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Fiction A to Z September 2019
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| Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane BuxtonWhat it is: a wholly unique story in which a domesticated crow narrates as humanity descends into a zombie apocalypse and their pets are left to save themselves.
Why you might like it: the crow's-eye view of humans (and of Seattle) is quirky and irreverent (and crass); the cast is made up almost entirely of animals (domesticated and wild); there's dark humor amid the tragedy.
For fans of: animal POVs; zombie fiction; clever and creative heroes. |
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| The Warehouse by Rob HartThe setting: a near future world destroyed by climate change, in which nearly all aspects of life are controlled by a massive global corporation called Cloud.
What happens: Two Cloud employees discover that all is not as it seems behind the closed doors of the near-monopoly.
For fans of: Dave Eggers' The Circle, of course, as well as Netflix's Black Mirror, but also totalitarian classics like George Orwell's 1984. |
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| How to Hack a Heartbreak by Kristin RockawayWhat it is: a charming story of a young woman challenging the male-dominated tech world while also pursuing romance.
What happens: Tired of being demeaned at work and on dates, help desk staffer Melanie Strickland creates a website that alerts other women to potential jerks -- when it goes viral, she's unprepared for her overnight success.
For fans of: Christina Lauren's My Favorite Half-Night Stand or Camille Perri's The Assistants. |
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The beekeeper of Aleppo : a novel
by Christy Lefteri
A beekeeper and his artist wife have their lives upended and must flee after war destroys their home in Aleppo, Syria and they set off on a dangerous journey through Turkey and Greece, towards an uncertain future in England.
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Inland : a novel
by Téa Obreht
An unflinching frontierswoman riding out the Arizona Territory drought of 1893 finds her life intertwined with that of a former outlaw whose ability to see ghosts has inspired a momentous expedition. By the New York Times best-selling author of The Tiger’s Wife.
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We are all good people here
by Susan Rebecca White
A pair of roommates at Belmont College in 1962 become close friends until their growing awareness of the South’s caste system causes them to question everything and one of them veers towards radicalism.
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| Green by Sam Graham-FelsenWhat it's about: It's 1992, and sixth-grader Green is one of the few white students at Boston's Martin Luther King Middle School. After Marlon, a studious black kid from the housing projects nearby, stands up for him, a friendship is born. It's strong enough to weather the typical middle school problems, but it may not be strong enough to survive their differences -- or the increasingly bigger problems they face.
For fans of: stories about interracial friendships (and the strains they come under) or coming-of-age stories told by imperfect but likable narrators. |
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| How to Be Safe by Tom McAllisterWhat happens: Not long after high school teacher Anna Crawford is suspended for a classroom outburst, a shooting at the school leaves dozens dead and wounded. And Anna becomes a person of interest.
Why you might like it: Though the novel's catalyst is a horrific event that is all too common in the U.S., the violence is mainly off the page, Anna is a character who encourages empathy, and the trenchant observations that follow are an indictment of gun violence.
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| John Woman by Walter MosleyWhat it's about: a young man's reinvention of himself as a student and professor after his participation in a violent crime requires a new identity.
What happens: John Woman lands at a liberal college in the Southwest as a professor of deconstructionist history -- that history is found in the details not written down. And he finds that, ultimately, his own hidden history will be discovered.
Read it for: the characters; the exploration of how history shapes us. |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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