BIOGRAPHY

Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton

Dalton, a British speech writer and political consultant, debuts with a tender account of rescuing and rearing a wild hare in the English countryside. After discovering the animal frozen in fear on the side of the road in winter 2021, Dalton scooped it up and took it home with her. Despite some initial hesitation—who was she to interfere with nature, Dalton wondered—she nursed the animal back to health and gave it free run of her house and garden. Electing not to name the creature, Dalton simply observed its behavior, sometimes following it outside for long walks that reacquainted her with the flora and fauna in her backyard. The more freedom she gave the hare, the greater the trust between them grew. More than a year later, it gave birth to a litter of leverets in the author’s presence, much to her wonder and delight. Though she’s working with well-worn tropes, Dalton makes her tale refreshingly unsentimental, delivering sharp insights about the value of trust, freedom, and respect for the natural world. It’s a delight. Publisher’s Weekly. December 2024.

I Want to Die but I Still Want to Eat Tteokbokki by Baek Sehee

In this frank sequel to I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki, Sehee continues to document her treatment for depression and anxiety. Organized into 14 essays, each themed after one of Sehee’s insecurities and framed by recorded conversations between the author and her psychiatrist, this memoir digs deeper than its predecessor, thanks in part to Sehee’s realization, after reading Roxane Gay’s Hunger, that she “had never been honest with myself, even as I’d baldly declared how revealing my darkness to the light was the way to become free.” In plain prose (Hur’s translation can border on dull), Sehee recounts obsessing over casual comments made by colleagues and friends, her debilitating fear of death, and her occasional self-harm. In the candid back-and-forths with her therapist, Sehee comes to realize she “lets others too much into myself,” and resolves to trust her own voice. As with the previous book, the dialogues oscillate between arresting and numbing, with some conversations robbed of their potential power by the limits of the format. Still, Sehee’s admirable commitment to showing her “deepest inner wounds” will resonate with readers struggling to unpack their own mental health issues. Publisher’s Weekly, June 2024.

The Woman in Me by Britney Spears

A heartfelt memoir from the pop superstar. Spears grew up with an alcoholic father, an exacting mother, and a fear of disappointing them both. She also displayed a natural talent for singing and dancing and a strong work ethic. Spears is grateful for the adult professionals who helped her get her start, but the same can’t be said of her peers. When she met Justin Timberlake, also a Mouseketeer on the Disney Channel’s updated Mickey Mouse Club, the two formed an instant bond. Spears describes her teenage feelings for Timberlake as “so in love with him it was pathetic,” and she’s clearly angry about the rumors and breakup that followed. This tumultuous period haunted her for years. Out of many candidates for villains of the book, Timberlake included, perhaps the worst are the careless journalists of the late 1990s and early 2000s, who indulged Timberlake while vilifying Spears. The cycle repeated for years, taking its toll on her mental health. Spears gave birth to sons Sean Preston and Jayden James within two years, and she describes the difficulties they all faced living in the spotlight. The author writes passionately about how custody of her boys and visits with them were held over her head, and she recounts how they were used to coerce her to make decisions that weren’t always in her best interest. As many readers know, conservancy followed, and for 13 years, she toured, held a residency in Las Vegas, and performed—all while supposedly unable to take care of herself, an irony not lost on her. Overall, the book is cathartic, though readers who followed her 2021 trial won’t find many revelations, and many of the other newsworthy items have been widely covered in the run-up to the book’s release. Spears’ vulnerability shines through as she describes her painful journey from vulnerable girl to empowered woman. Kirkus Reviews, Oct 2023.

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GENERAL FICTION

Orpheus Nine by Chris Flynn

No one could explain what they saw, and no one could do anything about it. All the children aged nine across the world froze in time as they died a horrific death. As they stood still, they simultaneously chanted in Latin a quote from Shakespeare’s King Lear which, afterwards, every person left alive would have ingrained in their memories: ‘As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods. They kill us for their sport.’ On the first day, 130 million died. The world has drastically changed as governments are overthrown, economies are ruined, wars have begun, conspiracy theories and cults run amok as people try to figure out what or who caused this catastrophe. Set in the rural Australian town of Gattan, the book focuses on three characters and how they react to the supernatural event known as ‘Orpheus Nine’: Jess, a grieving mother who watched her son die and finds solace in the Kingdom of Hades, a terrorist group of Orpheans (parents who’ve lost a child); Hayley, who is trying to work out how to save her daughter, whose ninth birthday is quickly approaching; and Dirk, whose wealthy and influential family always finds a way to benefit from tragedy. The small setting emphasises the immediate distrust and lack of social cohesion when tragedy occurs, offering the town as a microcosm for the rest of the world, not only in this novel but also if this were to happen in our world. How would we react? As suspense builds and rises to a crescendo at the end, Orpheus Nine compellingly explores the psychology of each character as the end-of-days is upon them and what methods they turn to as they attempt to find comfort, justice, or even answers in the event of a sudden loss. But no matter how rich or poor, prepared or not, death comes to all. And what happened on the day of Orpheus Nine was just the beginning. Readings, March 2025.

The Homemade God by Rachel Joyce

Siblings journey to an Italian lakeside villa to investigate the drowning death of their father. Famed artist Vic Kemp invites his four children to a bombshell of a London lunch. A playboy for decades, the 76-year-old is in love. Twenty-seven-year-old Bella-Mae has had a startling effect on Vic: He has forsworn alcohol, preferring her “special” tea; lost weight; and is planning his final masterpiece. The siblings, between 30 and 40, are alarmed. Netta assumes her father is prey to a gold digger; Susan is worried her caretaking will be usurped; Goose, also Vic’s studio assistant, is hurt he’s been left out of this latest work; and baby Iris only wants what’s best—whatever that is. The four are unbreakably close, having raised each other after their young mother’s death and their father’s haphazard parenting, and yet are devoted to him and his domineering allure. This compelling family tableau turns thrilling when Vic—thinner, secretive—texts that he and Bella-Mae have married at his Italian villa. A few weeks later he is found dead in the lake. As the siblings converge at their summer home, the novel begins to skirt the edges of a whodunit, but as they attempt to solve the mystery, their relationships with each other begin to fray. Each of them has been damaged by Vic, and at an explosive lakeside dinner, long-simmering resentments are revealed. This dramatic conclusion, hinted at in the prologue, is not the end—instead the novel marches ahead 10 years for a summation that is, although pleasing, a bit strained in its insistence that everybody gets a slice of happiness. The glamorous art world, juicy family discord, an Italian villa, potential murder—it’s hard to ask more from a summer read. Kirkus Reviews, April 2025

A Guardian and a Thief by Megha Majumdar

Majumdar (A Burning) spins a luminous story of a family facing climate catastrophe and food scarcity in near-future Kolkata. It revolves around a mother known only as Ma, who manages a shelter between caring for her aging father and two-year-old daughter, Mishti. The three of them have obtained highly coveted “climate visas” and are preparing to join Mishti’s father in Ann Arbor, Mich., where he’s spent the past six months working as a medical researcher. All is hopeful until the household is visited by a young thief named Boomba, who followed Ma home from the shelter suspecting (correctly) that she is siphoning food from her workplace. The plot thickens when Boomba makes off with the family’s passports, causing further complications for all involved. Majumdar conjures a city at once deteriorating and resilient, where markets sell seaweed and synthetic fish, and the city’s “remaining benevolent billionaire” lives on a heavily guarded man-made island in a widening river. As Ma and her family struggle to reclaim the passports, Majumdar unspools Boomba’s backstory, crafting a complex antagonist who gradually gains the reader’s sympathy. There’s no clear-cut villain here, just people attempting to survive and protect their own. This proves once again that Majumdar is a master of the moral dilemma. Publisher’s Weekly, July 2025.

The Transformations by Andrew Pippos

George Desoulis works as a subeditor for The National, a privately owned newspaper based in Sydney. The newspaper’s owner is Bruce Lattimore, who’s in the throes of succession planning. The diminishing returns of print media are well known, but Lattimore reassures his staff that he’s confident of continued success. George is a private person, used to being alone. He’s a bookworm, reading literary fiction and history. His past is complicated by abuse at the hands of a priest. George fathered a child, Elektra, as a teenager. He relinquished his parental rights to the mother, Madelaine, who’s now married to Nabeel and living in Melbourne, but Elektra wants George in her life. George is attracted to a reporter, Cass. She confides in him that she and her husband have an open marriage. They begin a torrid affair, and George imagines a future with her. Cass’s husband, Nico, is a reformed alcoholic, but Cass is worried he’ll start drinking again. She tells George their affair can’t continue. Despite promises, workers are retrenched from The National. George is given notice just as Elektra expresses a wish to permanently live with him. The title reflects change: sometimes gradual (the decline of the print media, George’s reconnection with Elektra) and sometimes sudden (his retrenchment, the end of the affair). George’s profession entails correcting other people’s mistakes. If only that subediting would work in his private life: he’s fathered a child he hasn’t been allowed to parent and is in love with a woman already married. George is drawn to have deep sources of patience and equanimity. He’ll need all of those reserves to not just survive but flourish in this terrific novel. Good Reading, November 2025.

Buckeye by Patrick Ryan

In this heartfelt novel from Ryan (The Dream Life of Astronauts), a V-E Day kiss between two strangers reverberates across decades. In a small town in Ohio, Cal Jenkins is unable to serve in WWII because one of his legs is two inches shorter than the other. He enters a mismatched marriage with a medium named Becky Hanover, clerks in his father-in-law’s hardware store, and fathers a child, Skip. A parallel narrative follows Margaret Anderson, who’s raised in a series of foster homes before she meets and marries Felix Salt, an aluminum factory executive who volunteers for the Navy and serves on a cargo ship in the Pacific. Margaret is in Cal’s shop when they both hear the news over the radio of Germany’s surrender, prompting them to share an impulsive kiss, after which they embark on an affair. Felix returns home, and he and Margaret have a son named Tom, who becomes friends with Skip. The secrets of these enmeshed families come out years later, as Tom protests the Vietnam War and Skip enlists in the Army. The author’s vision of small-town life is as timeless as Sherwood Anderson’s or Thornton Wilder’s and is enriched by his complex and morally conflicted characters. Filled with wit and emotion on every page, this is a stirring paean to the joys and sorrows of family. Publisher’s Weekly, July 2025

The Hitchhikers by Chevy Stevens

A 1976 road trip goes deeply awry when a vacationing husband and wife cross paths with a young couple on the lam. Having recently had a stillborn baby following three miscarriages, Seattleites Tom and Alice Bell pack up their Winnebago and head through Canada as part of their healing process. But their plans go horribly askew when, at a campsite, they meet a young Canadian couple who say their names are the hippyish Ocean and Blue, and offer to give them a ride. In reality, they’re Jenny Perron and Simon Gray, and they’re on the run from law enforcement, having left a bloody scene behind in Jenny’s home north of Vancouver, British Columbia. Alice discovers the ruse early on through a radio newscast and then a newspaper article. Unfortunately, it’s not early enough to avoid Simon’s enraged response when their true story is exposed. What follows is a road trip across the Canadian highways and backroads riven by violence, frustration, and terror. The narrative is studded with mid-’70s cultural references including humor writer Erma Bombeck, TV series Happy Days, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor “heading for another divorce,” eight-track tapes, Hamburger Helper, Jell-O, SpaghettiOs, and Pop Rocks. But the tale is even more palpably marked by the messes that Simon and Jenny leave wherever they go, with Alice and Tom perpetually in tow. In a nod to the historical timeframe, the more Alice tries to manage the erratic situation—Tom having been waylaid by a beating from Simon—the more she and Tom both realize her stay-at-home role may no longer be viable. As always, true to her modus operandi, Stevens keeps the ultimate twists firmly up her sleeve until the final pages. Stevens maintains the speed and frights in this on-the-road psychological thriller. Kirkus Reviews, August 2025.

Time Of The Child by Niall Williams

In a small Irish town, the local doctor deals with the very young, the very old, and the possibility that he’s ruined his daughter’s life. “To those who lived there, Faha was perhaps the last place on earth to expect a miracle. It had neither the history nor the geography for it. The history was remarkable for the one fact upon which all commentators agreed: nothing happened here.” Well, they are wrong about that. This sequel to Williams’ much-loved This Is Happiness (2019) is set in the same town several years later: Christmas season 1962, a period when small-town machinations of all kinds come to a head. These are presented in Williams’ signature prose style: sinuous sentences that may seem at first a bit hard to follow but in short order reveal themselves to be full of music, humor, and insight. Like the work of writers from James Joyce to Anna Burns, Williams’ novel is one of those books that teach you how to read it, ultimately staking out its own linguistic territory in your brain. As for the idea that “nothing happens here”—nothing except that 12-year-old Jude Quinlan finds an abandoned and possibly dead baby in a courtyard; the assistant priest is scheming furiously to replace his geriatric superior, who keeps wandering off, both physically and mentally; and Dr. Jack Troy, healer, brains, and backbone of Faha, fears he has made a terrible mistake. His oldest daughter, 29-year-old Ronnie, who after her mother’s death and the departure of two younger sisters still keeps house for her father and helps him run his practice, was courted by a young man named Noel Crowe. Troy shut down the relationship, thinking the boy unsuitable, but now gleans that Ronnie has been inquiring about Crowe, apparently crushed to learn he’s emigrated to the U.S. Overcome with remorse, the good doctor cooks up a daring if cockamamie plan. One need not have read the first installment to enjoy the second; reading them in the opposite order is just as good.Treat yourself to this. Kirkus Reviews, November 2024.

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HISTORICAL FICTION

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MYSTERY

Battle Mountain by C.J. Box

Unbeknownst to each other, Wyoming Fish and Game Warden Joe Pickett and outlaw falconer Nate Romanowski embark on equally urgent pursuits that converge in a way neither of them suspects. Nate, who’s been off the grid ever since his wife, Liv, was killed in a fire intended to kill him too in Three-Inch Teeth (2024), has sworn vengeance on murderous conspirator Axel Soledad. After shooting several of Soledad’s hirelings, he joins forces with his friend and fellow Special Forces vet Geronimo Jones, who’s tracked him down, to chase his quarry deep into the woods. Governor Spencer Rulon, meanwhile, has pressed Joe into service once again to find veteran hunting guide Spike Rankin and his new assistant, Mark Eisele, who just happens to be Rulon’s son-in-law. Although nobody’s heard from the men for two days, the governor doesn’t want his wife and daughter to know they’re missing, and that means not alerting the media or the local sheriff, who’s no fan of Rulon’s anyway. Readers who’ve already seen Rankin and Eisele overpowered and imprisoned by a mysterious crew they ran into while they were setting up for the elk hunting season will assume that Soledad is behind their kidnapping as well. But Box will keep everyone guessing about exactly how Soledad and the ragtag military cult he’s gathered around him plan to confront the military-industrial complex he’s persuaded them is a clear and present danger. You know you’re in for a wild ride when Joe, saying goodbye to Marybeth, his long-suffering wife, promises her, “I’ll do my job and not cross the line.” Middling for this stellar series, which makes it another must-read, preferably in one sitting. Kirkus Reviews, February 2025.

Murder by Cheesecake by Rachel Ekstrom Courage

Literary agent Courage (Nothing Bad Happens Here) kicks off a new series with this breezy whodunit featuring characters from The Golden Girls. When Rose Nylund’s niece decides to hold her wedding in Miami, the eager to please Midwesterner’s Norwegian American family descends on Florida, spiking Rose’s anxiety. Rose and her friends soon find they have bigger herring to fry, however, when hard-nosed Dorothy Zbornak is arrested at the bridal shower after a man she met through a VHS dating service is found dead with his face down in a cheesecake. Horrified, Rose enlists Southern belle Blanche and Dorothy’s mother, Sophia, to help clear Dorothy’s name, while trying to keep the wedding plans more or less on track. Courage splendidly captures the voices and mannerisms of her much-loved characters, and wisely resists the impulse to modernize the show’s 1980s Miami setting. For Golden Girls fans, this is a nostalgic delight. Publisher’s Weekly, January 2025.

There Will be Bodies by Lindsey Davis

Beneath the detritus of Mount Vesuvius lurk corpses and dark secrets. A decade after the devastating eruption in 79 C.E., veteran investigator Flavia Albia’s uncle Tullius Icilius has shrewdly obtained a promising property in remote Stabiae on the Bay of Neapolis at a bargain price. The acquisition of this fixer-upper is coincidentally a potential godsend for Flavia and her husband, Tiberius Manlius, whose building company teeters on the edge of insolvency. This property, though, requires more than the usual heroic measures, for chained to the walls inside the partially damaged villa are a number of corpses. The righteous Flavia is incensed by this clear evidence of murder, or at least inhumane and reprehensible behavior, but her outrage is met with indifference, fear, and condescension. Not one to back down from a challenge, Flavia begins an ambitious probe to excavate the truth and discovers an even more ominous tableau suggestive of murder. Her 13th adventure is arguably her most complex and layered, grounded in a momentous historical event but also touching on issues of class, misogyny, and the tensions between urban and rural communities in addition to its central mystery. It is also Flavia’s first case set outside the city of Rome, providing Davis the opportunity to exercise her considerable research skills in offering a vivid picture of the wider Empire. On the way to the intricate solution, Davis folds in several other subplots with historic roots. A detailed prefatory chart cheekily headed “Characters, mainly alive” helps immensely in keeping the tangled story and its large cast straight. Historical fiction of high quality, propelled by an intricate whodunit. Kirkus Reviews, May 2025.

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NON FICTION

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ROMANCE

It’s Probably You by Jayne Denker

Jayne Denker is the author of cute and contemporary romance novels The Rom-Com Agenda and Down on Love. She’s returned to the lovely town of Willow Cove with another sweet and swoony story to pull at the heartstrings. Gillian is happily divorced, single and loving life working as a pharmacist while tending to her beautiful home and spending time with her friends. After a string of failed attempts at online dating there’s nothing more satisfying than spending time in her garden. When Noah moves in next door to Gillian things are about to get a little more interesting. Noah is irritable, touchy, arrogant, not to mention handsome. He starts to change things in her safe haven just when Gillian is about to enter Willow Cove’s annual gardening competition. Amid their constant quarrelling they soon find themselves in a position where they might need each other more than they would have expected. It’s Probably You is a lovely cosy read that I relished from beginning to end. The slow build-up of the start made for a very pleasantly paced, entertaining and delightful story. The enemies-to-lovers theme is a great way to get a feel for the characters of Gillian and Nick and their moments and interactions with each other, which are full of laughter and repartee throughout. Highly recommended. Good Reading, January 2024.

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SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY

Sun of Blood and Ruin by Mariely Lares

Lares makes a triumphant debut with a vivid epic set in an alternate 16th-century colonial Mexico. It stars a mestiza woman known variously by her Spanish name, Leonora; her Nahua name, Tecuani; and her alter ego, Pantera, a defender of Indigenous people who is magically able to transform into a panther and draw superhuman strength from the sun. As she joins forces with an alliance of Indigenous groups calling themselves La Justicia and aiming to fight back against Spanish control, the kinetic fight scenes and deep, complex interpersonal relationships will swiftly draw readers into her world. With the Spaniards persecuting magic and dismissing “the old ways,” it’s up to Pantera to fulfill an ancient prophecy and thereby protect her people. Lares has a talent for historic detail and though there are dozens of Spanish and Nahuatl words that will likely be unfamiliar to many readers, she excels at weaving in enough context to make comprehension easy, including a helpful note on language at the beginning and a glossary at the end. The vast supporting cast is equally well integrated and easy to keep track of despite its size. Interweaving history, mythology, romance, and swashbuckling action, this is a surefire hit. Publisher’s Weekly, July 2023.

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TRAVEL

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New additions to eBooks at SMSA

eBooks & Audiobooks Help

EBOOKS

Safekeep by Yael Van Der Wouden

Van der Wouden sets her accomplished debut in the Netherlands in 1961, where WWII-era secrets about a family’s country home come to light. Isabel, who’s nearly 30 and has never been kissed, has lived alone in the house since her mother’s death years earlier. She’s close with her gay younger brother, Hendrik, but officious with their older sibling, Louis, who inherited the property. When the family moved there in 1944, the house was fully furnished, down to the dinnerware, cooking pots, and sheets. Isabel, fastidious and compulsive, fiercely protects each item, and is distressed when she unearths a shard from a missing plate in the vegetable garden. Then Louis shows up with his girlfriend, Eva, and announces she’ll be staying at the house with Isabel while Louis travels. Eva’s efforts to engage Isabel are met with rudeness and distance; Isabel resents both Eva’s friendliness with the maid and her careless messes. When more items start disappearing—a teaspoon, a letter opener, a thimble—Isabel is perplexed and suspicious, and the story takes an unexpected and dramatic turn that leads to stunning realizations about the women’s entwined history. Van der Wouden’s sensuous writing and flair for drama make this a winner. Publisher’s Weekly, March 2024.

The Duchess Deal by Tessa Dare

Dare’s delightful Girl Meets Duke series commencement unites two wounded souls in Regency England, as a duke meets his match in a seamstress. The Duke of Ashbury desperately needs an heir, and he decides to ask seamstress Emma Gladstone to be his wife after she demands payment for his former fiancé’s wedding gown. Ashbury admires Emma’s pluck and beauty, and hopes that his very businesslike offer of marriage and property will help Emma overlook his scars (which he feels are hideous) long enough to provide him with an heir. But Ashbury doesn’t anticipate Emma’s ability to stand up to him and insist that they have dinner together and converse. Emma refuses to be intimidated by Ashbury, displaying the confidence and intellectual ability to engage him in lighthearted banter. Their love scenes are both sensuous and alluring. Emma isn’t fearful of her own desires and often leaves the duke flummoxed by her willingness to show her love for him. Dare (Do You Want to Start a Scandal) perfectly crafts an ever-present romantic tension that propels the novel swiftly forward to its breathless conclusion. Publisher’s Weekly, July 2017.

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AUDIOBOOKS

The Widow’s Husband’s Secret Lie by Freida McFadden

After Alice laid her husband to rest, their seemingly perfect facade crumbled quickly. From his eight secret children to his abusive obsession with the blue/black versus white/gold dress debate, Grant was hardly flawless. Now Alice is inundated with casseroles and haunted by sightings of her supposedly dead husband. Luckily, she doesn’t need to solve his murder, because she already knows she did it, but she would like to live out her remaining guilt-ridden days in relative peace. McFadden (The Boyfriend) presents a satirical novella that pokes fun at oft-absurd domestic thrillers, especially her own. She employs every twisting trope available: unreliable narrator, secret siblings, mistaken identity, ghosts, hidden rooms, and toxic friendships, just to name a few. The many flawed characters commit an array of unspeakable crimes, from enjoying Nickelback to returning library books late. Narrator Marin Ireland’s deadpan delivery of this tongue-in-cheek tale creates an air of tension in the otherwise preposterous story, enhancing the laugh-worthy listening experience. VERDICT This audio will appeal to listeners seeking a fast-paced, farcical thriller with endless nonsensical twists. Recommended for fans of Katy Brent’s The Murder After the Night Before. Library Journal, March 2025.

The Observer Effect by Nick Jones

After the events in London, Joseph Bridgeman is beginning to feel more comfortable in his new life, but there are still unanswered questions: What is the Continuum? Who is Scarlett? And how does his sister fit into all this? When Bridgeman is contacted by the Continuum, it sends him to Paris in 1873, alongside a partner who’s not happy to be saddled with him, to save the life of a missing agent. This entry is the series’ most exciting and well-paced yet, pulling the reader along at just the right speed without making them feel jumbled. Jones formalizes the time travel mechanics he created in The Shadows of London (2021) while introducing more complexity and unknowns. He reveals more about the Continuum and Scarlett while leaving enough unanswered questions for subsequent novels. Jones has found his stride: his writing style is more assured now and he renders his characters more fully and naturally. He’s gotten better at integrating exposition without slowing down the plot. This third entry sets up a strong premise to sustain the series long term. Booklist, February 2025.

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