Surrounded by towering Douglas firs and a nearby forest to visit anytime, I enjoy sharing my days with backyard bird visitors—especially hummingbirds. Gentle, calming, and grounding, life in north Seattle truly feels like home to me. For as long as I can remember, nature and animals have always brought comfort and solace to my anxious …
This coming-of-age graphic novel deals with growing up, changing, navigating the ups and downs of friendship, and figuring out how to deal with our own mental health. For a middle grade book to do so effectively is a gift for us all and gives a path forward at a time when things just seem way …
Dear Bookseller, I was 14 when I traumatically lost ~50% of my hearing. As I grappled with this loss, my Generalized Anxiety Disorder skyrocketed. For years after, my only solace was found in stories—I’d get lost in books, focusing on fiction in an act of desperate self-preservation. But the more I read, the less I …
Sashiko’s Stitches is a new picture book from local favorite Sanae Ishida (Little Kunoichi: The Ninja Girl). Sashiko is a little girl with overwhelming fears and worries. One day, her mother teaches her about a style of decorative traditional Japanese stitching also called sashiko, which was originally used to repair fishermen’s clothes. As Sashiko begins …
From Rebel Heart Books, Jacksonville, OR [TW: suicide] “The pressure to be great, not just good, is unrelenting.” –from What Made Maddy Run Not long ago, a fifteen-year old girl came into the store and stayed awhile. After picking out a few books, she shyly asked if I could set aside the books she …
If you loved Susannah Cahalan’s Brain on Fire, get ready for another wild ride. In her newest book, The Great Pretender, Susannah discovers a doctor in the ’70s who convinced eight healthy people to commit themselves into mental hospitals. Little did they know they’d need to prove their sanity before being let out. This book …
I laughed so hard I cried. Then I went into silent laughter mode. Then I couldn’t breathe. You’ve been warned. –Kelsea A hilarious, quick read that will make you laugh from page one. The blogger Allie Brosh puts her life in the form of a comic It will make you cry with laughter and have …
Author Ashley Sweeney interviewed Portland author Ellen Notbohm about her debut novel The River by Starlight. Shortly before publication, the book won the Gold Medal for Best Regional Fiction, West-Mountain, in the Independent Publisher Book Awards. Notbohm is also author of four award-winning nonfiction books. Ashley Sweeney: Thank you, Ellen, for allowing me to interview you …
