en-US Mon, 07 Apr 2025 16:52:46 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 207296816 The ninth volume of the multiple Eisner, Harvey, Hugo, and British Fantasy Award-winning series.

Can loyalty and love transcend a history of betrayal and blood?

Maika, Kippa, and Ren return to their own world to discover a full year has passed in their absence—and Zinn is back in the clutches of Maika’s father, the megalomaniacal Lord Doctor. From the relative safety of the pirate-controlled Spice Islands, Maika and her friends must regroup, recover, and find a way stop the Lord Doctor’s murderous rampage before he destroys the Known World.

Collects MONSTRESS #49-54]]> 192 Marjorie M. Liu 1534392610 Athena 4 4.31 2024
author: Marjorie M. Liu
name: Athena
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/07
date added: 2025/04/07
shelves:
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]]> 127282631 Following the death of her closest friend, Sloane Crosley explores multiple kinds of loss in this disarmingly witty and poignant memoir.

Grief Is for People is a deeply moving and surprisingly suspenseful portrait of friendship and a book about loss packed with verve for life. Sloane Crosley is one of our most renowned observers of contemporary behavior, and now the pathos that has been ever present in her trademark wit is on full display. After the pain and confusion of losing her closest friend to suicide, Crosley looks for answers in friends, philosophy, and art, hoping for a framework more useful than the unavoidable stages of grief.]]> 208 Sloane Crosley 0374609845 Athena 3 3.85 2024
author: Sloane Crosley
name: Athena
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/07
date added: 2025/04/07
shelves:
review:

]]> 123298150
The feast in celebration of spring is drawing near, and there’s much for Rozemyne to do. The coming weeks bring a long-overdue meeting with the lower-city merchants, more divine protections rituals, the education of the next High Bishop... and a magnificent tale told at the closed country gate. It now falls to the archducal family to overcome history and the divide between factions.

Ehrenfest’s ambitious younger generation unites in the newest volume of this biblio-fantasy. Includes two short stories and four-panel manga by You Shiina.]]> 321 Miya Kazuki 1718346484 Athena 4 2025 4.65 2020
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.65
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/06
date added: 2025/04/07
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 60374066 The #1 Indie Next Pick, in the vein of the classic��84, Charing Cross Road�����Ի���Meet Me at the Museum, this witty and tender novel follows two women in 1960s America as they discover that food really does connect us all, and that friendship and laughter are the best medicine.

When twenty-seven-year-old Joan Bergstrom sends a fan letter--as well as a gift of saffron--to fifty-nine-year-old Imogen Fortier, a life-changing friendship begins. Joan lives in Los Angeles and is just starting out as a writer for the newspaper food pages. Imogen lives on Camano Island outside Seattle, writing a monthly column for a��Pacific Northwest��magazine, and while she can hunt elk and dig for clams, she’s never tasted fresh garlic--exotic fare in the Northwest of the sixties. As the two women commune through their letters, they build a closeness that sustains them through the Cuban Missile Crisis, the assassination of President Kennedy, and the unexpected in their own lives.
��
Food and a good life—they can’t be separated. It is a discovery the women share, not only with each other, but with the men in their lives. Because of her correspondence with Joan, Imogen’s decades-long marriage blossoms into something new and exciting, and in turn, Joan learns that true love does not always come in the form we expect it to. Into this beautiful, intimate world comes the ultimate test of Joan and Imogen’s friendship—a test that summons their unconditional trust in each other.
��
A brief respite from our chaotic world,��Love & Saffron��is a gem of a novel, a reminder that food and friendship are the antidote to most any heartache, and that human connection will always be worth creating.

]]> 4 Kim Fay Athena 4 2025 4.13 2022
author: Kim Fay
name: Athena
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/05
date added: 2025/04/05
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 228410840 🎧Listening Length = 5 hours and 35 minutes

John Green, the #1 bestselling author of The Anthropocene Reviewed and a passionate advocate for global healthcare reform, tells a deeply human story illuminating the fight against the world’s deadliest infectious disease.

Tuberculosis has been entwined with hu­manity for millennia. Once romanticized as a malady of poets, today tuberculosis is seen as a disease of poverty that walks the trails of injustice and inequity we blazed for it.

In 2019, author John Green met Henry Reider, a young tuberculosis patient at Lakka Government Hospital in Sierra Leone. John be­came fast friends with Henry, a boy with spindly legs and a big, goofy smile. In the years since that first visit to Lakka, Green has become a vocal advocate for increased access to treatment and wider awareness of the healthcare inequi­ties that allow this curable, preventable infec­tious disease to also be the deadliest, killing over a million people every year.

In Everything Is Tuberculosis, John tells Henry’s story, woven through with the scientific and social histories of how tuberculosis has shaped our world—and how our choices will shape the future of tuberculosis.

©2025 John Green 🅿2025 Listening Library]]> John Green Athena 5 2025 4.53 2025
author: John Green
name: Athena
average rating: 4.53
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/04
date added: 2025/04/05
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 218554737
Aboard are the heirs of the twelve provinces of Concordia, each graced with a unique and secret magical ability known as a Blessing.

Except Ganymedes Piscero - class clown, slacker, and all-round disappointment.

When a beloved heir is murdered, everyone is a suspect. Stuck at sea and surrounded by powerful people without a Blessing to protect him, odds of survival are slim.

But as the bodies pile higher, Ganymedes must become the hero he was not born to be. Can he unmask the killer and their blessing before this bloody crusade reaches the shores of Concordia?

Or will the empire as he knows it fall?]]> 464 Frances White 0778387909 Athena 0 to-read 3.20 2024
author: Frances White
name: Athena
average rating: 3.20
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 57062743 A deeply moving and insightful collection of personal essays from #1 bestselling author John Green, adapted from his critically acclaimed podcast.


The Anthropocene is the current geological age, in which human activity has profoundly shaped the planet and its biodiversity. In this remarkable symphony of essays adapted and expanded from his groundbreaking podcast, John Green reviews different facets of the human-centered planet--from the QWERTY keyboard and Staphylococcus aureus to the Taco Bell breakfast menu--on a five-star scale.

Complex and rich with detail, the Anthropocene's reviews have been praised as "observations that double as exercises in memoiristic empathy." John Green's gift for storytelling shines throughout this artfully curated collection that includes both beloved essays and all-new pieces exclusive to the book.

Narrated by the author.]]> 10 John Green 0593408535 Athena 5 2022, audiobooks, essays 4.42 2021
author: John Green
name: Athena
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2022/07/07
date added: 2025/04/04
shelves: 2022, audiobooks, essays
review:

]]> 88563329 As the end of the school term draws near, so too does a long-awaited reunion. Ferdinand is due to spend the night of the Interduchy Tournament in Ehrenfest’s tea party room, and as Rozemyne struggles to keep her emotions under control, she makes an unwavering declaration: “I will do everything in my power to welcome him!��
Rozemyne’s book-driven rampage continues and events happen back-to-back in the newest volume of this biblio-fantasy. Includes two short stories and four-panel manga by You Shiina.]]> 291 Miya Kazuki 1718346468 Athena 4 2025 4.71 2020
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.71
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/03
date added: 2025/04/03
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 205761310 A teen social media star learns he can’t control everything in this delicious, queer graphic novel adaptation that relocates Jane Austen’s Emma to a modern-day high school in Queens, New York.

Evan Horowitz has it beauty, brains, and a not-so-secret flair for matchmaking! An Insta influencer with a talent for makeup and a taste for romance, he’s no stranger to playing cupid for those hopelessly clueless in finding love.

So when shy transfer student Natalia shuffles into school one day, Evan can’t help but get his hands messy! With so many matches to choose from, it’s not long before he sets a plan in motion for Natalia—much against the better judgement of his level-headed best friend, Davi.

But he takes things too far, creating a web of drama that spirals out of his control. Can Evan learn to put the people closest to him before his misguided ambition? Or will he lose them and his own chance at romance, too?��]]> 264 Anne Camlin 0316704105 Athena 3 2025 3.64 2024
author: Anne Camlin
name: Athena
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/03
date added: 2025/04/03
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 58476152 Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century, the strange is made familiar and the familiar strange, such that a girl growing wings on her legs feels like an ordinary rite of passage, while a bug-infested house becomes an impossible, Kafkaesque nightmare. Each story builds a new world all its own: a group of children steal a haunted doll; a runaway bride encounters a sea monster; a vendor sells toy boxes that seemingly control the passage of time; an insomniac is seduced by the Sandman. These visions of modern life wrestle with themes of death and technological consequence, guilt and sexuality, and unmask the contradictions that exist within all of us.����

Mesmerizing, electric, and wholly original, Kim Fu’s Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century blurs the boundaries of the real and fantastic, offering intricate and surprising insights into human nature.]]> 232 Kim Fu 1951142993 Athena 0 currently-reading 3.84 2022
author: Kim Fu
name: Athena
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/03
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> 63338745 Rozemyne’s hand in marriage hangs in the balance in the newest volume of this biblio-fantasy. Includes two short stories and four-panel manga by You Shiina.]]> 365 Miya Kazuki 1718346441 Athena 5 4.75 2020
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.75
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/02
date added: 2025/04/02
shelves:
review:

]]> 228478864
A moving and fascinating meditation on freedom, trust, loss, and our relationship with the natural world, explored through the story of one woman’s unlikely friendship with a wild hare.

Imagine you could hold a baby hare and bottle-feed it. Imagine that it lived under your roof and lolloped around your bedroom at night, drumming on the duvet cover when it wanted your attention. Imagine that, over two years later, it still ran in from the fields when you called it and slept in your house for hours on end and gave birth to leverets in your study. For political advisor and speechwriter Chloe Dalton, who spent lockdown deep in the English countryside, far away from her usual busy London life, this became her unexpected reality.

In February 2021, Dalton stumbles upon a newborn hare—a leveret—that had been chased by a dog. Fearing for its life, she brings it home, only to discover how impossible it is to rear a wild hare, most of whom perish in captivity from either shock or starvation. Through trial and error, she learns to feed and care for the leveret with every intention of returning it to the wilderness. Instead, it becomes her constant companion, wandering the fields and woods at night and returning to Dalton’s house by day. Though Dalton feared that the hare would be preyed upon by foxes, stoats, feral cats, raptors, and even people, she never tried to restrict it to the house. Each time the hare leaves, Chloe knows she may never see it again. Yet she also understands that to confine it would be its own kind of death.

Raising Hare chronicles their journey together, while also taking a deep dive into the lives and nature of hares, and the way they have been viewed historically in art, literature, and folklore. We witness first-hand the joy at this extraordinary relationship between human and animal, which serves as a reminder that the best things, and most beautiful experiences, arise when we least expect them.

*This audiobook includes a bonus conversation between the author and narrator, available in audio only.

“A beautiful book that makes you think profoundly about how we so often tune out the natural world around us. Chloe Dalton is a tender, curious, wise, mind-expanding guide, connecting readers with the wild we humans once knew so well. I will be recommending this to everyone.��—Matt Haig, author of The Midnight Library ]]> 7 Chloe Dalton Athena 5 2025, biographies-memoirs 4.28 2025
author: Chloe Dalton
name: Athena
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/02
date added: 2025/04/02
shelves: 2025, biographies-memoirs
review:

]]> 62967232 Meanwhile, Rozemyne throws herself into her third year at the Royal Academy, trying to stave off the loneliness eating away at her. She pushes to win over the students of the former Veronica faction, hoping to save their lives, and meets a new archnoble librarian sent from the Sovereignty.
Rozemyne also attends her first class of the archduke candidate course—though her personal ambitions mean she is taking the scholar course as well. In the midst of this balancing act, she finds that her environment has changed drastically once again!
Here begins Part 5, the final chapter of this biblio-fantasy—and the legend of the saint grips Yurgenschmidt to the core! Includes two short stories and four-panel manga by You Shiina.]]> 400 Miya Kazuki 1718346425 Athena 5 2025 4.67 2020
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/01
date added: 2025/04/01
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 36436554 Roddy Doyle Athena 3 2025 3.40 1993
author: Roddy Doyle
name: Athena
average rating: 3.40
book published: 1993
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/31
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 61961591 As a farewell gift, Rozemyne treats Ferdinand and their retainers to a meal at the Italian restaurant. Dark clouds loom overhead, however, and an unexpected incident threatens to separate the pair even sooner than expected. Rozemyne can only fight back the tears as she utters a prayer for Ferdinand, blessing him one last time.
Part 4 of this biblio-fantasy concludes with this volume! Also includes a collection of short stories, three of which were written for this release, as a prelude to Part 5, as well as You Shiina’s classic four-panel manga!]]> 351 Miya Kazuki 1718346409 Athena 4 2025 4.75 2019
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.75
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/31
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 204016485
Making sure you get your rightful share in a family of five siblings is never easy. Everything must be carefully calculated and precisely measured to make sure no one misses out. How We Share Cake is a hilarious exploration of the timeless struggle for fairness and justice among brothers and sisters. This delightful story captures the very essence of family dynamics.]]> 52 Kim Hyo-eun 1957363851 Athena 4 2025 4.24
author: Kim Hyo-eun
name: Athena
average rating: 4.24
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/30
date added: 2025/03/30
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 61285003 “I should have died before my baptism.��
The secrets about his birth, his final promise with his father, and a bitter choice... How will Ferdinand respond when the very future of Ehrenfest rests on his shoulders? Find out in the newest volume of this biblio-fantasy, which includes two short stories and four-panel manga by You Shiina.]]> 359 Miya Kazuki 1718346387 Athena 4 2025 4.65 2019
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.65
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/30
date added: 2025/03/30
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 58912891
But someone does. An unexpected message arrives, begging her to travel to the remote and mysterious Nowhere House to teach three young witches how to control their magic. It breaks all of the rules, but Mika goes anyway, and is immediately tangled up in the lives and secrets of not only her three charges, but also an absent archaeologist, a retired actor, two long-suffering caretakers, and…Jamie. The handsome and prickly librarian of Nowhere House would do anything to protect the children, and as far as he’s concerned, a stranger like Mika is a threat. An irritatingly appealing threat.

As Mika begins to find her place at Nowhere House, the thought of belonging somewhere begins to feel like a real possibility. But magic isn't the only danger in the world, and when peril comes knocking at their door, Mika will need to decide whether to risk everything to protect a found family she didn’t know she was looking for....]]> 334 Sangu Mandanna Athena 4 2025 4.16 2022
author: Sangu Mandanna
name: Athena
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/29
date added: 2025/03/29
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 200414530 7 Sari Solden Athena 3 2025 3.53 2019
author: Sari Solden
name: Athena
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 43847257
Next Steps is an intermediate course, for nonbeginners, which follows on from the Complete French Beginner's course.

Building on your existing knowledge, Next Steps is designed to teach you the essential tenses and grammar you need to independently construct sentences in a simple and logical manner.

This is the perfect audio course for those looking to develop their French and further their fluency, containing the complete eight hours of audio and a handy downloadable booklet to help you revise and reinforce your learning.]]> Paul Noble Athena 4 2025, french 4.41
author: Paul Noble
name: Athena
average rating: 4.41
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: 2025, french
review:

]]> 221674943
Why is Miami…Miami? What does the heartbreaking fate of the cheetah tell us about the way we raise our children? Why do Ivy League schools care so much about sports? What is the Magic Third, and what does it mean for racial harmony? In this provocative new work, Malcolm Gladwell returns for the first time in twenty-five years to the subject of social epidemics and tipping points, this time with the aim of explaining the dark side of contagious phenomena.

Through a series of riveting stories, Gladwell traces the rise of a new and troubling form of social engineering. He takes us to the streets of Los Angeles to meet the world’s most successful bank robbers, rediscovers a forgotten television show from the 1970s that changed the world, visits the site of a historic experiment on a tiny cul-de-sac in northern California, and explore an alternate history of two of the biggest epidemics of our day: COVID and the opioid crisis.

Revenge of the Tipping Point is Gladwell's most personal book yet. With his characteristic mix of storytelling and social science, he offers a guide to making sense of the contagions of the modern world. It's time we took tipping points seriously.

Read by the author.]]> 9 Malcolm Gladwell 1668643332 Athena 3 2025 3.94 2024
author: Malcolm Gladwell
name: Athena
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/26
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 60765695 Rozemyne’s second year at the Royal Academy draws to a close with interrogation and investigations, which she must face on top of a resolute apprentice who wishes to swear his name to her. Things only become more complicated when she attends the Interduchy Tournament for the first time, and a grave development causes more trouble than ever expected. Can she and Ferdinand manage the chaos so soon before the graduation ceremony?]]> 365 Miya Kazuki Athena 5 2025 4.72 2019
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.72
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/23
date added: 2025/03/24
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 60393166
Somehow, Rozemyne manages to cause even more problems, and in quicker succession than the year before. She spends more time with the professors, the archduke candidates from top-ranking duchies, and even the Sovereignty’s third prince, much to her guardians�� displeasure. But as they agonize over interduchy diplomacy, Rozemyne blazes ahead on her own path. She charges forward with unbending focus and even hunts a ternisbefallen feybeast that shows up in Ehrenfest’s gathering spot!]]> 350 Miya Kazuki 1718346344 Athena 5 2025 4.72 2019
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.72
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/23
date added: 2025/03/24
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 173403935 A hilariously honest, heartwarming essay collection about life, love, and discovering you have ADHD at age 35
��
Despite being a published writer with a family, a gaggle of internet fans, and (most shockingly) a mortgage,��Emily Farris��could never get her act together. As she saw it, disorganization was one of her countless character flaws—that is, until she was diagnosed with ADHD at age 35. Like many women and girls who go undiagnosed, Farris grew up internalizing criticisms about her impulsivity and lack of follow-through. She held on to that shame as she tried (and often failed) to fit into a world designed for neurotypical brains.
��
I'll Just Be Five More Minutes��is a personal essay collection of laugh-out-loud funny, tear-jerking, and at times cringe-worthy true stories of Farris's experiences as a neurodivergent woman. With the newfound knowledge of her ADHD, Farris candidly reexamines her complicated relationships (including one with a celebrity stalker), her money problems, the years she spent unknowingly self-medicating, and her hyper-fixations.��
��
I'll Just Be Five More Minutes is a powerful collection of deeply relatable, wide-ranging stories about a woman's right to control her own body, about overwhelm and oversharing, about drinking too much and sleeping too little, and about being misunderstood by the people closest to you. At its heart, it's about not quite fitting in and not understanding why.]]> 304 Emily Farris 0306830310 Athena 0 dnf 3.57 2024
author: Emily Farris
name: Athena
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/23
shelves: dnf
review:

]]> 61296477
This new side series explores Rozemyne’s time at the Royal Academy from a variety of new perspectives! In this particular volume, there are stories from the first-year archduke candidates Wilfried, Hannelore, and Ortwin, Rozemyne’s retainers, other Ehrenfest students, and even dormitory supervisors. Events previously untold come to life in these pages!

Delve back into Rozemyne’s first year in this recollective volume of your favorite biblio-fantasy, comprising eighteen short stories in total. Also includes four-panel manga by You Shiina!]]> 268 Miya Kazuki 1718346727 Athena 4 2025 4.55 2018
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/22
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 150351878 Sue Lynn Tan’s highly acclaimed, bestselling Celestial Kingdom duology is expanded with this new compilation of stories from before, during, and after the events in Daughter of the Moon Goddess and Heart of the Sun Warrior, all from the perspectives of beloved characters and illustrated by Kelly Chong.

Return to the Immortal Realm, a world of gods, magic, and legendary creatures—and embark upon new adventures of valor, danger, and love.

Tales from the Celestial Kingdom collects nine spellbinding stories—two previously published, seven original, including the epilogue to the duology—set in the enchanting world of Sue Lynn Tan’s stunning debut. Filled with magic and mythology, friendship and love, these stories intertwine through the past, present, and future of the two novels, told from the perspectives of multiple characters, including Chang’e, Shuxiao, Liwei, and Wenzhi.

With beautiful illustrations from Kelly Chong throughout, these wondrous tales make the perfect complement to Sue Lynn Tan’s breathtaking series.]]> 153 Sue Lynn Tan 0063326698 Athena 5 2025, from-tbr-2025 4.08 2024
author: Sue Lynn Tan
name: Athena
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/22
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 30318615
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi’s transformation from a naïve medical student “possessed,�� as he wrote, “by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life�� into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.

What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir.

Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,�� he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’�� When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.

Source: booksontape.com]]> 228 Paul Kalanithi Athena 4 2025, from-tbr-2025 4.20 2016
author: Paul Kalanithi
name: Athena
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/20
date added: 2025/03/21
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 57239489
Her joy leads to a flurry of activity as she pours her all into advancing the paper-making industry and gathering more support, all so that she can create a world with more books for her to read. As the High Bishop, she eventually has to travel through the Central District for the Harvest Festival, and in the midst of all this, she even gets her first little sister.

But as everyone prepares for winter, the political struggle between nobles intensifies. Their plots sow discord within the temple, and what happens next will change Rozemyne’s future forever...

Shocking developments abound in this climactic conclusion to Part 3! This volume ends with a series of short stories leading into Part 4, alongside the now familiar four-panel manga drawn by You Shiina!]]> 326 Miya Kazuki 1718346220 Athena 5 2025 4.67 2017
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/09
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 217163829 #1��New York Times��bestselling author Fredrik Backman returns with an unforgettably funny, deeply moving tale of four teenagers whose friendship creates a bond so powerful that it changes a stranger’s life twenty-five years later.

Most people don’t even notice them—three tiny figures sitting at the end of a long pier in the corner of one of the most famous paintings in the world. Most people think it’s just a depiction of the sea. But Louisa, an artist herself, knows otherwise and she is determined to find out the story of these three enigmatic figures.

Twenty-five years earlier, in a distant town, a group of teenagers find refuge from their difficult home lives by spending their days laughing and telling stories out on a pier. There’s Joar, who never backs down from a fight; quiet and bookish Ted who is mourning his father; Ali, the daughter of a man who never stays in one place for long; and finally, there’s the artist, a boy who hoards sleeping pills and shuns attention, but who possesses an extraordinary gift that might be his ticket to a better life. These four lost souls find in each other a reason to get up each morning, a reason to dream.

Out of that summer emerges a transcendent work of art, a painting that will unexpectedly be put into eighteen-year-old Louisa’s care. As she struggles to decide what to do with this bequest, she embarks on a surprise-filled cross-country journey to learn the story of how the painting came to be. The closer she gets to the painting’s birthplace, the more she feels compelled to unleash her own artistic spirit, but happy endings don’t always take the form we expect in this fresh testament to the transformative power of friendship and art.]]> 448 Fredrik Backman 1982121653 Athena 0 to-read 4.00 2025
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Athena
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 203796571 In a wise and magical follow-up to The Puppets of Spelhorst, Kate DiCamillo revisits the land of Norendy, where tales swirl within tales—and every moment is a story in the making.

At the Hotel Balzaar, Marta’s mother rises before the sun, puts on her uniform, and instructs Marta to roam as she will but quietly, invisibly—like a little mouse. While her mother cleans rooms, Marta slips down the back staircase to the grand lobby to chat with the bellman, study the painting of an angel’s wing over the fireplace, and watch a cat chase a mouse around the face of the grandfather clock, all the while dreaming of the return of her soldier father, who has gone missing. One day, a mysterious countess with a parrot checks in, promising a story—in fact, seven stories in all, each to be told in its proper order. As the stories unfold, Marta begins to wonder: could the secret to her father’s disappearance lie in the countess’s tales? Book two in a trio of novellas bound by place and mood—with elegant line art by Júlia Sardà��The Hotel Balzaar masterfully juggles yearning and belief, shining light into every dark corner.]]> 160 Kate DiCamillo 153622331X Athena 5 2025 4.27 2024
author: Kate DiCamillo
name: Athena
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/18
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 59800470 Not everything is quite so straightforward, however—a normal wedding is enshrouded in complex interduchy politics, and as Rozemyne prepares for her second year in the Royal Academy, she finds herself needing to stay on guard against the rebellious former Veronica faction.]]> 356 Miya Kazuki 1718346328 Athena 4 2025 4.64 2018
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.64
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/17
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 144738092 "Orenstein is such a breezy, funny writer, it's easy to forget she's an important thinker too."--People

In this lively, funny memoir, Peggy Orenstein sets out to make a sweater from scratch--shearing, spinning, dyeing wool--and in the process discovers how we find our deepest selves through craft. Orenstein spins a yarn that will appeal to everyone.

The Covid pandemic propelled many people to change their lives in ways large and small. Some adopted puppies. Others stress-baked. Peggy Orenstein, a lifelong knitter, went just a little further. To keep herself engaged and cope with a series of seismic shifts in family life, she set out to make a garment from scratch: learning to shear sheep, spin and dye yarn, then knitting herself a sweater.

Orenstein hoped the project would help her process not just wool but her grief over the recent death of her mother and the decline of her dad, the impending departure of her college-bound daughter, and other thorny issues of aging as a woman in a culture that by turns ignores and disdains them. What she didn't expect was a journey into some of the major issues of our time: climate anxiety, racial justice, women's rights, the impact of technology, sustainability, and, ultimately, the meaning of home.

With her wry voice, sharp intelligence, and exuberant honesty, Orenstein shares her year-long journey as daughter, wife, mother, writer, and maker--and teaches us all something about creativity and connection.]]> 6 Peggy Orenstein 006308175X Athena 4 2025 3.74 2023
author: Peggy Orenstein
name: Athena
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/17
date added: 2025/03/17
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 59355876 344 Miya Kazuki 1718346301 Athena 4 2025 4.65 2018
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.65
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/17
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 58448027 Rozemyne finally clashes with the greater duchy Dunkelfelger over Schwartz and Weiss, and a game of treasure-stealing ditter is arranged between the two duchies�� apprentice knights. To make matters worse, she completely ignores proper diplomacy, accepting furtive consultations from the archduke candidates of other duchies and even giving the prince himself romantic advice! Her complete lack of foresight leaves the leaders of Ehrenfest in constant cranial agony.]]> 368 Miya Kazuki 1718346263 Athena 5 2025 4.71 2018
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.71
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/15
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 58873741 Even as winter starts drawing to a close, Rozemyne’s world continues to change. The conclusion to her first year in the Royal Academy sees her forced into a tea party with all the other duchies, and the sixth-years among her retainers prepare to graduate. Discussions even begin to focus on Rozemyne’s future engagement, which will one day play a crucial role in the growth of the duchy.]]> 373 Miya Kazuki 171834628X Athena 5 2025 4.69 2018
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.69
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/15
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 57905624 401 Miya Kazuki 1718346247 Athena 5 2025 4.70 2017
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.70
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/13
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 50541721
Twenty thousand years ago, women were making and wearing the first clothing created from spun fibers. In fact, right up to the Industrial Revolution the fiber arts were an enormous economic force, belonging primarily to women.

Despite the great toil required in making cloth and clothing, most books on ancient history and economics have no information on them. Much of this gap results from the extreme perishability of what women produced, but it seems clear that until now descriptions of prehistoric and early historic cultures have omitted virtually half the picture.

Elizabeth Wayland Barber has drawn from data gathered by the most sophisticated newer archaeological methods - methods she herself helped to fashion. In a "brilliantly original book" (Katha Pollitt, Washington Post Book World), she argues that women were a powerful economic force in the ancient world, with their own industry: fabric.

©1994 Elizabeth Wayland Barber (P)2019 Tantor]]> Elizabeth Wayland Barber Athena 0 to-read 3.91 1994
author: Elizabeth Wayland Barber
name: Athena
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1994
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 21470677 144 Hubert 1561638943 Athena 4 2025 3.96 2014
author: Hubert
name: Athena
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/13
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 63836890 Length: 5 hours and 28 minutes

From the New Yorker staff writer Hua Hsu, a gripping memoir on friendship, grief, the search for self, and the solace that can be found through art.

In the eyes of eighteen-year-old Hua Hsu, the problem with Ken--with his passion for Dave Matthews, Abercrombie & Fitch, and his fraternity--is that he is exactly like everyone else. Ken, whose Japanese American family has been in the United States for generations, is mainstream; for Hua, the son of Taiwanese immigrants, who makes 'zines and haunts Bay Area record shops, Ken represents all that he defines himself in opposition to. The only thing Hua and Ken have in common is that, however they engage with it, American culture doesn't seem to have a place for either of them.

But despite his first impressions, Hua and Ken become friends, a friendship built on late-night conversations over cigarettes, long drives along the California coast, and the textbook successes and humiliations of everyday college life. And then violently, senselessly, Ken is gone, killed in a carjacking, not even three years after the day they first meet.

Determined to hold on to all that was left of one of his closest friends--his memories--Hua turned to writing. Stay True is the book he's been working on ever since. A coming-of-age story that details both the ordinary and extraordinary, Stay True is a bracing memoir about growing up, and about moving through the world in search of meaning and belonging.]]> Hua Hsu Athena 4 2025 3.69 2022
author: Hua Hsu
name: Athena
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/11
date added: 2025/03/11
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 193953447 Live, laugh, shed blood. Dexter meets Richard Scarry’s Busy, Busy Town in this twisted debut graphic novel.

Don’t murder the locals—this is small-town serial killer, upstanding citizen, and adorable brown bear Samantha Strong’s cardinal rule. A sea of potential victims is in the city just beyond the forest, but when you’ve worked as hard as Sam to build a cozy life and a thriving business in a community surrounded by friendly fellow animal folk, warm decor, and the aroma of cedar trees and freshly baked apple pie, the last thing you want is to disturb the peace. So imagine Sam's indignation when one of Woodbrook’s own meets a grisly, mysterious demise. You wouldn’t blame her for doing anything it takes to hunt down her rival before the town self-destructs and Sheriff Patterson starts barking up the wrong tree.]]> 29 Patrick Horvath Athena 4 2025 4.36 2024
author: Patrick Horvath
name: Athena
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/10
date added: 2025/03/10
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 179517582 28 Joy Cowley 1776575563 Athena 5 2025 3.93
author: Joy Cowley
name: Athena
average rating: 3.93
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/10
date added: 2025/03/10
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 125645027 32 Maggie Smith 006321458X Athena 5 2025 4.12
author: Maggie Smith
name: Athena
average rating: 4.12
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/10
date added: 2025/03/10
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 218366592
In Japan, cats are a symbol of good luck. As the myth goes, if you are kind to them, they’ll one day return the favor. And if you are kind to the right cat, you might just find yourself invited to a mysterious coffee shop under a glittering Kyoto moon.

This particular coffee shop is like no other. It has no fixed location, no fixed hours, and it seemingly appears at random.

It’s also run by talking cats.

While customers at the Full Moon Coffee Shop partake in cakes and coffees and teas, the cats also consult their star charts, offering cryptic wisdom, and letting them know where their lives veered off course.

Every person who visits the shop has been feeling more than a little lost. For a down-on-her-luck screenwriter, a romantically stuck movie director, a hopeful hairstylist, and a technologically challenged website designer, the coffee shop’s feline guides will set them back on their fated paths. For there is a very special reason the shop appeared to each of them…]]> 5 Mai Mochizuki Athena 3 2025 3.45 2020
author: Mai Mochizuki
name: Athena
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/10
date added: 2025/03/10
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 59826557
Her father forbade hospitals, so Tara never saw a doctor or nurse. Gashes and concussions, even burns from explosions, were all treated at home with herbalism. The family was so isolated from mainstream society that there was no one to ensure the children received an education and no one to intervene when one of Tara's older brothers became violent.

Then, lacking any formal education, Tara began to educate herself. She taught herself enough mathematics and grammar to be admitted to Brigham Young University, where she studied history, learning for the first time about important world events like the Holocaust and the civil rights movement. Her quest for knowledge transformed her, taking her over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge. Only then would she wonder if she'd traveled too far, if there was still a way home.

Educated is an account of the struggle for self-invention. It is a tale of fierce family loyalty and of the grief that comes with severing the closest of ties. With the acute insight that distinguishes all great writers, Westover has crafted a universal coming-of-age story that gets to the heart of what an education is and what it offers: the perspective to see one's life through new eyes and the will to change it.]]> 336 Tara Westover 0399590528 Athena 5 2025, from-tbr-2025 4.47 2018
author: Tara Westover
name: Athena
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/04
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 51791252
Weaving together multiple strands and generations of this family, from the Deep South to California, from the 1950s to the 1990s, Brit Bennett produces a story that is at once a riveting, emotional family story and a brilliant exploration of the American history of passing. Looking well beyond issues of race, The Vanishing Half considers the lasting influence of the past as it shapes a person's decisions, desires, and expectations, and explores some of the multiple reasons and realms in which people sometimes feel pulled to live as something other than their origins.]]> 343 Brit Bennett 0525536299 Athena 4 2025, from-tbr-2025 4.12 2020
author: Brit Bennett
name: Athena
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/07
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 209439541 Endless night befalls a sleepy seaside town, leaving it to young Madeline Tock to save her community from a threat known only as the Night Mother . . .

The moon is stuck like a broken clock in the midnight sky, the sun a distant memory. No one in this quiet seaside town can remember how long this unnatural darkness has lasted. No one, that is, except for the curious girl who lives in the graveyard, caring for the dead: twelve-year-old Madeline Tock. In gratitude, the departed whisper their worries to her, sounding just like her overprotective but loving father: beware this endless night and she who causes it.

Because there’s someone else who can hear the whispers, too . . . someone whose gown is a map of the cosmos, hair a tangled constellation, eyes like the lights of faraway stars. The Night Mother. Her elemental duty is to gather the souls of the dead in her lantern, then send them to their eternal rest as beautiful moonlight. But when her hunger for power drives her to take souls from the living, Madeline bravely stands up to defend her town and those she loves. Can Madeline help bring back the sun, or will she be lured by the starry promises of this mysterious woman?

Written by Jeremy Lambert (Doom Patrol, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Goosebumps) and richly illustrated by Alexa Sharpe (Lumberjanes, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Uncanny Magazine), The Night Mother is a lush gothic tale perfect for readers of all ages who relish in the wonder of the night sky.]]> 88 Jeremy Lambert 1637154941 Athena 4 2025 3.74
author: Jeremy Lambert
name: Athena
average rating: 3.74
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/06
date added: 2025/03/06
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 56326460
The improved printing press is finally completed in the temple workshop, and the variety of available books is steadily beginning to expand. Picture books, collections of sheet music, knight stories—all are now being sold.

Their first aim is to further develop the paper-making industry in preparation for the spread of printing across the entire duchy. To this end, Rozemyne's party travels to Illgner, hoping to teach them how to make paper while also researching new materials to use.

As the environment around Rozemyne slowly improves, the archduke's older sister arrives for a visit, shrouding Ehrenfest in an air of unease.

Everything changes in this volume of this biblio-fantasy as nobles emotionally clash and the conclusion of Part 3 approaches!]]> 310 Miya Kazuki 1718346204 Athena 4 2025 4.63 2017
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.63
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/05
date added: 2025/03/06
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 211639584 0 Suzuka 1718338287 Athena 4 2025 4.56 2023
author: Suzuka
name: Athena
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/04
date added: 2025/03/04
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 205307705 The heroic tale��of a tiny dragon with a heart of gold and a taste for baked treats! A scrumptious picture book for fans of funny fairytales and fantastic beasts.

Ember has always been different from the other dragons. His fearsome roar sounds more like a polite sneeze, and when he breathes fire, the villagers just pat his head and say awwww.

Ember fears he’ll never collect a respectable hoard of gold until a chance encounter with a baker causes his fortunes to turn (and his stomach to grumble). As the little dragon soon discovers, the gold you make is way better than the gold you steal—and gold that is shared? That’s best of all.

Magic shimmers on every page of author-illustrator Devin Elle Kurtz's��feel-good story that celebrates baked goods, dragons, and generosity in equal measure. Filled with adorable illustrations, this is a perfect read aloud for bedtime or brunchtime!]]> 42 Devin Elle Kurtz 0593710967 Athena 5 4.51 2024
author: Devin Elle Kurtz
name: Athena
average rating: 4.51
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/03
date added: 2025/03/03
shelves: 2025, children-and-middle-grade
review:

]]> 18636916 Song of the Water Boatman, Dark Emperor and Other Poems of the Night), discover how animals stay alive in the wintertime and learn about their secret lives happening under the snow. Paired with stunning linoleum print illustrations by Rick Allen, that celebrate nature's beauty and power.
]]> 32 Joyce Sidman 0547906501 Athena 5 4.27 2014
author: Joyce Sidman
name: Athena
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/03
date added: 2025/03/03
shelves: 2025, children-and-middle-grade
review:

]]> 228124265
Bill Bailey has always had dogs, including a Patterdale terrier called Rocky who would travel with him in the van to his first shows and occasionally join him on stage. Fast forward a few decades and Bill has shared his home with a variety of birds, dogs, frogs, chameleons and an armadillo called Tommy. 'We even had a giant chicken, a huge Malay cockerel called Kid Creole. After a few stand-offs he took against me. He had to go in the end, I was being stalked in my own back garden.'

That chicken apart, animals have always been at the heart of an extraordinary life as one of the nation's favourite comedians, actors, musicians and (thanks to Strictly) dancers: from terriers to the orangutans of Sumatra and the parrots that share his breakfast every morning in west London.

Full of the leftfield humour, wit and wisdom that has made Bill Bailey such a beloved performer around the world, My Animals and Other Animals is the story of Bill's life; but more than that, it's the story of how all of our lives are enriched by the animals who accompany us on that journey]]> Bill Bailey Athena 4 2025, from-tbr-2025 4.20
author: Bill Bailey
name: Athena
average rating: 4.20
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/27
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 211721797 The third installment in the heartwarming and enchanting Emily Wilde series, about a curmudgeonly scholar of folklore and the fae prince she loves.

Emily Wilde has spent her life studying faeries. A renowned dryadologist, she has documented hundreds of species of Folk in her Encyclopaedia of Faeries. Now she is about to embark on her most dangerous academic project studying the inner workings of a faerie realm—as its queen.

Along with her former academic rival—now fiancé—the dashing and mercurial Wendell Bambleby, Emily is immediately thrust into the deadly intrigues of Faerie as the two of them seize the throne of Wendell’s long-lost kingdom, which Emily finds a beautiful nightmare filled with scholarly treasures.

Emily has been obsessed with faerie stories her entire life, but at first she feels as ill-suited to Faerie as she did to the mortal How can an unassuming scholar such as herself pass for a queen? Yet there is little time to settle in, for Wendell’s murderous stepmother has placed a deadly curse upon the land before vanishing without a trace. It will take all of Wendell’s magic—and Emily’s knowledge of stories—to unravel the mystery before they lose everything they hold dear.]]> 358 Heather Fawcett 0593500229 Athena 5 2025, from-tbr-2025 4.21 2025
author: Heather Fawcett
name: Athena
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/02
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 23332879 308 Stacy King 1927925355 Athena 3 2016 3.93 1815
author: Stacy King
name: Athena
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1815
rating: 3
read at: 2016/03/02
date added: 2025/03/01
shelves: 2016
review:

]]> 55628002
Her influence in both noble society and the temple is increasing steadily, and her squad of Gutenbergs work on improving the printing press while she sells picture books in the castle. Her love for books keeps growing, and the mana within her is likewise becoming progressively stronger! She must hunt the Lord of Winter with the Knight's Order, then gather ingredients for her jureve potion during Spring Prayer.

This is another action-packed volume of this biblio-fantasy, where the Saint of Ehrenfest overcomes a winter of mysticism and battle! Including two lengthy short stories and a four-panel manga drawn by You Shiina!]]> 307 Miya Kazuki 1718346182 Athena 5 2025 4.67 2017
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/28
date added: 2025/02/28
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 198133381
On a wild and rugged island cut off and isolated to some, artist Nell feels the island is her home. It is the source of inspiration for her art, rooted in landscape, folklore and the feminine. The mysterious Inions, a commune of women who have travelled there from all over the world, consider it a place of refuge and safety, of solace in nature.

All the islanders live alongside the strange murmurings that seem to emanate from within the depths of the island, a sound that is almost supernatural �� a Summoning as the Inions call it. One day, a letter arrives at Nell’s door from the reclusive Inions who invite Nell into the commune for a commission to produce a magnificent art piece to celebrate their long history. In its creation, Nell will discover things about the community and about herself that will challenge everything she thought she knew.

Beautifully written, prescient and eerily haunting, Sinéad Gleeson’s fiction debut takes in the darker side of human nature and the mysteries of faith and the natural world. A novel from one of our most beloved literary voices, this is perfect for fans of Margaret Atwood and Sarah Moss.]]> 307 Sinéad Gleeson 0008626669 Athena 3 2025 3.55 2024
author: Sinéad Gleeson
name: Athena
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/25
date added: 2025/02/25
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 53138084 A memoir of defying the odds from Kareem Rosser, captain of the first all-black squad to win the National Interscholastic Polo championship.

Born and raised in West Philadelphia, Kareem thought he and his siblings would always be stuck in “The Bottom��, a community and neighborhood devastated by poverty and violence. Riding their bicycles through Philly’s Fairmount Park, Kareem’s brothers discover a barn full of horses. Noticing the brothers�� fascination with her misfit animals, Lezlie Hiner, founder of The Work to Ride stables, offers them their escape: an after school job in exchange for riding lessons.

What starts as an accidental discovery turns into a love for horseback riding that leads the Rossers to discovering their passion for polo. Pursuing the sport with determination and discipline, Kareem earns his place among the typically exclusive players in college, becoming part of the first all-Black national interscholastic polo championship team—all while struggling to keep his family together.]]> 304 Kareem Rosser 1250270863 Athena 5 4.58 2021
author: Kareem Rosser
name: Athena
average rating: 4.58
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/23
date added: 2025/02/25
shelves: 2025, biographies-memoirs, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 57141377 "Open Water is tender poetry, a love song to Black art and thought, an exploration of intimacy and vulnerability between two young artists learning to be soft with each other in a world that hardens against Black people."--Yaa Gyasi, author of HOMEGOING

In a crowded London pub, two young people meet. Both are Black British, both won scholarships to private schools where they struggled to belong, both are now artists--he a photographer, she a dancer--and both are trying to make their mark in a world that by turns celebrates and rejects them. Tentatively, tenderly, they fall in love. But two people who seem destined to be together can still be torn apart by fear and violence, and over the course of a year they find their relationship tested by forces beyond their control.

Narrated with deep intimacy, Open Water is at once an achingly beautiful love story and a potent insight into race and masculinity that asks what it means to be a person in a world that sees you only as a Black body; to be vulnerable when you are only respected for strength; to find safety in love, only to lose it. With gorgeous, soulful intensity, and blistering emotional intelligence, Caleb Azumah Nelson gives a profoundly sensitive portrait of romantic love in all its feverish waves and comforting beauty.

This is one of the most essential debut novels of recent years, heralding the arrival of a stellar and prodigious young talent.]]> 155 Caleb Azumah Nelson 0802157955 Athena 3 2025 3.96 2021
author: Caleb Azumah Nelson
name: Athena
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/24
date added: 2025/02/24
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 60877592 Perfect for fans of Hidden Figures and Mae Among the Stars! To Boldly Go tells the true story of Nichelle Nichols and how she used her platform on Star Trek to inspire and recruit a new generation of diverse astronauts and many others in the space and STEM fields.

As Lieutenant Uhura on the iconic prime-time television show Star Trek, Nichelle Nichols played the first Black female astronaut anyone had ever seen on screen. A smart, strong, independent Black woman aboard the starship Enterprise was revolutionary in the 1960s when only white men had traveled to outer space in real life and most Black characters on TV were servants.

Nichelle not only inspired a generation to pursue their dreams, but also opened the door for the real-life pioneering astronaut Sally Ride, Dr. Mae Jemison, and more.

This empowering tribute to the trailblazing pop culture icon reminds us of the importance of perseverance and the power of representation in storytelling. You just might be inspired to boldly go where no one like you has ever gone before!]]> 40 Angela Dalton 0063073218 Athena 4 2025 4.37 2023
author: Angela Dalton
name: Athena
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/24
date added: 2025/02/24
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 36963767
Africville was a vibrant Black community for more than 150 years. But even though its residents paid municipal taxes, they lived without running water, sewers, paved roads and police, fire-truck and ambulance services. Over time, the city located a slaughterhouse, a hospital for infectious disease, and even the city garbage dump nearby. In the 1960s, city officials decided to demolish the community, moving people out in city dump trucks and relocating them in public housing.

Today, Africville has been replaced by a park, where former residents and their families gather each summer to remember their community.]]> 32 Shauntay Grant 1773060430 Athena 4 2025 4.09
author: Shauntay Grant
name: Athena
average rating: 4.09
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/23
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 39398515
No books. No rote memorisation. No chance of failure.
This download contains the entire course:

Part 1
�� Language ground rules
�� The use of the past tense
�� Finding French words used in English
�� Asking questions
�� Essential vocabulary to use when booking into a hotel, taking a taxi, and eating out.

Part 2
�� Useful vocabulary at the tourist office
�� Asking for directions
�� Where you are from and what you do
�� Pronunciation

Part 3
�� Practice and revision
�� Vocabulary for conversing with a doctor
�� Masculine and feminine
�� The present and future tense

Course Review
The course review offers a very useful opportunity to revise the full course and practise what you have learnt. A native-speaking French expert helps you to perfect your pronunciation. Learn over 6,000 words in no time at all and learn how to make your new vocabulary work for you.
A downloadable booklet is also included to use as a reference and revision tool.

A more in-depth course for those looking to improve their language skills, with over 12 hours of audio and handy written revision guide to reinforce your learning.]]> Paul Noble 0008182949 Athena 4 french, 2025 4.62 2010
author: Paul Noble
name: Athena
average rating: 4.62
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/22
date added: 2025/02/22
shelves: french, 2025
review:

]]> 219865560 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Braiding Sweetgrass, a bold and inspiring vision for how to orient our lives around gratitude, reciprocity, and community, based on the lessons of the natural world.

As indigenous scientist and author of Braiding Sweetgrass Robin Wall Kimmerer harvests serviceberries alongside the birds, she considers the ethic of reciprocity that lies at the heart of the gift economy. How, she asks, can we learn from indigenous wisdom and the plant world to reimagine what we value most? Our economy is rooted in scarcity, competition, and the hoarding of resources, and we have surrendered our values to a system that actively harms what we love.

Meanwhile, the serviceberry’s relationship with the natural world is an embodiment of reciprocity, interconnectedness, and gratitude. The tree distributes its wealth—its abundance of sweet, juicy berries—to meet the needs of its natural community. And this distribution insures its own survival. As Kimmerer explains, “Serviceberries show us another model, one based upon reciprocity, where wealth comes from the quality of your relationships, not from the illusion of self-sufficiency.”]]> 2 Robin Wall Kimmerer Athena 4 2025 4.24 2024
author: Robin Wall Kimmerer
name: Athena
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/20
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 53004274
A Good Morning America Book Club Pick, an Indie Next Pick, and a LibraryReads Pick �� Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2020 by The Washington Post, Bustle, ŷ������, and She Reads

Perfect for fans of Me Before You and One Day—a striking, powerful, and moving love story following an ambitious lawyer who experiences an astonishing vision that could change her life forever.

Where do you see yourself in five years?

When Type-A Manhattan lawyer Dannie Cohan is asked this question at the most important interview of her career, she has a meticulously crafted answer at the ready. Later, after nailing her interview and accepting her boyfriend’s marriage proposal, Dannie goes to sleep knowing she is right on track to achieve her five-year plan.

But when she wakes up, she’s suddenly in a different apartment, with a different ring on her finger, and beside a very different man. The television news is on in the background, and she can just make out the scrolling date. It’s the same night—December 15—but 2025, five years in the future.

After a very intense, shocking hour, Dannie wakes again, at the brink of midnight, back in 2020. She can’t shake what has happened. It certainly felt much more than merely a dream, but she isn’t the kind of person who believes in visions. That nonsense is only charming coming from free-spirited types, like her lifelong best friend, Bella. Determined to ignore the odd experience, she files it away in the back of her mind.

That is, until four-and-a-half years later, when by chance Dannie meets the very same man from her long-ago vision.

Brimming with joy and heartbreak, In Five Years is an unforgettable love story that reminds us of the power of loyalty, friendship, and the unpredictable nature of destiny.]]> 7 Rebecca Serle 1797103202 Athena 2 2025 3.58 2020
author: Rebecca Serle
name: Athena
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2020
rating: 2
read at: 2025/02/18
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 101126946
Back in the day, there was a heckuva party, a jam, for a word-making man. The King of Letters. Langston Hughes. His ABCs became drums, bumping jumping thumping like a heart the size of the whole country. They sent some people yelling and others, his word-children, to write their own glory.

Maya Angelou, Amiri Baraka, and more came be-bopping to recite poems at their hero’s feet at that heckuva party at the Schomberg Library, dancing boom da boom, stepping and stomping, all in praise and love for Langston, world-mending word man. Oh, yeah, there was hoopla in Harlem, for its Renaissance man. A party for Langston.]]> 56 Jason Reynolds 1534439447 Athena 5 2025 4.40 2023
author: Jason Reynolds
name: Athena
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/18
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 54902598
This is the most action-packed volume of this biblio-fantasy yet! Being the High Bishop is hard, okay?!]]> 345 Miya Kazuki 1718346166 Athena 5 2025 4.63 2016
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.63
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/17
date added: 2025/02/17
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 56349492
As one of the most beautiful and intriguing birds found in nature, hummingbirds fascinate people around the world. The lightest birds in the sky, hummingbirds are capable of incredible feats, such as flying backwards, diving at speeds of sixty-one MPH, and beating their wings more than sixty times a second. Miraculous creatures, they are also incredibly vulnerable when they first emerge from their eggs. That’s where Brenda Sherburn comes in.

With tenderness and patience, she rescues abandoned hummingbirds and nurses them back to health until they can fly away and live in the wild. In The Hummingbird’s Gift , the extraordinary care that Brenda provides her peanut-sized patients is revealed and, in the process, shows us just how truly amazing hummingbirds are. With Sy Montgomery’s signature “joyful passion�� ( Library Journal ), and including sixteen pages of gorgeous color photos, this beautifully written and inspiring little book celebrates the profound gift that hummingbirds are to our planet and is the ultimate gift for nature lovers and bird watchers everywhere.]]> Sy Montgomery 1797128671 Athena 4 2025 4.07 2021
author: Sy Montgomery
name: Athena
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/17
date added: 2025/02/17
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 147592 191 Agatha Christie 0006139124 Athena 4 2025, from-tbr-2025 3.68 1967
author: Agatha Christie
name: Athena
average rating: 3.68
book published: 1967
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/16
date added: 2025/02/16
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 209049995

Unaffordable housing in Canada is tearing communities apart. Rising prices force long-time residents to move elsewhere, while established businesses are forced to close their doors because they cannot find staff who can afford to live nearby.


In Home Truths, housing expert Carolyn Whitzman explores Canada’s crisis from all sides, including defining what adequate housing looks like, explaining why nonmarket housing is crucial for Canada, and outlining how and why to tackle ever-growing wealth disparities between renters and those who own. She details the decades of policy that got us into this mess and shows how all levels of government can work together to provide affordable housing where it is needed, using evidence-backed ideas from planners, politicians, developers, and advocates at home and abroad.]]> 334 Carolyn Whitzman 0774890703 Athena 5 2025, from-tbr-2025 4.28
author: Carolyn Whitzman
name: Athena
average rating: 4.28
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/15
date added: 2025/02/15
shelves: 2025, from-tbr-2025
review:

]]> 23846152
Oscar Lives Next Door is a fictional story inspired by these facts. The book imagines a next-door neighbor for Oscar named Millie, who gets into mischief with him but also appreciates his Oscar hears music in everything, and Millie calls him a magician for the way he can coax melodies from his trumpet. Millie writes to Oscar during his long stay in the hospital for tuberculosis, and she encourages his earliest notes on the piano.

Set in Oscar’s true childhood neighborhood of St-Henri �� now known as Little Burgundy �� the book provides a wonderful sense of this 1930s neighborhood where most of Montreal’s Black working class population lived. Detailed digital illustrations make the community’s culture and music almost tangible. The book concludes with a page of informational text about the author’s own connection to Little Burgundy and a short biography of the jazz legend.]]> 32 Bonnie Farmer 1771471042 Athena 4 2025 3.74 2015
author: Bonnie Farmer
name: Athena
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/15
date added: 2025/02/15
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 50246
Alternate cover is available here.]]> 329 Daphne du Maurier Athena 0 to-read 3.85 1969
author: Daphne du Maurier
name: Athena
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1969
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 146673550 Steve Martin is more candid than he’s ever been about his creative life in this engrossing audio-biography centered around a series of conversations recorded over many afternoons at home with his friend and neighbor, writer Adam Gopnik.

Steve Martin met his good friend Adam Gopnik three decades ago, and in that time, Gopnik has always marveled at Martin’s ability to flourish in a wide variety of artforms: magic, comedy, art collecting, writing, and music. In So Many Steves: Afternoons with Steve Martin, New Yorker writer Adam Gopnik creates a new type of profile: a year’s worth of conversations with Martin where Gopnik pulls back the curtain on his friend’s illustrious career.

This audio-biography places you in Martin’s apartment across from Steve and Adam, listening as their conversation flows from Steve’s first job in a magic shop to selling out stadiums as a standup comedian, starring in major motion pictures, writing his first novel, teaching himself to play the banjo, and starting a respected art collection. Through it all you’ll hear clips from Steve Martin’s iconic stand up routines and movies as well as excerpts from his writing and tv appearances, all knit together by an original banjo score created and played by Steve.]]> 3 Steve Martin Athena 4 2025 3.81
author: Steve Martin
name: Athena
average rating: 3.81
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/14
date added: 2025/02/14
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 198264780
Arrangements in Blue��elegantly honors the life lived completely by—and for—oneself. Inspired by Joni Mitchell’s seminal album��Blue, celebrated British poet Amy Key sets out to examine the volatile scales of romantic feeling as she has encountered them: from the low notes of loss and unfulfilled desire—punctuated by sharp, discordant feelings of jealousy and regret—to the deep harmony of friendship and the highs defined by sexual attraction and self-realization. Key celebrates the bliss of sleeping in an empty bed, the intimate energy required for cooking solo, and the transformative power of traveling alone—especially to the sea. Written with the exquisite finesse of a poet, this bold manual for navigating life alone provides an alternative perspective on a shared human experience so rarely explored.]]> 9 Amy Key Athena 3 2025 3.25 2023
author: Amy Key
name: Athena
average rating: 3.25
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/14
date added: 2025/02/14
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 204395407 325 Suzuka 1718338279 Athena 5 2025 4.49 2022
author: Suzuka
name: Athena
average rating: 4.49
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/12
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 58586873 Jacqueline Woodson and Rafael López’s highly anticipated companion to their #1 New York Times bestseller The Day You Begin illuminates the power in each of us to face challenges with confidence.

On a dreary, stuck-inside kind of day, a brother and sister heed their grandmother’s advice: “Use those beautiful and brilliant minds of yours. Lift your arms, close your eyes, take a deep breath, and believe in a thing. Somebody somewhere at some point was just as bored you are now.�� And before they know it, their imaginations lift them up and out of their boredom. Then, on a day full of quarrels, it’s time for a trip outside their minds again, and they are able to leave their anger behind. This precious skill, their grandmother tells them, harkens back to the days long before they were born, when their ancestors showed the world the strength and resilience of their beautiful and brilliant minds. Jacqueline Woodson’s lyrical text and Rafael Lopez’s dazzling art celebrate the extraordinary ability to lift ourselves up and imagine a better world.]]> 32 Jacqueline Woodson 0399545530 Athena 5 2025 4.39 2022
author: Jacqueline Woodson
name: Athena
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/12
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 179095421
Kitchen clatter.
Milk and juice.
Syrup splatter.
Chocolate mousse.
Bowl of berries��
Red and blue.
A mess can make a meal for two.

From a cozy breakfast together to crafts, fort-building, kitchen spills, and bedtime rituals, these sisters make tons of messes.

Imaginative, playful, forgiving, delicious messes.

And their messes make a day full of possibilities.

With bouncy rhyming language and warm illustrations, What Can A Mess Make? inspires readers to embrace their imaginations, linger in the beautiful messes on every page, and make some messes themselves.]]> 48 Bee Johnson 1250900247 Athena 5 2025 4.33
author: Bee Johnson
name: Athena
average rating: 4.33
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/11
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 146314287
Two children wake up to hear the lake singing, then the wind begins wailing �� or is it a wolf? They bundle up and venture out into the cold, carrying their skates. On the snow-covered shore, they spot tracks made by fox, deer, hare, mink, otter �� and the wolf! In the bay, the ice is thick and smooth. They lace up their skates, step onto the ice, stroking and gliding, and the great lake sings again.

In her signature poetic style, Jean E. Pendziwol describes the exhilarating experience of skating on the wild ice of Lake Superior, including the haunting singing that occurs as the ice expands and contracts. Accompanied by Todd Stewart’s breathtaking illustrations, this book will make us all long to skate wild!]]> 32 Jean E. Pendziwol 1773067044 Athena 5 2025 4.25
author: Jean E. Pendziwol
name: Athena
average rating: 4.25
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/11
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 53937732
The detailed setting expands as the printing industry grows in size. Here begins Part 3 of this bibliofantasy for book lovers everywhere!]]> 284 Miya Kazuki 171834614X Athena 5 2025 4.65 2016
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.65
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/09
date added: 2025/02/09
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 53046882
Part two of this biblio-fantasy concludes in this heart-wrenching volume! There's a collection of short stories following the shocking climax, as well as two completely original short stories and a four-panel manga drawn by You Shiina.]]> 289 Miya Kazuki 1718346123 Athena 5 2025 4.72 2016
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.72
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/09
date added: 2025/02/09
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 221641620 A charming and eye-opening exploration of the special relationship between humans and chickens from Sy Montgomery, “one of our finest chroniclers of the natural world�� (The New York Times). For more than two decades, Sy Montgomery—whose The Soul of an Octopus was a National Book Award finalist—has kept a flock of chickens in her backyard. Each chicken has an individual personality (outgoing or shy, loud or quiet, reckless or cautious) and connects with Sy in her own way. In this short, delightful book, Sy takes us inside the flock and reveals all the things that make chickens such remarkable only hours after leaving the egg, they are able to walk, run, and peck; relationships are important to them and the average chicken can recognize more than one hundred other chickens; they remember the past and anticipate the future; and they communicate specific information through at least twenty-four distinct calls. Visitors to her home are astonished by all this, but for Sy what’s more astonishing is how little most people know about chickens, especially considering there are about twenty percent more chickens on earth than people. With a winning combination of personal narrative and science, What the Chicken Knows is exactly the kind of book that has made Sy Montgomery such a beloved and popular author.]]> 2 Sy Montgomery Athena 4 2025 3.86 2024
author: Sy Montgomery
name: Athena
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/08
date added: 2025/02/08
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 207843756 Hi, friend! Welcome to the ADHD club.

You're here because, like me, you've been diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder—which, by the way, just might be the worst name for a condition ever—and you're trying to figure out how to make your life a little more manageable. Or because, like my wife, Kim, you love, teach, or work with someone who has ADHD, and you're trying to figure out how to best support them.

The world isn't built for ADHDers, and navigating it can wear us down. But we'll let you in on a little secret: having ADHD doesn't have to be a burden. It can actually be a superpower that propels you to creative heights and allows you to achieve more than you ever thought possible.

We want to give you a new perspective on ADHD, whether it's your own brain or a friend or family member's that you're trying to understand. We hope you come away with strategies you can employ to make things a little easier. (We also hope you laugh out loud, at least once or twice.)

Most of all, we want you to silence that voice that whispers that you're broken or a mess or a failure. None of that is true. You have ADHD—and that makes you awesome.

—Penn Holderness]]> 7 Penn Holderness Athena 3 2025 4.17 2024
author: Penn Holderness
name: Athena
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/07
date added: 2025/02/07
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 24264469 Medicine has triumphed in modern times, transforming birth, injury, and infectious disease from harrowing to manageable. But in the inevitable condition of aging and death, the goals of medicine seem too frequently to run counter to the interest of the human spirit. Nursing homes, preoccupied with safety, pin patients into railed beds and wheelchairs. Hospitals isolate the dying, checking for vital signs long after the goals of cure have become moot. Doctors, committed to extending life, continue to carry out devastating procedures that in the end extend suffering.
Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession's ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families. Gawande offers examples of freer, more socially fulfilling models for assisting the infirm and dependent elderly, and he explores the varieties of hospice care to demonstrate that a person's last weeks or months may be rich and dignified.
Full of eye-opening research and riveting storytelling, Being Mortal asserts that medicine can comfort and enhance our experience even to the end, providing not only a good life but also a good end.]]> 10 Atul Gawande Athena 5 health-and-family-care, 2025 4.52 2014
author: Atul Gawande
name: Athena
average rating: 4.52
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/05
date added: 2025/02/05
shelves: health-and-family-care, 2025
review:

]]> 50727911 297 Miya Kazuki 1718346107 Athena 5 2025 4.66 2016
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.66
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/04
date added: 2025/02/04
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 123314421 A singular new novel from Betty Trask Prize-winner Samantha Harvey,��Orbital��is an eloquent meditation on space and life on our planet through the eyes of six astronauts circling the earth in 24 hours


"Ravishingly beautiful."��—��Joshua Ferris,��New York Times

A slender novel of epic power,��Orbital��deftly snapshots one day in the lives of six women and men traveling through space.��Selected for one of the last space station missions of its kind before the program is dismantled, these astronauts and cosmonauts—from America, Russia, Italy, Britain, and Japan—have left their lives behind to travel at a speed of over seventeen thousand miles an hour as the earth reels below. We glimpse moments of their earthly lives through brief communications with family, their photos and talismans; we watch them whip up dehydrated meals, float in gravity-free sleep, and exercise in regimented routines to prevent atrophying muscles; we witness them form bonds that will stand between them and utter solitude. Most of all, we are with them as they behold and record their silent blue planet. Their experiences of sixteen sunrises and sunsets and the bright, blinking constellations of the galaxy are at once breathtakingly awesome and surprisingly intimate.��

Profound and contemplative,��Orbital��is a moving elegy to our environment and planet.]]> 212 Samantha Harvey 0802161553 Athena 3 2025 3.90 2023
author: Samantha Harvey
name: Athena
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/02
date added: 2025/02/02
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 54593563 A journey into the hidden world of fungi.

When we think of fungi, we likely think of mushrooms. But mushrooms are only fruiting bodies, analogous to apples on a tree. Most fungi live out of sight, yet make up a massively diverse kingdom of organisms that supports and sustains nearly all living systems. Fungi provide a key to understanding the planet on which we live, and the ways we think, feel, and behave.

In Entangled Life, the biologist Merlin Sheldrake shows us the world from a fungal point of view. Sheldrake's exploration takes us from yeast to psychedelics, to the fungi that range for miles underground and are the largest organisms on the planet, to those that link plants together in complex networks known as the "Wood Wide Web," to those that infiltrate and manipulate insect bodies with devastating precision.]]> 10 Merlin Sheldrake Athena 4 2025 4.09 2020
author: Merlin Sheldrake
name: Athena
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/01
date added: 2025/02/01
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 48758307
But there's still so much she doesn't know about the temple that doing anything is a struggle. She's forced into the education of a shrine maiden and has her hands full with her new attendants. She has a mountain of work as the orphanage director, too.

As always Myne has bitten off more than she can chew, but she charges forward with her love of books giving her strength. And as it becomes clear that someone with her level of mana will not continue to go unnoticed, the door to the world of nobles opens and the plot escalates dramatically!

Winter approaches, and a blizzard is about to fall upon this bibliofantasy!]]> 325 Miya Kazuki 1718346085 Athena 5 2025 4.66 2015
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.66
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at: 2025/01/30
date added: 2025/01/30
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 58708383 One summer. Two rivals. A plot twist they didn't see coming....

Nora Stephens�� life is books—she’s read them all—and she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl, and especially not the sweetheart. In fact, the only people Nora is a heroine for are her clients, for whom she lands enormous deals as a cutthroat literary agent, and her beloved little sister Libby.

Which is why she agrees to go to Sunshine Falls, North Carolina for the month of August when Libby begs her for a sisters�� trip away—with visions of a small-town transformation for Nora, who she’s convinced needs to become the heroine in her own story. But instead of picnics in meadows, or run-ins with a handsome country doctor or bulging-forearmed bartender, Nora keeps bumping into Charlie Lastra, a bookish brooding editor from back in the city. It would be a meet-cute if not for the fact that they’ve met many times and it’s never been cute.

If Nora knows she’s not an ideal heroine, Charlie knows he’s nobody’s hero, but as they are thrown together again and again—in a series of coincidences no editor worth their salt would allow—what they discover might just unravel the carefully crafted stories they’ve written about themselves.]]> 398 Emily Henry Athena 3 2025 4.27 2022
author: Emily Henry
name: Athena
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2025/01/28
date added: 2025/01/28
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 44143655 Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins

Early birds and night owls are born, not made. Sleep patterns are the most obvious manifestation of the highly individualized biological clocks we inherit, but these clocks also regulate bodily functions from digestion to hormone levels to cognition. By understanding and respecting our internal time, we can live better.]]> 8 Till Roenneberg Athena 4 2025 2.86 2010
author: Till Roenneberg
name: Athena
average rating: 2.86
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/28
date added: 2025/01/28
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 26055409
Sarah J. Maas's New York Times bestselling Throne of Glass series reaches new heights in this sweeping fourth volume.

Everyone Celaena Sardothien loves has been taken from her. But she's at last returned to the empire—for vengeance, to rescue her once-glorious kingdom, and to confront the shadows of her past . . .

She will fight for her cousin, a warrior prepared to die just to see her again. She will fight for her friend, a young man trapped in an unspeakable prison. And she will fight for her people, enslaved to a brutal king and awaiting their lost queen's triumphant return.

Celaena’s epic journey has captured the hearts and imaginations of millions across the globe. This fourth volume will hold readers rapt as Celaena’s story builds to a passionate, agonizing crescendo that might just shatter her world.]]> 21 Sarah J. Maas Athena 4 2025 4.44 2015
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Athena
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/21
date added: 2025/01/21
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 22914781
The best-selling series that has captured readers all over the world reaches new heights in this sequel to the New York Times best-selling Crown of Midnight. Packed with heart-pounding action, fierce new characters, and swoon-worthy romance, this third book will enthrall readers from start to finish.]]> 0 Sarah J. Maas Athena 4 2025 4.25 2014
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Athena
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/15
date added: 2025/01/15
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 199796715
Margo braucht Geld. Seit sie ungewollt von ihrem Collegeprofessor, der sie jetzt mit dem Kind alleinlässt, schwanger wurde, mehr denn je. Wie Margo es auch dreht und wendet, kein Job scheint passend zu sein, oder könnte auch nur ansatzweise ihr Leben mit einem Baby finanzieren. Durch einen Zufall wird sie auf die Plattform OnlyFans aufmerksam, und Margo ist fasziniert von dieser Welt, in der Frauen mit sich und ihrem Körper experimentieren, und offenbar gut dabei verdienen. Also beginnt auch sie, Inhalte zu produzieren. Dabei erhält sie Unterstützung von ihrer Mitbewohnerin Suzie, einem großen Cosplay-Fan, und auch von ihrem Vater Jinx, einem Ex-Wrestlingprofi. Ehe sie sich versieht, ist Margo ein Online-Phänomen. Könnte dies die Antwort auf all ihre Probleme sein, oder hat der Internet-Ruhm einen zu hohen Preis?]]> 368 Rufi Thorpe 0063356600 Athena 5 2025 3.93 2024
author: Rufi Thorpe
name: Athena
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/01/13
date added: 2025/01/12
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 52181039 314 Miya Kazuki 1718346069 Athena 4 2025 4.60 2015
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.60
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/11
date added: 2025/01/10
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 32758901 "As a heartless killing machine, I was a complete failure."

In a corporate-dominated space-faring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. For their own safety, exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids. But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn’t a primary concern.

On a distant planet, a team of scientists is conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied ‘droid--a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked its own governor module and refers to itself (though never out loud) as “Murderbot.�� Scornful of humans, Murderbot wants is to be left alone long enough to figure out who it is, but when a neighboring mission goes dark, it's up to the scientists and Murderbot to get to the truth.]]> 144 Martha Wells Athena 4 2025 4.11 2017
author: Martha Wells
name: Athena
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/09
date added: 2025/01/09
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 39674593 The Mysterious Affair at Styles isn’t just Agatha Christie’s first Poirot novel, it’s currently the only Poirot novel in the public domain. It was written on a bet that Christie couldn’t write a detective novel in which the reader couldn’t deduce the criminal. Her attempt laid the foundation for one of literature’s most famous detectives.

In this novel we’re introduced to Poirot as he’s settling in to a new life in England. After a woman is murdered at the country estate he’s visiting, he has to use his detective skills to catch the criminal. The Mysterious Affair at Styles sets the stage for the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, and has everything you’d expect from a story rich in those classic detective fiction tropes.]]> 212 Agatha Christie Athena 4 2025 3.60 1920
author: Agatha Christie
name: Athena
average rating: 3.60
book published: 1920
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/06
date added: 2025/01/05
shelves: 2025
review:

]]> 43459808 VINTAGE JAPANESE CLASSICS �� five masterpieces of Japanese fiction in gorgeous new gift editions.

Tanizaki's masterpiece is the story of four sisters, and the declining fortunes of a traditional Japanese family. It is a loving and nostalgic recreation of the sumptuous, intricate upper-class life of Osaka immediately before World War Two. With surgical precision, Tanizaki lays bare the sinews of pride, and brings a vanished era to vibrant life.]]> 562 Jun'ichirō Tanizaki 1784875430 Athena 5 2024 3.99 1948
author: Jun'ichirō Tanizaki
name: Athena
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1948
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/21
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: 2024
review:

]]> 49834779 357 Miya Kazuki 1718346042 Athena 5 2024 4.59 2015
author: Miya Kazuki
name: Athena
average rating: 4.59
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/31
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: 2024
review:

]]> 9505384 Nancy Mitford's The Pursuit of Love is one of the funniest, sharpest novels about love and growing up ever written.

Nancy Mitford was the eldest of the infamous Mitford sisters, known for her membership in 'The Bright Young Things' clique of the 1920s and an intimate of Evelyn Waugh; she produced witty, satirical novels with a cast of characters taken directly from the aristocratic social scene of which she was a part. Her novels, Wigs on the Green, Love in a Cold Climate, The Blessing and Don't Tell Alfred, are available in single paperback editions from Penguin or as part of The Penguin Complete Novels of Nancy Mitford which also includes Highland Fling, Christmas Pudding and Pigeon Pie. This edition of The Pursuit of Love is introduced by novelist Zoë Heller.

]]> 228 Nancy Mitford Athena 4 2024 4.01 1945
author: Nancy Mitford
name: Athena
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1945
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/29
date added: 2024/12/28
shelves: 2024
review:

]]> 35005608 9780140009842

One of Nancy Mitford’s most beloved novels, Love in a Cold Climate is a sparkling romantic comedy that vividly evokes the lost glamour of aristocratic life in England between the wars.

Polly Hampton has long been groomed for the perfect marriage by her mother, the fearsome and ambitious Lady Montdore. But Polly, with her stunning good looks and impeccable connections, is bored by the monotony of her glittering debut season in London. Having just come from India, where her father served as Viceroy, she claims to have hoped that society in a colder climate would be less obsessed with love affairs. The apparently aloof and indifferent Polly has a long-held secret, however, one that leads to the shattering of her mother’s dreams and her own disinheritance. When an elderly duke begins pursuing the disgraced Polly and a callow potential heir curries favor with her parents, nothing goes as expected, but in the end all find happiness in their own unconventional ways.]]> 249 Nancy Mitford Athena 0 to-read 3.74 1949
author: Nancy Mitford
name: Athena
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1949
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 127278133 An utterly original celebration of that which binds humanity across battle lines and history.

On the island of Sicily amid the Peloponnesian War, the Syracusans have figured out what to do with the surviving Athenians who had the gall to invade their city: they’ve herded the sorry prisoners of war into a rock quarry and left them to rot. Looking for a way to pass the time, Lampo and Gelon, two unemployed potters with a soft spot for poetry and drink, head down into the quarry to feed the Athenians if, and only if, they can manage a few choice lines from their great playwright Euripides. Before long, the two mates hatch a plan to direct a full-blown production of Medea. After all, you can hate the people but love their art. But as opening night approaches, what started as a lark quickly sets in motion a series of extraordinary events, and our wayward heroes begin to realize that staging a play can be as dangerous as fighting a war, with all sorts of risks to life, limb, and friendship.

Told in a contemporary Irish voice and as riotously funny as it is deeply moving, Glorious Exploits is an unforgettable ode to the power of art in a time of war, brotherhood in a time of enmity, and human will throughout the ages.]]> 304 Ferdia Lennon 1250893690 Athena 0 to-read 4.15 2024
author: Ferdia Lennon
name: Athena
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 177058810
Against the rugged backdrop of this faraway spot beyond Shetland, Carys Davies's intimate drama unfolds with tension and tenderness: a touching and crystalline study of ordinary people buffeted by history and a powerful exploration of the distances and connections between us. Perfectly structured and surprising at every turn, Clear is a marvel of storytelling, an exquisite short novel by a master of the form.]]> 203 Carys Davies Athena 5 2024 4.01
author: Carys Davies
name: Athena
average rating: 4.01
book published:
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/12/18
shelves: 2024
review:

]]> 139391940 A spicy small-town romance and TikTok phenomenon, perfect for fans of Hannah Grace and Stephanie Archer.

When Jeanie's aunt gifts her the beloved Pumpkin Spice Café in the small town of Dream Harbor, Jeanie jumps at the chance for a fresh start away from her very dull desk job.

Logan is a local farmer who avoids Dream Harbor's gossip at all costs. But Jeanie's arrival disrupts Logan's routine and he wants nothing to do with the irritatingly upbeat new girl, except that he finds himself inexplicably drawn to her.

Will Jeanie's happy-go-lucky attitude win over the grumpy-but-gorgeous Logan, or has this city girl found the one person in town who won't fall for her charm, or her pumpkin spice lattes��

The Pumpkin Spice Café is a cozy romantic mystery for fans of Gilmore Girls, with a grumpy x sunshine dynamic, a small-town setting and a HEA guaranteed!

Tropes:

�� grumpy x sunshine
�� small town
�� found family
�� spicy]]> 373 Laurie Gilmore 0008610665 Athena 3 2024 3.36 2023
author: Laurie Gilmore
name: Athena
average rating: 3.36
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/16
date added: 2024/12/15
shelves: 2024
review:

]]> 137114840 Librarian's Note: This is the entry for the short story collection. Please don't combine it with the short story of the same name.

From Booker Prize Finalist and bestselling author of��“pitch perfect�� ( Boston Globe ) Small Things Like These , �� comes a triptych of stories about love, lust, betrayal, and the ever-intriguing interchanges between women and men.
Celebrated for her powerful short fiction, considered “among the form’s most masterful practitioners�� ( New York Times ), Claire Keegan now gifts us three exquisite stories, newly revised and expanded, together forming a brilliant examination of gender dynamics and an arc from Keegan’s earliest to her most recent work. ��
In “So Late in the Day,�� Cathal faces a long weekend as his mind agitates over a woman with whom he could have spent his life, had he behaved differently; in “The Long and Painful Death,�� a writer’s arrival at the seaside home of Heinrich Böll for a residency is disrupted by an academic who imposes his presence and opinions; and in “Antarctica,�� a married woman travels out of town to see what it’s like to sleep with another man and ends up in the grip of a possessive stranger.��
Each story probes the dynamics that corrupt what could be between women and a lack of generosity, the weight of expectation, the looming threat of violence. Potent, charged, and breathtakingly insightful, these three essential tales will linger with readers long after the book is closed.]]> 64 Claire Keegan 0802160875 Athena 3 2024 3.93 2022
author: Claire Keegan
name: Athena
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/13
date added: 2024/12/13
shelves: 2024
review:

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