Hi everyone, here are our five suggested reads of the week!
Weekly Suggested Reading Five postings are usually published on Wednesdays, unless Monday is a holiday and then they are published later in the week.
And the next Suggested Reading posting will be published on Wednesday, March 12, 2025.
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If This Book Exists, You’re in the Wrong Universe by Jason Pargin
This time, it starts with an alien bug eating a man’s brain. Then there’s a specter that manifests inside of John’s wall and gets sliced up. So begins an ouroboros of a tale involving cults, alternate time lines, the end of the world, and a possessed plastic toy. This fourth entry in Pargin’s John Dies at the End series is less frenetic than its predecessor, What the Hell Did I Just Read (2017, as David Wong). Within the snarky humor is an incisive commentary on social media and the state of our connected world, and a story about trauma and how people lash out when they’re hurt. It’s a story about love and how people can be better. It’s rewarding to witness how Pargin has grown as a writer. He’s less interested in the gimmick and more focused on his characters. His compassion runs deep. This isn’t just a funny tale of inept supernatural investigators; it’s a story of people struggling through pain to find a better path. Pargin offers us a welcome note of hope. – Booklist Review
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The Lodge by Kayla Olson
Celebrity journalist Alix Morgan just got the biggest break of her career–writing the memoir of Sebastian Green, a former member of True North, the hottest boy band in recent memory. It’s been eight years since True North’s lead singer, Jett Beckett, mysteriously disappeared in the middle of a tour, and Alix, who was one of the last journalists to interview Jett, hopes that Sebastian’s notes and voice memos can give her and the band’s fans some answers. When Sebastian offers Alix the chance to spend the month writing at a luxury ski resort in Vermont, she jumps at the chance to get out of the city and away from the tiny apartment that she shares with her sister. After she meets the guy in the room next to hers, handsome ski instructor Tyler, her month on the slopes gets even more interesting, and ultimately her work gets a lot more complicated. Even though the twists are predictable, the well-paced storytelling will draw readers into this entertaining winter romance. VERDICT Readers will love Olson’s (The Reunion) trademark blend of romance and pop culture and the unique spin on the traditional third-act conflict, which ultimately leads to a satisfying conclusion.–Library Journal Review
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Show Don’t Tell: Stories by Curtis Sittenfeld
Sittenfeld’s first story collection since You Think It, I’ll Say It (2019) is peopled by women and men in midlife, examining their pasts and the parts of themselves they’ve lost, jettisoned, or prioritized thus far. They have kids, regrets, and embarrassing little secrets; they were in marriages that ended or are in marriages that maybe should. The protagonist of “”Follow-up”” must ask “”What is this a story about?”” in her work as a corporate lawyer as she awaits a life-changing judgment in her own life. In the truly hilarious “”The Hug,”” a husband and wife spend days discussing, to the point that they are hardly speaking, whether it would be appropriate for her to embrace an ex-boyfriend who plans to visit on his way through town during a pandemic road trip. “”Given that there’s not much difference between hugging him and not hugging him, how about not doing it?”” the husband suggests. Sittenfeld can describe midlife romance as more like “”an essential recognition,”” and it does sound pretty romantic. Her perfectly contained stories are a joy for their realistically and mundanely fractured characters, moral ambiguities, movingly related moments, and the message that even the smallest tale offers lessons to uncover. – Booklist Review
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Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood
Shortlisted for the 2024 Booker Prize, a novel about forgiveness, grief, and what it means to be good, from the award-winning author of The Weekend.
Burnt out and in need of retreat, a middle-aged woman leaves Sydney to return to the place she grew up, taking refuge in a small religious community hidden away on the stark plains of rural Australia. She doesn’t believe in God, or know what prayer is, and finds herself living this strange, reclusive existence almost by accident.
But disquiet interrupts this secluded life with three visitations. First comes a terrible mouse plague, each day signaling a new battle against the rising infestation. Second is the return of the skeletal remains of a sister who disappeared decades before, presumed murdered. And finally, a troubling visitor plunges the narrator further back into her past.
Meditative, moving, and finely observed, Stone Yard Devotional is a seminal novel from a writer of rare power, exploring what it means to retreat from the world, the true nature of forgiveness, and the sustained effect of grief on the human soul.
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You Are Fatally Invited by Ande Pliego
Pliego’s tongue-in-cheek debut puts a postmodern spin on the classic locked-room mystery. Six thriller authors are invited to a retreat on a private island off the coast of Maine organized by the mysterious J.R. Alastor, a pseudonymous bestseller who has never been seen in public and whose real identity remains unknown. At dinner on the first evening, each guest is invited to play a game that exposes some wrongdoing they’ve buried in their past. The next morning, the writers discover that their elusive benefactor has cut off all communication between the island and the mainland. Then one of the writers turns up dead, his mutilated corpse displayed above a gravestone with his name on it. Mila del Angél, a once-aspiring author whom Alastor has recruited to host the retreat, is stunned—mostly because she’s planning a murder of her own, and she never accounted for a second killer in her midst. Pliego gleefully toys with genre tropes while delivering a slick, satisfying mystery all her own. Seasoned Agatha Christie fans may have quibbles about mechanics and motives once the dust settles, but those issues are too minor to detract from the fun. It’s a thoroughly enjoyable ride. – Publishers Weekly Review
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Happy reading!
Linda Reimer, SSCL
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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
The 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 content on 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 on demand 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 companion app, also called Hoopla is available for mobile devices, 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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Have questions about how to access Internet based content (i.e. eBooks, eAudios)? Feel free to drop by the Reference Desk or call the library and we will assist you! The library’s telephone number is: 607-936-3713.
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Tech & Book Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
Tech & Book Talk at SSCL 