The Paragon Hotel has been my favorite historical fiction recommendation since it first published. It has so many things to love, a daring escape across the country, a crime to solve, a child to find, and characters to love. Set in segregated Oregon, you’ll find out things you never knew, while turning the pages as …
Despite my natural pessimism, this book broke down my defenses and set me up to root for a well-earned, conventional kind of happy ending. But then it took a turn and became an altogether different story, leaving me to sputter along with the characters, “Unfair—this is not what I was expecting.” I was crushed. And …
“If we lose one another, wait for me on the steps. Just here, by the door.” Champion is a 217-year-old dog who has sat in the same spot for a century, waiting for Valentyne to return…but waiting is hard. Adventures ensue as the dog searches 1600-1800s Europe for Valentyne. He traverses battlefields, meets alchemists, sniffs …
I loved this smart, funny peek inside the high stakes world of San Francisco private schools. It has everything: social satire, family drama, friendship, a lot of laughs, a touch of romance, and lots to think about after. If you’ve been looking for that Where’d You Go, Bernadette feeling, try this. Bonus: The co-authors live in …
Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Nickel Boys, is out in paperback. . . The Nickel Boys follows Elwood Curtis as he is unfairly sentenced to a juvenile reformatory called the Nickel Academy. Curtis falls in with a fellow “delinquent” named Turner, and the novel explores the very different reactions to the terrible system that …
In these days of trying times, political unrest, uncertainty on many fronts, it’s good to just take a step back and find some joy somewhere, anywhere. Reading Abbi Waxman’s novel is a good start. From the first page to the last, this is a book that will keep the reader giggling, chuckling, and even laughing …
…And speaking of hardheadedness and fisticuffs, one of our favorite books from last year is out in paperback now. It’s Dan Stroud’s gloriously gritty Titanshade, and yes, that is a ’80s cop show cover slapped on a noir fantasy novel because dear readers, that is exactly what this is. It’s “NYPD Blue” meets, uh, something that …
When your stand-up comedy routines fail to entertain and your career is on the fritz, there’s nothing left but to join a gang of vigilante thieves and steal the luck from winners. When Theo Potiris gets sick and tired of the family grocery business and he can’t get a laugh out of anyone, his life …
A classic of European literature unavailable in English for decades, Three Summers is perfectly timeless and perfectly seasonal. Set in the countryside of prewar Greece, it traces the doings and developing identities of a trio of sisters growing into adulthood, each of whom finds a different way to balance her desires for love and freedom. …
Malu finds herself caught between a Mexican mother who wants her to be the perfect señorita and a music-loving father who helped foster her love of all things punk. After their divorce, Malu and her mother move to Chicago from Florida, where Malu has to start a new school and find her place, ultimately discovering …
