Featuring Howe Library’s newest fiction books, perfect for some late summer reading. Check out our New Books shelf for this display in the Howe Library lobby.
She is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran
When Jade Nguyen arrives in Vietnam to visit her estranged father, she has one goal: survive five weeks pretending to be a happy family in the French colonial house Ba is restoring. She's always lied to fit in, so if she's straight enough, Vietnamese enough, American enough, she can get out with the college money he promised. But the house has other plans. Night after night, Jade wakes up paralyzed. The walls exude a thrumming sound while bugs leave their legs and feelers in places they don't belong. She finds curious traces of her ancestors in the gardens they once tended. And at night Jade can't ignore the ghost of the beautiful bride who leaves cryptic warnings: Don't eat. Neither Ba nor her sweet sister, Lily, believe anything strange is happening. With help from a delinquent girl, Jade tries to expose the house's rotten appetite. A home, after all, is only as powerful as those who breathe new life into its bones. And this one is determined never to be abandoned again ...
Always the Almost : a novel by Edward Underhill
Sixteen-year-old trans boy Miles Jacobson's New Year resolutions include winning back his ex-boyfriend and winning the Midwest's biggest classical piano competition, but when a new, proudly queer boy moves to town, Miles reconsiders who he was and who he is now.
The Black Queen by Jumata Emill
When Nova, Lovett High School's first black homecoming queen, is murdered the night of her coronation, her best friend, Duchess, finds an unlikely ally in her search for the killer--her prime suspect, Tinsley, the white rival nominee for queen.
Chaos & Flame by Tessa Gratton, Justina Ireland
Two unlikely allies from rival factions, Darling Seabreak and Talon Goldhoard must work together to navigate treacherous House politics and ancient magic to keep their world from falling apart.
Cool. Awkward. Black. edited by Karen Strong
A girl who believes in UFOs; a boy who might have finally found his Prince Charming; a hopeful performer who dreams of being cast in her school's production of The Sound of Music; a misunderstood magician of sorts with a power she doesn't quite understand. These plotlines and many more compose the eclectic stories found within the pages of this dynamic, exciting, and expansive collection featuring exclusively Black characters. From contemporary to historical, fantasy to sci-fi, magical to realistic, and with contributions from a powerhouse list of self-proclaimed geeks and bestselling, award-winning authors, this life-affirming anthology celebrates and redefines the many facets of Blackness and geekiness--both in the real world and those imagined.
The Davenports by Krystal Marquis
The Davenports are one of the few Black families of immense wealth and status in a changing United States, their fortune made through the entrepreneurship of William Davenport, a formerly enslaved man who founded the Davenport Carriage Company years ago. Now it's 1910, and the Davenports live surrounded by servants, crystal chandeliers, and endless parties, finding their way and finding love--even where they're not supposed to. There is Olivia, the beautiful elder Davenport daughter, ready to do her duty by getting married... until she meets the charismatic civil rights leader Washington DeWight and sparks fly. The younger daughter, Helen, is more interested in fixing cars than falling in love--unless it's with her sister's suitor. Amy-Rose, the childhood friend turned maid to the Davenport sisters, dreams of opening her own business--and marrying the one man she could never be with, Olivia and Helen's brother, John. But Olivia's best friend, Ruby, also has her sights set on John Davenport, though she can't seem to keep his interest... until family pressure has her scheming to win his heart, just as someone else wins hers.
Fake Dates and Mooncakes by Sher Lee
Dylan Tang wants to win a Mid-Autumn Festival mooncake-making competition for teen chefs--in memory of his mom, and to bring much-needed publicity to his aunt's struggling Chinese takeout in Brooklyn. Enter Theo Somers: charming, wealthy, with a smile that makes Dylan's stomach do backflips. AKA a distraction. Their worlds are sun-and-moon apart, but Theo keeps showing up. He even convinces Dylan to be his fake date at a family wedding in the Hamptons. In Theo's glittering world of pomp, privilege, and crazy rich drama, their romance is supposed to be just pretend . . . but Dylan finds himself falling for Theo. For real. Then Theo's relatives reveal their true colors--but with the mooncake contest looming, Dylan can't risk being sidetracked by rich-people problems. Can Dylan save his family's business and follow his heart--or will he fail to do both?
The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi
When COVID-19 sweeps through New York City, Jamie Gray is stuck as a dead-end driver for food delivery apps. That is, until Jamie makes a delivery to an old acquaintance, Tom, who works at what he calls "an animal rights organization." Tom's team needs a last-minute grunt to handle things on their next field visit. Jamie, eager to do anything, immediately signs on. What Tom doesn't tell Jamie is that the animals his team cares for are not here on Earth. Not our Earth, at least. In an alternate dimension, massive dinosaur-like creatures named Kaiju roam a warm and human-free world. They're the universe's largest and most dangerous panda - and they're in trouble. It's not just the Kaiju Preservation Society whose found their way to the alternate world. Others have, too. And their carelessness could cause millions back on our Earth to die.
Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher
This isn't a fairytale where the princess marries a prince. It's one where she kills him. After years of seeing her sisters suffer at the hands of an abusive prince, Marra has finally realized that no one is coming to their rescue. No one, except for Marra herself. Seeking help from a powerful gravewitch, Marra is offered the tools to kill a prince-if she can complete three impossible tasks. On her quest, Marra is joined by the gravewitch, a reluctant fairy godmother, a strapping former knight, and a chicken possessed by a demon. Together, the five of them intend to be the hand that closes around the throat of the prince and frees Marra's family and their kingdom from its tyrannous ruler at last.
A Woman's Game : The Rise, Fall, and Rise Again of Women's Soccer by Suzanne Wrack
A compelling and comprehensive history charting the rise, fall, and rise again of women's soccer. Women's soccer is a game that has so often been relegated to the margins in a world fixated on gender differences above passion and talent. It is a game that could attract 50,000 fans to a stadium in the 1920s, was later banned by England's Football Association grounds for being "unsuitable for females," and has emerged as a global force in the modern era with the US Women's National Team leading the charge. A Woman's Game traces this arc of changing attitudes, increasing professionalism, and international growth. Veteran journalist Suzanne Wrack has crafted a thoroughly reported history which pushes back at centuries of boundaries while celebrating the many wonders that women's soccer has to offer. With the enormous success of the World Cup, 82 million US viewers for the USWNT against Netherlands in the 2019 World Cup Final, enlightened and outspoken players like Megan Rapinoe helping raise the profile of the game across the world, and a fully professional top-tier league going from strength to strength in both the US and the UK, the time cannot be better for this in-depth look at the beautiful game.
The Next New Syrian Girl by Ream Shukairy
An unlikely friendship between Syrian American boxer Khadija and Syrian refugee Leene reveals the pressures and expectations of the perfect Syrian daughter and the repercussions of the Syrian Revolution both at home and abroad.
Promise Boys by Nick Brooks
The Urban Promise Prep School vows to turn boys into men. As students, J.B., Ramón, and Trey are forced to follow the prestigious program's strict rules. Extreme discipline, they've been told, is what it takes to be college bound, to avoid the fates of many men in their neighborhoods. This, the Principal Moore Method, supposedly saves lives. When Moore ends up murdered, the trio emerges as the case's prime suspects. All three maintain their innocence, and they band together to track down the real killer before they are arrested. But is the true culprit hiding among them?
Saints of the Household by Ari Tison
When brothers Max and Jay help a classmate in trouble, they struggle with the consequences of their violent actions and worry they may be more like their abusive father than they thought, so the brothers turn to their Bribri roots to find their way forward.
Spice Road by Maiya Ibrahim
When she learns that her brother is spreading the nation's secret spice magic to outsiders, sixteen-year-old Shield warrior Imani sets out on a dangerous mission to find him, discovering secrets that lie beyond the Forbidden Wastes--and in her own heart.
The Stolen Heir : A Novel of Elfhame by Holly Black
Eight years have passed since the Battle of the Serpent. In the icy north, Lady Nore of the Court of Teeth has reclaimed the Ice Needle Cathedral. She has produced a monster of stick and snow who will do her bidding-- and exact her revenge. Suren, child queen of the Court of Teeth, fled to the human world and lives in the woods. When she is chased through the streets by the hag Bogdana, Suren is saved by Prince Oak, the heir to Elfhame-- and the boy she was once promised to in marriage. He wants Suren's help on a mission-- but can she trust him?
The Deep Places : A Memoir of Illness and Discovery by Ross Douthat
In this vulnerable, insightful memoir, the New York Times columnist tells the story of his five-year struggle with a disease that officially doesn't exist, exploring the limits of modern medicine, the stories that we unexpectedly fall into, and the secrets that only suffering reveals. In the summer of 2015, Ross Douthat was moving his family, with two young daughters and a pregnant wife, from Washington, D.C., to a sprawling farmhouse in a picturesque Connecticut town when he acquired a mysterious and devastating sickness. It left him sleepless, crippled, wracked with pain--a shell of himself. After months of seeing doctors and descending deeper into a physical inferno, he discovered that he had a disease which according to CDC definitions does not actually exist: the chronic form of Lyme disease, a hotly contested condition that devastates the lives of tens of thousands of people but has no official recognition--and no medically approved cure. From a rural dream house that now felt like a prison, Douthat's search for help takes him off the map of official medicine, into territory where cranks and conspiracies abound and patients are forced to take control of their own treatment and experiment on themselves. Slowly, against his instincts and assumptions, he realizes that many of the cranks and weirdos are right, that many supposed hypochondriacs" are victims of an indifferent medical establishment, and that all kinds of unexpected experiences and revelations lurk beneath the surface of normal existence, in the places underneath. The Deep Places is a story about what happens when you are terribly sick and realize that even the doctors who are willing to treat you can only do so much. Along the way, Douthat describes his struggle back toward health with wit and candor, portraying sickness as the most terrible of gifts. It teaches you to appreciate the grace of ordinary life by taking that life away from you. It reveals the deep strangeness of the world, the possibility that the reasonable people might be wrong, and the necessity of figuring out things for yourself. And it proves, day by dreadful day, that you are stronger than you ever imagined, and that even in the depths there is always hope.
The Life of Crime : Detecting the History of Mysteries and Their Creators by Martin Edwards
The Life of Crime is the result of a lifetime of reading and enjoying all types of crime fiction, old and new, from around the world. In what will surely be regarded as his magnum opus, Martin Edwards has thrown himself undaunted into the breadth and complexity of the genre to write an authoritative - and readable - study of its development and evolution. With crime fiction being read more widely than ever around the world, and with individual authors increasingly the subject of extensive academic study, his expert distillation of more than two centuries of extraordinary books and authors - from the tales of E.T.A. Hoffmann to the novels of Patricia Cornwell - into one coherent history is an extraordinary feat and makes for compelling reading.