Thursday, August 11, 2022

New Releases: September Edition

Check out these highly anticipated September releases featuring fiction and nonfiction titles. Click on the title to request a copy or get your name on the waitlist. Don’t forget to watch for more featured releases next month! 


Fiction

The Witch and The Tsar by Olesya Salnikova Gilmore

As a half-goddess possessing magic, Yaga is used to living on her own. She mostly keeps to her hut in the woods, where those in need of healing seek her out, even as they spread rumors about her supposed cruelty and wicked spells. But when her old friend Anastasia-now the wife of the tsar, and suffering from a mysterious illness-arrives in her forest desperate for her protection, Yaga realizes the fate of all of Russia is tied to Anastasia’s, and she must step out of the shadows to protect the land she loves.


If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery

In the 1970s, Topper and Sanya flee to Miami as political violence consumes their native Kingston. But America, as the couple and their two children learn, is far from the promised land. Excluded from society as Black immigrants, the family pushes on through Hurricane Andrew and later the 2008 recession, living in a house so cursed that the pet fish launches itself out of its own tank rather than stay. But even as things fall apart, the family remains motivated, often to its own detriment, by what their younger son, Trelawny, calls "the exquisite, racking compulsion to survive."



For the first time in nearly four decades, Mary Alice Roth is not getting ready for the first day of school at Billington High. A few months into her retirement, Mary Alice does not know how to fill her days. At least there’s Ellie, who stops by each morning for coffee. When Mary Alice’s sister arrives on her doorstep with a staggering piece of news, it jeopardizes the careful shell she’s built around her life and puts her friendship with Ellie at risk.




Nonfiction

Teaching White Supremacy by Donald Yacovone

A powerful exploration of the past and present arc of America's white supremacy--from the country's inception and Revolutionary years to its 19th century flashpoint of civil war; to the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s and today's Black Lives Matter.





This is What it Sounds like by Susan Rogers & Ogi Ogas

This Is What It Sounds Like is a journey into the science and soul of music that reveals the secrets of why your favorite songs move you. But it’s also a story of a musical trailblazer who began as a humble audio tech in Los Angeles to became Prince’s chief engineer for Purple Rain, and then create other No. 1 hits (including Barenaked Ladies' "One Week") as one of the most successful female record producers of all time.



We all have a vague sense that social media is bad for our minds, for our children, and for our democracies. But the truth is that its reach and impact run far deeper than we have understood. Building on years of international reporting, Max Fisher tells the gripping and galling inside story of how Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and other social networks, in their pursuit of unfettered profits, preyed on psychological frailties to create the algorithms that drive everyday users to extreme opinions and, increasingly, extreme actions.

Wednesday, August 10, 2022

Read Beyond the Beaten Path: Summer Reading for Adults 2022

 


August 13th is the last day to join the Read Beyond the Beaten Path Adult Summer Reading Challenge For our grand prize, log at least 10 books for two chances to win a MoMA book lamp!
 
Find your next great read at our Reader's Corner, which features books recommended by WPL staff, or try one of our Bundles if you'd like a librarian to select books, magazines or DVDs for you. For information on adult classes and programs, visit mywpl.org

Enjoy these book reviews submitted by your fellow patrons through our WooReads challenge. 


The Speed of Dark by Elizabeth Moon

Brilliantly done. It is mostly first-person narration, with some 3rd-person, and the style differences brilliantly convey the shifts in POV and also create the narrator character for us. This is the "Flowers for Algernon" of the 21st century. But it has a happier ending. ~Amy W. 

The Catch Me If You Can by Jessica Nabongo

The Catch Me If You Can documents the journey of the first Black woman to travel to all 195 countries. Warning: causes bouts of envy and serious wanderlust. ~Mary T. 
Mean Baby by Selma Blair

This was an easy summer read. It's amazing how many doctors Selma consulted over the years before anyone ordered the MRI that revealed her chronic illness when it was quite advanced and required a potentially-dangerous treatment. About half the book is about Selma's childhood and school years, which she tells in a wonderfully humorous way. Highly recommend! 
~Linda J. 


I swear, Colson Whitehead can write anything. He takes all manner of popular genres and turns them into high quality literary fiction. He's done it with the Zombie novel, historical fiction, magical realism. And now with a crime novel that is at the same time a love letter to New York City and particularly Harlem. ~Dale R.