Author: McKinlay, Jenn, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F MCKINLAY Format: Books Summary: "During the most wonderful time of the year, famous author Helen Monroe arrives in Briar Creek to be the writer in residence, but her "bah humbug" attitude excludes her from the many holiday celebrations the town residents enjoy. To try to spread some Christmas cheer, library director Lindsey Norris invites the new writer in town to join her crafternoon club. Helen politely refuses, and when an altercation happens between Helen and another patron, Lindsey begins to suspect the author has been keeping to herself for a reason. Another newcomer, Jackie Lewis, reveals she's visiting Briar Creek to be near Helen because she believes they are destined to meet. Having dealt with a stalker in the past, Lindsey feels compelled to tell Helen about Jackie, as she suspects that Helen is unaware her "number one" fan is in town. When Jackie's body is later discovered in the town's park beneath the holiday-light display with a copy of Helen's latest manuscript in her hand, the reclusive novelist becomes the prime suspect in the murder of her self-proclaimed mega fan. Helen's frosty demeanor melts when Lindsey offers her help, and now the librarian and her crafternoon pals must prove the author innocent before "The End" becomes Helen's final sentence"--
Author: Loigman, Lynda Cohen, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F LOIGMAN Format: Books Summary: "It's never too late for new beginnings. On the cusp of turning eighty, newly retired pharmacist Augusta Stern is adrift. When she relocates to Rallentando Springs-an active senior community in southern Florida-she unexpectedly crosses paths with Irving Rivkin, the delivery boy from her father's old pharmacy-and the man who broke her heart sixty years earlier. As a teenager growing up in 1920's Brooklyn, Augusta's role model was her father, Solomon Stern, the trusted owner of the local pharmacy and the neighborhood expert on every ailment. But when Augusta's mother dies and Great Aunt Esther moves in, Augusta can't help but be drawn to Esther's curious methods. As a healer herself, Esther offers Solomon's customers her own advice-unconventional remedies ranging from homemade chicken soup to a mysterious array of powders and potions. As Augusta prepares for pharmacy college, she is torn between loyalty to her father and fascination with her great aunt, all while navigating a budding but complicated relationship with Irving. Desperate for clarity, she impulsively uses Esther's most potent elixir with disastrous consequences. Disillusioned and alone, Augusta vows to reject Esther's enchantments forever. Sixty years later, confronted with Irving, Augusta is still haunted by the mistakes of her past. What happened all those years ago and how did her plan go so spectacularly wrong? Did Irving ever truly love her or was he simply playing a part? And can Augusta reclaim the magic of her youth before it's too late?"--
Author: Sepetys, Ruta author. Published: 2022 Call Number: Y SEPETYS Format: Books Summary: In a country governed by isolation, fear, and a tyrannical dictator, seventeen-year-old Cristian Florescu is blackmailed by the secret police to become an informer, but he decides to use his position to try to outwit his handler, undermine the regime, give voice to fellow Romanians, and expose to the world what is happening in his country. Includes author's note. "Romania, 1989. Communist regimes are crumbling across Europe. Seventeen-year-old Christian Florescu dreams of becoming a writer, but Romanians aren't free to dream; they are bound by rules and force. Amid the tyrannical dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu in a country governed by isolation and fear, Christian is blackmailed by the secret police to become an informer." --Front jacket flap
Author: Confino, Sara Goodman, author. Published: 2022 Call Number: F CONFINO Format: Books Summary: For two women generations apart, going home will change their lives. Four years into her marriage, Jenna is blindsided when her husband asks for a divorce. With time on her hands and her life in flux, she agrees to accompany her eccentric grandmother Evelyn on a road trip to the seaside Massachusetts town where much of their family history was shaped. When they hit the road, Evelyn spins the tale of the star-crossed teenage romance that captured her heart more than seventy years ago and changed the course of her life. She insists the return to her hometown isn't about that at all - no matter how much she talks about Tony, her unforgettable and forbidden first love. Upon arrival, Jenna meets Tony's attentive great-nephew Joe. The new friendship and fresh ocean air give her the confidence and distance she needs to begin putting the pain of a broken marriage behind her. As the secrets and truths of Evelyn's past unfold, Jenna discovers a new side of her grandmother, and of herself, that she never knew existed - and learns that the possibilities for healing can come at the most unexpected times in a woman's life.
Author: McManus, Karen M. author. Published: 2020 Call Number: Y MCMANUS Format: Books Summary: After receiving an invitation to spend the summer with their estranged grandmother, the Story cousins arrive at her house only to discover that she is not there, and the longer they stay on the island, the more they realize their mysterious family history has some deadly secrets.
Author: Harris, Kamala, 1964- author. Published: 2019 Call Number: LP B HARRIS Format: Large print Summary: Senator Kamala Harris's commitment to speaking truth is informed by her upbringing. The daughter of immigrants, she was raised in an Oakland, California community that cared deeply about social justice; her parents--an esteemed economist from Jamaica and an admired cancer researcher from India--met as activists in the civil rights movement when they were graduate students at Berkeley. Growing up, Harris herself never hid her passion for justice, and when she became a prosecutor out of law school, a deputy district attorney, she quickly established herself as one of the most innovative change agents in American law enforcement. She progressed rapidly to become the elected District Attorney for San Francisco, and then the chief law enforcement officer of the state of California as a whole. Known for bringing a voice to the voiceless, she took on the big banks during the foreclosure crisis, winning a historic settlement for California's working families. Her hallmarks were applying a holistic, data-driven approach to many of California's thorniest issues, always eschewing stale "tough on crime" rhetoric as presenting a series of false choices. Neither "tough" nor "soft" but smart on crime became her mantra. Being smart means learning the truths that can make us better as a community, and supporting those truths with all our might. That has been the pole star that guided Harris to a transformational career as the top law enforcement official in California, and it is guiding her now as a transformational United States Senator, grappling with an array of complex issues that affect her state, our country, and the world, from health care and the new economy to immigration, national security, the opioid crisis, and accelerating inequality. By reckoning with the big challenges we face together, drawing on the hard-won wisdom and insight from her own career and the work of those who have most inspired her, Kamala Harris offers in The truths we hold a master class in problem solving, in crisis management, and leadership in challenging times. Through the arc of her own life, on into the great work of our day, she communicates a vision of shared struggle, shared purpose, and shared values. In a book rich in many home truths, not least is that a relatively small number of people work very hard to convince a great many of us that we have less in common than we actually do, but it falls to us to look past them and get on with the good work of living our common truth. When we do, our shared effort will continue to sustain us and this great nation, now and in the years to come.
Author: Stevenson, Shawn author. Published: 2016 Call Number: 612.8 STEVENSO Format: Books Summary: "Is high-quality sleep the missing component to help you shed fat for good, stave off diseases, and keep you productive? In Sleep Smarter, Shawn Stevenson, host of the popular podcast, The Model Health Show, answers these and many other sleep-related questions.As a teenager, Stevenson was diagnosed with a degenerative bone disease. He gave up on his health and his body, until he decided to fight back.Through years of research and consulting health experts, Stevenson discovered there is one criminally overlooked aspect of health: sleep.Through better sleep, Stevenson was able to achieve fitness and business goals he never thought possible, and now he shares his sleep secrets with the world. The book includes a 14-day plan with tips and tricks like the exact time of day to exercise for better sleep quality, what to wear to avoid waking up at night, and ways to fall asleep faster. Sleep Smarter is the ultimate guide to sleeping better, feeling refreshed, and achieving a healthier, happier life"--
Author: Bugliosi, Vincent, author. Gentry, Curt, 1931-2014 author. Published: 1994 1974 Call Number: 364.1523 BUGLIOSI Format: Books Summary: Prosecuting Attorney in the Manson trial, Vincent Bugliosi held a unique insider's position in one of the most baffling and horrifying cases of the twentieth century: the cold-blooded Tate-LaBianca murders carried out by Charles Manson and four of his followers. What motivated Manson in his seemingly mindless selection of victims, and what was his hold over the young women who obeyed his orders? Here is the gripping story of this famous and haunting crime.
Author: Coates, Ta-Nehisi, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: 070.92 Format: Books Summary: "Coates originally set off to write a book about writing, in the tradition of Orwell's classic Politics and the English Language, but found himself grappling with deeper questions about how our stories-our reporting and imaginative narratives and mythmaking-expose and distort our realities. The first of the book's three intertwining essays is set in Dakar, Senegal. Despite being raised as a strict Afrocentrist--and named for Nubian pharaoh--Coates had never set foot on the African continent until now. He roams the "steampunk" city of "old traditions and new machinery," meeting with strangers and dining with local writers who quiz him in French about African American politics. But everywhere he goes he feels as if he's in two places at once: a modern city in Senegal and a mythic kingdom in his mind, the pan-African homeland he was raised to believe was the origin and destiny for all black people. Finally he travels to the slave castles off the coast and touches the ocean that carried his ancestors away in chains--and has his own reckoning with the legacy of the Afrocentric dream. Back in the USA he takes readers along with him to Columbia, South Carolina, where he explores a different mythology, this one enforced on its subjects by the state. He enters the world of the teacher whose job is threatened for teaching one of Coates's own books and discovers a community of mostly white supporters who were transformed and even radicalized by the stories they discovered in the "racial reckoning" of 2020. But he also explores the backlash to this reckoning and the deeper myths and stories of the community--a capital of the confederacy with statues of segregationists looming over the its public squares. In Palestine, the longest of the essays, he discovers the devastating gap between the narratives we've accepted and the clashing reality of life on the ground. He meets with activists and dissidents, Israelis and Palestinians--the old, who remember their dispossessions on two continents, and the young who have only known struggle and disillusionment. He travels into Jerusalem, the heart of Zionist mythology, and to the occupied territories, where he sees the reality the myth is meant to hide. It is this hidden story that draws him in and profoundly changes him--and makes the war that would soon come all the more devastating"--
Author: Fisher, Suzanne Woods, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: LP F FISHER Format: Large print Summary: Ruth 'Dok' Stoltzfus is the kind of doctor who still believes in house calls, addressing not just her patients' physical needs but their emotional ones too. When newly widowed Bee faces a breast cancer diagnosis, Dok connects her with Fern Lapp for support. When her painfully shy assistant Annie finds herself drawn to a new calling, Dok goes to great lengths to help her achieve her dream. And when an abandoned newborn mysteriously appears at her office one frosty morning, Dok's world takes an unexpected turn as ripples of change touch several lives.
Author: Atwood, Margaret, 1939- author. Published: 2024 Call Number: 811.54 Format: Books Summary: "Tracing the legacy of Margaret Atwood - a writer who has fundamentally shaped the contemporary literary landscapes - Paper Boat assembles Atwood's most vital poems in one essential volume"-- "Tracing the legacy of Margaret Atwood--a writer who has fundamentally shaped the contemporary literary landscapes--Paper Boat: New and Selected Poems, 1961?2023 assembles Atwood's most vital poems in one essential volume. In pieces that are at once brilliant, beautiful, and hyper-imagined, Atwood gives voice to remarkably drawn characters--mythological figures, animals, and everyday people--all of whom have something to say about what it means to live in a world as strange as our own. 'How can one live with such a heart?' Atwood asks, casting her singular spell upon the reader and ferrying us through life, death, and whatever comes next. Atwood, in her journey through poetry, illuminates our most innate joys and sorrows, desires and fears. Spanning six decades of work--from her earliest beginnings to brand-new poems--this volume charts the evolution of one of our most iconic and necessary authors. in one essential volume. In pieces that are at once brilliant, beautiful, and hyper-imagined, Atwood gives voice to remarkably drawn characters--mythological figures, animals, and everyday people--all of whom have something to say about what it means to live in a world as strange as our own. 'How can one live with such a heart?' Atwood asks, casting her singular spell upon the reader and ferrying us through life, death, and whatever comes next. Atwood, in her journey through poetry, illuminates our most innate joys and sorrows, desires and fears. Spanning six decades of work--from her earliest beginnings to brand-new poems--this volume charts the evolution of one of our most iconic and necessary authors." --Amazon.com
Author: Solomon, Rivers, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F SOLOMON Format: Books Summary: "The Maxwell siblings return to their childhood home in the Dallas suburbs after the shocking news of their parents' death. They return to find the house, and the family itself, haunted by strange, inexplicable terrors"-- The three Maxwell siblings keep their distance from the lily-white gated enclave outside Dallas where they grew up. When their family moved there, they were the only Black family in the neighborhood. The neighbors acted nice enough, but right away bad things, scary things—the strange and the unexplainable—began to happen in their house. Maybe it was some cosmic trial, a demonic rite of passage into the upper-middle class. Whatever it was, the Maxwells, steered by their formidable mother, stayed put, unwilling to abandon their home, terrors and trauma be damned. As adults, the siblings could finally get away from the horrors of home, leaving their parents all alone in the house. But when news of their parents' death arrives, Ezri is forced to return to Texas with their sisters, Eve and Emanuelle, to reckon with their family’s past and present, and to find out what happened while they were away. It was not a “natural” death for their parents . . . but was it supernatural?
Author: Rooney, Sally, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F ROONEY Format: Books Summary: "An exquisitely moving story about grief, love, and family, from the global phenomenon Sally Rooney"-- "Aside from the fact that they are brothers, Peter and Ivan Koubek seem to have little in common. Peter is a Dublin lawyer in his thirties--successful, competent, and apparently unassailable. But in the wake of their father's death, he's medicating himself to sleep and struggling to manage his relationships with two very different women--his enduring first love, Sylvia, and Naomi, a college student for whom life is one long joke. Ivan is a twenty-two-year-old competitive chess player. He has always seen himself as socially awkward, a loner, the antithesis of his glib elder brother. Now, in the early weeks of his bereavement, Ivan meets Margaret, an older woman emerging from her own turbulent past, and their lives become rapidly and intensely intertwined. For two grieving brothers and the people they love, this is a new interlude--a period of desire, despair, and possibility; a chance to find out how much one life might hold inside itself without breaking." --Amazon.com
Author: Rasche, Anna, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F RASCHE Format: Books Summary: "A woman's secret. A deadly Plague. Unleash the hidden magic... 1348. As the Black Plague ravages Italy, Ginevra di Gasparo is summoned to Florence after nearly a decade of lonely exile. Ginevra has a gift--harnessing the hidden powers of gemstones, she can heal the sick. But when word spread of her unusual abilities, she was condemned as a witch and banished. Now the same men who expelled Ginevra are begging for her return. Ginevra obliges, assuming the city's leaders are finally ready to accept her unorthodox cures amid a pandemic. But upon arrival, she is tasked with a much different mission: she must use her collection of jewels to track down a ruthless thief who is ransacking Florence's churches for priceless relics--the city's only hope for protection. If she succeeds, she'll be a recognized physician and never accused of witchcraft again. But as her investigation progresses, Ginevra discovers she's merely a pawn in a much larger scheme than the one she's been hired to solve. And the dangerous men behind this conspiracy won't think twice about killing a stone witch to get what they want..."--
Author: Jaramillo, Luis, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F JARAMILL Format: Books Summary: "A riveting multigenerational tale of magic, sisterhood, and borders spanning centuries--from modern-day El Paso, to the 1940s, to 18th century colonial Mexico. It's 1943 in El Paso, Texas, and 18-year-old Nena spends her days caring for the infant children of her older sisters, while longing for a life of adventure and purpose. She also has a secret: her vivid premonitions are what's causing her to faint, and she fears she'll end up like the scary old curandera who lives down the street. When the mysterious and stern Sister Benedicta arrives late one evening, Nena is taken across borders of space and time for a life-changing experience in colonial Mexico. In the present-day, Nena's grand-niece Marta is balancing motherhood and a struggling legal aid practice, just as her own supernatural powers are emerging. When the 93-year-old Nena's care is added to Marta's already full plate, the two women's destinies become irrevocably intertwined, as they both struggle to find fulfillment and escape through La Vista, or "the hum," a mysterious, inherited magical ability that allows its recipients to tap into the subconscious hunger for destruction, rebirth, the natural world, lust, and the call to heed our darkest desires and brightest truths. Blending historical fiction with magical realism, The Witches of El Paso explores the enticing and destructive magic that arises out of the depths of human desire, to tell a story of empowerment and wonder that transcends borders both physical and metaphorical"--
Author: Griffiths, Elly, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F GRIFFITH Format: Books Summary: "From the internationally best-selling author of the Ruth Galloway Mysteries comes a collection of short stories featuring many characters that readers have come to know and love"--
Author: Berry, Jedediah, author. Published: 2024 Call Number: F BERRY Format: Books Summary: "The Naming Song understands the fundamental magic of language, and breathes that magic onto every page." -Holly Black, #1 New York Times bestselling author There's nothing more dangerous than an unnamed thing. When the words went away, the world changed. All meaning was lost, and every border fell. Monsters slipped from dreams to haunt the waking while ghosts wandered the land in futile reveries. Only with the rise of the committees of the named-Maps, Ghosts, Dreams, and Names-could the people stand against the terrors of the nameless wilds. They built borders around their world and within their minds, shackled ghosts and hunted monsters, and went to war against the unknown. For one unnamed courier of the Names Committee, the task of delivering new words preserves her place in a world that fears her. But after a series of monstrous attacks on the named, she is forced to flee her committee and seek her long-lost sister. Accompanied by a patchwork ghost, a fretful monster, and a nameless animal who prowls the shadows, her search for the truth of her past opens the door to a revolutionary future-for the words she carries will reshape the world. The Naming Song is a book of deep secrets and marvelous discoveries, strange adventures and dangerous truths. It's the story of a world locked in a battle over meaning. Most of all, it's the perfect fantasy for anyone who's ever dreamed of a stranger, freer, more magical world."--
Author: Presley, Lisa Marie, 1968-2023, author. Keough, Riley, 1989- author. Published: 2024 Call Number: B PRESLEY Format: Books Summary: Born to an American myth and raised in the wilds of Graceland, Elvis's daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, tells her whole story for the first time in a memoir faithfully completed by her daughter, Riley Keough, after Lisa Marie's death. "In 2022, Lisa Marie Presley asked her daughter to help finally finish her long-gestating memoir. A month later, Lisa Marie was dead, and the world would never know her story in her own words, never know the passionate, joyful, caring, and complicated woman that Riley loved and now grieved. Riley got the tapes that her mother had recorded for the book, lay in her bed, and listened as Lisa Marie told story after story about smashing golf carts together in the yards of Graceland, about the unconditional love she felt from her father, about being upstairs, just the two of them. About getting dragged screaming out of the bathroom as she ran toward his body on the floor. About living in Los Angeles with her mother, getting sent to school after school, always kicked out, always in trouble. About her singular, lifelong relationship with Danny Keough, about being married to Michael Jackson, what they had in common. About motherhood. About deep addiction. About ever-present grief. Riley knew she had to fulfill her mother's wish to reveal these memories, incandescent and painful, to the world. To make her mother known." --Amazon.com
