Franz Kafka

Stanley Corngold

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

New Mexico

Writings by and about Kafka and textual notes accompany his translations of his early twentieth-century work about Gregor Samsa, an ordinary man who wakes up one morning only to discover that he has been transformed into a monstrous insect and must deal with his physical alteration, as well as the alienation from his family. Reprint.

The Metamorphosis

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Elena Ferrante

Ann Goldstein

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

A powerful new novel set in a divided Naples by Elena Ferrante, the beloved best-selling author of My Brilliant Friend. Giovanna's pretty face has changed: it's turning into the face of an ugly, spiteful adolescent. But is she seeing things as they really are? Into which mirror must she look to find herself and save herself? She is searching for a new face in two kindred cities that fear and detest one another: the Naples of the heights, which assumes a mask of refinement, and the Naples of the depths, which professes to be a place of excess and vulgarity. She moves between these two cities, disoriented by the fact that, whether high or low, the city seems to offer no answer and no escape.

The Lying Life of Adults

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Leza Cantoral

Archetypes are real. Muses are real. Writers are the channels of these spirits & if that sounds like witchcraft that's because it is. These stories gave me chills. Sylvia Plath & Lana Del Rey course through the veins of these dark, sexy, mind-bending, fantastical, romantic, & haunting tales. Authors from different genres came together in their love & passion for these muses.

Tragedy Queens

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Sarah Penner

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Named Most Anticipated of 2021 by Newsweek, Good Housekeeping, Hello! magazine, Oprah.com, Bustle, Popsugar, Betches, Sweet July, and GoodReads! March 2021 Indie Next Pick and #1 LibraryReads Pick "A bold, edgy, accomplished debut!" --Kate Quinn, New York Times bestselling author of The Alice Network A forgotten history. A secret network of women. A legacy of poison and revenge. Welcome to The Lost Apothecary... Hidden in the depths of eighteenth-century London, a secret apothecary shop caters to an unusual kind of clientele. Women across the city whisper of a mysterious figure named Nella who sells well-disguised poisons to use against the oppressive men in their lives. But the apothecary's fate is jeopardized when her newest patron, a precocious twelve-year-old, makes a fatal mistake, sparking a string of consequences that echo through the centuries. Meanwhile in present-day London, aspiring historian Caroline Parcewell spends her tenth wedding anniversary alone, running from her own demons. When she stumbles upon a clue to the unsolved apothecary murders that haunted London two hundred years ago, her life collides with the apothecary's in a stunning twist of fate--and not everyone will survive. With crackling suspense, unforgettable characters and searing insight, The Lost Apothecary is a subversive and intoxicating debut novel of secrets, vengeance and the remarkable ways women can save each other despite the barrier of time.

The Lost Apothecary

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Kristen Arnett

A New York Times Bestseller "This book is my song of the summer." --Parul Sehgal, The New York Times A Most Anticipated Book of 2019 at Esquire, The Week, BuzzFeed, NYLON, Bustle, HuffPost, The Boston Globe, and more.

Mostly Dead Things

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Roselle Lim

Lush and visual, chock-full of delicious recipes, Roselle Lim's magical debut novel is about food, heritage, and finding family in the most unexpected places. At the news of her mother's death, Natalie Tan returns home. The two women hadn't spoken since Natalie left in anger seven years ago, when her mother refused to support her chosen career as a chef. Natalie is shocked to discover the vibrant neighborhood of San Francisco's Chinatown that she remembers from her childhood is fading, with businesses failing and families moving out. She's even more surprised to learn she has inherited her grandmother's restaurant. The neighborhood seer reads the restaurant's fortune in the leaves: Natalie must cook three recipes from her grandmother's cookbook to aid her struggling neighbors before the restaurant will succeed. Unfortunately, Natalie has no desire to help them try to turn things around--she resents the local shopkeepers for leaving her alone to take care of her agoraphobic mother when she was growing up. But with the support of a surprising new friend and a budding romance, Natalie starts to realize that maybe her neighbors really have been there for her all along.

Natalie Tan's Book of Luck and Fortune

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Claire Vaye Watkins

marker on back cover page, which is the only page it’s on :)

A Novel

NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST Named a Most Anticipated Book of Fall 2021 by The New York Times, USA Today, Vulture, The Week, and more! “There’s some kind of genius sorcery in this novel. It’s startlingly original, hilarious and harrowing by turns, finally transcendent. Watkins writes like an avenging angel. It's thrilling and terrifying to stand in her wake.” —Jenny Offill, author of Dept. of Speculation and Weather A darkly funny, soul-rending novel of love in an epoch of collapse—one woman’s furious revisiting of family, marriage, work, sex, and motherhood. Since my baby was born, I have been able to laugh and see the funny side of things. a) As much as I ever did. b) Not quite as much now. c) Not so much now. d) Not at all. Leaving behind her husband and their baby daughter, a writer gets on a flight for a speaking engagement in Reno, not carrying much besides a breast pump and a spiraling case of postpartum depression. Her temporary escape from domestic duties and an opportunity to reconnect with old friends mutates into an extended romp away from the confines of marriage and motherhood, and a seemingly bottomless descent into the past. Deep in the Mojave Desert where she grew up, she meets her ghosts at every turn: the first love whose self-destruction still haunts her; her father, a member of the most famous cult in American history; her mother, whose native spark gutters with every passing year. She can’t go back in time to make any of it right, but what exactly is her way forward? Alone in the wilderness, at last she begins to make herself at home in the world. Bold, tender, and often hilarious, I Love You but I’ve Chosen Darkness reaffirms Watkins as one of the signal writers of our time.

I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness

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Julia Quinn

A Bridgerton Prequel

There were Bridgertons before the eight alphabetically named siblings. In the third of the Bridgerton Prequel series, we go back to where it all began. . . from #1 New York Times bestselling author Julia Quinn

She was in the wrong place...

Fiercely independent and adventurous, Poppy Bridgerton will only wed a suitor whose keen intellect and interests match her own. Sadly, none of the fools from her London season qualify. While visiting a friend on the Dorset coast, Poppy is pleasantly surprised to discover a smugglers' hideaway tucked inside a cave. But her delight turns to dismay when two pirates kidnap her and take her aboard a ship, leaving her bound and gagged on the captain's bed...

He found her at the wrong time...

Known to society as a rascal and reckless privateer, Captain Andrew James Rokesby actually transports essential goods and documents for the British government. Setting sail on a time-sensitive voyage to Portugal, he's stunned to find a woman waiting for him in his cabin. Surely, his imagination is getting the better of him. But no, she is very real--and his duty to the Crown means he's stuck with her. 

Can two wrongs make the most perfect right?

 When Andrew learns that she is a Bridgerton, he knows he will likely have to wed her to avert a scandal--though Poppy has no idea that he is the son of an earl and neighbor to her aristocratic cousins in Kent. On the high seas, their war of words soon gives way to an intoxicating passion. But when Andrew's secret is revealed, will his declaration of love be enough to capture her heart...?

The Other Miss Bridgerton 2022 (full size!)

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Rachel Cusk

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

Essays

From Rachel Cusk, her first collection of essays about motherhood, marriage, feminism, and art Rachel Cusk redrew the boundaries of fiction with the Outline Trilogy, three “literary masterpieces” (The Washington Post) whose narrator, Faye, perceives the world with a glinting, unsparing intelligence while remaining opaque to the reader. Lauded for the precision of her prose and the quality of her insight, Cusk is a writer of uncommon brilliance. Now, in Coventry, she gathers a selection of her nonfiction writings that both offers new insights on the themes at the heart of her fiction and forges a startling critical voice on some of our most personal, social, and artistic questions. Coventry encompasses memoir, cultural criticism, and writing about literature, with pieces on family life, gender, and politics, and on D. H. Lawrence, Françoise Sagan, and Elena Ferrante. Named for an essay in Granta (“Every so often, for offences actual or hypothetical, my mother and father stop speaking to me. There’s a funny phrase for this phenomenon in England: it’s called being sent to Coventry”), this collection is pure Cusk and essential reading for our age: fearless, unrepentantly erudite, and dazzling to behold.

Coventry

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Naoise Dolan

'The book of the summer ... Kept me rapt until the final page' THE TIMES

'A sharp, smart, witty modern love story. I loved it' David Nicholls, author of ONE DAY

'More than lives up to the hype ... Likely to fill the Sally-Rooney-shaped hole in many readers' lives' IRISH TIMES

'Droll, shrewd and unafraid - a winning debut' Hilary Mantel, author of WOLF HALL

'I've been pushing Exciting Times on everyone I know. Some of Dolan's pithy observations of her characters are the best I've read since Edward St Aubyn' OBSERVER

'A frankly sensational book' Pandora Sykes on THE HIGH LOW

'In the tradition of Dorothy Parker, Joan Rivers and Nora Ephron ... I found myself purring with pleasure. ...This is comic writing at the highest level' Craig Brown, DAILY MAIL

When you leave Ireland aged 22 to spend your parents' money, it's called a gap year. When Ava leaves Ireland aged 22 to make her own money, she's not sure what to call it, but it involves:

- a badly-paid job in Hong Kong, teaching English grammar to rich children;
- Julian, who likes to spend money on Ava and lets her move into his guest room;
- Edith, who Ava meets while Julian is out of town and actually listens to her when she talks;
- money, love, cynicism, unspoken feelings and unlikely connections.

Exciting times ensue.

Exciting Times

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Lily King

An extraordinary new novel of art, love, and ambition from Lily King, the New York Times bestselling author of Euphoria Following the breakout success of her critically acclaimed and award-winning novel Euphoria, Lily King returns with an unforgettable portrait of an artist as a young woman. Blindsided by her mother's sudden death, and wrecked by a recent love affair, Casey Peabody has arrived in Massachusetts in the summer of 1997 without a plan. Her mail consists of wedding invitations and final notices from debt collectors. A former child golf prodigy, she now waits tables in Harvard Square and rents a tiny, moldy room at the side of a garage where she works on the novel she's been writing for six years. At thirty-one, Casey is still clutching onto something nearly all her old friends have let go of: the determination to live a creative life. When she falls for two very different men at the same time, her world fractures even more. Casey's fight to fulfill her creative ambitions and balance the conflicting demands of art and life is challenged in ways that push her to the brink. Writers & Lovers follows Casey--a smart and achingly vulnerable protagonist--in the last days of a long youth, a time when every element of her life comes to a crisis. Written with King's trademark humor, heart, and intelligence, Writers & Lovers is a transfixing novel that explores the terrifying and exhilarating leap between the end of one phase of life and the beginning of another.

Writers and Lovers

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Disney Books

Heavy Hardcover (2 to 4 lbs)

The newest addition to the line of hit Descendants books like Mal's Spell Book and Mal's Spell Book 2, this compelling tome will build upon the world, mythology, and magic of the Descendants franchise.

Descendants 2 & 3: Uma’s Wicked Book & Villain Kids Guide

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Aingeala Flannery

In the resort town of Tramore, County Waterford, visitors arrive in waves with the tourist season, reliving the best days of their childhoods at the seaside amusements. Local teenager Helen Grant is indifferent to the charm of her surroundings; infatuated with her glamorous classmate Stella Swaine, she yearns to escape with her to art college, and from there, the world. But leaving Tramore is easier said than done. With an alcoholic father and an unsympathetic mother, Helen's family life may shatter her dream, just when it seems to be within reach . . . Following the Grant and Swaine families and their neighbours over three decades, The Amusements is an unforgettable story about roads taken and not taken. It is a brilliantly observed portrait of life in a small town.

The Amusements

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Rachel Donohue

An Irish Bestseller Finalist for the Irish Book Awards’ Newcomer of the Yea Perched high atop a seaside cliff in Ireland, a lonely Victorian mansion is home to Temple House School. At Temple House, nothing is ever as it seems. Louisa is the new, brilliant scholarship student. Finding most of the other students at the all-girls Catholic boarding school as icy and unfamiliar as the drafty mansion, she forms a fierce bond with the intense and compelling Victoria, an outlier and student provocateur. Their close bond is soon unsettled by the young, charismatic art teacher, Mr. Lavelle—igniting tension and obsession in the cloistered world of the school. Then one day, Louisa and Mr. Lavelle disappear. There is no trace of either one. It’s the unsolved mystery that captivates the whole country. Year after year, the media revisit it, and the conspiracy theories persist. Now, on the twenty-fifth anniversary, a journalist—a woman who grew up on the same street as Louisa—delves into the past to write a series of articles and uncover the truth. She finds stories of jealousy and revenge, power and class. But will she find Louisa and Mr. Lavelle, too? Because remember—at Temple House, nothing is ever as it seems. Told through alternating points of view, Rachel Donohue’s debut novel skillfully, gradually, lets the reader into the hearts and minds of both Louisa and the determined reporter. Th is page-turner is perfect for fans of Elisabeth Thomas’s Catherine House or Kate Elizabeth Russell’s My Dark Vanessa.

The Temple House Vanishing

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Jessica Andrews

A Best Book of 2020:Open Letters Review

"Andrews's writing is transportingly voluptuous, conjuring tastes and smells and sounds like her literary godmother, Edna O'Brien . . . What makes her novel sing is its universal themes: how a young woman tries to make sense of her world, and how she grows up."
-Penelope Green,The New York Times Book Review

This "luminous" (TheObserver) feminist coming-of-age novel captures in sensuous, blistering prose the richness and imperfection of the bond between a daughter and her mother

It begins with our bodies . . . Safe together in the violet dark and yet already there are spaces beginning to open between us.

From that first immaculate, fluid connection, through the ups and downs of a working-class childhood in northern England, the one constant in Lucy's life has been her mother: comforting and mysterious, ferociously loving, tirelessly devoted, as much a part of Lucy as her own skin. Her mother's lessons in womanhood shape Lucy's appreciation for desire, her sense of duty as a caretaker, her hunger for a better, perhaps reckless life.

At university in glamorous London, Lucy's background sets her apart. And then she is finished, graduated, adrift. She escapes to a tiny house in Donegal left empty by her grandfather, a place where her mother once found happiness. There she will take a lover, live inside art and the past, and track back through her memories and her mother's stories to make sense of her place in the world.

In "a stunning new voice in British literary fiction" (The Independent) that lays bare our raw, dark selves, Jessica Andrews's debut honors the richness and imperfection of the bond between a daughter and her mother. Intricately woven in lyrical vignettes,Saltwater is a novel of becoming-- a woman, an artist-- and of finding a way forward by looking back.

Saltwater

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Patti Smith

"In lyric essays, a story, poems, and photographs, Smith illuminates the whirl of chance and choice that stokes a writer's imagination, recounting her fascination on the eve of a trip to Paris with Simone Weil and an evocative, accidentally discovered film about Stalin's mass deportation of Estonians. In France, a gravestone, a televised figure-skating competition, a meal, and a garden all converge in what becomes Devotion, [a] ... fairy tale about a young, displaced Estonian skater and a solitary dealer in rare objects and arms. This ... fable about creativity and obsession, possession and freedom is followed by a meditation on how a work of art is, for other artists, a call to action"--Booklist, 08/01/2017.

Devotion

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Lang Leav

Best-selling poet Lang Leav presents a gorgeous hardcover gift book featuring the best of Lullabies and Love & Misadventure plus thirty-five new poems for fans to discover, along with original color illustrations by the author. For fans of Lang Leav, this beautiful gift book is a must-have! Beloved pieces from Lullabies and Love & Misadventure are collected together in this illustrated treasury. In addition, 35 new poems that have not been published in any Lang Leav collection offer something new to discover. The author's original art is presented in lovely four-color illustrations. Lang Leav's evocative poetry in a gorgeous package with ribbon marker and cloth spine is an irresistible gift for any poetry lover!

Memories

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Arden Rose

All You Need to Know to Get It Together (Sort Of)

For fans of Grace Helbig and Alexa Chung comes a fresh, hilarious guide to growing up your way from social media influencer and lifestyle vlogger Arden Rose. Now in paperback with a brand-new chapter with tips from Arden about how to travel in style! In Almost Adulting—perfect for budding adults, failing adults, and eaters of microwave mug brownies—Arden tells you how to survive your future adulthood. Topics include: Making internet friends who are cool and not murderers Flirting with someone in a way to make them think you are cool and not a murderer Being in an actual relationship where you talk about your feelings in a healthy manner??? To the other person??????? Eating enough protein Assembling a somewhat acceptable adult wardrobe when you have zero dollars Going on adventures without starting to smell How sex is supposed to feel, but, like, actually though By the end of the book—a mash-up of essays, lists, and artwork—you'll have learned not only how to dress yourself, how to travel alone, how to talk to strangers online, and how to date strangers (in PERSON!), but also how to pass as a real, functioning, appropriately socialized adult.

Almost Adulting

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Rebecca Lee

"Wise and funny . . . [A] near-perfect collection."

--Entertainment Weekly



Rebecca Lee, one of our most gifted and original short story writers, guides readers into a range of landscapes, both foreign and domestic, crafting stories as rich as novels. A student plagiarizes a paper and holds fast to her alibi until she finds herself complicit in the resurrection of one professor's shadowy past. A dinner party becomes the occasion for the dissolution of more than one marriage. A woman is hired to find a wife for the one true soulmate she's ever found. In all, Rebecca Lee traverses the terrain of infidelity, obligation, sacrifice, jealousy, and yet finally, optimism. Showing people at their most vulnerable, Lee creates characters so wonderfully flawed, so driven by their desire, so compelled to make sense of their human condition, that it's impossible not to feel for them when their fragile belief in romantic love, domestic bliss, or academic seclusion fails to provide them with the sort of force field they'd expected.

Bobcat and Other Stories

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Mel Elliott

The Beefcake Activity Book for Good Color-Inners As Well As Beginners

Following the news, engaging in political debate, or going to the opera is all well and good, but from time to time you just need to sit back and look at some old-fashioned beefcake. Team that with some crayons, pens, and markers, and what do you have?

HEAVEN!
IN AN ACTIVITY BOOK!

Color Me Swooon will leave you weak in the knees as you and your pens caress chiseled features and chest hair. Along with coloring, you'll rate more than sixty gorgeous guys on swoon-worthy-ness, as well as learning what in their lives (beyond their killer looks, duh) makes them so hot. From Brad Pitt, George Clooney, and Will Smith to Daniel Craig, Jake Gyllenhaal, and even One Direction, all the heartthrobs are here, and in no particular order. (Except for Ryan Gosling, who is first. Obviously.)

So what are you waiting for? Get out your crayons and color those hotties good.

Color Me Swoon

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Simon Brew

Get ready to spot hundreds of things you've never seen before across a wide range of films, in this brand new book from the creator of Den Of Geek. From the small references and inspirations, through to clues, hidden meanings and moments in frame that you may have simply missed, this indispensable guide is both a love letter to cinema and a jam-packed treasure trove that no film fan will want to miss!

The Secret Life of the Movies

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Brynne Rebele-Henry

When sixteen-year-old, mythology-obsessed Raya and her true love, Sarah, are sent from their conservative Texas town to a re-education camp, Raya assumes the role of Orpheus to save them.

Orpheus Girl

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Nancy Jo Sales

Social Media and the Secret Lives of Teenagers

Explores the changes in the way teenage girls are growing up in America, discussing the new norms, from extreme behaviors to lack of basic communication skills.

American Girls

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Melissa Lozada-Oliva

A Novel in Verse

A feverish story of young adulthood, exploring how fandom and obsession shape how we relate to the world . . . Dreaming of You navigates the complexities of Latinx identity, self-loathing, love, and the loneliness of drifting into adulthood. --Miguel Salazar, Vulture Themes of celebrity, fandom, grief, queer identity, and loneliness feature in this novel in verse about a poet who resurrects Tejano pop star Selena. This story is as absurd and magical as it sounds. --Casey Stepaniuk, Autostraddle A macabre novel in verse of loss, longing, and identity crises following a poet who resurrects pop star Selena from the dead. Melissa Lozada-Oliva's Dreaming of You is an absurd yet heartfelt examination of celebrity worship. A young Latinx poet grappling with loneliness and heartache decides one day to bring Tejano pop star Selena Quintanilla back to life. The séance kicks off an uncanny trip narrated by a Greek chorus of gossiping spirits as she journeys through a dead celebrity prom, encounters her shadow self, and performs karaoke in hell. In visceral poems embodying millennial angst, paragraph-long conversations overheard at her local coffeeshop, and unhinged Twitter rants, Lozada-Oliva reveals an eerie, sometimes gruesome, yet moving love story. Playfully morbid and profoundly candid, an interrogation of Latinidad, womanhood, obsession, and disillusionment, Dreaming of You grapples with the cost of being seen for your truest self.

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Franz Kafka; Stanley Corngold