by An Yu
Mysteries don't get more surreal than Sunbirth, a marvelously dreamlike novel by An Yu (Braised Pork). The setting is Five Poems Lake, a small, remote village that feels gray, "like everything had been drawn in pencil," and has been in decline for years. Among its residents are the novel's unnamed narrator, who runs the family pharmacy, and her older sister, Dong Ji, a beauty and massage specialist at a wellness center. The village has bigger problems than grayness, however. Twelve years ago, residents woke
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by Holly Jackson
A 27-year-old woman with a week to live races to solve her own murder in Holly Jackson's twisty, addictive Not Quite Dead Yet. Characterized by the same propulsive plotting as her young adult novels, Jackson's first foray into thrillers for adult readers is a stunner.
When Jet Mason returns to her family's home after the annual Halloween festival they host, she's bludgeoned from behind and left for dead. Jet wakes up in the hospital and learns that she has two choices: immediate surgery that will almost certainly
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by Ann Bausum
Ann Bausum (Ensnared in the Wolf's Lair) intends to set the record straight about the War of the Rebellion (i.e. the Civil War), its cause, and its aftermath; her nonfiction YA title White Lies guides readers through the battlefields of one of the U.S.'s most contentious periods. Bausum employs extensive research to systematically dissect and debunk the falsehoods that created the Lost Cause narrative, a story that continues to endanger lives in the United States more than 100 years later.
The book is structured
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by Kara LaReau, illus. by Ariane Moreira
The enchanting early chapter book Witchycakes #1: Sweet Magic by Kara LaReau (Rise of Zombert), with art by debut illustrator Ariane Moreira, begins with a poem: "In a village by the sea live a witch and a witch-to-be." Said "witch-to-be" is young Blue, who works alongside their Mama Moon, witch and head baker of Witchycakes.
Cerulean-haired Blue bicycles around town delivering baked goods, encountering customers who each have a unique problem in need of solving. Blue's first attempts at using their budding
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by Garrett M. Graff
Pulitzer Prize finalist Garrett M. Graff marks the 80th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb, a comprehensive and riveting historical account. Culled from a first draft of "over 1.4 million words of quotations, reports, testimony, and firsthand accounts," Graff (UFO; The Only Plane in the Sky) leaves no stone unturned in this deeply informative and thoroughly captivating read. Though much
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by Jeanne Birdsall, illus. by Matt Phelan
An 11-year-old used to taking care of herself learns to be both nurtured and nurturing in the charming, cheering middle-grade fantasy The Library of Unruly Treasures by National Book Award-winning author Jeanne Birdsall (The Penderwicks series), illustrated by Scott O'Dell Award-winner Matt Phelan (The Storm in the Barn).
Gwen MacKinnon was supposed to live with her father but, without warning, he announces he will be "separating from his current (third) wife and that Gwen's mom" will need to "keep her" until
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by Nicholas Boggs
Playwright, poet, author, and activist James Baldwin holds an unrivaled position in the history of American literature, one that biographer Nicholas Boggs thoroughly examines in Baldwin: A Love Story. As the title suggests, Boggs's work distinguishes itself from prior biographies by using Baldwin's primary romantic, platonic, artistic, and intellectual relationships as the organizing principle. Depictions of relationships, such as with his lover artist Lucien Happersberger and enduring friends like Beauford
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