Susan's bookshelf: all en-US Wed, 27 Nov 2024 10:28:36 -0800 60 Susan's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Mansfield Park 45032 488 Jane Austen Susan 0 to-read 3.86 1814 Mansfield Park
author: Jane Austen
name: Susan
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1814
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/11/27
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Edge of Light (Edge of Light, #1)]]> 55447841
On October 23, 2030, a meteor explodes over Los Angeles, triggering chaos and panic. For seventeen-year-old Dev Harrison, the event coincides with a strange, recurring dream in which his long-disappeared physicist father reveals to him a location high on a Tahoe peak where he’s hidden the world’s most coveted scientific secret. Eager to see if there’s any truth to the dream, Dev hits the road with his best friends Abby and Conner.

But their journey across a bleak California is far more dangerous than they imagined as they encounter fanatic separatists, mysterious drones, and a ruthless federal agent. Worst of all are the “crawlers”—not human, not animal, terrifying creatures whose appearance in the wake of the meteor is no coincidence.

Courage, loyalty, wits: The friends want for none of these, but their adventure will demand much more. Especially after a conspiracy comes to light, and Dev realizes he’s all that stands between protecting his father’s legacy and global forces hellbent on altering the fate of the universe.]]> 360 Jay Antani Susan 5
The story centers on three best friends Dev, Abby & Conner as they race across a near-future dystopian California which is further worse for wear after decades of drought and fires and where most of the state's residents have already fled. They're headed to a far-off place where Dev's dad (who disappeared long ago under mysterious circumstances) has hidden a secret that could well break open the universe. Chased by unknown forces and encountering bizarre and vicious creatures (and a town of wacko separatists that could totally exist in our 2020 pandemic reality), the three rely on each other as things go from bad to worse and the world goes into full lockdown. I loved the friends storyline and especially appreciated Conner’s cynical yet logical conspiracy theory take on things and the budding relationship between Dev & Abby. Dev is a vulnerable yet active and loveable protagonist, driven to find answers to his deepest questions and perhaps even to clear his father’s reputation.

The book seamlessly slipped between the story of the 3 teens (with Dev as protagonist) and the backstory of Dev's father, a research physicist, and his Indian mother, a medical doctor in LA. The father's story (the discovery of a very intriguing parasite and his band of scientific research fellows) is truly compelling, and the global conglomerate funding his research is not to be trusted. The science is detailed and intelligent and seemed totally plausible to my non physicist brain! I felt like I’d wanted to separately follow Dev's father's story even further and almost found myself wishing this was 2 distinct books.

The creatures are as freaky, and vicious as can be and the tension truly amps up every time that storyline comes back around. A longtime fan of the whole zombie universe, this is a nice entry, if not a full on zombie apocalypse.... at least not yet?!?

Highly recommended and can't wait to find out what happens next. Especially after that ending!]]> 4.47 2013 Edge of Light (Edge of Light, #1)
author: Jay Antani
name: Susan
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at: 2020/10/01
date added: 2024/07/25
shelves:
review:
This book literally starts out with a bang as multiple meteorites strike cities across the earth at the same time, and is a roller coaster of a journey straight through to the end. Filled with terrific tension, a mysterious and bizarre infection spreading across California (and soon the world?), a well drawn futurescape (global wars, climate disaster, nefarious mega corporations and multiple competing intelligence agencies) and is complete with compelling hard science that any sci-fi fan will appreciate.

The story centers on three best friends Dev, Abby & Conner as they race across a near-future dystopian California which is further worse for wear after decades of drought and fires and where most of the state's residents have already fled. They're headed to a far-off place where Dev's dad (who disappeared long ago under mysterious circumstances) has hidden a secret that could well break open the universe. Chased by unknown forces and encountering bizarre and vicious creatures (and a town of wacko separatists that could totally exist in our 2020 pandemic reality), the three rely on each other as things go from bad to worse and the world goes into full lockdown. I loved the friends storyline and especially appreciated Conner’s cynical yet logical conspiracy theory take on things and the budding relationship between Dev & Abby. Dev is a vulnerable yet active and loveable protagonist, driven to find answers to his deepest questions and perhaps even to clear his father’s reputation.

The book seamlessly slipped between the story of the 3 teens (with Dev as protagonist) and the backstory of Dev's father, a research physicist, and his Indian mother, a medical doctor in LA. The father's story (the discovery of a very intriguing parasite and his band of scientific research fellows) is truly compelling, and the global conglomerate funding his research is not to be trusted. The science is detailed and intelligent and seemed totally plausible to my non physicist brain! I felt like I’d wanted to separately follow Dev's father's story even further and almost found myself wishing this was 2 distinct books.

The creatures are as freaky, and vicious as can be and the tension truly amps up every time that storyline comes back around. A longtime fan of the whole zombie universe, this is a nice entry, if not a full on zombie apocalypse.... at least not yet?!?

Highly recommended and can't wait to find out what happens next. Especially after that ending!
]]> <![CDATA[Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life]]> 18775383
Excellent Sheep takes a sharp look at the high-pressure conveyor belt that begins with parents and counselors who demand perfect grades and culminates in the skewed applications Deresiewicz saw firsthand as a member of Yale’s admissions committee. As schools shift focus from the humanities to "practical" subjects like economics and computer science, students are losing the ability to think in innovative ways. Deresiewicz explains how college should be a time for self-discovery, when students can establish their own values and measures of success, so they can forge their own path. He addresses parents, students, educators, and anyone who's interested in the direction of American society, featuring quotes from real students and graduates he has corresponded with over the years, candidly exposing where the system is broken and clearly presenting solutions.]]> 245 William Deresiewicz 1476702713 Susan 5 3.85 2014 Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life
author: William Deresiewicz
name: Susan
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2023/06/18
date added: 2023/08/01
shelves:
review:

]]> Transcendent 128068493 Part One of the Transcendent series starts off with a bang—literally.

Thirty trillion miles from Earth, the colony ship Transcendent, bound for the new human cities on the planet Prosperity, suffers a disaster that disables its engines and kills every member of its crew—all except one.

Panicked, medic Troy Hartman finds his approaching certain death vying with the sheer will to survive as he scrambles to revive the drifting ship. With the help of OTTO, the ship’s AI, Troy sets out to repair the damage, hotwire the engines, and establish communication with anyone out in the dark and forbidding void.

And as all hope seems to be fading, a mysterious lifeline appears—a signal from an unknown source, prompting Troy to redouble his last-ditch effort at making contact and changing course. Especially when he realizes that he may not be the last living human on board, after all.]]> 117 Jay Antani 0988419335 Susan 5 Jay Antani -- a beautiful character study wrapped around a truly compelling sci-fi space adventure that's made for the big screen. It's an eerie setting, stranded trillions of miles from Earth after Transcendent, on its way to the new colonies on Prosperity, suffers a terrible accident that kills much of the crew and renders the ship dead in the water. The protagonist, Troy Hartman, is an extremely relatable and likable character, especially after we learn more about his backstory in Africa which provides glimpses of his past and adds emotional weight to the story. 

Science but more importantly, great science fiction really drives the plot as Troy struggles against the elements, and certain fate, to try and figure out a way out of his predicament. And then fate or something else awakens from cryosleep one of the ship's other inhabitants. Here's where the story really takes off as now Troy's mission to get help or get off the ship takes on a whole new scope and weight and gives him renewed urgency and purposes.

The action sequences are intense and the story reminiscent of Andy Weir's "The Martian," showcasing Troy's resourcefulness, determination and humanity. The novella takes an unexpected turn towards the end, which was pretty remarkable, leaving open the possibility for future stories. If you're a sci-fi fan and enjoy tales of space voyages gone awry, this is right up your alley. It's a fun, fast read and I desperately wanted to know more about what happens to the characters after that ending1]]> 3.86 Transcendent
author: Jay Antani
name: Susan
average rating: 3.86
book published:
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/06/19
shelves:
review:
I absolutely loved reading the latest book by Jay Antani -- a beautiful character study wrapped around a truly compelling sci-fi space adventure that's made for the big screen. It's an eerie setting, stranded trillions of miles from Earth after Transcendent, on its way to the new colonies on Prosperity, suffers a terrible accident that kills much of the crew and renders the ship dead in the water. The protagonist, Troy Hartman, is an extremely relatable and likable character, especially after we learn more about his backstory in Africa which provides glimpses of his past and adds emotional weight to the story. 

Science but more importantly, great science fiction really drives the plot as Troy struggles against the elements, and certain fate, to try and figure out a way out of his predicament. And then fate or something else awakens from cryosleep one of the ship's other inhabitants. Here's where the story really takes off as now Troy's mission to get help or get off the ship takes on a whole new scope and weight and gives him renewed urgency and purposes.

The action sequences are intense and the story reminiscent of Andy Weir's "The Martian," showcasing Troy's resourcefulness, determination and humanity. The novella takes an unexpected turn towards the end, which was pretty remarkable, leaving open the possibility for future stories. If you're a sci-fi fan and enjoy tales of space voyages gone awry, this is right up your alley. It's a fun, fast read and I desperately wanted to know more about what happens to the characters after that ending1
]]> Little Fires Everywhere 51704136 Everything I Never Told You, a riveting novel that traces the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and the enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives.

In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned--from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.

Enter Mia Warren--an enigmatic artist and single mother--who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town--and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.

Little Fires Everywhere explores the weight of secrets, the nature of art and identity, and the ferocious pull of motherhood--and the danger of believing that following the rules can avert disaster.

Named a Best Book of the Year by: People, The Washington Post, Bustle, Esquire, Southern Living, The Daily Beast, GQ, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Audible, Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ, Library Reads, Book of the Month, Paste, Kirkus Reviews, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and many more...

Perfect for book clubs! Visit celesteng.com for discussion guides and more. ]]> 368 Celeste Ng 0143135163 Susan 3 4.06 2017 Little Fires Everywhere
author: Celeste Ng
name: Susan
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2017
rating: 3
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date added: 2023/03/28
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]]> <![CDATA[Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply]]> 587193 Stolen Harvest, Vandana Shiva describes how industrial agriculture steals food from nature and poor people. She urges us to reclaim our right to protect the earth and her diverse species. Food democracy, she says, is the new agenda for ecological sustainability and social justice.]]> 140 Vandana Shiva 0896086070 Susan 0 to-read 4.10 2000 Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply
author: Vandana Shiva
name: Susan
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/12/09
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Violence of the Green Revolution: Third World Agriculture, Ecology and Politics]]> 278184
Set in the context of a sophisticated critique of the privileged epistemological position achieved by modern science, whereby it both aspires to provide technological solutions for social and political problems while at the same time disclaiming responsibility for the new problems which it creates in its wake, the author looks to the future in an analysis of a new project to apply the latest Gene Revolution technology to India and warns of the further environmental and social damage which will ensue.]]> 264 Vandana Shiva 0862329655 Susan 0 to-read 4.09 1991 The Violence of the Green Revolution: Third World Agriculture, Ecology and Politics
author: Vandana Shiva
name: Susan
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1991
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/12/09
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World]]> 37506348 An insider's groundbreaking investigation of how the global elite's efforts to "change the world" preserve the status quo and obscure their role in causing the problems they later seek to solve.

Former New York Times columnist Anand Giridharadas takes us into the inner sanctums of a new gilded age, where the rich and powerful fight for equality and justice any way they can--except ways that threaten the social order and their position atop it. We see how they rebrand themselves as saviors of the poor; how they lavishly reward "thought leaders" who redefine "change" in winner-friendly ways; and how they constantly seek to do more good, but never less harm. We hear the limousine confessions of a celebrated foundation boss; witness an American president hem and haw about his plutocratic benefactors; and attend a cruise-ship conference where entrepreneurs celebrate their own self-interested magnanimity.

Giridharadas asks hard questions: Why, for example, should our gravest problems be solved by the unelected upper crust instead of the public institutions it erodes by lobbying and dodging taxes? He also points toward an answer: Rather than rely on scraps from the winners, we must take on the grueling democratic work of building more robust, egalitarian institutions and truly changing the world. A call to action for elites and everyday citizens alike.]]> 288 Anand Giridharadas 0451493249 Susan 0 currently-reading 4.12 2018 Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World
author: Anand Giridharadas
name: Susan
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2021/12/09
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> America: The Farewell Tour 36373497
America, says Pulitzer Prize­–winning reporter Chris Hedges, is convulsed by an array of pathologies that have arisen out of profound hopelessness, a bitter despair, and a civil society that has ceased to function. The opioid crisis; the retreat into gambling to cope with economic distress; the pornification of culture; the rise of magical thinking; the celebration of sadism, hate, and plagues of suicides are the physical manifestations of a society that is being ravaged by corporate pillage and a failed democracy. As our society unravels, we also face global upheaval caused by catastrophic climate change. All these ills presage a frightening reconfiguration of the nation and the planet.

Donald Trump rode this disenchantment to power. In his “forceful and direct� ( Publishers Weekly ) The Farewell Tour , Hedges argues that neither political party, now captured by corporate power, addresses the systemic problem. Until our corporate coup d’état is reversed these diseases will grow and ravage the country. “With a trademark blend of…sharply observed detail, Hedges writes a requiem for the American dream� ( Kirkus Reviews ) and seeks to jolt us out of our complacency while there is still time.]]> 400 Chris Hedges 150115267X Susan 4 4.23 2018 America: The Farewell Tour
author: Chris Hedges
name: Susan
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2018
rating: 4
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date added: 2021/12/09
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]]> <![CDATA[The Trespasser (Dublin Murder Squad, #6)]]> 29430013
Their new case looks like yet another by-the-numbers lovers� quarrel gone bad. Aislinn Murray is blond, pretty, groomed-to-a-shine, and dead in her catalog-perfect living room, next to a table set for a romantic dinner. There’s nothing unusual about her—except that Antoinette’s seen her somewhere before.

And that her death won’t stay in its neat by-numbers box. Other detectives are trying to push Antoinette and Steve into arresting Aislinn’s boyfriend, fast. There’s a shadowy figure at the end of Antoinetteʼs road. Aislinnʼs friend is hinting that she knew Aislinn was in danger. And everything they find out about Aislinn takes her further from the glossy, passive doll she seemed to be.

Antoinette knows the harassment has turned her paranoid, but she can’t tell just how far gone she is. Is this case another step in the campaign to force her off the squad, or are there darker currents flowing beneath its polished surface?]]> 449 Tana French 0670026336 Susan 0 3.91 2016 The Trespasser (Dublin Murder Squad, #6)
author: Tana French
name: Susan
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2021/01/05
date added: 2021/01/05
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]]> Rules of Civility 10054335 335 Amor Towles Susan 5 4.06 2011 Rules of Civility
author: Amor Towles
name: Susan
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2020/11/30
date added: 2020/11/30
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]]> The Mysterians manga 24835410 192 Jay Antani 1427820961 Susan 5 4.20 2015 The Mysterians manga
author: Jay Antani
name: Susan
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/11/07
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]]> The Leaving of Things 23382185
So begins a profound journey of self-discovery as Vikram, struggling with loneliness, culture shock, and the chaos of daily Indian life, finds his creativity awakened by a new romance and an old camera. His artistic gifts bring him closer to a place and family he barely knew. But a devastating family crisis challenges Vikram’s sense of his destiny, hurtling him toward a crossroads where he must make the fateful choice between India, the land of his soul, and America, the land of his heart.]]> 338 Jay Antani 147787612X Susan 5 3.88 2013 The Leaving of Things
author: Jay Antani
name: Susan
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/11/07
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]]> Where the Crawdads Sing 36809135
But Kya is not what they say. A born naturalist with just one day of school, she takes life's lessons from the land, learning the real ways of the world from the dishonest signals of fireflies. But while she has the skills to live in solitude forever, the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. Drawn to two young men from town, who are each intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new and startling world—until the unthinkable happens.

In Where the Crawdads Sing, Owens juxtaposes an exquisite ode to the natural world against a profound coming of age story and haunting mystery. Thought-provoking, wise, and deeply moving, Owens’s debut novel reminds us that we are forever shaped by the child within us, while also subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps.

The story asks how isolation influences the behavior of a young woman, who like all of us, has the genetic propensity to belong to a group. The clues to the mystery are brushed into the lush habitat and natural histories of its wild creatures.]]> 384 Delia Owens 0735219117 Susan 4 4.35 2018 Where the Crawdads Sing
author: Delia Owens
name: Susan
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2018
rating: 4
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date added: 2020/08/11
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]]> A Gentleman in Moscow 34066798 The mega-bestseller with more than 2 million readers—Now a Paramount+ with Showtime series starring Ewan McGregor as Count Alexander Rostov

From the #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Lincoln Highway and Rules of Civility, a beautifully transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel

In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him entry into a much larger world of emotional discovery.

Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose.]]> 462 Amor Towles Susan 5 4.28 2016 A Gentleman in Moscow
author: Amor Towles
name: Susan
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> The Goldfinch 17333223
Aged thirteen, Theo Decker, son of a devoted mother and a reckless, largely absent father, survives an accident that otherwise tears his life apart. Alone and rudderless in New York, he is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. He is tormented by an unbearable longing for his mother, and down the years clings to the thing that most reminds him of her: a small, strangely captivating painting that ultimately draws him into the criminal underworld. As he grows up, Theo learns to glide between the drawing rooms of the rich and the dusty antiques store where he works. He is alienated and in love - and his talisman, the painting, places him at the centre of a narrowing, ever more dangerous circle.

The Goldfinch is a haunted odyssey through present-day America and a drama of enthralling power. Combining unforgettably vivid characters and thrilling suspense, it is a beautiful, addictive triumph - a sweeping story of loss and obsession, of survival and self-invention, of the deepest mysteries of love, identity and fate.]]> 771 Donna Tartt 0316055433 Susan 4 3.94 2013 The Goldfinch
author: Donna Tartt
name: Susan
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2013
rating: 4
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> A Thousand Splendid Suns 128029
With the passing of time comes Taliban rule over Afghanistan, the streets of Kabul loud with the sound of gunfire and bombs, life a desperate struggle against starvation, brutality and fear, the women's endurance tested beyond their worst imaginings. Yet love can move people to act in unexpected ways, lead them to overcome the most daunting obstacles with a startling heroism. In the end it is love that triumphs over death and destruction.

A Thousand Splendid Suns is a portrait of a wounded country and a story of family and friendship, of an unforgiving time, an unlikely bond, and an indestructible love.]]> 372 Khaled Hosseini 1594489505 Susan 0 to-read 4.44 2007 A Thousand Splendid Suns
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Susan
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
shelves: to-read
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]]> All the Light We Cannot See 18143977
In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.

From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, the stunningly beautiful instant New York Times bestseller about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

An alternate cover for this ISBN can be found here]]> 544 Anthony Doerr 1476746583 Susan 5 4.31 2014 All the Light We Cannot See
author: Anthony Doerr
name: Susan
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2014
rating: 5
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America]]> 25898216 Stamped from the Beginning uses the lives of five major American intellectuals to offer a window into the contentious debates between assimilationists and segregationists and between racists and anti-racists. From Puritan minister Cotton Mather to Thomas Jefferson, from fiery abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison to brilliant scholar W. E. B. Du Bois to legendary anti-prison activist Angela Davis, Kendi shows how and why some of our leading pro-slavery and pro–civil rights thinkers have challenged or helped cement racist ideas in America.

As Kendi illustrates, racist thinking did not arise from ignorance or hatred. Racist ideas were created and popularized in an effort to defend deeply entrenched discriminatory policies and to rationalize the nation’s racial inequities in everything from wealth to health. While racist ideas are easily produced and easily consumed, they can also be discredited. In shedding much-needed light on the murky history of racist ideas, Stamped from the Beginning offers tools to expose them—and in the process, reason to hope.]]> 592 Ibram X. Kendi 1568584636 Susan 0 to-read 4.53 2016 Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
author: Ibram X. Kendi
name: Susan
average rating: 4.53
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)]]> 2767052
Winning means fame and fortune. Losing means certain death. The Hunger Games have begun. . . .

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before-and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that weigh survival against humanity and life against love.]]> 374 Suzanne Collins Susan 0 4.34 2008 The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)
author: Suzanne Collins
name: Susan
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> To Kill a Mockingbird 2657 "Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

A lawyer's advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic novel - a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the 1930s. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man's struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much.

"To Kill A Mockingbird" became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film.]]> 323 Harper Lee 0060935464 Susan 0 4.25 1960 To Kill a Mockingbird
author: Harper Lee
name: Susan
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1960
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> The Underground Railroad 30555488
In Whitehead's ingenious conception, the Underground Railroad is no mere metaphor--engineers and conductors operate a secret network of tracks and tunnels beneath the Southern soil. Cora and Caesar's first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But the city's placid surface masks an insidious scheme designed for its black denizens. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher, is close on their heels. Forced to flee again, Cora embarks on a harrowing flight, state by state, seeking true freedom.

Like the protagonist of Gulliver's Travels, Cora encounters different worlds at each stage of her journey--hers is an odyssey through time as well as space. As Whitehead brilliantly re-creates the unique terrors for black people in the pre-Civil War era, his narrative seamlessly weaves the saga of America from the brutal importation of Africans to the unfulfilled promises of the present day. The Underground Railroad is at once a kinetic adventure tale of one woman's ferocious will to escape the horrors of bondage and a shattering, powerful meditation on the history we all share.]]> 320 Colson Whitehead 0385542364 Susan 0 4.04 2016 The Underground Railroad
author: Colson Whitehead
name: Susan
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> The Nickel Boys 42270835 Author of The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead brilliantly dramatizes another strand of American history through the story of two boys sentenced to a hellish reform school in 1960s Florida.

Elwood Curtis has taken the words of Dr Martin Luther King to heart: he is as good as anyone. Abandoned by his parents, brought up by his loving, strict and clear-sighted grandmother, Elwood is about to enroll in the local black college. But given the time and the place, one innocent mistake is enough to destroy his future, and so Elwood arrives at The Nickel Academy, which claims to provide 'physical, intellectual and moral training' which will equip its inmates to become 'honorable and honest men'.

In reality, the Nickel Academy is a chamber of horrors, where physical, emotional and sexual abuse is rife, where corrupt officials and tradesmen do a brisk trade in supplies intended for the school, and where any boy who resists is likely to disappear 'out back'. Stunned to find himself in this vicious environment, Elwood tries to hold on to Dr King's ringing assertion, 'Throw us in jail, and we will still love you.' But Elwood's fellow inmate and new friend Turner thinks Elwood is naive and worse; the world is crooked, and the only way to survive is to emulate the cruelty and cynicism of their oppressors.

The tension between Elwood's idealism and Turner's skepticism leads to a decision which will have decades-long repercussions.

Based on the history of a real reform school in Florida that operated for one hundred and eleven years and warped and destroyed the lives of thousands of children, The Nickel Boys is a devastating, driven narrative by a great American novelist whose work is essential to understanding the current reality of the United States.]]> 213 Colson Whitehead Susan 0 to-read 4.25 2019 The Nickel Boys
author: Colson Whitehead
name: Susan
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> How to Be an Antiracist 40265832 How to be an Antiracist, Kendi asks us to think about what an antiracist society might look like, and how we can play an active role in building it.

In this book, Kendi weaves together an electrifying combination of ethics, history, law, and science, bringing it all together with an engaging personal narrative of his own awakening to antiracism. How to Be an Antiracist is an essential work for anyone who wants to go beyond an awareness of racism to the next step: contributing to the formation of a truly just and equitable society.]]> 305 Ibram X. Kendi 0525509283 Susan 0 to-read 4.36 2019 How to Be an Antiracist
author: Ibram X. Kendi
name: Susan
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
shelves: to-read
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]]> Misery 10614 #1, #2, #3, #4

Paul Sheldon. He's a bestselling novelist who has finally met his biggest fan. Her name is Annie Wilkes and she is more than a rabid reader - she is Paul's nurse, tending his shattered body after an automobile accident. But she is also his captor, keeping him prisoner in her isolated house.]]> 370 Stephen King 0450417395 Susan 0 4.22 1987 Misery
author: Stephen King
name: Susan
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1987
rating: 0
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]]> The Girl on the Train 22557272
An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.]]> 336 Paula Hawkins 1594633665 Susan 0 to-read 3.97 2015 The Girl on the Train
author: Paula Hawkins
name: Susan
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/06/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[In the Woods (Dublin Murder Squad, #1)]]> 237209
Twenty years later, the found boy, Rob Ryan, is a detective on the Dublin Murder Squad and keeps his past a secret. But when a twelve-year-old girl is found murdered in the same woods, he and Detective Cassie Maddox—his partner and closest friend—find themselves investigating a case chillingly similar to the previous unsolved mystery. Now, with only snippets of long-buried memories to guide him, Ryan has the chance to uncover both the mystery of the case before him and that of his own shadowy past.]]> 429 Tana French 0670038601 Susan 4 3.75 2007 In the Woods (Dublin Murder Squad, #1)
author: Tana French
name: Susan
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2007
rating: 4
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> Daisy Jones & The Six 40597810 Everyone knows DAISY JONES & THE SIX, but nobody knows the reason behind their split at the absolute height of their popularity . . . until now.

Daisy is a girl coming of age in L.A. in the late sixties, sneaking into clubs on the Sunset Strip, sleeping with rock stars, and dreaming of singing at the Whisky a Go Go. The sex and drugs are thrilling, but it’s the rock ’n� roll she loves most. By the time she’s twenty, her voice is getting noticed, and she has the kind of heedless beauty that makes people do crazy things.

Also getting noticed is The Six, a band led by the brooding Billy Dunne. On the eve of their first tour, his girlfriend Camila finds out she’s pregnant, and with the pressure of impending fatherhood and fame, Billy goes a little wild on the road.

Daisy and Billy cross paths when a producer realizes that the key to supercharged success is to put the two together. What happens next will become the stuff of legend.

The making of that legend is chronicled in this riveting and unforgettable novel, written as an oral history of one of the biggest bands of the seventies. Taylor Jenkins Reid is a talented writer who takes her work to a new level with Daisy Jones & The Six, brilliantly capturing a place and time in an utterly distinctive voice.]]> 368 Taylor Jenkins Reid 1524798622 Susan 3 4.20 2019 Daisy Jones & The Six
author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
name: Susan
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2019
rating: 3
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore (Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore, #1)]]> 13538873
Clay Jannon tells how serendipity, sheer curiosity, and the ability to climb a ladder like a monkey has sent him from Web Drone to night shift at Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore. After just a few days on the job, Clay realizes just how curious this store is.

A few customers come in repeatedly without buying anything. Instead they “check out� obscure volumes from strange corners of the store. All runs according to some elaborate, long-standing arrangement with the gnomic Mr. Penumbra. The store must be a front for something larger, Clay concludes.

He embarks on a complex analysis of the customers� behavior and ropes in friends to help. Once they bring their findings to Mr. Penumbra, it turns out the secrets extend far outside the walls of the bookstore. A quest to New York City dips in a world conspiracy for eternal life. The current of romance pulls Clay onward.]]> 288 Robin Sloan 0374214913 Susan 0 3.71 2012 Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore (Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore, #1)
author: Robin Sloan
name: Susan
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Outliers: The Story of Success]]> 3228917 Learn what sets high achievers apart � from Bill Gates to the Beatles � in this #1 bestseller from "a singular talent" (New York Times Book Review).

In this stunning book, Malcolm Gladwell takes us on an intellectual journey through the world of "outliers"—the best and the brightest, the most famous and the most successful. He asks the question: what makes high-achievers different?

His answer is that we pay too much attention to what successful people are like, and too little attention to where they are from: that is, their culture, their family, their generation, and the idiosyncratic experiences of their upbringing. Along the way he explains the secrets of software billionaires, what it takes to be a great soccer player, why Asians are good at math, and what made the Beatles the greatest rock band.

Brilliant and entertaining, Outliers is a landmark work that will simultaneously delight and illuminate.]]> 309 Malcolm Gladwell 0316017922 Susan 0 4.19 2008 Outliers: The Story of Success
author: Malcolm Gladwell
name: Susan
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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date added: 2020/06/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century]]> 38212124 An alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780393356311 can be found here.

The inspiration for Chloé Zhao's celebrated film starring Frances McDormand, winner of the Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actress
March and April pick for the PBS Newshour-New York Times "Now Read This" Book Club
New York Times bestseller

"People who thought the 2008 financial collapse was over a long time ago need to meet the people Jessica Bruder got to know in this scorching, beautifully written, vivid, disturbing (and occasionally wryly funny) book." —Rebecca Solnit




From the beet fields of North Dakota to the National Forest campgrounds of California to Amazon’s CamperForce program in Texas, employers have discovered a new, low-cost labor pool, made up largely of transient older Americans. Finding that social security comes up short, often underwater on mortgages, these invisible casualties of the Great Recession have taken to the road by the tens of thousands in late-model RVs, travel trailers, and vans, forming a growing community of nomads.

On frequently traveled routes between seasonal jobs, Jessica Bruder meets people from all walks of life: a former professor, a McDonald’s vice president, a minister, a college administrator, and a motorcycle cop, among many others—including her irrepressible protagonist, a onetime cocktail waitress, Home Depot clerk, and general contractor named Linda May.

In a secondhand vehicle she christens “Van Halen,� Bruder hits the road to get to know her subjects more intimately. Accompanying Linda May and others from campground toilet cleaning to warehouse product scanning to desert reunions, then moving on to the dangerous work of beet harvesting, Bruder tells a compelling, eye-opening tale of the dark underbelly of the American economy—one that foreshadows the precarious future that may await many more of us. At the same time, she celebrates the exceptional resilience and creativity of these quintessential Americans who have given up ordinary rootedness to survive. Like Linda May, who dreams of finding land on which to build her own sustainable “Earthship� home, they have not given up hope.]]> 288 Jessica Bruder Susan 4 3.98 2017 Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century
author: Jessica Bruder
name: Susan
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2020/06/02
date added: 2020/06/02
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Critical reading especially post Covid reality with fewer and fewer jobs and as we step further and further into an Amazon future. If you're over 50 in this country, you are screwed.
]]> Age of Vice 48590315 488 Deepti Kapoor 0593328817 Susan 0 to-read 3.80 2023 Age of Vice
author: Deepti Kapoor
name: Susan
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/11/13
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate: Discoveries from a Secret World]]> 28256439 The Hidden Life of Trees, Peter Wohlleben shares his deep love of woods and forests and explains the amazing processes of life, death, and regeneration he has observed in the woodland and the amazing scientific processes behind the wonders of which we are blissfully unaware. Much like human families, tree parents live together with their children, communicate with them, and support them as they grow, sharing nutrients with those who are sick or struggling and creating an ecosystem that mitigates the impact of extremes of heat and cold for the whole group. As a result of such interactions, trees in a family or community are protected and can live to be very old. In contrast, solitary trees, like street kids, have a tough time of it and in most cases die much earlier than those in a group.

Drawing on groundbreaking new discoveries, Wohlleben presents the science behind the secret and previously unknown life of trees and their communication abilities; he describes how these discoveries have informed his own practices in the forest around him. As he says, a happy forest is a healthy forest, and he believes that eco-friendly practices not only are economically sustainable but also benefit the health of our planet and the mental and physical health of all who live on Earth.]]> 272 Peter Wohlleben 1771642483 Susan 0 to-read 4.06 2015 The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate: Discoveries from a Secret World
author: Peter Wohlleben
name: Susan
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/08/26
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Tribe Of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World]]> 36200111 Tim Ferriss, the #1 New York Times best-selling author of The 4-Hour Workweek, shares the ultimate choose-your-own-adventure book--a compilation of tools, tactics, and habits from 130+ of the world's top performers. From iconic entrepreneurs to elite athletes, from artists to billionaire investors, their short profiles can help you answer life's most challenging questions, achieve extraordinary results, and transform your life.

From the

In 2017, several of my close friends died in rapid succession. It was a very hard year, as it was for many people.

It was also a stark reminder that time is our scarcest, non-renewable resource.

With a renewed sense of urgency, I began asking myself many

Were my goals my own, or simply what I thought I should want?
How much of life had I missed from underplanning or overplanning?
How could I be kinder to myself?
How could I better say "no" to the trivial many to better say "yes" to the critical few?
How could I best reassess my priorities and my purpose in this world?

To find answers, I reached out to the most impressive world-class performers in the world, ranging from wunderkinds in their 20s to icons in their 70s and 80s. No stone was left unturned.

This book contains their answers--practical and tactical advice from mentors who have found solutions. Whether you want to 10x your results, get unstuck, or reinvent yourself, someone else has traveled a similar path and taken notes.

This book, Tribe of Mentors, includes many of the people I grew up viewing as idols or demi-gods. Less than 10% have been on my podcast (The Tim Ferriss Show, more than 200 million downloads), making this a brand-new playbook of playbooks.

No matter your challenge or opportunity, something in these pages can help.

Among other things, you will

- More than 50 morning routines--both for the early riser and those who struggle to get out of bed.
- How TED curator Chris Anderson realized that the best way to get things done is to let go.
- The best purchases of $100 or less (you'll never have to think about the right gift again).
- How to overcome failure and bounce back towards success.
- Why Humans of New York creator Brandon Stanton believes that the best art will always be the riskiest.
- How to meditate and be more mindful (and not just for those that find it easy).
- Why tennis champion Maria Sharapova believe that "losing makes you think in ways victories can't."
- How to truly achieve work-life balance (and why most people tell you it isn't realistic).
- How billionaire Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz transformed the way he engages with difficult situations to reduce suffering.
- Ways to thrive (and survive) the overwhelming amount of information you process every day.
- How to achieve clarity on your purpose and assess your priorities.
- And much more.

This reference book, which I wrote for myself, has already changed my life. I certainly hope the same for you.

I wish you luck as you forge your own path.

All the best,

Tim Ferriss]]> 561 Timothy Ferriss 132899497X Susan 3 4.04 2017 Tribe Of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World
author: Timothy Ferriss
name: Susan
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2017
rating: 3
read at: 2019/08/26
date added: 2019/08/26
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]]> <![CDATA[Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis]]> 27161156 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780062300546.

Hillbilly Elegy recounts J.D. Vance's powerful origin story...

From a former marine and Yale Law School graduate now serving as a U.S. Senator from Ohio and the Republican Vice Presidential candidate for the 2024 election, an incisive account of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town that offers a broader, probing look at the struggles of America's white working class.

Hillbilly Elegy is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis—that of white working-class Americans. The disintegration of this group, a process that has been slowly occurring now for more than forty years, has been reported with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.

The Vance family story begins hopefully in postwar America. J. D.'s grandparents were "dirt poor and in love," and moved north from Kentucky's Appalachia region to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a middle-class family, and eventually one of their grandchildren would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of success in achieving generational upward mobility. But as the family saga of Hillbilly Elegy plays out, we learn that J.D.'s grandparents, aunt, uncle, and, most of all, his mother struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, never fully escaping the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. With piercing honesty, Vance shows how he himself still carries around the demons of his chaotic family history.

A deeply moving memoir, with its share of humor and vividly colorful figures, Hillbilly Elegy is the story of how upward mobility really feels. And it is an urgent and troubling meditation on the loss of the American dream for a large segment of this country.]]> 264 J.D. Vance Susan 4 3.81 2016 Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
author: J.D. Vance
name: Susan
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2019/08/26
date added: 2019/08/26
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]]> <![CDATA[Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief]]> 16142053 the Looming Tower. Based on more than two hundred personal interviews with both current and former Scientologists--both famous and less well known--and years of archival research, Lawrence Wright uses his extraordinary investigative skills to uncover for us the inner workings of the Church of Scientology: its origins in the imagination of science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard; its struggles to find acceptance as a legitimate (and legally acknowledged) religion; its vast, secret campaign to infiltrate the U.S. government; and its dramatic efforts to grow and prevail after the death of Hubbard.

At the book's center, two men whom Wright brings vividly to life, showing how they have made Scientology what it is today: The darkly brilliant L. Ron Hubbard--whose restless, expansive mind invented a new religion tailor-made to prosper in the spiritually troubled post-World War II era. And his successor, David Miscavige--tough and driven, with the unenviable task of preserving the church in the face of ongoing scandals and continual legal assaults.

We learn about Scientology's esoteric cosmology; about the auditing process that determines an inductee's state of being; about the Bridge to Total Freedom, through which members gain eternal life. We see the ways in which the church pursues celebrities, such as Tom Cruise and John Travolta, and how young idealists who joined the Sea Org, the church's clergy, whose members often enter as children, signing up with a billion-year contract and working with little pay in poor conditions. We meet men and women "disconnected" from friends and family by the church's policy of shunning critical voices. And we discover, through many firsthand stories, the violence that has long permeated the inner sanctum of the church.

In Going Clear, Wright examines what fundamentally makes a religion a religion, and whether Scientology is, in fact, deserving of the constitutional protections achieved in its victory over the IRS. Employing all his exceptional journalistic skills of observations, understanding, and synthesis, and his ability to shape a story into a compelling narrative, Lawrence Wright has given us an evenhanded yet keenly incisive book that goes far beyond an immediate exposé and uncovers the very essence of what makes Scientology the institution it is.]]> 430 Lawrence Wright 0307700666 Susan 4 4.02 2013 Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief
author: Lawrence Wright
name: Susan
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2013/08/30
date added: 2017/12/30
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]]> <![CDATA[The Brick Moon Fiction Annual Vol. 1]]> 28218976 440 Christian Beranek Susan 5 5.00 2015 The Brick Moon Fiction Annual Vol. 1
author: Christian Beranek
name: Susan
average rating: 5.00
book published: 2015
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2017/09/21
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]]> <![CDATA[The Brick Moon Fiction Annual Volume 2]]> 33217497 243 Rudolfo Serna Susan 5 4.75 2016 The Brick Moon Fiction Annual Volume 2
author: Rudolfo Serna
name: Susan
average rating: 4.75
book published: 2016
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2017/09/21
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]]> <![CDATA[The Luminous Heart of Jonah S.]]> 20949661
From Tehran to Los Angeles, The Luminous Heart of Jonah S. is a sweeping saga that tells the story of the Soleymans, an Iranian Jewish family tormented for decades by Raphael's Son, a crafty and unscrupulous financier who has futilely claimed to be an heir to the family's fortune.

Forty years later in contemporary Los Angeles, Raphael's Son has nearly achieved his goal--until he suddenly disappears, presumed by many to have been murdered. The possible suspects are legion: his long-suffering wife; numerous members of the Soleyman clan exacting revenge; the scores of investors he bankrupted in a Ponzi scheme; or perhaps even his disgruntled bookkeeper and longtime confidant.

Award-winning novelist Gina B. Nahai pulls back the curtain on a close-knit community that survived centuries of persecution in Iran before settling and thriving in the United States, but now finds itself divided to the core by one of its own members. By turns hilarious and affecting, The Luminous Heart of Jonah S. examines the eternal bonds of family and community, and the lasting scars of exile.
]]> 416 Gina B. Nahai 1617753203 Susan 0 to-read 3.68 2014 The Luminous Heart of Jonah S.
author: Gina B. Nahai
name: Susan
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2014
rating: 0
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date added: 2014/10/11
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Adventures of Tom Sawyer 24583
Unlike his brother Sid, Tom receives "lickings" from his Aunt Polly; ever the mischief-maker, would rather play hooky than attend school and often sneaks out his bedroom window at night to adventure with his friend, Huckleberry Finn ­ the town's social outcast. Tom, despite his dread of schooling, is extremely clever and would normally get away with his pranks if Sid were not such a "tattle-tale."

As punishment for skipping school to go swimming, Aunt Polly assigns Tom the chore of whitewashing the fence surrounding the house. In a brilliant scheme, Tom is able to con the neighborhood boys into completing the chore for him, managing to convince them of the joys of whitewashing. At school, Tom is equally as flamboyant, and attracts attention by chasing other boys, yelling, and running around. With his usual antics, Tom attempts to catch the eye of Becky Thatcher, a new girl in town, and persuades her to get "engaged" by kissing him. But their romance collapses when she learns Tom has been "engaged" previously to Amy Lawrence. Shortly after Becky shuns him, he accompanies Huckleberry Finn to the graveyard at night, where they witness the murder of Dr. Robinson.

Excerpt:
"TOM!"
No answer.
"TOM!"
No answer.
"What's gone with that boy,  I wonder? You TOM!"
No answer.
The old lady pulled her spectacles down and looked over them about the room; then she put them up and looked out under them. She seldom or never looked through them for so small a thing as a boy; they were her state pair, the pride of her heart, and were built for "style," not service—she could have seen through a pair of stove-lids just as well. She looked perplexed for a moment, and then said, not fiercely, but still loud enough for the furniture to hear:
"Well, I lay if I get hold of you I'll�"
She did not finish, for by this time she was bending down and punching under the bed with the broom, and so she needed breath to punctuate the punches with. She resurrected nothing but the cat.
"I never did see the beat of that boy!"]]> 244 Mark Twain Susan 4 3.92 1876 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
author: Mark Twain
name: Susan
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1876
rating: 4
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date added: 2014/04/25
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]]> <![CDATA[The Doctor's Daughter: Journey to Justice]]> 16241426 456 Belle Blackburn 0615690955 Susan 0 to-read 4.21 2012 The Doctor's Daughter: Journey to Justice
author: Belle Blackburn
name: Susan
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2013/11/09
shelves: to-read
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]]> City of Thieves 1971304
By turns insightful and funny, thrilling and terrifying, City of Thieves is a gripping, cinematic World War II adventure and an intimate coming-of-age story with an utterly contemporary feel for how boys become men.]]> 258 David Benioff 0670018708 Susan 4 4.28 2008 City of Thieves
author: David Benioff
name: Susan
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2008
rating: 4
read at: 2013/11/07
date added: 2013/11/07
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Such a wonderful coming of age story wrapped inside an impressive telling of an important historical event. Funny, poignant and really enlightening on the profound hardship of wartime in frozen, isolated and cut off Russia.
]]> Swamplandia! 8584686
The Bigtree alligator-wrestling dynasty is in decline, and Swamplandia!, their island home and gator-wrestling theme park, formerly #1 in the region, is swiftly being encroached upon by a fearsome and sophisticated competitor called the World of Darkness. Ava’s mother, the park’s indomitable headliner, has just died; her sister, Ossie, has fallen in love with a spooky character known as the Dredgeman, who may or may not be an actual ghost; and her brilliant big brother, Kiwi, who dreams of becoming a scholar, has just defected to the World of Darkness in a last-ditch effort to keep their family business from going under. Ava’s father, affectionately known as Chief Bigtree, is AWOL; and that leaves Ava, a resourceful but terrified thirteen, to manage ninety-eight gators and the vast, inscrutable landscape of her own grief.

Against a backdrop of hauntingly fecund plant life animated by ancient lizards and lawless hungers, Karen Russell has written an utterly singular novel about a family’s struggle to stay afloat in a world that is inexorably sinking. An arrestingly beautiful and inventive work from a vibrant new voice in fiction.]]> 315 Karen Russell 0307263991 Susan 0 3.22 2011 Swamplandia!
author: Karen Russell
name: Susan
average rating: 3.22
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at: 2013/07/10
date added: 2013/07/10
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]]> Just Kids 341879 Just Kids, Patti Smith's first book of prose, the legendary American artist offers a never-before-seen glimpse of her remarkable relationship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe in the epochal days of New York City and the Chelsea Hotel in the late sixties and seventies. An honest and moving story of youth and friendship, Smith brings the same unique, lyrical quality to Just Kids as she has to the rest of her formidable body of work--from her influential 1975 album Horses to her visual art and poetry.]]> 304 Patti Smith Susan 4 4.19 2010 Just Kids
author: Patti Smith
name: Susan
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/05/20
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review:

]]> Motherless Brooklyn 328854 Motherless Brooklyn is a brilliantly original homage to the classic detective novel by one of the most acclaimed writers of his generation.]]> 311 Jonathan Lethem 0345803396 Susan 0 to-read 3.86 1999 Motherless Brooklyn
author: Jonathan Lethem
name: Susan
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1999
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2013/05/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Shantaram 33600
So begins this epic, mesmerizing first novel set in the underworld of contemporary Bombay. Shantaram is narrated by Lin, an escaped convict with a false passport who flees maximum security prison in Australia for the teeming streets of a city where he can disappear.

Accompanied by his guide and faithful friend, Prabaker, the two enter Bombay's hidden society of beggars and gangsters, prostitutes and holy men, soldiers and actors, and Indians and exiles from other countries, who seek in this remarkable place what they cannot find elsewhere.

As a hunted man without a home, family, or identity, Lin searches for love and meaning while running a clinic in one of the city's poorest slums, and serving his apprenticeship in the dark arts of the Bombay mafia. The search leads him to war, prison torture, murder, and a series of enigmatic and bloody betrayals. The keys to unlock the mysteries and intrigues that bind Lin are held by two people. The first is Khader Khan: mafia godfather, criminal-philosopher-saint, and mentor to Lin in the underworld of the Golden City. The second is Karla: elusive, dangerous, and beautiful, whose passions are driven by secrets that torment her and yet give her a terrible power.

Burning slums and five-star hotels, romantic love and prison agonies, criminal wars and Bollywood films, spiritual gurus and mujaheddin guerrillas—this huge novel has the world of human experience in its reach, and a passionate love for India at its heart. Based on the life of the author, it is by any measure the debut of an extraordinary voice in literature.]]> 936 Gregory David Roberts 192076920X Susan 0 to-read 4.27 2003 Shantaram
author: Gregory David Roberts
name: Susan
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2013/05/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, #1)]]> 5899779 “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.�

So begins Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, an expanded edition of the beloved Jane Austen novel featuring all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie mayhem. As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton—and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she’s soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers—and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield. Can Elizabeth vanquish the spawn of Satan? And overcome the social prejudices of the class-conscious landed gentry? Complete with romance, heartbreak, swordfights, cannibalism, and thousands of rotting corpses,]]> 320 Seth Grahame-Smith 1594743347 Susan 0 to-read 3.32 2009 Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, #1)
author: Seth Grahame-Smith
name: Susan
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2013/05/19
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War]]> 8908
Ranging from the now infamous village of New Dachang in the United Federation of China, where the epidemiological trail began with the twelve-year-old Patient Zero, to the unnamed northern forests where untold numbers sought a terrible and temporary refuge in the cold, to the United States of Southern Africa, where the Redeker Plan provided hope for humanity at an unspeakable price, to the west-of-the-Rockies redoubt where the North American tide finally started to turn, this invaluable chronicle reflects the full scope and duration of the Zombie War.

Most of all, the book captures with haunting immediacy the human dimension of this epochal event. Facing the often raw and vivid nature of these personal accounts requires a degree of courage on the part of the reader, but the effort is invaluable because, as Mr. Brooks says in his introduction, "By excluding the human factor, aren't we risking the kind of personal detachment from history that may, heaven forbid, lead us one day to repeat it? And in the end, isn't the human factor the only true difference between us and the enemy we now refer to as 'the living dead'?"

Note: Some of the numerical and factual material contained in this edition was previously published under the auspices of the United Nations Postwar Commission.]]> 342 Max Brooks 0307346609 Susan 0 to-read 4.02 2006 World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
author: Max Brooks
name: Susan
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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]]> The Glass Castle 7445 THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

The Glass Castle is a remarkable memoir of resilience and redemption, and a revelatory look into a family at once deeply dysfunctional and uniquely vibrant. When sober, Jeannette's brilliant and charismatic father captured his children's imagination, teaching them physics, geology, and how to embrace life fearlessly. But when he drank, he was dishonest and destructive. Her mother was a free spirit who abhorred the idea of domesticity and didn't want the responsibility of raising a family.

The Walls children learned to take care of themselves. They fed, clothed, and protected one another, and eventually found their way to New York. Their parents followed them, choosing to be homeless even as their children prospered.

The Glass Castle is truly astonishing--a memoir permeated by the intense love of a peculiar but loyal family.]]> 288 Jeannette Walls 074324754X Susan 0 to-read 4.32 2005 The Glass Castle
author: Jeannette Walls
name: Susan
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet]]> 3367956 290 Jamie Ford 0345505336 Susan 0 to-read 4.03 2009 Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
author: Jamie Ford
name: Susan
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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]]> The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress 16690 288 Robert A. Heinlein 0340837942 Susan 0 to-read 4.16 1966 The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
author: Robert A. Heinlein
name: Susan
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1966
rating: 0
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]]> State of Wonder 9118135
As Dr. Marina Singh embarks upon an uncertain odyssey into the insect-infested Amazon, she will be forced to surrender herself to the lush but forbidding world that awaits within the jungle.

Charged with finding her former mentor Dr. Annick Swenson, a researcher who has disappeared while working on a valuable new drug, she will have to confront her own memories of tragedy and sacrifice as she journeys into the unforgiving heart of darkness.

Stirring and luminous, "State of Wonder" is a world unto itself, where unlikely beauty stands beside unimaginable loss beneath the rain forest's jeweled canopy.]]> 353 Ann Patchett 0062049801 Susan 0 to-read 3.88 2011 State of Wonder
author: Ann Patchett
name: Susan
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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]]> The Leaving of Things 17931571
So begins a profound journey of self-discovery as Vikram, struggling with loneliness, culture shock, and the chaos of daily Indian life, finds his creativity awakened by a new romance and an old camera. His artistic gifts bring him closer to a place and family he barely knew. But a devastating family crisis challenges Vikram’s sense of his destiny, hurtling him toward a crossroads where he must make the fateful choice between India, the land of his soul, and America, the land of his heart.]]> 368 Jay Antani 0988419300 Susan 5
Poignant, exceptionally written and instantly engaging. The haunting and absolutely vivid descriptions of time, place, and the people of India, are like a travelogue through a culture and society before globalization and the internet. It's also a beautifully told story of the power, draw, and ultimately the imprint that family leaves on us as adults. ]]> 3.59 2013 The Leaving of Things
author: Jay Antani
name: Susan
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/05/18
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On the cusp of adulthood and the adventures that await in college, an Indian born, U.S. bred eighteen year old is forced to leave his friends, girlfriend, the familiarities of living life as an American, for a one way ticket back to India. Touching down in the homeland everything is instantly different. Emotions are jumbled upon meeting family for the first time in 11 years, compounded by the palpable realization that this is not a vacation and there's no turning around and heading back to America. Though the location and experience may be foreign, we remember our own teenage years and immediately relate to the protagonist and are eager to follow along on his journey.

Poignant, exceptionally written and instantly engaging. The haunting and absolutely vivid descriptions of time, place, and the people of India, are like a travelogue through a culture and society before globalization and the internet. It's also a beautifully told story of the power, draw, and ultimately the imprint that family leaves on us as adults.
]]> Where'd You Go, Bernadette 12611253
When her daughter Bee claims a family trip to Antarctica as a reward for perfect grades, Bernadette, a fiercely intelligent shut-in, throws herself into preparations for the trip. But worn down by years of trying to live the Seattle life she never wanted, Ms. Fox is on the brink of a meltdown. And after a school fundraiser goes disastrously awry at her hands, she disappears, leaving her family to pick up the pieces--which is exactly what Bee does, weaving together an elaborate web of emails, invoices, and school memos that reveals a secret past Bernadette has been hiding for decades. Where'd You Go Bernadette is an ingenious and unabashedly entertaining novel about a family coming to terms with who they are and the power of a daughter's love for her mother.]]> 324 Maria Semple 0297867288 Susan 4 3.91 2012 Where'd You Go, Bernadette
author: Maria Semple
name: Susan
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2013/05/18
date added: 2013/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Six Spices: A Simple Concept of Indian Cooking]]> 2224787


Featuring authentic recipes and introducing the use of fundamental spices, this recipe collection guides cooks of all levels of expertise in the preparation of healthy, delicious Indian meals. The recipes selected use no more than six spices to create tasty, satisfying, and authentic dishes and introduce a simpler way to prepare Indian food. Each chapter focuses on a different cooking technique, offering insight into foods that at times can seem daunting for the novice cook. This recipe collection has been tasted and tested through more than 20 years of the author's teaching experience and Indian cooking expertise.]]> 176 Neeta Saluja 0976353997 Susan 5 4.00 2007 Six Spices: A Simple Concept of Indian Cooking
author: Neeta Saluja
name: Susan
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook]]> 3888 726 America's Test Kitchen 193361501X Susan 4 4.16 2005 The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook
author: America's Test Kitchen
name: Susan
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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]]> Gone Girl 8442457 What have we done to each other?

These are the questions Nick Dunne finds himself asking on the morning of his fifth wedding anniversary when his wife Amy suddenly disappears. The police suspect Nick. Amy's friends reveal that she was afraid of him, that she kept secrets from him. He swears it isn't true. A police examination of his computer shows strange searches. He says they weren't made by him. And then there are the persistent calls on his mobile phone.

So what did happen to Nick's beautiful wife?]]> 399 Gillian Flynn Susan 3 3.93 2012 Gone Girl
author: Gillian Flynn
name: Susan
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2012
rating: 3
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]]> Middlesex 2187 Middlesex tells the breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides, and three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family, who travel from a tiny village overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit, witnessing its glory days as the Motor City and the race riots of 1967 before moving out to the tree-lined streets of suburban Grosse Pointe, Michigan. To understand why Calliope is not like other girls, she has to uncover a guilty family secret, and the astonishing genetic history that turns Callie into Cal, one of the most audacious and wondrous narrators in contemporary fiction. Lyrical and thrilling, Middlesex is an exhilarating reinvention of the American epic.]]> 529 Jeffrey Eugenides 0312422156 Susan 0 to-read 4.03 2002 Middlesex
author: Jeffrey Eugenides
name: Susan
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society]]> 2728527
“Treat yourself to this book, please - I can’t recommend it highly enough.� (Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love)

“I wonder how the book got to Guernsey? Perhaps there is some sort of secret homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers.�

January 1946: London is emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, and writer Juliet Ashton is looking for her next book subject. Who could imagine that she would find it in a letter from a man she’s never met, a native of the island of Guernsey, who has come across her name written inside a book by Charles Lamb....

As Juliet and her new correspondent exchange letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of this man and his friends - and what a wonderfully eccentric world it is. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - born as a spur-of-the-moment alibi when its members were discovered breaking curfew by the Germans occupying their island - boasts a charming, funny, deeply human cast of characters, from pig farmers to phrenologists, literature lovers all. Juliet begins a remarkable correspondence with the society’s members, learning about their island, their taste in books, and the impact the recent German occupation has had on their lives. Captivated by their stories, she sets sail for Guernsey, and what she finds will change her forever.

Written with warmth and humor as a series of letters, this novel is a celebration of the written word in all its guises and of finding connection in the most surprising ways.

Praise for The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society

“A jewel... Poignant and keenly observed, Guernsey is a small masterpiece about love, war, and the immeasurable sustenance to be found in good books and good friends.� (People)

“A book-lover’s delight, an implicit and sometimes explicit paean to all things literary.� (Chicago Sun-Times)

“A sparkling epistolary novel radiating wit, lightly worn erudition and written with great assurance and aplomb.� (The Sunday Times [London])

“Cooked perfectly à point: subtle and elegant in flavour, yet emotionally satisfying to the finish.� (The Times [London])]]> 277 Mary Ann Shaffer 0385340990 Susan 4 4.13 2008 The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
author: Mary Ann Shaffer
name: Susan
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2008
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close]]> 4588
The key belonged to his father, he's sure of that. But which of New York's 162 million locks does it open?

So begins a quest that takes Oskar - inventor, letter-writer and amateur detective - across New York's five boroughs and into the jumbled lives of friends, relatives, and complete strangers. He gets heavy boots, he gives himself little bruises and he inches ever nearer to the heart of a family mystery that stretches back fifty years. But will it take him any closer to, or further from, his lost father?]]> 326 Jonathan Safran Foer 0618711651 Susan 0 to-read 3.98 2005 Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
author: Jonathan Safran Foer
name: Susan
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> The Help 4667024
Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.

Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.

Minny, Aibileen's best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody's business, but she can't mind her tongue, so she's lost yet another job. Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.

Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women, mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends, view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't.


Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here]]> 464 Kathryn Stockett 0399155341 Susan 4 4.46 2009 The Help
author: Kathryn Stockett
name: Susan
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2009
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium #1)]]> 2429135
An international publishing sensation, Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo combines murder mystery, family saga, love story, and financial intrigue into one satisfyingly complex and entertainingly atmospheric novel.]]> 480 Stieg Larsson 0670069019 Susan 0 to-read 4.17 2005 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium #1)
author: Stieg Larsson
name: Susan
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> The Lovely Bones 12232938
So begins the story of Susie Salmon, who is adjusting to her new home in heaven, a place that is not at all what she expected, even as she is watching life on earth continue without her -- her friends trading rumors about her disappearance, her killer trying to cover his tracks, her grief-stricken family unraveling. Out of unspeakable tragedy and loss, The Lovely Bones succeeds, miraculously, in building a tale filled with hope, humor, suspense, even joy.]]> 372 Alice Sebold 0316166685 Susan 3 3.87 2002 The Lovely Bones
author: Alice Sebold
name: Susan
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Fellowship of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings, #1)]]> 34
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkeness bind them

In ancient times the Rings of Power were crafted by the Elven-smiths, and Sauron, The Dark Lord, forged the One Ring, filling it with his own power so that he could rule all others. But the One Ring was taken from him, and though he sought it throughout Middle-earth, it remained lost to him. After many ages it fell into the hands of Bilbo Baggins, as told in The Hobbit.

In a sleepy village in the Shire, young Frodo Baggins finds himself faced with an immense task, as his elderly cousin Bilbo entrusts the Ring to his care. Frodo must leave his home and make a perilous journey across Middle-earth to the Cracks of Doom, there to destroy the Ring and foil the Dark Lord in his evil purpose.
--back cover]]> 398 J.R.R. Tolkien 0618346252 Susan 5 4.36 1954 The Fellowship of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings, #1)
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Susan
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1954
rating: 5
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]]> The Zombie Room 13568322

But when they stumble upon a sophisticated sex-trafficking operation, they soon realise that they are in mortal danger. The disappearance of a family member and the murder of a dear friend lead the three to delve deeper into a world of violence and deception. In their quest for retribution and justice, they put their lives on the line.

Their paths cross with that of Tatiana, who has left her home country for a better life in the West - or so she thinks. She soon realises she is in the hands of ruthless, violent people, who run an operation supplying girls to meet the most deviant desires of rich and powerful men.

Will she survive the horrors of The Zombie Room? Are Mangle, Decker and Tazeem brave enough to follow her there, in an attempt to set her free?

]]> 248 R.D. Ronald 1846247195 Susan 0 to-read 3.61 2012 The Zombie Room
author: R.D. Ronald
name: Susan
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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]]> The Swiss Family Robinson 62111 345 Johann David Wyss 1402726023 Susan 4 3.92 1812 The Swiss Family Robinson
author: Johann David Wyss
name: Susan
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1812
rating: 4
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]]> The Diary of a Young Girl 48855
In 1942, with the Nazis occupying Holland, a thirteen-year-old Jewish girl and her family fled their home in Amsterdam and went into hiding. For the next two years, until their whereabouts were betrayed to the Gestapo, the Franks and another family lived cloistered in the “Secret Annexe� of an old office building. Cut off from the outside world, they faced hunger, boredom, the constant cruelties of living in confined quarters, and the ever-present threat of discovery and death. In her diary Anne Frank recorded vivid impressions of her experiences during this period. By turns thoughtful, moving, and surprisingly humorous, her account offers a fascinating commentary on human courage and frailty and a compelling self-portrait of a sensitive and spirited young woman whose promise was tragically cut short.
--back cover]]> 283 Anne Frank Susan 5 4.19 1947 The Diary of a Young Girl
author: Anne Frank
name: Susan
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1947
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead]]> 18545 126 Tom Stoppard 0802132758 Susan 5 4.05 1967 Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
author: Tom Stoppard
name: Susan
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1967
rating: 5
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]]> Macbeth 8852
This shocking tragedy - a violent caution to those seeking power for its own sake - is, to this day, one of Shakespeare’s most popular and influential masterpieces.]]> 249 William Shakespeare 0743477103 Susan 5 3.90 1623 Macbeth
author: William Shakespeare
name: Susan
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1623
rating: 5
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]]> Les Misérables 24280 1463 Victor Hugo 0451525264 Susan 4 4.19 1862 Les Misérables
author: Victor Hugo
name: Susan
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1862
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hobbit, or There and Back Again]]> 5907 Written for J.R.R. Tolkien’s own children, The Hobbit met with instant critical acclaim when it was first published in 1937. Now recognized as a timeless classic, this introduction to the hobbit Bilbo Baggins, the wizard Gandalf, Gollum, and the spectacular world of Middle-earth recounts of the adventures of a reluctant hero, a powerful and dangerous ring, and the cruel dragon Smaug the Magnificent. The text in this 372-page paperback edition is based on that first published in Great Britain by Collins Modern Classics (1998), and includes a note on the text by Douglas A. Anderson (2001).]]> 366 J.R.R. Tolkien Susan 5 4.29 1937 The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Susan
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1937
rating: 5
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]]> The Red Pony 8732 95 John Steinbeck Susan 4 3.49 1933 The Red Pony
author: John Steinbeck
name: Susan
average rating: 3.49
book published: 1933
rating: 4
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]]> Brave New World 5129 Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order–all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine� (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New Worldd likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites.

"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." —Chicago Tribune]]> 268 Aldous Huxley 0060929871 Susan 4 3.99 1932 Brave New World
author: Aldous Huxley
name: Susan
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
rating: 4
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]]> Animal Farm 7613
The book tells the story of a group of farm animals who rebel against their human farmer, hoping to create a society where the animals can be equal, free, and happy. Ultimately, however, the rebellion is betrayed, and the farm ends up in a state as bad as it was before, under the dictatorship of a pig named Napoleon.

One night, all the animals at Mr. Jones' Manor Farm assemble in a barn to hear old Major, a pig, describe a dream he had about a world where all animals live free from the tyranny of their human masters. Old Major dies soon after the meeting, but the animals � inspired by his philosophy of Animalism � plot a rebellion against Jones.

Two pigs, Snowball and Napoleon, prove themselves important figures and planners of this dangerous enterprise. When Jones forgets to feed the animals, the revolution occurs, and Jones and his men are chased off the farm. Manor Farm is renamed Animal Farm, and the Seven Commandments of Animalism are painted on the barn wall...]]> 129 George Orwell Susan 4 3.90 1945 Animal Farm
author: George Orwell
name: Susan
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1945
rating: 4
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]]> 1984 5470 328 George Orwell Susan 4 4.15 1949 1984
author: George Orwell
name: Susan
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1949
rating: 4
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]]> A Room with a View 3087
Lucy has her rigid, middle-class life mapped out for her, until she visits Florence with her uptight cousin Charlotte, and finds her neatly ordered existence thrown off balance. Her eyes are opened by the unconventional characters she meets at the Pension Bertolini: flamboyant romantic novelist Eleanor Lavish, the Cockney Signora, curious Mr Emerson and, most of all, his passionate son George.

Lucy finds herself torn between the intensity of life in Italy and the repressed morals of Edwardian England, personified in her terminally dull fiancé Cecil Vyse. Will she ever learn to follow her own heart?]]> 119 E.M. Forster 1420925431 Susan 0 to-read 3.91 1908 A Room with a View
author: E.M. Forster
name: Susan
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1908
rating: 0
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]]> Fathers and Sons 19117
Fathers and Sons enraged the old and the young, reactionaries, romantics, and radicals alike when it was first published. At the same time, Turgenev won the acclaim of Flaubert, Maupassant, and Henry James for his craftsmanship as a writer and his psychological insight. Fathers and Sons is now considered one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century.

A timeless depiction of generational conflict during social upheaval, it vividly portrays the clash between the older Russian aristocracy and the youthful radicalism that foreshadowed the revolution to come—and offers modern-day readers much to reflect upon as they look around at their own tumultuous, ever changing world.

Introduction by Jane Costlow]]> 244 Ivan Turgenev 0451529693 Susan 0 to-read 3.99 1862 Fathers and Sons
author: Ivan Turgenev
name: Susan
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1862
rating: 0
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]]> Madame Bovary 2175 329 Gustave Flaubert 0192840398 Susan 0 to-read 3.70 1856 Madame Bovary
author: Gustave Flaubert
name: Susan
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1856
rating: 0
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]]> Doctor Zhivago 130440
Dr. Yury Zhivago, Pasternak's alter ego, is a poet, philosopher, and physician whose life is disrupted by the war and by his love for Lara, the wife of a revolutionary. His artistic nature makes him vulnerable to the brutality and harshness of the Bolsheviks. The poems he writes constitute some of the most beautiful writing featured in the novel.]]> 592 Boris Pasternak 0679774386 Susan 0 to-read 4.03 1957 Doctor Zhivago
author: Boris Pasternak
name: Susan
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1957
rating: 0
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]]> Ham on Rye 38501 288 Charles Bukowski 006117758X Susan 0 to-read 4.17 1982 Ham on Rye
author: Charles Bukowski
name: Susan
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1982
rating: 0
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]]> All the King's Men 5527 All the King's Men is a 1946 novel by Robert Penn Warren. Its title is drawn from the nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty". The novel tells the story of charismatic populist governor Willie Stark and his political machinations in the Depression-era Deep South. It is commonly thought to have been loosely inspired by the real-life story of U.S. Senator Huey P. Long, who was assassinated in 1935. Warren won the Pulitzer Prize for All the King's Men in 1947. The novel has received critical acclaim and remained perennially popular since its first publication. It was rated the 36th greatest novel of the 20th century by Modern Library, and it was chosen as one of Time magazine's 100 best novels since 1923. All the King's Men portrays the dramatic and theatrical political rise and governorship of Willie Stark, a cynical populist in the 1930s American South.]]> 439 Robert Penn Warren Susan 3 4.08 1946 All the King's Men
author: Robert Penn Warren
name: Susan
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1946
rating: 3
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]]> Ulysses 338798
According to Declan Kiberd, "Before Joyce, no writer of fiction had so foregrounded the process of thinking". Ulysses chronicles the peripatetic appointments and encounters of Leopold Bloom in Dublin in the course of an ordinary day, 16 June 1904. Ulysses is the Latinised name of Odysseus, the hero of Homer's epic poem the Odyssey, and the novel establishes a series of parallels between the poem and the novel, with structural correspondences between the characters and experiences of Bloom and Odysseus, Molly Bloom and Penelope, and Stephen Dedalus and Telemachus, in addition to events and themes of the early 20th-century context of modernism, Dublin, and Ireland's relationship to Britain.

The novel is highly allusive and also imitates the styles of different periods of English literature. Since its publication, the book has attracted controversy and scrutiny, ranging from an obscenity trial in the United States in 1921 to protracted textual "Joyce Wars." The novel's stream-of-consciousness technique, careful structuring, and experimental prose—replete with puns, parodies, and allusions—as well as its rich characterisation and broad humour have led it to be regarded as one of the greatest literary works in history; Joyce fans worldwide now celebrate 16 June as Bloomsday.']]> 783 James Joyce Susan 0 to-read 3.72 1922 Ulysses
author: James Joyce
name: Susan
average rating: 3.72
book published: 1922
rating: 0
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]]> Catch-22 168668
Set in Italy during World War II, this is the story of the incomparable, malingering bombardier, Yossarian, a hero who is furious because thousands of people he has never met are trying to kill him. But his real problem is not the enemy—it is his own army, which keeps increasing the number of missions the men must fly to complete their service. Yet if Yossarian makes any attempt to excuse himself from the perilous missions he’s assigned, he’ll be in violation of Catch-22, a hilariously sinister bureaucratic rule: a man is considered insane if he willingly continues to fly dangerous combat missions, but if he makes a formal request to be removed from duty, he is proven sane and therefore ineligible to be relieved.

This fiftieth-anniversary edition commemorates Joseph Heller’s masterpiece with a new introduction by Christopher Buckley; a wealth of critical essays and reviews by Norman Mailer, Alfred Kazin, Anthony Burgess, and others; rare papers and photos from Joseph Heller’s personal archive; and much more. Here, at last, is the definitive edition of a classic of world literature.]]> 453 Joseph Heller 0684833395 Susan 4 3.99 1961 Catch-22
author: Joseph Heller
name: Susan
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1961
rating: 4
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]]> Slaughterhouse-Five 4981 Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world’s great antiwar books. Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber’s son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming “unstuck in time.�

An instant bestseller, Slaughterhouse-Five made Kurt Vonnegut a cult hero in American literature, a reputation that only strengthened over time, despite his being banned and censored by some libraries and schools for content and language. But it was precisely those elements of Vonnegut’s writing—the political edginess, the genre-bending inventiveness, the frank violence, the transgressive wit—that have inspired generations of readers not just to look differently at the world around them but to find the confidence to say something about it.

Fifty years after its initial publication at the height of the Vietnam War, Vonnegut's portrayal of political disillusionment, PTSD, and postwar anxiety feels as relevant, darkly humorous, and profoundly affecting as ever, an enduring beacon through our own era’s uncertainties.]]> 275 Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Susan 4 4.10 1969 Slaughterhouse-Five
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Susan
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1969
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Little Women (Little Women, #1)]]> 1934 This is an alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780451529305.

Generations of readers young and old, male and female, have fallen in love with the March sisters of Louisa May Alcott’s most popular and enduring novel, Little Women. Here are talented tomboy and author-to-be Jo, tragically frail Beth, beautiful Meg, and romantic, spoiled Amy, united in their devotion to each other and their struggles to survive in New England during the Civil War.

It is no secret that Alcott based Little Women on her own early life. While her father, the freethinking reformer and abolitionist Bronson Alcott, hobnobbed with such eminent male authors as Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne, Louisa supported herself and her sisters with "woman’s work,� including sewing, doing laundry, and acting as a domestic servant. But she soon discovered she could make more money writing. Little Women brought her lasting fame and fortune, and far from being the "girl’s book� her publisher requested, it explores such timeless themes as love and death, war and peace, the conflict between personal ambition and family responsibilities, and the clash of cultures between Europe and America.

]]> 449 Louisa May Alcott Susan 4 4.16 1868 Little Women (Little Women, #1)
author: Louisa May Alcott
name: Susan
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1868
rating: 4
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]]> The Catcher in the Rye 5107 It's Christmas time and Holden Caulfield has just been expelled from yet another school...

Fleeing the crooks at Pencey Prep, he pinballs around New York City seeking solace in fleeting encounters—shooting the bull with strangers in dive hotels, wandering alone round Central Park, getting beaten up by pimps and cut down by erstwhile girlfriends. The city is beautiful and terrible, in all its neon loneliness and seedy glamour, its mingled sense of possibility and emptiness. Holden passes through it like a ghost, thinking always of his kid sister Phoebe, the only person who really understands him, and his determination to escape the phonies and find a life of true meaning.

The Catcher in the Rye is an all-time classic in coming-of-age literature- an elegy to teenage alienation, capturing the deeply human need for connection and the bewildering sense of loss as we leave childhood behind.

J.D. Salinger's (1919�2010) classic novel of teenage angst and rebellion was first published in 1951. The novel was included on Time's 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923. It was named by Modern Library and its readers as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. It has been frequently challenged in the court for its liberal use of profanity and portrayal of sexuality and in the 1950's and 60's it was the novel that every teenage boy wants to read.]]> 277 J.D. Salinger 0316769177 Susan 5 3.81 1951 The Catcher in the Rye
author: J.D. Salinger
name: Susan
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1951
rating: 5
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]]> Anna Karenina 15823480 Anna Karenina provides a vast panorama of contemporary life in Russia and of humanity in general. In it Tolstoy uses his intense imaginative insight to create some of the most memorable characters in all of literature. Anna is a sophisticated woman who abandons her empty existence as the wife of Karenin and turns to Count Vronsky to fulfil her passionate nature - with tragic consequences. Levin is a reflection of Tolstoy himself, often expressing the author's own views and convictions.

Throughout, Tolstoy points no moral, merely inviting us not to judge but to watch. As Rosemary Edmonds comments, 'He leaves the shifting patterns of the kaleidoscope to bring home the meaning of the brooding words following the title, 'Vengeance is mine, and I will repay.]]> 964 Leo Tolstoy 0345803922 Susan 4 4.11 1878 Anna Karenina
author: Leo Tolstoy
name: Susan
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1878
rating: 4
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]]> Jane Eyre 10210 Alternate editions can be found here and here.

A gothic masterpiece of tempestuous passions and dark secrets, Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre is edited with an introduction and notes by Stevie Davis in Penguin Classics.

Charlotte Brontë tells the story of orphaned Jane Eyre, who grows up in the home of her heartless aunt, enduring loneliness and cruelty. This troubled childhood strengthens Jane's natural independence and spirit - which prove necessary when she finds employment as a governess to the young ward of Byronic, brooding Mr Rochester. As her feelings for Rochester develop, Jane gradually uncovers Thornfield Hall's terrible secret, forcing her to make a choice. Should she stay with Rochester and live with the consequences, or follow her convictions - even if it means leaving the man she loves? A novel of intense power and intrigue, Jane Eyre dazzled readers with its passionate depiction of a woman's search for equality and freedom.]]> 532 Charlotte Brontë 0142437204 Susan 4 4.14 1847 Jane Eyre
author: Charlotte Brontë
name: Susan
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1847
rating: 4
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]]> The Nanny Diaries (Nanny, #1) 228333 306 Emma McLaughlin 0312291639 Susan 3 3.47 2002 The Nanny Diaries (Nanny, #1)
author: Emma McLaughlin
name: Susan
average rating: 3.47
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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]]> Pride and Prejudice 1885 Pride and Prejudice has remained one of the most popular novels in the English language. Jane Austen called this brilliant work "her own darling child" and its vivacious heroine, Elizabeth Bennet, "as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print." The romantic clash between the opinionated Elizabeth and her proud beau, Mr. Darcy, is a splendid performance of civilized sparring. And Jane Austen's radiant wit sparkles as her characters dance a delicate quadrille of flirtation and intrigue, making this book the most superb comedy of manners of Regency England.

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780679783268]]> 279 Jane Austen 1441341706 Susan 4 4.28 1813 Pride and Prejudice
author: Jane Austen
name: Susan
average rating: 4.28
book published: 1813
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Bridget Jones’s Diary (Bridget Jones, #1)]]> 227443 a. lose 7 pounds
b. stop smoking
c. develop Inner Poise

"129 lbs. (how is it possible to put on 4 pounds in the middle of the night? Could flesh have somehow solidified becoming denser and heavier? Repulsive, horrifying notion), alcohol units 4 (excellent), cigarettes 21 (poor but will give up totally tomorrow), number of correct lottery numbers 2 (better, but nevertheless useless)..."

"Bridget Jones' Diary" is the devastatingly self-aware, laugh-out-loud daily chronicle of Bridget's permanent, doomed quest for self-improvement � a year in which she resolves to: reduce the circumference of each thigh by 1.5 inches, visit the gym three times a week not just to buy a sandwich, form a functional relationship with a responsible adult - and learn to program the VCR.

Over the course of the year, Bridget loses a total of 72 pounds but gains a total of 74. She remains, however, optimistic. Through it all, Bridget will have you helpless with laughter, and � like millions of readers the world round � you'll find yourself shouting, "Bridget Jones is me!"]]> 288 Helen Fielding 014028009X Susan 3 3.81 1996 Bridget Jones’s Diary (Bridget Jones, #1)
author: Helen Fielding
name: Susan
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1996
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything]]> 1202
These may not sound like typical questions for an economist to ask. But Steven D. Levitt is not a typical economist. He is a much heralded scholar who studies the stuff and riddles of everyday life -- from cheating and crime to sports and child rearing -- and whose conclusions regularly turn the conventional wisdom on its head. He usually begins with a mountain of data and a simple, unasked question. Some of these questions concern life-and-death issues; others have an admittedly freakish quality. Thus the new field of study contained in this book: freakonomics.

Through forceful storytelling and wry insight, Levitt and co-author Stephen J. Dubner show that economics is, at root, the study of incentives -- how people get what they want, or need, especially when other people want or need the same thing. In Freakonomics, they set out to explore the hidden side of ... well, everything. The inner workings of a crack gang. The truth about real-estate agents. The myths of campaign finance. The telltale marks of a cheating schoolteacher. The secrets of the Ku Klux Klan.

What unites all these stories is a belief that the modern world, despite a surfeit of obfuscation, complication, and downright deceit, is not impenetrable, is not unknowable, and -- if the right questions are asked -- is even more intriguing than we think. All it takes is a new way of looking. Steven Levitt, through devilishly clever and clear-eyed thinking, shows how to see through all the clutter.

Freakonomics establishes this unconventional premise: If morality represents how we would like the world to work, then economics represents how it actually does work. It is true that readers of this book will be armed with enough riddles and stories to last a thousand cocktail parties. But Freakonomics can provide more than that. It will literally redefine the way we view the modern world.
(front flap)]]> 268 Steven D. Levitt 0061234001 Susan 0 to-read 4.01 2005 Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
author: Steven D. Levitt
name: Susan
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference]]> 2612 The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire. Just as a single sick person can start an epidemic of the flu, so too can a small but precisely targeted push cause a fashion trend, the popularity of a new product, or a drop in the crime rate. This widely acclaimed bestseller, in which Malcolm Gladwell explores and brilliantly illuminates the tipping point phenomenon, is already changing the way people throughout the world think about selling products and disseminating ideas.]]> 301 Malcolm Gladwell 0316346624 Susan 0 to-read 4.01 2002 The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
author: Malcolm Gladwell
name: Susan
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream]]> 9742 The Audacity of Hope is Barack Obama's call for a new kind of politics—a politics that builds upon those shared understandings that pull us together as Americans. Lucid in his vision of America's place in the world, refreshingly candid about his family life and his time in the Senate, Obama here sets out his political convictions and inspires us to trust in the dogged optimism that has long defined us and that is our best hope going forward.]]> 375 Barack Obama 0307237699 Susan 4 3.83 2006 The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream
author: Barack Obama
name: Susan
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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]]> Eat, Pray, Love 19501
Around the time Elizabeth Gilbert turned thirty, she went through an early-onslaught midlife crisis. She had everything an educated, ambitious American woman was supposed to want—a husband, a house, a successful career. But instead of feeling happy and fulfilled, she was consumed with panic, grief, and confusion. She went through a divorce, a crushing depression, another failed love, and the eradication of everything she ever thought she was supposed to be.

To recover from all this, Gilbert took a radical step. In order to give herself the time and space to find out who she really was and what she really wanted, she got rid of her belongings, quit her job, and undertook a yearlong journey around the world—all alone. Eat, Pray, Love is the absorbing chronicle of that year. Her aim was to visit three places where she could examine one aspect of her own nature set against the backdrop of a culture that has traditionally done that one thing very well. In Rome, she studied the art of pleasure, learning to speak Italian and gaining the twenty-three happiest pounds of her life. India was for the art of devotion, and with the help of a native guru and a surprisingly wise cowboy from Texas, she embarked on four uninterrupted months of spiritual exploration. In Bali, she studied the art of balance between worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence. She became the pupil of an elderly medicine man and also fell in love the best way—unexpectedly.

An intensely articulate and moving memoir of self-discovery, Eat, Pray, Love is about what can happen when you claim responsibility for your own contentment and stop trying to live in imitation of society’s ideals. It is certain to touch anyone who has ever woken up to the unrelenting need for change.]]> 368 Elizabeth Gilbert 0143038419 Susan 3 3.64 2006 Eat, Pray, Love
author: Elizabeth Gilbert
name: Susan
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2006
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance]]> 88061 453 Barack Obama 1921351438 Susan 4 3.93 1995 Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance
author: Barack Obama
name: Susan
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1995
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks]]> 6493208
Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.

Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored� ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia � a land of wooden quarters for enslaved people, faith healings, and voodoo � to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of her cells.

Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality� until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family � past and present � is inextricably connected to the history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.

Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah, who was devastated to learn about her mother’s cells. She was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Did it hurt her when researchers infected her cells with viruses and shot them into space? What happened to her sister, Elsie, who died in a mental institution at the age of fifteen? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance?

Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put down, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human consequences.]]> 370 Rebecca Skloot 1400052173 Susan 4 4.12 2010 The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
author: Rebecca Skloot
name: Susan
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2010
rating: 4
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]]>