| Flashlight by Susan ChoiFlashlight follows American Louisa Kang and her family across locations and years, but focuses on the night young Louisa and her ethnically Korean father walk on a beach in Japan. Later, she washes ashore, amnesiac and clinging to life, but her dad can't be found. Covering family relationships and geopolitics, this slow burn novel is "never sentimental, never predictable" (Kirkus Reviews). Try this next: Kyung-Sook Shin's I Went to See My Father. |
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Trust Exercise: A Novel
by Susan Choi
Falling in love while attending a competitive 1980s performing arts high school, David and Sarah rise through the ranks before the realities of their family dynamics and economic statuses trigger a spiral that impacts their adult lives.
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| Great Black Hope by Rob FranklinAmid the glitz and glamour of New York, a 20-something gay Black man from a well-to-do Atlanta family flounders after the mysterious death of his roommate, the daughter of a famous singer. Grief-stricken, he's soon arrested for cocaine possession and caught between the worlds of race and class in this debut that's perfect for book clubs. For fans of: Rumaan Alam's Entitlement; Vinson Cunningham's Great Expectations. |
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Entitlement
by Rumaan Alam
Working at an elderly billionaire's charitable foundation, former teacher Brooke Orr gets drawn into the opulent world of big money. The tension ratchets up as she makes questionable moves in this thought-provoking novel that examines desire, class, and race. For fans of: the TV show Succession; The Coin by Yasmin Zaher.
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| The Road to Tender Hearts by Annie HartnettPJ Halliday is a 63-year-old hoarder who drinks too much. When he learns his old high school girlfriend is newly single, he sets out on a cross-country road trip from Massachusetts to Arizona, bringing along his newly orphaned grandniece and grandnephew, his 26-year-old daughter, and Pancakes, a death-predicting cat. Funny and bittersweet, this novel works for fans of Steven Rowley's The Guncle and Kevin Wilson's Run for the Hills. |
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The Road Trip
by Beth O'Leary
Forced to take a road trip together to their friend's wedding in Scotland, former lovers Dylan and Addie are forced to confront the choices they made that tore them apart– and ask themselves whether that final decision was the right one after all. Original.
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| Open, Heaven by Seán HewittIn this lyrical and poignant first novel by a poet and memoirist, librarian James looks back on his youth as a shy, gay 16-year-old. Growing up in a remote northern English village in 2002, James feels isolated from most people, except his ill younger brother, but he soon develops a friendship and consuming crush on the troubled new boy in town. For fans of: Douglas Stuart. |
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Young Mungo
by Douglas Stuart
Star-crossed lovers: Fifteen-year olds Mungo and James reside in the same Glasgow neighborhood, but live in different worlds. Mungo's Protestant family is plauged by poverty and alcoholism. It's bad enough that Mungo must hide his true self -- worse that he's fallen for James, a Catholic.
Reviewers say: "Romantic, terrifying, brutal, tender, and, in the end, sneakily hopeful" (Kirkus Reviews).
What to read next? The End of Eddy by Édouard Louis.
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| Big Chief by Jon HickeyHaving moved around a lot, 30-year-old lawyer Mitch Caddo is an outsider at his Wisconsin reservation. But with his old friend Mack up for reelection as tribal president, political fixer Mitch works hard to defeat a nationally known activist, whose young aide is Mack's sister and Mitch's old flame. Jon Hickey, a member of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, debuts with a timely, thought-provoking novel. For fans of: David Heska Wanbli Weiden's Winter Counts. |
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Winter Counts: A Novel
by David Heska Wanbli Weiden
A vigilante enforcer on South Dakota's Rosebud Indian Reservation enlists the help of an ex to investigate the activities of an expanding drug cartel, while a new tribal council initiative raises controversial questions. A first novel. 75,000 first printing.
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| Awake in the Floating City by Susanna KwanIn a flooded near-future San Francisco, grieving artist Bo lives in a high rise and hopes for the return of her mother, missing for two years. On the verge of finally leaving the city, she instead stays to help her 130-year-old neighbor, whose stories inspire Bo's creativity. Exploring grief, art, memory, climate change, and multi-generational friendships, this is a "marvelously graceful debut" (Kirkus Reviews). Read-alike: Eiren Caffall's All the Water in the World. |
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All the Water in the World
by Eiren Caffall
In a flooded and abandoned Manhattan, 13-year-old Nonie, her family, and a few others live at the top of the closed American Museum of Natural History, working to preserve artifacts. After a superstorm hits, the four survivors take a canoe from a display and set out on the Hudson River in a novel that depicts their journey and narrator Nonie's remembrances. For another lyrical apocalyptic tale, try Sequoia Nagamatsu's How High We Go in the Dark.
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| Food Person by Adam RobertsUncomfortable on camera, digital cooking magazine writer Isabella Pasternack is forced to go live on Instagram, which results in her firing. Desperate for a job, she's soon ghostwriting a cookbook for a scandal-plagued actress who's not interested in food. This fun debut combines the culinary world with friendship, ambition, and romance to create a great summer read. Try this next: Beth Harbison's The Cookbook Club. |
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The Cookbook Club: A Novel of Food and Friendship
by Elizabeth M. Harbison
"MUST LOVE BUTTER: The Cookbook Club is now open to members. Foodies come join us! No diets! No skipping dessert! Margo Everson sees the call out for the cookbook club and knows she's found her people. Recently dumped by her self-absorbed husband, who frankly isn't much of a loss, she has little to show for her marriage but his 'parting gift'-a dilapidated old farm house-and a collection of well-loved cookbooks. Aja Alexander just hopes her new-found friends won't notice that that every time she looks at food, she gets queasy. It's hard hiding a pregnancy, especially one she can't bring herself to share with her wealthy boyfriend and his snooty mother. Trista Walker left the cutthroat world of the law behind and decided her fate was to open a restaurant...not the most secure choice ever. But there she could she indulge her passion for creating delectable meals and make money at the same time. The women bond immediately, but it's not all popovers with melted brie and blackberry jam. Margo's farm house is about to fall down around her ears; Trista's restaurant needs a makeover and rat-removal fast; and as for Aja, just how long can you hide a baby bump anyway? In this delightful novel, these women form bonds that go beyond a love grilled garlic and soy sauce shrimp. Because what is more important in life than friendship...and food?"
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| So Far Gone by Jess WalterIn a divided 2016 America, retired Rhys Kinnick decks his son-in-law Shane at Thanksgiving and then goes off-grid in Washington State. A few years later, his grandkids show up, brought by a neighbor at the request of Rhys' daughter. But then Shane sends members of his church militia after the kids, leading Rhys to team up with an eccentric group of old friends. Read-alike: The Feral Detective by Jonathan Lethem. |
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Beautiful Ruins
by Jess Walter
Though not strictly historical fiction, for half the book takes place in present-day L.A., this romantic, enjoyable novel will delight those yearning for the good old days of Hollywood glamour. It follows a young Italian who, in 1962, hosts a beautiful American starlet in his mediocre hotel. Pasquale is immediately smitten by Dee Moray, who's in hiding; her costar Richard Burton also appears, while an oily publicist takes pains to keep Dee hidden from view. Zipping between past and present, author Jess Walter offers both a twisty narrative and writing that is "funny, brash, [and] witty" (Kirkus Reviews).
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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