October 2026

Picture Books

Kitty Camp by Drew Brockington

A girl accidentally finds herself at a summer camp for kitties in this hilarious companion to Puppy Bus from Drew Brockington, the creator of the CatStronauts series

Heading to day camp for the first time, one girl can’t wait to hike, swim, and sing around the campfire. But when she accidentally gets on the wrong bus, she ends up at a very different summer camp—full of kitties!

Arts & Crafts is pretty chaotic, it seems like it’s always nap time, and it’s impossible to eat lunch with kittens pouncing on her food. She starts to wonder if maybe this won’t be the greatest summer ever—until her fellow campers show her some new ways to have fun.

For cat lovers everywhere, this charming picture book from author-illustrator Drew Brockington is a laugh-out-loud twist on the classic fish-out-of-water tale.

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Penelope Rex vs. the New Kid by Ryan T. Higgins

Just when she has gotten used to being the only dinosaur in a class full of children, Penelope Rex is surprised to learn that the new kid is…a dinosaur just like her! Will the playground be big enough for the two of them?

Penelope Rex is the only dinosaur in her school and she likes it that way. But when a new kid joins her class, Penelope doesn’t know how to feel about it—because this new kid is another dinosaur! As she tries to welcome Patty Topps, Penelope is faced with some dino-size questions about standing out, fitting in, and what really makes her feel special.

Readers will root for Penelope as she navigates what it means to be one of a kind (even if she’s no longer the only kid in her class who is seven feet tall and covered in scales).

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Early Chapter Books

Press Start: Battle of the Super Rabbit Boys! by Thomas Flintham

Super Rabbit Boy competes with different versions of himself in the latest page-turning installment of this USA Today bestselling series!

Super Rabbit Boy is cloned by meanie King Viking’s new Clone-bot — now there are twenty Super Rabbit Boys in Super World! The Super Rabbit Boys agree they’ve got to stop King Viking from cloning more robots and creating a robot army. They decide to have a friendly competition to see who can stop him first… Sunny is playing a new multiplayer Super Rabbit Boy game where everyone is competing to be the best Super Rabbit Boy. Can Sunny beat the other players and come out on top? Which Super Boy will be the one to save the day?

Thomas Flintham’s full-color artwork on every page brings energy and fun to this action-packed, gaming-themed series. And comic panels with speech bubbles make this early graphic chapter book impossible for kids to put down!

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Fairy House Halloween (A Choose Your Own Adventure book) by James Preller, illustratd by Norm Grock

Choose from 13 possible endings in this interactive book from the bestselling Choose Your Own Adventure series, now for 5- to 8-year-old readers! Filled with colorful illustrations, these books for little kids make reading together extra fun. But be careful!!! The choices YOU make could land you inside a real-life Halloween fairy house.

You and your family just moved out of the city, leaving all your friends behind for an old house in the country. Tomorrow is Halloween, but today you are bored … so bored that you decide to make a fairy house. Silly, right? But before you know it, the house has summoned Beezle, an apprentice fairy tasked with saving Halloween. His magic sometimes gets mixed up, but maybe you can help him … the only question is do you want a day full of tricks? Or treats?

Packed with seriously spooky twists and turns and playfully charming full-color artwork, Fairy House Halloween is full of wacky surprises and zany endings!

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Chaos of the Vortex Dragon (Dragon Masters #30) by Tracey West

Drake and Worm face off against the evil wizard Maldred with the help of the mysterious Chaos Dragon in the latest action-packed installment of this New York Times bestselling series perfect for newly independent readers!

The evil wizard Maldred has been turned into one hundred mini-Maldreds! Dragon Masters around the world are battling them, and it’s up to Drake, Worm, and their friends to stop Maldred once and for all. Drake, Rori, Bo, Ana, and their dragons travel to Goryeo to meet the Chaos Dragon Seong-Min and her Dragon Master Ji-Min. Seong-Min is the only dragon powerful enough to stop the chaos the Maldreds are causing! But Ji-Min warns that the Chaos Dragon is very difficult to control, even for her. Will Drake and his friends convince Ji-Min to help them defeat the Maldreds? What will happen when the Chaos Dragon uses his powers?

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The Epic Guide to Dragon Masters by Tracey West

Calling all Dragon Masters! This is the guidebook that no Dragon Master should be without — featuring full-color artwork on every page!

Kids love reading all about the Dragon Masters’ adventures in Tracey West’s New York Times bestselling Dragon Masters early chapter book series. Now fans can own the official guide to Dragon Masters. This epic, 256-page, full-color special edition features maps, information about Dragon Masters and their dragons, notes from wizards, the history of Dragon Masters, and more! This book has everything a future Dragon Master needs to know!

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Youth Graphic Novels

Monkey King: Uproar in Heaven by Alina Chau

Drawing from classic Chinese adventure Journey to the West, Alina Chau’s bright new adaptation centers on the Monkey King’s wild beginnings and brings one of mythology’s most unforgettable troublemakers to life in a whole new way.

Sun Wukong wasn’t born in the usual way―he hatched from an egg atop Hua Guo Mountain, full of big dreams and an even bigger attitude. With a shape-shifting staff, a cloud he can ride like lightning, and an unstoppable belief in himself, Wukong isn’t just another monkey . . . he’s the Monkey King.

When word of his wild powers reaches the Heavenly Realm, the gods try to keep him close to prevent any chaos. But Wukong didn’t come all this way to play by someone else’s rules. And when he decides to shake things up, the skies themselves might not be ready for the storm he’s about to unleash. Can one monkey’s mischief really cause an uproar in heaven?

Combining Alina’s sumptuous, dreamy art with a faithful, respectful adaptation of a favorite mythical tale, Uproar in Heaven still manages to be as much fun as a barrel full of monkeys.

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Dream Big by Shannon Hale, illustrated by Marcela Cespedes

Dream Big is the perfect book for readers who love friendship stories, The Babysitter’s Club and Click graphic novels, and hopeful, inspiring reads.

A movie is being filmed right in Cassie’s neighborhood! Is this her chance to be a star? Dreams come true when she and her best friend Vali get hired as extras. Plus, she’ll get paid, which will help her parents with their money troubles. But when Vali drops out of the movie, Cassie is stuck with the mean kid actors. Even worse, it turns out she’s in a horror movie, and the monster in it scares her. Will she get called a “baby” or “scaredy-cat”. Can Cassie make it through the movie without her fears driving her away?

Join Cassie as she finds the courage to face her fears and dream big!

With bright and charming illustrations by Marcela Cespedes, Dream Big is a joyful story filled with imagination, fun dreams, and wonder.

This book is perfect for readers who want to enjoy a gentle and accessible friendship story, as well as anyone looking for SEL themes about empathy, kindness, compassion, and forgiveness.

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Junior Fiction

The Second Life of Snap by Erin Entrada Kelly

Twelve-year-old Zuzu Santos doesn’t want a robot. She and her best friends would rather explore Bright Valley on their own. But then Zuzu meets Snap, a know-it-all guardian robot with a limited battery life and an abundance of hope. A gripping, stand-alone, thematically rich survival story by two-time Newbery Medalist Erin Entrada Kelly, for fans of The Wild Robot and A Rover’s Story.

Bright Valley Subsidized Camp #5 is not a perfect place to live. It’s dusty, there are no trees to provide respite from the beating sun, the trailers are falling apart, and the water supply is heavily rationed. But to twelve-year-old Zuzu Santos and her three best friends, Bright Valley is home.

When Zuzu’s dad loses his job at Lockwood, the corporation that controls everything from rations to education, he isn’t given money or food or water as severance, but a dated, first-generation robot. They do not provide a working charging station. Zuzu names the robot Snap, and he soon becomes part of the Bright Valley family. But Snap’s battery is dwindling every day, and though Snap is prepared for his inevitable reset, Zuzu isn’t. She would do whatever it takes to keep Snap alive. The problem is, Snap would do the same for Zuzu and her friends, no matter the cost.

Erin Entrada Kelly tells a moving story of friendship and family, rich with themes and characters that will resonate with readers. The Second Life of Snap is a futuristic book for middle graders that is grounded, full of heart and humor, and unforgettable. An excellent choice for fans of The Wild Robot, A Rover’s Story, and Erin Entrada Kelly’s own We Dream of Space.

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The Ginghams by T.C. Kemper

An eerie middle grade mystery debut that follows a young girl who returns home to find the people of her little town, including her best friend, chillingly changed after the arrival of the prim and proper Gingham family.

When 12-year-old Joni Bird returns home from summer camp, it’s clear something strange is afoot in Olive Springs. May, her usually head-banging best friend, now wears her hair in a tight bun and calls playing the drums “unladylike.” The ice cream shop only serves vanilla ice cream. The women and girls of the neighborhood all sport big pearl earrings and crisp cotton dresses.

At the heart of it all? The creepy new family in the neighborhood with their soulless, carnival smiles and retro fashion sense: the Ginghams. Everyone they invite to their Thursday night book club re-emerges as dead-eyed, smiling, Gingham-approved “model citizens,” all thanks to Mr. Gingham’s lifestyle guide, The Pillars of Perfection―and something even more sinister hidden behind his basement door.

Through quick thinking and cunning, Joni and her friend Tyler set out to fight not only to get their friend May back, but to save their whole town from forever falling under the Ginghams’ control.

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Junior Nonfiction

ADHD!: Understanding You, Your Brain, and How to Thrive in a Neurodivergent World by Rachel Brian

Learn all about ADHD and discover helpful strategies to help play to your strengths―whether or not you have ADHD!―in this fun and empowering illustrated guide.

Every brain is different! And understanding how your brain works can help you figure out ways to make your life easier. If you have ADHD, life may seem especially hard sometimes, so the more you know, the better prepared you’ll be.

In this kid-friendly illustrated guide, discover what ADHD is, how it might affect you or your friends, and what strategies you could try in your own life. Kids with or without ADHD will discover empowering facts about neurodiversity, and learn how to put words to what they might be experiencing or observing.

From the creator of Consent (for Kids!), this comforting and inspiring book is perfect for:

– Kids who have just been diagnosed with ADHD, or kids who know somebody who’s just received an ADHD diagnosis
– Teachers or guidance counselors looking to explain ADHD in class or one-on-one
– Families to read together, and discuss
– Anyone! Since everyone’s brain is unique!

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History Smashers: The Space Race by Kate Messner

Myths! Lies! Failed satellite launches? Head to the launch pad with beloved educator and New York Times bestselling author Kate Messner, because the History Smashers are busting the biggest misconceptions about the Space-Race, and the facts are blasting off in 10-9-8…

On April 14, 1969, President John F. Kennedy announced that the U.S. would put a man on the moon kicking off the Space Race, right? WRONG! The Space Race was already well underway by 1969…and honestly, the U.S. was lightyears behind the Russians when it came to space exploration.

Alright, but once the U.S. got going, it was smooth sailing to the stars, right? Not exactly. Space exploration always comes with risk, and the truth is to learn about our universe, it took the work of many scientists, politicians, and passionate everyday citizens like you.

Grab your helmet and join New York Times bestselling author Kate Messner as she leads the History Smashers to dispel the misconceptions and outright myths about tensions between the U.S. and Russia during the consequential Space Race.

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Young Adult Fiction

The Sixth Faction by Veronica Roth

The worldwide sensation as you’ve never seen it before. Step into a bold new Divergent series from #1 New York Times bestselling author Veronica Roth.

Beatrice Prior stands on the brink of a decision every person in her world must make: five factions, five futures, five lives.

She has a plan: she’s going to make the bravest choice and leave Abnegation to join Dauntless, even though it means abandoning her family.

But when tragedy strikes at her choosing ceremony, everything changes—her world, her plans, even Beatrice herself.

Her decision will thrust her into the crosshairs of an underground rebellion, where a boy with secrets as dangerous as her own—a boy with only a number for a name—may be the only person she can trust.

One choice will change everything.

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Young Adult Graphic Novels

Witch’s Inheritance by Paige Hender

A contemporary dark fantasy graphic novel about a young woman who discovers she comes from a long line of witches and is tasked with keeping her new town safe from the creatures lurking in the forest―for fans of E. M. Carroll, Molly Knox Ostertag, and Trung Le Nguyen.

Home is where the monsters are…

Edie Birch needs an escape from her crumbling life. When a death in the family leaves Edie the inheritor of a strange, towering house in the small town of Hart Creek, she doesn’t look back.

While she tries to connect with her estranged aunt and learn more about her mysterious family history, she uncovers a shocking truth: She comes from a long line of witches. The heir to her grandmother’s powers, Edie is Hart Creek’s only hope to keep away the beasts lurking at the forest’s edge. As she struggles to master her magic, she’ll enlist the help of local folklore nerd Leander and discovers secrets that will leave her questioning who the true monsters are . . .

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Soulmates by David Wilson

For fans of As I Dream of You and Pumpkinheads, David Wilson’s author-illustrator graphic novel debut explores themes of life and death, the bittersweetness of first love, and the notion that perhaps your perfect soulmate is the one who helps you discover your true self.

Kit is the golden boy of his small town. Captain of the football team, perfect grades, perfect relationship, perfect everything. But when his childhood best friend, Emma, mysteriously returns to town, Kit’s life is thrown into turmoil.

She’s the only one who knows what happened that day he fell at the cliffs―and why he woke up alone on the shore. She’s also the only one who may know the truth about the strange visions he’s been having―and why the people he sees in them are turning up dead.

As Kit and Emma reconnect and rekindle the past, Kit’s forced to admit that things aren’t as perfect as they seem. And Emma. . . well, she isn’t what she seems either. Her family’s been hiding a secret for generations and with Death looming over all of them, the truth can’t stay buried forever.

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Adult Fiction

The Wild Beneath by Kelly Anderson

For fans of Wild Dark Shore and Remarkably Bright Creatures, a love story as fierce and mysterious as the sea itself.

Annie MacLeod always knew she was different, growing up on a sailboat in the Pacific Northwest, navigating by the stars and swimming in the ocean. But when a tsunami shatters her world and her parents are swept away, Annie is stranded on land, grief-stricken and forced to confront just how unconventional she is, despite her enduring love for her childhood sweetheart, Evan.

In the wreckage, she rescues a wordless man named Walker, who emits a hum only she can hear. Their connection is instant, elemental. When Walker disappears—along with any explanation he might hold about who she really is—Annie is forced to decide between evacuating with Evan or staying to unlock a secret that feels vital to her survival.

Six years later, Annie has buried the past. But when Walker’s otherworldly sound returns, it forces a reckoning with the wild life she’s left behind. Is the truth of the ocean more powerful than she knows?

The Wild Beneath is a spellbinding story of soulmates, homecoming and the ancient bonds that tie us all to the natural world.

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Not a Word by Linwood Barclay

In the latest chilling thriller from New York Times bestselling author Linwood Barclay, a man’s world is upended after he stumbles upon a grisly crime scene in the family home.

Every family has secrets, but when Reece visits his parents’ house, he’s shocked to find them in bed, dead. At first glance it looks like a murder-suicide perpetrated by his father, but on closer inspection there’s clearly more to the story. For starters, inconsistencies in the crime scene suggest his dad may not have shot himself.

As Reece, shaken by his horrifying discovery, awaits questioning from the police, his phone lights up with a call. It’s the last person he ever would have expected to hear from.

Reeling from the day’s events, Reece finds himself questioning everything he thought he knew about his parents—and whether he and his own family are in danger now. While the authorities work to untangle the baffling crime scene, Reece is pulled into a web of secrets linked to the unscrupulous pharma company his father worked for years ago.

In order to protect the people he loves most, he’ll have to dig deep into his own past to understand who his parents were, what they did, and who they hurt—before he ends up paying for their sins.

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The Shadow Friends by Tess Gerritsen

From New York Times bestselling author Tess Gerritsen comes a harrowing and emotional thriller where ghosts of the Cold War return with a vengeance—and cannot be outrun.

When a renowned disease expert and Russian defector dies mysteriously during a global affairs conference in Purity, Maine, the tight-knit band of former spies in the Martini Club once again sees their quiet coastal retirement interrupted by international intrigue. And when a waitress at the conference hotel is found murdered, Ingrid Slocum sees chilling links to a disastrous mission that nearly killed her three decades ago.

Desperate to uncover the truth, Ingrid’s drawn back into the game by a magnetic ex-CIA colleague—and former lover—who was with her on the long-ago doomed mission. He convinces her to join him, and together they head to Amsterdam to track down her would-be killer.

Ingrid’s frantic husband Lloyd and Maggie Bird are close behind, but a clandestine network of assassins is intent on stopping them. Forced to question every allegiance, the Martini Club must rely on the skills they tried to leave behind. Because in this game of revenge and deception, the past never dies—it just hides in the shadows.

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Partita by Barbara Kingsolver

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Demon Copperhead, a story of a brief, passionate, life-changing love affair, wrapped up in what might be the greatest romance of all: our eternal human longing for art and beauty.

Livia Cable has made her peace with her marriage and modest livelihood in the farm country where she grew up, until a shocking phone call from an old lover shakes her to the core. Decades earlier, this man knew her as Livia Bohusz, a music conservatory student estranged from her home and family, uncertain of anything except her passion for music and promise as an extraordinary pianist. His request, now, to see her again stirs up ghosts she’s kept at bay for a lifetime.

Shifting between past and present, Livia’s decision to meet or reject the reunion means confronting step by step, in memories framed as musical dances, the experiences of childhood loss, abandonment, self-immolating passion, and perilous attachment to a man who broke her belief in love and ruptured the course of her life.

With razor-sharp acuity and deep affection, Kingsolver’s unforgettable new novel reflects on class barriers, the risks of ambition, and the timeless, life-changing power of art.

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The Pirate Queen by Ariel Lawhon

A sweeping historical adventure inspired by the life of Grace O’Malley, the legendary Irish folk heroine who risked everything to defend her people. Venture onto the high seas with the thrilling latest from the New York Times bestselling author of The Frozen River and I Was Anastasia.

Grace O’Malley was born to be a sea captain. But despite her natural skill on the water, Grace learns early that her dreams of a life at the helm are not compatible with the expectations of her noble family. As the only daughter of a powerful chieftain, her role is to secure a strong alliance and bear children. But when she’s sent to foster with a nearby clan, Grace falls for a clever and open-minded second son—a man she cannot have.

Married off against her will to a brutal warrior, Grace performs her duty, all the while gathering followers loyal to her, and consolidating her husband’s power, only to be ousted from his lands. But this betrayal offers Grace the opportunity to return to sea, finally leading clan O’Malley’s mighty fleet. Just as she finds true independence, Queen Elizabeth’s incursions into Ireland grow bolder and Grace must fight to defend her land, her ships, and the people she loves most against the cruel and power-hungry English deputies, who will stop at nothing to check her influence.

Keenly observed and fiercely written, Ariel Lawhon’s new action-packed novel channels the untamed beauty and harsh realities of sixteenth-century Ireland, as seen through the eyes of an unforgettable heroine who rightly became “the Pirate Queen of Ireland.”

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A Tender Age by Chang-Rae Lee

From the Pulitzer Prize finalist, a story of guilt, innocence, and a boy on the cusp of adolescence

A spellbinding exploration of American masculinity and family dynamics as seen through the confused eyes of a prepubescent child of immigrants, A Tender Age joins the rich tradition of the American bildungsroman. The natural descendent of characters like Huckleberry Finn and Holden Caufield, Korean-American Jeon-Gi is torn between competing ideas of himself. At home, his working-class parents dote on him. Outside, he is part of a roving pack of kids with dominion over a derelict baseball field, weedy parking lot, and rusty jungle gym. Getting into and out of trouble is all-consuming. But the summer he turns eleven, he becomes embroiled in a staggering series of events reverberating far beyond himself and his family.

Devastating in its emotional precision, A Tender Age captures a family and community in striking distance of the American dream, and a young person on the precipice of adult knowledge, looking at his own culpability and looking away—then thinking about it for the rest of his life.

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Exit Party by Emily St. John Mandel

The award-winning, bestselling author of Station Eleven and Sea of Tranquility returns with a breathtaking novel of doubles, shadow worlds, and fractured timelines as a man disappears from a glittering Los Angeles party, and a woman—a gunrunner, an art collector, an operative of the State—searches for answers.

Los Angeles, 2031: The first spring after the collapse of the United States, peacekeeping troops withdraw from the city, the Jacaranda trees blossom, and the curfew is finally lifted. Ari Waker and her roommate pass the gauntlet of bomb-sniffing dogs, the shanty towns, and the Red Cross tents as they walk across Silverlake to a party. The mood is ecstatic inside the apartment, people drink and dance, a woman wears a silver dress, pleated like tinfoil. And then: A shift. A bewildered twin, an uncanny doppelganger stumbles through the crowd and out into the night, and Kareem, the party’s host, vanishes into thin air.

As Ari Waker unravels the mystery of this inexplicable night, Emily St. John Mandel unfurls a story that takes us from a future America splintered by civil war to the seaside cliffs of Greece where weapons dealers hide in an elegant resort, and from the domed city of Paris to a colony on the moon. An unforgettable literary feat, Exit Party is a novel about the price of safety, the perils of the surveillance state, a requiem for a world not unlike our own, and a breathtaking story of resilience in the face of cataclysmic change.

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Big Little Truths by Liane Moriarty

In this highly anticipated sequel, Liane Moriarty examines the complexities of modern women’s lives, shining light on family dynamics and long-hidden truths with wit and compassion. Whether you’ve read Big Little Lies or not, this is the perfect novel for longtime fans and new readers alike.

The last time we saw the women of Big Little Lies—Madeline, Celeste, Jane, Renata, and Bonnie—their children were five years old. If someone wasn’t invited to a birthday party, feelings were hurt. But ten years have passed and the kids are in high school, navigating all of the drama that accompanies teendom (goodbye playdates, hello drugs, sex, and alcohol).

When the high school principal receives a threatening package in the mail, word quickly spreads throughout the community and parents are in an uproar. But Madeline, Celeste, Jane, Renata, and Bonnie have other things to worry about. Celeste’s mother-in-law, Mary Louise, is behaving oddly—is it old-age forgetfulness and bluntness or something more sinister? Madeline is facing perhaps the biggest challenge of her life, Jane is at a dangerous fork in her marriage, Bonnie has realized there’s only so much solace in yoga. And Renata? Renata is living her best life—revenge is sweet.

When a stranger begins lurking around the school asking supposedly innocent questions, this tightly connected group of women must finally face the full repercussions of the big little truths they have and haven’t shared with their kids. Because the stakes are now much higher than not being invited to an ice-skating party—and the ice has never been thinner for any of them.

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Sunrise by Téa Obreht

Three lives, one hundred years, one forgotten town.

In 2024, Nina’s small aircraft crashes into a lake in the Wyoming mountains. Lost, freezing and alone, she stumbles upon Sunrise – an abandoned frontier town that is strangely well-maintained.

In 2003, Sunrise’s golden boy Coll is about to start rehearsals for the town’s annual historical reenactment when he is linked with a scandalous incident at a local bar. When an author comes to him with questions about one of Sunrise’s most beloved figures, Coll is forced to reassess everything he thought he knew about the city – and himself.

In 1902, town founder, gunslinger and adventure-novel hero Anton Vargas returns to Sunrise and helps the search for a missing boy. But who really is Vargas? What does he know about the boy’s disappearance? And why has he returned after so many years away?

These three are strangers, separated by time. But Sunrise has secrets which lie in waiting like gunpowder: quiet, until they encounter a spark.

From the bestselling author of The Tiger’s Wife comes an explosive novel that challenges the myths we think we know: of heroes and villains, of the places we lay claim to, and most of all, of our own lives.

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We Chase Shadows by Richard Osman

Back together.
Back on the case.
And back to solving murders . . .

At sunrise, high in the Italian hills, a body is found on the steps of a beautiful private villa. On the body is a threatening note, signed by a mystery man.

Back at We Solve Murders HQ, Amy, Rosie, and Steve leap at the chance to take on their first proper case. So what if their new client seems to have his own reasons for avoiding the police? All they need to do is uncover who left the note, and then find them. Simple.

But once they start digging, the suspects keep piling up: there’s Sweden’s most-wanted criminal, a canny ex-wife and a fierce business rival – yet the murderer keeps evading them. And as the trio chase a villain through the shadows, danger travels closer to home . . .

Between Italy and Palm Springs, via Barcelona and Steve’s village pub, can the team catch an elusive killer who knows EXACTLY where to hide?

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Miss Wolcott’s Ghost by Louise Penny

Armand Gamache returns!

“There’s a body in Lost Nation.”

“Where?” demands Armand as he scribbles on the pad by his bed.

But the line goes dead before Chief Inspector Gamache can question the caller.

The head of homicide for the Sûreté du Québec has no idea where Lost Nation is, or who woke him in the small hours of the morning at his home in Three Pines. What he does know is that the man was terrified.

And so Armand is thrust out of a deep sleep and into the surrounding forests in search of the mythical Lost Nation. And a body.

When he and his team of Jean-Guy Beauvoir and Isabelle Lacoste find both, the situation only grows more bizarre. The unidentified dead man appears to be from an era more than a century old. He’s lying in a long-abandoned cemetery, on top of a grave with a date, but no name.

Adding to the mystery, the early morning call appears to have come from Gamache’s friend and neighbor, Clara Morrow. While she denies any knowledge of it, it becomes clear there is some connection between her, the Morrow family, and Lost Nation.

Soon, Gamache and his team are faced with tracking down not just the legend of Lost Nation, but a lost ship, lost documents belong to an eccentric Victorian botanist, and a mysterious plant not seen in a century, that might save, or take, countless lives.

As the murder investigation deepens, nightmarish spectres from the past begin to haunt the Sûreté officers, only heightened by the appearance of one of Gamache’s former and now disgraced proteges, with whom he must form an uneasy alliance.

As the ghosts begin to gather, Gamache, Beauvoir, and Lacoste, with the help of Reine-Marie, Clara, and the other villagers of Three Pines, realize that the body on the grave is far from the only death. To solve the crime and avert catastrophe they must look to rancid secrets and old lies no longer dead and buried.

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Hollow Bones by Jodi Picoult

From the acclaimed author of By Any Other Name comes a riveting novel about the risks we take to protect the ones we love in a world where crisis is always just around the corner.

On September 11, 2001, when Molly Fitzgerald was only two months old, her mother went to an appointment at the World Trade Center and never came home. Her father and the stepmother who raised her couldn’t have loved her more, but she still grew up with a healthy dread of disasters.

Now an adult, she runs the Rhode Island Department for Emergency Preparedness, mapping out ways to save lives during storms, epidemics, and airplane crashes. She and her husband, Jesse—a police polygraph expert with his own history of crisis—have found a love that is a solace in a dangerous world. But then the unexpected upends their new marriage, leading them both to question everything they thought they knew.

Moving between past and present, Hollow Bones is an epic story of the lies we tell ourselves as we write the narratives of our lives, the plans we design to protect ourselves at the worst moments, and the ties that bind mothers and daughters.

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All That Is Left of Life by Roberta Recchia

One summer evening, in a quiet seaside town near Rome, everything changes for the Ansaldo family.

The Ansaldo family’s contented life is built on routine, with days spent running their beloved delicatessen and summers at their modest house by the sea. But when sixteen-year-old Betta sets off for a beach party and never returns, they are left only with grief – and questions.

The town whispers, the police are lost, and as the family fractures under the weight of their loss, no one suspects the burden Miriam carries. She has answers, but vows to tell no one, even those who loved Betta most. Seeking to bury her heavy secret, Miriam drifts into the orbit of Leo, a young drug dealer, and gains an unlikely set of friends. But when Leo starts to pull loose the threads of Betta’s fate, will his search for the truth offer Miriam a way forward or risk unravelling everything?

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Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt by Ben Reeves

For fans of Fredrik Backman and Virginia Evans, an astonishing novel about finding beauty in the brevity of life, as narrated by the one who knows it best: Death.

Travis is Death in the modern world. He lives with his cat in a small, gray town. His job is to offer people comfort in their final hours of life, which he does without complaint or judgement. He’s stoic, gentle, and a little naive, despite who he is, but he never tries to change anyone’s fate. He is responsible for maintaining the balance of nature, and every life must eventually end.

Then Travis meets Dalia, a midwife, and her boisterous eight-year-old daughter Layla, who live across the hall, and despite his best attempts to keep his distance, he finds himself wholeheartedly embraced by other people for the first time. So it is with this seemingly unremarkable family that Travis begins to understand what it means to be truly alive—and what might be irrevocably lost in death.

Written with radiant warmth, wisdom, and compassion, Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt is a timeless and ultimately uplifting story that will resonate with anyone who has ever loved and lost or worried about time’s passing.

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The Secrets We Hide by Karin Slaughter

The next thrilling mystery in the new North Falls series from Karin Slaughter, New York Times bestselling author of The Good Daughter and the Will Trent Series.

Welcome to North Falls. A small town with big secrets…

1601 Iris Drive looks like any other house on the quiet, residential street. But rumors are rampant about the Vickery family, and what goes on behind closed doors.

When gunshots ring out, Sheriff Emmy Clifton and her sister, ex-federal agent Jude Archer, discover a devastating crime scene. Allison Vickery has been murdered in her own kitchen, and her teenage daughter is bleeding upstairs, left for dead.

Everyone thinks they know what happened. But secrets are buried everywhere in this small town.

And it’s up to Emmy Clifton to uncover the truth…

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The Teacher by Tim Sullivan

He’s a victim. But is he innocent?

Detective Sergeant George Cross has always been a good student—attentive, methodical, and careful to double-check his work. So when an elderly schoolteacher is found dead at home in southwest England, Cross knows the math isn’t adding up. The angle of the man’s neck suggests he fell down the stairs. But the stab wound on his body changes the equation.

In the weeks before his murder, the reclusive Alistair Moreton seemed different. He had always kept to himself, but people swear someone else was in the house when they checked on him. There was a reason he wouldn’t let them inside.

DS George Cross has a long list of suspects. Prickly and miserable, Moreton made life hell for his neighbors and former pupils. But every victim deserves justice—even one who never learned an important truth: If you go through life making enemies, you shouldn’t be surprised when someone decides to teach you a lesson.

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Adult Nonfiction

Briefly Perfectly Human: Making an Authentic Life by Getting Real about the End by Alua Arthur

A deeply transformative memoir that reframes how we think about death and how it can help us lead better, more fulfilling and authentic lives, from America’s most visible death doula.

For her clients and everyone who has been inspired by her humanity, Alua Arthur is a friend at the end of the world. As our country’s leading death doula, she’s spreading a transformative message: thinking about your death―whether imminent or not―will breathe wild, new potential into your life.

Warm, generous, and funny AF, Alua supports and helps manage end-of-life care on many levels. The business matters, medical directives, memorial planning; but also honoring the quiet moments, when monitors are beeping and loved ones have stepped out to get some air―or maybe not shown up at all―and her clients become deeply contemplative and want to talk. Aching, unfinished business often emerges in this spiritual journey. Alua has been present for thousands of these sacred moments―when regrets, fears, secret joys, hidden affairs, and dim realities are finally said aloud. When this happens, Alua focuses her attention at the pulsing center of her clients’ anguish and creates space for them, and sometimes their loved ones, to find peace.

This has had a profound effect on Alua, who was already no stranger to death’s periphery. Her family fled a murderous coup d’état in Ghana in the 1980s. She has suffered major, debilitating depressions. And her dear friend and brother-in-law died of lymphoma. Advocating for him in his final months is what led Alua to her life’s calling. She knows firsthand the power of bearing witness and telling the truth about life’s painful complexities, because they do not disappear when you look the other way. They wait for you.

Briefly Perfectly Human is a life-changing, soul-gathering debut, by a writer whose empathy, tenderness, and wisdom shimmers on the page. Alua Arthur combines intimate storytelling with a passionate appeal for loving, courageous end-of-life care. Hers is a powerful testament to getting in touch with something deeper in our lives, by embracing the fact of our own mortality. “Hold that truth in your mind,” Alua says, “and wondrous things will begin to grow around it.”

• A Guide to Dying Well: Learn from America’s most visible death doula how thinking about the end can transform the way you live, offering a powerful testament to getting in touch with something deeper in our lives.
• Navigating Grief and Loss: Journey through intimate, life-changing stories―from fleeing a coup in Ghana to advocating for a dying loved one―that reveal the power of bearing witness to life’s painful complexities.
• Finding Purpose Through Service: Discover how Alua Arthur found her life’s calling at her brother-in-law’s bedside, a profound experience that shaped her mission to provide loving, courageous end-of-life care.
• The Power of Human Connection: In thousands of sacred moments with her clients, Alua creates space for regrets, fears, and secret joys to be spoken, fostering peace and honoring the quiet moments at the end of the world.

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Hush: How to Radiate Power and Confidence without Saying a Word by Linda Clemons

Harness the power of silence and let your presence speak volumes.

Words matter but your body language speaks loud and clear without them. It’s what you’re not saying out loud that matters most. Before you open your mouth, your microexpressions, posture, gestures, and even the tilt of your chin are announcing to the world how you feel about yourself. Your body can say, “I’m so nervous I want to hide in the corner,” or you can take control of your nonverbal communication to radiate confidence, exude warmth, or announce your power. Hush will show you how to say more with a simple glance or gesture than words ever could.

As one of the world’s foremost body language experts, Linda Clemons, creator of The Clemons Method, travels the world training top CEOs, sales teams, celebrities, media luminaries, single people who want to learn the art of attraction, and anyone who needs to harness the enormous power of nonverbal communication to get what they want and succeed at the highest levels.

In Hush, Clemons offers practical strategies with a dose of wit and plenty of straight talk that will supercharge your confidence during any social interaction. Her unique approach eliminates common body language challenges and her secrets to leveling up your presence will be your ticket to closing deals, landing jobs, owning the room, getting your ideas heard, calming fears, and even making someone’s heart race.

Work, love, power moves—whatever your goal, Hush shows you how to speak volumes…even in total silence.

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Crash Course FASD: All About Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders by Angelle Gremillion & Emily Rusnak, Ph.D.

FASD is more common than autism, yet it is poorly understood and rarely diagnosed.

Let’s be real: it’s impossible to find a single source for FASD facts and research. FASD information is hidden, much like the condition. It’s frustrating to piece together reliable research you can readily share with others. Crash Course FASD remedies this struggle by explaining:

• What FASD means
• Neurodevelopmental disorders and neurodiversity
• Parent stress and the struggle to find care
• How to search for diagnostic help
• Symptoms of FASD
• Overlapping characteristics with conditions like ADHD and autism
• The battle of misdiagnosis
• Why society doesn’t support FASD
• Plus, there’s a cheat sheet!

Understanding all the information surrounding FASD can be complicated. Crash Course FASD simplifies it. Whether you have an FASD or want to support a loved one on their journey, this is the book you need to move forward.

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The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State by Jill Lepore

“Much in history is headlong but few grand transformations have been more precipitate or more heedless than the rise of… the Artificial State,” writes Jill Lepore in this passionate account of how rule by machine has ravaged the world. Inspired by Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism, which argued in 1951 that the machinery of modern life was reshaping the very fundamentals of human existence, Lepore, profoundly disturbed by the technology revolution and by the soulless inundation of artificial intelligence, unfurls a new history for our own twenty-first century.

Building on an essay in The New Yorker in 2024, Lepore’s clarion call traces our increasing dependence on and strangulation by data. Political campaigns, awash in an avalanche of fake bots, have been reduced to attention-mining algorithms, while multinational media corporations dictate public discourse, and the era of the liberal nation-state seems to be coming to a rapid end, replaced by billionaire technocrats reliant on autocracy and the tools of AI.

With Orwellian overtones, The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State demonstrates how technology has corroded global democracy, leading to the destruction of both human community and capacity for self-government, creating a new form of AI government, a digital citizen’s assembly, where AI will recommend the course of action to humans in place of human-run legislatures. Especially sobering with this proliferation of “dizzying, ever-changing schemes, prophesies, and predictions” is that the Artificial State has come at the expense of the natural world, leading to catastrophic loss of wildlife habitat and biodiversity.

Deliberately alarming, The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State, despite its abundance of dire facts, is not a funeral dirge; rather, it’s an inspiring wake-up call, written in Lepore’s typically elegiac prose, which demonstrates that nothing about the Artificial State was inevitable, for it is a “government without consent, even government without humans.” It can, Lepore asserts, be dismantled. Other heinous systems, like feudalism, fascism, and slavery, have also been dismantled, but disassembly requires identifying the parts, tracing the sources. It requires telling a new history. This is the purpose of The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State.

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Hotel Almighty: Poems by Sarah J. Sloat

Visually arresting and utterly one-of-a-kind, Sarah J. Sloat’s Hotel Almighty is a book-length erasure of pages from Misery by Stephen King, a reimagining of the novel’s themes of constraint and possibility in elliptical, enigmatic poems.

Here, “joy would crawl over broken glass, if that was the way.” Here, sleep is a “circle whose diameter might be small,” a circle “pitifully small,” a “wrecked and empty hypothetical circle.”

Paired with Sloat’s stunning mixed-media collage, each poem is a miniature canvas, a brief associative profile of the psyche―its foibles, obsessions, and delights.

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September 2026

Large Print Collection

These titles will be available until November, and then we’ll receive another set of 30. Each book has a three-week checkout period.

H.R. McMaster: At War with Ourselves: My Tour of Duty in the Trump White House
David Baldacci: To Die For
Steve Berry: The Atlas Maneuver
C.J. Box: Three-Inch Teeth
Lee and Andrew Child: Better Off Dead
Tom Clancy (by Andrews & Wilson): Executive Power
Harlan Coben: Think Twice
Michael Connelly: The Waiting
Michael Connelly: Ironwood
Paul Doiron: Dead Man’s Wake
Robert Galbraith: The Running Grave
Julie Garwood: The Gift
Elizabeth George: A Slowly Dying Cause
John Grisham: The Exchange
Rachel Hawkins: The Heiress
Craig Johnson: First Frost
Fern Michaels: Rock Bottom
Maggie O’Farrell: The Marriage Portrait
Richard Osman: The Man Who Died Twice
Sara Paretsky: Pay Dirt
James Patterson: The Country Road Murders
James Patterson: The Perfect Assassin
Louise Penny: The Grey Wolf
Anne Perry: The Fourth Enemy
Susan Elizabeth Phillips: Simply the Best
Kathy Reichs: Fire and Bones
J.D. Robb: Random in Death
Lisa Scottoline: The Truth about the Devlins
Karin Slaughter: After that Night
Brad Thor: Edge of Honor
Colson Whitehead: Crook Manifesto
Stuart Woods (by Brett Battles): Smolder

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Audiobook Collection

We have a new selection of audiobooks available through the end of the year. These have a three-week checkout period.

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DVD Collection

We have a new crop of DVDs available through November. These have a two-week checkout period.

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Youth Nonfiction

Ramadan on Rahma Road: A Recipe Storybook by Razeena Omar Gutta, Recipes by Faaiza Osman, illustrated by Atieh Sohrabi

“An exceptional book about Ramadan that celebrates the breaking of the daily fast and the sharing of the transcendent power of food.” — School Library Journal

In the houses of Rahma Road are people from all over the world. Some are fasting for Ramadan, and some are not. But the annual potluck iftar is something they all attend. Who would miss the grandest, tastiest, most delicious meal of the year? From chicken tikka to roti bom, each house is planning on bringing something to share. The result? A feast of food from around the world! Travel from house to house on Rahma Road to see what everyone’s making (and even take a glimpse at the recipes to make them yourself)!

• Includes 25 globally inspired recipes throughout the book
• A Ramadan book that helps kids choose recipes for family and community iftars
• Endnotes include information about Ramadan and additional recipes from each character’s kitchen

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Adult Fiction

The Other Einstein by Marie Benedict

“Superb…the haunting story of Einstein’s brilliant first wife who was lost in his shadow.”―Sue Monk Kidd, New York Times bestselling author of The Invention of Wings, The Secret Life of Bees, and The Mermaid Chair

From the author of The Mystery of Mrs. Christie, in the tradition of The Paris Wife and Mrs. Poe, The Other Einstein offers us a window into a brilliant, fascinating woman whose light was lost in Einstein’s enormous shadow. It is the story of Einstein’s wife, a brilliant physicist in her own right, whose contribution to the special theory of relativity is hotly debated and may have been inspired by her own profound and very personal insight.

Mitza Maric has always been a little different from other girls. Most twenty-year-olds are wives by now, not studying physics at an elite Zurich university with only male students trying to outdo her clever calculations. But Mitza is smart enough to know that, for her, math is an easier path than marriage. And then fellow student Albert Einstein takes an interest in her, and the world turns sideways. Theirs becomes a partnership of the mind and of the heart, but there might not be room for more than one genius in a marriage.

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The Academy by Elin Hilderbrand and Shelby Cunningham

From #1 bestselling author of The Perfect Couple, Elin Hilderbrand, and her daughter, Shelby Cunningham, deliver the irresistible, deliciously scandalous story of one drama-filled year at a New England boarding school.

It’s move-in day at Tiffin Academy and amidst the happy chaos of friends reuniting, selfies uploading, and cars unloading, shocking news arrives: America Today just ranked Tiffin the number two boarding school in the country. It’s a seventeen-spot jump—was there a typo? The dorms need to be renovated, their sports teams always come in last place, and let’s just say Tiffin students are known for being more social than academic. On the other hand, the campus is exquisite, class sizes are small, and the dining hall is run by an acclaimed New York chef. And they do have fun—lots of parties and school dances, and a piano man plays in the student lounge every Monday night.

But just as the rarefied air of Tiffin is suffused with self-congratulation, the wheels begin to turn—and then they fall off the bus. One by one, scandalous blind items begin to appear on phones across Tiffin’s campus, thanks to a new app called ZipZap, and nobody is safe. From Davi Banerjee, international influencer and resident queen bee, to Simone Bergeron, the new and surprisingly young history teacher, to Charley Hicks, a transfer student who seems determined not to fit in, to Cordelia Spooner, Admissions Director with a somewhat idiosyncratic methodology—everyone has something to hide.

As if high school wasn’t dramatic enough … As the year unfolds, bonds are forged and broken, secrets are shared and exposed, and the lives of Tiffin’s students and staff are changed forever. The Academy is Elin Hilderbrand’s fresh, buzzy take on boarding school life, and a thrilling new direction from one of America’s most satisfying and popular storytellers.

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Adult Nonfiction

Family of Spies: A World War II Story of Nazi Espionage, Betrayal, and the Secret History Behind Pearl Harbor by Christine Kuehn

A propulsive, never-before-told story of one family’s shocking involvement as Nazi and Japanese spies during WWII and the pivotal role they played in the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

It began with a letter from a screenwriter, asking about a story. Your family. World War II. Nazi spies. Christine Kuehn was shocked and confused. When she asked her seventy-year-old father, Eberhard, what this could possibly be about, he stalled, deflected, demurred, and then wept. He knew this day would come.

The Kuehns, a prominent Berlin family, saw the rise of the Nazis as a way out of the hard times that had befallen them. When the daughter of the family, Eberhard’s sister, Ruth, met Nazi leader Joseph Goebbels at a party, the two hit it off, and they had an affair. But Ruth had a secret―she was half Jewish―and Goebbels found out. Rather than having Ruth killed, Goebbels instead sent the entire Kuehn family to Hawaii, to work as spies half a world away. There, Ruth and her parents established an intricate spy operation from their home, just a few miles down the road from Pearl Harbor, shielding Eberhard from the truth. They passed secrets to the Japanese, leading to the devastating attack on Pearl Harbor. After Eberhard’s father was arrested and tried for his involvement in planning the assault, Eberhard learned the harsh truth about his family and faced a decision that would change the path of the Kuehn family forever.

Jumping back and forth between Christine discovering her family’s secret and the untold past of the spies in Germany, Japan, and Hawaii, Family of Spies is fast-paced history at its finest and will rewrite the narrative of December 7, 1941.

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The Land and Its People by Savid Sedaris

In this new collection, David Sedaris reflects on what it means to be a foreigner, a brother, a lifelong friend, in essays that are “among the best of his career” (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

In The Land and Its People, Sedaris investigates what it means to be a traveler, a brother, a lifelong friend. Trying on the role of caretaker after his boyfriend Hugh’s hip-replacement surgery, he both succeeds and fails. He covers ground with his friend Dawn and challenges her to eat a truck tire. A ambivalent Duolingo bot becomes his unlikely confidante as he attempts to describe his family in a foreign language. Ever adding to his list of “Countries I Have Been To,” he rides a horse named Tequila in Guatemala, buys a bespoke priest’s cassock in Vatican City, and goes on safari in Kenya without taking a single photo.

Time takes its toll: scrolling through his address book, he counts those he couldn’t bear to outlive, and realizes how many are already gone. He is bitten by a dog and insulted by a wee train passenger. A woman on the street late at night either sexually harasses him or doesn’t. It’s easy to agree with the lady waving a sign that reads, “Enough Is Enough.” And yet, life holds much to delight in: the massive testicles of a ram, a trip abroad with his sisters, a really excellent reptile video, a pair of well-made cotton underpants.

Throughout these essays―at once acerbic and tender, playful and profound―Sedaris shows how much there is to marvel at when you keep your head up and your eyes open, observing with warmth and curiosity our fascinating human species and the lands we inhabit.

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August 2026

Picture Books

Whirby by Molly Harris, illustrated by Jacob Souva

If you (and your children!) struggle with setting a nighttime routine, staying up for countless hours, and regretting it the day after—this picture book is for you! 

Whirby the robot is all systems go for his favorite school activity: bot battles! All that clinking, clanging, beeping, and banging makes Whirby so excited.

So excited that he forgets to recharge at night. He stays up practicing his best moves and building the coolest contraptions before the big battle.

But when it’s finally his turn to compete…BWOMP! BZZZ! ZZT!

With his battery on 0%, will Whirby find a way to still be the bot battle champion? Find out in this funny new offering from The Big Squeeze author, Molly Harris, and the illustrator of Big Bike, Little Bike, Jacob Souva! 

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Easy Readers

Bob Books: Sight Words: Kindergarten

Created by a teacher, Bob Books have been helping children learn to read for more than forty years! Introduce young readers to key sight words with this fun, phonics-based set of easy-to-read stories–now in a sturdy hardcover bind-up.

With playful stories, silly illustrations, and a phonics approach based on Science of Reading research, Bob Books keep young readers’ confidence high, leading to continued success and a love of reading. Your child will soon join the millions of happy kids who say, “I read the whole book!”®

Sight words, also known as high frequency words, are common words that appear again and again in children’s reading materials. Knowing these words “by sight” is essential for reading fluency. Kids learn to easily recognize 30 of these words in Bob Books Sight Words – Kindergarten. Each story introduces three new sight words commonly taught in kindergarten. The rest of the words in each book can be sounded out. With plenty of repetition within each story, and pictures that support the text, your young reader will quickly master early sight words!

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Early Chapter Books

Unicorn Diaries: Legend of the Sea Dragon by Rebecca Elliott

Bo and the unicorns learn about a mysterious sea dragon during a trip to the beach in this early chapter book from the New York Times bestselling author-illustrator of Owl Diaries!

In this twelfth book in the USA Today bestselling Unicorn Diaries series, the unicorns are taking a trip to Silver Shell Beach. The mermaids tell Bo and the other unicorns about a mythical sea dragon who is rumored to live there, but no one knows if she really exists. The unicorns make it their mission to discover the truth about the sea dragon — and meet this magical sea creature! With full-color artwork throughout and plenty of smiles, your young reader won’t be able to put this book down!

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Junior Fiction

The Missing Magic of Sparrow Xia by Leia Ham

Welcome to a world that depends on magic – but where each person’s magic fades away before they reach adulthood.

The pressure is on for Sparrow Xia to develop her pitifully limited fire mage abilities at Zenith Academy. It doesn’t help that expectations are extra high for her because her older brother Ainsley’s magic is exceptionally powerful – the burn scar on Sparrow’s cheek is proof of that. Sparrow can only hope that her studies will help her discover her fire and finally make her family proud.

At Zenith, Sparrow does indeed gain magical strength – and new friends – but her life at school raises more questions than answers. Should she risk her own future in order to help others? And is Sparrow’s magic the most important thing about her?

Then a mysterious illness breaks out at school, draining students of their powers. Sparrow and her friends are drawn into the search for the cause, but they need to be careful: in a world where magic means everything, some people will go to terrible lengths to try to keep it…

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Sawyer Lee and the Quest to Just Stay Home by Zach Weinersmith

From New York Times-bestselling and Hugo Award-winning author Zach Weinersmith comes a cartoon-illustrated middle grade novel starring a ferociously inactive kid who is dragged against his will into the madcap adventures of his friends and family.

Eleven-year-old Sawyer Lee descends from an endless lineage of absolute go-getters: astronauts, scientists, champion athletes, spies, and other assorted people of action. To this heritage, he says “thanks, but no.” His life’s goal, if we must use that word, is to spend his days on his best friend Gary’s couch, with roughly the ambition of a barnacle with the flu.

The problem is that Sawyer lives in the town of Ovelaville, where everybody (including his aunt Celia and other best friend Angela) is obsessed with doing whatever it takes to win the grand prize at the annual gourd festival, celebrating nature’s dullest vegetable. As their schemes for total gourd domination grow, Sawyer is, to his horror, caught up in both an adventure and a mystery. And he knows it will take a regrettable amount of energy either to get to the bottom of things or convince everyone to give up on it, and find the way back to his happy place on Gary’s couch, with a cozy throw blanket, a steaming mug of chamomile tea, and an empty schedule.

In this tale of friendship, love, betrayal, madness, and gardening enthusiasm, acclaimed cartoonist Zach Weinersmith introduces a hero who, as a general matter, would rather not. In that spirit, he has reduced the total number of words by providing over a hundred hilarious cartoons.

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Youth Nonfiction

Hide, Fish, Hide!: Sea Creature Camouflage by Derick Wilder, illustrated by Monika Filipina

Award-winning author Derick Wilder delivers this fact-filled fishy tale showcasing the amazing ways marine life can adapt and defend.

It’s a beautiful day to be living in the ocean. The sun is shining, and the water is a glorious blue. But wait . . . something big, something hungry, something menacing is approaching. It’s a great white shark! Luckily, there’s no reason for alarm. From ink-releasing cuttlefish to burrowing flounder to camouflaging leafy dragon, all the local sea creatures seem to have a way to hide from our hungry shark. Well, almost all. Puffer fish finds that all the best hiding places are taken. What can a poor puffer do? As it turns out, Puffer has a trick or two, so Great White isn’t guaranteed an easy meal. And the hungry shark soon learns that even big guys need to watch their tails.

Back matter provides additional information about all the crafty ways sea creatures use camouflage to avoid becoming a snack.

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A Taxi for Everyone: How Roy Velásquez Fought for Equality by Debbie Zapata, illustrated by Laura Sandoval Herrera

This compelling biography tells the story of Roy Velásquez and how he built a community fighting against segregation and discrimination in Austin, Texas, by starting a thriving taxi company for those not being served by the city’s institutions.

Roy Velásquez was the son of Mexican immigrants, living in Austin, Texas, at the height of segregation. Roy knew the hardships faced by people of color because of the insurmountable policies put into place. What was anyone to do? Even just simple acts can go a long way. But Roy went further than that. . . .

In segregated Austin, people of color weren’t allowed in taxis, and the streetcar ended far from their homes. So Roy borrowed five dollars from a friend, purchased a taxi permit and a tank of gas, and drove people of color wherever they needed to go.

Before long, one lone taxi became a fleet. For over seventy-five years, Roy’s Taxi Service helped to fight segregation and poll taxes, and grow Austin into a community for everyone. Roy’s story is a reminder that we can all affect change and that inclusion is our strength.

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Youth Graphic Novels

Hand-Me-Down: A Graphic Memoir by Damian Alexander

From the author of the highly praised debut Other Boys comes a moving graphic memoir about the love we pass down across generations. Perfect for fans of Hey, Kiddo and Flamer.

Damian’s mother died when he was a baby, and he has lived with his grandma ever since. Now, all he has left of his mother are old photos and the stories Nanny shares with him. Nanny has a lot of stories, some about his mom and some about her own childhood growing up in foster care.

When Damian feels lonely, he imagines what life was like when his mother and grandmother were middle schoolers like him. Through memories, stories, and daydreams, he feels closer to the mother he lost and begins to see the mother he found.

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Young Adult Fiction

Just Another Dead Boy by Kelly McCaughrain

Regan has two rules: Don’t fall in love. Don’t have hope.

In a world where everyone knows the date they will die, wild-child Regan works at a luxury resort as a “Juliet” for the Romeo & Juliet Service, promising to provide the illusion of star-crossed romance to rich boys on end-of-life retreats. She gets to live life on the edge—skydiving, partying, and doing a host of other people’s bucket-list thrills—then moves on to her next client. But when world-famous Death Date researchers the Dalys arrive, she’s tasked with her hardest client yet, their overachieving, stone-faced son. Jude Daly sees right through the setup—he thinks she’s a parasite, and, frankly, she thinks he’s an entitled jerk. They agree to fake romance for the sake of Jude’s parents and Regan’s job, but as contempt turns into something else, will Regan ignore her ironclad rules so she and Jude can take on Fate together? Or will his impending Death Date catch up with them first? A compelling and heartbreaking twist on Romeo and Juliet, in which Regan realizes she might have to stop living like today is her last—and start living like it isn’t.

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Young Adult Graphic Novels

Olive: Lost in Inner Space by Vero Cazot and Lucy Mazel

A fantastical coming-of-age graphic novel involving love, loss, and found family, centered around a determined autistic heroine who refuses to make herself fit neatly into other peoples’ space.

Wherever she is, Olive has never quite fit in, and living in a dorm room for the first time is no exception. To get away from the bullies, annoying teachers, and her parents, Olive escapes alone into her own vast world of vivid landscapes and fantastical inventions―until she gets an unexpected visit from a mysterious astronaut.

Could the astronaut in her inner world be the same astronaut who recently crash-landed on earth without a trace? Night by night, Olive watches his health fade and becomes more and more certain that she has to take action.

When no one believes that she knows how to save him, she joins forces with her plucky new roommate to unpack the clues from her inner world and venture on a journey to real-life countries she’s never been to before―all to save an astronaut who, as far as she can recall, she’s never met.

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Adult Fiction

The Amateur by Chris Bohjalian

When a young woman, a golf prodigy, kills a caddy with a stray ball at the country club, the investigation of this freak accident reveals a dark and shocking tale of secret affairs, predatory men, and a teenager on trial.

1978: It is the first Thursday in August and temperatures are flirting with ninety when Mira Winston, eighteen years old, drives a golf ball from her tee toward the practice net near the clubhouse and caddy shack. The golf ball, weighing 1.6 ounces, tears through the net, traveling 150 miles per hour, and slams, with sickening force, into the temple of a high school junior named Kenny Foster, rupturing an artery and unleashing a torrent of blood. Kenny brings his hand to the side of his head, then topples onto his side. He’s dead before the ambulance even arrives.

In the wake of this terrible accident—and everyone, at first, agrees it was an accident—Mira looks for comfort in all the wrong places: In her lover, Theo Catton, a married man three decades her senior. In her mother, a well-kept woman with secrets of her own. In the dead caddy’s little sisters, girls bewildered by grief. But when the investigators look more closely at the torn net, when a detective recalls Mira’s history of recklessness, and when Kenny’s father spies Mira with her married lover, the affluent and mannered community turns on this once-promising young woman. A gripping story that takes the reader from the sun-soaked greens of a tony Westchester country club to the fluorescent-lit stand of a county courtroom, The Amateur asks: What happens when one small moment—a swing, a ball, a piece of string—changes the course of an entire life?

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The Correspondent by Virginia Evans

Discover the word-of-mouth hit hailed by Ann Patchett as “A cause for celebration”—an intimate novel about the transformative power of the written word and the beauty of slowing down to reconnect with the people we love.

“This novel is a complete and utter joy.”—Ann Napolitano, author of Hello Beautiful
“Quietly dazzling.”—The New York Times
“I cried more than once as I witnessed this brilliant woman come to understand herself more deeply.”—Florence Knapp, author of The Names

“Imagine, the letters one has sent out into the world, the letters received back in turn, are like the pieces of a magnificent puzzle. . . . Isn’t there something wonderful in that, to think that a story of one’s life is preserved in some way, that this very letter may one day mean something, even if it is a very small thing, to someone?”

Filled with knowledge that only comes from a life fully lived, The Correspondent is a gem of a novel about the power of finding solace in literature and connection with people we might never meet in person. It is about the hubris of youth and the wisdom of old age, and the mistakes and acts of kindness that occur during a lifetime.

Sybil Van Antwerp has throughout her life used letters to make sense of the world and her place in it. Most mornings, around half past ten, Sybil sits down to write letters—to her brother, to her best friend, to the president of the university who will not allow her to audit a class she desperately wants to take, to Joan Didion and Larry McMurtry to tell them what she thinks of their latest books, and to one person to whom she writes often yet never sends the letter.

Sybil expects her world to go on as it always has—a mother, grandmother, wife, divorcee, distinguished lawyer, she has lived a very full life. But when letters from someone in her past force her to examine one of the most painful periods of her life, she realizes that the letter she has been writing over the years needs to be read and that she cannot move forward until she finds it in her heart to offer forgiveness.

Sybil Van Antwerp’s life of letters might be “a very small thing,” but she also might be one of the most memorable characters you will ever read.

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Just a Highland Fling by Naina Kumar

Sparks fly on a road trip through the Scottish highlands in this delightful forced proximity romance from the author of Flirting With Disaster.

Neelu Pillai makes a last-minute decision to fly to Scotland for her estranged father’s wedding with one goal: to get through it with as little conflict as possible. But when her tipsy tirade at the rehearsal dinner is the reason her father gets left at the altar, she agrees to help him track down his runaway bride.

There’s just one problem: The third member of this road trip through the highlands is Jacob, the hot desi bagpiper from the wedding who just happens to be Neelu’s recent one-night stand. They couldn’t keep their hands off each other a few nights ago, but now he can’t seem to stand her.

Their journey to Skye is certainly not smooth, but as the two work together through the obstacles, doing their best to reunite Neelu’s father with his bride, they realize that there’s more to each other than meets the eye. And that the electric connection they’d felt the night they met is still as strong as ever. . . .

Fiery first impressions, fierce clashes, and undeniable chemistry make for a bumpy ride through the Highlands in this swoony, witty romance about family, forgiveness, and finding love where you least expect it.

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Beginning Middle End by Valeria Luiselli

From the beloved, award-winning author of the culture-changing hits Lost Children Archive and Tell Me How it Ends comes her most powerful and page-turning novel yet: the tale of a mother and daughter traveling together after the collapse of a marriage and the dissolution of their traditional family structure.

Valeria Luiselli’s novel opens the morning a mother and her teenage daughter arrive in Sicily, during a summer of rapidly-changing winds, volcanic rumbles, and sudden tempests. They’ve landed near the ancient ruins where the narrator’s grandmother worked long ago on an archaeological dig. How do you begin again, the mother wonders, pondering her family line, and what if the new beginning you’re imagining is actually the end?

While the mother tries to figure out how to reconstruct their lives together—cooking meals side by side, reading out loud to each other, playing chess, bickering and making-up—her deeply intelligent, inquisitive daughter begins to take the reins of the story. She becomes increasingly curious about her great-grandmother’s past as a digger in archaeological sites and ancient tombs, and urges her mother to leave their enclosed day-to-day in search for answers about their family’s past and future.

Beginning Middle End evolves into a road novel of exquisite tenderness. In their drive through Sicily, mother and daughter cross paths with the island’s migrants, storekeepers, and elders, but also its volcanoes, its winds and its waters. As their trip progresses, it becomes a journey to origins—not just to the familial past across continents, languages, and generations, but also further back to a mythical and geological past. With her own mother showing signs of dementia, the narrator confronts the primary questions of life: Where is home? Where do we dwell and seek safety? How are a family’s memories made and what happens when they disappear?

Warm, funny, and poetic, this novel is an ode to imagination and possibility in dark times.

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Land by Maggie O’Farrell

The award-winning, bestselling author of Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait returns with a soaring historical novel set in Ireland in the years before and after the Great Hunger.

On a windswept peninsula stretching out into the Atlantic, Tomás and his reluctant son, Liam, are working for the great Ordnance Survey project to map the whole of Ireland. The year is 1865, and in a country not long since ravaged and emptied by the Great Hunger, the task is not an easy one. Tomás, however, is determined that his maps will be a record of the disaster.

The British soldiers in charge are due to arrive any day, expecting the work to be completed, but Tomás is unexpectedly sent off course by an unsettling encounter in a copse. His life, and the lives of those of his family, will never be the same again. Liam is terrified by the sudden change in his taciturn father. What was it that caused such cracks to open in Tomás, and how is Liam, aged only ten, going to finish the mapping and get them both home?

Land is a novel about separation and reunion, tragedy and recovery, colonization and rebellion. It is a story of buried treasure, overlapping lives, ancient woodland, persistent ghosts, a particularly loyal dog, and how, when it comes to both land and history, nothing ever goes away. As spellbinding and varied as the landscape that inspired it, Land is, above all, a story of survival, for our times and for all time.

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Under the Falls by Richard Russo

The Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Empire Falls returns with a spellbinding page-turner about a crime in a small town that exposes long-held secrets and betrayals among a group of lifelong friends.

When Tyler Sinclair left Stone Mountain at eighteen, he had no plans of returning. With only a duffel bag full of clothes, a few bucks stolen from his father’s dresser, and a guitar, his most prized possession, Tyler disappeared without so much as a goodbye. Eighteen years later, Tyler, now the frontman of a famous band aptly named Stone Mountain, finds himself returning to his hometown for a one-night-only benefit concert to support his old friend, Doc, who lost feeling in his legs following a childhood accident. As Tyler ascends the mountain, memories of his childhood come rushing back—memories of his abusive father and despondent mother, of the friends he left behind—and he quickly learns that, for many people on Stone Mountain, the past does not feel like so long ago, and not everyone has been eagerly awaiting Tyler’s return.

At the concert, resentment simmers just beneath the surface, and Tyler finds himself confronted with faces new and old: there’s Curt, Tyler’s childhood best friend, now Stone Mountain’s chief of police, and his star officer, Deb, an out-of-towner who may have bitten off more than she can chew by accepting a job in Stone Mountain. And then there’s Freddi, Curt’s wife and Tyler’s former lover, a woman whose questionable dealings and fraught history with Tyler will become the catalyst for a tragedy that will upend each of their lives and threaten to validate Tyler’s worst fear: that “Stone Mountain is the kind of place you might escape from once, if you’re lucky, but not twice.”

Under the Falls is at once a propulsive thriller, a gut-wrenching portrait of a tight-knit rural community undone by the sins of its past, and an unflinchingly honest depiction of how porous the line between right and wrong, good versus evil, can become. This is a stunning, deeply empathetic novel, one that takes Russo’s penchant for character-driven drama to thrilling new heights.

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Green City Wars by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Philip Marlowe meets Redwall in this superior adult noir tale, where all the characters are animals, fighting for survival in the city underneath the humans.

In the solar cities of the future, the humans relax in the sun and the animals work in the shadows. Genetically engineered Little Helpers, serving humanity—unseen, unheard.

Meet Skotch. Raccoon, PI—yours for a few buttons as long as the job isn’t too illegal, whatever that means.

A mouse has gone missing. Normally this wouldn’t raise any hackles, nor any alarms, but this mouse has something that everyone seems to want, though nobody appears particularly eager to say what that something is.

The fee is good—perhaps too good. Certainly not something Skotch can easily turn down.

If only Skotch can work out where the mouse is hiding, what he’s hiding, and why his secrets are upsetting a lot of animals caught up in the Green City wars.

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Cool Machine by Colson Whitehead

From #1 New York Times bestselling author and two-time Pulitzer winner Colson Whitehead, an exuberantly entertaining novel that brings to life 1980s New York in the magnificent final volume of his Harlem Trilogy.

1981. New York City is beginning to emerge from financial ruin and decline, energized by rampant real estate development and a Wall Street unchained by Reagan-era predatory capitalism. Up in Harlem, successful business owner/master fence Ray Carney has just been named Sterling Furniture’s Dealer of the Month. When the banks won’t give his beloved wife Elizabeth a loan for her new travel agency, however, Carney gambles on one last heist, and finds himself entangled with a legendary criminal mastermind.

1983. To some, Carney’s friend and partner in crime, Pepper, is a stone-cold sociopath. To others, a top thief with questionable people skills. Either way, he’s feeling his age in his troubled gut and his aching bones. When he takes on a bodyguard gig as a favor to Elizabeth, he’s plunged into the alien territory of the East Village art and club scene. Luckily for him, whether you’re uptown or down, everyone speaks the same language of violence—Pepper is a native speaker.

1986. Carney has always been haunted by his inability to save his cousin Freddie. Now, twenty years after Freddie’s death, he has a chance to rescue Freddie’s son from the violent forces of the city. But coming out of retirement and teaming up with Pepper again will mean risking the safety and security he’s spent decades building for his family, with only one shot to get it right.

With his usual pitch-perfect prose, Whitehead paints a portrait of a city in transition, where shimmering skyscrapers rise to the heavens as displaced people huddle in abandoned tunnels below. In a dazzling display of protean imagination, Cool Machine roves all over the city, from Windows on the World to the Meadowlands, to show that in New York, and in the lives of Whitehead’s vivid characters, it’s what’s below the surface that reveals the truth.

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Etna by Paul Yoon

The best-reviewed book of the summer by The New York Times, Time, NPR, and more, Etna is a “devastating and gorgeous” (The New York Times Book Review), “hypnotic” (Time) literary novel that follows an ex-military dog who leaves the soldiers he once served and sets out on an odyssey across a war-torn country in search of home, hope, and a life beyond conflict—this is a novel about the power of an idea, about never giving up, and ultimately an “epic journey of hope” (Booklist, starred review) that finds light in the most dire of times.

“No dog lover should miss this.” —People
“Don’t let the book’s length mislead you…Etna’s odyssey deserves the epithet ‘epic.'” —NPR, Best of August

Set in a fictional country in the present day, this is a story told through the eyes of an ex-military dog, Etna. After surviving years of a devastating war, Etna decides one night to leave the men he has fought alongside for years and return home—to the place where he was taken from when he was young, in the thin but persistent hope that if a home exists for him, it might be there.

Thus begins an exhilarating odyssey told through the eyes of a dog as he traverses across ruined landscapes and fights to survive in a world that, even in peacetime, proves to be just as precarious. Along the way, he encounters other animals and humans who are attempting to figure out how to start again. What makes a life when there is no home to go back to? How do we begin to trust each other again after such profound loss?

This is a novel about the power of an idea, about never giving up, and ultimately a novel about finding hope in the most dire of times.

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Adult Nonfiction

The following nonfiction titles were purchased with donations provided by the community. Thank you!

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Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily Nagoski, PhD and Amelia Nagoski, DMA

“This book is a gift! I’ve been practicing their strategies, and it’s a total game changer.”—Brené Brown, PhD, author of Dare to Lead

This groundbreaking book explains why women experience burnout differently than men—and provides a roadmap to minimizing stress, managing emotions, and living more joyfully.
 
Burnout. You, like most American women, have probably experienced it. What’s expected of women and what it’s really like to exist as a woman in today’s world are two different things—and we exhaust ourselves trying to close the gap. Sisters Emily Nagoski, PhD, and Amelia Nagoski, DMA, are here to help end the all-too-familiar cycle of feeling overwhelmed and exhausted. They compassionately explain the obstacles and societal pressures we face—and how we can fight back. 
 
You’ll learn
• what you can do to complete the biological stress cycle
• how to manage the “monitor” in your brain that regulates the emotion of frustration
• how the Bikini Industrial Complex makes it difficult for women to love their bodies—and how to defend yourself against it
• why rest, human connection, and befriending your inner critic are keys to recovering from and preventing burnout
 
With the help of eye-opening science, prescriptive advice, and helpful worksheets and exercises, all women will find something transformative in Burnout—and will be empowered to create positive change.

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On Living Well: Brief Reflections on Wisdom for Walking in the Way of Jesus by Eugene H. Peterson

In these never-before-published stories, sayings, and biblical teachings, the beloved author and translator of The Message Bible shows us how the wisdom of deep faith helps us live well.

“Jesus’ words bring us the news of an expanded world, a bright world, a full-dimensioned world, a world in which God rules, mercy is common experience, and love is the daily working agenda.”
 
Eugene H. Peterson (1932–2018) was one of the most beloved authors, pastors, poets, and professors of our time. While millions have read his bestselling paraphrased Bible translation, The Message, far fewer have heard his direct practical insights and wisdom about how to live well.

Eugene knew the extraordinary spirituality of ordinary life. He understood that we actually become more, not less, human as we grow to live like Jesus. And living like Jesus means living well.

On Living Well collects some of Eugene’s best never-before-published short writings to help you walk in the way of Jesus with a little more courage, passion, and hope—by offering new ways to practice generosity, community, prayer, simplicity, worship, inner peace, and so much more . . . even with the challenges of today.

This book is a rich feast for the soul, ideal as a daily spiritual touchpoint or simply to nourish a heart hungry for pastoral wisdom. It is your invitation to enter into the meaningful simplicity of life with Jesus in a world of immense beauty, real difficulty, and endless wonder.

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July 2026

Board Books

Alan’s Big, Scary Teeth by Jarvis

A goofy and lonely denizen of the jungle has just one talent — scaring other creatures with his big, scary teeth! What would he do without them?

Deep in the jungle lurks Alan the alligator, descended from a long line of very scary alligators. He prepares carefully — polishing his scales, brushing each of his big, scary teeth, and practicing his frightening faces — then sneaks into the jungle to terrorize the jungle critters. (“I’m big, scary Alan! Fear my razor-sharp teeth!”) But after a long day of scaring, Alan likes nothing better than to enjoy the crossword, run a warm mud bath, and take out his teeth, which nobody else knows are false. Until one morning, when Alan wakes up and finds that his teeth are gone! Without those teeth, he’s just not very scary, and scaring is the only thing he knows how to do. Or is it? Witty, charming, and playful storytelling will have preschoolers cheering for Alan as he discovers a new way to fit in.

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Picture Books

The River of Caregiving by Jocelyn Chung, Illustrated by Sarah Gonzales

An uplifting celebration of familial love and support through the generations

Caregiving flows through a little girl’s family in so many ways, like a river connecting them all. Her grandfather cares for her by picking her up from school with a snack and a smile, and she cares for him by keeping him company at his doctors’ appointments with a snack and a smile. Her mother helps her grandmother get ready for the day, just as her grandmother once helped her mother. And when the relatives send packages to each other, their caring makes them feel closer. Through occasions big and small, it’s a comfort to know this river of love is ever-present, and her family will always be there for each other.

Jocelyn Chung’s evocative text and Sarah Gonzales’ gorgeous pictures remind us that our family’s love is a gift to be treasured.

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I Told a Little Lie by Judith Henderson

One teensy, tiny lie has a BIG impact in this picture book with an irresistible heroine and charming mixed-media illustrations.

When a little girl finds a balloon, she figures it’s her lucky day. Hooray!

But the crowd around her assumes it’s her birthday. . . Oops.

The girl doesn’t correct them, and the next thing she knows, they’re expecting a party and a cake. It seems that one little lie can have big consequences. The group demands to know: How many layers? What kind of frosting? Will there be sprinkles?

What’s a girl to do?! It’s hard to confess to a lie–especially when you didn’t intend for it to go this far. She thinks about it… and thinks about it… and realizes that she knows just how to remedy the situation. It’s time to make cupcakes. (With frosting!)

A universally relatable topic comes to life with a light, kid friendly touch. Perfect for young readers who have been known to “embellish” their stories or let an assumption get carried away.

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The Wildest Thing by Emily Winfield Martin

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author and illustrator of The Wonderful Things You Will Be comes an enchanting picture book about a child finding their “wild” self.

What would you do if you let the wild in?

Eleanor loved wild things.
Every wing and wild sprout.

There was something wild inside of her,
waiting to come out…

With gorgeous illustrations, this book is the ideal addition to any bedtime reading routine or read aloud. The Wildest Thing beautifully expresses a timeless message about little ones unleashing their inner “wild” and encouraging their budding imagination and unique individuality.

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The Weedy Garden by Margaret Renkl, illustrated by Billy Renkl

This debut picture book from acclaimed and New York Times bestselling author Margaret Renkl—with collage illustrations by her brother, fine artist Billy Renkl—invites readers to observe and wonder about the various inhabitants in the vibrant ecosystem of a wildlife-friendly backyard garden. 

If you were hungry squirrel in the weedy garden, where would you find an acorn? If you were a cottontail rabbit, where would you hide your bunnies? And if you were a child, sitting still and listening, what would the weedy garden say to you?

Margaret Renkl, a beloved regular contributor to The New York Times and two-time recipient of the Southern Book Prize, writes beautifully about our changing natural world. In her debut picture book, she asks questions that draw young readers deeper and deeper into the garden, inviting observation and conversation along the way. Each page turn introduces a new plant or animal friend, buzzing and dancing with quiet wonder. The fine artist Billy Renkl, Margaret Renkl’s brother and frequent collaborator, brings the weedy garden to life through his signature mixed-media collages. Includes backmatter with more information about the residents of the garden, eco-friendly gardening tips, and instructions on how to make your own collage art project at home or in school.

This book was purchased with funds donated by The Hanover Garden Club.

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Jia Has a Dog Problem by Stephanie Ellen Sy, illustrated by Isabella Kung

A young girl is afraid of dogs, and a small dog is afraid of children in this funny, bighearted picture book about overcoming fear to find friendship.

Jia runs from every dog—big, tiny, spotted, or shaggy. Charlie the French bulldog hides from every kid—behind couches, laundry, even grown-ups’ legs.

When something far scarier forces these two together, they discover a sweet surprise: a friend who understands.

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Early Chapter Books

The Fabled Stables: Belly of the Beast by Jonathan Auxier, illustrated by Olga Demidova

Belly of the Beast is the third book in the one-of-a-kind Fabled Stables adventure series from New York Times bestselling author Jonathan Auxier, exploring the real magic behind simple acts of kindness—with colorful illustrations by Olga Demidova.

Auggie loves his job at the Fabled Stables, but he fears the day when it will come to an end. Fen keeps dropping hints that caretakers don’t stay forever, and it’s giving Auggie the grumps. Thankfully, there always seems to be a new stall to fill. This time, the stables set Auggie on a quest to rescue a beast called the Shibboleth—but the portal leads Auggie and Fen to the lair of the evil Rooks!

In the dark, damp dungeon, they meet one mysterious girl and one very hungry monster. It’s already gobbled up all of the Rooks, and Auggie and Fen are next unless they figure out the one way to calm the creature. Will they be able to work together to complete the mission before it’s too late?

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Youth Graphic Novels

Through the Black Gate by Alfredo Cáceres

A “poignant, insightful, and otherworldly” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) middle grade graphic novel about an orphaned girl and a music-loving boy who venture into the land of the dead with the hope of seeing their loved ones again.

Thirteen-year-old orphan Irene believes her father’s soul is trapped inside her cat, Moses. Living at her caregiver Ruth’s hostel, Irene spends every waking hour studying a mystical book that her parents left behind in the fire that took their lives. Irene thinks the book can help her see them again, if only Moses will give her a clue.

Then, just as a strange fog sweeps over their quiet Chilean town, a mysterious young musician named Francis moves into the hostel. Irene and her new roommate don’t particularly get along, but Moses soon leads them both through the fog to a strange tear in reality: an entrance to the Land of the Dead.

Believing this is the key to seeing her parents again, Irene and Francis cross to the other side. There, they encounter the Ferryman of the Dead, who is desperate to escape into the Land of the Living. The Ferryman offers to return Irene and Francis’s loved ones in exchange for their help. In the face of such a massive promise, Irene and Francis must decide whether to risk the fate of both the Lands of the Living and the Dead or be braver than they ever thought possible.

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The Hidden Dominion of Geordie James by Mike Dawson

In this uplifting middle grade novel, loner Geordie James joins four other struggling fifth graders in a science fair group project that answers the question “what is our place in this world?” 

When Geordie becomes obsessed with the fate of a pig who escaped from a factory farm, the group project is put in jeopardy. As Geordie starts to push harder into difficult questions, he finds everything changing—his friendships, his ability to express himself, even how he plays his favorite online role-playing game, Dominion.  

The Hidden Dominion of Geordie James is about kids coming to terms with a world that feels outside of their control, ending with the message that we humans do not exist apart from nature, but rather as an integral part of it.

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Spider-Man: Animals Assemble! by Mike Maihack

Marvel Comics’ friendly neighborhood superhero becomes a pet sitter in Spider-Man: Animals Assemble, an original graphic novel for early readers by award-winning author-illustrator Mike Maihack. 
 
When the Avengers are assembled to contain a super threat in New York City, Spider-Man is given the most important job of all: to make sure all the Avengers’ super pets are safe! Spidey wants in on the bad guy fighting action, but with great power comes great pet sitting.
 
Featuring fan favorite Avengers like Captain America, Captain Marvel, and Black Panther, this fun and funny original graphic novel sees the mighty web-slinger teaming up with the most unlikely of heroes to save the day!

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Chernobyl, Life, and Other Disasters by Yevgenia Nayberg

Strong-willed Genya sets her mind to attending art school in 1980s Ukraine, amidst the turmoil of Soviet control, the Cold War, and the unfolding Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

Genya—the nickname of the book’s author and story’s protagonist, Yevgenia—knows from age five that she wants to be an artist. When she turns eleven, she’ll apply to the same prestigious art school that her mother attended. But making the cut won’t be easy, especially with the school’s open-secret rule that no more than 1% of the student body can be Jewish.

The years before Genya’s eleventh birthday bring plenty to distract her. Nothing in Soviet Ukraine is quite as it seems; adults mock the government, but only in private; and her classmates are terrified of American bomb strikes. And that’s all before April 26, 1986, when Genya’s police officer neighbor gets called to an emergency in a town she’s never heard of: Chernobyl.

A graphic memoir account of creator Yevgenia Nayberg’s childhood, Chernobyl, Life, and Other Disasters is both deeply personal and a glimpse into broader Soviet intelligentsia experiences. Young readers curious about life elsewhere, particularly in the face of disaster, will find ample details to devour, while those dreaming of a creative life will take inspiration from Genya’s perseverance. Salient and yet often slyly funny, this is a must-read for any graphic memoir fan.

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Fruitcake by Rex Ogle & Dave Valeza

A pitch-perfect middle-grade graphic memoir about crushes, coming out, and finding the courage to be yourself.

Eighth grade isn’t off to a great start. Everyone but Rex seems to be coupling up, and he’s starting to feel like an outsider… until he meets Charlotte. She’s fearless, smart, pretty, and she likes him back. But as great as Charlotte is, there’s someone else Rex can’t stop thinking about.

Drew is Rex’s childhood best friend, so when he kisses Rex, all kinds of new feelings begin to stir. Though at school, Drew acts like he doesn’t even know Rex, making those feelings turn really confusing really fast. And with all the strong opinions Rex hears from friends and at church, he questions his own worth and what his affections actually mean. Rex wants to be more like his new friend, Nina, and not care what others think, but being himself seems impossible. When did middle school get so confusing?!

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Katie the Catsitter: Villain Con by Colleen AF Venable and Stephanie Yue

Welcome to Villain Con! Is Katie the Catsitter actually a villain?! Find out in this bestselling girl (and cat) power graphic novel series that’s perfect for fans of Babysitters Club, Sweet Valley Twins, and anyone who loves cats!

Sometimes the line between villain and hero can be hard to see.

Middle school is a roller coaster and lately Katie doesn’t know which way is up or down, who’s a hero…and who’s a villain. Even the people she cares about most keep surprising her. Are Katie’s best friends leaving her behind?! Katie just wants things to stay the same–but is she holding her friends…and herself back? Maybe it’s time for a change. Afterall, Madeline is running for mayor to try to change things in the city. Maybe Katie’s changing too. And maybe some of the things she thought she knew about villains–and about heroes–were wrong. Is Katie ready to move forward…even if means moving away from her friends?

Get ready for more friendship and fun, more drama and disguises (and cats, definitely more cats!) in Katie the Catsitter: Villain Con!

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Junior Fiction

The Magic of the Unicorn – A Choose Your Own Adventure Book by Deborah Lerme Goodman

Search for a magical unicorn’s horn in this interactive book where YOU decide what happens next! Packed with 27 possible endings!

Choose Your Own Adventure books–the 4th bestselling children’s series of all time–are back and as much fun as you remember. Kids and adults agree, these are the books that get 9- to 12-year-olds reading.

YOU are your medieval village’s last hope at finding a magical unicorn’s horn that can purify your water. Will your enchanted net catch a unicorn or a dragon? Can the sorceress help? Or will she cause even more trouble? A fire-breathing dragon, angry warlock, and powerful wood-witch all stand in your path. Be careful, the choices YOU make might end in glory, disaster, or certain death.

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Nell O’Dell Hates Quests by Emily B. Martin

What happens when the quest finds you, despite your best efforts? A reluctant adventurer sets off on an unexpected journey in this broadly appealing fantasy at once earnest and self-aware, funny and heartfelt, and thoroughly charming.

Nell O’Dell yearns for a quiet life tending her garden and caring for her chickens. Unfortunately, her family runs the bustling Crossroads Inn—accommodating all species of patron from fairies to fauns to half-giants, most of them questers on their way to seek glory and fortune. What’s more, her parents are retired questers themselves, and everyone assumes that Nell will follow in their footsteps. Then the day comes when a letter arrives from the government, threatening the Inn and all that Nell holds dear, and someone needs to go on a short journey to the capital to take care of it. Nell is the only one available—but that’s fine, because it’s just a boring business trip, not a quest! Even if she does find herself up against an excitable travel partner, a thief in the night, a stolen treasure, and a mysterious knife . . . Lively black-and-white illustrations by the author embellish this breezy, bighearted adventure that will satisfy both longtime questers and first-time visitors to the genre.

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Youth Nonfiction

Diamond Fever!: A True Crime Story in the Wild West by Steve Sheinkin, illustrated by Jon Chad

A fun, high-stakes true crime story story set in the Wild West, featuring spot art and comics throughout. Perfect for fans of MONA LISA VANISHES!

Late one night, two travel-weary miners, Philip Arnold and John Slack, show up at a businessman’s office in San Francisco. The miners seem nervous. They’ve got something that needs to be locked in a safe overnight. What is it? Well, that really has to stay secret, but it’s…

DIAMONDS! And lots of them.

Had these two miners just discovered America’s first diamond mine? Well, this is the Gold Rush era after all. Plenty of people are striking it rich. Anything is possible.

When word of the find hits the streets, diamond fever sweeps the country. Wealthy investors are desperate to elbow Arnold and Slack aside and seize control—but can they persuade the miners to reveal the location of their bonanza? At the same time, thousands of prospectors fan out across the mountains and deserts of the West—will one of them find the site before greedy bankers grab everything for themselves?

In this page-turning, high-stakes western adventure, New York Times bestselling and award-winning author Steve Sheinkin tells the true story of the Great Diamond Hoax of 1872, a rollicking tale of heists and hijinks, scams and scoundrels—and the last-minute triumph of a most unlikely hero.

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Young Adult Graphic Novels

How to Survive the End of the World: A Graphic Exploration of How to (Maybe) Avoid Extinction by Katy Doughty

In a full-color debut, a graphic novelist takes an engrossing, gleefully existential deep dive into the many ways that humanity could—and almost did—meet its end.

Since 99.9 percent of all species that have lived are extinct, it’s bound to be our turn eventually, right? So what’s most likely to kill us? A well-timed asteroid? Some new robot overlords? With wit and dry humor, debut graphic novelist Katy Doughty blends science and history to explore our chances of surviving disasters such as plagues, global warming, and alien invasion. Drawing on interviews with experts in fields like infectious diseases, AI, and interplanetary exploration, she combines cutting-edge research with compelling visuals: mugshots of the deadliest microbes, graphs of the winners and losers of mass extinction events, and a whole lot of dinosaur drawings. For apocalypse aficionados, the morbidly curious, and the just plain curious, this is your antidote to existential dread—a timely, imaginative, and ultimately hopeful take on humankind’s ability to survive the odds.

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Heartstopper (Vol. 1) by Alice Oseman

Boy meets boy. Boys become friends. Boys fall in love. A sweet and charming coming-of-age story that explores friendship, love, and coming out.

Shy and softhearted Charlie Spring sits next to rugby player Nick Nelson in class one morning. A warm and intimate friendship follows, and that soon develops into something more for Charlie, who doesn’t think he has a chance. But Nick is struggling with feelings of his own, and as the two grow closer and take on the ups and downs of high school, they come to understand the surprising and delightful ways in which love works.

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Adult Fiction

Road Trip by Mary Kay Andrews

New from the beloved New York Times bestselling author of Summers at the Saint and Hello, Summer! Pack your bags for a summer journey shaped by family secrets, long-buried history, and charming men with Irish accents.

Maeve and Therese Dunigan haven’t spoken in years. Raised under the same roof in Savannah, the two sisters could not be more opposite―Maeve the rule follower, Therese the unapologetic rebel. But when their mother’s death pulls them back together, they inherit more than just grief: a mysterious painting that may be worth millions…if it’s real.

Determined to uncover the truth―and desperately in need of the money―the sisters set out on a journey to Ireland, tracing their family’s roots and the origins of the portrait. What begins as a search for answers soon becomes something deeper―a reckoning with the past, as they uncover secrets that span generations and reshape everything they thought they knew about their family.

With tensions simmering, the two hit the road and find themselves on twisty lanes, in colorful villages, at local pubs, and with handsome men whose gift of the gab is surpassed only by their charm.

Can Maeve and Therese actually survive the journey without killing each other? Join Mary Kay Andrews on a road trip that will entertain you for miles.

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Monk and Robot: A Psalm for the Wild-Built & A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers

Becky Chambers’ two award-winning, bestselling, beloved, and uplifting Monk and Robot stories, A Psalm for the Wild-Built and A Prayer for the Crown-Shy, together in trade paperback for the first time! This delightful, post-Utopian, Hugo Award-winning series gives us hope for the future.

It’s been centuries since the robots of Panga gained self-awareness and laid down their tools; centuries since they wandered, en masse, into the wilderness, never to be seen again; centuries since they faded into myth and urban legend.

One day, the life of a tea monk is upended by the arrival of a robot, there to honor the old promise of checking in. The robot cannot go back until the question of “what do people need?” is answered.

But the answer to that question depends on who you ask, and how.
They’re going to need to ask it a lot.

Becky Chambers’ series asks: in a world where people have what they want, does having more matter?

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Storm Tide by Paul Doiron

Game Warden Mike Bowditch investigates a series of brutal killings during a life-changing year in Storm Tide, the harrowing new thriller from Edgar Award-nominated author Paul Doiron.

When the magnificent home of entrepreneur Brian Malloy mysteriously goes up in flames, Maine game warden Mike Bowditch tries to pull Malloy’s burning body from the fire but is too late. Malloy was suspected of murdering his young, illegitimate son. Now it looks like someone else has delivered a verdict.

Miles away, on a lonely stretch of icy railroad track, the body of Axl Deming, once accused of a brutal rape, is found literally cut in half. Though the two murders seem unrelated, a cryptic text from an unknown number draws Bowditch to the scene―and hints at a chilling connection. He believes someone is orchestrating the executions of criminals who escaped justice, and for reasons he can’t explain, his own name is on the list, but the state police aren’t convinced. His search for the truth takes him through frozen harbors, trackless forests, and remote islands, far from rescue.

Meanwhile, Bowditch is facing a disciplinary hearing that could end his career. His wife Stacey, just weeks from giving birth, is being stalked by a stranger in a white van. And when he realizes someone has also been watching their home, the case turns increasingly personal.

To protect his family, Bowditch must work alone to uncover who’s behind the killings―and stop them before he becomes their next victim.

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Villa Coco by Andrew Sean Greer

Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Less, showcases his wit, sophistication, and deep knowledge of focaccia in this tale of a young man who takes an unspecified job with a charismatic elderly Baronessa at her crumbling villa in the Tuscan hills.

An aspiring archivist determined to begin a “serious” life after an undistinguished undergraduate career takes up residence in the Italian countryside. Here, he becomes the all-purpose assistant to the Baronessa, known to her friends as Coco, a defiantly youthful and naturally flamboyant woman of ninety-two. Amid a chaotic and colorful milieu of gin-swilling princesses, incomprehensible handymen, roaming boarhunters, nuns, and other local wildlife, our young man does his best to catalog the villa’s extensive collection of art and antiques—although he notices that things seem to go missing from right under his nose.

Despite himself, he tumbles into an affair with a married man, complicating his future plans considerably. And when the Baronessa loses someone close to her, he becomes an unwitting accomplice in the acceleration of Coco’s great and final plan: to locate the love of her life and be reunited before it’s too late. Told with the signature wit, charm, and humanity that made Less an international phenomenon, Villa Coco is a dazzling, sun-soaked ode to life itself, a meditation on how seriously we ought to take ourselves, and a bawdy Mediterranean ballad about becoming who we’ve always wanted to be.

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Before I Forget by Tory Henwood Hoen

A funny, heartfelt, late coming-of-age story that examines the role of memory in holding us back―and in moving us forward―for fans of The Collected Regrets of Clover and Maame.

Call it inertia. Call it a quarter-life crisis. Whatever you call it, Cricket Campbell is stuck. Despite working at a zeitgeisty wellness company, the 26-year-old feels anything but well. Still adrift after a tragedy that upended her world a decade ago, she has entered early adulthood under the weight of a new burden: her father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis.

When Cricket’s older sister Nina announces it is time to move Arthur from his beloved Adirondack lake house into a memory-care facility, Cricket has a better idea. In returning home to become her father’s caretaker, she hopes to repair their strained relationship and shake herself out of her perma-funk. But even deeply familiar places can hold surprises.

As Cricket settles back into the family house at Catwood Pond―a place she once loved, but hasn’t visited since she was a teenager―she discovers that her father possesses a rare gift: as he loses his grasp of the past, he is increasingly able to predict the future. Before long, Arthur cements his reputation as an unlikely oracle, but for Cricket, believing in her father’s prophecies might also mean facing the most painful parts of her history. As she begins to remember who she once was, she uncovers a vital truth: the path forward often starts by going back.

With laugh-out-loud humor and profound grace, Before I Forget explores the nuances of family, the complexities of memory, and how sometimes, the people we know the best are the ones who surprise us the most.

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The Shampoo Effect by Jenny Jackson

An accidental pregnancy turns a tight-knit group on its head in this witty and irresistible summer novel from the New York Times bestselling author.

OVER ONE LONG SUMMER, WHO KNOWS WHAT MIGHT COME OUT IN THE WASH?

When writer Caroline Lash arrives in Greenhead, she falls immediately for its scenic beaches and New England charm – and even harder for Van Whittaker, a gorgeous, fleece-wearing, litter-collecting, kayak enthusiast.

She meets his friends: Augusta, old money and uptight; Fran, drowning in everyone else’s problems whilst keeping two kids (and an inebriated husband) afloat; and Bailey, who is sexy, confident… and inconveniently pregnant with Van’s child.

Determined nothing will dull the shine of her new romance, Caroline joins the friends as they run wild through Greenhead, drinking on houseboats, gossiping on beaches while their children paddle, and playing risky games.

It seems the fun will last forever – until it doesn’t. As decades-old friendships and marriages begin to fracture, Caroline’s place in their world is called into question. And with all the group’s most tightly held secrets at stake, who knows what might come out?

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It Could Have Been Her by Lisa Jewell

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Then She Was Gone, two women’s lives converge in a house containing devastating secrets that refuse to stay buried in this “deliciously dark, devilishly addictive” (Alice Feeney, bestselling author of My Husband’s Wife) novel.

Jane Trevally is walking her dogs on her country estate when a small white terrier appears, alone and with no sign of the teenaged girl he’d been staying with nearby. When the teenager is reported missing, Jane offers to return the dog to his registered owner, hours away in London. Arriving at a run-down house called Thornwood in the deepest backwaters of Hampstead, she is immediately on alert—because Jane has a dark history with this house.

The man who answers the door is not the man that Jane remembers from her past. He is cagey, and claims to know nothing about the missing teenage girl. Then, through the window of the house, Jane catches a glimpse of a haunted-looking woman.

Conjuring her memories from twenty-five years ago, Jane knows this unsettling house holds the key—to the missing teenager, to her own traumatic story, and to the dark secrets of the past.

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Country People by Daniel Mason

A year in the life of a family as they strike out into the unknown (aka Vermont)—a “witty and gorgeous” (The Guardian) novel from Pulitzer Prize finalist Daniel Mason, the bestselling author of North Woods

Miles Krzelewski is a devoted husband, a doting father beloved for his outlandish bedtime stories, and the proud owner of a truffle-hunting dog in a land with no truffles. He is also a bit lost, twelve years late with his PhD on Russian folktales and increasingly haunted by a sense that he’s become a disappointment to his family. So when his wife, Kate, accepts a visiting professorship at a prestigious college in the faraway forests of Vermont, he decides that this will be the year to finally move forward with his life.

But Miles is a man of many enthusiasms, one who possesses, in Kate’s words, a great capacity “to fall in with anyone, anywhere.” And no sooner does he arrive than he finds himself entangled with a cast of characters as colorful as those of any of his folktales, from a ghostly tree surgeon to a scythe-mad biochemist, from a Shakespearean temptress to a photographer of snowflakes obsessed with chronicling, on thousands of index cards, the world’s delusions in an Inventory of Wrong Ideas.

The new friends, the enchanted woods, the histories: sure, no PhD, but all good fun. Until Miles stumbles upon a bizarre—perhaps ridiculous—local legend, which, he soon suspects, might not be just a legend after all.

Joyous, absurd, and life-affirming, Country People is a luminous exploration of marriage and parenthood, the nature of belief and the power of stories, and the ways in which we find connection in an increasingly fragmented world.

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Whistler by Ann Patchett

The acclaimed, prize-winning #1 New York Times bestselling writer returns with a moving, luminous novel that reminds us of the sweetness and impermanence of life and the power of connection to defy time.

When Daphne Fuller and her husband Jonathan visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they notice an older, white-haired gentleman following them. The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, who had been married to her mother for a little more than year when Daphne was nine. Now fifty-three, Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie for many years, not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives. Meeting again, time falls away; while their relationship was brief, it had a profound impact on them both, and now that they are reunited, they have no intention of ever being separated again.

Whistler is a story about two adults looking back over the choices they made, and the choices that were made for them. It’s a story about bravery, memory, the often small yet consequential moments that define our lives, and the endless stream of loss that in time comes for us all. Beautiful in its simplicity, it is ultimately about how love endures, and how the feeling of being known by one other person, even for a short period of time, can change everything.

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Seek the Traitor’s Son by Veronica Roth

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Veronica Roth comes a sweeping new epic featuring a world consumed by fever and a prophecy that will shake the stars.

Elegy Ahn did not ask for destiny to find her.

She is happy with her life as a soldier. She spends her days fighting the Talusar, whose deadly Fever and mysterious gifts threaten her small country’s very existence.

But then she’s summoned to hear a prophecy–her, and the most ruthless of Talusar generals, Rava Vidar. Brought face to face, they learn that one of them will lead their people to victory over the other…but they don’t know which. And at the center of both of their fates: a man. A man that, Elegy is told, she will fall in love with.

In just one day, Elegy’s old life–her job, her purpose, and her future–is over. She and Rava are destined to collide, with the fate of their nations hanging in the balance. And when they do, only one will be left standing.

Elegy intends to make sure it’s her.

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Daughters of the Sun and Moon by Lisa See

From belovedbestselling author Lisa See, the story of three Chinese women whose unexpected friendship helps them survive and, despite the odds, thrive, in the turmoil of post–Civil War Los Angeles.

In 1870, three Chinese women arrive in the small, dusty, and violent pueblo of Los Angeles. Dove, the bound-footed daughter of an imperial scholar, is entrancing and innocent. These characteristics should bring her great rewards, beginning with her arranged marriage to a much older merchant. Petal, the big-footed daughter of peasants, has grown up hungry and with dirt between her toes. In a moment of desperation, Petal’s father sells her to buy money for rice seed, and she is loaded onto a ship to the Gold Mountain—America—where she is once again sold. Moon is married to a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine. She is educated, speaks fluent English, and has been endowed with a face of great beauty, yet her failed footbinding as a child has left her with a limp that lessens her value in the eyes of many.

Each woman has her own desires. Dove wants to love and be loved, Petal desires freedom, and Moon seeks justice. Together they face a larger society that wishes them not one ounce of good will. Anti-Chinese sentiment is strong in Los Angeles, and this eventually leads to the Night of Horrors during which all three women are challenged in ways they could not have imagined. Brought together by hardship and heartbreak, they must use their bravery, endurance, and ability to “eat bitterness” to discover their voices, find freedom, and connect through solace and friendship. Together they are daughters of the sun and moon.

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A Year of Marvelous Ways by Sarah Winman

The remarkably life-affirming novel from the highly acclaimed author of Still Life, set in 1940s Cornwall following the unlikely friendship between an eighty-nine-year-old woman at the end of her story and a young soldier, reeling from World War II, at the start of his own.

Marvelous Ways has lived alone alongside a winding creek near the rugged Cornwall coast for nearly all her life, and has recently taken to spending her days sitting on the steps of her caravan with a telescope. She is waiting for something, but she’s not sure what. She will know when she sees it and that is good enough for her.

Francis Drake, a young soldier adrift after the death of a fellow comrade, is grateful for the mission that guides his days. He has agreed to fulfil his friend’s last wish: to hand-deliver a letter to his father in Cornwall. But Francis’s journey doesn’t go as planned. After a brief, sweet, and serendipitous reunion with a woman from his past, Francis washes up in Marvelous’s creek, broken both in body and spirit.

Marvelous will come to his aid, and an unlikely friendship will grow between these two solitary souls. Marvelous has lived a long life, with many loves and countless stories to tell, and Francis needs a reason to keep going—even just the hope that life still has more to offer.

A beautiful, bighearted story that bursts with the magic of what it means to grab hold of connection and purpose when it is right in front of you, A Year of Marvelous Ways is a testament to friendship and another timeless classic from the acclaimed Sarah Winman.

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Adult Graphic Novels

The Cartoon History of the Universe (Volumes 1-3) by Larry Gonick

An irreverent and highly entertaining graphic novel approach to the history of the universe that traces world history from the big bang to Alexander the Great (Volume 1), then from the “springtime” of China to the fall of Rome (Volume 2), and finallly from the rise of Arabia to the Renaissance (Volume 3). You’ll never look at history in quite the same way again!

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Belonging: A German Reckons with History and Home by Nora Krug

Named a Best Book of the Year by The New York Times, The Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, NPR, Comics Beat, The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, Kirkus Reviews, and Library Journal

This“ingenious reckoning with the past” (The New York Times), by award-winning artist Nora Krug investigates the hidden truths of her family’s wartime history in Nazi Germany.

Nora Krug was born decades after the fall of the Nazi regime, but the Second World War cast a long shadow over her childhood and youth in the city of Karlsruhe, Germany. Yet she knew little about her own family’s involvement; though all four grandparents lived through the war, they never spoke of it.

After twelve years in the US, Krug realizes that living abroad has only intensified her need to ask the questions she didn’t dare to as a child. Returning to Germany, she visits archives, conducts research, and interviews family members, uncovering in the process the stories of her maternal grandfather, a driving teacher in Karlsruhe during the war, and her father’s brother Franz-Karl, who died as a teenage SS soldier. In this extraordinary quest, “Krug erases the boundaries between comics, scrapbooking, and collage as she endeavors to make sense of 20th-century history, the Holocaust, her German heritage, and her family’s place in it all” (The Boston Globe). A highly inventive, “thoughtful, engrossing” (Minneapolis Star-Tribune) graphic memoir, Belonging “packs the power of Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home and David Small’s Stitches” (NPR.org).

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Charity & Sylvia by Tillie Walden

An openly Lesbian couple survives and thrives in 19th century Vermont–a true story, as told by Tillie Walden

The month is February in the year 1807. The place is Weybridge, Vermont: small, cold, lonely, and beautiful. Sylvia Drake is exhausted. As an unwed woman with few prospects, she is residing with and caring for her sister’s rambunctious family. Today the house is abuzz awaiting a guest―Charity Bryant. A friend of the family, she is most known for her elegant letters, with their swoopy and evocative penmanship and carefully chosen prose. But Charity’s visit is a guise, she is coming to Vermont to start over after heartbreak and rumours―so many rumours―that have grown too loud back in Massachusetts.

Being openly gay in 19th century New England is not an easy row to hoe. But Charity can only be herself, and she immediately catches―and holds―the eye of none other than Sylvia Drake. From this point on, for 44 years, the two would be inseparable, building a life together despite all odds and living as a lesbian couple in small town Vermont.

The true, exceptional story of these remarkable women is brought to life with humor and passion by the unparalleled and award-winning Tillie Walden (Spinning, On A Sunbeam). We see America grow alongside these women over a period that brings about the railroad, many novels, 14 Presidents, riots, rebellion, plagues, and poetry. Based on extensive archives of their writing, Charity and Sylvia is a groundbreaking biography that is also the story of 19th century America.

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Adult Nonfiction

The following nonfiction titles were purchased with donations provided by the community. Thank you!

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The Yahoo Boys: Love, Deception, and the Real Lives of Nigeria’s Romance Scammers by Carlos Barragán

An astonishing work of immersion journalism about four young romance scammers in Lagos, Nigeria, exploring how and why they scam, and the moral dilemmas they face

When his mother started emailing with a handsome American soldier who promised to send gold bars to her Madrid apartment, the journalist Carlos Barragán came face to face with the human toll of online romance fraud. After tracing the emails to an IP address in Nigeria, he set off on a journey to Lagos to find his mother’s scammer, where he stumbled on a much bigger story. There, in a crowded and impoverished neighborhood in the midst of Africa’s largest city, he encountered thousands of young men engaged in romance scamming. They call themselves “Yahoo Boys,” and each year they catfish millions of dollars from lonely victims overseas, building a dizzying local economy from their phones.

In this astonishing work of immersion journalism, Barragán takes us inside the lives of four of the Yahoo Boys of Lagos. We meet Biggy and Chibuike, each struggling with the temptations of fast money; Azeez, a tailor’s apprentice caught between the lure of crime and Nigeria’s economic crisis; and Richie, who is convinced that he’s responsible for the death of a woman in Kentucky he manipulated online for years. Some Yahoo Boys attain the status of folk heroes, buying houses and cars with the money they make, while others become dependent on drugs and “cash out”―successfully scam a victim―only to lose it all.

Through the Yahoo Boys’ twisting fortunes, Barragán discovers the psychological tactics they perfect, the brutal economic realities that drive them, and the moral dilemmas they confront. A work of radical empathy, this book reveals the human face behind a global phenomenon, and shows how loneliness in the West and poverty in Nigeria are two sides of the same screen.

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When Memory Fades: What to Expect at Every Stage, from Early Signs to Full Support for Alzheimer’s and Dementia by Nathaniel Chin, MD with George Spencer

A geriatrician whose perspective on his specialty changed when his own father was diagnosed with dementia provides clear, calm questions to ask and tasks to tackle―as well as what not to worry about―from the first moments of concern.

When Nate Chin’s father, also a doctor, began to feel his mind slipping, even a family as knowledgeable and capable as theirs was knocked back on its heels, disorganized, and unsure of what to do first. Chin, who in addition to his practice, became one of his father’s primary caregivers until he died, determined to figure out the best way to move forward, for his own family, his patients, and now for everyone else.

When Memory Fades is clear, smart, and cuts through the understandable impulse to grasp at ineffective treatments. From the first concerns that something might be wrong right through to the toughest stages of the disease, Chin gives granular information and frames topics that help readers figure out how to think about what’s happening:

–How to Distinguish Normal Signs of Aging from Clinical Dementia
–How to Avoid Delaying Assessment
–Navigating the Medical Exam
–How to Plan & Run a Family Meeting
–Focus on the early stages/transition period to full disease can be determinative to both quality of patient life and interactions
–How to Set New Routines & Healthy Habits
–Day to Day Patient Care
–Community and Connection, and How to Maintain Them
–Dying of Alzheimer’s is Just Dying

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Pizza Before We Die: An Eyewitness Account in Gaza by Hassan Kanafani with Yasuko Thanh

A heart-wrenching personal account of the ongoing devastation in Gaza by an ordinary citizen who bears witness to the undoing of his community and homeland

The human tragedy unfolding in Gaza has been made all the more tragic by the widespread denial and apathy expressed by much of the rest of the world. Here is an urgent first-hand account of life and death in Gaza, written not by a war correspondent, but an ordinary citizen whose life was upended when the genocide began.

In the midst of the chaos, Hassan began posting about his daily experiences on Reddit. Three activists, moved by his words, started collecting his posts without a clear plan—only the conviction that his story needed to be seen and the hope that somehow, it might help raise funds for him. By chance, those posts found their way to award-winning author Yasuko Thanh, who helped Hassan frame them for a book.

Hassan’s missives are a vivid, heartbreaking account of war and its toll—on families, on children, on innocent civilians. These are stories of hunger, survival, and death. These are stories that demand to be heard. And yet, stories like these are not being told: Mainstream media has largely remained silent. Foreign journalists are barred from Gaza. Local journalists are being killed. In this vacuum, Hassan’s voice breaks through out of the darkness and into the light.

Pizza Before We Die is literary journalism at its rawest and most urgent—clear eyed, unflinching, and deeply humane. Hassan captures the unspeakable horror of the tragedy in Gaza with restraint and precision, never sensationalizing, always bearing witness. It is a work of raw power and emotion and a reminder that in the midst of chaos and tragedy, our shared humanity remains intact.

In addition to editing this book, Yasuko Thanh has written a foreword that provides context for Hassan’s powerful story.

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How Not to Kill Yourself: A Portrait of the Suicidal Mind by Clancy Martin

FINALIST FOR THE KIRKUS PRIZE FOR NONFICTION • ONE OF TIME’S 100 MUST-READ BOOKS OF THE YEAR • ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW’S CRITICS’ PICKS • ONE OF THE BOSTON GLOBE’S 55 BOOKS WE LOVED THIS YEAR • ONE OF KIRKUS’S BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE YEAR• An intimate, insightful, at times even humorous blend of memoir and philosophy that examines why the thought of death is so compulsive for some while demonstrating that there’s always another solution—from the acclaimed writer and philosophy professor, based on his viral essay, “I’m Still Here.”

If you’re going to write a book about suicide, you have to be willing to say the true things, the scary things, the humiliating things. Because everybody who is being honest with themselves knows at least a little bit about the subject. If you lie or if you fudge, the reader will know.

The last time Clancy Martin tried to kill himself was in his basement with a dog leash. It was one of over ten attempts throughout the course of his life. But he didn’t die, and like many who consider taking their own lives, he hid the attempt from his wife, family, coworkers, and students, slipping back into his daily life with a hoarse voice, a raw neck, and series of vague explanations.

In How Not to Kill Yourself, Martin chronicles his multiple suicide attempts in an intimate depiction of the mindset of someone obsessed with self-destruction. He argues that, for the vast majority of suicides, an attempt does not just come out of the blue, nor is it merely a violent reaction to a particular crisis or failure, but is the culmination of a host of long-standing issues. He also looks at the thinking of a number of great writers who have attempted suicide and detailed their experiences (such as David Foster Wallace, Yiyun Li, Akutagawa, Nelly Arcan, and others), at what the history of philosophy has to say both for and against suicide, and at the experiences of those who have reached out to him across the years to share their own struggles.

The result combines memoir with critical inquiry to powerfully give voice to what for many has long been incomprehensible, while showing those presently grappling with suicidal thoughts that they are not alone, and that the desire to kill oneself—like other self-destructive desires—is almost always temporary and avoidable.

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The Vermont Farm to Table Cookbook: Over 50 Fresh & Local Recipes for Every Season by Nora Rice & Jenna Rice

The Vermont Farm to Table Cookbook is an ode to the flavors and ingredients of Vermont. Featuring over 50 recipes focused on fresh, local ingredients, this homegrown cookbook is your invitation to savor the bounty of the Green Mountain State.

The Vermont Farm to Table Cookbook is a celebration of Vermont’s unique flavors, focusing on recipes that utilize locally grown meats, dairy products, and vegetables.

Experience a full year in a Vermont kitchen—every dish flows with the rhythm of the land, no matter the season. Featured recipes include:

• Herbed Ricotta Stuffed Chicken
• Potato and Wild Leek Gratin
• Asparagus and Goat Cheese Frittata
• Maple Bourbon Glazed Pork Chops
• Blackened Peach Salad
• Summer Berry Maple Pavlova
• Roasted Delicata with Cider Syrup
• Red Wine Braised Short Ribs
• Apple Celeriac Salad
• Maple Fudge

With expert tips, beautiful photography, and a variety of dishes to suit any taste, The Vermont Farm to Table Cookbook is a love letter to all the colors and flavors of Vermont.

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America’s Test Kitchen: The Complete Baby and Toddler Cookbook

Being a new parent usually means an overload of information on how to keep your baby healthy and happy. But what information should we trust as parents? America’s Test Kitchen, with their years of expertise and their tried-and-true testing methods, has opened their test kitchens for the first time ever to include the youngest of foodies: babies and toddlers! This baby food book is the perfect choice for parents looking to dive into the world of baby food recipes and cooking toddler food!

From purees to smoothies to family meals that everyone can enjoy, this cookbook includes the very best (kitchen-tested!) recipes to get you through the early years. Whether you’re looking for ways to introduce your child to solid foods or engage kids in the kitchen, this is the essential cookbook young families need.

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I Eat the Stars: How to Live Fully and Beautifully in a Collapsing World by Sarah Wilson

From New York Times bestselling author Sarah Wilson comes a deeply moving, wise guide to finding joy and meaning in a world that seems to be falling apart

It’s hard to escape the feeling that something is deeply wrong . . . that life has become precariously off-balance. We are hit hourly with headlines about catastrophic wildfires, unprecedented flooding, record heat waves, collapsing democracies, AI and nuclear threat, rising economic inequality, widespread unrest, and more. In I Eat the Stars, Sarah Wilson argues we are undergoing what every complex civilization before us has—systemic collapse.

So how do we continue to live as sensitive humans amidst such a tumultuous shift? What does life look like when the systems we rely on deteriorate? Should we be having kids? How do we make financial decisions? Should we be prepping? And, most importantly, how do we avoid succumbing to doom and despair?

In I Eat the Stars, Sarah Wilson delves into these pressing questions. Drawing on many years of research and wisdom gained from more than 200 conversations with philosophers, poets, game theorists, and spiritual leaders, Wilson takes readers on an intimate journey as she lays out a path for living fully, meaningfully, and beautifully through these troubled times. Our predicament, she argues, is ultimately an urgent call to us all to relish what is valuable to us—to eat the stars—and to return to our humanity once again.

I Eat the Stars empowers readers to move beyond panic, doom, and despair. With her warm, incisively intelligent, wise, and down-to-earth voice, Wilson creates a space for readers to confront their fears and anxieties about an uncertain future, guiding them toward one rooted in truth, hope, justice, creativity, community, and to step up as “warriors” and meet the moment.

We are in what we were warned about for decades. But from a crisis comes stunning possibility.

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Games

Join a team of fearless adventurers on a do-or-die mission to capture four sacred treasures from the ruins of this perilous paradise. 2-4 players, ages 10+

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