the ticket.”

The Woman Left Behind: Linda Howard’s latest romantic thriller has all the action of a high-stakes espionage film, and enough passion and intrigue to keep fans (and new readers, too!) riveted.  Jina Modell works in Communications for a paramilitary organization, and she really likes it…But when Jina displays a really high aptitude for spatial awareness and action, she’s reassigned to work as an on-site drone operator in the field with one of the GO-teams, an elite paramilitary unit. The only problem is she isn’t particularly athletic, to put it mildly.  Team leader Levi, call sign Ace, doesn’t have much confidence in Jina, convinced that a ‘tech geek’ is going to ruin their elite operation.  In the following months, however, no one is more surprised than he when Jina begins to thrive in her new environment, displaying a grit and courage that wins her the admiration of her hardened, battle-worn teammates–and the attention of her team leader.  Meanwhile, a powerful Congresswoman is working behind the scenes to destroy the GO-teams, and a trap is set to ambush Levi’s squad in Syria. Thought dead by her comrades, Jina escapes to the desert where, brutally tested beyond measure, she has to figure out how to stay undetected by the enemy and make it to her crew in time.  Pulse-pounding in more ways that one, this book earned a starred review from Booklist, who called it “High-adrenaline action and high-octane passion once again prove to be an irresistible combination in best-selling Howard’s latest addictive suspense novel… the literary equivalent of pure gold.”

Census: Jesse Ball’s tale of a father and son journey is one of those magical books that is wonderfully simple in its structure, but marvelously deep and complex beneath the surface.  When a widower receives notice from a doctor that he doesn’t have long left to live, he is struck by the question of who will care for his adult son—a son whom he fiercely loves, and who lives with Down syndrome. With no recourse in mind, and with a desire to see the country on one last trip, the man signs up as a census taker for a mysterious governmental bureau and leaves town with his son.  Traveling into the country, through towns named only by ascending letters of the alphabet, the man and his son encounter a wide range of human experience. While some townspeople welcome them into their homes, others who bear the physical brand of past censuses on their ribs are wary of their presence. When they press toward the edges of civilization, the landscape grows wilder, and the towns grow farther apart and more blighted by industrial decay. As they approach “Z,” the man must confront a series of questions: What is the purpose of the census? Is he complicit in its mission? And just how will he learn to say good-bye to his son?  The Los Angeles Times wrote a beautiful review of this book, noting, in part, “If there’s a refrain running through [Ball’s] large body of work, it’s that compassion, kindness and empathy trump rules and authority of any kind…this damning but achingly tender novel holds open a space for human redemption, never mind that we have built our systems against it.”

Speak No Evil: A book about difference and conformity, about the power to speak and the power to identify one’s self in a society that encourages neither action, Uzodinma Iweala’s newest novel is garnering attention and praise from critics around the country.  On the surface, Niru leads a charmed life. Raised by two attentive parents in Washington, D.C., he’s a top student and a track star at his prestigious private high school. Bound for Harvard in the fall, his prospects are bright. But Niru has a painful secret: he is queer—an abominable sin to his conservative Nigerian parents. No one knows except Meredith, his best friend, the daughter of prominent Washington insiders—and the one person who seems not to judge him.  When his father accidentally discovers Niru is gay, the fallout is brutal and swift. Coping with troubles of her own, however, Meredith finds that she has little left emotionally to offer him. As the two friends struggle to reconcile their desires against the expectations and institutions that seek to define them, they find themselves speeding toward a future more violent and senseless than they can imagine. Neither will escape unscathed.  The New York Times Review of Books loved this work and Iweala’s writing, saying in their review that he “…writes with such ease about adolescents and adolescence that Speak No Evil could well be a young adult novel. At the same time, he toys with other well-defined forms: the immigrant novel, the gay coming-of-age novel, the novel of being black in America. The resulting book is a hybrid of all these. If he’s something of a remix artist, Iweala remains faithful to the conventions of these forms, a writer so adept that the book’s climax feels both surprising and wholly inevitable.”

Until next week, beloved patrons–happy reading!

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!