Featured Fiction Titles for January:
They whisper about her in Chicago. Men come to her with their hopes, their dreams--their fortunes. But no one sees them leave. No one sees them at all after they come to call on the Widow of La Porte. The good people of Indiana may have their suspicions, but if those fools knew what she'd given up, what was taken from her, how she'd suffered, surely they'd understand. Belle Gunness learned a long time ago that a woman has to make her own way in this world. That's all it is. A bloody means to an end. A glorious enterprise meant to raise her from the bleak, colorless drudgery of her childhood to the life she deserves. After all, vermin always survive.
Pickard County Atlas by Chris Harding Thornton
In a dusty Nebraska town, sheriff’s deputy Harley Jensen patrols the streets. It’s July 1978, and the heat is making people restless. That and the Reddick family patriarch has decided, decades after authorities ended the search for his boy’s body, to lay a headstone. Instead of bringing closure, this decision is the spark that threatens to set Pickard County ablaze. After the memorial service, Harley tails the youngest Reddick, Paul, through the abandoned farms and homes outside town. The pursuit puts Harley in the path of Pam Reddick, a young woman looking for escape. Pam is drawn to Harley’s dark history, not unlike that of her husband, Rick—a man raised in the wreckage of a brother’s death and a mother’s fury. Unfolding over six days, Pickard County Atlas sets Harley and the Reddicks on a collision course.
In a dusty Nebraska town, sheriff’s deputy Harley Jensen patrols the streets. It’s July 1978, and the heat is making people restless. That and the Reddick family patriarch has decided, decades after authorities ended the search for his boy’s body, to lay a headstone. Instead of bringing closure, this decision is the spark that threatens to set Pickard County ablaze. After the memorial service, Harley tails the youngest Reddick, Paul, through the abandoned farms and homes outside town. The pursuit puts Harley in the path of Pam Reddick, a young woman looking for escape. Pam is drawn to Harley’s dark history, not unlike that of her husband, Rick—a man raised in the wreckage of a brother’s death and a mother’s fury. Unfolding over six days, Pickard County Atlas sets Harley and the Reddicks on a collision course.
Siri, Who Am I? by Sam Tschida
Mia looks like a Millennial but she was born yesterday. Emerging from a coma with short-term amnesia, she can’t remember her own name until the Siri assistant on her iPhone provides it. Based on her cool hairstyle, dress, and signature lipstick she senses she’s wealthy, but the only way to know is to retrace her steps outside the hospital. Using Instagram and Uber, she arrives at the duplex she calls home in her posts but finds Max, a cute, off-duty postdoc supplementing his income with house-sitting. He tells her the house belongs to JP, a billionaire. A few texts later, JP confirms her wildest dreams: they’re in love, Mia is living the good life, and he’ll be back that weekend. But as Mia and Max work backward through her Instagram they discover an ugly truth, and evidence that her head wound was no accident.
Featured Nonfiction Titles for January:
Mia looks like a Millennial but she was born yesterday. Emerging from a coma with short-term amnesia, she can’t remember her own name until the Siri assistant on her iPhone provides it. Based on her cool hairstyle, dress, and signature lipstick she senses she’s wealthy, but the only way to know is to retrace her steps outside the hospital. Using Instagram and Uber, she arrives at the duplex she calls home in her posts but finds Max, a cute, off-duty postdoc supplementing his income with house-sitting. He tells her the house belongs to JP, a billionaire. A few texts later, JP confirms her wildest dreams: they’re in love, Mia is living the good life, and he’ll be back that weekend. But as Mia and Max work backward through her Instagram they discover an ugly truth, and evidence that her head wound was no accident.
Featured Nonfiction Titles for January:
One day, a baby magpie falls from its nest and into Charlie’s hands. Magpies, he discovers, are as clever and mischievous as monkeys. They are also notorious thieves, and this one steals his heart. By the time the creature develops shiny black feathers that inspire the name Benzene, Charlie and the bird have forged an unbreakable bond. While caring for Benzene, Charlie finds a poem written by his biological father, a British poet named Heathcote Williams who vanished when Charlie was a baby. As he grapples with Heathcote’s abandonment, Charlie is drawn to the poem, in which Heathcote describes how a young jackdaw—who, like magpies, are part of the crow family—fell from its nest and captured his affection. Benzene helps Charlie unravel his fears about repeating the past—and embrace the role of father himself.
To Be Honest: A Memoir by Michael Leviton
If you’re like most people, you've probably lied. But imagine if your parents had raised you to never lie, under any circumstances. This is Michael Leviton’s extraordinary account of being raised in a family he calls a “little honesty cult.” For young Michael, his parents’ core philosophy felt liberating. He loved “just being honest.” By the time he was twenty-nine years old he'd learned that this honesty had consequences—in friendships, on dates, and at job interviews. And when honesty slowly poisoned a romance, Michael decided there had to be something to lying after all. He set himself the task of learning to be as casually dishonest as the rest of us.
If you’re like most people, you've probably lied. But imagine if your parents had raised you to never lie, under any circumstances. This is Michael Leviton’s extraordinary account of being raised in a family he calls a “little honesty cult.” For young Michael, his parents’ core philosophy felt liberating. He loved “just being honest.” By the time he was twenty-nine years old he'd learned that this honesty had consequences—in friendships, on dates, and at job interviews. And when honesty slowly poisoned a romance, Michael decided there had to be something to lying after all. He set himself the task of learning to be as casually dishonest as the rest of us.
Aftershocks: A Memoir by Nadia Owusu
Young Nadia followed her father, a United Nations official, from Europe to Africa and back again. Just as she and her family settled into a new home, her father would say it was time to leave. This instability of her childhood was deepened by family secrets and fractures. Her Armenian American mother, who abandoned Nadia when she was two, would periodically reappear then vanish again. Her father, a Ghanaian, died when she was thirteen. After his passing, Nadia’s stepmother gave her a revelation that was either a secret or a lie. When Nadia arrived in New York she felt uncertain yet eager to find herself. But what followed were periods of depression in which she struggled to hold herself and her siblings together. Aftershocks is the way she hauled herself from the wreckage of her life’s quaking.
Young Nadia followed her father, a United Nations official, from Europe to Africa and back again. Just as she and her family settled into a new home, her father would say it was time to leave. This instability of her childhood was deepened by family secrets and fractures. Her Armenian American mother, who abandoned Nadia when she was two, would periodically reappear then vanish again. Her father, a Ghanaian, died when she was thirteen. After his passing, Nadia’s stepmother gave her a revelation that was either a secret or a lie. When Nadia arrived in New York she felt uncertain yet eager to find herself. But what followed were periods of depression in which she struggled to hold herself and her siblings together. Aftershocks is the way she hauled herself from the wreckage of her life’s quaking.
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