Whack Job: A History of Axe Murder

by Rachel McCarthy James

For millennia, the axe has served as a vital survival tool but also a weapon exemplifying the bloody nexus of technology and human violence, according to Rachel McCarthy James's bewitching Whack Job. "Every murder weapon has an innate interest," James says, and she claims none more so than the ubiquitous axe, the star attraction in this eclectic mix of 12 true stories of murder by hatchet. From the neolithic to the present, each story highlights a particular axe and how it exemplified the blade's evolution

Read More »

Dream for the Land

by Laekan Zea Kemp, illus. by Leo Espinosa

Dream for the Land is a moving and ultimately hopeful look at how one family in the Southwestern U.S. works and dreams of rain during a megadrought.

A child with brown skin and messy pigtails chases bunnies away from crops on her family's small farm. But this is the second batch of tomatoes that looks "withered on the vine" and the squash is being destroyed by spider mites. When a horned toad "skitters across the soil," Pá demonstrates how to catch it, kiss its head, and make a wish. The hardworking

Read More »

Everybody Wants to Rule the World Except Me

by Django Wexler

The second novel in the Dark Lord duology by Django Wexler (Ashes of the Sun) brings the battle between humans and wilders to a thrilling end. The hilarity and obscenity from the first volume (How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying) continue in Everybody Wants to Rule the World Except Me, in which plot twists, double crosses, and near-death experiences abound.

Davi, the new Dark Lord, is tasked with leading a horde of wilders (nonhuman beings whom humans love to slaughter) to attack the Kingdom. In Davi's

Read More »

The Listeners

by Maggie Stiefvater

War comes knocking at the doors of an Appalachian luxury hotel built on a mystical mountain spring in this assured, propulsive adult debut from powerhouse YA author Maggie Stiefvater (The Raven Cycle)

The morning of January 25, 1942, starts out like any other for June Hudson, mountaineer and general manager of the Avallon, a West Virginia luxury hotel. On the agenda is a ball--a demonstration that life at the hotel will remain unchanged despite the entrance of the U.S. into World War II. The Avallon attracts

Read More »

Mansion Beach

by Meg Mitchell Moore

Meg Mitchell Moore's absorbing ninth novel, Mansion Beach, exposes the darkness behind the glittering facade of a picture-postcard summer on Block Island, R.I. Through the intertwined lives of three women, Moore (The Islanders; Vacationland) delves into the strictures of class, the ache of star-crossed love, and the explosive power of secrets.

Former lawyer Nicola Carr is starting fresh with a summer internship at a marine institute. Nicola is annoyed and intrigued by loud, decadent parties at the mansion

Read More »