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Fiction A to Z August 2023
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| The Librarianist by Patrick deWittMeet: Bob Comet, a 71-year-old retired librarian who has lived alone for nearly 50 years in the same Portland, Oregon, house he grew up in.
What happens: A chance meeting with a confused elderly woman leads to Bob volunteering at a senior center, which offers him a place to belong as well as a few surprises.
Why you might like it: Award-winning author Patrick deWitt (The Sisters Brothers) also revisits Bob as a recently wed (and quickly betrayed) young man in his 20s and as an 11-year-old runaway in this "quietly effective and moving character study" (Kirkus Reviews). π |
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The keepsake
by Julie Brooks
1832. The morning after her father's funeral, Prudence Merryfield wakes to the liberating thought that this is the first day of her new life. At thirty-five and unmarried, she is now mistress of her own fate. But a cruel revelation at the reading of her father's will forces Prudence to realise that taking only the most drastic action will set her free.
Present day. Eliza is gifted a family heirloom by her aunt - a Georgian pocket book, belonging to her ancestor, Prudence Merryfield, whose existence reverberates through the lives of generations of Eliza's family, the Ambroses. Intrigued by what she reads inside, Eliza is drawn more and more into the infamous 'Merryfield Mystery'.
What happened to Prudence who so bravely dared to defy convention two hundred years ago - then disappeared?"
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Queen Bee
by Ciara Geraghty
Sheβs earned her stripes. But the hiveβs misbehaving. Insomnia. How do I have three extra adult males β and a small yappy dog β living in my house when I need to grow into a graceful and sexual midlife woman?
Rage. Am furious. Anxiety. Whatβs going to happen to my career if I canβt get out of this rut? Feel invisible. What is happening to me?
Fifty-year-old Agatha Doyle loves her empty nest β until hot flushes, a pair of killer heels and an overbearing man who wonβt stop talking conspire to change her life. In one moment of madness, she unwittingly becomes a heroine to women everywhere. But can she become the heroine of her own life? Sometimes you just have to wing it.
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Sweet bean paste
by Dorian Sukegawa
Sentaro has failed. He has a criminal record, drinks too much, and his dream of becoming a writer is just a distant memory. With only the blossoming of the cherry trees to mark the passing of time, he spends his days in a tiny confectionery shop selling dorayaki, a type of pancake filled with sweet bean paste. But everything is about to change.
Into his life comes Tokue, an elderly woman with a troubled past. Tokue makes the best sweet bean paste Sentaro has ever tasted. She begins to teach him her craft, but as their friendship flourishes, social pressures become impossible to escape and Tokue's dark secret is revealed, with devastating consequences.
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| Excavations by Kate MyersFeaturing: Elise, Kara, Zara, and Patty, four very different women with varying problems (including issues with each other).
The discovery: While working on an archeological dig in Greece where ancient sporting events occurred, they unearth a stunning find and must come together to deal with their obnoxious boss and save it.
Why you might like it: This evocative debut expertly depicts excavation details and is "fresh, funny, intelligent, and deeply satisfying" (Kirkus Reviews).
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| The Only One Left by Riley SagerCoastal Maine, 1983: After her last job ended badly, live-in caregiver Kit McDeere takes the only position open to her: working with elderly Lenora Hope, who everyone thinks murdered her family when she was a teen.
What happens: At the large cliffside home where the killings occurred and now-disabled Lenora still lives, Kit settles in, though with some misgivings. Then Lenora says she's going to tell her the truth.
Read this next: For other suspenseful novels with twisty plots and mysterious mansions, try Ruth Ware's The Turn of the Key, Jess Kidd's Mr. Flood's Last Resort, or Simone St. James' The Book of Cold Cases.
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The one and only Dolly Jamieson
by Lisa Ireland
Dolly Jamieson is not homeless, she's merely between permanent abodes. The 78-year-old spends her days keeping warm at the local library, where she enjoys sparring with the officious head librarian and helping herself to the free morning tea. It's not so bad, really.
But it's certainly a far cry from the 1960s, when this humble girl from Geelong became an international star of the stage. As the acclaimed lead in the Broadway production of The Rose of France, all Dolly's dreams had come true. So how, in her old age, did she end up here? When Jane Leveson, a well-to-do newcomer to the library, shows an interest in Dolly, the pair strike up an unlikely friendship - and soon Jane is offering to help Dolly write her memoirs.
Yet Dolly can detect a deep sadness in the younger woman's eyes. Perhaps by working together to recount the glittering highs, devastating lows and tragic secrets of Dolly's life, both women can finally face their pasts and start to heal...
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The bookbinder of Jericho
by Pip Williams
What is lost when knowledge is withheld? In 1914, when the war draws the young men of Britain away to fight, it is the women who must keep the nation running. Two of those women are Peggy and Maude, twin sisters who work in the bindery at Oxford University Press.
Peggy is intelligent, ambitious and dreams of studying at Oxford University, but for most of her life she has been told her job is to bind the books, not read them. Maude, meanwhile, wants nothing more than what she has. She is extraordinary but vulnerable. Peggy needs to watch over her.
When refugees arrive from the devastated cities of Belgium, it sends ripples through the community and through the sisters' lives. Peggy begins to see the possibility of another future where she can use her intellect and not just her hands, but as war and illness reshape her world, it is love, and the responsibility that comes with it, that threaten to hold her back.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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