heritage months

May is both Jewish American Heritage Month and Asian, Asian American, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Put some of these thought-provoking, engrossing releases, some of them brand new and upcoming, on your TBR!

CURRENTLY PUBLISHED: 

All Other Nights by Dara Horn (eaudio on Hoopla)

How is tonight different from all other nights? For Jacob Rappaport, a Jewish soldier in the Union army during the Civil War, it is a question his commanders have already answered for him―on Passover, 1862, he is ordered to murder his own uncle, who is plotting to assassinate President Lincoln. After this harrowing mission, Jacob is recruited to pursue another enemy agent, but this time, his assignment isn’t to murder the spy, but to marry her.

Antiquities by Cynthia Ozick

Lloyd Wilkinson Petrie, one of the seven elderly trustees of the now-defunct Temple Academy for Boys, is preparing a memoir of his days at the school, intertwined with the troubling distractions of present events. As he navigates, with faltering recall, between the subtle anti-Semitism that pervaded the school's ethos and his fascination with his own family's heritage-he reconstructs the passions of a childhood encounter with the oddly named Ben-Zion Elefantin, a mystifying older pupil who claims descent from Egypt's Elephantine Island. 

Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer (ebook & eaudio on Hoopla)

Jonathan Safran Foer's debut—"a funny, moving...deeply felt novel about the dangers of confronting the past and the redemption that comes with laughing at it, even when that seems all but impossible." (Time)

The Flight Portfolio by Julie Orringer (eaudio on Hoopla)

From the bestselling, award-winning author of The Invisible Bridge comes a gripping tale of forbidden love, high-stakes adventure, and unimaginable courage filled with "suspense and tragedy, unexpected twists and deliverance” (The Seattle Times). • THE INSPIRATION FOR THE NETFLIX SERIES TRANSATLANTIC 

The Houseguest by Kim Brooks (eaudio on Hoopla)

Set on the eve of America’s involvement in World War II, The Houseguest examines a little-known aspect of the war and highlights the network of organizations seeking to help Jews abroad, just as masses of people seeking to escape Europe are turned away from American shores.

The Lake on Fire by Rosellen Brown (ebook & eaudio on Hoopla)

The Lake on Fire is an epic narrative that begins among 19th century Jewish immigrants on a failing Wisconsin farm. Dazzled by lore of the American dream, Chaya and her strange, brilliant, young brother Asher stow away to Chicago; what they discover there, however, is a Gilded Age as empty a façade as the beautiful Columbian Exposition luring thousands to Lake Michigan’s shore. 

Love and Shame and Love by Peter Orner

Covering four generations of the Popper family, Peter Orner illuminates the countless ways that love both makes us whole and completely unravels us. A comic and sorrowful tapestry of memory of connection and disconnection, Love and Shame and Love explores the universals with stunning originality and wisdom.

The Magnificent Esme Wells by Adrienne Sharp (ebook & eaudio on Hoopla)

Narrated by the twenty-year-old Esme, The Magnificent Esme Wells moves between pre–WWII Hollywood and postwar Las Vegas—a golden age when Jewish gangsters and movie moguls were often indistinguishable in looks and behavior. Esme’s voice—sharp, observant, and with a quiet, mordant wit—chronicles the rise and fall and further fall of her complicated parents, as well as her own painful reckoning with love and life.

Moonglow by Michael Chabon (ebook & eaudio on Hoopla)

From the Jewish slums of prewar South Philadelphia to the invasion of Germany, from a Florida retirement village to the penal utopia of New York’s Wallkill prison, from the heyday of the space program to the twilight of the “American Century,” the novel revisits an entire era through a single life and collapses a lifetime into a single week. A lie that tells the truth, a work of fictional nonfiction, an autobiography wrapped in a novel disguised as a memoir, Moonglow is Chabon at his most moving and inventive.

The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman

Alice Hoffman weaves her trademark magic, romance, and masterful storytelling to unite Coralie and Eddie in a tender and moving story of young love in tumultuous times. The Museum of Extraordinary Things is, “a lavish tale about strange yet sympathetic people” (The New York Times Book Review).

Nemesis by Philip Roth (ebook on Hoopla)

Bucky Cantor is a vigorous, dutiful twenty-three-year-old playground director during the summer of 1944. As a devastating polio outbreak begins to ravage Bucky’s playground, Roth leads us through every inch of emotion such a pestilence can breed: fear, panic, anger, bewilderment, suffering, and pain. Moving between the streets of Newark and a pristine summer camp high in the Poconos, Nemesis tenderly and startlingly depicts Cantor’s passage into personal disaster, the condition of childhood, and the painful effect that the wartime polio epidemic has on a closely-knit, family-oriented Newark community and its children.

The Pinch by Steve Stern (eaudio on Hoopla)

The Pinch revolves around a single enchanted day containing years, during which the antics of a group of Jewish mystics threaten to ravage the life of general store proprietor Pinchas Pin with miracles, and his nephew Muni's ardor for an alluring tightrope walker collides with his passion for chronicling the wonders of North Main Street. Their stories, gleaned by a hapless bookseller from a fabulist history book, transform the fate of the neighborhood. 

The Street Sweeper by Elliot Perlman

From the civil rights struggle in the United States to the Nazi crimes against humanity in Europe, there are more stories than people passing one another every day on the bustling streets of every crowded city. Only some stories survive to become history. As two men try to survive in early-twenty-first-century New York, history comes to life in ways neither of them could have foreseen. Two very different paths—Lamont’s and Adam’s—lead to one greater story as The Street Sweeper, in dealing with memory, love, guilt, heroism, the extremes of racism and unexpected kindness, spans the twentieth century to the present, and spans the globe from New York to Chicago to Auschwitz.

The Vixen by Francine Prose (ebook & eaudio on Hoopla)

Critically acclaimed, bestselling author Francine Prose returns with a dazzling new novel set in the glamorous world of 1950s New York publishing, the story of a young man tasked with editing a steamy bodice-ripper based on the recent trial and execution of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg—an assignment that will reveal the true cost of entering that seductive, dangerous new world. 

The Great Reclamation by Rachel Heng

In this poignant coming-of-age story set in a fishing village in Singapore, Ah Boon and Siok Mei are neighbors and friends who fall in love amid the turbulence of their country’s struggles for independence. 

The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese (ebook on Hoopla)
The author of Cutting for Stone presents an epic novel sharing the saga of three generations of a loving yet seemingly cursed family in South India.

Now You See Us by Balli Kaur Jaswal
Corazon, Donita, and Angel are all domestic workers from the Philippines, sent to Singapore to earn a living and create a new life for themselves and their families. When a fellow domestic worker is accused of murdering her wealthy employer, all of the women come together to solve the mystery — because they know the secrets of Singapore’s high society better than anyone…

Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H

This intimate collection of essays follows the author through her coming of age into early adulthood as she navigates what it means to be queer and Muslim, finding comfort in her identity at a young age in the Quran.

Flux by Jinwoo Chong (eaudio on Hoopla)

Fans of complex, emotionally powerful time travel narratives won’t want to miss this one. Three people at vastly different points in their lives — an eight-year-old boy whose mother has just died in a tragic accident, a 28-year-old man who finds himself unemployed, and a 48-year-old man who is a key witness in a criminal trial — find their worlds intertwined as they uncover a shocking network of secrets. 

The Sense of Wonder by Matthew Salesses

The New Yorker praises this recent release, saying this “playfully self-referential novel examines Asian American identity through the twin lenses of basketball and Korean TV dramas.” 

Biting the Hand by Julia Lee

In this memoir, author Julia Lee examines what it means to be Asian in America. As she reflects on her past — from the burning of her hometown of Los Angeles in the 1992 riots to her experience earning her PhD in English — Julia passionately argues that Asian Americans must work alongside other marginalized groups as allies to enact lasting change.

Local by Jessica Machado

In this powerful and heartfelt memoir, Jessica Machado reflects on her experience growing up as a native Hawaiian with a father whose ancestors were indigenous to the land and a mother from the South.

Yellowface by R.F. Kuang

June Hayward and Athena Liu are Yale classmates who publish their debut novels the same year. However, while Athena becomes the darling of the publishing world, June’s career stalls. When Athena dies in a freak accident, June steals her unfinished manuscript, assumes the pseudonym Juniper Song, and claims Athena’s book — and her success — for herself. But will protecting her secret cost June everything?

Girls Like Girls by Hayley Kiyoko

Pop star Hayley Kiyoko makes her authorial debut with this coming-of-age story based on her hit song and music video! When Coley moves to rural Oregon, she finds herself feeling utterly alone — until she meets Sonya. As the two struggle with their own insecurities surrounding love and identity, they must decide if they’ll let fear hold them back from love.

UPCOMING TITLES:

Almost Brown by Charlotte Gill JUNE 6, 2023

An award-winning writer retraces her dysfunctional, biracial, globe-trotting family's journey as she reckons with ethnicity and belonging, diversity and race, and the complexitites of life within a multicutural household.

All the Right Notes by Dominic Lin JUNE 6, 2023

In this hilarious and joyous rom com, sparks fly when a piano genius and a Hollywood heartthrob are thrown together for a charity performance of solos, heartfelt duets, and a big, showstopping finale.

Much Ado About Nada by Uzma Jalaluddin JUNE 13, 2023

A sparkling second-chance romance inspired by Jane Austen's Persuasion.

The Deep Sky by Yume Kitasei JULY 18, 2023

With the Earth on the verge of collapse, 80 elite humans — the graduates of a strenuous program designed to save humanity — are launched into space on a generation ship. 

Happiness Falls by Angie Kim SEPTEMBER 5, 2023

This upcoming release is part mystery, part intimate family portrait, following the Parsons as they grapple with a shocking loss.

The Museum of Failures by Thrity Umrigar SEPTEMBER 26, 2023

Remy returns to India after learning that his mother has been hospitalized and is unable to communicate — and while visiting, he discovers a note from his late father that completely changes his perspective on his family and his relationships.