all about books

 

The next Books & Beyond (BAB) book club meeting is on Halloween, Tue Oct 31st at 6:30pm!  The topic up for discussion is journalism and there are suggestions available on the Shelf Care page of our website, simply scroll down to find it: https://oneallibrary.org/adults---reading-recommendations. 

If you’d rather attend via Zoom, register your email on the calendar: https://emmetoneal.libnet.info/event/6648599

This week, BAB met to discuss booky topics: books and films about libraries, librarians, bookstores, etc.

The Cracked Spine by Paige Shelton
In need of a good adventure, Delaney Nichols takes the leap and moves to Edinburgh, Scotland, to start a job at a quaint bookstore called The Cracked Spine. But before she can settle in to her new life, a precious artifact - a previously undiscovered first folio of Shakespeare's plays - goes missing, and Edwin's sister is murdered, seemingly in connection to the missing folio. Delaney decides to do some sleuthing of her own to find out just what the real story is behind the priceless folio and how it's connected to the tragic death - all without getting harmed herself.

The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean
Devon is part of The Family, an old and reclusive clan of book eaters. Her brothers grow up feasting on stories of valor and adventure, and Devon—like all other book eater women—is raised on a carefully curated diet of fairy tales and cautionary stories. But real life doesn't always come with happy endings, as Devon learns when her son is born with a rare and darker kind of hunger—not for books, but for human minds.

The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw
You may think you know how the fairy tale goes: a mermaid comes to shore and weds the prince. But what the fables forget is that mermaids have teeth. And now, her daughters have devoured the kingdom and burned it to ashes. On the run, the mermaid is joined by a mysterious plague doctor with a darkness of their own. Deep in the eerie, snow-crusted forest, the pair stumble upon a village of ageless children who thirst for blood, and the three “saints” who control them. The mermaid and her doctor must embrace the cruelest parts of their true nature if they hope to survive.

Overdue: Reckoning with the Public Library by Amanda Oliver
Through her firsthand experiences from six years of professional work as a librarian, Oliver highlights the national problems that have existed in libraries since they were founded, troublingly at odds with the common romanticization of the library as a shining beacon of equality: racism, segregation, and economic oppression. These fundamental American problems manifest today as police violence, the opioid epidemic, widespread inaccessibility of affordable housing, and a lack of mental health care nationwide—all of which regularly come to a head in public library spaces.

Lions of Fifth Avenue by Fiona Davis
In New York Times bestselling author Fiona Davis's latest historical novel, a series of book thefts roils the iconic New York Public Library, leaving two generations of strong-willed women to pick up the pieces.

You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me by Sarra Manning (not available in the JCLC)
Sweet, bookish Neve Slater always plays by the rules. And the number one rule is that good-natured fat girls like her don’t get guys like gorgeous, handsome William, heir to Neve’s heart since university. But William’s been in LA for three years, and Neve’s been slimming down and re-inventing herself so that when he returns, he’ll fall head over heels in love with the new, improved her.

Grimoires: A History of Magic Books by Owen Davies (not available in the JCLC)
No books have been more feared than grimoires, and no books have been more valued and revered. In Grimoires: A History of Magic Books, Owen Davies illuminates the many fascinating forms these recondite books have taken and exactly what these books held.

Loving Literature: A Culture History by Deidre Shauna Lynch (not available in the JCLC)
How did it come to be that professional literary scholars are expected not just to study, but to love literature, and to inculcate that love in generations of students? What Lynch discovers is that books, and the attachments we form to them, have played a vital role in the formation of private life—that the love of literature, in other words, is deeply embedded in the history of literature.

Material Girls (podcast) https://podnews.net/press-release/material-girls
For fans of Witch, Please and shows like Pop Culture Happy Hour, Maintenance Phase and You’re Wrong About, Material Girls offers a fresh approach to discussing pop culture of the past and present by asking: Why this, why now? Why do we like what we like, and what can pop culture teach us about how the world works?

Among Others by Jo Walton
Startling, unusual, and yet irresistibly readable, Jo Walton's Among Others is at once the compelling story of a young woman struggling to escape a troubled childhood, a brilliant diary of first encounters with the great novels of modern fantasy and SF, and a spellbinding tale of escape from ancient enchantment.

The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett
From one of England's most celebrated writers, a funny and superbly observed novella about the Queen of England and the subversive power of reading.

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
Reclusive author Vida Winter, famous for her collection of twelve enchanting stories, has spent the past six decades penning a series of alternate lives for herself. Now old and ailing, she is ready to reveal the truth about her extraordinary existence and the violent and tragic past she has kept secret for so long. 

Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
The lives of a 15th century orphan, a present day octogenarian in Idaho, and a young girl on the interstellar ship Argos are gloriously intertwined through the pages of a mysterious book.

A Lesson in Thorns with Sierra Simone (available in ebook on Hoopla)
When librarian Poe Markham takes the job at Thornchapel, she only wants two things: to stay away from Thornchapel’s tortured owner, Auden Guest, and to find out what happened to her mother 12 years ago. It should be easy enough-keep her head down while she works in the house’s crumbling private library and while she hunts down any information as to why this remote manor tucked into the fog-shrouded moors would be the last place her mother was seen alive. But Thornchapel has other plans for her...