Staff Picks

If you grew up in the era when emo music exploded and ever wondered how the bands started out and later found success, this in-depth history is for you. Told exclusively through interviews with the members of the biggest bands and those who worked closely with them, this is an interesting look back at a time when wearing skinny jeans and writing heartbreaking lyrics was all the rage. Nostalgic and honest.

 

Publisher's description:

Told through interview with more than 150 people, including bands, producers, managers and fans, a music journalist offers an authoritative, impassioned and occasionally absurd account of the turn-of-the-millennium emo subculture that took over the American music scene from 1999 to 2008.

 

Born a Crime is a hilarious and heartbreaking autobiography about Trevor Noah. It tells about Trevor’s childhood, mischief, and curiosity, woven with the challenges of apartheid. He struggles with fitting in with his classmates, as well as in his family, when his stepdad comes into the picture. His resilience keeps his relationship with his mom steady and respectful throughout his life. This book was very impactful and not just about surviving in a difficult world, but about finding humor, hope, and the strength to survive the worst-case scenario.

 

Publisher's Description:

One of the comedy world's fastest-rising stars tells his wild coming of age story during the twilight of apartheid in South Africa and the tumultuous days of freedom that followed.

 

What would the world look like if the bad guy won? Kelsier has had enough of this dark world. He brings together a group of unlikely people and tries for the impossible: to overthrow the godlike villain who has been in power for centuries. Will they do it? There's only one way to find out!
 

Publisher description:

For a thousand years the ash fell and no flowers bloomed. For a thousand years the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years the Lord Ruler, the "Sliver of Infinity," reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible. Then, when hope was so long lost that not even its memory remained, a terribly scarred, heart-broken half-Skaa rediscovered it in the depths of the Lord Ruler's most hellish prison. Kelsier "snapped" and found in himself the powers of a Mistborn. A brilliant thief and natural leader, he turned his talents to the ultimate caper, with the Lord Ruler himself as the mark. Kelsier recruited the underworld's elite, the smartest and most trustworthy allomancers, each of whom shares one of his many powers, and all of whom relish a high-stakes challenge. Only then does he reveal his ultimate dream, not just the greatest heist in history, but the downfall of the divine despot. But even with the best criminal crew ever assembled, Kel's plan looks more like the ultimate long shot, until luck brings a ragged girl named Vin into his life. Like him, she's a half-Skaa orphan, but she's lived a much harsher life. Vin has learned to expect betrayal from everyone she meets, and gotten it. She will have to learn to trust, if Kel is to help her master powers of which she never dreamed. This saga dares to ask a simple question: What if the hero of prophecy fails?.

 

I loved this book! It's the story of an ambitious dragon who might be destined for evil. It seems like it's for older kids than the Wings of Fire: Original Series.

 

Publisher's description:

Long before the SandWing and the Dragonet Prophecy, Darkstalker, half NightWing and half IceWing, is hatched under the three moons--born into a divided heritage, he is destined to become the most powerful and dangerous dragon Pyrrhia will ever know, and it will take the combined efforts of a SeaWing named Fatham and a NightWing seer named Clearsight to come up with a way to save all the kingdoms from his anger.

 

 

Beautifully written and so interesting, this exploration of muscle (both physical and metaphorical) weaves together the clinical, the cultural, and the personal to describe our relationship with "the stuff that moves us." It will make you fall back in love with your own body in motion--and inspire you through the stories of others fully living that relationship.

 

Publisher’s description:

Cardiac, smooth, skeletal--these three different types of muscle in our bodies make our hearts beat; push food through our intestines, blood through our vessels, babies out the uterus; attach to our bones and allow for motion. Tsui also traces how muscles have defined beauty--and how they have distorted it--through the ages, and how they play an essential role in our physical and mental health.

 

Ever wanted to step inside your favorite book series--literally? That's what happens in this new book by the author The Dead Romantics. Eileen is feeling a bit lost in real life, so she retreats into her fave cozy read, only to end up actually living inside it in an adorable fictional town!

 

Publisher's Description:

English professor Eileen "Elsy" Merriweather feels frozen in place after her fiancé breaks up with her a week before their wedding. Thankfully, there's the promise of a "week of wine and happily ever afters" when her Super Smutty Book Club vacations together in a cabin in the Catskills. When Elsy gets lost in a storm on the way there, however, she winds up in Eloraton, the fictional small-town setting of bestseller Rachel Flowers's hit Quixotic Falls series, the romances that brought the Super Smutty Book Club together in the first place. Flowers died before she could finish the series and Eloraton is stuck at the point where she stopped writing. The owner of the local bookstore, Anderson Sinclair, is the only person aware there's anything odd about the town. He warns Elsy not to make ripples or change things, but she feels compelled to help her favorite characters find the happy endings their author planned for them.

 

Th1rteen R3asons Why is an emotional and tragic book. It portrays Clay, a sophomore in high school, who receives a box of tapes with a shocking story. When Hanna Baker’s voice pierces his heart through the tapes, he realizes that there are many reasons behind her passing, and he may be one of them. The novel doesn’t offer easy answers, which is what makes it so impactful. It is a difficult story because it brings awareness to how you should treat people. You never know what they’re going through, which is easy to forget. This book was heartbreaking, but very engaging as you follow Clay while he listens to the thirteen tapes of a girl who used to go to his school.

 

Publisher's Description:

When high school student Clay Jenkins receives a box in the mail containing thirteen cassette tapes recorded by his classmate Hannah, who committed suicide, he spends a bewildering and heartbreaking night crisscrossing their town, listening to Hannah's voice recounting the events leading up to her death.

 

This book was absolutely marvelous. The voice in the writing was captivating. I was taken into a corner of the world I knew nothing about, and was exposed to the timeless controversies of the value of money vs. the value of pride, and if voiceless people who know what's "right" are still wrong.

 

Publisher description:

Budd Schulberg's celebrated novel of the prize ring has lost none of its power since its first publication almost fifty years ago. Crowded with unforgettable characters, it is a relentless exposé of the fight racket. A modern Samson in the form of a simple Argentine peasant is ballyhooed by an unscrupulous fight promoter and his press agent -- and then betrayed and destroyed by connivers. Mr. Schulberg creates a wonderfully authentic atmosphere for this book that many critics hailed as even better than What Makes Sammy Run? The wrongs of the boxing business that the book illuminates are still with us.

 

Kids get to pilot a thrilling undersea STEM expedition in this choose-your-own-adventure-style nonfiction for young readers. Innovative, inclusive, and brimming with fascinating facts about squid and the various scientists that study them, this is a terrific pick for elementary school science lovers as well as kids who struggle to connect with traditional reading. 

 

Publisher's description:

An exciting ocean-themed choose-your-path STEM adventure for emerging readers! Take a journey to the ocean's twilight zone in Search for a Giant Squid ! An exciting mixture of action and non action, this choose-your-own-adventure-style story allows readers to take on the mantle of a teuthologist looking for a giant squid in its natural habitat. Once readers pick their submersible, pilot, and dive site, the adventure begins!

 

Dominic Salt and his three children are caretakers of Shearwater, a tiny island not far from Antarctica. Home to the world’s largest seed bank, Shearwater was once full of researchers, but with sea levels rising, the Salts are now its final inhabitants. Until, during the worst storm the island has ever seen, a woman mysteriously washes ashore. Isolation has taken its toll on the Salts, but as they nurse the woman, Rowan, back to strength, it begins to feel like she might just be what they need. Rowan, long accustomed to protecting herself, starts imagining a future where she could belong to someone again. But Rowan isn’t telling the whole truth about why she set out for Shearwater. And when she discovers sabotaged radios and a freshly dug grave, she realizes Dominic is keeping his own secrets. As the storms on Shearwater gather force, they all must decide if they can trust each other enough to protect the precious seeds in their care before it’s too late -- and if they can finally put the tragedies of the past behind them to create something new, together.

 

Publisher's description: 
McConaghy's descriptions of the remote island and shifting points of view make for an atmospheric, suspenseful read. There are ghosts on the pages, reminding us of the horrors of mass hunting and the ghosts that climate change brings about. And yet, I finished the book most struck by the love and hope found within the pages.

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