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Fiction A to Z October 2017
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| Little Fires Everywhere: A Novel by Celeste NgUgliness seethes under a placid suburban surface in this multilayered novel, which features two families that grow too close for comfort. It begins when itinerant artist Mia and her teenage daughter Pearl rent a Shaker Heights, Ohio, house from the Richardsons, who have four kids around Pearl's age. Three of the four become Pearl's constant companions; the fourth becomes Mia's. But it's a custody suit elsewhere in the community that threatens everything -- and calls into being the "little fires everywhere." Told backwards through time through multiple narrators, this insightful book will appeal to fans of complex family dramas like Ann Patchett's Commonwealth or Liane Moriarty's Big Little Lies. |
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In the midst of winter : a novel
by Isabel Allende
In the Midst of Winter begins with a minor traffic accident--which becomes the catalyst for an unexpected and moving love story between two people who thought they were deep into the winter of their lives. Richard Bowmaster--a 60-year-old human rights scholar--hits the car of Evelyn Ortega--a young, undocumented immigrant from Guatemala--in the middle of a snowstorm in Brooklyn. What at first seems just a small inconvenience takes an unforeseen and far more serious turn when Evelyn turns up at the professor's house seeking help. At a loss, the professor asks his tenant Lucia Maraz--a 62-year-old lecturer from Chile--for her advice. These three very different people are brought together in a mesmerizing story that moves from present-day Brooklyn to Guatemala in the recent past to 1970s Chile and Brazil, sparking the beginning of a long overdue love story between Richard and Lucia.
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| Sing, Unburied, Sing: A Novel by Jesmyn WardThis new novel from National Book Award-winning author Jesmyn Ward started getting attention long before it was published, and is already being considered for prizes of its own. A story of how the past affects the present, and of deeply entrenched racism, it is also the tale of a biracial boy and his addicted, grieving black mother and incarcerated white father. A road trip to Dad's prison kick-starts the novel, which offers deeply affecting characters, a strong sense of place (rural Mississippi), and a touch of magical realism in appearances by the dead. |
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Secrets of Cavendon
by Barbara Taylor Bradford
It's the summer of 1949, and things have run smoothly at Cavendon Hall for years, with very few quarrels, dramas, or upsets between the two families. But since the end of World War II, changes have arrived at Cavendon. A new generation is at the helm, and also at the forefront of new scandal and intrigue. With romance, betrayal, heartbreak, and possible murder threatening to tear them apart, the Inghams and Swanns will have to find a way to come together and protect each other in the face of threats they never could have predicted.ate is torn by scandal, intrigue and romantic betrayals that force the Inghams and Swanns to protect each other from unimaginable threats. By the best-selling author of Secrets from the Past
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| Something Like Happy by Eva WoodsThirty-five-year-old Annie Hebden has lost her baby, her husband, and will soon lose her mother, too. Depressed and numb, she is the antithesis of her eccentric, bubbly new friend, Polly, who wakes each morning determined to wring as much happiness out of her day as she can. Polly has challenged Annie to try one way to be happy each day for 100 days -- which may be all that Polly, who has terminal brain cancer, has left. Alternately tragic and comic, this charming, heartwarming debut set in London is "inspiration in a bottle" (Booklist), and was inspired by a social media hashtag. |
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| If I Could Turn Back Time by Beth HarbisonTomorrow is Ramie Phillips' 38th birthday, and she's celebrating on a luxury boat funded by her successful career. But a friend's pregnancy announcement reawakens doubts about her life's priorities, so when Ramie wakes up the next morning as her 18-year-old self, she decides to give life with her first love a second chance. Will that make her any happier? Only time will tell... |
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| Seconds: A Graphic Novel by Bryan Lee O'MalleyNot long after 29-year-old chef Kate makes a terrible error in the kitchen of her restaurant, she discovers the house sprite who lives there. It begrudgingly grants her the ability to retroactively fix her mistake -- but having gotten one makes Kate greedy for more "second chances," and soon her grasp on reality weakens as she changes more and more of her decisions. Written and illustrated by the author of the Scott Pilgrim series, this colorful, bold graphic novel is "hilarious" (Publishers Weekly). |
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| Landline by Rainbow RowellDeftly balancing a successful career and a wonderful family, Georgie McCool's life reaches the next level when she sells a television pilot to a network -- but it comes with a deadline that conflicts with the family's annual Christmas vacation. When she opts out in favor of working, her frustrated husband Neal takes the kids and heads to Nebraska without her. And when Georgie calls on the landline, Neal picks up. However, it's not present-day Neal she's speaking to -- it's Neal from the past, shortly before they got engaged. Handed an improbable opportunity to reexamine (and possibly alter) her past, Georgie must evaluate her life and decide what to do about her own future. |
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