Hi everyone, here are our recommended reads for the week!
*More information on the three catalogs and available formats is found at the end of the list of recommended reads*
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Weekly Suggested Reading postings are published on Wednesdays.
And the next Suggested Reading posting will be published on Wednesday, February 21, 2024.
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At First Spite by Olivia Dade
Athena Greydon’s fiancé, Johnny Vine, has broken off their engagement days before the wedding, leaving Athena nowhere to live–nowhere except the house that she bought him as a wedding gift, using almost all of her savings. There, only an alleyway separates her from Johnny’s brother, Matthew, the man who told Johnny to ditch her. While Athena has no choice about where she lives, she can make Matthew pay, whether that means putting creepy dolls in the windows or playing monster erotica at top volume. Matthew knows he made the right decision when he convinced Johnny to leave Athena, but he also understands that he’s messed up her life, so he’ll do everything he can to make things easier for her–while secretly wishing he could have her for himself. This swoony contemporary romance is well-written and paced, but what really makes it shine are the intricate characters that Dade (Ship Wrecked) has brought to life. Readers will connect emotionally with Athena and Matthew, laughing at their witty banter and tearing up when they’re vulnerable.
VERDICT Buy multiple copies of this title, because it won’t stay on the shelf. – Starred Library Journal Review
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Crosshairs by James Patterson & James O. Born
A killer uses fearsome precision to take out impossible targets.
Detective Michael Bennett teams with a shooting expert—a former Army Ranger and sniper with NYPD’s Emergency Services Unit. But Officer Rob Trilling seems more comfortable with rifles than he is with people.
When his new partner begins to log unexplained absences from duty, only Bennett can prove whether the decorated officer is a lonely hunter or a hardened assassin.
Reader’s Note: Crosshairs is the sixteenth book in the Michael Bennett series. If you’d like to start reading the series from the beginning check out book one: Step On A Crack.
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Dead Man’s Hand by Brad Taylor
In the new, ripped-from-the-headlines Pike Logan thriller, the American intelligence operative is sent to Sweden, where a Russian assassin is apparently planning to carry out a deadly plan to keep Sweden from joining NATO as part of a larger scheme hatched by Vladimir Putin to finally win the war with Ukraine. If, that is, a splinter group of Ukrainian nationalists doesn’t assassinate him first. Taylor’s latest Logan novel, the eighteenth in the series, couldn’t be more timely, what with Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine keeping it in rotation as a top news story. The author, a former Special Forces operative who has made a remarkably smooth transition to novelist, has always kept the Logan novels grounded in actual geopolitical events, which is one of the things that makes them so readable and resonant. The politics are familiar and the characters seem very much like real people navigating a real world. Fans of the series will be lining up for this one. – Booklist Review
Reader’s Note: Dead Man’s Hand is the eighteenth book in the Pike Logan series. If you’d like to start reading the series from the beginning, check out book one: One Rough Man.
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Dear Mom And Dad: A Letter About Family, Memory, and the America We Once Knew by Patti Davis
Davis, the 71-year-old daughter of Ronald and Nancy Reagan, pens a healing letter to her late parents. She attempts to look differently at the dysfunctional life they lived together. Her reflections show she believed that her mother was always displeased with her, and later, that her parents were an “island of two,” who would have been fine together without her or her younger brother, Ron. But early home movies and walks in her childhood California neighborhood stir up loving memories. She acknowledges that her father’s inattentiveness could have been modeled on his father. She also understands that her mother felt abandoned by her own mother. Davis also shares her discoveries and reflections of her father’s loss of his infant daughter with his previous wife, actress Jane Wyman; the 1981 attempted assassination; her thoughts on of some of his political views and his mishandling of the AIDS crisis; his Alzheimer’s disease; and her regret about writing an earlier tell-all memoir.
VERDICT This book about Davis’s relationship with her parents, Ronald and Nancy Reagan, unpacks a lot. Her eloquent writing and reassessment of her family bonds will keep readers intrigued. – Library Journal Review
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Flowers Over The Inferno by Ilaria Tuti
Set in Northern Italy, Tuti’s exhilarating debut and series launch introduces Supt. Teresa Battaglia, a tough, solitary woman in her 60s who has earned her place as the head of an all-male homicide team and is keeping her battle with declining health secret from her colleagues. When a middle-aged man’s naked body with its eyes gouged out is found in the densely wooded Dolomite Mountains near the Austrian border, Teresa takes charge of the investigation. An effigy made out of the victim’s bloodied clothing close to the body prompts Teresa to observe, “The effigy is a representation of the killer. He stood here contemplating his work, and wanted us to know…” Other victims follow who are left alive but mutilated. The kidnapping of a baby raises the stakes. Interspersed with the present-day action are horrific chapters set in an Austrian orphanage in 1978 that shed light on the killer’s psychology. Teresa, who must deal with casual and constant sexism in her position of authority, is an unforgettable character readers will want to see a lot more of. – Starred Publishers Weekly Review
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The Last Days Of The Midnight Ramblers by Sarah Tomlinson
Mari, a struggling writer, believes she’s been handed the opportunity of a lifetime when she is hired to ghostwrite the memoir of former model Anke Berben, who is best known for her relationships with three different members of the world-famous rock band the Midnight Ramblers. Speculation still swirls around the band and Anke decades after the death of their lead singer, Mal, to whom Anke was married at the time he died. Mari delves into Anke’s story, determined to uncover the real cause of Mal’s death, but will getting to know the band members and the charming but mercurial Anke influence her objectivity? In her fiction debut, Tomlinson, the ghostwriter of many celebrity memoirs herself, ably demonstrates the fragile balance Mari must strike to earn her subjects’ trust while still uncovering the story readers want to hear. Comparisons to Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Daisy Jones & the Six (2019) are inevitable, but this novel is less a juicy, behind-the-scenes tell-all about a fictional band and instead an exploration of the many ways celebrities can wield their wealth and power, especially against each other. – Booklist
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Maybe Next Time by Cesca Major
Major (The Silent Hours) draws on Groundhog Day for a poignant tale of love, regret, and second chances involving a London couple. High-powered literary agent Emma, married with two children to hopeless romantic Dan, has forgotten to write him a letter on Monday, December 3—the day the two met on a London tube. Dan has come to expect these letters each year, and after a tiff, he goes out to walk the dog—and gets hit by a car and dies. Or does he? Emma wakes up the next morning and suddenly it’s Monday, December 3, all over again, and she has a second chance to show Dan how much she loves him. For months, Emma and Dan are caught in a time loop of endless Mondays, and despite Emma’s most fervent efforts—ignoring the constant pings from WhatsApp is a significant sacrifice—Dan dies every time, whether by car, heart attack, or other circumstance. Things culminate in a surprising coincidence, and Major caps it all off with an ambiguous ending. Well-drawn supporting characters add depth, in particular Emma’s sister-in-law, Hattie, with whom the couple is especially close, and whom Emma forces herself to make more time for as well. Women’s fiction fans will love this tearjerker. – Publishers Weekly
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The Phoenix Crown by Kate Quinn & Janie Chang
Quinn (The Diamond Eye) and Chang (The Porcelain Moon) team up for a stirring story involving opera, prized antiquities, and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Gemma Garland, a soprano in New York’s Metropolitan Opera, is hoping to revive her lagging career. Shortly after her arrival with the Met’s traveling company in San Francisco, where she’s slated to perform with Enrico Caruso, Gemma meets and falls for charming railroad magnate Henry Thornton. Soon, she’s singing at his house for members of high society. Her affection for Henry curdles, however, after she learns about his dark side from Chinese embroiderer Suling Feng, whom Henry has hired to mend a damaged robe from a Beijing palace. Among his other collectibles is an ornate crown, also taken from the palace. It turns out Suling’s lover Reggie has disappeared, and she tells Gemma that Henry is to blame. The women confront him just as the earthquake hits, after which Henry and the crown disappear. The authors ably develop the two main characters as they discover a shared sense of independence and join in common cause while reckoning with the mixed blessings of a powerful man’s patronage. Readers of historicals with strong female leads will savor this. – Publishers Weekly Review
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The Rehearsals by Annette Christie
Megan and Tom have been together since their freshman year of college, and when their wedding weekend finally arrives, it’s a perfect day–until two relationship-destroying secrets are revealed at their rehearsal dinner. Years ago, Megan had a one-night stand with Tom’s best friend, Leo. Tom, whose life is ruled by his cold, WASPy parents, hasn’t told Megan that he’s accepted a job in Missouri. The night ends with the formerly happy couple calling off their wedding, only to wake up the next morning to find that they’re stuck in a time loop, forced to relive the worst day of their lives until they finally get it right. Each day, the choices Megan and Tom make vary, from Megan running off with Leo to Tom finally saying “no” to his parents. Debut author Christie keeps the tone light, inserting repeating scenarios into each day, and turning the nightmare time loop into a journey of self-discovery. There’s a feeling of resolution at the end, which isn’t what the characters expected, but it’s what they needed. Fans of Christina Lauren and Meg Cabot will savor this charming relationship comedy. – Booklist Review
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The Witches of Moonshyne Manor by Bianca Marais
The Sisterhood has lived at Moonshyne Manor and Distillery for over 80 years. Ivy is the keeper of plants and preparer of elixirs (with witchy recipes included). Tabitha is the animal whisperer. Ursula reads the future. Jezebel casts seduction spells. Queenie is magical with inventions. Ruby has shape-shifting and transitioning powers. Although the magic of these irreverent octogenarians is fraying around the edges, they still love their uniqueness. But all is not well, and Ruby has been gone for 33 years, leaving her sisters on the night of a disaster. The others have longed for her return, but they also need her to lead them to the treasure stolen right before she went away. That is the only thing that will prevent foreclosure of the manor. When Ruby arrives their reunion is anything but magical, and they must confess old secrets if they want to save the Sisterhood.
VERDICT Marais’s (If You Want to Make God Laugh) latest is a quirky Golden Girls with wands that explores women’s empowerment, friendship, and loyalty and addresses racial equality, identity, and gender fluidity. A timely, fun modern-day fable about women who refuse to conform. – Starred Library Journal Review
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Happy reading!
Linda Reimer, SSCL
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Have questions or want to request a book?
Feel free to call the library! Our telephone number is 607-936-3713.
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Note: Book summaries are from the respective publishers unless otherwise specified.
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Information on the three library catalogs
Digital Catalog: https://stls.overdrive.com/
The Digital Catalog, is an online catalog containing eBooks, eAudiobooks, and digital magazines. You can use your library card and checkout/download content to a PC; you can also use the companion app, Libby, to access titles on your mobile devices; so you can enjoy eBooks and eAudiobooks on the go!
All card holders of all Southern Tier Library System member libraries can check out items from the Digital Catalog.
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Hoopla Catalog: https://www.hoopladigital.com/
The Hoopla Catalog features instant checkouts of eBooks, eAudiobooks, comic books, albums, movies and TV shows. Patron check out limit is 10 items per month.
Hoopla is a Southeast Steuben County Library service available to all Southeast Steuben County Library card holders.
The Hoopla App is available for Android or Apple mobile devices, PCs, Macs*, smart TVs & media streaming players.
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StarCat: The catalog of physical/traditional library materials: https://starcat.stls.org
Card holders of all Southern Tier Library System member libraries can access StarCat to search for and request materials available at libraries through out the Southern Tier Library System.
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*You must have an active Internet connection to access Hoopla content on a Mac.
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