Books

Mysteries and thrillers are such wide genres that include many different kinds of stories. Maybe you’re the type of person who loves all mysteries and thrillers, whether they’re cozy, domestic, detective stories, amateur sleuth stories, legal thrillers, locked room mysteries, and everything in between. But maybe your tastes are a little more particular. In those

When I realized my childhood Barnes & Noble was closing, I was devastated. I’m an indie bookstore lover, but growing up, there were no indie bookstores in my town: only one gorgeous, cozy Barnes & Noble. We went to book clubs there as kids, met there as teens basically every Friday night, studied for the

In early September 2021, before most of the country knew what Moms for Liberty or No Left Turn were — both of which were operating — Central York High School in Pennsylvania was leading the way in book bans. But they weren’t just being leaders in restricting the First Amendment Rights of students. Students themselves

At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic circa 2020, there came the rise of virtual book clubs. With the strict adherence to social distancing rules, many started virtual book clubs in schools, libraries, or even just among friends. These virtual book clubs work in a similar way as those from Oprah Winfrey and Reese Witherspoon.

Why do I pay attention to AAPI Heritage Month? As a school librarian, I spend a lot of time thinking about the diversity of my collection. I’m a white woman working in a school where white kids are a slight minority. I know that my ingrained racism keeps me from selecting books that are appropriate

Investigative journalist and award-winning author Rachel Louise Snyder has reported on natural disasters, genocides, wars and social justice issues around the globe. Acclaimed for her seminal 2019 study of domestic violence in America, No Visible Bruises, she turns her focus to her own troubled family history in Women We Buried, Women We Burned, a memoir

This Is the First Book I Will Read to You Start off on the proverbial right foot with This Is the First Book I Will Read to You, in which a father celebrates the joys of reading with his newborn child. “I’ll be nervous,” he admits, “to share this moment that only you and I

A couple of weeks back, I shared a roundup of pending legislation across several states and at the national level which would ensure the right to read. There is another bill worth highlighting during this legislative session that is making positive progress in Connecticut. Senate Bill 2, called the Act Concerning the Mental, Physical, and

In 2019, we had Greta Gerwig’s Little Women, but in 2022, we were gifted with the Korean adaptation of the 19th century American classic. “Loose interpretation” might be a better term for the K-Drama that works as espionage thriller, high-stakes political drama, supernatural mystery, and Cinderella story. Each episode clocks in at over an hour, drawing viewers into the twisted

If there is one thing I love as much as I love books, it is coffee. I buy my beans through a subscription service, and start every day with a hot cup of freshly brewed “hairbender” roast. I take it black, and I have more funny mugs than fit in my cupboard. Most mornings, my

In Archives of Joy: Reflections on Animals and the Nature of Being, French Canadian author Jean-François Beauchemin looks back, around and into the mystic, to great effect. His brief and often breathtaking reflections on creatures he has encountered throughout his life meld into a salve for the troubled, weary or distracted mind and will appeal

The world is tough. Living in the modern world involves grappling with pressures from all sides, and if you are a marginalised person, you have added structural barriers and pressures to deal with. We’re all harmed by capitalism, bigotry, and other social factors, as well as having to live with medical issues, mental health problems,

The women of the Marlow Murder Club are back in business in Death Comes to Marlow, the delightful second installment of Robert Thorogood’s cozy mystery series. Life is returning to normal for Judith Potts. She became something of a local celebrity after she and her friends Becks and Suzie helped solve a series of murders

Heartstopper fans rejoice! Not only is season two on the horizon, but there’s also a novella coming out this year. This Winter was originally published in the UK in 2015, following Tori Spring of Solitaire along with her brother and her brother’s boyfriend, Heartstopper characters Charlie and Nick. The first American edition comes out September

T.C. Boyle has never been afraid to torment his characters or draw from real life, and he does both in Blue Skies, putting his cast through just about every climate-related calamity to make the contours of the crisis so prominent that no one could miss them. He begins this bicoastal adventure—the action toggles between Florida

The Cure has been my favorite band since I was about 14. This was not too long after Wish came out, and while I enjoyed “Friday I’m in Love,” it was pretty far on the light side of pop for my 8th grade punk-grunge taste; I liked it, but I listened to Nirvana and the

Author Abdi Nazemian won a Lambda Literary Award for his debut novel for adults, The Walk-In Closet. His debut novel for teens, Like a Love Story, received a Stonewall Honor and was recognized by Time magazine as one of the 100 greatest YA novels of all time. His fifth book, Only This Beautiful Moment, seems

Researching and reading books for this piece has been an unexpectedly needed experience for me. I may be speaking for myself, but when I think of “Asian horror” my first thoughts are of works in translation and their movie adaptations that make me want to pour bleach on my eyeballs. And I say that as

The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki did not immediately bring World War II to an end. Bestselling author Evan Thomas (Ike’s Bluff) explains why in his superbly crafted military and diplomatic history Road to Surrender: Three Men and the Countdown to the End of World War II. “This book is a narrative of how the

With Pride just a few weeks away, it’s time for library workers to start thinking about the where, how, when, and what of their book displays. We know that queer books remain among the most targeted in the current book ban ~curation~ wave and we also know that Pride displays have historically been among the

In When You Can Swim, readers explore the joys of swimming in various bodies of water—oceans, ponds, lakes, rivers and more—in a text set primarily in conditional statements (the “when you can swim” of the title), as spoken by a parent to a child. This phrase is a refrain that conveys the abundant possibilities and

Is there anything more exciting than seeing a book you read and enjoyed being adapted into a film or movie? You’ve imagined all of these scenes and characters in your head. Now you get to see it all play out in front of you. Will the adaptation include all of your favorite lines or moments?

Geniuses seem to inhabit a world apart from mere mortals like us. But they don’t, as the irreverent and entertaining Edison’s Ghosts makes clear. Debut author and science writer Katie Spalding has mined history, biography and psychology to turn the cult of genius on its head, shining a sassy light on the idiosyncrasies of some

Romance book clubs are the heart of romance community discourse. They can be a place to make friends. They can give you an opportunity to become connected to your neighborhood. Romance book clubs are also a place where romance readers can find conversations that go deeper into the intricacies of the genre and what makes

In this era of domestic thrillers, a novel about a functional, loving family can feel refreshing and downright unexpected. Extraordinary circumstances severely test the bonds of one such family in Laura Dave’s The Last Thing He Told Me. Hannah Hall’s adoring husband, coding genius Owen Michaels, vanishes on the same day that his company is

The advent of machine learning algorithms in publishing ushered the era of online book recommendations. First there was Goodreads, and then came Amazon. And now, there’s Tertulia, which scrapes an excessive amount of public data to recommend books to its users. There are also others out there that function similarly, be it an app or

How to Not Be Afraid of Everything At a reading in 2022, I heard poet Jane Wong describe her obsession with time-lapse videos of rotting fruit. Her poetry collection, How to Not Be Afraid of Everything, is full of the physicality of food, informed by Wong’s research into the Great Leap Forward, which was a

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Squire is the brainy sidekick to the brawny Sir Kelton, a knight whose reputation precedes him but never quite seems to prove itself. Regardless, while Sir Kelton is heralded as a hero, Squire stands quietly by, more interested in books and knowledge than sword fighting and rescuing. When the two come across a desolate village

What is literary fiction? I’ve been trying to figure it out, and I’m stumped. (Let me just say this up front: this essay is about 750 words, and I absolutely do not give a definitive definition anywhere in those words.) Like any genre or age category, “literary fiction” is a designation that is primarily a