Shelley Noble

Paperback (1 to 2 lbs)

California

A Novel

A Manhattan photographer finds inspiration and new possibilities in a Gothic Rhode Island beach house in this uplifting fall-set read from New York Times bestselling author Shelley Noble. Dani Campbell is the latest darling of the Manhattan art scene. As a self-taught photographer, Dani is loving every minute of her sudden popularity, but has no idea how she got there, or a clue as to how to stay. On a shoot at an antiques barn, she discovers an envelope of old photos and sees in them what her photos are missing. Her search for their source leads Dani to a small Rhode Island town, a dilapidated American Gothic beach house--and Lawrence Sinclair. Reclusive and bitter, the last thing eighty-year-old Lawrence wants to think about is photography--the thing that inadvertently led to his son's death and tore his family apart. But Dani is determined and persuasive, and Lawrence can't help but be intrigued by the girl with spiky hair who wants to learn from him, when almost everyone else just wants to relieve him of his substantial fortune. Dani and Lawrence's mentorship blossoms unexpectedly, but everything is put in jeopardy by the appearance of Lawrence's estranged grandson, Peter. Peter is determined to spend some time reconnecting with his grandfather and to get rid of the supposed fortune hunter after Lawrence's money. But Dani is not what he was expecting, and he soon discovers that they have more things in common than not. Brought together by fortune, fate, and the ties that bind, all three embark on journeys of discovery and love.

Picture Perfect Autumn

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Brené Brown

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead

The #1 New York Times bestseller. More than 2 million copies sold! Look for Brené Brown’s new podcast, Dare to Lead, as well as her ongoing podcast Unlocking Us! From thought leader Brené Brown, a transformative new vision for the way we lead, love, work, parent, and educate that teaches us the power of vulnerability. “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; . . . who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.”—Theodore Roosevelt Every day we experience the uncertainty, risks, and emotional exposure that define what it means to be vulnerable or to dare greatly. Based on twelve years of pioneering research, Brené Brown PhD, MSW, dispels the cultural myth that vulnerability is weakness and argues that it is, in truth, our most accurate measure of courage. Brown explains how vulnerability is both the core of difficult emotions like fear, grief, and disappointment, and the birthplace of love, belonging, joy, empathy, innovation, and creativity. She writes: “When we shut ourselves off from vulnerability, we distance ourselves from the experiences that bring purpose and meaning to our lives.” Daring Greatly is not about winning or losing. It’s about courage. In a world where “never enough” dominates and feeling afraid has become second nature, vulnerability is subversive. Uncomfortable. It’s even a little dangerous at times. And, without question, putting ourselves out there means there’s a far greater risk of getting criticized or feeling hurt. But when we step back and examine our lives, we will find that nothing is as uncomfortable, dangerous, and hurtful as standing on the outside of our lives looking in and wondering what it would be like if we had the courage to step into the arena—whether it’s a new relationship, an important meeting, the creative process, or a difficult family conversation. Daring Greatly is a practice and a powerful new vision for letting ourselves be seen.

Daring Greatly

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Anne Eekhout

A novel of innocence, young love, and gothic mystery that is a sapphic reimagining of Mary Shelley's life, and a wonderfully imaginative exploration of the roots of her literary masterpiece, Frankenstein. Europe, 1816. A volcanic eruption in Indonesia envelopes the continent in ash and clouds. Amid the gloom of this "year without summer," eighteen-year-old Mary Shelley, her lover Percy Bysshe Shelley, their baby boy William, and her stepsister Claire visit Lord Byron and his companion John Polidori at Lake Geneva. The friends spend rainy wine-soaked evenings around the fireplace, exchanging ghost stories. One night, Byron issues a challenge to determine which of them can write the best horror story of their own. Musing over her tale, Mary is reminded of another summer, when she was fourteen. A guest of the Baxter family, Mary arrives in Dundee, Scotland, and quickly falls into a warm friendship with young Isabella Baxter. The girls spend hours together wandering through fields and forests, conjuring stories about mythical Scottish creatures, ghosts, and monsters which roam the lowlands. One day, while deep in the woods, they come upon a real monster, an encounter that leaves them questioning whether the fabulous creatures of their stories are more than just figments of the imagination. As their bond deepens from their secret experience, Mary and Isabella's feelings for each other intensify. But the girls do not know that someone has been watching them--the charismatic and vaguely sinister Mr. Booth, Isabella's older brother-in-law, another kind of monster who wears the face of a man. That memory inspires Mary's tale--a story that will become one of the most original, thrilling, and influential works of literature ever written. In this beautiful blend of fact and fiction, wonderfully atmospheric and pulsing with emotion, Anne Eekhout brings the legendary writer to life with verve and great imagination. Translated from the Dutch by Laura Watkinson

Mary and the Birth of Frankenstein

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Thao Thai

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

A sweeping, evocative debut novel following three generations of Vietnamese American women reeling from the death of their matriarch, revealing the family's inherited burdens, buried secrets, and unlikely love stories. When Ann Tran gets the call that her fiercely beloved grandmother, Minh, has passed away, her life is already at a crossroads. In the years since she's last seen Minh, Ann has built a seemingly perfect life--a beautiful lake house, a charming professor boyfriend, and invites to elegant parties that bubble over with champagne and good taste--but it all crumbles with one positive pregnancy test. With both her relationship and carefully planned future now in question, Ann returns home to Florida to face her estranged mother, Huơng. Back in Florida, Huơng is simultaneously mourning her mother and resenting her for having the relationship with Ann that she never did. Then Ann and Huơng learn that Minh has left them both the Banyan House, the crumbling old manor that was Ann's childhood home, in all its strange, Gothic glory. Under the same roof for the first time in years, mother and daughter must face the simmering questions of their past and their uncertain futures, while trying to rebuild their relationship without the one person who's always held them together. Running parallel to this is Minh's story, as she goes from a lovestruck teenager living in the shadow of the Vietnam War to a determined young mother immigrating to America in search of a better life for her children. And when Ann makes a shocking discovery in the Banyan House's attic, long-buried secrets come to light as it becomes clear how decisions Minh made in her youth affected the rest of her life--and beyond. Spanning decades and continents, from 1960s Vietnam to the wild swamplands of the Florida coast, Banyan Moon is a stunning and deeply moving story of mothers and daughters, the things we inherit, and the lives we choose to make out of that inheritance.

Banyan Moon

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James Wade

Award-winning author James Wade blends atmospheric prose with soul-stirring themes in Hollow Out the Dark, a gothic adventure set against a Depression-era landscape where a whiskey war threatens to decimate a small Texas town. Veteran of the Great War, Jesse Cole is grateful for the quiet life he now leads. But when his closest friend runs afoul of local criminals, Frog and Squirrel Fenley, Jesse is forced to spin his moral compass and enter a violent and volatile underworld. There he encounters corrupt lawmen, hired assassins, and a dark family secret that will upend all he once knew. Complicating matters are Texas Ranger Amon Atkins--who arrives to investigate the Fenleys just as their empire is threatened by a deadly new competition--and the green-eyed, raven-haired Adaline, a love Jesse thought he'd lost forever. With resources scarce and winter falling hard on the town, a desperate Jesse must choose between the law and the lawless and find a way to survive while still protecting the people he loves. A heart-pounding tale full of plot-twisting revelations, Hollow Out the Dark brings readers into a whiskey-fueled world where everyone has a secret, and love everlasting balances on the edge of a knife.

Hollow Out the Dark

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Willy Vlautin

A FINALIST FOR THE PEN/FAULKNER AWARD

From Willy Vlautin,  award-winning author of Lean on Pete and The Motel Life, comes a powerful exploration of identity and loneliness pulled from deep within America's soul.

Don't Skip Out On Me is going to make your heart crumple into a little wad of paper and then open it back up into a perfect paper airplane sailing the skies from the hand of a boy. How does a bi-cultural man find a self when he's been abandoned by his parents? He invents it, that's how, with his hands, his fists, and that fist-shaped muscle, a heart. No one anywhere writes as beautifully about people whose stories stay close to the dirt. Willy Vlautin is a secular--and thus real and profoundly useful--saint."

--Lidia Yuknavitch, author of The Book of Joan

 

Horace Hopper has spent most of his life on a Nevada sheep ranch, but dreams of something bigger. Mr. and Mrs. Reese, the aging ranchers, took him in and treated him like a son, intending to leave the ranch in his hands. But Horace, ashamed not only of his half-Paiute, half-Irish heritage, but also of the fact his parents did not want him, feels as if he doesn't belong on the ranch, or anywhere. Knowing he needs to make a name for himself, he decides to leave the only loving home he's known to prove his worth as a championship boxer.

Mr. Reese is holding on to a way of life that is no longer sustainable. He's a seventy-two-year-old rancher with a bad back. He's not sure how he'll keep things going without Horace but he knows the boy must find his own way.

To become a champion Horace must change not just the way he eats, trains, and thinks, but who he is. Reinventing himself as Hector Hildago, a scrappy Mexican boxer, he heads to Tucson and begins training and entering fights. His journey brings him to boxing rings across the Southwest and Mexico and finally, to the streets of Las Vegas, where Horace learns he can't change who he is or outrun his destiny.

A beautiful, wrenching portrait of a downtrodden man, Don't Skip Out on Me narrates the struggle to find one's place in a vast and lonely world with profound tenderness, and will make you consider those around you--and yourself--differently.

Don't Skip Out on Me

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Candice Carty-Williams

Bridget Jones’s Diary meets Americanah in this disarmingly honest, boldly political, and truly inclusive novel that will speak to anyone who has gone looking for love and found something very different in its place. Queenie Jenkins is a 25-year-old Jamaican British woman living in London, straddling two cultures and slotting neatly into neither. She works at a national newspaper, where she’s constantly forced to compare herself to her white middle class peers. After a messy break up from her long-term white boyfriend, Queenie seeks comfort in all the wrong places…including several hazardous men who do a good job of occupying brain space and a bad job of affirming self-worth. As Queenie careens from one questionable decision to another, she finds herself wondering, “What are you doing? Why are you doing it? Who do you want to be?”—all of the questions today’s woman must face in a world trying to answer them for her. With “fresh and honest” (Jojo Moyes) prose, Queenie is a remarkably relatable exploration of what it means to be a modern woman searching for meaning in today’s world.

Queenie

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Alex North

Heavy Hardcover (2 to 4 lbs)

**THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER** "WORKS BEAUTIFULLY... If you like being terrified, The Whisper Man has your name on it." —The New York Times, Editor's Pick "SUPERB" —Publisher's Weekly, Starred Review "BRILLIANT... will satisfy readers of Thomas Harris and Stephen King." —Booklist, Starred Review "POIGNANT AND TERRIFYING" —Entertainment Weekly In this dark, suspenseful thriller, Alex North weaves a multi-generational tale of a father and son caught in the crosshairs of an investigation to catch a serial killer preying on a small town. After the sudden death of his wife, Tom Kennedy believes a fresh start will help him and his young son Jake heal. A new beginning, a new house, a new town. Featherbank. But the town has a dark past. Twenty years ago, a serial killer abducted and murdered five residents. Until Frank Carter was finally caught, he was nicknamed "The Whisper Man," for he would lure his victims out by whispering at their windows at night. Just as Tom and Jake settle into their new home, a young boy vanishes. His disappearance bears an unnerving resemblance to Frank Carter's crimes, reigniting old rumors that he preyed with an accomplice. Now, detectives Amanda Beck and Pete Willis must find the boy before it is too late, even if that means Pete has to revisit his great foe in prison: The Whisper Man. And then Jake begins acting strangely. He hears a whispering at his window...

The Whisper Man

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Dave Barry

Pulitzer Prize–winning and New York Times bestselling author—and actual Florida Man—Dave Barry returns with a “hilariously funny” (Steve Martin) caper full of oddballs and more twists and turns than a snake slithering away from a gator. Jesse Braddock is trapped in a tiny cabin deep in the Everglades with her infant daughter and her ex-boyfriend, a wannabe reality TV star who turned out to be a lot prettier on the outside than on the inside. Broke and desperate for a way out, Jesse stumbles across a long-lost treasure, which could solve all her problems—if she can figure out how to keep it. The problem is some very bad men are also looking for the treasure, and they know Jesse has it. Meanwhile, Ken Bortle of Bortle Brothers Bait and Beer has hatched a scheme to lure tourists to his failing store by making viral videos of the “Everglades Melon Monster.” The Monster is, in fact, an unemployed alcoholic newspaperman named Phil wearing a Dora the Explorer costume head. Incredibly, this plan actually works, inspiring a horde of TikTokers to swarm into the swamp in search of the Monster at the same time villains are on the hunt for Jesse’s treasure. Amid this mayhem, a presidential hopeful arrives in the Everglades to start his campaign. Needless to say, it does not go as planned. In fact, nothing in this story goes as planned. This is, after all, Florida.

Swamp Story

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Rachel Heng

WINNER OF THE NEW AMERICAN VOICES AWARD LONGLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE AND THE JOYCE CAROL OATES PRIZE NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY TIME, TOWN & COUNTRY, KIRKUS, ELECTRIC LITERATURE AND BOOKPAGE! "Stunning…epic…impressive…It is a pleasure to simply live alongside these characters.”—The New York Times "A deep and powerful love story."—NBC The Today Show "A beautifully written novel. I loved so much in this book: the richly imagined setting, the complicated love story, and the heartbreaking way history can tear apart a family." —Ann Napolitano, New York Times bestselling author of Hello Beautiful Set against a changing Singapore, a sweeping novel about one boy’s unique gifts and the childhood love that will complicate the fate of his community and country Ah Boon is born into a fishing village amid the heat and beauty of twentieth-century coastal Singapore in the waning years of British rule. He is a gentle boy who is not much interested in fishing, preferring to spend his days playing with the neighbor girl, Siok Mei. But when he discovers he has the unique ability to locate bountiful, movable islands that no one else can find, he feels a new sense of obligation and possibility—something to offer the community and impress the spirited girl he has come to love. By the time they are teens, Ah Boon and Siok Mei are caught in the tragic sweep of history: the Japanese army invades, the resistance rises, grief intrudes, and the future of the fishing village is in jeopardy. As the nation hurtles toward rebirth, the two friends, newly empowered, must decide who they want to be, and what they are willing to give up. An aching love story and powerful coming-of-age that reckons with the legacy of British colonialism, the World War II Japanese occupation, and the pursuit of modernity, The Great Reclamation confronts the wounds of progress, the sacrifices of love, and the difficulty of defining home when nature and nation collide, literally shifting the land beneath people’s feet.

The Great Reclamation

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Jennifer McVeigh

Set in Kenya in the 1950s against the fading backdrop of the British Empire, a story of self-discovery, betrayal, and an impossible love from the author of The Fever Tree. After six years in England, Rachel has returned to Kenya and the farm where she spent her childhood, but the beloved home she’d longed for is much changed. Her father’s new companion—a strange, intolerant woman—has taken over the household. The political climate in the country grows more unsettled by the day and is approaching the boiling point. And looming over them all is the threat of the Mau Mau, a secret society intent on uniting the native Kenyans and overthrowing the whites. As Rachel struggles to find her place in her home and her country, she initiates a covert relationship, one that will demand from her a gross act of betrayal. One man knows her secret, and he has made it clear how she can buy his silence. But she knows something of her own, something she has never told anyone. And her knowledge brings her power.

Leopard at the Door

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Tyler Schwanke

Tyler Schwanke's debut is a fast-moving, gritty, and hilarious tribute to Hollywood heist movies . . . and anyone who's ever had a dream. Millie has one goal: to make a movie in tribute to her late father. At the Manhattan Movie Academy, run by Ricky O'Naire, her favorite director, she's determined to make it happen. But before she can finish her project, the academy is shut down. Six months later, she sees a preview for the new O'Naire movie--and he's stolen her idea. Outraged, she reunites her former film crew to steal the movie and hold it for ransom days before its high-profile premiere. Putting their training and film-nerd backgrounds to use, they pull off the heist in extravagant fashion. But when an unexpected femme fatale uncovers their plan, it's not long before a trio of hardened criminals want in on the take. With the stakes now higher than she ever imagined--and her life on the line--Millie has no choice but to lead them all through a dazzling series of moves and countermoves that result in an ending not even Hollywood could see coming.

Breaking In

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Steven Rowley

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

"From the bestselling author of Lily and the Octopus comes a funny, poignant, and highly original novel about an author whose relationship with his very famous book editor will change him forever--both as a writer and a son. After years of struggling as a writer in 1990s New York City, James Smale finally gets his big break when his novel sells to an editor at a major publishing house: none other than Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. Jackie, or Mrs. Onassis as she's known in the office, has fallen in love with James's candidly autobiographical novel, one that exposes his own dysfunctional family. But when the book's forthcoming publication threatens to unravel already fragile relationships, both within his family and with his partner, James finds that he can't bring himself to finish the manuscript. Jackie and James develop an unexpected friendship, and she pushes him to write an authentic ending, encouraging him to head home to confront the truth about his relationship with his mother. But when a long-held family secret is revealed, he realizes his editor may have had a larger plan that goes beyond the page... With lovable characters and the same intimate prose that readers loved in Steven Rowley's debut novel, Lily and the Octopus, The Editor is a poignant, insightful novel of young men and their mothers, authors and their editors, and the minefields of speaking the truth about those we love"--

The Editor

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W. E. Bowman

Bill Bryson

Loosely modelled on a 1937 account of Bill Tilman's Nanda Devi expedition, The Ascent of Rum Doodle riotously parodies the familiar tropes of 1950s mountaineering literature. Bowman's intrepid cast of characters may come from all walks of life, but are similarly at a loss when it comes to their supposed specialties "€" Prone, the expedition's doctor, is constantly incapacitated by sudden illnesses; Jungle, charged with navigation, is forever losing his way and cabling for money from obscure locations; and Constant, who alone speaks the native language of their guides and porters, through linguistic error provokes not just one but several riots. Led by Binder, whose narration would have you believe his crew and mission to represent nothing short of historic bravery and grit, these daring incompetents cut their path to the summit (sort of). Though W.E. Bowman was a civil engineer and published little in his lifetime, The Ascent of Rum Doodle proves itself a classic parody, sustained with winning humor and charm. Rescued from obscurity by writer and humorist Bill Bryson, it is now revived for the enjoyment of readers, and is listed among James Mustich's 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die (Workman, 2018).

The Ascent of Rum Doodle

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Jasmine Guillory

"On the eve of his ex's wedding festivities, Drew is minus a plus one--until a power outage strands him with the perfect candidate for a fake girlfriend. From the best man's toast to the bouquet toss, Alexa and Drew have more fun than they ever thought possible. But before they know it, Drew has to fly back to Los Angeles and his job as a pediatric surgeon, and Alexa heads home to Berkeley, where she's the mayor's chief of staff. Too bad they can't stop thinking about the other"--

The Wedding Date

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Jean Kwok

"At once a hugely atmospheric and suspenseful mystery and a compelling exploration of motherhood and belonging that packs a profound emotional punch. I couldn't stop thinking about this book." -- Lucy Foley, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Paris Apartment

An evocative family drama and a riveting mystery about the ferocious pull of motherhood for two very different women--from the New York Times bestselling author of Searching for Sylvie Lee and Girl in Translation.

Jasmine Yang arrives in New York City from her rural Chinese village without money or family support, fleeing a controlling husband, on a desperate search for the daughter who was taken from her at birth--another female casualty of China's controversial One Child Policy. But with her husband on her trail, the clock is ticking, and she's forced to make increasingly risky decisions if she ever hopes to be reunited with her daughter.

Meanwhile, publishing executive Rebecca Whitney seems to have it all: a prestigious family name and the wealth that comes with it, a high-powered career, a beautiful home, a handsome husband, and an adopted Chinese daughter she adores. She's even hired a nanny to help her balance the demands of being a working wife and mother. But when an industry scandal threatens to jeopardize not only Rebecca's job but her marriage, this perfect world begins to crumble and her role in her own family is called into question.

The Leftover Woman finds these two unforgettable women on a shocking collision course. Twisting and suspenseful and surprisingly poignant, it's a profound exploration of identity and belonging, motherhood and family. It is a story of two women in a divided city--separated by severe economic and cultural differences yet bound by a deep emotional connection to a child.

"A magnetic meditation on secret histories, motherhood, love, and how we show up for each other in the most surprising of ways. A beautiful, propulsive story!" -- Laura Dave, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Last Thing He Told Me

"A heart-tugging exploration of love, belonging, and the meaning of family." -- Ruth Ware, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The It Girl

The Leftover Woman

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Karin Slaughter

“Part True Detective, part The Girl on the Train. All parts gripping.” --theSkimm Husbands and wives. Mothers and daughters. The past and the future. Secrets bind them. And secrets can destroy them. The author of Pretty Girls returns with an electrifying, emotionally complex thriller that plunges its fascinating protagonist into the darkest depths of a mystery that just might destroy him. With the discovery of a murder at an abandoned construction site, Will Trent of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation is brought in on a case that becomes much more dangerous when the dead man is identified as an ex-cop. Studying the body, Sara Linton—the GBI’s newest medical examiner and Will’s lover—realizes that the extensive blood loss didn't belong to the corpse. Sure enough, bloody footprints leading away from the scene indicate there is another victim—a woman—who has vanished . . . and who will die soon if she isn’t found. Will is already compromised, because the site belongs to the city’s most popular citizen: a wealthy, powerful, and politically connected athlete protected by the world’s most expensive lawyers—a man who’s already gotten away with rape, despite Will’s exhaustive efforts to put him away. But the worst is yet to come. Evidence soon links Will’s troubled past to the case . . . and the consequences will tear through his life with the force of a tornado, wreaking havoc for Will and everyone around him, including his colleagues, family, friends—and even the suspects he pursues. Relentlessly suspenseful and furiously paced, peopled with conflicted, fallible characters who leap from the page, The Kept Woman is a seamless blend of twisty police procedural and ingenious psychological thriller -- a searing, unforgettable novel of love, loss, and redemption.

The Kept Woman

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Maria Semple

A brilliant novel from the author of Where'd You Go, Bernadette, about a day in the life of Eleanor Flood, forced to abandon her small ambitions and awake to a strange, new future. Eleanor knows she's a mess. But today, she will tackle the little things. She will shower and get dressed. She will have her poetry and yoga lessons after dropping off her son, Timby. She won't swear. She will initiate sex with her husband, Joe. But before she can put her modest plan into action-life happens. Today, it turns out, is the day Timby has decided to fake sick to weasel his way into his mother's company. It's also the day Joe has chosen to tell his office-but not Eleanor-that he's on vacation. Just when it seems like things can't go more awry, an encounter with a former colleague produces a graphic memoir whose dramatic tale threatens to reveal a buried family secret. TODAY WILL BE DIFFERENT is a hilarious, heart-filled story about reinvention, sisterhood, and how sometimes it takes facing up to our former selves to truly begin living.

Today Will Be Different

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Susan Choi

WINNER OF THE 2019 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION “Electrifying” (People) • “Masterly” (The Guardian) • “Dramatic and memorable” (The New Yorker) • “Magic” (TIME) • “Ingenious” (The Financial Times) • "A gonzo literary performance” (Entertainment Weekly) • “Rare and splendid” (The Boston Globe) • “Remarkable” (USA Today) • “Delicious” (The New York Times) • “Book groups, meet your next selection" (NPR) In an American suburb in the early 1980s, students at a highly competitive performing arts high school struggle and thrive in a rarified bubble, ambitiously pursuing music, movement, Shakespeare, and, particularly, their acting classes. When within this striving “Brotherhood of the Arts,” two freshmen, David and Sarah, fall headlong into love, their passion does not go unnoticed—or untoyed with—by anyone, especially not by their charismatic acting teacher, Mr. Kingsley. The outside world of family life and economic status, of academic pressure and of their future adult lives, fails to penetrate this school’s walls—until it does, in a shocking spiral of events that catapults the action forward in time and flips the premise upside-down. What the reader believes to have happened to David and Sarah and their friends is not entirely true—though it’s not false, either. It takes until the book’s stunning coda for the final piece of the puzzle to fall into place—revealing truths that will resonate long after the final sentence. As captivating and tender as it is surprising, Susan Choi's Trust Exercise will incite heated conversations about fiction and truth, and about friendships and loyalties, and will leave readers with wiser understandings of the true capacities of adolescents and of the powers and responsibilities of adults.

Trust Exercise

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Sopan Deb

"From a New York Times reporter and memoirist Sopan Deb comes a heartwarming and charmingly funny debut novel about a box in the attic that leads one Bengali-American family down a path toward rediscovering family love, even when splintered. Shantanu Das is living in the shadows of his past. In his 60s, he finds himself iced out of his traditional Bengali community after an uncouth divorce from his wife, Chaitali; he hasn't spoken to his eldest daughter Mitali in months; and most painfully, he lives each day with the regret that the Dases couldn't accept their youngest daughter Keya after coming out as gay. As the anniversary of Keya's death approaches, Shantanu wakes up one morning utterly alone in his suburban New Jersey home and realizes it's finally time to sell the place. That's when he discovers a tucked away box in his attic that could change everything. When Mitali Das gets a call from her estranged father asking her to come back to New Jersey and help him pack up the house, she does so out of pity. But then father and daughter find the manuscript of an unfinished play Keya and her girlfriend had been writing. It's a wild idea, but Shantanu has nothing left to lose: what if they were to stage the play? It could be an homage to Keya's memory, and a way to make amends. But first he'll need to convince Keya's girlfriend, Pamela, to give her blessing. Soon Shantanu has assembled a host of unlikely helpers-Kalpana, his traditional Bengali mother; Catherine, his dry witted girlfriend; his ex-wife Chaitali and her new husband, Jahar; and Neesh, Mitali's boyfriend who, with surprising revelations from his past, binds them all together. Set in the vibrant world of the Bengali New Jersey suburbs, Keya Das's Second Act is a warmly drawn homage to family, creativity, and second chances. In his debut novel, Sopan Deb has written a poignant and at turns surprisingly hilarious testament to the unexpected ways we build family and find love, old and new"--

Keya das's Second Act

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Lang Leav

Internationally acclaimed poet Lang Leav's debut adult novel combines her poetical lyricism and emotional acumen to create an enthralling coming of age narrative set against the backdrop of anti-Asian sentiment sweeping Australia in the late 90's. A stirring portrayal of guilt, loss, and memory, Others Were Emeralds explores the inherent danger of allowing our misconceptions to shape our reality. What comes first, the photograph or the memory? The daughter of Cambodian refugees, Ai grew up in the small Australian town of Whitlam populated by Asian immigrants who once fled war-torn countries to rebuild their shattered lives. It is now the late 90's and despite their parent's harrowing past, Ai and her tightknit group of school friends: charismatic Brigitte, sweet, endearing Bowie, shy, inscrutable Tin, and politically minded Sying, lead seemingly ordinary lives, far removed from the unimaginable horrors suffered by their parents. But that carefree innocence is shattered in their last year of school when Ai and her friends encounter a pair of racist men whose cruel acts of intimidation spiral into senseless violence. Grappling with the magnitude of her grief at such a young age, Ai leaves Whitlam for college before her trauma has a chance to fully resolve. In her second year of college Ai suffers a mental health crisis, driving her back home to Whitlam, a place she swore never to return. There, she reconnects with those she left behind and together they are compelled to look back on the tragedy that shaped their adolescence and examine the role they may have unwittingly played.

Others Were Emeralds

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Lisa Halliday

A TIME and NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOK of the YEAR * New York Times Notable Book and Times Critic’s Top Book of 2018 NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF 2018 BY * Elle * Bustle * Kirkus Reviews * Lit Hub* NPR * O, The Oprah Magazine * Shelf Awareness The bestselling and critically acclaimed debut novel by Lisa Halliday, hailed as “extraordinary” by The New York Times, “a brilliant and complex examination of power dynamics in love and war” by The Wall Street Journal, and “a literary phenomenon” by The New Yorker. Told in three distinct and uniquely compelling sections, Asymmetry explores the imbalances that spark and sustain many of our most dramatic human relations: inequities in age, power, talent, wealth, fame, geography, and justice. The first section, “Folly,” tells the story of Alice, a young American editor, and her relationship with the famous and much older writer Ezra Blazer. A tender and exquisite account of an unexpected romance that takes place in New York during the early years of the Iraq War, “Folly” also suggests an aspiring novelist’s coming-of-age. By contrast, “Madness” is narrated by Amar, an Iraqi-American man who, on his way to visit his brother in Kurdistan, is detained by immigration officers and spends the last weekend of 2008 in a holding room in Heathrow. These two seemingly disparate stories gain resonance as their perspectives interact and overlap, with yet new implications for their relationship revealed in an unexpected coda. A stunning debut from a rising literary star, Asymmetry is “a transgressive roman a clef, a novel of ideas, and a politically engaged work of metafiction” (The New York Times Book Review), and a “masterpiece” in the original sense of the word” (The Atlantic). Lisa Halliday’s novel will captivate any reader with while also posing arresting questions about the very nature of fiction itself.

Asymmetry

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Karen Russell

The Bigtree children struggle to protect their Florida Everglades alligator-wrestling theme park from a sophisticated competitor after losing their parents.

Swamplandia!

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In Zara Raheem's newest novel we meet Nadia Abbasi--whose attempts to save her marriage create unexpected complications--and follow her as she navigates the twists and turns of love. Perfect for fans of Sonali Dev, Christina Lauren, and Sara Desai.

Nadia Abbasi's marriage is falling apart. It starts with a gifted Roomba, but when she stumbles upon some questionable photos in her husband Aman's office, everything makes sense--the late-night texting, the sudden interest in fitness, the new clothes. Aman--the kind, thoughtful man she married--is having an affair.

Determined to find out what went wrong in her marriage, Nadia enlists the help of Zeba, the estranged sister she hasn't seen or spoken to since their mom's funeral over a year ago. As the two sisters fight to reconcile their past, Nadia realizes her relationship with Aman is not the only one that needs mending.

Nevertheless, the plan itself is simple: confront the "other woman" and win back her husband. Her clumsy attempt at sleuthing leads her from yoga studio--Aman's latest hangout--to a three-day wellness retreat in the foothills of the Santa Monica mountains. But somewhere in between falling out of tree pose and choking down plant-based meals, Nadia's plans unravel again when she discovers more than she expected about herself, her husband, and the nature of love.

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