James Han Mattson

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

Maine

A Novel

"An eventual American classic that is unrelenting in its beauty and incisive cultural critique." - KIESE LAYMON A chilling and blisteringly relevant literary novel of social horror centered around a brutal killing that takes place in a full-contact haunted escape room--a provocative exploration of capitalism, hate politics, racial fetishism, and our obsession with fear as entertainment. On April 27, 1997, four contestants make it to the final cell of the Quigley House, a full-contact haunted escape room in Lincoln, Nebraska, made famous for its monstrosities, booby-traps, and ghoulishly costumed actors. If the group can endure these horrors without shouting the safe word, "reprieve," they'll win a substantial cash prize--a startling feat accomplished only by one other group in the house's long history. But before they can complete the challenge, a man breaks into the cell and kills one of the contestants. Those who were present on that fateful night lend their points of view: Kendra Brown, a teenager who's been uprooted from her childhood home after the sudden loss of her father; Leonard Grandton, a desperate and impressionable hotel manager caught in a series of toxic entanglements; and Jaidee Charoensuk, a gay international student who came to the Unites States in a besotted search for his former English teacher. As each character's journey unfurls and overlaps, deceits and misunderstandings fueled by obsession and prejudice are revealed--forcing all to reckon with the ways in which their beliefs and actions contributed to a horrifying catastrophe. A startlingly soulful exploration of complicity and masquerade, Reprieve combines the psychological tension of classic horror with searing social criticism, and seamlessly threads together trial transcripts, evidence descriptions, and deeply layered individual narratives to present a chilling portrait of this tangled American life.

Reprieve

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Kalynn Bayron

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

New York Times bestselling author Kalynn Bayron teases and torments in this high-concept YA horror, perfect for fans of White Smoke and The Honeys.

You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight

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Cyrus Parker

Parker Lee

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

coffee days, whiskey nights is a collection of poetry, prose, and aphorisms that juxtaposes the hopefulness a brand new day can bring with the lingering thoughts that often keep us up into the late-night hours. A lot can happen between the first sip of coffee and the last taste of whiskey, and this book takes a look at the way a single day can change our outlook on everything from relationships with others, to our relationships with ourselves, and everything in between. Ultimately, coffee days, whiskey nights illustrates that no matter how hopeless we may feel at the end of the day, a new one is only a few hours away.

Coffee Days Whiskey Nights

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Nicola Keegan

Heavy Paperback (2 to 4 lbs)

Haunted by an agoraphobic mother, a lost father, and a drug-addled sister, Philomena, reluctantly known as Pip, transforms her suffering and rage into beauty, grace, and purity in the swimming lane as she rises to the Olympic level. A first novel.

Swimming

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Amy Ellis Nutt

The Transformation of an American Family

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The inspiring true story of transgender actor and activist Nicole Maines, whose identical twin brother, Jonas, and ordinary American family join her on an extraordinary journey to understand, nurture, and celebrate the uniqueness in us all. Nicole appears as TV’s first transgender superhero on CW’s Supergirl When Wayne and Kelly Maines adopted identical twin boys, they thought their lives were complete. But by the time Jonas and Wyatt were toddlers, confusion over Wyatt’s insistence that he was female began to tear the family apart. In the years that followed, the Maineses came to question their long-held views on gender and identity, to accept Wyatt’s transition to Nicole, and to undergo a wrenching transformation of their own, the effects of which would reverberate through their entire community. Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Amy Ellis Nutt spent almost four years reporting this story and tells it with unflinching honesty, intimacy, and empathy. In her hands, Becoming Nicole is more than an account of a courageous girl and her extraordinary family. It’s a powerful portrait of a slowly but surely changing nation, and one that will inspire all of us to see the world with a little more humanity and understanding. Named One of the Ten Best Books of the Year by People • One of the Best Books of the Year by The New York Times Book Review and Men’s Journal • A Stonewall Honor Book in Nonfiction • Finalist for the Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Nonfiction “Fascinating and enlightening.”—Cheryl Strayed “If you aren’t moved by Becoming Nicole, I’d suggest there’s a lump of dark matter where your heart should be.”—The New York Times “Exceptional . . . ‘Stories move the walls that need to be moved,’ Nicole told her father last year. In telling Nicole’s story and those of her brother and parents luminously, and with great compassion and intelligence, that is exactly what Amy Ellis Nutt has done here.”—The Washington Post “A profoundly moving true story about one remarkable family’s evolution.”—People “Becoming Nicole is a miracle. It’s the story of a family struggling with—and embracing—a transgender child. But more than that, it’s about accepting one another, and ourselves, in all our messy, contradictory glory.”—Jennifer Finney Boylan, former co-chair of GLAAD and author of She’s Not There: A Life in Two Genders

Becoming Nicole

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G. Willow Wilson

A fantastical journey set at the height of the Spanish Inquisition from the award-winning author of Alif the Unseen and writer of the Ms. Marvel series, G. Willow Wilson's The Bird King is a jubilant story of love versus power, religion versus faith, and freedom versus safety. G. Willow Wilson's debut novel Alif the Unseen was an NPR and Washington Post Best Book of the Year, and it established her as a vital American Muslim literary voice. Now she delivers The Bird King, a stunning new novel that tells the story of Fatima, a concubine in the royal court of Granada, the last emirate of Muslim Spain, and her dearest friend Hassan, the palace mapmaker. Hassan has a secret--he can draw maps of places he's never seen and bend the shape of reality. When representatives of the newly formed Spanish monarchy arrive to negotiate the sultan's surrender, Fatima befriends one of the women, not realizing that she will see Hassan's gift as sorcery and a threat to Christian Spanish rule. With their freedoms at stake, what will Fatima risk to save Hassan and escape the palace walls? As Fatima and Hassan traverse Spain with the help of a clever jinn to find safety, The Bird King asks us to consider what love is and the price of freedom at a time when the West and the Muslim world were not yet separate.

The Bird King

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Karen Russell

"From the Pulitzer finalist and universally beloved author of the New York Times best sellers Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove, a stunning new collection of short fiction that showcases her extraordinary gifts of language and imagination"--

Orange World and Other Stories

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John Banville

these unearthly beings start to stir up trouble, to sometimes wildly unintended effect." --Book Jacket.

The Infinities

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Dianne Lake

Deborah Herman

My Story of Charles Manson, Life Inside His Cult, and the Darkness That Ended the Sixties

In this poignant and disturbing memoir of lost innocence, coercion, survival, and healing, Dianne Lake chronicles her years with Charles Manson, revealing for the first time how she became the youngest member of his Family and offering new insights into one of the twentieth century’s most notorious criminals and life as one of his "girls." At age fourteen Dianne Lake—with little more than a note in her pocket from her hippie parents granting her permission to leave them—became one of "Charlie’s girls," a devoted acolyte of cult leader Charles Manson. Over the course of two years, the impressionable teenager endured manipulation, psychological control, and physical abuse as the harsh realities and looming darkness of Charles Manson’s true nature revealed itself. From Spahn ranch and the group acid trips, to the Beatles’ White Album and Manson’s dangerous messiah-complex, Dianne tells the riveting story of the group’s descent into madness as she lived it. Though she never participated in any of the group’s gruesome crimes and was purposely insulated from them, Dianne was arrested with the rest of the Manson Family, and eventually learned enough to join the prosecution’s case against them. With the help of good Samaritans, including the cop who first arrested her and later took her into his home, the courageous young woman eventually found redemption and grew up to lead an ordinary life. While much has been written about Charles Manson, this riveting account from an actual Family member is a chilling portrait that recreates in vivid detail one of the most horrifying and fascinating chapters in modern American history. Member of the Family includes 16 pages of photographs.

Member of the Family

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Allan G. Hunter

Paperback (1 to 2 lbs)

Writing Exercises for Self-Exploration

Every life passage we go through shapes us, each one differently, each one forever. Often we tend to think there are only a few of these -- childhood, adolescence, middle years, old age. In this book you'll find that there are many more, and it is only by understanding them that we can come to know fully who we are. Sometimes, though, it feels as if we're so busy living we just don't have the chance to put our lives in any sort of perspective. This book can give you that chance, and supply that perspective. In these pages you will find the tools you need to come to a deeper understanding of yourself, so you can claim your selfhood and live your life more fully. You'll learn that you can do much of this work yourself, and that you don't have to rely on the specialists for meaningful self-exploration to occur. In these pages you will find a series of writing exercises (and sometimes drawing exercises, too) all of which are designed to help you reflect on your life so that you can understand yourself better. The exercises will give you the tools of the trade, that can enable you to undertake the vital work of personal exploration yourself, rather than having to rely on the experts -- the psychiatrists, the analysts, the therapists -- in the way that many of us tend to do now.

Life Passages *SIGNED*

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This house eats and is eaten . . .

"A riveting debut from a remarkable new voice! Trang Thanh Tran weaves an impressive gothic mystery in which Jade's father is determined to restore a decrepit home to its former glory and Jade is the only person who feels the soul-crushing devastation of colonialism lingering within its walls." --Angeline Boulley, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Firekeeper's Daughter

A House with a terrifying appetite haunts a broken family in this atmospheric horror, perfect for fans of Mexican Gothic.

When Jade Nguyen arrives in Vietnam for a visit with her estranged father, she has one goal: survive five weeks pretending to be a happy family in the French colonial house Ba is restoring. She's always lied to fit in, so if she's straight enough, Vietnamese enough, American enough, she can get out with the college money he promised.

But the house has other plans. Night after night, Jade wakes up paralyzed. The walls exude a thrumming sound while bugs leave their legs and feelers in places they don't belong. She finds curious traces of her ancestors in the gardens they once tended. And at night Jade can't ignore the ghost of the beautiful bride who leaves cryptic warnings: Don't eat.

Neither Ba nor her sweet sister Lily believe that there is anything strange happening. With help from a delinquent girl, Jade will prove this house--the home they have always wanted--will not rest until it destroys them. Maybe, this time, she can keep her family together. As she roots out the house's rot, she must also face the truth of who she is and who she must become to save them all.

She Is a Haunting

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#paperback #writing #craft #selfhelp #psychology 

How Writers Transcend Fear

The Courage to Write is an invaluable book and essential reading for anyone who wishes to learn how to write well.

Katherine Anne Porter called courage "the first essential" for a writer. "I have to talk myself into bravery with every sentence," agreed Cynthia Ozick, "sometimes every syllable." E. B. White said he admired anyone who "has the guts to write anything at all."An author who has taught writing for more than thirty years,

InThe Courage to Write, Ralph Keyes, an author who has taught writing for more than thirty years, assures us that anxiety is felt by writers at every level, especially when they dare to do their best. He describes the sequence of "courage points" through which all writers must pass, from the challenge of identifying a worthwhile project to the mixture of pride and panic they feel when examining a newly published book or article.

Keyes also offers specifics on how to root out dread of public "performance" and of the judgment of family and friends, make the best use of writers' workshops and conferences, and handle criticism of works in progress. Throughout, he includes the comments of many accomplished writers -- Pat Conroy, Amy Tan, Rita Dove, Isabel Allende, and others -- on how they transcended their own fears to produce great works.

The Courage to Write

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#hardcover #language #etymology #sociology #nonfiction #socialscience #history #words


English in the Gutter: Then, Now, and Forever

Profanity has always been a deliciously vibrant part of our lexicon, an integral part of being human. In fact, our ability to curse comes from a different part of the brain than other parts of speech - the urgency with which we say 'f..k!' is instead related to the instinct that tells us to flee from danger. Language evolves with time, and so does what we consider profane or unspeakable. Nine Nasty Words is a rollicking examination of profanity, explored from every angle: historical, sociological, political, linguistic. In a particularly coarse moment, when the public discourse is shaped in part by once-shocking words, nothing could be timelier.

Nine Nasty Words

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#paperback #biography #movie #memoir #india #bestseller


A Memoir

As a little boy in India, Saroo Brierley got lost on a train. Twenty-five years later, from Australia, he found his way back. This is what happened in between. Born in a poor village in India, Saroo lived hand-to-mouth in a one room hut with his mother and three siblings…until at age five, he mistakenly boarded a train by himself, and ended up in Calcutta, all the way across the country. Uneducated, illiterate, and unable to recall the name of his hometown, he managed to survive for weeks on that city’s rough streets. Soon after, he was adopted by a couple in Tasmania. But despite growing up in a loving upper-middle class Aussie family, Saroo still clung to the last memories of his hometown and family in India, and always wondered if he’d ever find them again. Amazingly, twenty-five years later, with some dogged determination and a heap of luck—and the advent of Google Earth—he did. A Long Way Home is a poignant and inspirational true story of survival and triumph against incredible odds, celebrating the importance of never letting go of what drives the human spirit: hope.

A Long Way Home

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#hardcover #fiction #historical #emmadonoghue #mystery #historicalfiction #ireland #bookofthemonth #botm


In Emma Donoghue's latest masterpiece, an English nurse brought to a small Irish village to observe what appears to be a miracle-a girl said to have survived without food for months-soon finds herself fighting to save the child's life. Tourists flock to the cabin of eleven-year-old Anna O'Donnell, who believes herself to be living off manna from heaven, and a journalist is sent to cover the sensation. Lib Wright, a veteran of Florence Nightingale's Crimean campaign, is hired to keep watch over the girl. Written with all the propulsive tension that made Room a huge bestseller, THE WONDER works beautifully on many levels--a tale of two strangers who transform each other's lives, a powerful psychological thriller, and a story of love pitted against evil.

The Wonder

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Page Habit edition with annotations from the author #hardcover #dystopian #fiction #memory #scifi #speculativefiction #pagehabit 

A short novel grappling with memory, identity, and ownership in an alternate version of the 1920s where the elite's memories can be removed and exist as clones

Karla Fossett

@karla272603

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James Han Mattson

Reprieve

Kalynn Bayron

You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight

Cyrus Parker; Parker Lee

Coffee Days Whiskey Nights

Nicola Keegan

Swimming

Amy Ellis Nutt

Becoming Nicole

G. Willow Wilson

The Bird King

Karen Russell

Orange World and Other Stories

John Banville

The Infinities

Dianne Lake; Deborah Herman

Member of the Family

Allan G. Hunter

Life Passages SIGNED

Trang Thanh Tran

She Is a Haunting

Ralph Keyes

The Courage to Write

John McWhorter

Nine Nasty Words

Saroo Brierley

A Long Way Home

Emma Donoghue

The Wonder

Bethany C. Morrow

Mem

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James Han Mattson

Reprieve

Kalynn Bayron

You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight

Cyrus Parker; Parker Lee

Coffee Days Whiskey Nights

Nicola Keegan

Swimming

Amy Ellis Nutt

Becoming Nicole

G. Willow Wilson

The Bird King

Karen Russell

Orange World and Other Stories

John Banville

The Infinities

Dianne Lake; Deborah Herman

Member of the Family

Allan G. Hunter

Life Passages *SIGNED*

Trang Thanh Tran

She Is a Haunting

Ralph Keyes

The Courage to Write

John McWhorter

Nine Nasty Words

Saroo Brierley

A Long Way Home

Emma Donoghue

The Wonder

Bethany C. Morrow

Mem

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Life Passages SIGNED