Hi everyone, here is the weekly list of New York Times Bestsellers.
New York Times Bestsellers can be requested through StarCat (for print books) & The Digital Catalog/Libby for eBooks and Downloadable Audiobooks. Select titles may also be checked out, on demand, through the Hoopla Catalog.
For more information on the three catalogs skip to the section below the bestselling titles*
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New York Times Bestseller blog posts are published on Sundays. And the next New York Times blog post will be posted in two weeks on Sunday, December 24, 2023.
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FICTION
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ALEX CROSS MUST DIE by James Patterson
The 32nd book in the Alex Cross series. When a jet is gunned down, Cross goes back into action.
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ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE by Anthony Doerr
The lives of a blind French girl and a gadget-obsessed German boy before and during World War II.
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THE COVENANT OF WATER by Abraham Verghese
Three generations of a family living on South India’s Malabar Coast suffer the loss of a family member by drowning.
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DEMON COPPERHEAD by Barbara Kingsolver
Winner of a 2023 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. A reimagining of Charles Dickens’s “David Copperfield” set in the mountains of southern Appalachia.
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THE EDGE by David Baldacci
The second book in the 6:20 Man series. Travis Devine investigates the murder of the C.I.A. operative Jenny Silkwell in rural Maine.
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THE EXCHANGE by John Grisham
In a sequel to “The Firm,” Mitch McDeere, who is now a partner at the world’s largest law firm, gets caught up in a sinister plot.
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FOURTH WING by Rebecca Yarros
Violet Sorrengail is urged by the commanding general, who also is her mother, to become a candidate for the elite dragon riders.
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THE HEAVEN & EARTH GROCERY STORE by James McBride
Secrets held by the residents of a dilapidated neighborhood come to life when a skeleton is found at the bottom of a well.
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HOLLY by Stephen King
The private detective Holly Gibney investigates whether a married pair of octogenarian academics had anything to do with Bonnie Dahl’s disappearance.
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THE HOUSEMAID by Freida McFadden
Troubles surface when a woman looking to make a fresh start takes a job in the home of the Winchesters.
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ICEBREAKER by Hannah Grace
Anastasia might need the help of the captain of a college hockey team to get on the Olympic figure skating team.
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INHERITANCE by Nora Roberts
After the death of her mysterious uncle, a graphic designer receives an inheritance that stipulates she must live in a haunted Victorian house for at least three years.
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IRON FLAME by Rebecca Yarros
The second book in the Empyrean series. Violet Sorrengail’s next round of training might require her to betray the man she loves.
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LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus
A scientist and single mother living in California in the 1960s becomes a star on a TV cooking show.
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THE LITTLE LIAR by Mitch Albom
The actions of an 11-year-old boy help facilitate the delivery of Jewish residents, including his family, to Auschwitz.
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RESURRECTION WALK by Michael Connelly
The seventh book in the Lincoln Lawyer series. Haller and Bosch team up to prove the innocence of a woman in prison for killing her husband.
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SERPENT AND THE WINGS OF NIGHT by Carissa Broadbent
The first book in the “Crowns of Nyaxia” series. Oraya enters a tournament held by the goddess of death.
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TOM LAKE by Ann Patchett
Three daughters, who return to their family orchard in the spring of 2020, learn about their mother’s relationship with a famous actor.
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NON-FICTION
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BEHIND THE SEAMS by Dolly Parton with Holly George-Warren
The country music legend shares stories about her favorite outfits she has worn on and off the stage.
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BEING HENRY by Henry Winkler with James Kaplan
The Emmy Award-winning actor shares how playing roles such as the Fonz and his struggles with dyslexia affected his life.
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DEMOCRACY AWAKENING by Heather Cox Richardson
The historian and author of the newsletter “Letters From an American” shares her views on the current political moment.
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ELON MUSK by Walter Isaacson
The author of “The Code Breaker” traces Musk’s life and summarizes his work on electric vehicles, private space exploration and artificial intelligence.
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FRIENDS, LOVERS, AND THE BIG TERRIBLE THING by Matthew Perry
The late actor, known for playing Chandler Bing on “Friends,” shares stories from his childhood and his struggles with sobriety.
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GHOSTS OF HONOLULU by Mark Harmon and Leon Carroll Jr.
The story of a Japanese American naval intelligence agent, a Japanese spy and events in Hawaii before the start of World War II.
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KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON by David Grann
The story of a murder spree in 1920s Oklahoma that targeted Osage Indians, whose lands contained oil.
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KILLING THE WITCHES by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard
The 13th book in the conservative commentator’s Killing series gives a portrayal of the events of 1692 and 1693 in Salem Village, Mass.
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THE KINGDOM, THE POWER, AND THE GLORY by Tim Alberta
The author of “American Carnage” looks at divisions within the American evangelical movement.
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MY EFFIN’ LIFE by Geddy Lee with Daniel Richler
The musician known for his work with the band Rush chronicles his life as the child of Holocaust survivors and his time in the limelight.
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MY NAME IS BARBRA by Barbra Streisand
The EGOT winner chronicles her journey in show business and reveals details about some of her personal relationships.
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OATH AND HONOR by Liz Cheney
The former congresswoman from Wyoming recounts how she helped lead the Select Committee to Investigate the Jan. 6. Attack on the United States Capitol.
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OUTLIVE by Peter Attia with Bill Gifford
A look at recent scientific research on aging and longevity.
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PREQUEL by Rachel Maddow
The MSNBC host and co-author of “Bag Man” details a campaign to overthrow the U.S. government and install authoritarian rule prior to and during our involvement in World War II.
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THE WAGER by David Grann
The survivors of a shipwrecked British vessel on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain have different accounts of events.
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THE WOMAN IN ME by Britney Spears
The Grammy Award-winning pop star details her personal and professional experiences, including the years she spent under a conservatorship overseen by her father.
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Have a great week!
Linda Reimer, SSCL
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Search for and request books online!
eBooks & Audiobooks Through The Digital Catalog & Libby
Card holders of all Southern Tier Library System member libraries can access
StarCat to search for and request materials available at libraries throughout the Southern Tier Library System.
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Also of Note: If a New York Times Bestseller isn’t yet available in any of the three catalogs, you can contact the library and request to be notified when it becomes available.
Southeast Steuben County Library Telephone Number: 607-936-3713.
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Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
The catalog of e-books, downloadable audiobooks and a handful of streaming videos.
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The Libby App
Libby is the companion app to the Digital Catalog and may be found in the Apple & Google app.
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Hoopla
A catalog of instant check out items, including eBooks, downloadable audiobooks, comic books, TV shows and movies for patrons of the Southeast Steuben County Library.
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Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
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 Wednesday.
And the next Suggested Reading posting will be published on Wednesday, December 20, 2023.
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So many books, so little time!
And speaking of time, it is that time of the year again – the time when the best books of the year lists come out!
So I’ve compiled a list of great best-of-2023 reads, from a variety of sources, including NPR, The New York Times, LitHub, Time and more for your perusal.
The recommended reading schedule for the next month is as follows:
December 13: A selection of the best fiction books of 2023, part 1 (12 titles)
December 20: A selection of the best fiction books of 2023, part 2 (12 titles)
December 27: A selection of the best mysteries of 2023 (12 titles)
January 3: A selection of the best non-fiction books of 2023 (12 titles)
And, as a bonus, just in you case you need something extra to read over the one of the long holiday weekends this month, on December 22, I’ll post a list containing twelve of the best Science Fiction & Fantasy titles of 2023.
And if you wish to do a deep dive into the best of 2023 reading lists – I’ve included reference links at the end of this post.
And without further ado, here is our first dozen of, among best of 2023, fiction titles!
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Absolution by Alice McDermitt
A riveting account of women’s lives on the margins of the Vietnam War, from the renowned winner of the National Book Award.
You have no idea what it was like. For us. The women, I mean. The wives.
American women—American wives—have been mostly minor characters in the literature of the Vietnam War, but in Absolution they take center stage. Tricia is a shy newlywed, married to a rising attorney on loan to navy intelligence. Charlene is a practiced corporate spouse and mother of three, a beauty and a bully. In Saigon in 1963, the two women form a wary alliance as they balance the era’s mandate to be “helpmeets” to their ambitious husbands with their own inchoate impulse to “do good” for the people of Vietnam.
Sixty years later, Charlene’s daughter, spurred by an encounter with an aging Vietnam vet, reaches out to Tricia. Together, they look back at their time in Saigon, taking wry account of that pivotal year and of Charlene’s altruistic machinations, and discovering how their own lives as women on the periphery—of politics, of history, of war, of their husbands’ convictions—have been shaped and burdened by the same sort of unintended consequences that followed America’s tragic interference in Southeast Asia.
A virtuosic new novel from Alice McDermott, one of our most observant, most affecting writers, about folly and grace, obligation, sacrifice, and, finally, the quest for absolution in a broken world. – Publisher Description
(Recommended by: Good Housekeeping, LA Times, NPR, NYPL & Time Magazine)
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The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters
Peters’ debut combines narrative skill and a poignant story for a wonderful novel to which many readers will gravitate. In 1962, an Indigenous Mi’kmaq family is in Maine to pick summer blueberries when their youngest child, four-year-old Ruthie, disappears. Her six-year-old brother, Joe, saw her last. Told in alternating, first-person chapters from Joe and a narrator called Norma, the novel follows the painful reverberations of Ruthie’s disappearance across five decades. Peters wisely never makes the reader wonder if Norma is Ruthie; we know that she is, which allows more compelling questions to come into focus. How much do Joe’s subsequent life events and choices trace back to this first major trauma? Is his lifelong guilt justified? How does Norma/Ruthie reconcile love for the white mother who stole her from her birth mother and for the white aunt who saved her from a lonely childhood but knew the secret all along? The story is told in braided strands, and it is a testament to Peters’ ability that both strands fascinate. Indigenous stories like this matter, and while little is easy for Peters’ characters, in the end, for all of them–even for those who stole a small child–there is hope. – Starred Booklist Review
(Recommended by: B&N)
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The Bee Sting by Paul Murray
In a small town outside of Dublin, an economic downturn spells trouble for the once-affluent Barnes family at the heart of this latest from Murray, perhaps best known for the Booker Prize–shortlisted Skippy Dies. For Cass, finishing up high school, it’s the worry that her parents won’t be able to send her to university. For her little brother, PJ, it’s the illogical fear that they will send him away to boarding school. Shopaholic mother Imelda is forced to curtail her spending and sell off some of her treasures. For father Dickie, who has lived in the shadow of his dead brother, a beloved football star, it’s the disgrace of running his father’s car business into the ground. Will Grandfather return from his golfing life in Portugal to set things right and save the family from those who threaten them, including a gang of local thugs, a Polish blackmailer, an online predator, and a crackpot survivalist, or will it all implode? VERDICT This is a big, multilayered book full of secrets and surprises. But not a word is wasted in this unsettling, character-rich, devilishly plotted page-turner. – Starred Library Journal Review
(Recommended by: Booker Prize shortlist, LitHub, NYT & NYPL)
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Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton
A Best Book of the Year: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Time, Financial Times, Slate, The Chicago Public Library, Kirkus, The Telegraph
A Barack Obama Summer Reading Pick
“[A] savagely satirical thriller.” —People
The Booker Prize–winning author of The Luminaries brings us Birnam Wood, a gripping thriller of high drama and kaleidoscopic insight into what drives us to survive.
Birnam Wood is on the move . . .
A landslide has closed the Korowai Pass on New Zealand’s South Island, cutting off the town of Thorndike and leaving a sizable farm abandoned. The disaster presents an opportunity for Birnam Wood, an undeclared, unregulated, sometimes-criminal, sometimes-philanthropic guerrilla gardening collective that plants crops wherever no one will notice. For years, the group has struggled to break even. To occupy the farm at Thorndike would mean a shot at solvency at last.
But the enigmatic American billionaire Robert Lemoine also has an interest in the place: he has snatched it up to build his end-times bunker, or so he tells Birnam’s founder, Mira, when he catches her on the property. He’s intrigued by Mira, and by Birnam Wood; although they’re poles apart politically, it seems Lemoine and the group might have enemies in common. But can Birnam trust him? And, as their ideals and ideologies are tested, can they trust one another?
A gripping psychological thriller from the Booker Prize–winning author of The Luminaries, Eleanor Catton’s Birnam Wood is Shakespearean in its drama, Austenian in its wit, and, like both influences, fascinated by what makes us who we are. A brilliantly constructed study of intentions, actions, and consequences, it is a mesmerizing, unflinching consideration of the human impulse to ensure our own survival. – Publisher Description
(Recommended by: NPR & Time Magazine)
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Biography of X: A Novel by Catherine Lacey
Named one of the Best Books of 2023 by The New York Times, the New Yorker, Vulture, NPR, the Los Angeles Times, Esquire, Time, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, Lit Hub, and Amazon. National Bestseller. Winner of the 2023 Brooklyn Library Prize. A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice.
“A major novel, and a notably audacious one.” —Dwight Garner, The New York Times
From one of our fiercest stylists, a roaring epic chronicling the life, times, and secrets of a notorious artist.
When X—an iconoclastic artist, writer, and polarizing shape-shifter—falls dead in her office, her widow, CM, wild with grief and refusing everyone’s good advice, hurls herself into writing a biography of the woman she deified. Though X was recognized as a crucial creative force of her era, she kept a tight grip on her life story. Not even CM knows where X was born, and in her quest to find out, she opens a Pandora’s box of secrets, betrayals, and destruction. All the while, she immerses herself in the history of the Southern Territory, a fascist theocracy that split from the rest of the country after World War II, and which finally, in the present day, is being forced into an uneasy reunification.
A masterfully constructed literary adventure complete with original images assembled by X’s widow, Biography of X follows CM as she traces X’s peripatetic trajectory over decades, from Europe to the ruins of America’s divided territories, and through her collaborations and feuds with everyone from Bowie and Waits to Sontag and Acker. At last, when she finally understands the scope of X’s defining artistic project, CM realizes her wife’s deceptions were far crueler than she imagined.
Pulsing with suspense and intellect while blending nonfiction and fiction, Biography of X is a roaring epic that plumbs the depths of grief, art, and love. In her most ambitious novel yet, Catherine Lacey pushes her craft to its highest level, introducing us to an unforgettable character who, in her tantalizing mystery, shows us the fallibility of the stories we craft for ourselves.
(Recommended by: LA Times, LitHub, NPR, Publishers Weekly & Time Magazine)
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Blackouts by Justin Torres
Winner of the National Book Award for Fiction
A Best Book of the Year: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, The Washington Post, Time, BookPage, The New York Public Library, Powell’s
A Must-Read: The New York Times, Time, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, The Guardian, Boston Herald, Literary Hub, The Rumpus, The Bay Area Reporter, Datebook, Electric Literature, The Stacks, Them, Publishers Weekly
“Sweeping, ingenious . . . A kiss to build a dream on.” —Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air
From the bestselling author of We the Animals, Blackouts mines lost histories—personal and collective.
Out in the desert in a place called the Palace, a young man tends to a dying soul, someone he once knew briefly but who has haunted the edges of his life: Juan Gay. Playful raconteur, child lost and found and lost, guardian of the institutionalized, Juan has a project to pass along, one built around a true artifact of a book—Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns—and its devastating history. This book contains accounts collected in the early twentieth century from queer subjects by a queer researcher, Jan Gay, whose groundbreaking work was then co-opted by a committee, her name buried. The voices of these subjects have been filtered, muted, but it is possible to hear them from within and beyond the text, which, in Juan’s tattered volumes, has been redacted with black marker on nearly every page. As Juan waits for his end, he and the narrator recount for each other moments of joy and oblivion; they resurrect loves, lives, mothers, fathers, minor heroes. In telling their own stories and the story of the book, they resist the ravages of memory and time. The past is with us, beside us, ahead of us; what are we to create from its gaps and erasures?
A book about storytelling—its legacies, dangers, delights, and potential for change—and a bold exploration of form, art, and love, Justin Torres’s Blackouts uses fiction to see through the inventions of history and narrative. A marvel of creative imagination, it draws on testimony, photographs, illustrations, and a range of influences as it insists that we look long and steadily at what we have inherited and what we have made—a world full of ghostly shadows and flashing moments of truth. A reclamation of ransacked history, a celebration of defiance, and a transformative encounter, Blackouts mines the stories that have been kept from us and brings them into the light. – Publisher Description
(2023 Nation Book Award Fiction Winner)
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Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwane Adjei-Brenyah
Reader’s Note: This novel, as you might expect from the description of the plot, contains graphic violence – so just FYI, before you start to read!
A NEW YORK TIMES TOP TEN BOOK OF THE YEAR • FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION • A READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Two top women gladiators fight for their freedom within a depraved private prison system not so far-removed from America’s own in this explosive, hotly-anticipated debut novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Friday Black • LONGLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE
“Like Orwell’s 1984 and Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Adjei-Brenyah’s book presents a dystopian vision so…illuminating that it should permanently shift our understanding of who we are and what we’re capable of doing.” —The Washington Post
“This book will change you!…A masterpiece.” —Jenna Bush Hager, The Today Show’s #ReadWithJenna
She felt their eyes, all those executioners…
Loretta Thurwar and Hamara “Hurricane Staxxx” Stacker are the stars of the Chain-Gang All-Stars, the cornerstone of CAPE, or Criminal Action Penal Entertainment, a highly popular, highly controversial profit-raising program in America’s increasingly dominant private prison industry. It’s the return of the gladiators, and prisoners are competing for the ultimate prize: their freedom.
In CAPE, prisoners travel as Links in Chain-Gangs, competing in death matches before packed arenas with righteous protestors at the gates. Thurwar and Staxxx, both teammates and lovers, are the fan favorites. And if all goes well, Thurwar will be free in just a few matches, a fact she carries as heavily as her lethal hammer. As she prepares to leave her fellow Links, Thurwar considers how she might help preserve their humanity, in defiance of these so-called games. But CAPE’s corporate owners will stop at nothing to protect their status quo, and the obstacles they lay in Thurwar’s path have devastating consequences.
Moving from the Links in the field to the protestors, to the CAPE employees and beyond, Chain-Gang All-Stars is a kaleidoscopic, excoriating look at the American prison system’s unholy alliance of systemic racism, unchecked capitalism, and mass incarceration, and a clear-eyed reckoning with what freedom in this country really means from a “new and necessary American voice” (Tommy Orange, The New York Times Book Review). – Publisher Description
(Recommended by: B&N, Library Journal, National Book Award Finalist, NYPL & NYT)
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Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling author of Harlem Shuffle continues his Harlem saga in a powerful and hugely-entertaining novel that summons 1970s New York in all its seedy glory.
A Best Book of the Year: The New York Times, The Washington Post, TIME, NPR, BookPage
“Dazzling” –Walter Mosley, The New York Times Book Review.
It’s 1971. Trash piles up on the streets, crime is at an all-time high, the city is careening towards bankruptcy, and a shooting war has broken out between the NYPD and the Black Liberation Army. Amidst this collective nervous breakdown furniture store owner and ex-fence Ray Carney tries to keep his head down and his business thriving. His days moving stolen goods around the city are over. It’s strictly the straight-and-narrow for him — until he needs Jackson 5 tickets for his daughter May and he decides to hit up his old police contact Munson, fixer extraordinaire. But Munson has his own favors to ask of Carney and staying out of the game gets a lot more complicated – and deadly.
1973. The counter-culture has created a new generation, the old ways are being overthrown, but there is one constant, Pepper, Carney’s endearingly violent partner in crime. It’s getting harder to put together a reliable crew for hijackings, heists, and assorted felonies, so Pepper takes on a side gig doing security on a Blaxploitation shoot in Harlem. He finds himself in a freaky world of Hollywood stars, up-and-coming comedians, and celebrity drug dealers, in addition to the usual cast of hustlers, mobsters, and hit men. These adversaries underestimate the seasoned crook – to their regret.
1976. Harlem is burning, block by block, while the whole country is gearing up for Bicentennial celebrations. Carney is trying to come up with a July 4th ad he can live with. (“Two Hundred Years of Getting Away with It!”), while his wife Elizabeth is campaigning for her childhood friend, the former assistant D.A and rising politician Alexander Oakes. When a fire severely injures one of Carney’s tenants, he enlists Pepper to look into who may be behind it. Our crooked duo have to battle their way through a crumbling metropolis run by the shady, the violent, and the utterly corrupted.
CROOK MANIFESTO is a darkly funny tale of a city under siege, but also a sneakily searching portrait of the meaning of family. Colson Whitehead’s kaleidoscopic portrait of Harlem is sure to stand as one of the all-time great evocations of a place and a time.
(Recommended by: NPR & Time Magazine)
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The Cuban Heiress by Chanel Cleeton
An NPR Books We Love selection for 2023
“An unforgettable read that should be at the top of every TBR list.”—NPR
In 1934, a luxury cruise becomes a fight for survival as two women’s pasts collide on a round-trip voyage from New York to Havana in New York Times bestselling author Chanel Cleeton’s page-turning new novel inspired by the true story of the SS Morro Castle.
New York heiress Catherine Dohan seemingly has it all. There’s only one problem. It’s a lie. As soon as the Morro Castle leaves port, Catherine’s past returns with a vengeance and threatens her life. Joining forces with a charismatic jewel thief, Catherine must discover who wants her dead—and why.
Elena Palacio is a dead woman. Or so everyone thinks. After a devastating betrayal left her penniless and on the run, Elena’s journey on the Morro Castle is her last hope. Steeped in secrecy and a burning desire for revenge, her return to Havana is a chance to right the wrong that has been done to her—and her prey is on the ship.
As danger swirls aboard the Morro Castle and their fates intertwine, Elena and Catherine must risk everything to see justice served once and for all.
(Recommended by: NPR)
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Day by Michael Cunningham
The Pulitzer Prize-winning Cunningham follows a Brooklyn family over the span of three years. Cunningham focuses his first novel since The Snow Queen (2014) on two siblings–Isabel, a flinty photo editor, wife, and mother of two; and Robbie, her softhearted younger brother, who lives in the attic of her brownstone–and the rest of their somewhat loosely defined family, glimpsing them in snapshots of time over three years: “April 5, 2019: Morning,” “April 5, 2020: Afternoon,” and “April 5, 2021: Evening.” During the course of those days, which comprise the three sections of the book and are punctuated by the pandemic, Isabel’s marriage to aging musician Dan deteriorates; her two children, precocious elementary-schooler Violet and angsty preteen Nathan, struggle and grow; and Dan’s brother, bad-boy artist Garth, contends with his deepening feelings for his friend Chess and the child they share, Odin. But it is Robbie–the sweet emotional center of the family, whom everyone adores; who is trading an unfulfilling role as a schoolteacher for a life of exotic travel and, eventually, he hopes, medical school; and who has amassed a significant Instagram following under the guise of an alter-ego, Wolfe–whose life changes most dramatically. Writing with empathy, insight, keen observation, and elegant subtlety, Cunningham reveals something not only about the characters whose lives he limns in these pages, but also about the crises and traumas, awakenings and opportunities for growth the world writ large experienced during a particularly challenging era–and about the way people found a way to connect with one another and themselves as individuals in a time heightened by love and loss. This subtle, sensitively written family story proves poignant and quietly powerful. – Kirkus Review
(Recommended by: LitHub)
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Eastbound by Maylis de Kerangal
** SELECTED BY THE NEW YORK TIMES AS 1 OF THE 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR **
** INCLUDED ON THE NEW YORKER’S BEST BOOKS OF 2023 **
“At The New York Times Book Review, I think it’s fair to say we were dazzled by the way the author creates . . . a miniature masterpiece of narrative tension and compression” – Emily Eakin, “The Book Review” podcast
In this gripping tale, a Russian conscript and a French woman cross paths on the Trans-Siberian railroad, each fleeing to the east for their own reasons
Perfect for fans of Maggie Shipstead’s Great Circle and The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles
Eastbound is both an adventure story and a duet of two vibrant inner worlds.
In mysterious, winding sentences gorgeously translated by Jessica Moore, De Kerangal gives us the story of two unlikely souls entwined in a quest for freedom with a striking sense of tenderness, sharply contrasting the brutality of the surrounding world.
Racing toward Vladivostok, we meet the young Aliocha, packed onto a Trans-Siberian train with other Russian conscripts. Soon after boarding, he decides to desert and over a midnight smoke in a dark corridor of the train, he encounters an older French woman, Hélène, for whom he feels an uncanny trust.
A complicity quickly grows between the two when he manages to urgently ask—through a pantomime and basic Russian that Hélène must decipher—for her help to hide him. They hurry from the filth of his third-class carriage to Hélène’s first-class sleeping car. Aliocha now a hunted deserter and Hélène his accomplice with her own inner landscape of recent memories to contend with.
(Recommended by: NYT)
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The Faraway World: Stories by Patricia Engel
Engel follows up her New American Voices Award–winning novel Infinite Country with a strong collection of 10 short stories. The stories primarily focus on the Colombian diaspora in the United States and Cuba and are tied together by events of misfortune and trauma as well as pervasive feelings of isolation and melancholy. A twin on the cusp of adulthood is left behind after her sister goes missing and is forced to grapple with her uncertain future and her parents’ failing marriage as they desperately await their child’s return. A young woman begins unknowingly and then knowingly helping her boyfriend run drugs for money to begin their lives together. A grieving woman must find a new resting place for her brother after his grave is ransacked. Engel writes with empathy and care, deeply exploring the inner world of her characters, and despite using first-person perspective, she keeps the stories from being melodramatic by having them told in retrospect. The result is a peek into rich, fully realized characters and their lives.
VERDICT Engel’s character-focused short stories are thought-provoking and intense; readers of literary fiction will enjoy this masterfully written collection. – Library Journal Review
(Recommended by: Good Housekeeping & LitHub)
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Happy reading!
Linda Reimer, SSCL
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Reference Links (for December 2023 & January 5, 2024; Best of 2023 recommended reads posts!)
Patchett, A., Beard, M., Myrie, C., Levy, D., Kilroy, C., O’Connell, M., Frankopan, P., Nolan, M., Enright, A., Morrison, B., Paterson, D., Li, Y., Ford, R., Heisey, M., Branigan, T., Grant, C., Thrall, N., Adegoke, Y., & Penman, I. (2023, December 3). The best books to give as presents this Christmas. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/dec/03/the-best-books-to-give-as-presents-this-christmas
The Digital Catalog, is an online catalog containing eBooks, Downloadable Audiobooks, digital magazines and a handful of streaming videos. The catalog, which allows one to download content to a PC, also has a companion app, Libby, which you can download to your mobile device; so you can enjoy eBooks and Downloadable Audiobooks on the go!
All card holders of all Southern Tier Library System member libraries can check out items from the Digital Catalog.
The Hoopla Catalog features instant checkouts of eBooks, Downloadable Audiobooks, comic books, albums, movies and TV series. Patron check out limit is 6 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 devices, smart TVs & media streaming players.
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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Book summaries are from the respective publishers unless otherwise specified.
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Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
Hi everyone, here is the weekly list of New York Times Bestsellers.
New York Times Bestsellers can be requested through StarCat (for print books) & The Digital Catalog/Libby for eBooks and Downloadable Audiobooks. Select titles may also be checked out, on demand, through the Hoopla Catalog.
For more information on the three catalogs skip to the section below the bestselling titles*
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New York Times Bestseller blog posts are published on Sundays. And the next New York Times blog post will be posted in two weeks on Sunday, December 17, 2023.
–
FICTION
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ALEX CROSS MUST DIE by James Patterson
The 32nd book in the Alex Cross series. When a jet is gunned down, Cross goes back into action.
–
ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE by Anthony Doerr
The lives of a blind French girl and a gadget-obsessed German boy before and during World War II.
–
THE COVENANT OF WATER by Abraham Verghese
Three generations of a family living on South India’s Malabar Coast suffer the loss of a family member by drowning.
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DEMON COPPERHEAD by Barbara Kingsolver
Winner of a 2023 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. A reimagining of Charles Dickens’s “David Copperfield” set in the mountains of southern Appalachia.
–
DIRTY THIRTY by Janet Evanovich
The 30th book in the Stephanie Plum series. Plum tracks a local jeweler’s former security guard and has an overnight stakeout with relatives.
–
THE EDGE by David Baldacci
The second book in the 6:20 Man series. Travis Devine investigates the murder of the C.I.A. operative Jenny Silkwell in rural Maine.
–
THE EXCHANGE by John Grisham
In a sequel to “The Firm,” Mitch McDeere, who is now a partner at the world’s largest law firm, gets caught up in a sinister plot.
–
FOURTH WING by Rebecca Yarros
Violet Sorrengail is urged by the commanding general, who also is her mother, to become a candidate for the elite dragon riders.
–
THE HEAVEN & EARTH GROCERY STORE by James McBride
Secrets held by the residents of a dilapidated neighborhood come to life when a skeleton is found at the bottom of a well.
–
HOLLY by Stephen King
The private detective Holly Gibney investigates whether a married pair of octogenarian academics had anything to do with Bonnie Dahl’s disappearance.
–
THE HOUSEMAID by Freida McFadden
Troubles surface when a woman looking to make a fresh start takes a job in the home of the Winchesters.
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ICEBREAKER by Hannah Grace
Anastasia might need the help of the captain of a college hockey team to get on the Olympic figure skating team.
–
INHERITANCE by Nora Roberts
After the death of her mysterious uncle, a graphic designer receives an inheritance that stipulates she must live in a haunted Victorian house for at least three years.
–
IRON FLAME by Rebecca Yarros
The second book in the Empyrean series. Violet Sorrengail’s next round of training might require her to betray the man she loves.
–
LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus
A scientist and single mother living in California in the 1960s becomes a star on a TV cooking show.
–
THE LITTLE LIAR by Mitch Albom
The actions of an 11-year-old boy help facilitate the delivery of Jewish residents, including his family, to Auschwitz.
–
RESURRECTION WALK by Michael Connelly
The seventh book in the Lincoln Lawyer series. Haller and Bosch team up to prove the innocence of a woman in prison for killing her husband.
–
UNNATURAL DEATH by Patricia Cornwell
The 27th book in the Kay Scarpetta series. Scarpetta must discover the murderer of two campers who were wanted by federal law enforcement.
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NON-FICTION
–
BEHIND THE SEAMS by Dolly Parton with Holly George-Warren
The country music legend shares stories about her favorite outfits she has worn on and off the stage.
–
BEING HENRY by Henry Winkler with James Kaplan
The Emmy Award-winning actor shares how playing roles such as the Fonz and his struggles with dyslexia affected his life.
–
THE BODY KEEPS THE SCORE by Bessel van der Kolk
How trauma affects the body and mind, and innovative treatments for recovery.
–
DEMOCRACY AWAKENING by Heather Cox Richardson
The historian and author of the newsletter “Letters From an American” shares her views on the current political moment.
–
ELON MUSK by Walter Isaacson
The author of “The Code Breaker” traces Musk’s life and summarizes his work on electric vehicles, private space exploration and artificial intelligence.
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ENDGAME by Omid Scobie
The author of “Finding Freedom” gives an overview of the British monarchy after the death of Queen Elizabeth II.
–
FRIENDS, LOVERS, AND THE BIG TERRIBLE THING by Matthew Perry
The late actor, known for playing Chandler Bing on “Friends,” shares stories from his childhood and his struggles with sobriety.
–
GHOSTS OF HONOLULU by Mark Harmon and Leon Carroll Jr.
The story of a Japanese American naval intelligence agent, a Japanese spy and events in Hawaii before the start of World War II.
–
I’M GLAD MY MOM DIED by Jennette McCurdy
The actress and filmmaker describes her eating disorders and difficult relationship with her mother.
–
KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON by David Grann
The story of a murder spree in 1920s Oklahoma that targeted Osage Indians, whose lands contained oil.
–
KILLING THE WITCHES by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard
The 13th book in the conservative commentator’s Killing series gives a portrayal of the events of 1692 and 1693 in Salem Village, Mass.
–
MY EFFIN’ LIFE by Geddy Lee with Daniel Richler
The musician known for his work with the band Rush chronicles his life as the child of Holocaust survivors and his time in the limelight.
–
MY NAME IS BARBRA by Barbra Streisand
The EGOT winner chronicles her journey in show business and reveals details about some of her personal relationships.
–
OUTLIVE by Peter Attia with Bill Gifford
A look at recent scientific research on aging and longevity.
–
PREQUEL by Rachel Maddow
The MSNBC host and co-author of “Bag Man” details a campaign to overthrow the U.S. government and install authoritarian rule prior to and during our involvement in World War II.
–
THE WAGER by David Grann
The survivors of a shipwrecked British vessel on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain have different accounts of events.
–
THE WOMAN IN ME by Britney Spears
The Grammy Award-winning pop star details her personal and professional experiences, including the years she spent under a conservatorship overseen by her father.
–
Have a great week!
Linda Reimer, SSCL
–
Search for and request books online!
eBooks & Audiobooks Through The Digital Catalog & Libby
Card holders of all Southern Tier Library System member libraries can access
StarCat to search for and request materials available at libraries throughout the Southern Tier Library System.
–
Also of Note: If a New York Times Bestseller isn’t yet available in any of the three catalogs, you can contact the library and request to be notified when it becomes available.
Southeast Steuben County Library Telephone Number: 607-936-3713.
–
Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
The catalog of e-books, downloadable audiobooks and a handful of streaming videos.
–
The Libby App
Libby is the companion app to the Digital Catalog and may be found in the Apple & Google app.
–
Hoopla
A catalog of instant check out items, including eBooks, downloadable audiobooks, comic books, TV shows and movies for patrons of the Southeast Steuben County Library.
–
Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
Teens try to reclaim what’s theirs in the cutthroat world of Hollywood. Since before her father died in a botched bank robbery, 17-year-old aspiring filmmaker Millie Blomquist has dreamed of becoming a famous director of heist films. She finally gets the chance to pursue her dreams at the Manhattan Movie Academy, where she is working with friends Paz, Devin, and Jordan, when her idol, famed director and academy founder Ricky O’Naire, is arrested for embezzlement. The school collapses before her summer program is even over. Seven months later, Millie is back home in Fargo, North Dakota, trying to make movies on her own when she sees the trailer for recently exonerated O’Naire’s new project–only to realize it’s the film about her father she presented to him at the academy. Desperate to hold him responsible, Millie organizes Paz, Devin, and Jordan to carry out a real-life heist and take O’Naire’s materials ransom. But with the stakes ramping up, they don’t realize how dangerous things are about to become. Given her personal history with heists gone wrong, Millie’s naiveté is occasionally unbelievable, and readers not deeply familiar with heist films may have trouble with the endless movie references, but overall, this is a compelling read that doesn’t shy away from slightly darker content. Main characters are cued White; contextual clues may indicate that Paz is Latine and Jordan is Black. A fast-paced homage to the classic heist film. – Kirkus Review
In a youthful, spirited voice, Keylor Leigh narrates a sweeping novel that takes place on Nantucket Island in the summer of 1846. The story is told from the points of view of three characters: a lonely sea captain’s wife, a progressive librarian who is also an astronomer, and a pregnant Black business owner. Leigh gives all three women distinctive voices, and listeners come to understand their viewpoints, prejudices, and longings. All three are tested by the horrendous fire that destroys many homes and businesses. The island tragedy alters the lives and perspectives of the women. This work of historical fiction is fast paced, informative, richly detailed, and filled with memorable characters. Leigh keeps the story moving and listeners engaged. AudioFile Review
The small town of Crooked Tree is home to Dr. Robert Bookman, a well-known specialist in the field of nightmares, and his grandson, horror novelist Ben Bookman. It’s also where veteran detective Winchester Mills and rookie Samantha Blue investigate a murderer who sews his victims into corn husk cocoons, a crime that mirrors details in Ben’s new book. Now the detectives must find the link between Ben, his grandfather, and the evil plaguing Crooked Tree before another written death becomes real. The town of Crooked Tree is less Stephen King’s bucolic Castle Rock and more a darker version of Batman’s Gotham City, meaning the villains’ acts could easily strain one’s suspension of disbelief. The characters themselves read like archetypes, from the grizzled detective to the quirky, haunted writer. This might be a plus for those fans who love Dean Koontz thrillers, however, as the book’s pacing doesn’t give the reader time to poke at plot holes but lets them simply enjoy the dark ride.
VERDICT Markert’s (Midnight at the Tuscany Hotel, published under the name James Markert) first horror novel is both a literary thrill ride and a supernaturally satisfying guilty pleasure. – Library Journal Review
Alice Bush is excited to welcome her sister Ethel and brother-in-law Clarence Berry home from Yukon, Canada, to celebrate the couple’s prosperous claims in the Klondike Gold Rush, and even more excited to join the couple on the return trip north. Once there, she discovers how rough living conditions are for the newly arrived, as well as how much worse they are for the First Nations people pushed off their land and into domestic work. Over a century later, Anna and her grandfather, descendants of the Bush-Berrys, are trying to right old wrongs with one Native Canadian family in particular. By using the perspective of one main character in each time line to tell their generation’s story and the trauma they pass down and inherit, Djanikian creates strong emotional attachments and builds subtle tension for readers. By explaining the gold rush’s historical background and narrating everyday life for prospectors, she provides a solid framework for exploring issues of racism, settler colonialism, and exploitation of natural resources. This engaging book will appeal to fans of Leon Uris, James Michener, and Herman Wouk. – Booklist Review
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Silver Lady by Mary Jo Putney
(Available Formats: Print Book & Hoopla Instant Checkout eBook)
Putney launches an exciting new historical romance series set in 19th-century Cornwall. Bran had a rough start in life after being cast out as a young child by his birth father because of his gift of intuition; however, he found a wonderful new family when he was taken in by Lord and Lady Tremayne. Many years later, circumstances require that Bran face his birth parents, but he doesn’t expect to also encounter and rescue a compelling and beautiful lady in the woods. That lady, Merryn, struggles to overcome her mystical stupor and amnesia to escape her captors and is grateful for Bran’s assistance. Bran and Merryn are instantly drawn to each other and find that Merryn’s extraordinary gifts have put her in the middle of a plot by the French and some dangerous smugglers. They must work together using their gifts, which only makes their bond and passion stronger.
VERDICT Recommended for readers who like some fantasy in their historical romance and appreciate stories with chosen family and strong women. – Library Journal Review
Opening a tea shop brings surprises welcome and unwelcome for a recent divorcee. Elliott’s first page amounts almost to a parody of a shopkeeper cozy. Having shed her faithless husband, Brad, Shayleigh Myers gazes at the quaint Victorian houses lining the main street of picturesque Bray Harbor, California, “finding it hard to believe she was actually back in the small town she thought she had left behind forever.” But this series opener has a twist. Instead of a coffee shop, bakery, or candle outlet with a preciously punning name, the emporium Shay inherits from Bridget Early, a woman she barely knew, is Crystals & CuriosiTEAS, specializing in herbs, teas, and objects of the occult. In life, Bridget read tea leaves and was rumored to possess special healing powers that Shay’s beginning to believe she may share. So instead of selling the shop, as the pushy realtor presses her to do, she refurbishes the dusty old place with the help of Tassi, the niece of her old friend Joanne, who owns Cuppa-Jo, Main Street’s coffee shop. Since every cozy needs a murder, Shay’s renovations are soon halted by the discovery of a corpse on her roof. Her obligatory romantic interest is Liam Madigan, owner of the pub next door to CuriosiTEAS. If all this sounds pretty formulaic, the discovery of an amulet with mystical powers, a box of mysterious old photos, and the lingering presence of Spirit, a mongrel with uncanny intuition, take Shay along a road less traveled. A promising series debut.
YA novelist Cordani makes an impressive adult debut with this devious holiday whodunit. Twelve years ago, a group of university friends formed a murder mystery cosplaying group called the Masquerade Society. During their final game, the group’s ringleader, Karl, went missing, and another member’s expensive necklace vanished. In the present, each of the society’s former members—Charley, Leo, Sam, Gideon, Pan, and Shona—have been summoned by a mysterious invitation to a hunting lodge in the Scottish Highlands for a Christmas reunion game. What begins as lighthearted fun turns grave when Pan, who’d been assigned the role of “Lady Partridge,” is found dead and dangling from a pear tree. As the body count starts to rise, the group is forced to reopen questions about what happened to Karl all those years ago, and determine who among them poses a threat to the others. Cordani starts in the key of a holiday cozy but gets dark fast, a risky transition she pulls off without a hitch. Mystery lovers of all stripes will walk away satisfied. – Publishers Weekly Review
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Unladylike Lessons In Love by Amita Murray
(Available Formats: Print Book & Hoople Instant Checkout eBook)
As the out-of-wedlock daughter of an English earl and his Indian mistress, Lila Marleigh is well acquainted with life on the outskirts of society. However, she does enjoy some degree of social status as the eccentric hostess of a celebrated gambling salon. One ill-fated evening, she is confronted at her salon by both Ivor Tristram, who accuses her of being his father’s mistress, and Maisie, a friend she let down in the past, who is now a pregnant prostitute in desperate need of help. Against the odds, the three join forces, venturing from society soirees to seedy slums to solve a crime and clear an innocent man’s name. Murray (“Arya Winters” mystery series) makes her romance debut with this first series installment, a Regency romance that doubles as a moving mystery. Rich, realistic detail immerses readers in all manner of London locales, from regal to rat-infested. The narrative is both charming and charged with suspense, yielding a captivating and compelling reading experience.
VERDICT This book will appeal to readers seeking a multicultural historical romance heavy on adrenaline and intrigue. Recommended for fans of Sarah MacLean, Eva Leigh, and Julia Quinn. – Library Journal Review
A sizzling, standalone, feel-good opposites attract holiday romance from Tessa Bailey, #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Happened One Summer- now in a beautiful new package!
Two weeks before Christmas and all through Manhattan, shop windows are decorated in red and green satin. Stella’s standing alone outside a famous department store, when a charming man asks her opinion on the décor.
It’s a tragedy in tinsel, she says, unable to lie. Then he asks for a better idea, with a twinkle in his eye. She didn’t know he owned the place, when he put her on the spot, and now she’s working for that man, trying to ignore that he’s hot.
But as a down-on-her-luck girl with a difficult past, Stella knows how to make a good opportunity last. So she gives it her all, working without stopping. Trying to resist temptation, because she’s just window shopping.
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Yours For The Taking by Gabrielle Korn
(Available Formats: Print Book)
Korn makes her fiction debut (after the essay collection Everybody (Else) Is Perfect) with an alluring story of a feminist dystopia. It’s 2050, and unchecked climate change has caused civilization to crumble amid dangerous storms and disappearing coastal areas. The story unfolds through intersecting narratives of various women. Among them are Shelby, who is accompanying her billionaire boss Jacqueline Millender on a space shuttle orbiting Earth, and Ava, who gains acceptance to Jacqueline’s city-size Inside Project, a series of weather-resistant tunnels in New York City that allow people to move between buildings without exposure to the worsening climate. Korn also portrays life on Earth for the less fortunate, including Ava’s ex-girlfriend, Orchid, who is forced to fend for herself on the dying planet. As a member of Inside, Ava lets her life be designed and controlled by Jacqueline. There are no men allowed into the tunnels, as Jacqueline has determined that the planet can only be healed by eliminating the patriarchy. Before the end, though, Ava uncovers the dark side of Jacqueline’s vision for populating the next generation. Korn’s conceits are as provocative as her characters are well-rounded. Readers will eat up this distinctive work of climate fiction. – Publishers Weekly Review
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Happy reading!
Linda Reimer, SSCL
–
Have questions or want to request a book?
Feel free to call the library! Our telephone number is 607-936-3713.
–
Note: Book summaries are from the respective publishers unless otherwise specified.
The Digital Catalog, is an online catalog containing eBooks, Downloadable Audiobooks, digital magazines and a handful of streaming videos. The catalog, which allows one to download content to a PC, also has a companion app, Libby, which you can download to your mobile device; so you can enjoy eBooks and Downloadable Audiobooks on the go!
All card holders of all Southern Tier Library System member libraries can check out items from the Digital Catalog.
The Hoopla Catalog features instant checkouts of eBooks, Downloadable Audiobooks, comic books, albums, movies and TV series. Patron check out limit is 6 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 devices, smart TVs & media streaming players.
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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Format Note: Under each book title you’ll find a list of all the different formats that specific title is available in; including: Print Books, Large Print Books, CD Audiobooks, eBooks & Downloadable Audiobooks from the Digital Catalog (Libby app) and Hoopla eBooks & Hoopla Downloadable Audiobooks (Hoopla app).
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Book summaries are from the respective publishers unless otherwise specified.
–
Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
Hi everyone, here is the weekly list of New York Times Bestsellers.
New York Times Bestsellers can be requested through StarCat (for print books) & The Digital Catalog/Libby for eBooks and Downloadable Audiobooks. Select titles may also be checked out, on demand, through the Hoopla Catalog.
For more information on the three catalogs skip to the section below the bestselling titles*
–
New York Times Bestseller blog posts are published on Sundays. And the next New York Times blog post will be posted in two weeks on Sunday, December 10, 2023.
–
FICTION
–
ALEX CROSS MUST DIE by James Patterson
The 32nd book in the Alex Cross series. When a jet is gunned down, Cross goes back into action.
–
ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE by Anthony Doerr
The lives of a blind French girl and a gadget-obsessed German boy before and during World War II.
–
THE BALL AT VERSAILLES by Danielle Steel
Four young women are invited to an event, which may change their lives, at the Palace of Versailles in the summer of 1959.
–
DEMON COPPERHEAD by Barbara Kingsolver
Winner of a 2023 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. A reimagining of Charles Dickens’s “David Copperfield” set in the mountains of southern Appalachia.
–
DIRTY THIRTY by Janet Evanovich
The 30th book in the Stephanie Plum series. Plum tracks a local jeweler’s former security guard and has an overnight stakeout with relatives.
–
THE EDGE by David Baldacci
The second book in the 6:20 Man series. Travis Devine investigates the murder of the C.I.A. operative Jenny Silkwell in rural Maine.
–
THE EXCHANGE by John Grisham
In a sequel to “The Firm,” Mitch McDeere, who is now a partner at the world’s largest law firm, gets caught up in a sinister plot.
–
FOURTH WING by Rebecca Yarros
Violet Sorrengail is urged by the commanding general, who also is her mother, to become a candidate for the elite dragon riders.
–
THE HEAVEN & EARTH GROCERY STORE by James McBride
Secrets held by the residents of a dilapidated neighborhood come to life when a skeleton is found at the bottom of a well.
–
HOLLY by Stephen King
The private detective Holly Gibney investigates whether a married pair of octogenarian academics had anything to do with Bonnie Dahl’s disappearance.
–
ICEBREAKER by Hannah Grace
Anastasia might need the help of the captain of a college hockey team to get on the Olympic figure skating team.
–
INHERITANCE by Nora Roberts
After the death of her mysterious uncle, a graphic designer receives an inheritance that stipulates she must live in a haunted Victorian house for at least three years.
–
IRON FLAME by Rebecca Yarros
The second book in the Empyrean series. Violet Sorrengail’s next round of training might require her to betray the man she loves.
–
LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus
A scientist and single mother living in California in the 1960s becomes a star on a TV cooking show.
–
THE LITTLE LIAR by Mitch Albom
The actions of an 11-year-old boy help facilitate the delivery of Jewish residents, including his family, to Auschwitz.
–
RESURRECTION WALK by Michael Connelly
The seventh book in the Lincoln Lawyer series. Haller and Bosch team up to prove the innocence of a woman in prison for killing her husband.
–
THE SECRET by Lee Child and Andrew Child
The 28th book in the Jack Reacher series. It’s 1992 and Reacher looks into the cause of a string of mysterious deaths.
–
TWISTED LOVE by Ana Huang
The first book in the Twisted series. Secrets emerge when Ava explores things with her brother’s best friend.
–
NON-FICTION
–
BEHIND THE SEAMS by Dolly Parton with Holly George-Warren
The country music legend shares stories about her favorite outfits she has worn on and off the stage.
–
THE BODY KEEPS THE SCORE by Bessel van der Kolk
How trauma affects the body and mind, and innovative treatments for recovery.
–
ELON MUSK by Walter Isaacson
The author of “The Code Breaker” traces Musk’s life and summarizes his work on electric vehicles, private space exploration and artificial intelligence.
–
FRIENDS, LOVERS, AND THE BIG TERRIBLE THING by Matthew Perry
The late actor, known for playing Chandler Bing on “Friends,” shares stories from his childhood and his struggles with sobriety.
–
GHOSTS OF HONOLULU by Mark Harmon and Leon Carroll Jr.
The story of a Japanese American naval intelligence agent, a Japanese spy and events in Hawaii before the start of World War II.
–
I’M GLAD MY MOM DIED by Jennette McCurdy
The actress and filmmaker describes her eating disorders and difficult relationship with her mother.
–
KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON by David Grann
The story of a murder spree in 1920s Oklahoma that targeted Osage Indians, whose lands contained oil.
–
KILLING THE WITCHES by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard
The 13th book in the conservative commentator’s Killing series gives a portrayal of the events of 1692 and 1693 in Salem Village, Mass.
–
MY EFFIN’ LIFE by Geddy Lee with Daniel Richler
The musician known for his work with the band Rush chronicles his life as the child of Holocaust survivors and his time in the limelight.
–
MY NAME IS BARBRA by Barbra Streisand
The EGOT winner chronicles her journey in show business and reveals details about some of her personal relationships.
–
OUTLIVE by Peter Attia with Bill Gifford
A look at recent scientific research on aging and longevity.
–
PREQUEL by Rachel Maddow
The MSNBC host and co-author of “Bag Man” details a campaign to overthrow the U.S. government and install authoritarian rule prior to and during our involvement in World War II.
–
TEDDY AND BOOKER T.by Brian Kilmeade
The Fox News host gives an account of the relationship between President Theodore Roosevelt and Booker T. Washington.
–
THE WAGER by David Grann
The survivors of a shipwrecked British vessel on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain have different accounts of events.
–
THE WOMAN IN ME by Britney Spears
The Grammy Award-winning pop star details her personal and professional experiences, including the years she spent under a conservatorship overseen by her father.
–
Have a great week!
Linda Reimer, SSCL
–
Search for and request books online!
eBooks & Audiobooks Through The Digital Catalog & Libby
Card holders of all Southern Tier Library System member libraries can access
StarCat to search for and request materials available at libraries throughout the Southern Tier Library System.
–
Also of Note: If a New York Times Bestseller isn’t yet available in any of the three catalogs, you can contact the library and request to be notified when it becomes available.
Southeast Steuben County Library Telephone Number: 607-936-3713.
–
Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
This blog post includes all the new titles that have been ordered by the library this month; and are either already published, or will be published in the month ahead of us.
Some of these titles have arrived and can be requested through StarCat; other titles are not yet ready to circulate (and thus are not yet found in StarCat).
So, if you see a book you’d love to read, but don’t find it listed in StarCat, send me an email and let me know which title you’d like to read; and I will place it on hold for you, when it is ready to circulate.
And just a little note, the library ordered books, monthly, on a 10-month ordering schedule, from January through October, so there are only a few new titles coming to the library’s collection this month.
And here is list the list of New Books Coming Your Way for December 2023:
Heartstopper #5: A Graphic Novel by Alice Oseman (12.19.2023)
What Really Happens in Vegas: True Stories of the People Who Make Vegas, Vegas by James Patterson (12.4.2023)
Winter Turning: A Graphic Novel (Wings of Fire Graphic Novel #7) by Tui T. Sutherland (12.26.2023)
Yours for the Taking by Gabrielle Korn (12.5.2023)
New Books is a monthly post; coming on the first Saturday of the month.
–
Happy reading!
Linda Reimer, SSC Library
–
Accessing The Catalogs:
And the direct link to our catalog of physical materials, AKA StarCat, is: https://starcat.stls.org/
The direct link to the online version of the Digital Catalog (companion app Libby, found in your app store) is: https://stls.overdrive.com/
And the Hoopla catalog (which is like Netflix in that all content* is available on-demand & which also has a complementary app, simply called Hoopla) can be accessed online at: https://www.hoopladigital.com/
*Hoopla content includes Audiobooks, eBooks, comic books, TV shows & Movies (A Smart TV app is available),
The catalog of e-books, downloadable audiobooks and a handful of streaming videos.
–
The Libby App
Libby is the companion app to the Digital Catalog and may be found in the Apple & Google app.
–
Hoopla
A catalog of instant check out items, including eBooks, downloadable audiobooks, comic books, TV shows and movies for patrons of the Southeast Steuben County Library.
–
Tech Talk is a Southeast Steuben County Library blog.
Tech & Book Talk at SSCL 