en-US Sun, 25 Dec 2022 20:56:42 -0800 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 56969519 A new story about hope and survival.

Years ago, when plagues and natural disasters killed millions of people, much of the world stopped dreaming. Without dreams, people are haunted, sick, mad, unable to rebuild. The government soon finds that the Indigenous people of North America have retained their dreams, an ability rumored to be housed in the very marrow of their bones. Soon, residential schools pop up—or are re-opened—across the land to bring in the dreamers and harvest their dreams.

Seventeen-year-old French lost his family to these schools and has spent the years since heading north with his new found family: a group of other dreamers, who, like him, are trying to build and thrive as a community. But then French wakes up in a pitch-black room, locked in and alone for the first time in years, and he knows immediately where he is—and what it will take to escape.

Meanwhile, out in the world, his found family searches for him and dodges new dangers—school Recruiters, a blood cult, even the land itself. When their paths finally collide, French must decide how far he is willing to go—and how many loved ones is he willing to betray—in order to survive.]]> 400 Cherie Dimaline 1419753479 Dory 0 to-read-in-2022, to-read 4.29 2021
author: Cherie Dimaline
name: Dory
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/12/25
shelves: to-read-in-2022, to-read
review:

]]> 60018639
Thistlefoot, as the house is called, has arrived from the Yagas' ancestral home in Russia--but not alone. A sinister figure known only as the Longshadow Man has tracked it to American shores, bearing with him violent secrets from the past: fiery memories that have hidden in Isaac and Bellatine's blood for generations. As the Yaga siblings embark with Thistlefoot on a final cross-country tour of their family's traveling theater show, the Longshadow Man follows in relentless pursuit, seeding destruction in his wake. Ultimately, time, magic, and legacy must collide--erupting in a powerful conflagration to determine who gets to remember the past and craft a new future.

An enchanted adventure illuminated by Jewish myth and adorned with lyrical prose as tantalizing and sweet as briar berries, Thistlefoot is an immersive modern fantasy saga by a bold new talent.]]> 448 GennaRose Nethercott 059346883X Dory 4 3.92 2022
author: GennaRose Nethercott
name: Dory
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2022/10/21
date added: 2022/10/21
shelves: to-read-in-2022, family-sagas, fantastical-sci-fi, read-in-2022, rogues-thieves-and-bandits
review:

]]> 60165386 Longlisted for the PEN/Faulkner Award

A masterful debut that weaves together the lives of three generations of a Mexican American family bound by love, and a curse. The tight-knit Izquierdo family is grappling with misfortunes none of them can explain. Their beloved patriarch has suffered from an emotional collapse and is dying; eldest son Gonzalo’s marriage is falling apart; daughter Dina, beleaguered by the fear that her nightmares are real, is a shut-in. When Gonzalo digs up a strange object in the backyard of the family home, the Izquierdos take it as proof that a jealous neighbor has cursed them―could this be the reason for all their troubles? As the Izquierdos face a distressing present and an uncertain future, they are sustained by the blood that binds them, a divine presence, and an abiding love for one another. Told in a series of soulful voices brimming with warmth and humor, The Family Izquierdo is a tender narrative of a family at a turning point.]]> 304 Ruben Degollado 0393866823 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.78 2022
author: Ruben Degollado
name: Dory
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/09/13
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60471573 Time) is back with a masterful collection that explores ideas of power, ethics, and justice, and cuts to the very heart of what it means to live in community with our fellow humans. With his trademark prose--wickedly funny, unsentimental, and perfectly tuned--Saunders continues to challenge and surprise: here is a collection of prismatic, deeply resonant stories that encompass joy and despair, oppression and revolution, bizarre fantasy and brutal reality.

Love Letter is a tender missive from grandfather to grandson, in the midst of a dystopian political situation in the not-too-distant future, that reminds us of our obligations to our ideals, ourselves, and each other. Ghoul is set in a Hell-themed section of an underground amusement park in Colorado, and follows the exploits of a lonely, morally complex character named Brian, who comes to question everything he takes for granted about his "reality." In Mother's Day, two women who loved the same man come to an existential reckoning in the middle of a hailstorm. And in Elliott Spencer, our eighty-nine-year-old protagonist finds himself brainwashed--his memory "scraped"--a victim of a scheme in which poor, vulnerable people are reprogrammed and deployed as political protesters.

Together, these nine subversive, profound, and essential stories coalesce into a case for viewing the world with the same generosity and clear-eyed attention as Saunders does, even in the most absurd of circumstances.]]> 256 George Saunders 0525509593 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.99 2022
author: George Saunders
name: Dory
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/08/21
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59894742 For fans of Amy Tan, KJ Dell’Antonia, and Kevin Kwan, this debut celebrates a family of estranged Vietnamese women who experiences mishaps and unexpected joy after a psychic makes a startling prediction about their lives.

Everyone in Orange County’s Little Saigon knew that the Duong sisters were cursed.

It started with their ancestor, Oanh, who dared to leave her marriage for true love—so a fearsome Vietnamese witch cursed Oanh and her descendants so that they would never find love or happiness, and the Duong women would give birth to daughters, never sons.�

Oanh’s current descendant Mai Nguyen knows this curse well. She’s divorced, and after an explosive disagreement a decade ago, she’s estranged from her younger sisters, Minh Pham (the middle and the mediator) and Khuyen Lam (the youngest who swears she just runs humble coffee shops and nail salons, not Little Saigon’s underground). Though Mai’s three adult daughters, Priscilla, Thuy, and Thao, are successful in their careers (one of them is John Cho’s dermatologist!), the same can’t be said for their love lives. Mai is convinced they might drive her to an early grave.

Desperate for guidance, she consults Auntie Hua, her trusted psychic in Hawaii, who delivers an unexpected prediction: this year, her family will witness a marriage, a funeral, and the birth of a son. This prophecy will reunite estranged mothers, daughters, aunts, and cousins—for better or for worse.

A multi-narrative novel brimming with levity and candor, The Fortunes of Jaded Women is about mourning, meddling, celebrating, and healing together as a family. It shows how Vietnamese women emerge victorious, even if the world is against them.]]> 272 Carolyn Huynh 1982188731 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.62 2022
author: Carolyn Huynh
name: Dory
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/08/21
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57841291
Paris, 1750. In the midst of winter, as birds fall frozen from the sky, a new maid arrives at the home of a celebrated clockmaker and his clever, unworldly daughter. But rumours are stirring that Reinhart's uncanny mechanical creations - bejewelled birds, silver spiders - are more than mere automata. That they might defy the laws of nature, perhaps even at the expense of the living...

But Madeleine is hiding a dark past, and a dangerous purpose - to discover the truth of the clockmaker's experiments and record his every move, in exchange for her own chance of freedom.

Meanwhile, in the streets, children are quietly disappearing - and Madeleine comes to fear that she has stumbled upon a greater conspiracy. One which might reach to the heart of Versailles...]]> 400 Anna Mazzola 1398703818 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.90 2022
author: Anna Mazzola
name: Dory
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58783802 A rollicking feminist tale set in 1950s America where thousands of women have spontaneously transformed into dragons, exploding notions of a woman’s place in the world and expanding minds about accepting others for who they really are.

The first adult novel by the Newbery award-winning author of The Girl Who Drank the Moon.

Alex Green is a young girl in a world much like ours, except for its most seminal event: the Mass Dragoning of 1955, when hundreds of thousands of ordinary wives and mothers sprouted wings, scales, and talons; left a trail of fiery destruction in their path; and took to the skies. Was it their choice? What will become of those left behind? Why did Alex’s beloved aunt Marla transform but her mother did not? Alex doesn’t know. It’s taboo to speak of.

Forced into silence, Alex nevertheless must face the consequences of this astonishing event: a mother more protective than ever; an absentee father; the upsetting insistence that her aunt never even existed; and watching her beloved cousin Bea become dangerously obsessed with the forbidden.

In this timely and timeless speculative novel, award-winning author Kelly Barnhill boldly explores rage, memory, and the tyranny of forced limitations. When Women Were Dragons exposes a world that wants to keep women small—their lives and their prospects—and examines what happens when they rise en masse and take up the space they deserve.]]> 367 Kelly Barnhill 0385548222 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.79 2022
author: Kelly Barnhill
name: Dory
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59808046 For readers of On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous and My Brilliant Friend, Bushra Rehman's Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion is an unforgettable story about female friendship and queer love in a Muslim-American community.

Razia Mirza grows up amid the wild grape vines and backyard sunflowers of Corona, Queens, with her best friend, Saima, by her side. When a family rift drives the girls apart, Razia’s heart is broken. She finds solace in Taslima, a new girl in her close-knit Pakistani-American community. They embark on a series of small rebellions: listening to scandalous music, wearing miniskirts, and cutting school to explore the city.

When Razia is accepted to Stuyvesant, a prestigious high school in Manhattan, the gulf between the person she is and the daughter her parents want her to be, widens. At Stuyvesant, Razia meets Angela and is attracted to her in a way that blossoms into a new understanding. When their relationship is discovered by an Aunty in the community, Razia must choose between her family and her own future.

Punctuated by both joy and loss, full of �80s music and beloved novels, Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion is a new classic: a fiercely compassionate coming-of-age story of a girl struggling to reconcile her heritage and faith with her desire to be true to herself.]]> 276 Bushra Rehman 1250834783 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.98 2022
author: Bushra Rehman
name: Dory
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57835937
It's a hot summer, and life's going all right for Jackson and his family on the Mish. It's almost Christmas, school's out, and he's hanging with his mates, teasing the visiting tourists, avoiding the racist boys in town. Just like every year, Jackson's Aunty and annoying little cousins visit from the city -- but this time a mysterious boy with a troubled past comes with them. As their friendship evolves, Jackson must confront the changing shapes of his relationships with his friends, family and community. And he must face his darkest secret -- a secret he thought he'd locked away for good.]]> 245 Gary Lonesborough 1338749544 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.98 2021
author: Gary Lonesborough
name: Dory
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57593396
Jordan is the gorgeous rowing star and school captain of Luca's new school. Everyone says he's straight - but Luca’s not so sure . . .

As their unlikely bond grows stronger, Luca starts to wonder: who is he without ballet? And is he setting himself up for another heartbreak?]]> 336 Tobias Madden 1761042025 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.94 2021
author: Tobias Madden
name: Dory
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56779306
Henry Hamlet doesn’t know what he wants after school ends. It’s his last semester of year twelve and all he’s sure of is his uncanny ability to make situations awkward. Luckily, he can always hide behind his enigmatic best friend, Len. They’ve been friends since forever, but where Len is mysterious, Henry is clumsy; where Len is a heart-throb, Henry is a neurotic mess. Somehow it’s always worked.

That is, until Henry falls. Hard. For the last person he imagined.

From an exciting debut author comes this passionate story of growing up, letting go, and learning how to love.]]> 328 Rhiannon Wilde 0702263141 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.18 2021
author: Rhiannon Wilde
name: Dory
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56777619
Seventeen-year-old Avery Anderson is convinced her senior year is ruined when she's uprooted from her life in DC and forced into the hostile home of her terminally ill grandmother, Mama Letty. The tension between Avery’s mom and Mama Letty makes for a frosty arrival and unearths past drama they refuse to talk about. Every time Avery tries to look deeper, she’s turned away, leaving her desperate to learn the secrets that split her family in two.

While tempers flare in her avoidant family, Avery finds friendship in unexpected places: in Simone Cole, her captivating next-door neighbor, and Jade Oliver, daughter of the town’s most prominent family—whose mother’s murder remains unsolved.

As the three girls grow closer—Avery and Simone’s friendship blossoming into romance—the sharp-edged opinions of their small southern town begin to hint at something insidious underneath. The racist history of Bardell, Georgia is rooted in Avery’s family in ways she can’t even imagine. With Mama Letty's health dwindling every day, Avery must decide if digging for the truth is worth toppling the delicate relationships she's built in Bardell—or if some things are better left buried.]]> 257 Jas Hammonds Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.43 2022
author: Jas Hammonds
name: Dory
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57918190
Inspired by the author's experiences restoring Jewish cemeteries in Eastern Europe.

"A must-read for lost souls everywhere." —Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review

Magic will burn you up.

Sent to stay with her aunt in Prague and witness the humble life of an artist, Ilana Lopez—a biracial Jewish girl—finds herself torn between her dream of becoming a violinist and her immigrant parents� desire for her to pursue a more stable career.

When she discovers a forgotten Jewish cemetery behind her aunt’s cottage, she meets the ghost of a kindhearted boy named Benjamin, who died over a century ago. As Ilana restores Benjamin’s grave, he introduces her to the enchanted side of Prague, where ghosts walk the streets and their kisses have warmth.

But Benjamin isn't the only one interested in Ilana. Rudolph Wassermann, a man with no shadow, has become fascinated with her and the music she plays. He offers to share his magic, so Ilana can be with Benjamin and pursue her passion for violin. But after Ilana discovers the truth about Wassermann and how Benjamin became bound to the city, she resolves to save the boy she loves, even if it means losing him—forever.

A love letter to Latin American and Jewish diasporas, based on the author's experiences working to maintain Jewish cemeteries in Eastern Europe. The Ghosts of Rose Hill is a tender and empowering read that you will devour in one sitting. Steeped in history and the experiences of immigrant families, especially Jewish families, each carefully-chosen word of this magical verse novel casts a spell.

A Sydney Taylor Notable Book
A School Library Journal Best Book of the Year
A Kirkus Best YA Book of the Year
A BuzzFeed Best YA Book of the Year
An Indie Next Pick!]]> 380 R.M. Romero 1682633381 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.96 2022
author: R.M. Romero
name: Dory
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57911600 Prepare to die. His kingdom is near.

Sixteen-year-old trans boy Benji is on the run from the cult that raised him—the fundamentalist sect that unleashed Armageddon and decimated the world’s population. Desperately, he searches for a place where the cult can’t get their hands on him, or more importantly, on the bioweapon they infected him with.

But when cornered by monsters born from the destruction, Benji is rescued by a group of teens from the local Acheson LGBTQ+ Center, affectionately known as the ALC. The ALC’s leader, Nick, is gorgeous, autistic, and a deadly shot, and he knows Benji’s darkest secret: the cult’s bioweapon is mutating him into a monster deadly enough to wipe humanity from the earth once and for all.

Still, Nick offers Benji shelter among his ragtag group of queer teens, as long as Benji can control the monster and use its power to defend the ALC. Eager to belong, Benji accepts Nick’s terms…until he discovers the ALC’s mysterious leader has a hidden agenda, and more than a few secrets of his own.

A furious, queer debut novel about embracing the monster within and unleashing its power against your oppressors.]]> 416 Andrew Joseph White 1682633241 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.11 2022
author: Andrew Joseph White
name: Dory
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60310707 From National Book Award–winner Kacen Callender, aĚýcontemporary YA thatĚýfollows Lark's journey to speak the truth and discover how their own self-love can be a revolution

Lark Winters wants to be a writer, and for now that means posting on their social media accounts––anything to build their platform. When former best friend Kasim accidentally posts a thread on Lark's Twitter declaring his love for a secret, unrequited crush, Lark's tweets are suddenly the talk of the school—and beyond. To protect Kasim, Lark decides to take the fall, pretending they accidentally posted the thread in reference to another classmate. It seems like a great idea: Lark gets closer to their crush, Kasim keeps his privacy, and Lark's social media stats explode. But living a lie takes a toll—as does the judgment of thousands of Internet strangers. Lark tries their best to be perfect at all costs, but nothing seems good enough for the anonymous hordes––or for Kasim, who is growing closer to Lark, just like it used to be between them . . .

In the end, Lark must embrace their right to their messy emotionsĚýand learn how to be in love.]]> 336 Kacen Callender 1419756877 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.71 2022
author: Kacen Callender
name: Dory
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60182535 A riveting exploration of the complexity within mother-daughter relationships and the dynamic vitality of Vancouver's former Hogan's Alley neighbourhood. 1930s, Hogan's Alley―a thriving Black and immigrant community located in Vancouver's East End. Junie is a creative, observant child who moves to the alley with her mother, a jazz singer with a growing alcohol dependency. Junie quickly makes meaningful relationships with two mentors and a girl her own age, Estelle, whose resilient and entrepreneurial mother is grappling with white scrutiny and the fact that she never really wanted a child. As Junie finds adulthood, exploring her artistic talents and burgeoning sexuality, her mother sinks further into the bottle while the thriving neighbourhood―once gushing with potential―begins to change. As her world opens, Junie intuits the opposite for the community she loves. Told through the fascinating lens of a bright woman in an oft-disquieting world, this book is intimate and urgent―not just an unflinching look at the destruction of a vibrant community, but a celebration of the Black lives within.]]> 334 Chelene Knight 1771667680 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.78
author: Chelene Knight
name: Dory
average rating: 3.78
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/07/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 53401578 Celeste, a card sharp with a need for justice, takes on the role of advocatus diaboli, to defend her sister Mariel, accused of murdering a Virtue, a member of the ruling class of this mining town, in an “intricate…engrossing� (The Washington Post) new world of dark fantasy from the New York Times bestselling author of Black Sun, Rebecca Roanhorse.

The year is 1883 and the mining town of Goetia is booming as prospectors from near and far come to mine the powerful new element Divinity from the high mountains of Colorado with the help of the pariahs of society known as the Fallen. The Fallen are the descendants of demonkind living amongst the Virtues, the winners in an ancient war, with the descendants of both sides choosing to live alongside Abaddon’s mountain in this tale of the mythological West from the bestselling mastermind Rebecca Roanhorse.]]> 128 Rebecca Roanhorse 1982166207 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.68 2022
author: Rebecca Roanhorse
name: Dory
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60060431 Bearded, bad-boy barber Knox prefers to live his life the way he takes his coffee: Alone. Unless you count his basset hound, Waylon.
Knox doesn’t tolerate drama, even when it comes in the form of a stranded runaway bride.

Naomi wasn’t just running away from her wedding. She was riding to the rescue of her estranged twin to Knockemout, Virginia, a rough-around-the-edges town where disputes are settled the old-fashioned way…with fists and beer. Usually in that order.

Too bad for Naomi her evil twin hasn’t changed at all. After helping herself to Naomi’s car and cash, Tina leaves her with something unexpected. The niece Naomi didn’t know she had. Now she’s stuck in town with no car, no job, no plan, and no home with an 11-year-old going on thirty to take care of.

There’s a reason Knox doesn’t do complications or high-maintenance women, especially not the romantic ones. But since Naomi’s life imploded right in front of him, the least he can do is help her out of her jam. And just as soon as she stops getting into new trouble he can leave her alone and get back to his peaceful, solitary life.

At least, that’s the plan until the trouble turns to real danger.]]> 572 Lucy Score 1945631848 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.14 2022
author: Lucy Score
name: Dory
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60353768 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.

The author of award-winning Hamnet brings the world of Renaissance Italy to jewel-bright life in this unforgettable fictional portrait of the captivating young duchess Lucrezia de� Medici as she makes her way in a troubled court.

Florence, the 1550s. Lucrezia, third daughter of the grand duke, is comfortable with her obscure place in the palazzo: free to wonder at its treasures, observe its clandestine workings, and devote herself to her own artistic pursuits. But when her older sister dies on the eve of her wedding to the ruler of Ferrara, Modena and Reggio, Lucrezia is thrust unwittingly into the limelight: the duke is quick to request her hand in marriage, and her father just as quick to accept on her behalf.

Having barely left girlhood behind, Lucrezia must now enter an unfamiliar court whose customs are opaque and where her arrival is not universally welcomed. Perhaps most mystifying of all is her new husband himself, Alfonso. Is he the playful sophisticate he appeared to be before their wedding, the aesthete happiest in the company of artists and musicians, or the ruthless politician before whom even his formidable sisters seem to tremble?

As Lucrezia sits in constricting finery for a painting intended to preserve her image for centuries to come, one thing becomes worryingly clear. In the court’s eyes, she has one duty: to provide the heir who will shore up the future of the Ferranese dynasty. Until then, for all of her rank and nobility, the new duchess’s future hangs entirely in the balance.

Full of the beauty and emotion with which she illuminated the Shakespearean canvas of Hamnet, Maggie O’Farrell turns her talents to Renaissance Italy in an extraordinary portrait of a resilient young woman’s battle for her very survival.]]> 355 Maggie O'Farrell Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.97 2022
author: Maggie O'Farrell
name: Dory
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60123788 186 Rebecca van Laer 1950987205 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.38
author: Rebecca van Laer
name: Dory
average rating: 4.38
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57694030

When Alice realizes the mysterious Honeybee Emeralds could be her chance to save the magazine, she recruits her friends Lily and Daphne to form the “Fellowship of the Necklace.� Together, they set out to uncover the romantic history of the gems. Through diaries, letters, and investigations through the winding streets and iconic historic landmarks of Paris, the trio begins to unravel more than just the secrets of the necklace’s obsolete past. Along the way, Lily and Daphne’s relationships are challenged, tempered, and changed. Lily faces her long-standing attraction to a friend, who has achieved the writing success that eluded her. Daphne confronts her failing relationship with her husband, while also facing simmering problems in her friendship with Lily. And, at last, Alice finds her place in the world—although one mystery still remains: how did the Honeybee Emeralds go from the neck of American singer Josephine Baker during the Roaring Twenties to the basement of a Parisian magazine?]]> 338 Amy Tector 1684427584 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.92 2022
author: Amy Tector
name: Dory
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60528666

In striking, immersive detail against the backdrop of an ever-changing international landscape, What We Fed to the Manticore speaks to the fears and joys of the creatures we share our world with, and ultimately places the reader under the rich canopy of the tree of life.]]> 200 Talia Lakshmi Kolluri 1953534414 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.10 2022
author: Talia Lakshmi Kolluri
name: Dory
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59336344
“Captures the ache-inducing quality of art and desire . . . a deeply relatable and profoundly enjoyable read, one drenched in prismatic color and light.”—Kristen Arnett, New York Times bestselling author of With Teeth

It’s 2011: America is in a deep recession and Occupy Wall Street is escalating. But at the elite Wrynn College of Art, students paint and sculpt in a rarefied bubble. Louisa Arceneaux is a thoughtful, observant nineteen-year-old when she transfers to Wrynn as a scholarship student, but she soon finds herself adrift in an environment that prizes novelty over beauty. Complicating matters is Louisa’s unexpected attraction to her charismatic roommate, Karina Piontek, the preternaturally gifted but mercurial daughter of wealthy art collectors. Gradually, Louisa and Karina are drawn into an intense sensual and artistic relationship, one that forces them to confront their deepest desires and fears. But Karina also can’t shake her fascination with Preston Utley, a senior and anti-capitalist Internet provocateur, who is publicly feuding with visiting professor and political painter Robert Berger—a once-controversial figurehead seeking to regain relevance.

When Preston concocts an explosive hoax, the fates of all four artists are upended as each is unexpectedly thrust into the cutthroat New York art world. Now all must struggle to find new identities in art, in society, and among each other. In the process, they must find either their most authentic terms of life—of success, failure, and joy—or risk losing themselves altogether.

With a canny, critical eye, Sirens & Muses overturns notions of class, money, art, youth, and a generation’s fight to own their future.]]> 368 Antonia Angress Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.91 2022
author: Antonia Angress
name: Dory
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59382048 A novel about family secrets and a volatile relationship between a mother and her daughters.

When Anna's sister calls with an urgent message, Anna doesn't return the call. She knows it's about their mother.

Growing up in working class Boston in an Italian American family, Anna's childhood was sparse but comfortable--filled with homemade meals and front-porch gatherings in their close-knit neighborhood. Anna and her sisters are devoted to their mother, orbiting her like the sun, trying to keep up with her loving but mercurial nature as she bounces between tenderness and bitterness.

When their father gets a new job outside the city, the family is tossed unceremoniously into a middle-class suburban existence. Anna's mother is suddenly adrift, and the darkness lurking inside her expands until it threatens to explode. Her daughters, trapped with her in the new house, isolated, must do everything they can to keep her from unraveling.

Alternating between childhood and Anna's twenties, in which she receives a shattering call about her mother and threatens to blow up her own precariously constructed new life in New York, Mother in the Dark asks whether we can ever really go back home when the idea of home is so unstable. Whether we can escape that instability or accept that our personalities are built around the defenses we put up. Maiuri is a master at revealing the fragile horrors of domestic family life and how the traumas of the past shape the present and generations of women.

A story about sisterhood, the complications of class, and the chains of inheritance between mothers and daughters, Mother in the Dark delivers an unvarnished portrayal of a young woman consumed by her past and a family teetering on the edge.
]]> 304 Kayla Maiuri 0593083288 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.80 2022
author: Kayla Maiuri
name: Dory
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58673061 Blisteringly sharp, hypersmart, and compulsively readable―meet Isabel Kaplan’s searing debut novel about a young woman trying to succeed in Hollywood without selling her soul.

From the outside, the unnamed protagonist in NSFW appears the vision of success. She has landed an entry-level position at a leading TV network that thousands of college grads would kill for. And sure, she has much to learn. The daughter of a prominent feminist attorney, she grew up outside the industry, better versed in gender dynamics than box office hits. But she’s resourceful and hardworking―what could go wrong?

At first, the high adrenaline work environment motivates her, yet as she climbs the ranks, she confronts the reality of creating change from the inside. Her points only get attention when echoed by male colleagues. She hears whispers of abuse and sexual misconduct. Her mother says to keep her head down until she’s the one in charge―a scenario that seems idealistic at best, morally questionable at worst.

When her personal and professional lives collide, threatening both the network and her future, she must finally decide what to protect: the career she’s given everything for or the empowered woman she claims to be.]]> 272 Isabel Kaplan 1250822890 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.48 2022
author: Isabel Kaplan
name: Dory
average rating: 3.48
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59576076
São vizinhos, e vivem num complexo habitacional de baixo custo em Vacca Vale, cidade em decadência. É a partir deste lugar inóspito que Tess Gunty conduz o leitor numa invulgar viagem pelo desconcerto do espírito humano, pelas grandes doenças sociais e pelo alcance incomensurável da imaginação. Uma estreia literária arrebatadora, que inscreve Tess Gunty na linhagem do Grande Romance Americano.]]> 399 Tess Gunty Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.50 2022
author: Tess Gunty
name: Dory
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59807976
Accompanied by Almost Brilliant, a talking bird with an indelible memory, Chih confronts old legends and new dangers alike as they learn that every story—beautiful, ugly, kind, or cruel—bears more than one face.]]> 100 Nghi Vo 1250851424 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.01 2022
author: Nghi Vo
name: Dory
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60461898
Forced to flee her home once more, Xingyin and her companions venture to unexplored lands of the Immortal Realm, encountering legendary creatures and shrewd monarchs, beloved friends and bitter adversaries. With alliances shifting quicker than the tides, Xingyin has to overcome past grudges and enmities to forge a new path forward, seeking aid where she never imagined she would. As an unspeakable terror sweeps across the realm, Xingyin must uncover the truth of her heart and claw her way through devastation--to rise against this evil before it destroys everything she holds dear, and the worlds she has grown to love... even if doing so demands the greatest price of all.

The stunning sequel to Daughter of the Moon Goddess delves deeper into beloved Chinese mythology, concluding the epic story of Xingyin--the daughter of Chang'e and the mortal archer, Houyi--as she battles a grave new threat to the realm, in this powerful tale of love, sacrifice, and hope.]]> 466 Sue Lynn Tan 0063031361 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.00 2022
author: Sue Lynn Tan
name: Dory
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55348105
Attempted vehicular manslaughter was not part of Shani’s plan. She was supposed to be focusing on her month-long paleoichthyology internship. She was going to spend all her time thinking about dead fish and not at all about how she was unceremoniously dumped days before winter break.

It could be going better.

But when a dog-walking gig puts her back in May’s path, the fossils she’s meant to be diligently studying are pushed to the side—along with the breakup. Then they’re snowed in together on Christmas Eve. As things start to feel more serious, though, Shani’s hurt over her ex-girlfriend’s rejection comes rushing back. Is she ready to try a committed relationship again, or is she okay with this just being a passing winter fling?]]> 384 Jake Maia Arlow Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.78 2022
author: Jake Maia Arlow
name: Dory
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58842731 A debut novel about a queer Mexican American girl navigating Catholic school, while falling in love and learning to celebrate her true self.

Sixteen-year-old Yamilet Flores prefers to be known for her killer eyeliner, not for being one of the only Mexican kids at her new, mostly white, very rich Catholic school. But at least here no one knows she's gay, and Yami intends to keep it that way.

After being outed by her crush and ex-best friend before transferring to Slayton Catholic, Yami has new priorities: keep her brother out of trouble, make her mom proud, and, most importantly, don't fall in love. Granted, she's never been great at any of those things, but that's a problem for Future Yami.

The thing is, it's hard to fake being straight when Bo, the only openly queer girl at school, is so annoyingly perfect. And smart. And talented. And cute. So cute. Either way, Yami isn't going to make the same mistake again. If word got back to her mom, she could face a lot worse than rejection. So she'll have to start asking, WWSGD: What would a straight girl do?]]> 385 Sonora Reyes 006306023X Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.27 2022
author: Sonora Reyes
name: Dory
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56978109 A teen girl navigates friendship drama, the end of high school, and discovering her queerness in Ophelia After All, a hilarious and heartfelt contemporary YA debut by author Racquel Marie.

Ophelia Rojas knows what she likes: her best friends, Cuban food, rose-gardening, and boys - way too many boys. Her friends and parents make fun of her endless stream of crushes, but Ophelia is a romantic at heart. She couldn't change, even if she wanted to.

So when she finds herself thinking more about cute, quiet Talia Sanchez than the loss of a perfect prom with her ex-boyfriend, seeds of doubt take root in Ophelia's firm image of herself. Add to that the impending end of high school and the fracturing of her once-solid friend group, and things are spiraling a little out of control. But the course of love--and sexuality--never did run smooth. As her secrets begin to unravel, Ophelia must make a choice between clinging to the fantasy version of herself she's always imagined or upending everyone's expectations to rediscover who she really is, after all.]]> 341 Racquel Marie 1250797306 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.06 2022
author: Racquel Marie
name: Dory
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55878999 Welcome to The Sunbearer Trials, where teen semidioses compete in a series of challenges with the highest of stakes, in this electric new Mexican-inspired fantasy from Aiden Thomas, the New York Times bestselling author of Cemetery Boys.

“Only the most powerful and honorable semidioses get chosen. I’m just a Jade. I’m not a real hero.�

As each new decade begins, the Sun’s power must be replenished so that Sol can keep traveling along the sky and keep the evil Obsidian gods at bay. Ten semidioses between the ages of thirteen and eighteen are selected by Sol himself as the most worthy to compete in The Sunbearer Trials. The winner carries light and life to all the temples of Reino del Sol, but the loser has the greatest honor of all―they will be sacrificed to Sol, their body used to fuel the Sun Stones that will protect the people of Reino del Sol for the next ten years.

Teo, a 17-year-old Jade semidiós and the trans son of Quetzal, goddess of birds, has never worried about the Trials…or rather, he’s only worried for others. His best friend Niya―daughter of Tierra, the god of earth―is one of the strongest heroes of their generation and is much too likely to be chosen this year. He also can’t help but worry (reluctantly, and under protest) for Aurelio, a powerful Gold semidiós and Teo’s friend-turned-rival who is a shoo-in for the Trials. Teo wouldn’t mind taking Aurelio down a notch or two, but a one-in-ten chance of death is a bit too close for Teo’s taste.

But then, for the first time in over a century, Sol chooses a semidiós who isn’t a Gold. In fact, he chooses two: Xio, the 13-year-old child of Mala Suerte, god of bad luck, and…Teo. Now they must compete in five mysterious trials, against opponents who are both more powerful and better trained, for fame, glory, and their own survival.]]> 352 Aiden Thomas Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.31 2022
author: Aiden Thomas
name: Dory
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57626046
In an oceanic world swarming with vicious beasts, the Landers―the ruling elite, have indentured Koral's family to provide the maristags for the Glory Race, a deadly chariot tournament reserved for the upper class. The winning contender receives gold and glory. The others―if they're lucky―survive.

When the last maristag of the year escapes and Koral has no new maristag to sell, her family's financial situation takes a turn for the worse and they can't afford medicine for her chronically ill little sister. Koral's only choice is to do what no one in the world has ever dared: cheat her way into the Glory Race.

But every step of the way is unpredictable as Koral races against contenders―including her ex-boyfriend―who have trained for this their whole lives and who have no intention of letting a low-caste girl steal their glory. When a rebellion rises and rogues attack Koral to try and force her to drop out, she must choose―her life or her sister's―before the whole island burns.

She grew up battling the monsters that live in the black seas, but it couldn't prepare her to face the cunning cruelty of the ruling elite.

Perfect for fans of The Hunger Games and These Violent Delights, this South Asian-inspired fantasy is a gripping debut about the power of the elite, the price of glory, and one girl's chance to change it all.]]> 352 Tanvi Berwah 1728247624 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.46 2022
author: Tanvi Berwah
name: Dory
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59440716 A dazzling new fantasy from New York Times and indie bestselling author Joan He, Strike the Zither is a powerful, inventive, and sweeping fantasy that reimagines the Chinese classic tale of the Three Kingdoms.

The year is 414 of the Xin Dynasty, and chaos abounds. A puppet empress is on the throne. The realm has fractured into three factions and three warlordesses hoping to claim the continent for themselves.

But Zephyr knows it's no contest.

Orphaned at a young age, Zephyr took control of her fate by becoming the best strategist of the land and serving under Xin Ren, a warlordess whose loyalty to the empress is double-edged—while Ren's honor draws Zephyr to her cause, it also jeopardizes their survival in a war where one must betray or be betrayed. When Zephyr is forced to infiltrate an enemy camp to keep Ren's followers from being slaughtered, she encounters the enigmatic Crow, an opposing strategist who is finally her match. But there are more enemies than one—and not all of them are human.]]> 368 Joan He 1250258588 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.70 2022
author: Joan He
name: Dory
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 36139586
Del Samatar's drawings conjure beings who drag worlds in their wake. World Fantasy Award-winning author Sofia Samatar responds with allusive, critical, and ecstatic meditations. Together they have created a secret history of the multi-racial child, a guide to the beasts of an unknown mythos, and a dreamer's iconography. Monster Portraits resonates in a world obsessed with the Other, using captivating nomenclature, art, fiction, and essay to examine society’s damaging desire to define and divide. The monstrous never looked so simultaneously haunting and familiar.]]> 78 Sofia Samatar 1941628109 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.07 2017
author: Sofia Samatar
name: Dory
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59249732
Another AppalachiaĚýexamines both the roots and the resonance of Avashia’s identity as a queer desi Appalachian woman, while encouraging readers to envision more complex versions of both Appalachia and the nation as a whole. With lyric and narrative explorations of foodways, religion, sports, standards of beauty, social media, gun culture, and more,ĚýAnother AppalachiaĚýmixes nostalgia and humor, sadness and sweetness, personal reflection and universal questions.]]> 171 Neema Avashia 1952271428 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.23 2022
author: Neema Avashia
name: Dory
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/29
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59807978
When she meets a young Nathaniel Hawthorne, the two are instantly drawn to each other: he is a man haunted by his ancestors, who sent innocent women to the gallows––while she is an unusually gifted needleworker, troubled by her own strange talents. As the weeks pass and Edward's safe return grows increasingly unlikely, Nathaniel and Isobel grow closer and closer. Together, they are a muse and a dark storyteller; the enchanter and the enchanted. But which is which?

In this sensuous and hypnotizing tale, a young immigrant woman grapples with our country's complicated past, and learns that America's ideas of freedom and liberty often fall short of their promise. Interwoven with Isobel and Nathaniel's story is a vivid interrogation of who gets to be a "real" American in the first half of the 19th century, a depiction of the early days of the Underground Railroad in New England, and atmospheric interstitials that capture the long history of "unusual" women being accused of witchcraft. Meticulously researched yet evocatively imagined, Hester is a timeless tale of art, ambition, and desire that examines the roots of female creative power and the men who try to shut it down.

A vivid reimagining of the woman who inspired Hester Prynne, the tragic heroine of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, and a journey into the enduring legacy of New England's witchcraft trials.]]> 322 Laurie Lico Albanese 1250278554 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.94 2022
author: Laurie Lico Albanese
name: Dory
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/27
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59365049 A sweeping, lyrical novel following a Korean immigrant pursuing the American dream who must confront the secrets of the past or risk watching the world he’s worked so hard to build come crumbling down.

Dr. Yungman Kwak is in the twilight of his life. Every day for the last fifty years, he has brushed his teeth, slipped on his shoes, and headed to Horse Breath’s General Hospital, where, as an obstetrician, he treats the women and babies of the small rural Minnesota town he chose to call home.

This was the life he longed for. The so-called American dream. He immigrated from Korea after the Korean War, forced to leave his family, ancestors, village, and all that he knew behind. But his life is built on a lie. And one day, a letter arrives that threatens to expose it.

Yungman’s life is thrown into chaos—the hospital abruptly closes, his wife refuses to spend time with him, and his son is busy investing in a struggling health start-up. Yungman faces a choice—he must choose to hide his secret from his family and friends or confess and potentially lose all he’s built. He begins to question the very assumptions on which his life is built—the so-called American dream, with the abject failure of its healthcare system, patient and neighbors who perpetuate racism, a town flawed with infrastructure, and a history that doesn’t see him in it.

Toggling between the past and the present, Korea and America, Evening Hero is a sweeping, moving, darkly comic novel about a man looking back at his life and asking big questions about what is lost and what is gained when immigrants leave home for new shores.]]> 430 Marie Myung-Ok Lee 1476735077 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.77 2022
author: Marie Myung-Ok Lee
name: Dory
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/01
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59366233
As the wedding day draws near, misunderstandings, infidelities, and long-held secrets upend both Yasmin’s relationship and that of her parents, a “love marriage,� according to the family lore that Yasmin has believed all her life.

A gloriously acute observer of class, sexual mores, and the mysteries of the human heart, Monica Ali has written a riveting social comedy and a moving, revelatory story of two cultures, two families, and two people trying to understand one another.]]> 432 Monica Ali 1982181478 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.78 2022
author: Monica Ali
name: Dory
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/06/01
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57693584
A dark romance exposing the gaps in American identity politics, especially when exported overseas, If an Egyptian Cannot Speak English is at once ravishing and wry, scathing and tender. Told in alternating perspectives, Noor Naga’s experimental debut examines the ethics of fetishizing the homeland and punishing the beloved . . . and vice versa. In our globalized twenty-first-century world, what are the new faces (and races) of empire? When the revolution fails, how long can someone survive the disappointment? Who suffers and, more crucially, who gets to tell about it?]]> 186 Noor Naga 164445081X Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.95 2022
author: Noor Naga
name: Dory
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/04/12
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57771220 Already compared to Hemingway and Murakami, Shuang Xuetao is one of the most highly celebrated young Chinese writers—his English-language debut Rouge Street collects three dazzling novellas of Northeast China, mixing realism, mysticism, and noir

An enterprising inventor dreams of escaping his drab surroundings in a flying machine. A criminal, trapped beneath a frozen lake, transforms into a giant fish. A strange girl pledges to ignite a field of sorghum stalks.

Rouge Street collects three novellas by Shuang Xuetao, the lauded young Chinese writer whose frank, fantastical short fiction has already inspired comparisons to Ernest Hemingway and Haruki Murakami. Located in China’s frigid Northeast, Shenyang, the author’s birthplace, boasts an illustrious past—legend holds that the emperor’s makeup was manufactured here. But while the city enjoyed renewed importance as an industrial hub under Mao Zedong, China’s subsequent transition from communism to a private economy led to an array of social ills—unemployment, poverty, alcoholism, domestic violence, divorce, suicide—which gritty Shenyang epitomizes.

Orbiting the toughest neighborhood of a postindustrial city whose vast, inhospitable landscape makes every aspect of life a struggle, these many-voiced missives are united by Shuang Xuetao’s singular style—one which balances hardscrabble naturalism with the transcendent, and faces the bleak environs with winning humor. Lyrical, masterful, Rouge Street illuminates not only the hidden pains of those left behind in an extraordinary economic boom, but also the unlikely, nourishing grace they, nevertheless, manage to discover.]]> 240 Shuang Xuetao 1250835879 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.82 2022
author: Shuang Xuetao
name: Dory
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/04/12
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57693570 My grandmother, sitting at her doily-covered table, marmalade on her cheek, explained that the aswang is all the evil bad things that a town or a society would want to deny--eventually it has to come out, has to be personified into something or the truth will reveal itself.

Marina Salles's life does not end the day she wakes up dead.

Instead, in the course of a moment, she is transformed into the stuff of myth, the stuff of her grandmother's old Filipino stories--an aswang. She spent her life on the margins, knowing very little about her own life, let alone the lives of others; she was shot like a pinball through a childhood of loss, a veteran of Child Protective Services and a survivor, but always reacting, watching from a distance. Death brings her into the hearts and minds of those she has known--even her killer--as she is able to access their memories and to see anew the meaning of her own. In the course of these pages she traces back through her life, finally able to see what led these lost souls to this crushingly inevitable conclusion.]]> 352 Melissa Chadburn 0374277753 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.86 2022
author: Melissa Chadburn
name: Dory
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/04/12
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57926137 We can’t choose what we inherit. But can we choose who we become?

In present-day California, Eleanor Bennett’s death leaves behind a puzzling inheritance for her two children, Byron and Benny: a black cake, made from a family recipe with a long history, and a voice recording. In her message, Eleanor shares a tumultuous story about a headstrong young swimmer who escapes her island home under suspicion of murder. The heartbreaking tale Eleanor unfolds, the secrets she still holds back, and the mystery of a long-lost child challenge everything the siblings thought they knew about their lineage and themselves.

Can Byron and Benny reclaim their once-close relationship, piece together Eleanor’s true history, and fulfill her final request to “share the black cake when the time is right�? Will their mother’s revelations bring them back together or leave them feeling more lost than ever?

Charmaine Wilkerson’s debut novel is a story of how the inheritance of betrayals, secrets, memories, and even names can shape relationships and history. Deeply evocative and beautifully written, Black Cake is an extraordinary journey through the life of a family changed forever by the choices of its matriarch.]]> 385 Charmaine Wilkerson Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.06 2022
author: Charmaine Wilkerson
name: Dory
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58502645 A lost young woman returns to small-town New Hampshire under the strangest of circumstances in this one-of-a-kind novel of life, death, and whatever comes after from the acclaimed author of Rabbit Cake.

It was a source of entertainment at Maple Street Cemetery. Both funny and sad, the kind of story we like best.

Natural-born healer Emma Starling once had big plans for her life, but she's lost her way. A med school dropout, she's come back to small-town Everton, New Hampshire to care for her father, dying from a mysterious brain disease. Clive Starling has been hallucinating small animals, as well as visions of the ghost of a long-dead naturalist, Ernest Harold Baynes, once known for letting wild animals live in his house. This ghost has been giving Clive some ideas on how to spend his final days.

Emma arrives home knowing she must face her dad's illness, her mom's judgement, and her younger brother's recent stint in rehab, but she's unprepared to find that her former best friend from high school is missing, with no one bothering to look for her. The police say they don't spend much time looking for drug addicts. Emma's dad is the only one convinced the young woman might still be alive, and Emma is hopeful he could be right. Someone should look for her, at least. Emma isn't really trying to be a hero—but somehow she and her father set in motion just the kind of miracle the town needs.

Set against the backdrop of a small town in the throes of a very real opioid crisis, Unlikely Animals is a tragicomic novel about familial expectations, imperfect friendships, and the possibility of resurrecting that which had been thought irrevocably lost.]]> 348 Annie Hartnett 0593160223 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.05 2022
author: Annie Hartnett
name: Dory
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59089923 A savvy former street child working at a law office in Mumbai fights for redemption and a chance to live life on her own terms in this fresh, propulsive debut novel about fortune and survival.

Rakhi is a twenty-three-year-old haunted by the grisly aftermath of an incident that led to the loss of her best friend eleven years ago. Constantly reminded she doesn't belong, Rakhi lives alone in a Mumbai slum, working as a lowly office assistant at Justice For All, a struggling human-rights law organization headed by the renowned lawyer who gave her a fresh start.

Fiercely intelligent and in possession of a sharp wit and an even sharper tongue, Rakhi is nobody's fool, even if she is underestimated by everyone around her. Rakhi's life isn't much, but she's managing. That is, until Rubina Mansoor, a fading former Bollywood starlet, tries to edge her way back into the spotlight by becoming a celebrity ambassador for Justice For All. Steering the organization into uncharted territories, she demands an internship for Alex, a young family friend from Canada and Harvard-bound graduate student. Ambitious, persistent, and naĂŻve, Alex persuades Rakhi to show him "the real" India. In exchange, he'll do something to further Rakhi's dreams in a transaction that seems harmless, at first.

As old guilt and new aspirations collide, everything Rakhi once knew to be true is set ablaze. And as the stakes mount, she will come face-to-face with the difficult choices and moral compromises that people make in order to survive, no matter the cost. Reema Patel's transportive debut novel offers a moving, smart, and arrestingly clever look at the cost of ambition and power in reclaiming one's story.]]> 336 Reema Patel 0593499506 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.00 2022
author: Reema Patel
name: Dory
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58064044
All that changes on Hannah’s seventeenth birthday when she wakes up transformed, a pair of golden eyes with knife-slit pupils blinking back at her from the mirror—the first of many such impossible mutations. Promising that she knows someone who can help, her mother leaves Hannah and Gabe behind to find a cure. But as the days turn to weeks and their mother doesn’t return, they realize it’s up to them to find the truth.

What they discover is a family they never knew and a history more tragic and fantastical than Hannah could have dreamed—one that stretches back to her grandmother’s childhood in Prague under the Nazi occupation, and beyond, into the realm of Jewish mysticism and legend. As the past comes crashing into the present, Hannah must hurry to unearth their family’s secrets in order to break the curse and save the people she loves most, as well as herself.]]> 416 Rebecca Podos 0062699067 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.83 2022
author: Rebecca Podos
name: Dory
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/02
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56978096 In this young adult novel by award-winning author Anna-Marie McLemore, two non-binary teens are pulled into a magical world under a lake - but can they keep their worlds above water intact?

Everyone who lives near the lake knows the stories about the world underneath it, an ethereal landscape rumored to be half-air, half-water. But Bastián Silvano and Lore Garcia are the only ones who’ve been there. Bastián grew up both above the lake and in the otherworldly space beneath it. Lore’s only seen the world under the lake once, but that one encounter changed their life and their fate.

Then the lines between air and water begin to blur. The world under the lake drifts above the surface. If Bastián and Lore don’t want it bringing their secrets to the surface with it, they have to stop it, and to do that, they have to work together. There’s just one problem: Bastián and Lore haven’t spoken in seven years, and working together means trusting each other with the very things they’re trying to hide.]]> 304 Anna-Marie McLemore 1250624142 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.90 2022
author: Anna-Marie McLemore
name: Dory
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/02
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55962377 One small fandom convention. One teen beauty pageant.
One meet cute waiting to happen.

Up and coming fanfic author Kaylee Beaumont is internally screaming at the chance to finally meet her fandom friends in real life and spend a weekend at GreatCon. She also has a side quest for the weekend:

Try out they/them pronouns to see how it feels
Wear more masculine-presenting cosplay
Kiss a girl for the first time

It’s� a lot, and Kay mostly wants to lie face down on the hotel floor. Especially when her hometown bully, Miss North Carolina, shows up in the very same hotel. But there’s this con-sponsored publishing contest, and the chance to meet her fandom idols� and then, there’s Teagan.

Pageant queen Teagan Miller (Miss Virginia) has her eye on the much-needed prize: the $25,000 scholarship awarded to the winner of the Miss Cosmic Teen USA pageant. She also has secrets:

She loves the dresses but hates the tiaras
She’s a giant nerd for everything GreatCon
She’s gay af

If Teagan can just keep herself wrapped up tight for one more weekend, she can claim the scholarship and go off to college out and proud. If she’s caught, she could lose everything she’s worked for. If her rival, Miss North Carolina, has anything to do with it, that’s exactly how it’ll go down.

When Teagan and Kay bump into one another the first night, sparks fly. Their connection is intense—as is their shared enemy. If they’re spotted, the safe space of the con will be shattered, and all their secrets will follow them home. The risks are great� but could the reward of embracing their true selves be worth it?]]> 272 Remi K. England 1250814863 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.07 2022
author: Remi K. England
name: Dory
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/02
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58438562 Perfect for fans of Samantha Irby and Trick Mirror, a funny, whip-smart collection of personal essays exploring the intersection of queerness, relationships, pop culture, the internet, and identity, introducing one of the most undeniably original new voices today

Jill Gutowitz’s life—for better and worse—has always been on a collision course with pop culture. There’s the time the FBI showed up at her door because of something she tweeted about Game of Thrones. The pop songs that have been the soundtrack to the worst moments of her life. And of course, the pivotal day when Orange Is the New Black hit the airwaves and broke down the door to Jill’s own sexuality. In these honest examinations of identity, desire, and self-worth, Jill explores perhaps the most monumental cultural shift of our lifetimes: the mainstreaming of lesbian culture. Dusting off her own personal traumas and artifacts of her not-so-distant youth she examines how pop culture acts as a fun house mirror reflecting and refracting our values—always teaching, distracting, disappointing, and revealing us.

Girls Can Kiss Now is a fresh and intoxicating blend of personal stories, sharp observations, and laugh-out-loud humor. This timely collection of essays helps us make sense of our collective pop-culture past even as it points the way toward a joyous, uproarious, near—and very queer—future.]]> 227 Jill Gutowitz 1982158506 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.79 2022
author: Jill Gutowitz
name: Dory
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/02
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58340947 New York, 1998. Santiago Larrea, a wealthy Argentine diplomat, is holding court alongside his wife, Lila, and their daughter, Paloma, a college student and budding jewelry designer, at their annual summer polo match and soiree. All seems perfect in the Larreas’Ěýworld—until an unexpected party guest from Santiago's university days shakes his usually unflappable demeanor. The woman's cryptic comments spark Paloma’s curiosity about her father’s past, of which she knows little.
Ěý
When the family travels to Buenos Aires for Santiago's UN ambassadorial appointment, Paloma is determined to learn more about his life in the years leading up to the military dictatorship of 1976. With the help of a local university student, Franco Bonetti, an activist member of H.I.J.O.S.—a group whose members are the children of the desaparecidos, or the “disappeared,� men and women who were forcibly disappeared by the state during Argentina’s “Dirty War”—Paloma unleashes a chain of events that not only leads her to question her family and her identity, but also puts her life in danger.

InĚýcompelling fashion, On a Night of a Thousand Stars speaks to relationships, morality, and identity during a brutal period in Argentinian history, and the understanding—and redemption—people crave in the face of tragedy.]]> 352 Andrea Yaryura Clark 1538720299 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.89 2022
author: Andrea Yaryura Clark
name: Dory
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/03/02
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58409723
What follows is a story of wonder and betrayal, from the gaslit streets of London, and the wooden theaters of Meiji-era Tokyo, to an eerie estate outside Edinburgh where other children with gifts--like Komako, a witch-child and twister of dust, and Ribs, a girl who cloaks herself in invisibility--are forced to combat the forces that threaten their safety. There, the world of the dead and the world of the living threaten to collide. With this new found family, Komako, Marlowe, Charlie, Ribs, and the rest of the Talents discover the truth about their abilities. And as secrets within the Institute unfurl, a new question arises: What truly defines a monster?

Riveting in its scope, exquisitely written, Ordinary Monsters presents a catastrophic vision of the Victorian world--and of the gifted, broken children who must save it.]]> 672 J.M. Miro Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.96 2022
author: J.M. Miro
name: Dory
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/07
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58662507
The zombies are coming back.

And all Nona wants is a birthday party.

In many ways, Nona is like other people. She lives with her family, has a job at her local school, and loves walks on the beach and meeting new dogs. But Nona's not like other people. Six months ago she woke up in a stranger's body, and she's afraid she might have to give it back.

The whole city is falling to pieces. A monstrous blue sphere hangs on the horizon, ready to tear the planet apart. Blood of Eden forces have surrounded the last Cohort facility and wait for the Emperor Undying to come calling. Their leaders want Nona to be the weapon that will save them from the Nine Houses. Nona would prefer to live an ordinary life with the people she loves, with Pyrrha and Camilla and Palamedes, but she also knows that nothing lasts forever.

And each night, Nona dreams of a woman with a skull-painted face...]]> 480 Tamsyn Muir 1250854113 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.36 2022
author: Tamsyn Muir
name: Dory
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/07
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60117152 In this taut and explosive debut novel, one lapse in judgement lands a young mother in a government reform program where custody of her child hangs in the balance.

Frida Liu is struggling. She doesn’t have a career worthy of her Chinese immigrant parents� sacrifices. She can’t persuade her husband, Gust, to give up his wellness-obsessed younger mistress. Only with Harriet, their cherubic daughter, does Frida finally attain the perfection expected of her. Harriet may be all she has, but she is just enough.

Until Frida has a very bad day.

The state has its eyes on mothers like Frida. The ones who check their phones, letting their children get injured on the playground; who let their children walk home alone. Because of one moment of poor judgment, a host of government officials will now determine if Frida is a candidate for a Big Brother-like institution that measures the success or failure of a mother’s devotion.

Faced with the possibility of losing Harriet, Frida must prove that a bad mother can be redeemed. That she can learn to be good.

A searing page-turner that is also a transgressive novel of ideas about the perils of “perfect� upper-middle class parenting; the violence enacted upon women by both the state and, at times, one another; the systems that separate families; and the boundlessness of love, The School for Good Mothers introduces, in Frida, an everywoman for the ages. Using dark wit to explore the pains and joys of the deepest ties that bind us, Chan has written a modern literary classic.]]> Jessamine Chan Dory 0 to-read-in-2022 3.82 2022
author: Jessamine Chan
name: Dory
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/07
shelves: to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59651555 Nothing like a little rivalry between scientists to take love to the next level.

Mara, Sadie, and Hannah are friends first, scientists always. Though their fields of study might take them to different corners of the world, they can all agree on this universal truth: when it comes to love and science, opposites attract and rivals make you burn�

Logically, Sadie knows that civil engineers are supposed to build bridges. However, as a woman of STEM she also understands that variables can change, and when you are stuck for hours in a tiny New York elevator with the man who broke your heart, you earn the right to burn that brawny, blond bridge to the ground. Erik can apologize all he wants, but to quote her rebel leader—she’d just as soon kiss a Wookiee.

Not even the most sophisticated of Sadie’s superstitious rituals could have predicted such a disastrous reunion. But while she refuses to acknowledge the siren call of Erik’s steely forearms or the way his voice softens when he offers her his sweater, Sadie can’t help but wonder if there might be more layers to her cold-hearted nemesis than meet the eye. Maybe, possibly, even burned bridges can still be crossed�.

To read Mara and Hannah’s stories look for the novellas Under One Roof, available now, and Below Zero, coming soon from Berkley!]]> 127 Ali Hazelwood Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.56 2022
author: Ali Hazelwood
name: Dory
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/07
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55596771 The conclusion to Ken Liu's chronicle of the Dandelion Dynasty.

±«°ě˛âłÜ-łŇ´Ç˛Ô»ĺĂ©.
Stalked by foes and dogged by betrayal, Princess Théra is pursued across a continent vaster than she could ever have imagined, to the hidden valleys of the World's Edge Mountains, into the barrows and subterranean halls of the City of Ghosts, across the ice floes of the far north. She breached the Wall of Storms intent on taking war to the Lyucu homelands, but how do you conquer the unconquerable?

Dara.
Empress Jia, Prince Phyro and PĂ©kyu Tanvanaki find themselves bound to paths they never would have chosen. Amid atrocity and subterfuge, they will discover that the Courage of Brutes is no substitute for the Grace of Kings, and that little separates the Grace of Kings from the Madness of Tyrants.

On both sides of the Wall of Storms, defeat's bitter tears mix with the fruits of knowledge new and ancient as two empires bound by blood and bone, by writ and iron, by time and custom, face a whirlwind that threatens to utterly consume them.

The teeth, as they say, are on the board.]]> 1047 Ken Liu 1982148977 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.54 2022
author: Ken Liu
name: Dory
average rating: 4.54
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58587145 A dazzling epic of betrayal, love, and fate that spans five generations of an Indigenous Chicano family in the American West, from the author of the National Book Award Finalist Sabrina & Corina

"There is one every generation--a seer who keeps the stories."

Luz "Little Light" Lopez, a tea leaf reader and laundress, is left to fend for herself after her older brother, Diego, a snake charmer and factory worker, is run out of town by a violent white mob. As Luz navigates 1930's Denver on her own, she begins to have visions that transport her to her Indigenous homeland in the nearby Lost Territory. Luz recollects her ancestors' origins, how her family flourished and how they were threatened. She bears witness to the sinister forces that have devastated her people and their homelands for generations. In the end, it is up to Luz to save her family stories from disappearing into oblivion.

Written in Kali Fajardo-Anstine's singular voice, the wildly entertaining and complex lives of the Lopez family fill the pages of this multigenerational western saga. Woman of Light is a transfixing novel about survival, family secrets, and love, filled with an unforgettable cast of characters, all of whom are just as special, memorable, and complicated as our beloved heroine, Luz.]]> 336 Kali Fajardo-Anstine 0525511326 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.62 2022
author: Kali Fajardo-Anstine
name: Dory
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55118302
Fifteen-year-old Mack is a hopeless romantic - he blames the films he's grown up watching. He has liked Karim for as long as he can remember, and is ecstatic when Karim becomes his boyfriend - it feels like love.

But when Mack's dad gets a job on a film in Scotland, Mack has to move, and soon hediscovers how painful love can be. It's horrible being so far away from Karim, but the worst part is that Karim doesn't make the effort to visit. Love shouldn't be only on the weekends.

Then, when Mack meets actor Finlay on a film set, he experiences something powerful, a feeling like love at first sight. How long until he tells Karim - and when will his old life and new life collide?]]> 368 Dean Atta 1444960571 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.67 2022
author: Dean Atta
name: Dory
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58723896
And by fix, they mean straighten, they mean whiten;

but how do you fix this shipwrecked

history of hair?

In her most famous spoken-word poem, author of the Pura Belpré-winning novel-in-verse The Poet X Elizabeth Acevedo embraces all the complexities of Black hair and Afro-Latinidad—the history, pain, pride, and powerful love of that inheritance.

Paired with full-color illustrations by artist Andrea Pippins in a format that will appeal to fans of Mahogany L. Browne’s Black Girl Magic or Jason Reynolds’s For Everyone, this poem can now be read in a vibrant package, making it the ideal gift, treasure, or inspiration for readers of any age.]]> 48 Elizabeth Acevedo Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.46 2022
author: Elizabeth Acevedo
name: Dory
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58245889 Returning triumphantly to the brilliantly evoked near-Renaissance world of A Brightness Long Ago and Children of Earth and Sky, international bestselling author Guy Gavriel Kay deploys his signature "quarter turn to the fantastic" to tell a story of vengeance, power, and love.

On a dark night along a lonely stretch of coast, a small ship sends two people ashore. Their purpose is assassination. They have been hired by two of the most dangerous men alive to alter the balance of power in the world. If they succeed, the consequences will affect the destinies of empires, and lives both great and small.

One of those arriving at that beach is a woman abducted by corsairs as a child and sold into years of servitude. Having escaped, she is trying to chart her own course-and is bent upon revenge. Another is a seafaring merchant who still remembers being exiled as a child with his family from their home, for their faith, a moment that never leaves him. In what follows, through a story both intimate and epic, unforgettable characters are immersed in the fierce and deadly struggles that define their time.

All the Seas of the World is a page-turning drama that also offers moving reflections on memory, fate, and the random events that can shape our lives-in the past, and today.]]> 522 Guy Gavriel Kay 0593441060 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.38 2022
author: Guy Gavriel Kay
name: Dory
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59232998
Feyi Adekola wants to learn how to be alive again.

It’s been five years since the accident that killed the love of her life and she’s almost a new person now—an artist with her own studio, and sharing a brownstone apartment with her ride-or-die best friend, Joy, who insists it’s time for Feyi to ease back into the dating scene. Feyi isn’t ready for anything serious, but a steamy encounter at a rooftop party cascades into a whirlwind summer she could have never imagined: a luxury trip to a tropical island, decadent meals in the glamorous home of a celebrity chef, and a major curator who wants to launch her art career.

She’s even started dating the perfect guy, but their new relationship might be sabotaged before it has a chance by the dangerous thrill Feyi feels every time she locks eyes with the one person in the house who is most definitely off-limits. This new life she asked for just got a lot more complicated, and Feyi must begin her search for real answers. Who is she ready to become? Can she release her past and honor her grief while still embracing her future? And, of course, there’s the biggest question of all—how far is she willing to go for a second chance at love?

Akwaeke Emezi’s vivid and passionate writing takes us deep into a world of possibility and healing, and the constant bravery of choosing love against all odds.]]> 288 Akwaeke Emezi 1982188707 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.52 2022
author: Akwaeke Emezi
name: Dory
average rating: 3.52
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 59651557 A scientist should never cohabitate with her annoyingly hot nemesis � it leads to combustion.

Mara, Sadie, and Hannah are friends first, scientists always. Though their fields of study might take them to different corners of the world, they can all agree on this universal truth: when it comes to love and science, opposites attract and rivals make you burn�.

As an environmental engineer, Mara knows all about the delicate nature of ecosystems. They require balance. And leaving the thermostat alone. And not stealing someone else’s food. And other rules Liam, her detestable big-oil lawyer of a roommate, knows nothing about. Okay, sure, technically she’s the interloper. Liam was already entrenched in his aunt’s house like some glowering grumpy giant when Mara moved in, with his big muscles and kissable mouth just sitting there on the couch tempting respectable scientists to the dark side…but Helena was her mentor and Mara’s not about to move out and give up her inheritance without a fight.

The problem is, living with someone means getting to know them. And the more Mara finds out about Liam, the harder it is to loathe him…and the easier it is to love him.]]> 112 Ali Hazelwood 0593437810 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.65 2022
author: Ali Hazelwood
name: Dory
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57005205 From the creator of Yes, I'm Hot In This, this cheeky, hilarious, and honest graphic novel asks the question everyone has to figure out for themselves: Who are you?

Huda and her family just moved to Dearborn, Michigan, a small town with a big Muslim population. In her old town, Huda knew exactly who she was: She was the hijabi girl. But in Dearborn, everyone is the hijabi girl.

Huda is lost in a sea of hijabis, and she can't rely on her hijab to define her anymore. She has to define herself. So she tries on a bunch of cliques, but she isn't a hijabi fashionista or a hijabi athlete or a hijabi gamer. She's not the one who knows everything about her religion or the one all the guys like. She's miscellaneous, which makes her feel like no one at all. Until she realizes that it'll take finding out who she isn't to figure out who she is.]]> 192 Huda Fahmy 0593324315 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.15 2021
author: Huda Fahmy
name: Dory
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/02/06
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 60149573 A novel about a mother’s unbreakable love in a world consumed by fear.

Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving but broken father, a former linguist who now shelves books in a university library. Bird knows to not ask too many questions, stand out too much, or stray too far. For a decade, their lives have been governed by laws written to preserve “American culture� in the wake of years of economic instability and violence. To keep the peace and restore prosperity, the authorities are now allowed to relocate children of dissidents, especially those of Asian origin, and libraries have been forced to remove books seen as unpatriotic—including the work of Bird’s mother, Margaret, a Chinese American poet who left the family when he was nine years old.

Bird has grown up disavowing his mother and her poems; he doesn’t know her work or what happened to her, and he knows he shouldn’t wonder. But when he receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, he is pulled into a quest to find her. His journey will take him back to the many folktales she poured into his head as a child, through the ranks of an underground network of librarians, into the lives of the children who have been taken, and finally to New York City, where a new act of defiance may be the beginning of much-needed change.]]> 335 Celeste Ng 0593492544 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.74 2022
author: Celeste Ng
name: Dory
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/23
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55711695
Nobody ever makes it to the start of a story, not even the people in it. The most one can do is make some sort of start and then work toward some kind of ending.

One might as well start with SĂ©raphin: playlist-maker, nerd-jock hybrid, self-appointed merchant of cool, Rwandan, stifled and living in Windhoek, Namibia. Soon he will leave the confines of his family life for the cosmopolitan city of Cape Town, in South Africa, where loyal friends, hormone-saturated parties, adventurous conquests, and race controversies await. More than that, his long-awaited final year in law school promises to deliver a crucial puzzle piece of the Great Plan immigrant: a degree from a prestigious university.

But a year is more than the sum of its parts, and en route to the future, the present must be lived through and even the past must be survived.]]> 384 RĂ©my Ngamije 1982164425 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.76 2019
author: RĂ©my Ngamije
name: Dory
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/17
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56461570
In Chinatown, Qian’s parents labor in sweatshops. Instead of laughing at her jokes, they fight constantly, taking out the stress of their new life on one another. Shunned by her classmates and teachers for her limited English, Qian takes refuge in the library and masters the language through books, coming to think of The Berenstain Bears as her first American friends. And where there is delight to be found, Qian relishes it: her first bite of gloriously greasy pizza, weekly "shopping days," when Qian finds small treasures in the trash lining Brooklyn’s streets, and a magical Christmas visit to Rockefeller Center � confirmation that the New York City she saw in movies does exist after all.

But then Qian’s headstrong Ma Ma collapses, revealing an illness that she has kept secret for months for fear of the cost and scrutiny of a doctor’s visit. As Ba Ba retreats further inward, Qian has little to hold onto beyond his constant refrain: Whatever happens, say that you were born here, that you’ve always lived here.

Inhabiting her childhood perspective with exquisite lyric clarity and unforgettable charm and strength, Qian Julie Wang has penned an essential American story about a family fracturing under the weight of invisibility, and a girl coming of age in the shadows, who never stops seeking the light.

The moving story of an undocumented child living in poverty in the richest country in the world � an incandescent debut from an astonishing new talent]]> 320 Qian Julie Wang 0385547218 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.16 2021
author: Qian Julie Wang
name: Dory
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/17
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 41952489
Everyone else is fodder, destined to fight and die in the endless war. Young, gift-less Tau knows all this, but he has a plan of escape. He's going to get himself injured, get out early, and settle down to marriage, children, and land. Only, he doesn't get the chance. Those closest to him are brutally murdered, and his grief swiftly turns to anger. Fixated on revenge, Tau dedicates himself to an unthinkable path. He'll become the greatest swordsman to ever live, a man willing to die a hundred thousand times for the chance to kill the three who betrayed him.]]> 535 Evan Winter 031648976X Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.29 2017
author: Evan Winter
name: Dory
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/14
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55948826 New York Times bestselling author and National Book Award finalist, Traci Chee, comes a Japanese-influenced fantasy brimming with demons, adventure, and plans gone awry.

In the realm of Awara, where gods, monsters, and humans exist side by side, Miuko is an ordinary girl resigned to a safe, if uneventful, existence as an innkeeper’s daughter. But when Miuko is cursed and begins to transform into a demon with a deadly touch, she embarks on a quest to reverse the curse and return to her normal life. Aided by a thieving magpie spirit and continuously thwarted by a demon prince, Miuko must outfox tricksters, escape demon hunters, and negotiate with feral gods if she wants to make it home again. But with her transformation comes power and freedom she never even dreamed of, and she’ll have to decide if saving her soul is worth trying to cram herself back into an ordinary life that no longer fits her� and perhaps never did.]]> 400 Traci Chee Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.78 2022
author: Traci Chee
name: Dory
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/10
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56554281 Clashing empires, forbidden romance, and a long-forgotten queen destined to save her people—Tahereh Mafi’s first in an epic, romantic trilogy inspired by Persian mythology.

To all the world, Alizeh is a disposable servant, not the long-lost heir to an ancient Jinn kingdom forced to hide in plain sight.

The crown prince, Kamran, has heard the prophecies foretelling the death of his king. But he could never have imagined that the servant girl with the strange eyes, the girl he can’t put out of his mind, would one day soon uproot his kingdom—and the world.

Perfect for fans of Leigh Bardugo, Tomi Adeyemi, and Sabaa Tahir, this is the explosive first book in a new fantasy trilogy from the New York Times bestselling and National Book Award-nominated author Tahereh Mafi.]]> 512 Tahereh Mafi 0062972464 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.95 2022
author: Tahereh Mafi
name: Dory
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2022/01/10
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55977886
Flare is power.

With only a drop of flare, one can light the night sky with fireworks . . . or burn a building to the ground -- and seventeen-year-old Ingrid Ellis wants her fair share.

Ingrid doesn't have a family fortune, monetary or magical, but at least she has a plan: Rise to the top on the arm of Linden Holt, heir to a hefty political legacy and the largest fortune of flare in all of Candesce. Her only obstacle is Linden's father who refuses to acknowledge her.

So when Senator Holt announces his run for president, Ingrid uses the situation to her advantage. She strikes a deal to spy on the senator’s opposition in exchange for his approval and the status she so desperately craves. But the longer Ingrid wears two masks, the more she questions where her true allegiances lie.

Will she stand with the Holts, or will she forge her own path?]]> 368 Rosiee Thor 1338679112 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.59 2022
author: Rosiee Thor
name: Dory
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57698597
Lenore Bennett has always been a force. A star artist and style icon at her high school, she’s a master in the subtle art of not giving a . . . well, you know what. But now that graduation is here, she’s a little less sure.

She’s heading to NYU in the fall with a scarlet U (for “undeclared�) written across her chest. Her parents always remind her that Black kids don’t have the luxury of figuring it out as they go—they have to be 110 percent prepared. But it’s a lot of pressure to be her ancestors� wildest dreams when Lenore’s not even sure what her dreams are yet.

When her family embarks on a post-graduation Mediterranean cruise, her friend Tessa is sure Lenore’s in for a whirlwind romance. But Lenore knows that doesn’t happen to girls like her.

Then she meets Alex Lee. After their parents bond over the Cupid Shuffle, she ends up stuck with him for the remainder of the cruise. He’s a hopeless romantic and a golden boy with a ten-year plan. In short, he’s irritating as hell.

But as they get to know each other during the picturesque stops across Europe, Alex may be able to help Lenore find something else she’s been looking for, even if she doesn’t want to admit it to love.]]> 320 Elise Bryant 0062982869 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.86 2022
author: Elise Bryant
name: Dory
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55297669 The first openly nonbinary contestant on America’s favorite cooking show falls for their clumsy competitor in this delicious romantic comedy debut that USA Today hailed as “an essential read.â€� Recently divorced and on the verge of bankruptcy, Dahlia Woodson is ready to reinvent herself on the popular reality competition show Chef’s Special. Too bad the first memorable move she makes is falling flat on her face, sending fish tacos flying—not quite the fresh start she was hoping for. Still, she's focused on winning, until she meets someone she might want a future with more than she needs the prize money.Ěý After announcing their pronouns on national television, London Parker has enough on their mind without worrying about the klutzy competitor stationed in front of them. They’re there to prove the trolls—including a fellow contestant and their dad—wrong, and falling in love was never part of the plan. As London and Dahlia get closer, reality starts to fall away. Goodbye, guilt about divorce, anxiety about uncertain futures, and stress from transphobia. Hello, hilarious shenanigans on set, wedding crashing, and spontaneous dips into the Pacific. But as the finale draws near, Dahlia and London’s steamy relationship starts to feel the heat both in and outside the kitchen—and they must figure out if they have the right ingredients for a happily ever after. Ěý Booklist'sĚýBestĚýRomance Debuts of the YearWomen's Health's Best Romance Novels of the YearBookpage's Best Romance Novels of the Year]]> 384 Anita Kelly 1538754851 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.81 2022
author: Anita Kelly
name: Dory
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57899793 Lahore, Pakistan. Then.
Misbah is a dreamer and storyteller, newly married to Toufiq in an arranged match. After their young life is shaken by tragedy, they come to the United States and open the Cloud’s Rest Inn Motel, hoping for a new start.

Juniper, California. Now.
Salahudin and Noor are more than best friends; they are family. Growing up as outcasts in the small desert town of Juniper, California, they understand each other the way no one else does. Until The Fight, which destroys their bond with the swift fury of a star exploding.

Now, Sal scrambles to run the family motel as his mother Misbah’s health fails and his grieving father loses himself to alcoholism. Noor, meanwhile, walks a harrowing tightrope: working at her wrathful uncle’s liquor store while hiding the fact that she’s applying to college so she can escape him—and Juniper—forever.

When Sal’s attempts to save the motel spiral out of control, he and Noor must ask themselves what friendship is worth—and what it takes to defeat the monsters in their pasts and the ones in their midst.

From one of today’s most cherished and bestselling young adult authors comes a breathtaking novel of young love, old regrets, and forgiveness—one that’s both tragic and poignant in its tender ferocity.]]> 376 Sabaa Tahir 0593202341 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.48 2022
author: Sabaa Tahir
name: Dory
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58064046 Everything casts a shadow. Even the world we live in. And as with every shadow, there is a place where it must touch. A seam, where the shadow meets its source.

Olivia Prior has grown up in Merilance School for girls, and all she has of her past is her mother’s journal—which seems to unravel into madness. Then, a letter invites Olivia to come home—to Gallant. Yet when Olivia arrives, no one is expecting her. But Olivia is not about to leave the first place that feels like home, it doesn’t matter if her cousin Matthew is hostile or if she sees half-formed ghouls haunting the hallways.

Olivia knows that Gallant is hiding secrets, and she is determined to uncover them. When she crosses a ruined wall at just the right moment, Olivia finds herself in a place that is Gallant—but not. The manor is crumbling, the ghouls are solid, and a mysterious figure rules over all. Now Olivia sees what has unraveled generations of her family, and where her father may have come from.

Olivia has always wanted to belong somewhere, but will she take her place as a Prior, protecting our world against the Master of the House? Or will she take her place beside him?]]> 338 Victoria E. Schwab 0062835777 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.70 2022
author: Victoria E. Schwab
name: Dory
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57021127 Ocean’s Eleven meets The Farewell in Portrait of a Thief, a lush, lyrical heist novel inspired by the true story of Chinese art vanishing from Western museums; about diaspora, the colonization of art, and the complexity of the Chinese American identity.

History is told by the conquerors. Across the Western world, museums display the spoils of war, of conquest, of colonialism: priceless pieces of art looted from other countries, kept even now.

Will Chen plans to steal them back.

A senior at Harvard, Will fits comfortably in his carefully curated roles: a perfect student, an art history major and sometimes artist, the eldest son who has always been his parents� American Dream. But when a mysterious Chinese benefactor reaches out with an impossible—and illegal—job offer, Will finds himself something else as well: the leader of a heist to steal back five priceless Chinese sculptures, looted from Beijing centuries ago.

His crew is every heist archetype one can imag­ine—or at least, the closest he can get. A con artist: Irene Chen, a public policy major at Duke who can talk her way out of anything. A thief: Daniel Liang, a premed student with steady hands just as capable of lockpicking as suturing. A getaway driver: Lily Wu, an engineering major who races cars in her free time. A hacker: Alex Huang, an MIT dropout turned Silicon Valley software engineer. Each member of his crew has their own complicated relationship with China and the identity they’ve cultivated as Chinese Americans, but when Will asks, none of them can turn him down.

Because if they succeed? They earn fifty million dollars—and a chance to make history. But if they fail, it will mean not just the loss of everything they’ve dreamed for themselves but yet another thwarted at­tempt to take back what colonialism has stolen.

Equal parts beautiful, thoughtful, and thrilling, Portrait of a Thief is a cultural heist and an examination of Chinese American identity, as well as a necessary cri­tique of the lingering effects of colonialism.]]> 375 Grace D. Li 0593184734 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.43 2022
author: Grace D. Li
name: Dory
average rating: 3.43
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 58210933 An unparalleled novel about money, power, intimacy, and perception

Even through the roar and effervescence of the 1920s, everyone in New York has heard of Benjamin and Helen Rask. He is a legendary Wall Street tycoon; she is the daughter of eccentric aristocrats. Together, they have risen to the very top of a world of seemingly boundless wealth—all as a decade of excess and speculation draws to an end. But at what cost have they acquired their immense fortune? This is the mystery at the center of Bonds, a successful 1937 novel that all of New York seems to have read. Yet there are other versions of this tale of privilege and deceit.

Hernan Diaz's TRUST elegantly puts these competing narratives into conversation with one another—and in tension with the perspective of one woman bent on disentangling fact from fiction. The result is a novel that spans over a century and becomes more exhilarating with each new revelation.

At once an immersive story and a brilliant literary puzzle, TRUST engages the reader in a quest for the truth while confronting the deceptions that often live at the heart of personal relationships, the reality-warping force of capital, and the ease with which power can manipulate facts.]]> 402 Hernan Diaz 0593420314 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.77 2022
author: Hernan Diaz
name: Dory
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55650158 Inspired by true events that rocked the nation, a profoundly moving novel about a Black nurse in post-segregation Alabama who blows the whistle on a terrible wrong done to her patients, from the New York Times bestselling author of Wench.

Montgomery, Alabama 1973. Fresh out of nursing school, Civil Townsend has big plans to make a difference, especially in her African American community. At the Montgomery Family Planning Clinic, she intends to help women make their own choices for their lives and bodies.

But when her first week on the job takes her down a dusty country road to a worn down one-room cabin, she’s shocked to learn that her new patients are children—just 11 and 13 years old. Neither of the Williams sisters has even kissed a boy, but they are poor and Black and for those handling the family’s welfare benefits that’s reason enough to have the girls on birth control. As Civil grapples with her role, she takes India, Erica and their family into her heart. Until one day, she arrives at the door to learn the unthinkable has happened and nothing will ever be the same for any of them.

Decades later, with her daughter grown and a long career in her wake, Dr. Civil Townsend is ready to retire, to find her peace and to leave the past behind. But there are people and stories that refuse to be forgotten.That must not be forgotten.

Because history repeats what we don’t remember.]]> 359 Dolen Perkins-Valdez 0593337697 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.36 2022
author: Dolen Perkins-Valdez
name: Dory
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57797679 An incisive and exhilarating debut novel of female friendship following three Anglo-Nigerian best friends and the lethally glamorous fourth woman who infiltrates their group—the most unforgettable girls since Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte, and Miranda.

Ronke wants happily ever after and 2.2. kids. She’s dating Kayode and wants him to be “the one� (perfect, like her dead father). Her friends think he’s just another in a long line of dodgy Nigerian boyfriends.

Boo has everything Ronke wants—a kind husband, gorgeous child. But she’s frustrated, unfulfilled, plagued by guilt, and desperate to remember who she used to be.

Simi is the golden one with the perfect lifestyle. No one knows she’s crippled by impostor syndrome and tempted to pack it all in each time her boss mentions her “urban vibe.� Her husband thinks they’re trying for a baby. She’s not.

When the high-flying, charismatic Isobel explodes into the group, it seems at first she’s bringing out the best in each woman. (She gets Simi an interview in Hong Kong! Goes jogging with Boo!) But the more Isobel intervenes, the more chaos she sows, and Ronke, Simi, and Boo’s close friendship begins to crack.

A sharp, modern take on friendship, ambition, culture, and betrayal, Wahala (trouble) is an unforgettable novel from a brilliant new voice.]]> 384 Nikki May 0063084244 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.59 2022
author: Nikki May
name: Dory
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55196813
Since Gran died a few months ago, twenty-five-year-old Molly has been navigating life's complexities all by herself. No matter—she throws herself with gusto into her work as a hotel maid. Her unique character, along with her obsessive love of cleaning and proper etiquette, make her an ideal fit for the job. She delights in donning her crisp uniform each morning, stocking her cart with miniature soaps and bottles, and returning guest rooms at the Regency Grand Hotel to a state of perfection.

But Molly's orderly life is upended the day she enters the suite of the infamous and wealthy Charles Black, only to find it in a state of disarray and Mr. Black himself dead in his bed. Before she knows what's happening, Molly's unusual demeanor has the police targeting her as their lead suspect. She quickly finds herself caught in a web of deception, one she has no idea how to untangle. Fortunately for Molly, friends she never knew she had unite with her in a search for clues to what really happened to Mr. Black—but will they be able to find the real killer before it's too late?

A Clue-like, locked-room mystery and a heartwarming journey of the spirit, The Maid explores what it means to be the same as everyone else and yet entirely different—and reveals that all mysteries can be solved through connection to the human heart.]]> 304 Nita Prose 0593356152 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.71 2022
author: Nita Prose
name: Dory
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/12/30
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 54732983
What does it mean to be other? What does it mean to love in a world determined to keep us apart?

These questions murmur in the heart of each of Brenda Peynado’s strange and singular stories. Threaded with magic, transcending time and place, these stories explore what it means to cross borders and break down walls, personally and politically. In one story, suburban families perform oblations to cattlelike angels who live on their roofs, believing that their “thoughts and prayers� will protect them from the world’s violence. In another, inhabitants of an unnamed dictatorship slowly lose their own agency as pieces of their bodies go missing and, with them, the essential rights that those appendages serve. “The Great Escape� tells of an old woman who hides away in her apartment, reliving the past among beautiful objects she’s hoarded, refusing all visitors, until she disappears completely. In the title story, children begin to levitate, flying away from their parents and their home country, leading them to eat rocks in order to stay grounded.

With elements of science fiction and fantasy, fabulism and magical realism, Brenda Peynado uses her stories to reflect our flawed world, and the incredible, terrifying, and marvelous nature of humanity.]]> 276 Brenda Peynado 0143135627 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.97 2021
author: Brenda Peynado
name: Dory
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57282218
Persephone, young goddess of spring, is new to Olympus. Her mother, Demeter, has raised her in the mortal realm, but after Persephone promises to train as a sacred virgin, she’s allowed to live in the fast-moving, glamorous world of the gods. When her roommate, Artemis, takes her to a party, her entire life changes: she ends up meeting Hades and feels an immediate spark with the charming yet misunderstood ruler of the Underworld. Now Persephone must navigate the confusing politics and relationships that rule Olympus, while also figuring out her own place—and her own power.

This edition of Smythe’s original Eisner-winning webcomic Lore Olympus features a brand-new, exclusive short story, and brings the Greek Pantheon into the modern age in a sharply perceptive and romantic graphic novel.

This volume collects episodes 1-25 of the #1 WEBTOON comic, Lore Olympus.]]> 384 Rachel Smythe 0593160290 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.23 2021
author: Rachel Smythe
name: Dory
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 49151032
As the family journeys from Pakistan to Indonesia to Nauru, heading toward a hope of home, they must rely on fragile and temporary shelters, strangers both mercenary and kind, and friends who vanish as quickly as they’re found.

When they arrive in Australia, what seemed like a stable shore gives way to treacherous currents. Neighbors, classmates, and the government seek their own ends, indifferent to the family’s fate. For Firuzeh, her fantasy worlds provide some relief, but as her family and home splinter, she must surface from these imaginings and find a new way.]]> 273 E. Lily Yu 1645660095 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.08 2021
author: E. Lily Yu
name: Dory
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56199766
Tough-minded, vulnerable, and brave, Jocelyn Nicole Johnson’s precisely imagined debut explores burdened inheritances and extraordinary pursuits of belonging. Set in the near future, the eponymous novella, “My Monticello,� tells of a diverse group of Charlottesville neighbors fleeing violent white supremacists. Led by Da’Naisha, a young Black descendant of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, they seek refuge in Jefferson’s historic plantation home in a desperate attempt to outlive the long-foretold racial and environmental unravelling within the nation.

In “Control Negro,� hailed by Roxane Gay as “one hell of story,� a university professor devotes himself to the study of racism and the development of ACMs (average American Caucasian males) by clinically observing his own son from birth in order to “painstakingly mark the route of this Black child too, one whom I could prove was so strikingly decent and true that America could not find fault in him unless we as a nation had projected it there.� Johnson’s characters all seek out home as a place and an internal state, whether in the form of a Nigerian widower who immigrates to a meager existence in the city of Alexandria, finding himself adrift; a young mixed-race woman who adopts a new tongue and name to escape the landscapes of rural Virginia and her family; or a single mother who seeks salvation through “Buying a House Ahead of the Apocalypse.�

United by these characters� relentless struggles against reality and fate, My Monticello is a formidable book that bears witness to this country’s legacies and announces the arrival of a wildly original new voice in American fiction.]]> Jocelyn Nicole Johnson Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.17 2021
author: Jocelyn Nicole Johnson
name: Dory
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55871780 Ěý
Through an indelible array of lives, Yoon Choi explores where first and second generations either clash or find common ground, where meaning falls in the cracks between languages, where relationships bend under the weight of tenderness and disappointment, where displacement turns to heartbreak.
Ěý
Skinship is suffused with a profound understanding of humanity and offers a searing look at who the people we love truly are.]]> 304 Yoon Choi 0593318218 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.16 2021
author: Yoon Choi
name: Dory
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56953631
Refugee High is a chronicle of the 2017-8 school year at Sullivan High, a time when anti-immigrant rhetoric was at its height in the White House. Even as we follow teachers and administrators grappling with the everyday challenges facing many urban schools, we witness the complicated circumstances and unique education needs of refugee and immigrant children.]]> 288 Elly Fishman 1620975084 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.16 2021
author: Elly Fishman
name: Dory
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 53317416
A wrenching debut about the causes and effects of poverty, as seen by a father and son living in a pickup

Evicted from their trailer on New Year’s Eve, Henry and his son, Junior, have been reduced to living out of a pickup truck. Six months later, things are even more desperate. Henry, barely a year out of prison for pushing opioids, is down to his last pocketful of dollars, and little remains between him and the street. But hope is on the Today is Junior’s birthday, and Henry has a job interview tomorrow.

To celebrate, Henry treats Junior to dinner at McDonald’s, followed by a night in a real bed at a discount motel. For a moment, as Junior watches TV and Henry practices for his interview in the bathtub, all seems well. But after Henry has a disastrous altercation in the parking lot and Junior succumbs to a fever, father and son are sent into the night, struggling to hold things together and make it through tomorrow.

In an ingenious structural approach, Jakob Guanzon organizes Abundance by the amount of cash in Henry’s pocket. A new chapter starts with each debit and credit, and the novel expands and contracts, revealing the extent to which the quality of our attention is altered by the abundance―or lack thereof―that surrounds us. Set in an America of big-box stores and fast food, this incandescent debut novel trawls the fluorescent aisles of Walmart and the booths of Red Lobster to reveal the inequities and anxieties around work, debt, addiction, incarceration, and health care in America today.]]> 278 Jakob Guanzon 1644450461 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.83 2021
author: Jakob Guanzon
name: Dory
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55725741 A princess in exile, the boy she left at the altar, six enchanted cranes, and a dragon from the deepest sea.

Shiori, the only princess of Kiata, has a secret. Forbidden magic runs through her veins. Normally she conceals it well, but on the morning of her betrothal ceremony, Shiori loses control. At first, her mistake seems like a stroke of luck, forestalling the wedding she never wanted, but it also catches the attention of Raikama, her stepmother.

Raikama has dark magic of her own, and she banishes the young princess, turning her brothers into cranes, and warning Shiori that she must speak of it to no one: for with every word that escapes her lips, one of her brothers will die.

Peniless, voiceless, and alone, Shiori searches for her brothers, and, on her journey, uncovers a conspiracy to overtake the throne--a conspiracy more twisted and deceitful, more cunning and complex, than even Raikama's betrayal. Only Shiori can set the kingdom to rights, but to do so she must place her trust in the very boy she fought so hard not to marry. And she must embrace the magic she's been taught all her life to contain--no matter what it costs her.

From the author of Spin the Dawn comes a breathtakingly original fantasy inspired by East Asian folklore and perfect for fans of Leigh Bardugo or Tomi Adeyemi.]]> 456 Elizabeth Lim 0593300912 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.20 2021
author: Elizabeth Lim
name: Dory
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56221776 "What if I played football?" I ask. As soon as it's out of my mouth, I feel stupid. Even suggesting it feels like I've overstepped some kind of invisible line we've all agreed not to discuss. We don't talk about how Mara is different from other girls. We don't talk about how Mara is gay but no one says so. But when I do stuff like this, I worry it gets harder for us all to ignore what's right in front of us. I direct my gaze to Quinn. "What do you think?"
"I think it's frickin' genius," he says.


After getting kicked off the basketball team for a fight that was absolutely totally not her fault (okay maybe a little her fault), Mara is dying to find a new sport to play to prove to her coach that she can be a team player. A lifelong football fan, Mara decides to hit the gridiron with her brother, Noah, and best friend, Quinn-and she turns out to be a natural. But joining the team sets off a chain of events in her small Oregon town-and within her family-that she never could have predicted.

Inspired by what they see as Mara's political statement, four other girls join the team. Now Mara's lumped in as one of the girls-one of the girls who can't throw, can't kick, and doesn't know a fullback from a linebacker. Complicating matters is the fact that Valentina, Mara's crush, is one of the new players, as is Carly, Mara's nemesis-the girl Mara fought with when she was kicked off the basketball team. What results is a coming-of-age story that is at once tear-jerking and funny, thought-provoking and real, as Mara's preconceived notions about gender, sports, sexuality, and friendship are turned upside down.


Britta Lundin's sophomore novel will give readers all the feels, and make them stand up and cheer.]]> 384 Britta Lundin 1368039928 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.16 2021
author: Britta Lundin
name: Dory
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 48691825 A way to serve.
A way to save.

Simi prayed to the gods, once. Now she serves them as Mami Wata—a mermaid—collecting the souls of those who die at sea and blessing their journeys back home.

But when a living boy is thrown overboard, Simi goes against an ancient decree and does the unthinkable—she saves his life. And punishment awaits those who dare to defy the gods.

To protect the other Mami Wata, Simi must journey to the Supreme Creator to make amends. But all is not as it seems. There’s the boy she rescued, who knows more than he should. And something is shadowing Simi, something that would rather see her fail. . . .

Danger lurks at every turn, and as Simi draws closer, she must brave vengeful gods, treacherous lands, and legendary creatures. Because if she fails, she risks not only the fate of all Mami Wata, but also the world as she knows it.]]> 336 Natasha Bowen 0593120965 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.81 2021
author: Natasha Bowen
name: Dory
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/25
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 53348764 A reimagining of Little Women set in the spring of 1942, when the United States is suddenly embroiled in the second World War, this story, told from each March sister's point of view, is one of grief, love, and self-discovery.

In the spring of 1942, the United States is reeling from the attack on Pearl Harbor. While the US starts sending troops to the front, the March family of Concord, Massachusetts grieves their own enormous loss: the death of their daughter, Beth.

Under the strain of their grief, Beth's remaining sisters fracture, each going their own way with Jo nursing her wounds and building planes in Boston, Meg holding down the home front with Marmee, and Amy living a secret life as a Red Cross volunteer in London--the same city where one Mr. Theodore Laurence is stationed as an army pilot.

Each March sister's point of view is written by a separate author, three in prose and Beth's in verse, still holding the family together from beyond the grave. Woven together, these threads tell a story of finding one's way in a world undergoing catastrophic change.]]> 400 Joy McCullough 059337259X Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.77 2022
author: Joy McCullough
name: Dory
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/19
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 57739876 From the author of the classic A Little Life, a bold, brilliant novel spanning three centuries and three different versions of the American experiment, about lovers, family, loss and the elusive promise of utopia.

In an alternate version of 1893 America, New York is part of the Free States, where people may live and love whomever they please (or so it seems). The fragile young scion of a distinguished family resists betrothal to a worthy suitor, drawn to a charming music teacher of no means. In a 1993 Manhattan besieged by the AIDS epidemic, a young Hawaiian man lives with his much older, wealthier partner, hiding his troubled childhood and the fate of his father. And in 2093, in a world riven by plagues and governed by totalitarian rule, a powerful scientist’s damaged granddaughter tries to navigate life without him—and solve the mystery of her husband’s disappearances.

These three sections are joined in an enthralling and ingenious symphony, as recurring notes and themes deepen and enrich one another: A townhouse in Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village; illness, and treatments that come at a terrible cost; wealth and squalor; the weak and the strong; race; the definition of family, and of nationhood; the dangerous righteousness of the powerful, and of revolutionaries; the longing to find a place in an earthly paradise, and the gradual realization that it can’t exist. What unites not just the characters, but these Americas, are their reckonings with the qualities that make us human: Fear. Love. Shame. Need. Loneliness.

To Paradise is a fin de siècle novel of marvellous literary effect, but above all it is a work of emotional genius. The great power of this remarkable novel is driven by Yanagihara’s understanding of the aching desire to protect those we love � partners, lovers, children, friends, family and even our fellow citizens � and the pain that ensues when we cannot.]]> 720 Hanya Yanagihara 0385547935 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.74 2022
author: Hanya Yanagihara
name: Dory
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/19
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55818283 How much would you risk to save the ones you love? Would you tempt even the most dangerous fate?

Briseis has one chance to save her mother, but she'll need to do the impossible: find the last fragment of the deadly Absyrtus Heart. If she is to locate the missing piece, she must turn to the blood relatives she's never known, learn about their secret powers, and take her place in their ancient lineage. Briseis is not the only one who wants the Heart, and her enemies will stop at nothing to fulfill their own ruthless plans. The fates tell of a truly dangerous journey, one that could end in more heartache, more death. Bolstered by the sisterhood of ancient magic, can Briseis harness her power to save the people she loves most?]]> 320 Kalynn Bayron 1547610697 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.98 2022
author: Kalynn Bayron
name: Dory
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/09/14
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 42080508 The Perseverance is the remarkable debut book by British-Jamaican poet Raymond Antrobus. Ranging across history and continents, these poems operate in the spaces in between, their haunting lyrics creating new, hybrid territories.

The Perseverance is a book of loss, contested language and praise, where elegies for the poet’s father sit alongside meditations on the d/Deaf experience.]]> 91 Raymond Antrobus 1908058528 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.31 2018
author: Raymond Antrobus
name: Dory
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/09/08
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 55836535
Narrated with deep intimacy, Open Water is at once an achingly beautiful love story and a potent insight into race and masculinity that asks what it means to be a person in a world that sees you only as a Black body; to be vulnerable when you are only respected for strength; to find safety in love, only to lose it. With gorgeous, soulful intensity, and blistering emotional intelligence, Caleb Azumah Nelson gives a profoundly sensitive portrait of romantic love in all its feverish waves and comforting beauty.

This is one of the most essential debut novels of recent years, heralding the arrival of a stellar and prodigious young talent.]]> 164 Caleb Azumah Nelson 0802157947 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 4.04 2021
author: Caleb Azumah Nelson
name: Dory
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/09/08
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]> 56921877 Time's Best YA books of all time, gives Titanic an Ocean’s 8 makeover in a heist for a treasure aboard the infamous ship that sank in the Atlantic many years ago.

A thief. An artist. A acrobat. An actress. While Josefa, Emilie, Hinnah, and Violet seemingly don’t have anything in common, they’re united in one goal: stealing the Rubaiyat, a jewel-encrusted book aboard the RMS Titanic that just might be the golden ticket to solving their problems.

But careless mistakes, old grudges, and new romance threaten to jeopardize everything they’ve worked for and put them in incredible danger when tragedy strikes. While the odds of pulling off the heist are slim, the odds of survival are even slimmer . . .

Perfect for fans of Stalking Jack the Ripper and Girl in the Blue Coat, this high-seas heist from the author of The Henna Wars is an immersive story that makes readers forget one important detail� the ship sinks.]]> 367 Adiba Jaigirdar 0062916378 Dory 0 to-read, to-read-in-2022 3.42 2022
author: Adiba Jaigirdar
name: Dory
average rating: 3.42
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/09/07
shelves: to-read, to-read-in-2022
review:

]]>