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Fiction A to Z October 2020
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American Dirt : Oprah's Book Club
by Jeanine Cummins
Selling two favorite books to an unexpectedly erudite drug-cartel boss, a bookstore manager is forced to flee Mexico in the wake of her journalist husband’s tell-all profile and finds her family among thousands of migrants seeking hope in America.
Reviewers say: With a story line sure to be much discussed this election year plus a film in the works American Dirt may be the don't-miss book of 2020. (Booklist)
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The Authenticity Project
by Clare Pooley
What it's about: the connections made between strangers in a London neighborhood as they make deeply personal entries in a little green notebook.
For fans of: warmhearted tales of strangers coming together over shared experiences and honest conversations, like Anne Youngson's Meet Me at the Museum or Erica Bauermeister's The School of Essential Ingredients.
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The Bear
by Andrew Krivak
What it is: a moving, fable-like tale of the last two humans on earth, long after civilization has crumbled and nature has taken over.
Read it for: the haunting descriptions of a world empty of humans; the depictions of nature in all its glory; the tender relationship between a father and his daughter; the interactions between the last girl and the bear who befriends and helps her.
Want a taste? "Without you I'd be nothing but alone, he said. And without you I'd be alone, said the girl."
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The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi DaréAdunni, a 14-year-old Nigerian girl who longs for an education, must find a way for her voice to be heard loud and clear in a world where she and other girls like her are taught to believe, through words and deeds, that they are nothing. Reviewers say: Although the problems and antagonists Adunni faces would challenge even capable adults, she defies almost everyone's expectations and not only survives but thrives. (Booklist)
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A Good Marriage
by Kimberly McCreight
Begged for help by an old friend, an overworked lawyer investigates a suspicious death in a Brooklyn brownstone before she is confronted by a close-knit circle of parents who would protect an exclusive school.
Reviewers say: McCreight fashions a plot with so many twists and turns that little is what it originally seemed, combining psychological suspense, murder investigation, and a legal thriller. (Booklist)
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The Guest List by Lucy FoleyAn expertly planned celebrity wedding between a rising television star and an ambitious magazine publisher is thrown into turmoil by petty jealousies, a college drinking game, the bride's ruined dress and an untimely murder.
Read it if: you like fictional psychological thrillers such as Kate Morton's The Lake House or Ruth Ware's The Woman in Cabin 10.
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The Jane Austen Society
by Natalie Jenner
A group of disparate bibliophiles bands together in the small English village of Chawton in the hopes of restoring the final home of Jane Austen, revealing their respective losses along the way.
Reviewers say: Readers won't need previous knowledge of Austen and her novels to enjoy this tale's slow revealing of secrets that build to a satisfying and dramatic ending, while devoted Austen fans will pore over these pages, savoring the deeper connections between the lives of Jenner's postwar characters and of Austen's creations. (Booklist)
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Lady Clementine
by Marie Benedict
The best-selling author of The Only Woman in the Room presents a historical tale inspired by the life of Clementine Churchill that traces her unflinching role in protecting the life and wartime agendas of her husband, Winston Churchill.
Reviewers say: This outstanding story deserves wide readership. Fans of historical fiction, especially set around World War II; readers who appreciate strong, intelligent female leads; or those who just want to read a compelling page-turner will enjoy this gem of a novel. (Library Journal)
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The Library of Legends
by Janie Chang
Set in 1937 China, as Japanese bombs begin falling on the city of Nanking, Hu Lian and her classmates at Minghua University, entrusted with a priceless treasure, must navigate a world of danger, betrayal and love to keep a 500-year-old collection of myths and legends safe.
Reviewers say: Chang (Dragon Springs Road) has created a lovely novel that is both joyful and lighthearted and deeply tragic as she explores a culture and people who are forced to accept that their country will never be the same following the war and the departure of the spirits that protected their land for centuries. (Library Journal)
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Mexican Gothic
by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
A reimagining of the classic gothic suspense novel follows the experiences of a courageous socialite in 1950s Mexico who is drawn into the treacherous secrets of an isolated mansion. By the author of Gods of Jade and Shadow.
Reviewers say: This original, well-paced novel from Moreno-Garcia (Gods of Jade and Shadow) has great gothic elements with a little VanderMeer creativity thrown in. (Library Journal)
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The Mirror & the Light
by Hilary Mantel
A tale inspired by the final years of Thomas Cromwell describes how after the execution of Anne Boleyn and childbed death of Queen Jane, the former blacksmith’s son orchestrates a desperate plot to fortify England and save his own life.
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The Prettiest Star
by Carter Sickels
A young, gay man who left small-town Appalachia for New York City in 1980 returns home to die six years later after contracting AIDS, in a novel about love, family and redemption from the award-winning author of The Evening Hour.
Reviewers say: The alternating narrators of Brian, Sharon, and Jess are fleshed out in all of their complexities and contradictions. This immersive, tragic book will stay with readers. (Booklist)
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Qualityland
by Marc-Uwe Kling
A U.S. release of an international best-seller imagines a country where a universal ranking system determines its citizens’ statuses, careers and romantic partners, where a machine scrapper becomes the unwitting leader of a band of misfit robots.
Reviewers say: Sharp and biting, the most implausible aspect of Kling's novel is the relative note of optimism that ends it. This is spot-on satire. (Publisher's Weekly)
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Real Life
by Brandon Taylor
Starring: biochem grad student Wallace, who is black, gay, and whose research is potentially being sabotaged.
What it's about: Wallace is not truly comfortable at his midwestern university, where all of his friends and colleagues are white and straight...including Miller, with whom he's just begun a turbulent relationship.
Reviewers say: "a sophisticated character study of someone squaring self-preservation with a duty to tolerate people who threaten it" (The New Yorker).
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The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady HendrixPatricia's hectic but predictable life is upended by a vicious attack by an elderly local, she unexpectedly bonds with a well-read neighbor who her senile mother-in-law claims to have known herself when she was a girl.
Reviewers say: The perfect mix of American Housewife, by Helen Ellis (2016); Dacre Stoker and J. D. Barker's Dracul (2018)--and a cheeky, spot-on pick for book clubs. (Booklist)
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The Talented Mr. Varg
by Alexander McCall Smith
A sequel to The Department of Sensitive Crimes finds detective Ulf Varg and his team investigating a playboy whose blackmailing case is complicated by Ulf’s brother’s questionable politics. By the author of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series.
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The Bodies in the Library
by Marty Wingate
The new curator of an exclusive first-edition library in Bath encounters resistance in her efforts to modernize, before the murder of a fan-fiction writer threatens everything she has worked to achieve. By the author of the Potting Shed series.
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Checked Out for Murder
by Allison Brook
Investigating the murder of a recently returned local who hid a tragic past, librarian Carrie Singleton, aided by library ghost Evelyn and the bushy-tailed Smoky Joe, finds her efforts complicated by her celebrity stepdad's latest production.
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