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Best Science Fiction 2020
Finna
Summary:When an elderly customer at a Swedish big box furniture store — but not that one — slips through a portal to another dimension, it’s up to two minimum-wage employees to track her across the multiverse and protect their company’s bottom line. Multi-dimensional swashbuckling would be hard enough, but those two unfortunate souls broke up a week ago. To find the missing granny, Ava and Jules will brave carnivorous furniture, swarms of identical furniture spokespeople, and the deep resentment simmering between them. Can friendship blossom from the ashes of their relationship? In infinite dimensions, all things are possible.
Harrow the ninth
Summary:"After rocking the cosmos with her deathly debut, Tamsyn Muir continues the story of the penumbral Ninth House in Harrow the Ninth, a mind-twisting puzzle box of mystery, murder, magic, and mayhem. Nothing is as it seems in the halls of the Emperor, and the fate of the galaxy rests on one woman’s shoulders. Harrowhark’s health is failing, her magic refuses to cooperate, her sword makes her throw up, and even her mind threatens to betray her. What’s worse, someone is trying to kill her. And she has to wonder: if they succeeded, would the universe be better off?"
Riot baby
Summary:"Rooted in foundational loss and the hope that can live in anger, Riot Baby is both a global dystopian narrative and an intimate family story with quietly devastating things to say about love, fury, and the black American experience. Ella and Kev are brother and sister, both gifted with extraordinary power. Their childhoods are defined and destroyed by structural racism and brutality. Their futures might alter the world. When Kev is incarcerated for the crime of being a young black man in America, Ella-through visits both mundane and supernatural-tries to show him the way to a revolution that could burn it all down."
Hench : a novel
Summary:"Anna does boring things for terrible people because even criminals need office help and she needs a job. Working for a monster lurking beneath the surface of the world isn’t glamorous. But is it really worse than working for an oil conglomerate or an insurance company? In this economy? As a temp, she’s just a cog in the machine. But when she finally gets a promising assignment, everything goes very wrong, and an encounter with the so-called "hero" leaves her badly injured. And, to her horror, compared to the other bodies strewn about, she’s the lucky one. So, of course, then she gets laid off. With no money and no mobility, with only her anger and internet research acumen, she discovers her suffering at the hands of a hero is far from unique. When people start listening to the story that her data tells, she realizes she might not be as powerless as she thinks. Because the key to everything is data: knowing how to collate it, how to manipulate it, and how to weaponize it. By tallying up the human cost these caped forces of nature wreak upon the world, she discovers that the line between good and evil is mostly marketing. And with social media and viral videos, she can control that appearance. It’s not too long before she’s employed once more, this time by one of the worst villains on earth. As she becomes an increasingly valuable lieutenant, she might just save the world."–Amazon.
Bonds of brass
Summary:A young pilot risks everything to save his best friend–the man he trusts most and might even love–only to learn that his friend is secretly the heir to a brutal galactic empire. Ettian’s life was shattered when the merciless Umber Empire invaded his world. He’s spent seven years putting himself back together under its rule, joining an Umber military academy and becoming the best pilot in his class. Even better, he’s met Gal–his exasperating and infuriatingly enticing roommate who’s made the academy feel like a new home. But when dozens of classmates spring an assassination plot on Gal, a devastating secret comes to light: Gal is the heir to the Umber Empire. Ettian barely manages to save his best friend and flee the compromised academy unscathed, rattled that Gal stands to inherit the empire that broke him, and that there are still people willing to fight back against Umber rule. As they piece together a way to deliver Gal safely to his throne, Ettian finds himself torn in half by an impossible choice. Does he save the man who’s won his heart and trust that Gal’s goodness could transform the empire? Or does he throw his lot in with the brewing rebellion and fight to take back what’s rightfully theirs?
The space between worlds
Summary:"The multiverse business is booming, but there’s just one catch: no one can visit a world where their counterpart is still alive. Enter Cara, whose parallel selves happen to be exceptionally good at dying-from diseases, from turf wars, from vendettas they couldn’t outrun. But on this earth, Cara’s survived. And she’s reaping the benefits, thanks to the well-heeled Wiley City scientists who ID’d her as an outlier and plucked her from the dirt. Now she’s got a new job collecting offworld data, a path to citizenship, and a near-perfect Wiley City accent. Now she can pretend she’s always lived in the city she grew up staring at from the outside, even if she feels like a fraud on either side of its walls. But when one of her eight remaining doppelgangers dies under mysterious circumstances, Cara is plunged into a new world with an old secret. What she discovers will connect her past and future in ways she never could have imagined-and reveal her own role in a plot that endangers not just her world, but the entire multiverse."
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Best Fiction for Tweens : 2020
Maya and the rising dark
Summary:"A twelve-year-old girl discovers her father is the keeper of the gateway between our world and The Dark, and when he goes missing she’ll need to unlock her own powers and fight a horde of spooky creatures set on starting a war."
Becoming Muhammad Ali : a novel
Summary:A biogrphical novel tells the story of Cassius Clay, the determined boy who would one day become Muhammad Ali, one of the greatest boxers of all time.
Everything sad is untrue : (a true story)
Summary:At the front of a middle school classroom in Oklahoma, a boy named Khosrou (whom everyone calls "Daniel") stands, trying to tell a story. His story. But no one believes a word he says. To them he is a dark-skinned, hairy-armed boy with a big butt whose lunch smells funny; who makes things up and talks about poop too much. But Khosrou’s stories, stretching back years, and decades, and centuries, are beautiful, and terrifying, from the moment his family fled Iran in the middle of the night with the secret police moments behind them, back to the sad, cement refugee camps of Italy.and further back to the fields near the river Aras, where rain-soaked flowers bled red like the yolk of sunset burst over everything, and further back still to the Jasmine-scented city of Isfahan. Like Scheherazade in a hostile classroom, Daniel weaves a tale to save his own life: to stake his claim to the truth. And it is (a true story).
Snapdragon
Summary:Snap’s town had a witch. At least, that’s how the rumor goes. But in reality, Jacks is just a crocks-wearing, internet-savvy old lady who sells roadkill skeletons online–after doing a little ritual to put their spirits to rest. It’s creepy, sure, but Snap thinks it’s kind of cool, too. They make a deal: Jacks will teach Snap how to take care of the baby opossums that Snap rescued, and Snap will help Jacks with her work. But as Snap starts to get to know Jacks, she realizes that Jacks may in fact have real magic–and a connection with Snap’s family’s past.
Before the ever after
Summary:ZJ’s friends Ollie, Darry and Daniel help him cope when his father, a beloved professional football player, suffers severe headaches and memory loss that spell the end of his career.
King and the dragonflies
Summary:"In a small but turbulent Louisiana town, one boy’s grief takes him beyond the bayous of his backyard, to learn that there is no right way to be yourself."
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Reading is Snow Much Fun!
Miracle on 133rd Street
Summary:The day before Christmas, everyone in Jose’s neighborhood seems grumpy, including his mother who is homesick for Puerto Rico, but when he and his parents return from the pizzeria where they borrowed an oven to cook their roast, the heavenly aroma reminds those they pass of all they have to celebrate.
When Christmas feels like home
Summary:"After moving from a small village in Mexico to a town in the United States, Eduardo is sure it will never feel quite like home. The other children don’t speak his language and they do not play fútbol. His family promises him that he will feel right at home by the time Christmas comes along, when "your words float like clouds from your mouth" and "trees will ride on cars." With whimsical imagery and a sprinkling of Spanish vocabulary, Gretchen Griffith takes readers on a multicultural journey with Eduardo who discovers the United States is not so different from Latin America and home is wherever family is."
Silent night
Summary:"Silent night, holy night / All is calm, all is bright." Celebrate the magic of Christmas with this beautifully illustrated book, based on the world’s best-loved carol, ‘Silent Night.’ Rediscover the nativity story in all its glory – from quaking shepherds to heaven-sent angels – as the song lyrics are brought to life on every spread.
The Christmas gift = El regalo de Navidad
Summary:When his family has to move again a few days before Christmas in order to find work, Panchito worries that he will not get the ball he has been wanting.
Everybody’s tree
Summary:"Over the course of eighty years a spruce tree grows, along with the little boy who first selected it at a tree farm. At the end of its life, the tree is chosen to be the centerpiece of a city’s holiday celebration"–
I got the Christmas spirit
Summary:As she and her mother enjoy the sights and sounds of the holiday season, a young girl feels the Christmas spirit in every jingle, yum, and ho ho ho.
The Christmas wish
Summary:Young Anja, whose greatest dream is to be one of Santa’s elves, makes friends with the animals that guide her on the journey from her home in the far North to meet Santa.
Manger
Summary:There is a legend that describes how, at midnight on Christmas Eve, all creatures are granted the power of speech for one hour. In this collection, Lee Bennett Hopkins and a dozen other poets imagine what responses they might offer.
Summary:There is a legend that describes how, at midnight on Christmas Eve, all creatures are granted the power of speech for one hour. In this collection, Lee Bennett Hopkins and a dozen other poets imagine what responses they might offer.
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Remembering John Le Carre
Tinker, tailor, soldier, spy
Summary:British agent George Smiley hunts for a mole in the Secret Service and begins his epic game of international chess with his Soviet counterpart, an agent named Karla.
Agent running in the field
Summary:"Nat, a 47 year-old veteran of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, believes his years as an agent runner are over. He is back in London with his wife, the long-suffering Prue. But with the growing threat from Moscow Centre, the office has one more job for him. Nat is to take over The Haven, a defunct substation of London General with a rag-tag band of spies. The only bright light on the team is young Florence, who has her eye on Russia Department and a Ukrainian oligarch with a finger in the Russia pie. Nat is not only a spy, he is a passionate badminton player. His regular Monday evening opponent is half his age: the introspective and solitary Ed. Ed hates Brexit, hates Trump and hates his job at some soulless media agency. And it is Ed, of all unlikely people, who will take Prue, Florence and Nat himself down the path of political anger that will ensnare them all."–
A legacy of spies
Summary:Peter Guillam, staunch colleague and disciple of George Smiley of the British Secret Service, otherwise known as the Circus, is living out his old age on the family farmstead on the south coast of Brittany when a letter from his old Service summons him to London. The reason? His Cold War past has come back to claim him. Intelligence operations that were once the toast of secret London, and involved such characters as Alec Leamas, Jim Prideaux, George Smiley and Peter Guillam himself, are to be scrutinised under disturbing criteria by a generation with no memory of the Cold War and no patience with its justifications.
The pigeon tunnel : stories from my life
Summary:The author shares personal anecdotes from his life, discussing subjects ranging from his Cold War-era service in British intelligence to his work as a writer in Russia before and after the collapse of the Berlin Wall.
Absolute friends
Summary:Follows friends and fellow ex-spies, Ted Mundy and Sasha, as they attempt to change their lives and the world in which they live, covering their new escapades in Germany and the ones from their past.
A delicate truth
Summary:2008. A counter-terrorist operation, codenamed Wildlife, is being mounted on the British crown colony of Gibraltar. Its purpose: to capture and abduct a high-value jihadist arms-buyer. Its authors: an ambitious Foreign Office Minister, a private defense contractor who is also his bosom friend, and a shady American CIA operative of the evangelical far-right. So delicate is the operation that even the Minister’s personal private secretary, Toby Bell, is not cleared for it. Cornwall, UK, 2011. A disgraced Special Forces Soldier delivers a message from the dead. Was Operation Wildlife the success it was cracked up to be–or a human tragedy that was ruthlessly covered up? Summoned by Sir Christopher ("Kit") Probyn, retired British diplomat, to his decaying Cornish manor house, and closely observed by Kit’s beautiful daughter, Emily, Toby must choose between his conscience and duty to his Service. If the only thing necessary to the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing, how can he keep silent?
The mission song
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Working as an interpreter for British Intelligence, Bruno Salvador, the abandoned son of an Irish father and Congolese mother, is sent to a mysterious island to interpret a secret conference among Central African warlords.
Our kind of traitor
Summary:At an exclusive tennis resort in Antigua, Perry and Gail meet a Russian money launderer, Dima, who convinces them to help him defect.
The constant gardener : a novel
Summary:When the young and beautiful wife of a much older embassy worker and amateur gardener is found murdered near northern Kenya’s Lake Turkana, his personal pursuit of the killers not only sets him up as their next target, but as a suspect among his embassy colleagues.
A most wanted man : a novel
Summary:A half-starved young Russian man claiming to be a devout Muslim, an idealistic young German civil rights lawyer, and a sixty-year-old scion of a failing British bank based in Hamburg form an unlikely alliance as the rival spies of Germany, England and America scent a sure kill in the "War on Terror," and converge upon the innocents.
Single & single : a novel
Summary:"The high-stakes world of international finance turns deadly as a lawyer from a London banking house is murdered, a London merchant banker vanishes, a Russian freighter is intercepted in the Black Sea, and a children’s magician discovers an unexplained fortune in his daughter’s trust fund."
A perfect spy
Summary:"When British intelligence agent Magnus Pym disappears, two desperate searches are initiated–the hunt of agents, East and West, for the missing spy and Pym’s own quest to uncover the mysteries of his own past."
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Killer Christmas
Murder in season : a novel
Summary:"With work on the reconstruction of her beloved home almost complete, Jessica Fletcher is in high holiday spirits, spearheading the annual Christmas pageant, supervising the Friends of the Library’s toy drive, and preparing for her nephew Grady and his family to come to town. The only thing dampening the holiday cheer is the discovery on Jessica’s property of two sets of bones: one set ancient, the other only a few weeks old. It’s concluded they were placed there during the construction, and Jessica suspects that despite the centuries between them, the bones might be connected. Soon, tabloid reporter Franklin Joy arrives in Cabot Cove to write a story about what he calls "Murder Cove, USA." But when Franklin himself is murdered, Jessica speculates that his arrival, his death, and the discovery of the bones are all connected. As Jessica digs deeper to find the connection between the bones and the murder, everything seems to come back to a mystery that has long plagued Cabot Cove. If she wants to solve the case, she’ll need to delve into her beloved town’s dark history, or else this holiday season may be her last…"
A Christmas resolution : a novel
Summary:"When Celia Hooper discovers that her dear friend Clementine is to marry widower Seth Marlowe – a man with a sinister past – she calls upon her husband, Detective John Hooper of the Thames River Police, to help her find out what really happened to Seth’s first wife several years ago. Rumour has it that she killed herself and Seth’s daughter ran away to live on the streets but no one seems to know the truth."
The gift of the magpie : a Meg Langslow mystery
Summary:"Meg’s running Caerphilly’s Helping Hands for the Holidays project, in which neighbors help each other with things they can’t do and can’t afford to have done. Her hopes for a relatively peaceful (if busy) Christmas vanish when someone murders Harvey the Hoarder, whose house the Helping Hands were decluttering. Was there any truth to the rumor that he had something valuable hidden beneath all his junk? Was one of his friends, neighbors, or relatives greedy enough to murder him for the rumored treasure? And what about the magpie that has been bringing her family bits of tinsel and costume jewelry-does the bird’s latest gift hold a clue to solving the crime?"
Have yourself a fudgy little Christmas : a candy-coated mystery with recipes
Summary:When a mysterious note leads her to a dying woman who names her friend, Frances, as her killer, fudge shop owner Allie McMurphy knows that’s impossible and must wrap up this case before the trail runs cold.
A garland of bones
Summary:"Sarah Booth has traded in hosting this Christmas season for a road trip with her besties. Each little Delta town has a special Christmas activity, and Sarah Booth’s bff and detective partner, Tinkie, has arranged to rent a limo for the gang and drive to Columbus, MS, to stay in a B&B. But Christmas cheer soon turns to Christmas fear when, at one event after another, people keep getting hurt. And when the woman who hires Sarah Booth to find the villain behind the so-called accidents is nearly killed with an arrow during a holiday mumming, Sarah Booth knows something more sinister is at work."
Saddled with murder
Summary:"It’s Christmas season and veterinarian Kate Turner is definitely not feeling jolly. She’s overworked, unappreciated, dealing with two dissatisfied clients AND a complicated personal life. Then, both dissatisfied clients pass away within two weeks of each other. Coincidence, right? But when Kate’s ex-boyfriend, Jeremy, is mugged and robbed after they have a heated argument in the hospital parking lot, all the coincidences seem to point to something a little more sinister… The fifth entry in the delightful, animal-focused mystery series finds Kate with her hands tied while trying to juggle her love-life, work, and a murder investigation."
Mrs. Claus and the Santaland slayings
Summary:April Claus is adjusting to life in the North Pole with her new husband, Nick, when the suspicious death of an ill-tempered elf, initially ruled an accident, motivates her to investigate suspects on a potentially lethal naughty list.
Christmas card murder
Summary:Christmas card murder: "In the midst of holiday home renovations, Lucy Stone accidentally unwraps a murder mystery decades in the making when she discovers an old Christmas card with a nasty message belonging to one of her farmhouse’s previous residents. The case may be colder than a New England Christmas, but Lucy’s determined to sort it out before Santa comes to town."–Amazon.,Death of a Christmas Carol: "The Island Times Christmas soiree gets off to a scroogey start when Hayley Powell, Mona Barnes, and Rosana Moretti receive a Christmas card from the town flirt, Carol Waterman, who threatens to run off with one of their husbands! The ladies chalk it up to an imprudent prank…until they find Carol mistletoe-up under her tree…"–Amazon.,Death of a Christmas card crafter: "Slay bells ring when the body of Arborville High School’s beloved art teacher (and annual Christmas card designer), Karma Karling, is discovered on the first day of the Holiday Craft Fair. Now, Pamela Paterson and the Knit and Nibble crew must swap swatching for sleuthing in order to put a Christmas killer on ice."–Amazon.
Summary:Christmas card murder: "In the midst of holiday home renovations, Lucy Stone accidentally unwraps a murder mystery decades in the making when she discovers an old Christmas card with a nasty message belonging to one of her farmhouse’s previous residents. The case may be colder than a New England Christmas, but Lucy’s determined to sort it out before Santa comes to town."–Amazon.,Death of a Christmas Carol: "The Island Times Christmas soiree gets off to a scroogey start when Hayley Powell, Mona Barnes, and Rosana Moretti receive a Christmas card from the town flirt, Carol Waterman, who threatens to run off with one of their husbands! The ladies chalk it up to an imprudent prank…until they find Carol mistletoe-up under her tree…"–Amazon.,Death of a Christmas card crafter: "Slay bells ring when the body of Arborville High School’s beloved art teacher (and annual Christmas card designer), Karma Karling, is discovered on the first day of the Holiday Craft Fair. Now, Pamela Paterson and the Knit and Nibble crew must swap swatching for sleuthing in order to put a Christmas killer on ice."–Amazon.
Gingerdead man
Summary:When a man playing Santa is poisoned by one of her cookies at the Dickens of a holiday festival, Val Deniston’s reputation is on the line and she and her Granddad must race against time to catch a cookie-cutter killer.
Christmas cupcake murder
Summary:While Hannah speeds through a lengthy holiday checklist, drama in town grows like Santa’s waistline on Christmas Eve. Her sister Andrea wants to stave off the blues by helping out at The Cookie Jar, Michele’s love life is becoming complicated,
Scandi Style
The little book of fika : the uplifting daily ritual of the Swedish coffee break
Summary:"While the Danish concept of hygge as caught on around the globe, so has lagom–its Swedish counterpart. An essential part of the lagom lifestyle, fika is the simple art of taking a break–sometimes twice a day–to enjoy a warm beverage and sweet treat with friends. This delightful gift book offers an introduction to the tradition along with recipes to help you establish your own fika practice"–Amazon.com.
Scandinavian classic baking
Summary:From coffee breads and cakes to cookies and tarts, this gorgeous cookbook offers forty-three recipes, along with photographs, history, musings, and stories. These classic Scandinavian baking recipes are knockouts for the eye and the taste buds.
Traditional Nordic knits : over 40 hats, mittens, gloves, and socks
Summary:The classic Nordic knitting tradition is a widely-respected – and increasingly popular – source of exquisite patterns and design inspiration all over the world. Now, with Traditional Nordic Knits, get a glimpse into the rich history and heritage of this beloved cornerstone of needlecraft. 15 time-honored patterns become over 40 different projects, gracing mittens, gloves, hats, and socks through designs suitable for all levels of experience, and each project is introduced with an example of a historic knitted item and a fascinating explanation of the pattern’s background and origin.
Nordic light : lighter, everyday eating from a Scandinavian kitchen
Summary:Presents a new angle on the trends in Scandinavian recipes and techniques, shying away from the classics and instead presenting lighter, cleaner, simpler modern recipes.
Bakeland : Nordic treats inspired by nature
Summary:From the Danish concept of hygge (or zcozinessy) to the Swedish fika (or zcoffee breaky), when it comes to enjoying the good things in life, the Nordic countries tend to know best. And dessert, Bakeland reveals, is no exception. Written by Marit Hovland, the Norse graphic designer, baker, and photographer behind the popular Instagram account and blog Borrow My Eyes, this gorgeous recipe book is a remarkably innovative homage to the beauty of the world around us that will delight lovers of baking, crafting, nature, and all things Scandinavian. With fifty tempting dessert recipes and 140 stunning color photographs, Bakeland is as much a treat for the eyes as it is for the taste buds. Focusing on purity, season, and quality, Hovland offers a sweet, playful approach to the New Nordic cuisine trend made popular by chefs like Magnus Nilsson. Her belief that zinspiration can be found everywherey shines through in each of her culinary creations, which replicate the most striking aspects of the natural world.
Lagom : the Swedish art of balanced living
Summary:Explains how to live "lagom," or a balanced life, by cherishing relationships, improving work-life balance, freeing the home from clutter, and savoring good food.,Lagom (pronounced ‘lar-gom’) has no equivalent in the English language but is loosely translated as ‘not too little, not too much, just right’. It is widely believed that the word comes from the Viking term ‘laget om’, for when a mug of mead was passed around a circle and there was just enough for everyone to get a sip. But while the anecdote may hit the nail on the head, the true etymology of the word points to an old form of the word ‘lag’, which means ‘law’. Far from restrictive, lagom is a liberating concept, praising the idea that anything more that ‘just enough’ is a waste of time. Crucially it also comes with a selflessness and core belief of responsibility and common good. By living lagom you can live a happier and more balanced life, reduce your environmental impact, improve your work-life balance, free your home from clutter, enjoy good food the Swedish way, grow your own and learn to forage, and cherish the relationships with those you love.
The gentle art of Swedish death cleaning : how to free yourself and your family from a lifetime of clutter
Summary:Margareta suggests which possessions you can easily get rid of (unworn clothes, unwanted presents, more plates than you’d ever use) and which you might want to keep (photographs, love letters, a few of your children’s art projects). Digging into her late husband’s tool shed, and her own secret drawer of vices, Margareta introduces an element of fun to a potentially daunting task. Along the way readers get a glimpse into her life in Sweden, and also become more comfortable with the idea of letting go.
How to hygge : the Nordic secrets to a happy life
Summary:"The "Danish coziness" philosophy is fast becoming the new "French living" in terms of aspirational lifestyle books and blogs. There are countless viral articles comparing the happiness levels of Americans versus Danes. Their homes are more homey; their people are more cheerful. It’s an attitude that defies definition, but there is a name for this slow-moving, stress-free mindset: hygge (pronounced "hoo-ga"). Hygge values the idea of cherishing yourself: candlelight, bakeries, and dinner with friends; a celebration of experiences over possessions, as well as being kind to yourself and treasuring a sense of community."–Amazon.com.
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All is Calm : Calming Books for Teens
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Positively teen : a practical guide to a more positive, more confident you
Summary:Morgan teaches teens how to approach their adolescent years with optimism and understanding. She provides advice on how to flourish both physically and mentally, giving them the skills they need to develop long-term well-being. She emphasizes the importance of doing things you enjoy, and understanding the relation of diet, exercise and attitude to your personality and long-term well-being. — adapted from Amazon.com
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Be the one : six true stories of teens overcoming hardship with hope
Summary:“Emmy Award-winning ABC News chief national correspondent and Nightline coanchor, Byron Pitts shares the heartbreaking and inspiring stories of six young people who overcame impossible circumstances with extraordinary perseverance. Abuse. Bullying. War. Drug Addiction. Mental Illness. Violence. None of these should be realities for anyone, much less a young person. But for some it is the only reality they have ever known. In these dark circumstances, six teens needed someone to “be the one” for them–the hero to help them back into the light. For Tania, Mason, Pappy, Michaela, Ryan, and Tyton, that hero was themselves. Through stirring interviews and his award-winning storytelling, Byron Pitts brings the struggles and triumphs of these everyday heroes to teens just like them, encouraging all of us to be the source of inspiration in our own lives and to appreciate the lives of others around us.”
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Heads up : changing minds on mental health
Summary:“This nonfiction book for teen readers is a guide to understanding mental health and coping with mental illness, trauma and recovery. It features real-life stories of resilient teens and highlights innovative approaches to mental-health challenges.”
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Quiet power : the secret strengths of introverts
Summary:“The monumental bestseller Quiet has been recast in a new edition that empowers introverted kids and teens Susan Cain sparked a worldwide conversation when she published Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. With her inspiring book, she permanently changed the way we see introverts and the way introverts see themselves. The original book focused on the workplace, and Susan realized that a version for and about kids was also badly needed. This book is all about kids’ world–school, extracurriculars, family life, and friendship. You’ll read about actual kids who have tackled the challenges of not being extroverted and who have made a mark in their own quiet way.”
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Mindfulness and meditation : handling life with a calm and focused mind
Summary:“Feeling stressed out? Social media, homework, tests, and relationships can create deep anxiety. So can concerns about health and world affairs. Research shows that a regular mindfulness practice can help calm the mind, improve focus, and build happiness. Living mindfully involves paying attention to your inner and outer experiences with patience and without judgment. It also means acting and making choices with thoughtful consideration rather than impulsively. One key aspect of mindfulness is meditation. This ancient practice involves quieting the mind through breathing exercises and intentional inward focus, for a peaceful, relaxed, and natural state of awareness.” — Dust jacket.
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Project you : more than 50 ways to calm down, de-stress, and feel great
Summary:“Find your balance. Make a protein-packed smoothie to energize for a busy day. Center yourself after a stressful week by taking five minutes to write in your journal. Strengthen your body and calm your mind with simple yoga poses and breathing techniques. Craft a vision board to help you achieve your goals. Create a time budget to organize your schedule. Develop an evening routine that will help you wind down before sleep. Award-winning author Aubre Andrus shares more than 50 do-right-now projects that will help you beat stress, smile big, and discover a calmer, more blissful you.”
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The mindful teen : powerful skills to help you handle stress one moment at a time
Summary:“Outlines a program structured around mindfulness-based stress reduction techniques to help teens manage stress, navigate strong emotions, and improve communication skills.”
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Your brain needs a hug : life, love, mental health, and sandwiches
Summary:Rae Earl offers her personalized advice on the A to Zs of mental health, social media, family and friendship. “Imbued with a sense of humor, understanding, and hope, Your Brain Needs a Hug is a judgment-free guide for living well with your mind. My Mad Fat Diary author Rae Earl offers her personalized advice on the A to Zs of mental health, social media, family and friendship. When she was a teenager, Rae dealt with OCD, anxiety, and an eating disorder, but she survived, and she thrived. Your Brain Needs a Hug is filled with her friendly advice, coping strategies and laugh-out-loud moments to get you through the difficult days. Witty, honest, and enlightening, this is the perfect read for feeling happier and healthier and learning to navigate life without feeling overwhelmed or isolated.”
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2020 National Book Award : Nonfiction
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The dead are arising : the life of Malcolm X
Summary:“An epic biography of Malcolm X finally emerges, drawing on hundreds of hours of the author’s interviews, rewriting much of the known narrative. Les Payne, the renowned Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist, embarked in 1990 on a nearly thirty-year-long quest to interview anyone he could find who had actually known Malcolm X-all living siblings of the Malcolm Little family, classmates, street friends, cellmates, Nation of Islam figures, FBI moles and cops, and political leaders around the world. His goal was ambitious: to transform what would become over a hundred hours of interviews into an unprecedented portrait of Malcolm X, one that would separate fact from fiction. The result is this historic biography that conjures a never-before-seen world of its protagonist, a work whose title is inspired by a phrase Malcolm X used when he saw his Hartford followers stir with purpose, as if the dead were truly arising, to overcome the obstacles of racism. Setting Malcolm’s life not only within the Nation of Islam but against the larger backdrop of American history, the book traces the life of one of the twentieth century’s most politically relevant figures ‘from street criminal to devoted moralist and revolutionary.'”
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Unworthy republic : the dispossession of Native Americans and the road to Indian territory
Summary:“A masterful and unsettling history of the forced migration of 80,000 Native Americans across the Mississippi River in the 1830s. On May 28, 1830, Congress authorized the expulsion of indigenous peoples from the East to territories west of the Mississippi River. Over the next decade, Native Americans saw their homelands and possessions stolen through fraud, intimidation, and murder. Thousands lost their lives. In this powerful, gripping book, Claudio Saunt upends the common view that “Indian Removal” was an inevitable chapter in US expansion across the continent.”
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My autobiography of Carson McCullers
Summary:“While working as an intern in the archives at the Harry Ransom Center, Jenn Shapland encounters the love letters of Carson McCullers and a woman named Annemarie-letters that are tender, intimate, and unabashed in their feelings. Shapland recognizes herself in the letters’ language-but does not see McCullers as history has portrayed her. And so, Shapland is compelled to undertake a recovery of the full narrative and language of McCullers’s life: she wades through the therapy transcripts; she stays at McCullers’s childhood home, where she lounges in her bathtub and eats delivery pizza; she relives McCullers’s days at her beloved Yaddo. As Shapland reckons with the expanding and collapsing distance between her and McCullers, she sees the way McCullers’s story has become a way to articulate something about herself.”
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The undocumented Americans
Summary:“Traveling across the country, journalist Karla Cornejo Villavicencio risked arrest at every turn to report the extraordinary stories of her fellow undocumented Americans. Her subjects have every reason to be wary around reporters, but Cornejo Villavicencio has unmatched access to their stories. Her work culminates in a stunning, essential read for our times. Born in Ecuador and brought to the United States when she was five years old, Cornejo Villavicencio has lived the American Dream. Raised on her father’s deliveryman income, she later became one of the first undocumented students admitted into Harvard. She is now a doctoral candidate at Yale University and has written for The New York Times. She weaves her own story among those of the eleven million undocumented who have been thrust into the national conversation today as never before.”
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How to make a slave and other essays
Summary:“Personal essays exploring identity, family, and community through the prism of race and black culture. Confronts the medical profession’s racial biases, shopping while black at Whole Foods, the legacy of Michael Jackson, raising black boys, haircuts that scare white people, racial profiling, and growing up in Southside Chicago.”
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Is rape a crime? : a memoir, an investigation, and a manifesto
Summary:“The crime of rape sizzles like a lightning strike. It pounces, flattens, destroys. A person stands whole, and in a moment of unexpected violence, that life, that body is gone. Award-winning writer and public health executive Michelle Bowdler’s memoir indicts how sexual violence has been addressed for decades in our society, asking whether rape is a crime given that it is the least reported major felony, least successfully prosecuted, and fewer than 3% of rapists ever spend a day in jail. Cases are closed before they are investigated and DNA evidence sits for years untested and disregarded Rape in this country is not treated as a crime of brutal violence but as a parlor game of he said / she said. It might be laughable if it didn’t work so much of the time. Given all this, it seems fair to ask whether rape is actually a crime.”
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If then : how the simulmatics corporation invented the future
Summary:“The Simulmatics Corporation, founded in 1959, mined data, targeted voters, accelerated news, manipulated consumers, destabilized politics, and disordered knowledge–decades before Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Cambridge Analytica. Silicon Valley likes to imagine it has no past but the scientists of Simulmatics are the long-dead grandfathers of Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk. Borrowing from psychological warfare, they used computers to predict and direct human behavior, deploying their “People Machine” from New York, Cambridge, and Saigon for clients that included John Kennedy’s presidential campaign, the New York Times, Young & Rubicam, and, during the Vietnam War, the Department of Defense. Jill Lepore, distinguished Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer, unearthed from the archives the almost unbelievable story of this long-vanished corporation, and of the women hidden behind it. In the 1950s and 1960s, Lepore argues, Simulmatics invented the future by building the machine in which the world now finds itself trapped and tormented, algorithm by algorithm”
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Picture Books for Hanukkah
Simon and the bear : a Hanukkah story
Summary:Stranded on an iceberg on his way to America, Simon remembers his mother’s parting words and lights the first candle on his menorah while praying for a miracle, which soon arrives in the form of a friendly polar bear.
Oskar and the eight blessings
Summary:A young Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany arrives in New York City on the seventh night of Hanukkah and receives small acts of kindness while exploring the city.
All-of-a-kind family Hanukkah
Summary:In 1912 New York, Gertie feels left out while Mama and her four older sisters cook Hanukkah dinner, but Papa comes home and asks her help with an important task.
Little Red Ruthie : a Hanukkah tale
Summary:Heading through the forest to her Bubbe Basha’s house to make latkes (potato pancakes) on the first night of Hanukkah, Little Red Ruthie encounters a hungry wolf. Includes a recipe for latkes.
Queen of the Hanukkah dosas
Summary:A boy is worried that his little sister’s climbing will spoil the first night of Hanukkah, when his family combines his father’s Jewish traditions with his mother’s East Indian cooking.
The Hanukkah magic of Nate Gadol
Summary:Introducing Nate Gadol, a new larger-than-life holiday hero who brings Hanukkah wonder and generosity to all those in need. He is a generous spirit whose magic can make things last exactly as long an they’re needed. When the Glaser family immigrates to the United States, their first Hanukkah looks like it will be a meager one. And their neighbors are struggling too, with money scarce and Christmas around the corner. Even Santa’s spirits are running low. Luckily, Nate Gadol has enough magic to make this a miraculous holiday for all.
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2020 National Book Award : Fiction
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Interior Chinatown : a novel
Summary:“From the infinitely inventive author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe comes a deeply personal novel about race, pop culture, assimilation, and escaping the roles we are forced to play.”
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Leave the world behind : a novel
Summary:“A magnetic novel about two families, strangers to each other, who are forced together on a long weekend gone terribly wrong.”
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A children’s bible : a novel
Summary:“An indelible and haunting new novel that explores the loss of childhood, intergenerational conflict, and humanity’s complacency in the face of its own demise. Lydia Millet’s multilayered new novel – her first since the National Book Award Longlist Sweet Lamb of Heaven — follows a group of children and their families on summer vacation at a lakeside mansion. The teenage narrator Eve and the other children are contemptuous of their parents, who spend the days and nights in drunken stupor. This tension heightens when a great storm arrives and throws the house and its residents into chaos.”
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The secret lives of church ladies
Summary:“The Secret Lives of Church Ladies explores the raw and tender places where black women and girls dare to follow their desires and pursue a momentary reprieve from being good. The nine stories in this collection feature four generations of characters grappling with who they want to be in the world, caught as they are between the church’s double standards and their own needs and passions.”
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Shuggie Bain : a novel
Summary:“Shuggie Bain is the unforgettable story of young Hugh “Shuggie” Bain, a sweet and lonely boy who spends his 1980s childhood in public housing in Glasgow, Scotland. Thatcher’s war on heavy industry has put husbands and sons out of work, and the city’s notorious drugs epidemic is waiting in the wings. Shuggie’s mother Agnes walks a wayward path: she is Shuggie’s guiding light but a burden for his artistic brother and practical sister. She dreams of a house with its own front door while she flicks through the pages of the Freemans catalogue, ordering a little happiness on credit, anything to brighten up her grey life.”
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The index of self-destructive acts
Summary:“The day Sam Waxworth arrives in New York to write for The Interviewer, a street-corner preacher declares that the world is coming to an end. A sports statistician, data journalist, and newly minted media celebrity who correctly forecasted every outcome of the 2008 election, Sam’s familiar with predicting the future. But when projection meets reality, things turn complicated.”
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The vanishing half
Summary:“The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it’s not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it’s everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Ten years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other secretly passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters’ storylines intersect? “
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If I had two wings : stories
Summary:“Ten heavenly stories that chronicle ineffable events in ordinary lives. When Randall Kenan’s first collection was published, The New York Times called it “nothing short of a wonder-book.” With comparable inventiveness but seasoned by maturity and shot through with humor, his second collection, If I Had Two Wings, riffs on the human relationship with the transcendent.”
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A burning
Summary:“After a fiery attack on a train leaves 104 people dead, the fates of three people become inextricably entangled. Jivan, a bright, striving woman from the slums looking for a way out of poverty, is wrongly accused of planning the attack because of a careless comment on Facebook. PT Sir, a slippery gym teacher from Jivan’s former high school, has hitched his aspirations to a rising right wing party, and his own ascent becomes increasingly linked to Jivan’s fall. Lovely, a spirited, impoverished, relentlessly optimistic hjira, who harbors dreams of becoming a Bollywood star, can provide the alibi that would set Jivan free–but her appearance in court will have unexpected consequences that will change the course of all of their lives.”
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The great offshore grounds : a novel
Summary:“On the day of their estranged father’s wedding, half-sisters Cheyenne and Livy set off to claim their inheritance. It’s been years since the two have seen each other. Cheyenne is newly back in Seattle, crashing with Livy after a failed marriage and a series of dead ends. Livy works refinishing boats, her resentment against her free-loading sister growing as she tamps down dreams of fishing off the coast of Alaska. But the promise of a shot at financial security brings the two together to claim what’s theirs. Except: instead of money, their father gives them information-a name-that both reveals a stunning secret and compels them to come to grips with it.”
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